# Situations That seem to challenge the amazing AF systems of the R6 and R6



## Aussie shooter (Jan 20, 2021)

Having used the R6 for a little while now i am starting to come to grips with the incredible AF system. But having said that there are certain situations that seem to defeat it. So this thread is to relay your experiences where the AF has been thrown off. For me the most interesting one is that the eye AF fails with Zebras, even at close range. Obviously the high contrast stripes have something do do with it but I found it interesting nevertheless considering how incredible it is with just about every other situation. Is anyone else finding any quirks like this?


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## AlanF (Jan 20, 2021)

Aussie shooter said:


> Having used the R6 for a little while now i am starting to come to grips with the incredible AF system. But having said that there are certain situations that seem to defeat it. So this thread is to relay your experiences where the AF has been thrown off. For me the most interesting one is that the eye AF fails with Zebras, even at close range. Obviously the high contrast stripes have something do do with it but I found it interesting nevertheless considering how incredible it is with just about every other situation. Is anyone else finding any quirks like this?


The observation about zebras is very interesting as their stripes are speculated to make it more difficult for predators to focus on them. The one annoying problem that several of us have reported is that unlike DSLRs which are programmed to focus on the nearest object, mirrorless will often focus on the background instead of a perched bird or small object in the foreground. I suppose lions should use a DSLR when hunting zebras and leave their Rs in their den.


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## Aussie shooter (Jan 20, 2021)

AlanF said:


> The observation about zebras is very interesting as their stripes are speculated to make it more difficult for predators to focus on them. The one annoying problem that several of us have reported is that unlike DSLRs which are programmed to focus on the nearest object, mirrorless will often focus on the background instead of a perched bird or small object in the foreground. I suppose lions should use a DSLR when hunting zebras and leave their Rs in their den.


Their stripes definitely make it harder for lions to pick out an individual amongst the herd. I relay that information every day in my presentations. But that requires one zebra to be mixing in with a lot of others. But it seems to also work at disguising the eye on a single animal.


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## AlanF (Jan 20, 2021)

Aussie shooter said:


> Their stripes definitely make it harder for lions to pick out an individual amongst the herd. I relay that information every day in my presentations. But that requires one zebra to be mixing in with a lot of others. But it seems to also work at disguising the eye on a single animal.


Interesting article on why zebras have stripes https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20191031-the-truth-behind-why-zebras-have-stripes
Maybe you have new evidence. Perhaps our safari experts like Grant Atkinson can report back on the R5/R6 in the field.


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## Aussie shooter (Jan 20, 2021)

AlanF said:


> Interesting article on why zebras have stripes https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20191031-the-truth-behind-why-zebras-have-stripes
> Maybe you have new evidence. Perhaps our safari experts like Grant Atkinson can report back on the R5/R6 in the field.


Nothing new. The camouflage works simply by making it harder to identify and individual within the herd. It does not prevent an attack but it serves to possibly give the zebras an extra second or two as a lion may hesitate. I have heard the fly theory before and it seems possible. The heat theory has never held water on my opinion.


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## docsmith (Jan 20, 2021)

Interesting. I'll focus on another aspect of the Zebra, but black and white. I have mostly used my R5 on birds. The eye-AF is great, within a certain range (~50 ft for small birds) for almost all birds, but it is a bit less consistent with downy woodpeckers, which are, largely, black and white. I still have a number of nice photos of downys, so it is not that big of an issue. But, enough that I have noticed.

Obviously the R5 works great on black and white test subjects like test charts, so there may be nothing too this, but perhaps certain blacks absorb enough light, and then additional light is lost at the bayer filter, that AF on black subjects is off a bit. Perhaps not that different from AF slowing down in low light. Pure speculation on my part.


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## AlanF (Jan 20, 2021)

Aussie shooter said:


> Nothing new. The camouflage works simply by making it harder to identify and individual within the herd. It does not prevent an attack but it serves to possibly give the zebras an extra second or two as a lion may hesitate. I have heard the fly theory before and it seems possible. The heat theory has never held water on my opinion.


I meant that your observation on eyeAF breaking down with zebras is actually new evidence and you might have actually discovered something.


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## Viggo (Jan 20, 2021)

Not sure if it’s my lenses, RF50 and RF85, but I find my R5 when it misses it jumps and makes a clunking sound and gets lost. Like a hard snap, clunk.
And when somethings move a bit fast it really overdoes (if that’s a word) the searching.

with a dslr it was much smaller movement and much smaller misses and much closer to focus always.
Perhaps nature of focus by wire, but nonetheless it’s a very different behavior, and not better..


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## Aussie shooter (Jan 20, 2021)

AlanF said:


> I meant that your observation on eyeAF breaking down with zebras is actually new evidence and you might have actually discovered something.


Oh. Sorry. I missed your point. My bad. It certainly caught be by surprise when it failed. Even at close range with very still subjects. It certainly shows what such unique colouration ia capable of


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## privatebydesign (Jan 20, 2021)

Aussie shooter said:


> Oh. Sorry. I missed your point. My bad. It certainly caught be by surprise when it failed. Even at close range with very still subjects. It certainly shows what such unique colouration ia capable of


A way of increasing the interest in that data would be to know if it was fooled the same in both portrait and landscape orientations.


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## BBarn (Jan 20, 2021)

My RP seems nearly unable to find the eyes of those wearing face masks.​


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## Aussie shooter (Jan 21, 2021)

privatebydesign said:


> A way of increasing the interest in that data would be to know if it was fooled the same in both portrait and landscape orientations.


Good point. I THINK i tried both and it failed both ways but i will have another go today and make sure


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## Aussie shooter (Jan 21, 2021)

Anyone know how this thread somehow got lumped with a different title? Its my thread and i didnt do it?


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## Nemorino (Jan 21, 2021)

It is not the only one:





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Maybe a mistake of an admin.
I would send a PM to Canon Rumors Guy.


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## Aussie shooter (Jan 21, 2021)

Nemorino said:


> It is not the only one:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Yeah. I just reported it and it says it has(or is being resolved). These things happens


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## Nemorino (Jan 21, 2021)

Will the opening post be restored?
At least it would be useful to change the title. Could be done by You.


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## Aussie shooter (Jan 21, 2021)

Nemorino said:


> Will the opening post be restored?
> At least it would be useful to change the title. Could be done by You.


Yeah. Will do I think
Edit: Fixed


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## Aussie shooter (Jan 30, 2021)

This is another situation where the R6 AF system just could not cope( I doubt ANY AF system would work here). I had to resort to manual focus to get these shots as there was just too much grass waving around in front of the Hare


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## Chris.Chapterten (Jan 30, 2021)

Aussie shooter said:


> This is another situation where the R6 AF system just could not cope( I doubt ANY AF system would work here). I had to resort to manual focus to get these shots as there was just too much grass waving around in front of the Hare
> View attachment 195569
> View attachment 195570
> View attachment 195571


Wow! Great work with the manual focus. These images are really interesting, I couldn’t even see the hare at first and thought it was just a photo of dry grass


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## AlanF (Jan 30, 2021)

Aussie shooter said:


> This is another situation where the R6 AF system just could not cope( I doubt ANY AF system would work here). I had to resort to manual focus to get these shots as there was just too much grass waving around in front of the Hare
> View attachment 195569
> View attachment 195570
> View attachment 195571


It would take a higher form of artificial intelligence to sort those out. Did using just the centre point fail? I have just posted a couple of shots in the Bird Portrait thread illustrating how the eyeAF can find the head of tiny distant birds.


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## Aussie shooter (Jan 30, 2021)

Chris.Chapterten said:


> Wow! Great work with the manual focus. These images are really interesting, I couldn’t even see the hare at first and thought it was just a photo of dry grass


Thanks mate. I have been chasing these shots for a while and actually just got lucky with these ones as i was leaving at the time and saw this fella. Shot these out of the car window  and the hare was obliging enough for me to be able to zoom in to achieve manual focus.


AlanF said:


> It would take a higher form of artificial intelligence to sort those out. Did using just the centre point fail? I have just posted a couple of shots in the Bird Portrait thread illustrating how the eyeAF can find the head of tiny distant birds.


Centre point failed as well. Even when the eye was visible. But I am not suggesting it is a flaw of the system. it is just about as difficult a situation as one could come up against. But the ability to zoom in to 10x magnification while manual focusing helped


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## Sporgon (Jan 30, 2021)

Aussie shooter said:


> But the ability to zoom in to 10x magnification while manual focusing helped


With the advent of EVFs there's been a lot of talk about the wonders of focus peaking, but I've found the only sure way of critical focus is still greater magnification.


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## koenkooi (Jan 31, 2021)

Sporgon said:


> With the advent of EVFs there's been a lot of talk about the wonders of focus peaking, but I've found the only sure way of critical focus is still greater magnification.



Especially with insect macro, the peaking algo is convinced everything is in focus. I greatly appreciate the wonders of 10x and higher magnification in the EVF for that.


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## Nemorino (Jan 31, 2021)

Of cause magnification is the best choice to keep *one* subject in focus. But focus peaking is great to get *two* in the plane of focus. 






Focus peaking is also very useful to adjust angle of a tilt lens.


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## Aussie shooter (Feb 1, 2021)

Going back to my initial point about the AF being unable to locate a zebras eye. It goes further than that. It jumps all over the place with them. It simply cannot pick a spot and stick. I wish I could record it and show you. Quite amazing considering how good it is with almost anything else. nature is amazing


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## docsmith (Feb 1, 2021)

Hopefully the Zebra eye phenomena is a firmware fix at some point down the road. As you mention, it really is remarkable. This juvenile hawk was taken through a lot of brush. The blue box was bouncing off the eye to body, to the brush. But when I got home, I only had to throw out maybe 4-5 shots for being OOF. Nothing I'll put on my wall. But, still, the Eye-AF is impressive.


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## YuengLinger (Feb 14, 2021)

Aussie shooter said:


> This is another situation where the R6 AF system just could not cope( I doubt ANY AF system would work here). I had to resort to manual focus to get these shots as there was just too much grass waving around in front of the Hare



Funny, just yesterday couldn't AF on cardinal walking in much shorter grass exactly this color. Bird was not obscured at all. Seemed like the colors were throwing off AF.


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## stevelee (Feb 15, 2021)

Zebras have stripes so that they won’t be spotted.


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## Aussie shooter (Feb 15, 2021)

stevelee said:


> Zebras have stripes so that they won’t be spotted.


That hurt my soul


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## JPAZ (Feb 15, 2021)

Over the weekend tried some waterfowl pics on R5. The light was not great and he iso was 2000 and up. I was using an adapted EF 100-400 mkii with 1.4x mkiii. Some challenges but when I used "2 button" back button focus (as documented in multiple sites - one button is AF and second button is eye AF), got a lot of accurate focusing. The photos? Many are really marginal because 560mm equivalent in that setting needed cropping but when I checked the focus, most were spot on even with that lens and adapter combo. I am going to return to that location in the future with an adapted EF 300 f/2.8 and 2x mkiii and give it another try. 

Always learning......


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## stevelee (Feb 15, 2021)

Aussie shooter said:


> That hurt my soul


I had just happened to see that somewhere recently, so I couldn’t resist passing it along.


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## Bdbtoys (Feb 15, 2021)

I once did a test shot of a notepad document (with just A's on word wrap) on my monitor... zoomed in so it was the only thing visible (no monitor edges to go off of) and it hunted like no tomorrow (would go OoF on wide, past 'in focus', then OoF on zoom, then repeat). I was further than min focusing distance away (so that wasn't it). I attribute it to many factors, most of which it being a light source, distance, ambient lighting, the refresh rate of the monitor, and the camera settings. It was something I normally don't have an issue with, but was able to create (and duplicate) a perfect storm of settings where I could trigger it on demand.


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