Canon Newbie - advice for shooting soccer

vincentp wrote:

Hi All

Just received my Canon R5 and RF 70-200mm f/2.8 - switching from a Fuji XT3 & 50-140 f/2.8

I would recommend downloading an electronic copy of the manual so you can search it. The problem you will have is playing the game of figuring out what the search word should be.

Any advice for setting up the camera for shooting soccer?

Some big bad news, I think you are going to find the 70-200 far too short unless you can get up close and run up and down the sidelines. That focal length range is more for shooting basketball-size courts. You want something more like the 100-500mm (or longer). You will probably find yourself wanting more than 500mm, but with the R5 you have a lot of cropping ability to "zoom in post-processing" which I think would be better than say getting a 1.4x extender that will create more problems than is solves (limits the zoom range and may force you to be too close if the action is near you). Having a 5x zoom range is very helpful as the action will move on both directions on the field.

If the RF100-500 is not in your budget now, you might think about getting a (used to make much budget sense) EF100-400IS mk.2. In which case you might consider a 1.4x extender.

This is my first Canon and I'm finding it very foreign - I've had the fuji gear for a few years (nikon before that) and gotten quite comfortable with it, but had the itch to switch to full frame

What AF modes are people using with soccer? On the XT3 I used zone mode (the tracking mode is pretty hopeless), I can change the size of the zone , but haven't found a way to do that on the R5 yet.

I particularly like the setup of "back button focus" on the AF-ON and using the * button for eye (people) detect (many pros recommend this setup with the RF. This will let you switch back and forth at will. It also will let you clue in the eye/people tracking on where to start. Jan Wegener, who is a professional bird photographer (pretty much the same problem as tracking people), has a good video on how to set up the R5 (just change the "animal tracking" to "people.") https://youtu.be/-nnRqgXu7QI

I usually shoot in shutter priority or manual. I'm still figuring out customisation on the R5, a bit disappointed I can't customise the dial functions much at all (or am I missing something) - I was hoping to put exposure compensation on the main dial as the control ring on the lens is a bit awkward to use.

I would suggest shooting in Manual with the ISO in AUTO. This is a modern trick. This lets you control the motion blur of the players and the depth of focus. The R5 can go to fairly high ISOs without a problem. Just check to make sure you are not clamping at either end and letting the exposure go wild. You may want to limit the upper ISO range, but with software like DLO PL4 with DeepPrime I would not be afraid to go into double-digit ISOs.

You will likely want to keep your shutter speed at 1/1000th or faster.

I'm not sure what your problem is on setting the dials other than it is a bit buried on the Customize (Orange) menu tab 3 (once again the Jan Wegener video may help).

I have 3 batteries (battery grip on order), that should get me through a game (I would use 2 for a game on the XT3).

I have a game Sat and a one on Sun to shoot, only local amateur games so not worried if I mess up

Any advice appreciated, thx.