5D Mark II Auto Focus is awesome!
OK, I now have to say that the AF in the 5D Mark II is definitely a step up from the 5D. Given that hardware-wise they have the exact same AF, the difference must be the Digic IV processor.
This weekend we took the kids to a birthday party at a jumping house. I had been to this identical location several months earlier with my old 5D and I was keen to see what the true difference would be.
The first thing I did was crank it up to ISO 6400. As this was inside a large building and the lights were rather dim, the whole place was very dark. Even at ISO 6400 I could not have taken the shot with just ambient light. Therefore I added a 580EX II together with a Lumiquest diffuser, put the camera in AI servo, and let the camera rip once the kids started sliding.
With my old 5D, during a shoot like this I would wind up with maybe one or two decent shots. Not the case here. With each slide, I would take about three or four shots. Some of those I would delete, but I would get at least one or two good shots from each attempt.
With my old 5D, I would take as many shots as I could with the hope that at least one or two would come out great. The the Mark II, I actually stopped photographing at one point because I realized that I already had some good shots and I then started sliding myself.
I do not think that the AF is any faster than my old camera, but it does seem to have the knack to follow a subject much better. I do not think that I have improved my skills much here as it was only a few months ago I shot in the exact same location under the same conditions.
Also, the additional .9 fps did seem to matter here, as it probably enabled me to get one more shot per slide. ISO 6400 helped not just to get some of the ambient light, it also enabled the flash to keep up with the faster frame rate. I did not have any shots where the flash failed to recycle quick enough – though I did have the flash hooked up the my CP-E4 just in case. When I switched to ISO 3200, though, the flash had a harder time keeping up and I would have at least one black frame.
All in all I really like this camera so far. With my original 5D, I had planned to upgrade to a 1Ds Mark III someday. With the 5D Mark II, I do not feel the need to upgrade to a 1 series camera – though I’m sure Canon will release something someday that will change my mind.
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Tags: 5d, AF, autofocus, canon, children, photography, slide