nikon d7000 focusing advice?

[PieGuy]

Hello again:

I thought I posted this but it seems to have gotten...

Oh well. I've got a d7000 w/Tamron 70-200 and I photograph race cars. I'm just getting familiar with the camera (up from a D70s), so don't know if I am not doing the correct settings or if I just expect way more than my D70s could deliver.

The situation:

135mm to 200mm focal length, panning with cars from 50 to 80 feet away in a 90 degree arc or less.

Camera settings

FOCUS
Focus Mode: AF Continuous, release priority
AF Area Mode: 39 point Dynamic (not 3D tracking)
Focus tracking with lock-on: normal (3)
Number of focus points: 11

METERING: Matrix

RELEASE: Continuous High

I suspect that I may have to experiment with choosing 3D tracking, turning off my Focus Tracking Lock-On, and increasing the number of focus points. But I would love to have your feedback.

Thanks,

PG

 

[PieGuy]

Oops!

I forgot to include what the problem has been. Sorry.

The problem is that the focus does not seem to be keeping up with the car.

If I'm panning, I'll pick up the car and focus and fire off 2 to 5 frames on continuous but the car may go out of focus during the pan.

Same with a car that is coming towards me: I'll autofocus on the car in the distance but as it comes toward me the focus usually lags.

Hope that helps and elicits some response.

PG

 

[SCraig]

Yet another person trying to use 3D tracking and getting bad results. Turn any focus option that has the phrase "3D" or "Dynamic" in it OFF and leave it off. Set your focus point to single point, lock it in the center of the viewfinder, and never change it again. You will be much happier. If not you can always turn it back on and ruin some more images.

 

[MLeeK]

It's the lens you are using. The tamron 70-200 f/2.8 is slow as mud to focus. It's great for weddings, portraits, macro and a little bit of much slower moving sports (I did have some trouble with it for football and volleyball) but it sucks for anything extremely fast moving.
I wouldn't be using 11 focus points either. You run a chance of it locking on one of those 11 that are on the track and that's going to drag your focus back quite a bit.
The Sigma HSM/Macro version of that lens is a little bit faster-you'd notice it a bit, but still probably not going to work with high speed sports like that.

Macro lenses are slower to focus on purpose. That one is probably the slowest I have met in modern lenses.

 

[PieGuy]

You know, I now recall something I read awhile back about the slowness of this particular lens before I purchased it. But when it came to plunking down a lot of cash for the Nikon lens, or spending less on three Tamron lenses, well, I needed three lenses and that was that. Guess I'll just have to do what I've always done with this lens and the D70s: Manually pre-focus for the distance I capture pans, and manually follow focus for oncoming cars. I don't get em all but who needs perfection?

Thank you both for your insights. Will take them into account and see what I can do to make the most of what I've got.

Regards,

PG