Sport Photography - what focus mode works for you ?

mikeyw

mikeyw

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Hi,

I assisted a guy yesterday on a football match shoot to gain some experience. I used a Nikon D7200 + 70-300VR which worked pretty well in the main. However i lost a few good images do to the AF system going wrong. I was shooting AF-Continous and 3D Tracking to try and keep focus on the moving players.

Occasionally though it would for some daft reason jump and lock focus on the crowd as in this example

DSC_3039.jpg


What focus modes have you found work best for you to minimise mistakes like this ?

Thanks in advance,
Mike.
 
TBH I've never found 3D Tracking to be useful on any Nikon camera, though some do claim it to be helpful ... I don't do a lot of sport but when I do I would use 9-point or single-point on the D7200 but of course it relies on you keeping the focus point/area where you want it to be.
3D in my experience can so easily choose any random point to focus on and that's what you have found here with the crowd in the background.
 
I need to look at my settings too - I'm finding my AF-C doesn't always lock on properly when tracking a single subject - I use 25-point dynamic-area AF
 
I never use 3D-tracking, it's too unpredictable. In your example, there are just too many things going on in the photo and it'll jump all over the place. It's okay for things like birds in-flight, where there is a subject against a simple sky.

For my football photography, I use, on Nikon D3S, 9-point dynamic AF in the centre and obviously AF-C. Aim at the logos on the players chest, for good contrast, and it works fine.

I sometimes use single point AF but 99% of the time I use 9-point dynamic (y)
 
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