D7000 Live View Autofocus

I'd love to hear from the first folks who get a D7000 underwater, how the live view and video autofocus works. Topside it seems to work pretty well with a lot of flexibility and control. On the weekend I shot some video from a fast moving boat and found that setting the autofocus to a single static point, then moving the point as desired with the multiswitch on the back, and half pressing the shutter to capture focus, one could track point of focus desired from far to really close up quite easily. Be interesting to see if it works underwater as well.

I have been spoiled though with my D700 with regard to autofocus speed and capture for topside bird photography. With my 70-200 with or without the 2x convertor, the D7000 was not nearly as fast or accurate as the D700. Not my choice as a bird photography camera.

Yes, it focuses well with the 10-17mm UW in live view. I even shots some stills in liveview - which is much better for stills than the D700.

Alex

That's great to hear; good news for my old eyes.

Alex - can you elaborate how its better in LV for stills? I have D700 & D300 and LV on both is a PITA - even if i manually focus it still has to cycle the mirror down, up, down to take a picture and hit shutter again to move the mirror back up to return to LV. The time between firing a shot (even MF) from LV and returning to LV is enormous. Not to mention if you don't hold the shutter down for like 2 secs it wont even take the picture. Have they remedied this idiocy?

Loftus - what kinda birds you shooting w a 70-200 on FF, they in cages?? Are you saying the D7000 AF is far inferior to D700? i kinda guessed that but ya never know with the rate technology filters down, though i suspect they keep it purposefully slower to keep camera models well separated. Or were you just referring to the LV AF???

i was tempted with the $1200 price tag, but i'll wait for the next D300/700 update. I suspect the video/LV AF will be well tweaked by then.

Cheers,

Chris

Loftus - what kinda birds you shooting w a 70-200 on FF, they in cages?? Are you saying the D7000 AF is far inferior to D700? i kinda guessed that but ya never know with the rate technology filters down, though i suspect they keep it purposefully slower to keep camera models well separated. Or were you just referring to the LV AF???

 

i was tempted with the $1200 price tag, but i'll wait for the next D300/700 update. I suspect the video/LV AF will be well tweaked by then.

Cheers,

 

Chris

From a boat; it's not that easy to shoot anything that much longer.

But last weekend I was in Mosquito Lagoon, north of Cape Canaveral, and it was mostly white pelicans, and other Florida waterbirds, and we could get quite close stalking them from a flats boat. I used the 70-200 and if needed the new Nikon 2x convertor, so equivalent to a 600mm on FX. I used that combination a few months ago in South Africa on my D700 and I was very pleased with both quality and focusing speed and accuracy. I'm referring to the viewfinder AF. I hardly ever even attempt stills with LV, makes no sense for me when I can use a viewfinder.

At least with that combination, yes the D7000 was significantly slower acquiring focus, particularly with moving subjects, some of that may also have been my inexperience using the camera and the different autofocus settings. I will spend some more time with it this weekend. But if you think about it that's what one pays for in the pro bodies, increased responsiveness and durability.

So I am not really knocking the D7000, for general purpose photography it's more fun to drag around than the D700.

I was actually quite pleased with the LV autofocus shooting video, definitely a helpful tool for me particularly because I hate focusing manually on an LCD screen

The D7000's liveview is a completely different proposition to any previous Nikon. I took a lot of photos with it today in the Red Sea (mainly with the 10-17mm).

I also shot fish portraits in the late afternoon with the D7000 + 105mm VR (not using live view) and was very pleased with speed and accuracy of the AF (no focus light used). Although I haven't downloaded the pictures yet!

Alex

The D7000's liveview is a completely different proposition to any previous Nikon. I took a lot of photos with it today in the Red Sea (mainly with the 10-17mm).

I also shot fish portraits in the late afternoon with the D7000 + 105mm VR (not using live view) and was very pleased with speed and accuracy of the AF (no focus light used). Although I haven't downloaded the pictures yet!

Alex

The D7000's liveview is a completely different proposition to any previous Nikon. I took a lot of photos with it today in the Red Sea (mainly with the 10-17mm).

 

I also shot fish portraits in the late afternoon with the D7000 + 105mm VR (not using live view) and was very pleased with speed and accuracy of the AF (no focus light used). Although I haven't downloaded the pictures yet!

 

Alex

 

The D7000's liveview is a completely different proposition to any previous Nikon. I took a lot of photos with it today in the Red Sea (mainly with the 10-17mm).

 

I also shot fish portraits in the late afternoon with the D7000 + 105mm VR (not using live view) and was very pleased with speed and accuracy of the AF (no focus light used). Although I haven't downloaded the pictures yet!

 

Alex

Hi Alex,

I think the Nikon 105mm VR less can produce some excellent very sharp portraits on the surface, but how about underwater with all it's additional challenges?

I am in the process of getting a D7000 in the water in the new Nauticam NA-D7000 housing (with plenty of great help from Alex at UWVisions!), plus this 105mm (was thinking about getting the focus gear, but now not so sure?) and a Tokina 10-17mm in an 8.5" dome. The usual suspects.. Thanks for the excellent review of the NA-D7000 by the way! Such a quality look piece of engineering. Very excited, plan on taking it to maybe to Indonesia and Philippines in Feb-Mar 2011.

I think Nauticam have done a great job getting this housing out so early, it looks like I can actually get hold of the housing before any D7000 stock arrives here in Denmark itself!! I was about to kit up my 'old' D90 but I think the D7000 is a much improved beast..

I am very interested to hear how you got on with the 105mm for portraits, can you show/upload your fish portrait images somewhere? Would be great to see them. You also said without a focus light? What sort of working distance are you talking?

Cheers,

Lee

Hi Lee,

The 105mm was the main lens I used for macro/fish portraits in the Red Sea.

Most of the shots on this page are with the 105mm:

http://wetpixel.com/i.php/full/field-revie...am-na-d7000/P4/

I'll choose some different images for the version of the review that I plan to submit for the next issue of UWP Magazine.

Alex

I went over to Samy's camera, and played with the d7000 and kit lens for awhile.

Nice camera and all, but I have to say while yes, the live view focus is way better than previous nikon DSLRs, what that means, (with that setup), is that focus takes 1 second, rather than 2 or more.

It was bright enough, and contrasty enough.

Alex, I'm guess focusing with the fisheye wide angle just does not need to move it much, since the DOF is so deep.

So for using lcd for composing, and shooting stills, this does not seem in the same league, (AF and shutter lag wise), as the sony nex or a55 or pany gh or gf series.

What's up?