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Focusing issues with Canon R1 and R5 Mark II

fingham
Contributor

Hi,

I have used the Canon R1 and R5 Mark II for several weeks to photograph sports.  Both cameras seem to have the same problem for me, and I am looking to see if others have had issues as well.

When using the R1 or R5II with the 100-300 f2.8 or 24-105 f2.8, after some time, I am unable to focus and must turn the camera off, remove/insert the battery, and turn it back on for it to function correctly.  I am using the following Camera and AF settings (the ones that I think might be relevant to this issue):

Camera:

Pre-Cont Shooting - Enable; Blackout-Free Display - On

AF:

AF Operation - SERVO; Whole Area Tracking SERVO - On; Subject to Detect - People; Eye Detection - Auto; Action Priority - Enable; Sports Event - Basketball; (AF) Case - Auto

The focusing issue seems to happen once I have been using the cameras for some time (perhaps 1-2 hours) and after I have taken 1000+ photos. Specifically, as I use my back-button focusing button and zoom the lens in/out to frame the action, I am suddenly not able to focus at all. I then have to shut down the cameras and hope focusing returns.

All of my cameras and lenses have the latest firmware.

This originally happened with my R5II but not with my R1. However, since I updated the R1 to firmware 1.0.1, it has also happened with the R1.

It appears to be a software issue akin to a memory leak or resource exhaustion of some other type. These cameras are very expensive, and we rely on them to function correctly, especially during sports/news action. At this point, I cannot trust them to function correctly when I most need them to.

Has anyone else seen this?  Is there a proven solution?  We are dealing with new technology, but I thought they were stress-tested during the Olympics and other such events. Did this not happen there as well?

Thanks

1 ACCEPTED SOLUTION

I photographed another 6+ basketball games, this time without utilizing Action Priority/Basketball, and I did not encounter the focusing issues I had previously. At this point, I prepared to say that Action Priority did cause my focusing issues on both cameras—it does not appear to work for extended periods of time.

View solution in original post

10 REPLIES 10

First, thank you for the link to the document; I had not seen it for the R1 before, and it is interesting to read. I have never had the focusing issue when I was NOT using Action Priority. My setup has two differences from your settings; I am using 'Expand AF area: Around', and I use 'Case Manual'/Tracking sensitivity -1/Accel./devel. tracking +1.  I would not think those would help your issue, but I am using it without fail to date.

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