7D high-speed shooting not working

It would be nice to have a firmware update to resolve the bug though, it's a bit annoying to be pressing the DOF button while shooting.
Why? You get pictures that are at least 10 stops underexposed - so why bother shooting 8 of those per second?
--
regards
Karl Günter Wünsch
 
Sorry, I'm not sure what you're getting at, I haven't posted any photos and you're saying they're underexposed garbage? How did you work that out?
Why? You get pictures that are at least 10 stops underexposed - so why bother shooting 8 of those per second?
--
regards
Karl Günter Wünsch
 
Sorry, I'm not sure what you're getting at, I haven't posted any photos and you're saying they're underexposed garbage? How did you work that out?
Because the slowdown due to the metering method is limited to situations where you wouldn't be able to achieve 8fps without grossly underexposing the shot anyways...

--
regards
Karl Günter Wünsch
 
My photos are exposed just fine. Sorry if this irks you.
Sorry, I'm not sure what you're getting at, I haven't posted any photos and you're saying they're underexposed garbage? How did you work that out?
Because the slowdown due to the metering method is limited to situations where you wouldn't be able to achieve 8fps without grossly underexposing the shot anyways...

--
regards
Karl Günter Wünsch
 
If not the phographer,not the grip for the extra battery,it could be the shutter
speed, i think DPRVIEW used 1/640 shutter speed to test the camera for 8 FPS
 
This issue came up in a thread a month or so ago.
http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/readflat.asp?forum=1019&thread=40153794
Let me quote myself from that thread:
Indeed this is happening in dim light. However the 1DMKIII is still shooting at 10fps in M or TV in the same lighting conditions and same shutter speed ie 1/2,500.

I'd imagine that in M mode the AF & metering would not affect the shutter speed and fps
Perfectly reasonable assumption but wrong for the 7D. This appears to be a bug (or a feature if you like :)) of this camera when in continuous high speed drive mode. Here's my typical base setup:
  • Back-button AF; i.e., AF-ON button set to AF and metering start and shutter button disconnected from AF system. So the shutter release should be unaffected by AF considereations (as long as I'm not also pressing the AF-ON button)
  • Manually set ISO. So metering associated with Auto ISO calculations shouldn't have any bearing on drive speed.
  • Shutter button half-press set to AE lock. So once half-pressed or fully pressed exposure metering and calculations also should not have any bearing on drive speed.
  • PQ set to full RAW with High Speed Noise Reduction and other such things all turned off. So (you'd think) light levels and ISO and consequently varoius kinds of in-camera processing shouldn't have any effect either.
So in High Speed drive mode if I AF and meter on a random target with the AF-ON button, lock exposure with a shutter half-press, then release the AF-ON button, and lastly fire the shutter: in P, Tv, and Av modes the drive will fire at 8 frames per second no matter what the light conditions are (provided of course that the shutter speed is high enough and the buffer doesn't fill); but in M mode the drive speed will vary with the lighting from a high of roughly 8 FPS with decent light to a low of a bit more than 4 FPS in the dark (literally). On the other hand, a similar slow down does not happen in Live View!
Agreed. This can slow AF response, making it more difficult to achieve focus.
This will also slow down the iFCL metering which is used to drive the metering display in the viewfinder.
I wasn't aware of this issue, but it's the only explanation that fits the facts, especially the difference in behavior between using the viewfinder and Live View. And as such, I think it can only be called a bug in the firmware. I can't think of a single good reason why this metering is required during a high speed burst. At the very least Canon should have included a Custom Function to disable it or to give priority to drive speed under these conditions.
Karl was a little less argumentative in that one. It was Christmas, after all. :)
 
It's been posted when the 7d first came out. Someone was complaining he couldn't shoot in the dark at 7 FPS. He was right I guess, but people wondered why he needed to do this :)

Anyhow, I guess there might be a legitimate need to shoot high speed in dim lighting, but I don't know why the 7d slows down. People tried everything, nothing seems to help. Mysterious. I doubt you are going to "fix" it.
 
No proper fix but there is a workaround in shooting in live view or pressing the DOF button.
It's been posted when the 7d first came out. Someone was complaining he couldn't shoot in the dark at 7 FPS. He was right I guess, but people wondered why he needed to do this :)

Anyhow, I guess there might be a legitimate need to shoot high speed in dim lighting, but I don't know why the 7d slows down. People tried everything, nothing seems to help. Mysterious. I doubt you are going to "fix" it.
 
tko wrote:

but I don't know why the 7d slows down. People tried everything, nothing seems to help. Mysterious.

It the tie in between autofocus module and metering that's taking it's time because the autofocus module is out of it's full working range in such dim lighting (it is well below the lighting level at which you get 1/100 @ ISO 6400 @ f/2.8 because at that low light level I still could achieve - almost, 1/100 is too long a shutter speed for that - full speed without resorting to any tricks). The camera always evaluates all focusing points to give the metering algorithm the necessary data of where the subject is located - even in M.

There is a trick if you desperately want to ruin the shutter: Use Av mode and depress the AE-Lock button, then no metering will be performed and the camera will be able to rip though the full shutter life in about 6 hours at night...
--
regards
Karl Günter Wünsch
 
Why do the Nikons need the grip? Dees the camera need the extra power or what is the technical reason?
It may be a technical reason, it may be purely a "we want to customer to pay us extra for it" reason..

--
regards
Karl Günter Wünsch
 
Weird, what's your problem with shooting at 8FPS? Still think I'm going to kill my camera?
There is a trick if you desperately want to ruin the shutter: Use Av mode and depress the AE-Lock button, then no metering will be performed and the camera will be able to rip though the full shutter life in about 6 hours at night...
--
regards
Karl Günter Wünsch
 
Weird, what's your problem with shooting at 8FPS? Still think I'm going to kill my camera?
It's a fact, the shutter is rated to last an average of 150.000 shots, every second at 8 fps will take you 8 closer to a costly repair and all for nothing as under circumstances that are as dark as to trigger this behavior you can not achieve sufficient shutter speed that would allow 8 fps anyways. So why do you want to ruin your shutter for nothing worthwhile?

There are two considerations: You need sufficient shutter speed to achieve 8fps on one hand and you need sufficient lighting to have the camera not slow down due to the AF/metering coupling - both limits are quite close to each other with the shutter speed limit, even at highest ISO being the more stringent one. Or formulated differently: If you can achieve sufficient shutter speed for a properly exposed photo you won't experience a slowdown due to the AF/metering coupling! Only if you grossly underexpose the shots you will end up with that problem.
--
regards
Karl Günter Wünsch
 
Yet again you're assuming my photos aren't worthwhile and are underexposed. They're not. I'm not ruining my shutter by shooting short 8FPS bursts.
Weird, what's your problem with shooting at 8FPS? Still think I'm going to kill my camera?
It's a fact, the shutter is rated to last an average of 150.000 shots, every second at 8 fps will take you 8 closer to a costly repair and all for nothing as under circumstances that are as dark as to trigger this behavior you can not achieve sufficient shutter speed that would allow 8 fps anyways. So why do you want to ruin your shutter for nothing worthwhile?

There are two considerations: You need sufficient shutter speed to achieve 8fps on one hand and you need sufficient lighting to have the camera not slow down due to the AF/metering coupling - both limits are quite close to each other with the shutter speed limit, even at highest ISO being the more stringent one. Or formulated differently: If you can achieve sufficient shutter speed for a properly exposed photo you won't experience a slowdown due to the AF/metering coupling! Only if you grossly underexpose the shots you will end up with that problem.
--
regards
Karl Günter Wünsch
 

Keyboard shortcuts

Back
Top