What are your Fast Action custom settings?

[hyakuhei]

Hi Guys,

I've had my new gear for a few days now. Yesterday I was along on a car journey with no working radio player so being the boring b****r I am I went through all my shooting and custom functions and set them up for the things I typically shoot.

I have a D300 which has banks of shooting settings and banks of custom settings.

My Shooting Banks:
A : Walk About
B : Low Fly
C : Studio (Cust WB)
D : Press

My Custom Banks:
A : General Hand Held
B : Fast Action
C : Studio

I've listed my settings for aviation below - they should apply to motorsport as well.

Shooting Bank B:
Active folder [101]
File naming [WWP]
Image quality [Fine]
Image size [L]
JPG compression [Optimal]
NEF recording [Lossless, 12bit]
White balance [AUTO]
Set picture control [SD]
Color space [sRGB]
Active D-Lighting [OFF] - Thanks Tomas
Long exp. NR [ON]
High ISO NR [OFF]
ISO sensitivity [L01]
ISO sensitivity auto control [ON, 1600, 1/60]
Liveview [Handheld, CL]
Multiple exposure [OFF]
Interval timer shooting [OFF]

Custom Setting Bank B:
I've set a few handling options like the function button for spot metering but for the most part my changes here are all about autofocus.
Autofocus:
a1 AF-C priority selection [Focus]
a2 AF-S priority selection [Focus]
a3 Dynamic AF area [21]
a4 Focus tracking with lock-on [OFF/Normal] (see below)
a5 AF activation [ON]
a6 AF point illumination [ON]
a7 Focus point wrap-around [ON]

There is a lot of discussion of whether a4 slows the camera down, a good overview of the issue can be found here what I've taken from that is that for Airshows, I'll have custom setting a4 set to [Off], When I'm doing low level aviation stuff its a bit more tricky, I'll most likely have it set to Normal on dark days when there isn't much contrast between aircraft and the ground. On brighter days I'll most likely have it set to off.

What are your settings, what would you do differently?

 

[Big_Ham]

I don't use custom settings.

I tend to just change the general settings for whatever I'm shooting at the time. I keep noise reduction "ON" on the 1D as it doesn't slow it down, but always have it turned off on the 450D because it makes it run dog slow.

I tend to shoot in RAW most of the time.

WB is set to auto all the time.

 

[Tyke Tiler]

What are your settings, what would you do differently?

Well, this is for figure skating and indoor sports primarily but works well for any high speed action

Manual Mode to get constant aperture and shutter speeds.
9 point AF (This has increased the hit rate significantly, I used to use 51 point)
Continuos focus
White Balance is dependent on location lightning. Daylight FL for most arena's with adjustments to magenta and blue, Nikon terms - B1, M1.
Metering mode is usually partial for general flood lighting, for spotlights and theatrical lightning I opt for spot metering.

NEF recording [Uncompressed, 14bit]
Color space [ADOBE]
Active D-Lighting [OFF] Increasing buffer performance.
Long exp. NR [OFF]
High ISO NR [OFF]
ISO sensitivity auto control [ON, H02, 1/800] (shutter speed & ISO threshold dependent on circumstances).

36 frames in high speed drive before buffer needs to clear to CF, then your at the mercy of the CF transfer speed.
Transcend are very good cards, much faster than Sandisk.

Custom function - Focus tracking with lock-on, this can come in serious handy if you have subjects at varying distances randomly entering your frame. It allows you to maintain focus tracking on your prime subject without having any AF deviation.

 

[hyakuhei]

Active D-Lighting [OFF] Increasing buffer performance.

Fantastic! I didn't realize D-lighting was limiting my buffer performance, its off now - much better - exactly why I started this thread. Thanks Tomas

 

[Tyke Tiler]

Fantastic! I didn't realize D-lighting was limiting my buffer performance, its off now - much better - exactly why I started this thread. Thanks Tomas

No probs mate, if you get chance try out a transcend 133x or 266x speed CF card too, I can imagine them helping you out a little if shooting fast moving aircraft in continuos drive

 

[hyakuhei]

I've got a couple of Extreme III 4G's and a Transcend 266

With my current settings I'm getting 17 RAW shots or 20 L-Fine Jpg shots in the buffer. This is a lot better than the 7 I was getting before!

 

[Tyke Tiler]

I've got a couple of Extreme III 4G's and a Transcend 266

With my current settings I'm getting 17 RAW shots or 20 L-Fine Jpg shots in the buffer. This is a lot better than the 7 I was getting before!

Good man