Canon R5 Canon R5 Animal Eye Focus

[Hali]

I have been using my R5 for a while and the animal eye focus has been great for static shots - birds on a branch, my neighbors dog sitting or moving slowly, birds walking around on the ground. It catches and holds the eye great.
Today I was out looking for some Ice to do some macro with but it hasn't been cold enough, long enough and as I walked back home my neighbors dog was up for a bit of fetch with a wood block. So I'd toss the block and settle down and shoot some as he came back at me. It seemed that the eye focus grabbed the eye while I was shooting but I had less than a handful of keepers. Most were total misses and using the DPP software the focus point was often not anywhere on the eye.

Any hints as to what I need to do fix this. I use back button focusing that I copied from the guy at Whistling Wings Photography's youtube channel (he uses all three buttons, (obviously not at that same time and for different reasons) maybe that's overkill?)

Thanks in advance

 

[Jake Shoots Birds]

In the AF-3 menu what do you have the Servo AF set to? For birds I find Auto works fine, but when I did something similar with my neighbor's dog I found that while it locked on the eye the forward movement put the focus ultimately right behind the eye. I haven't had an opportunity to mess with that scenario again, but I suspect Case 4 might work better for you. Main thing is to get to learn what works best for you in what scenarios. And I should note, I don't use the Canon software so I'm basing my statements on what I observe and not where they say the focus point is.

 

[Hali]

In the AF-3 menu what do you have the Servo AF set to? For birds I find Auto works fine, but when I did something similar with my neighbor's dog I found that while it locked on the eye the forward movement put the focus ultimately right behind the eye. I haven't had an opportunity to mess with that scenario again, but I suspect Case 4 might work better for you. Main thing is to get to learn what works best for you in what scenarios. And I should note, I don't use the Canon software so I'm basing my statements on what I observe and not where they say the focus point is.

Thank you for the reply! Funny enough I never noticed that there was an auto button. I have the camera set to Case 2 (Continue to track sujects ignoring possible obstacles with the tracking sensitivity set all the way to - and the accel/decel tracking set all the way to +. The only reason I broke out the Canon software was because I was so frustrated I wanted to see where the actual point was. Normally I'm a lightroom user. I will have to give it a try with Case 4. And if I ever get around to actually shooting birds off of "sticks" and in flight I will try auto too.

 

[Jake Shoots Birds]

Thank you for the reply! Funny enough I never noticed that there was an auto button. I have the camera set to Case 2 (Continue to track sujects ignoring possible obstacles with the tracking sensitivity set all the way to - and the accel/decel tracking set all the way to +. The only reason I broke out the Canon software was because I was so frustrated I wanted to see where the actual point was. Normally I'm a lightroom user. I will have to give it a try with Case 4. And if I ever get around to actually shooting birds off of "sticks" and in flight I will try auto too.

I know a Canon rep (who finally got me to switch from Nikon after 10 years by handing me an R5) and his recommendation was to use Auto unless a situation specifically warrants one of the others.

 

[Hali]

I know a Canon rep (who finally got me to switch from Nikon after 10 years by handing me an R5) and his recommendation was to use Auto unless a situation specifically warrants one of the others.

I am going to change my setting to that and get out and see how that works out! Thanks.