topic Re: EOS Rebel T7 Continuous shooting interval too slow in EOS DSLR & Mirrorless Cameras

EOS Rebel T7 Continuous shooting interval too slow

poohdabar — Wed, 06 Sep 2023 23:47:28 GMT

I am taking pictures of my son's football team. So i use continous for things like kick off's etc. But I keep missing the photo of them actually kicking the ball. It seems the time lapse between photos is too spread out. How do I fix that?

Re: Continuous mode

Danny — Wed, 06 Sep 2023 13:40:41 GMT

Thanks for joining the conversation, poohdabar!

So that the Community can help you better, we need to know exactly which Canon camera model you're using. That, and any other details you'd like to give will help the Community better understand your issue!

If this is a time-sensitive matter, click HERE search our knowledge base or find additional support options HERE.

Thanks and have a great day!

Re: Continuous mode

ebiggs1 — Wed, 06 Sep 2023 14:31:33 GMT

First thing to do is reset your camera to default. Now get the fastest CF or SD card your manual recommends. Before you shoot don't mess with any other setting except what is necessary for exposure. Don't add any of the enhancing or photo processing features. Choose jpg not Raw in this case. Perhaps the only case where jpg is preferred.

Now it is possible the lighting is poor enough that your SS is the determining factor in how fast the continuous speed is. All photographic gear has limits to what it can do. If this is the case you have hit one of those limits. You will need to reduce the exposure requirements some how. This could be a faster lens or kicking the ISO up or a better camera which has better high ISO specs.

It would help if you supplied more, I mean way more, info about gear and how you shoot and the conditions. Otherwise no one here can give you exacting recommendations beyond my generic ones.

Re: Continuous mode

wq9nsc — Wed, 06 Sep 2023 14:49:21 GMT

Even in high speed continuous mode, with fast moving sports there is going to be a lot of action between frames. Your options are either timing your captures or shooting in video mode and settling for the lower resolution video frames as still captures.

With high school football, the problem often becomes greater because poor field lighting may force lower than optimal shutter speed resulting in reduced capture rate in high speed mode. I use f2 and f2.8 glass for HS sports which allows me to maintain 1/1000 shutter speeds with reasonable ISO for 1DX series bodies even on poorly illuminated fields but using "slower" glass and/or a body less high ISO friendly can easily force a shutter speed slow enough that the camera cannot maintain its rated maximum capture rate.

I use 1DX III bodies for sports and they are set to 16 FPS in high speed capture but if I relied upon just shooting at high continuous rate, it would still be a low percentage of specific contact shots. Most of my captures at sports events are from quick shutter presses resulting in single frame captures at the right time. Once you gain experience with the sport and the specific shutter release lag of your camera body, timing becomes pretty easy.

But for kicking, the moment of contact with the ball often doesn't result in the best photo and typically more interesting is the "power pose" of the player with kicking leg back preparing to make contact or with the kicking leg follow through with the ball still in frame. My daughter was recruited from soccer to do kickoff, field goal, and point after for the football team during her sports shortened Covid junior year of high school. The first two photos were captures of foot to football contact using precise timing and I captured several of those during the season but I preferred images captured before and after contact which I think better present the power of the kicker.

Rodger

Re: Continuous shooting interval too slow

normadel — Wed, 06 Sep 2023 17:05:04 GMT

Since you don't say what camera you have, the work is up to you. Does it have two high-speed continuous modes?

Also, are you using too slow shutter speeds? High speed continuous doesn't work any faster than how many exposures can be fired in a second.

Re: Continuous shooting interval too slow

poohdabar — Wed, 06 Sep 2023 23:05:23 GMT

I just purchased a canon rebel7

Re: Continuous mode

poohdabar — Wed, 06 Sep 2023 23:45:16 GMT

Ad I Said is a rebel 7. As I shoot continuous it takes the photos but goes from foot back to completely off the screen. The lapse between pictures is extreme. I had ISO at 1600 to stop motion and using a 75 - 300 mm lense.

Re: Continuous mode

poohdabar — Wed, 06 Sep 2023 23:47:58 GMT

I was thinking it might be due to taking pictures in RAW instead of jpeg?

Re: Continuous mode

wq9nsc — Thu, 07 Sep 2023 01:01:44 GMT

The maximum frame rate will be the same for RAW or JPG but the buffer depth is larger for JPG. With a fast card shooting JPG, you can shoot at its 5 FPS rate pretty much continuously but with RAW the buffer will be filled in about 15 frames.

With sports, particularly when light is less than perfect, I would stick with RAW. There is really no need in football to shoot continuously past the roughly 3 seconds of buffered continuous with your camera. It has sufficient buffer depth in RAW for a burst of ball coming into the receiver's area through wrapping up or missing the pass.

For a long lasting play (i.e. kick or punt return) there is no reason to shoot the entire sequence in burst mode. Pick and choose your shots within those longer plays. I do that with my 1DX III bodies even though they have unlimited buffer depth at their maximum 16 FPS rate. Your goal is some good keepers and not hundreds of "garbage" shots. At 5 FPS, you definitely have to learn to time to capture peak action but with a little practice I think you will nail that process and the quality results are well worth putting in the effort to develop that skill.

But stay with RAW because you can do so much with noise reduction in RAW during post and with lower than pro or D1 level college sports, lighting for indoor and night events will always be a compromise.

Rodger

Re: EOS Rebel T7 Continuous shooting interval too slow

kvbarkley — Thu, 07 Sep 2023 01:19:43 GMT

Make sure to turn off any processing intensive steps like peripheral lighting correction, which is pretty much the only one in the base T7.

Re: EOS Rebel T7 Continuous shooting interval too slow

Tronhard — Thu, 07 Sep 2023 02:06:49 GMT

Hi and welcome to the forum:
It would be helpful to know your settings, such as shutter speed, ISO and aperture. Have you delved into the manual for assistance? If not I would recommend downloading the manual as a PDF from THIS LINK.

As my colleagues say, you need a fairly fast shutter speed to freeze sports action, and you also need to have the camera on Continuous Shooting mode. As regards focus, I would suggest having the camera set to AI Servo Mode, which allows the camera to assess if the subject is moving or not and look to track it. You might also want to explore customizing the buttons on the back rear to assist your with locking focus: refer P265 of that manual for that.

Re: EOS Rebel T7 Continuous shooting interval too slow

Waddizzle — Thu, 07 Sep 2023 16:59:26 GMT

@poohdabar wrote:
I am taking pictures of my son's football team. So i use continous for things like kick off's etc. But I keep missing the photo of them actually kicking the ball. It seems the time lapse between photos is too spread out. How do I fix that?

The shot you are trying to capture is not an easy one to grab. It does take some practice. A faster frame rate may help, but you would still be likely to miss the “money shot” of the kick-off.

Your lens does not refocus very quickly, so that can contribute to slowing down the frame rate. I suggest pre-focusing on the ball on the tee. Turn [off] AF on the lens. Try not start the shot sequence too soon. With some practice and some luck, you may capture that elusive shot.

One further note, as eluded to by others your camera settings can make or break your success at capturing the kick-off. The Basic Automatic Sports mode is more likely to be a let down than a success.

I refer to the kick-off as a “money shot” because it is so elusive. Capturing a baseball player hitting a ball is just as elusive. Capturing a tennis racket hitting a ball is just as tough. Even capturing a quarterback or pitcher throwing a ball is tough.

It takes practice and some basic luck to get it right.

Re: EOS Rebel T7 Continuous shooting interval too slow

Tintype_18 — Thu, 07 Sep 2023 12:34:28 GMT

I have a Canon T7 and have taken multiple shots of baseball games. The first time I used it, I was pleasantly surprised to see the ball come off the bat or released from the pitcher's hand. I also have photos of my granddaughter running cross country; both feet are off the ground! I would have to search the photos to get the exact settings but I do set the camera to take the maximum of 10 shots in 10 seconds.

Re: EOS Rebel T7 Continuous shooting interval too slow

ebiggs1 — Thu, 07 Sep 2023 14:44:52 GMT

I very rarely disagree with Rodger because his work tells enough about his ability but in your case I would still prefer jpg. The actual frame rate may be the same but the buffer fill up is significant. Your Rebel could lock up after 4 or even 3 shots in raw. Paper specs are not physical real world performance. It will not shoot again until the buffer clears. Also how fast your kit lens can AF will determine the frame rate. If it can't focus the camera will not fire.

So bottom line is you are going to reset the Rebel T7 to defaults which will turn off most extra features. Set large jpg. Suitably high enough ISO for conditions. One shot not Ai-servo, center focus point. Personally I like Av mode for this so set your lens to its widest aperture and let the T7 handle the SS. Whoever made the suggestion of using manual focus and fix focus on the football is also good. Doing these settings will almost assuredly get you the highest frame rate even if you decide to use raw.

As to hundreds of garbage pictures, I was at a recent KC Royals game in the photographers pit. I was talking with one of the guys around the third inning. They had already taken several thousand shots.

Re: EOS Rebel T7 Continuous shooting interval too slow

Walt_Felix — Thu, 07 Sep 2023 17:52:48 GMT

If I'm reading the specs right, the T7 does not appear to be a good choice for this scenario.

Drive Modes

Single shooting
Continuous shooting
- Max. approx. 3.0 fps
- Shutter speed 1/500 sec., Maximum aperture
- Continuous shooting speed may become slower depending on the shutter speed, aperture, subject condition, brightness, lens model, flash use, remaining battery capacity, etc.

At 3 fps, you are going to have a hard time catching that shot!

Re: EOS Rebel T7 Continuous shooting interval too slow

Tronhard — Thu, 07 Sep 2023 18:13:46 GMT

I tend to agree on this point. This is a good example of where technology and technique work together. Sport photography is a genre that demands high shutter speeds and a fast frame-rate and a decent buffer, which is why the R3 has only a 24MP sensor and it BSI/Stacked with a big buffer to throughput a very high frame rate. Now, while that is a pro-level camera, it makes the point.

While I would like to know if the OP has read the manual to get the most out of the camera, I think that model is quite limited for the context in which it is being used. The camera's poor frame-rate, combined with a mediocre lens are limiting factors. This may be mitigated to some extent by experience, when one gets better at anticipating the critical moment at which to shoot, and I think Ernie may have a good point about shooting in JPG rather than RAW - given the impact of the latter on buffer capacity.

The alternative is to seek a camera and lens more suited to the purpose if the OP is serious about this endeavour. I would suggest something like the Canon EOS 90D - which offers up to 11 fps, with Canon's excellent EF 70-300 f/4-5.6 MkII IS USM which has lightning fast focus, or the Sigma 100-400mm F/5-6.3 DG OS HSM Contemporary might well be a better solution, accepting that again, whatever is chosen needs to be studied and configured for the purpose.

I would further recommend to the OP to check with others who are attending the games and are successful at this to get actual hands-on coaching.

Re: EOS Rebel T7 Continuous shooting interval too slow

Waddizzle — Fri, 08 Sep 2023 02:18:33 GMT

@Walt_Felix wrote:
If I'm reading the specs right, the T7 does not appear to be a good choice for this scenario.

Drive Modes
Single shooting
Continuous shooting
Max. approx. 3.0 fps
Shutter speed 1/500 sec., Maximum aperture
Continuous shooting speed may become slower depending on the shutter speed, aperture, subject condition, brightness, lens model, flash use, remaining battery capacity, etc.
At 3 fps, you are going to have a hard time catching that shot!

Pre-focus on the football. Switch the lens to MF. Fire the shutter just as the kicker’s foot is making contact with the ball. Fire the shutter “early” because your finger will be taking that crucial fraction of a second to fire the shutter will make all the difference.

Re: EOS Rebel T7 Continuous shooting interval too slow

Tintype_18 — Fri, 08 Sep 2023 13:00:18 GMT

poohdabar, I suggest you download the manual as a shortcut on your computer and read it. I do this periodically with the camera in front of me. Then I can see what settings on the camera are needed when I have a question about certain situations as sports.

Some people call football as what we call soccer.

Re: EOS Rebel T7 Continuous shooting interval too slow

ebiggs1 — Fri, 08 Sep 2023 14:56:19 GMT

These two suggestions are the most likely to get you to your goal. Both of us have long experience, decades of it, doing this so it is worth a try.

"Pre-focus on the football. Switch the lens to MF. Fire the shutter just as the kicker’s foot is making contact with the ball. Fire the shutter “early” because your finger will be taking that crucial fraction of a second to fire the shutter will make all the difference."

"So bottom line is you are going to reset the Rebel T7 to defaults which will turn off most extra features. Set large jpg. Suitably high enough ISO for conditions. One shot not Ai-servo, center focus point. Personally I like Av mode for this so set your lens to its widest aperture and let the T7 handle the SS. Whoever made the suggestion of using manual focus and fix focus on the football is also good. Doing these settings will almost assuredly get you the highest frame rate even if you decide to use raw."

Its always best to have the best and mostest gear but sometimes that is just not a possibility for whatever reason. Sometimes you need to work with what you have.

Re: EOS Rebel T7 Continuous shooting interval too slow

normadel — Fri, 08 Sep 2023 16:38:05 GMT

What you all have to realize is that many many many "fantastic action shots" taken by real pros that you see published, just like high-end modelling and fashion photography, is the result of shooting hundreds or thousands of frames, then sitting down and looking through everything to find the "money shot" that appears in the media. There's a lot of luck in capturing just the right instant. That is WHY there is high-speed continuous shooting, and large-capacity memory cards. It's the modern equivalent of 250-shot backs on film cameras.