AF settings advice for Dynamic Tracking

[mr_aznar]

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I have found the SL lens AF system so unreliable I've been using my wonderful R lenses on the SL and having a ball with the classic glass on the new body.  However, upcoming projects necessitate using the SL lenses.  I tested the SL zooms against their R counterparts and indeed the image quality improvement is substantial.  Now... to figure out the AF system...  There is not much info in the manual or online.  It would be great if someone could do an instructional video or blog writeup.  Here is what I've found using AFC, Dynamic Tracking, 1Point, 49 Points: 1. There is very little logic to the red box - exposure can be correct, the focus target can be clear and contrasty yet the box remains red.  2. Forcing the shutter when the box is red results in correct focus about 70% of the time (helpful but not good enough).  3. The lenses lock up too often, especially on white/bright or smooth targets like petals or clouds.  4. The manual override option has never worked.  5. When the shutter is half-pressed the green tracking box only appears 50% of the time (helpful but not good enough). 6. Tracking is very slow, not fast enough to follow a skateboarder.  7. There are not enough focus points to the edge of the frame.  8. The joystick is fiddly, I wish there were a smoother, faster way to direct the focus box.  8. My SL 24-90 has a metallic squeak when focusing, has anyone else experienced this?  Hoping someone has some tips...

what settings have you found to be helpful. just got my sl and having the same struggle or still very much learning it. coming from a7rii, this thing is a turtle. im also using 50mm sl which af is very slow. cant really compare my q, but i wish it would work that way.

[sillbeers15]

Unfortunately there is no 'one size fits all' answer.

For a start, make sure your SL and native lenses are updated with latest v3.0 firmware.

For complicated background & foreground, single point AF setting makes sense. Many times, I set the focus mode to MF and use the joystick to autofocus and stop focus at my full control (also known as back button focusing method). With less distracting background, maximize yr AF coverage by selecting field or zone. I'm not certain if this were just a SL unique experience using AF tracking chasing a fast moving subject such as BIF, if I were to wait till the moving subject to be clear in focus before pressing the shutter fully to fire the shots, there is high chance that the focusing would go off in opposite direction and one would loose the view of the subject due to off focus (on 90-280mm especially) and would result from frustration, not to be mixed up with back light & poor light situation where contrast detection AF is at its weakest. However I repeatedly get pleasantly surprised good clear shots when I choose to slam the shutter release fully when fast moving subject is unclearly in view, the results were fairly good in capturing a good % of clear pics where the view finder does not even show a single clear image. However, I never select 'high' in continuous drive mode as the camera locks focus after the first frame. So my experience with the SL's AF tracking fast moving subject is that I would not get 100% clear focus in every shot but many time get surprising clear shots when I least expect it.

On the other hand it is a pain in my opinion to use the SL for landscape shots mounted on a tripod. I have to remember to turn off AF and optical stability control. Plus closing down the F stop makes all things in focus which makes AF redundant. Just my two cents worth of my sharing. Oh, I forget to mention that I always enjoy holding my telephoto zoom lens, so AF becomes really useful.

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