SL2-S Autofocus Tips?

[petereprice]

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Hi all - I'm a fairly new user to the SL2-S and so far I have been enjoying the camera a lot mainly for its stunning image quality and robust build and ergonomics. I know that AF is a sticky topic with this camera, and just wondering how people are navigating around the Auto Focus System.

With moving subjects even in portraiture, I've noticed the camera does not stick to the subject at all when in AFC and in Medium to High Burst while the subject is approaching me.

If I shoot individual shots, the camera quickly locks on focus and then takes the shot, and I can try and do that in single shot mode several pops at a time, but then I run into the EVF blacking out too slow, where if I shoot the shutter consecutively and too quickly, the EVF stay's blacked out. But if I go into burst mode, the EVF stays always on, but then I seem to lose AF tracking when subjects are approaching or moving away. Side to side is fine.

 

Is this a limitation of the camera? Even when I turn tracking off and just go into spot or other AF modes, I still run into this issue. I'm shooting with the 50mm f2.0 SL ASPH Summicron (Non-APO).

 

Would love to hear experienced users in this group tell me how they are working with AF on this camera...or should I be using my manual M lenses instead and rely on myself?

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[Ken Abrahams]

Hello Peter

I am relatively new to auto focus lenses for Leica SL and SL2. Up until recently I have always shot with M glass relying on my reflexes and experience to get the focus right. It's not all plain sailing with this system on the SL range either. One needs to open up aperture to focus with "peaking" and then stop back down to preferred exposure. One must be careful with lenses which have potential for focus shift however.

The Summicron SL 50 Asph is a pretty quick lens to focus in my experience. I have not shot with the lens too much but I have attempted some Street photography where I literally point and shoot before the subject has seen me. That is pretty quick in my book. The camera and lens combo doesn't always get it right and I have it set on AFs with focussing rectangle in the centre of the frame. The camera needs time to calculate the exposure to and hopefully not from "waking up position". I like the lens, it's light and fast with practice. I shoot continuously and with Afs. Moving subjects with scenes showing variable lighting (exposures) requires setting up the back button focus or setting up AFs lock away from the shutter button. Dont worry about it if the lighting is even and constant. Basically one can frame the subject and press shutter half down for highlight of shadows in the exposure calculation and then press the toggle button to focus and then fully depress the shutter to shoot. Not easy to achieve in continuous mode however but at least the focus is right in such conditions.  

I have used AFc with long video shots where a train is headed straight towards camera from a distance and the tracking wasn't too bad. It was good enough. It seems that using ones reflexes and experience still applies for modern autofocusing glass.

Best

Ken    

[epand56]

I find the AF Mode Tracking quite useful. You focus on a subject and then if you move the camera or the subject moves, the focus is always on him (page 111 of the user manual)

Best,

Enrico

[keeping_a_balance]

I have been using the sl2-s with a variety of lenses, sigma, and leica l mount lenses. 

I have had quite satisfactory success with people/face recognition autofocus during the day even when shooting from the hip.... 

Shooting directly into heavy backlit scenes are hard for the contrast based AF to pick up subjects, and so are darker scenes, but then I will switch to MF using back-button focusing and dial in manually if needed....

So far quite happy with the AF given everyone complains to much about it.

 

[LEGEND]

Hallo

I have SL2-S and Vario-Elmarit SL 24-90 Asph. that I use only when I need AF or zoom.
Mostly I have my Summilux M 50 Asph. mounted on the camera because I love manual focus and 50mm.

When I shoot with my SL2-S and VE 24-90 I use AFs set on Field and some times on Spot.
I use Field adjusted to the smallest size and because the Field is much easier to see then the 
AFs Spot.  Spot is only small crosshair that sometimes “disappears“ in the EVF. I would like
to see that Leica brings back that circle  with the crosshair inside as they had on the SL 601.

 I find Eye/Face/Body detection very confusing and I never know where exactly the AF focused.
It is distracting with boxes all over the frame that switch from person to person so I don't use it.

The AFc also don't use that often also because I am not sure is the focus locked all the time 
on the place where I wanted to be. It is not Sony after all...  

99% of the time I have AF set to AFs on Field or Spot because I find that is enough fast for my photography.
It is so fast that I can get focus and make a photo even if the subject is moving. Uf course that depend on speed
of subject , direction and light conditions. Because the SL system has contrast detect AF and that is not as fast or
reliable  as a phase detect. Especially in low light and low contrast...

And the problem with EVF black out I got this also from time to time.
That in the AFs if I take series of shots, not in burst, one by one, fast...
Most of the time everything is ok in 99%,  but then some times it happens.

I also noticed that I get these kind of problems appear more often when I use 2 
SD card inserted, especially when they are in back up mode then only with
1 SD card. If I use flash these things happen also and the some
time the camera just freeze. You can not turn her off on the on/off button , only when you remove the battery.

I think that Leica cameras will always have problems with flash photography.
Also when I use RAW + JPG i noticed more glitches of these kind. But I don't use JPG that much so it is not a problem.

I suspect all this is because of interaction of the camera firmware with hardware, perhaps is buffer or processor not fast enough. 
All kind of combinations and situations that not tested or thought of that then can make problems.

The more different factors you bring in the more is likely to encounter some problem. I use my SL2-S in simplest possible way I can.
If I need AF then only AFs with field or spot, Single shot, Highlight weighted metering, Exposure preview on and in Manual mode.
If I use manual focus lens then everything above except this settings for AF.  Also I shoot only in RAW DNG and with one SD card.

In my experience these are to me most reelable camera setting for my workflow when I use my SL2-S... 
I also had SL 601 and SL2 before that also showed these kind of problems from time to time.
Nothing new as it seams ... Perhaps Leica will remove some of these bugs in the future firmware, who knows... 

Sorry for my bad English... It is not my native language...  

Nikola

 

[Photoworks]

I think the face detection option is the best for this camera.

I was shooting NY marathon runners with 90-280 at 280 and AF-c and most of the images are focused right on the subject running in my direction. Impressive.

it is less useful in a group of people.

[LEGEND]

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9 minutes ago, Photoworks said:

I think the face detection option is the best for this camera.

I was shooting NY marathon runners with 90-280 at 280 and AF-c and most of the images are focused right on the subject running in my direction. Impressive.

it is less useful in a group of people.

You are right. I tried to use face detect during one wedding , lot of people that moved around all the time and in low light. It did't work at all.
Also it did't work outside with enough light. Big group of people just confuses the face detect in my opinion so I used AFs. 
The Leica need to work more on Face detect. Personally I think it is not for me...

Nikola