5DII AF is amazingly good for pro tennis

even 10fps isn;t fast enough to get bat on ball or ball on racket or ball on head, depending upon the sport, so you need to one time it even with a mkiii or mkiv unless they really, really up teh fps.

José B said:

Have a few questions, how are you dealing with limited FPS, getting
some shots on the racquet and bursts etiquette? I was just thinking
about this the other night. Let's say I am shooting Rafa with my
5DMKII and 300/2.8 L IS. As you know capturing Rafa is a
photographer's dream----even his warmups are pretty intense so you
get great expressions from his backswings to the actual hit to
follow-through to the fist pump.

For ex. if I am facing his forehand side I will shoot in bursts
probably start it way before he actually hits it (so I can capture
the backswings) and then keep on pressing the shutter until the
follow-through and maybe even the fist pump afterwards. Now with this
strategy I doubt very much if I can get the ball or close to the
racquet so I would also alternate this strategy with just using one
shot and time the shot (much easier for groundies than volleys).

What about you---what are your workarounds the 3.9 fps limitation?

Looking forward to seeing more tennis pics.

Best regards,

José

richiedodson said:

I have found 300, 200 and 135mm have been the best focal lengths on
FF for tennis from the pit using 5DII. (300 2.8 IS with IS switched
off and 70-200 2.8 IS with IS switched off)
--
'high IQ'

Click to expand...

--
Feeling it from downtown with the well-endowed FiftyDee, the 2Marks
and hitting the quadrupLe-doubLe
Recent work:
http://www.pbase.com/jmb_56/mel_5dmkii
http://www.pbase.com/jmb_56/cris_5dmkii
http://www.pbase.com/jmb_56/alejandra_1dmkiii
http://www.pbase.com/jmb_56/ashley

Click to expand...

n/t

kruger said:

---------
Best
Shaun
http://shaunnycgraphics.com

Click to expand...

--

Feeling it from downtown with the well-endowed FiftyDee, the 2Marks and hitting the quadrupLe-doubLe
Recent work:
http://www.pbase.com/jmb_56/mel_5dmkii
http://www.pbase.com/jmb_56/cris_5dmkii
http://www.pbase.com/jmb_56/alejandra_1dmkiii
http://www.pbase.com/jmb_56/ashley

those are more what I prefer. The ball is on the racket and most shots are very close if not the high point of the action. The 5Dmk2 shots while good are nowhere near the action point, either a problem with shutter delay or timing I guess time will tell, some more practice I think....
--
Cal

Put a Canon to your head, You deserve it....

http://funshots.smugmug.com/

as opposed to fps. Sometimes even 10fps does not guarantee getting the ball on or close to the strings with one sequence. You still have to shoot a lot with it----playing the percentage game. Modesty aside, I used to play tennis really well (4.5 rating) that is more like advance intermediate to advanced so I know how to 'time the ball' to get that picture with the ball on or close to the strings for ground strokes. For volleys it's more a spray and pray with the 10fps. and lots of shots.

Don't get me wrong I still prefer as much fps as possible. However, I am looking forward to shooting with the 5DMKII for tennis as well. I think it has a better IQ than the 1DMKIII at high ISOs which should benefit me in shooting night tennis.

Cheers,

José

Cal Dawson said:

those are more what I prefer. The ball is on the racket and most
shots are very close if not the high point of the action. The 5Dmk2
shots while good are nowhere near the action point, either a problem
with shutter delay or timing I guess time will tell, some more
practice I think....
--
Cal

Put a Canon to your head, You deserve it....

http://funshots.smugmug.com/

Click to expand...

--

Feeling it from downtown with the well-endowed FiftyDee, the 2Marks and hitting the quadrupLe-doubLe
Recent work:
http://www.pbase.com/jmb_56/mel_5dmkii
http://www.pbase.com/jmb_56/cris_5dmkii
http://www.pbase.com/jmb_56/alejandra_1dmkiii
http://www.pbase.com/jmb_56/ashley

great captures - these guys are so good at setting up points that they rarely get caught out of position and shots like those with real action are hard to come by - side-to-side tennis can look really static and boring in photos even if they are super sharp.

The noise reduction software does make them look a little painterly but most clients couldn't care less so long as the capture is a good one - you could have even left course grain I'd think and they would still be great. We tend to scrutinize that kind of thing way too much in these forums compared to the real world...

I do all of Giant Bicycles' (biggest bike company in the world) graphic design and studio photography for Australia and NZ - often I get images of the Tour de France and other races from the pros in those countries with VERY course grain and they have a sort of sports style to them that shouldn't be altered too much in my opinion. Giant even specified this kind of effect for their global marketing material this year.

--
'high IQ'

I don't think it's a timing issue at all - I got plenty of these as you can tell with the consecutive file names. They make horrible pictures and I would consider any like this to be NON-keepers. I also like close action shots but it's just a matter of choosing the pic and cropping closer - there are hundreds of photos to choose from and you have 21MP to play with for cropping. My pics with room on the sides are probably from the 70-200mm since the 300mm is closer framing like in these pics...

As a graphic designer I tend to allow more room on the sides of photos to allow for any bleed in print (where the image has to go partly off the page and get cropped in the printing process) also it allows for more creative positioning of the image on the page rather than contrained by the photograph and it can allow for text etc. on parts of the photo.

These photos are directly from the camera (jpeg not the raw) with no post and no cropping - only reduced in size for web - normally I would delete them but only to show timing is not an issue...





--
'high IQ'

Your shots with the 5dmkII are excellent and the guys with the 1dmkIII are just upset that someone else can do very well in a sports oriented application because they want to own photographing the sports world, don't let them get to you. They subtely changed the subject from how well obviously your doing shooting tennis with the 5dmkII to reading about the focusing abilities of 1dmkIII (what does the heck does reading any article have to do with taking pictures anyway?)

hehe thanks VF.

Canon Professional Services were lending their 5DII out to other photogs so there were some pros taking an interest in it especially for the night games where I believe it would be superior to a 1DIII. Incidentally CPS were great help and really nice guys everytime I spoke to them - they charged my battery a couple of times since I can't get a spare anywhere and they had those great comfy Canon EOS camera straps and sun hats to give away - I'm not a CPS member but it was all cool (and I would be if I had two pro bodies)
--
'high IQ'

I have some shots that I really don't process even though the ball are on the strings because either the background is terrible and or I did not like the player's expression.

When you look at shots in Tennis magazine they published some without the ball---focusing on the player's expression.

--

Feeling it from downtown with the well-endowed FiftyDee, the 2Marks and hitting the quadrupLe-doubLe
Recent work:
http://www.pbase.com/jmb_56/mel_5dmkii
http://www.pbase.com/jmb_56/cris_5dmkii
http://www.pbase.com/jmb_56/alejandra_1dmkiii
http://www.pbase.com/jmb_56/ashley

in January. Spending too much time in dpreview forums is not good as I sometimes get carried away with the pixel peeping. I subscribe to Vogue, Elle and Vanity Fair and looking at January's cover in pixel peeping eyes I say that Anne H's shot was a bit noisy and the eyes are not critically sharp. Great thing 'the overall big picture' prevailed because it's a beautiful shot

Cheers,

José

richiedodson said:

great captures - these guys are so good at setting up points that
they rarely get caught out of position and shots like those with real
action are hard to come by - side-to-side tennis can look really
static and boring in photos even if they are super sharp.

The noise reduction software does make them look a little painterly
but most clients couldn't care less so long as the capture is a good
one - you could have even left course grain I'd think and they would
still be great. We tend to scrutinize that kind of thing way too much
in these forums compared to the real world...

I do all of Giant Bicycles' (biggest bike company in the world)
graphic design and studio photography for Australia and NZ - often I
get images of the Tour de France and other races from the pros in
those countries with VERY course grain and they have a sort of sports
style to them that shouldn't be altered too much in my opinion. Giant
even specified this kind of effect for their global marketing
material this year.

--
'high IQ'

Click to expand...

--

Feeling it from downtown with the well-endowed FiftyDee, the 2Marks and hitting the quadrupLe-doubLe
Recent work:
http://www.pbase.com/jmb_56/mel_5dmkii
http://www.pbase.com/jmb_56/cris_5dmkii
http://www.pbase.com/jmb_56/alejandra_1dmkiii
http://www.pbase.com/jmb_56/ashley

Richard... I know you're using all AF points, did you acquire focus with the center one first ?. Did you just shoot whenever the player is in the 9 AF points area ?. Did you follow through after each shots you've made ?.

TIA,

John

ISO6400 allowed me to keep shutter up around 2000 and aperture at anything up to about f6.3 - something the pro bodies wouldn't be able to do in such dark night matches.

No noise reduction in camera or in post! only a little bit of smart sharpen and some re-gain of highlight areas, then reduced for web.

Full size 21MP is a bit grainy but for most print sizes you'd hardly care - it doesn't distract from the content so much.













--
'high IQ'

--
'high IQ'

These aren't necessarily the best emotion in images but they're a good indication that 5DII can do the job well for tennis - at night. I might find better emotion amongst the others who knows...

















--
'high IQ'

Sorry John - didn't see this until now.

Centre focus point works fine - I would have the assist points on also - but I don't have to have the player centred with all points active as the camera just picks up whatever is in the foreground whatever AF point that happens to be - so having all points on allows for the player to be off centre - it still tracks well.

I have my lenses switched to focus at the longest distance (ie: 6.5m to infinity on the 300mm) so if a ball boy ot other photographers lens got in the way during panning it wouldn't throw off the focus - I believe the camera concentrates on the centre point first and then switches to the outer points if the subject moves off centre during panning.

I noticed at one point that the camera had accidentally switched to AI-Focus instead of AI-servo (probably on the way to the court from onother court) - I only noticed because in the viewfinder everytime I focused on the player the active AF points would light up which they don't in AI-servo but it still managed to track a running player fine for the few rallies until I worked out what was going on - I didn't think AI-focus would quite work that well and that it would more likely be for slight movements during portraits or whatever - so I was surprised.
--
'high IQ'

I just follow the whole rally until the end and snap at the appropriate times I think there could be a good photo - blackout was not a problem and was barely noticeable.
--
'high IQ'

I didn't know it was 4.1 with the Extreme III 8GB... I purchased that exact card for day 2 of the tennis.

On the full frame issue - there were two guys using medium format cameras that I saw - I don't know much about MF but I assume they would be even slower than 5DII?
--
'high IQ'

Thanks for sharing. As an aside, where were you sitting - public seats or press area? If press, how/where did you get a pass? If public, what are the restrictions on photography?

I was in public seats at the BlackRock Masters tournament in December, and while not magazine quality, I did get some shots I was happy with. However, the second day I was told I couldn't use my camera during the match as it was clearly professional, even if I wasn't (at the time of the telling off I was using my 30D with 17-40mm).
--

Thanks Richard for your reply. I was messing around with AI Servo yesterday with 300mm f/4 IS, I used all the AF points, tried to shoot some crows . I didn't get good results, it must be my fault. I know I had enough shutter speed at least 1/1000, enough aperture f/8, and I press shutter halfway all the time. Maybe I have turn off the IS or maybe I don't have enough shutter speed for the crows, I'll try again whenever I get my camera back from my brother.

John