Nailing Focus on Fast Action Sports

[OnTheFly7]

I have had the opportunity to shoot 2 bull riding events over the past couple of weeks. I have 4-5 more events over the next 4 weeks. Rodeo and western living is not new to me. However, this is the first time I have had an opportunity like this, which could lead to repeat work down the road. I have some images that I am extremely satisfied with. Yet, I have many that I am not happy with. Below is the equipment that I am using and the settings that I have used.

D810
70-200mm f/2.8 as a primary lens
Continuous High
Release Priority
Aperture between f/4.5 to f/2.8
Auto ISO (most of the time)
Auto WB (once in a while, such as with quickly changing sky conditions)
Shutter Speed of 1250-2000
Group Focus
Focus Tracking set to 1 or 2

Some of the rides are hit and miss with regards to focus. Other rides, the focus is right on and you could almost replay the entire ride, simply by viewing the images. My main gripe is that the percentage of clean, crisp shots is not as high as I want. At first, I was not zooming in as much as possible, due to wanting to capture some of the surroundings.

I am wondering if I bring the subject in close to fill more of the frame, will the focus improve? I am also wondering if Dynamic-9 may be a better focus option than the "Group" focus selection.

Most of these events begin at 7:00pm and as the evening progresses, the lighting gets worse. However, I know I am limited here (since I am unable to use my strobes), so my main concern is obtaining a higher percentage of in focus, crisp images.

Thoughts?

And thanks!

 

[Solarflare]

Well, why are you using low settings for Focus Tracking ? It means the camera will very quickly focus on something different if something is ever in the foreground. I would have figured that the minimum setting would be 3, if not even higher, for sports ?

Are you setting the af point by hand on the face in the beginning ?

Are you prefocusing, i.e. either half-pressing or, if you have configured that, pressing the AF-ON, for like half a second or so, so the camera doesnt start shooting before it focuses for the first time, so frames arent taken before the camera actually had time to focus ?

Thats the sources of errors I could identify from your posting. In general it seems you're doing everything correctly. At least I'm assuming you're using one of the dynamic modes that follow the subject over the frame.


After a quick google, a good source of information about focus (and other settings) on the D810 seems to be: Recommended Nikon D810 Settings