Competent Used Camera Body for Motorsports Photography?

[Kneedragger95]

Good evening.

I attended the final round of the British Superbike Championship at Brands hatch yesterday, as well as some earlier rounds at Donnington and Silverstone. When I went to these races I brought my Fuji XT-100 and 50-230mm 4.5 lens to try and take some photographs, and some of them I am proud of.

However the camera seemed a little sluggish to me regarding autofocus, because the camera simply couldn't keep up with the motorbikes, and would often drift completely out of focus as if the camera wasnt quite sure what to be focusing on. This resulted in probably 75% of shots coming out completely out of focus.

So I wanted to ask if there is a camera body out there under £500 used that is capable of handling motorsport photography regarding focusing speeds?

Thanks in advance.

[Tony1963]

Just the body, no lens?

[Kneedragger95]

Tony1963 said:

Just the body, no lens?

I thought Autofocus speed/accuracy was primarily down to the camera body?
I only say this because in the reviews of the camera I'm using they all state that the AF is so slow and its pointless using it for sports or anything involving fast action.

ETA if there is a specific body/brand that has well priced quality lenses that is a bonus too.

Edited by Kneedragger95 on Monday 21st October 21:03

[amanu1]

Choose a position, set everything - focus, aperture, exposure - then wait for the motorbike to come into shot.

[DIW35]

amanu1 said:

Choose a position, set everything - focus, aperture, exposure - then wait for the motorbike to come into shot.

That's how we used to do it before autofocus was a thing.

[Mav281]

I recently upgraded my camera body from a Nikon D5500 to a Nikon D810, but even my old Nikon D5500 was capable of taking some very good quality photos with a decent telephoto lens on it.

Part of the trick is to use the appropriate auto-focus settings. For example the Nikon D5500 has an auto-focus setting called 3D tracking. Once selected and you press the shutter button half-way, the active autofocus point moves to follow subjects around the frame. It's a great feature for capturing moving subjects. Couple this with a relatively high shutter speed 1/500 or 1/1000 for motorsport would be where I would start.

If I was shooting motorbikes, or cars (as I tend to do Touring car etc), then I would put the camera in Shutter Priority mode, so the camera controls the aperture value, and I would take control of the ISO value, shutter speed etc.

Hope that helps!

[GravelBen]

Most recent DSLR's should do well enough, I don't know if there are many mirrorless cameras with fast enough tracking for motorsport photography yet (haven't seen any pros using them, but that could be down to battery life as well).

If you're already invested in Fuji X lenses it would be worth testing a more recent Fuji X body for comparison though, I think they have got a lot better.

I use a Nikon D7200 (with various lenses) and generally get results I'm happy with:

DSC_7482 by Ben, on Flickr

Even my ancient old Nikon D80 did ok considering its age:

20131201-BurtMunro-272 by Ben, on Flickr

[Kneedragger95]

Thanks for the replies everyone.

Mav281 said:

I recently upgraded my camera body from a Nikon D5500 to a Nikon D810, but even my old Nikon D5500 was capable of taking some very good quality photos with a decent telephoto lens on it.

Part of the trick is to use the appropriate auto-focus settings. For example the Nikon D5500 has an auto-focus setting called 3D tracking. Once selected and you press the shutter button half-way, the active autofocus point moves to follow subjects around the frame. It's a great feature for capturing moving subjects. Couple this with a relatively high shutter speed 1/500 or 1/1000 for motorsport would be where I would start.

If I was shooting motorbikes, or cars (as I tend to do Touring car etc), then I would put the camera in Shutter Priority mode, so the camera controls the aperture value, and I would take control of the ISO value, shutter speed etc.

Hope that helps!

That's interesting regarding the D5500 and 3d tracking, my fuji has a tracking mode too but it's very slow and quite dim-witted, so it doesn't really work for the vast majority of the time.

Regarding the poster who suggested that I set the focus, aperture etc beforehand and wait for the subject to come to the focus point, that is what I have had to do eventually to get a decent success rate.
However this method relies on the bikes/cars going exactly where I predict they will go. It's not so useful for example when someone goes off of the racing line/track, or if there's a crash etc.

This is where a fast and reliable AF system would become very useful indeed.

[Kneedragger95]

GravelBen said:

Most recent DSLR's should do well enough, I don't know if there are many mirrorless cameras with fast enough tracking for motorsport photography yet (haven't seen any pros using them, but that could be down to battery life as well).

If you're already invested in Fuji X lenses it would be worth testing a more recent Fuji X body for comparison though, I think they have got a lot better.

I use a Nikon D7200 (with various lenses) and generally get results I'm happy with:

DSC_7482 by Ben, on Flickr

Even my ancient old Nikon D80 did ok considering its age:

20131201-BurtMunro-272 by Ben, on Flickr

Yeah, you see my camera is a mirrorless camera, which shortly after I bought it I realised they weren't quite up to par regarding AF speed compared to similar priced DSLR cameras.

To be fair I did originally buy the camera for landscape photography, which its does really well.

[Lynchie999]

GravelBen said:

(haven't seen any pros using them, but that could be down to battery life as well).

quite a few out there now on Sony and some Fuji shooters....

[jurbie]

There are quite a lot of motosport photographers shooting Fuji. Most of FIA WEC's official photography is shot on Fuji and they also partner with them so at Silverstone Fuji were in the media room cleaning everyones sensors for free (regardless of make) and lending anyone who wanted it their latest kit.

It shows how confident they are of their kit and why they will soon overtake Canon and Nikon who are seriously asleep at the wheel right now.

Not much use for the OP as the latest Fuji kit will set him back about £5000. On that score I would suggest any old Canon or Nikon body and then spend what you can on glass. You could probably get a Canon 30D for around £100 and then keep an eye out for something like an old Sigma. I recently sold a slightly fungal 15 year old 50-500 for £150 and a similar vintage 120-300 for £400. Both were great for motorsport.

Ebay has a couple of Nikon versions available:
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Sigma-50-500mm-1-4-6-3-...

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/NIKON-AF-S-SIGMA-EX-50-...

I can't help with a body as I don't know much about Nikon kit but maybe someone else can help. Just make sure whatever you buy the first thing you do is set up back button focus and you'll be away.

[Craikeybaby]

I’m pretty sure an X-T30 will be out of budget, but that would be my choice of budget Fuji body for decent AF.

X-T2s are currently £449 on the Fuji refurb store, and are still good cameras, the X-T20 has the same sensor/AF and will be even cheaper.

[GravelBen]

jurbie said:

There are quite a lot of motosport photographers shooting Fuji...

I haven't seen any rally photographers using mirrorless but thats good to hear, they've obviously improved the AF enough to be competitive. I've been thinking about a Fuji X as a smaller/lighter alternative to the DSLR for hiking trips etc, they seem like nice kit.

[CVP]

An XT-2 will be a lot faster AF than the OP's current body. Of course XT-3 even better but out of price range right now

[Kneedragger95]

The Xt2 recommendations sound like a good shout, theres lots of praise for them in the reviews that I have read.

A refurb/second hand model seems like a bargain at around £500, especially as I can keep all of my current x-mount lenses. I love using a mirrorless camera too, the compact design and EVF are huge advantages to me over a DSLR.

Thanks for the advice yet again.

[Tony1963]

Just wondering. How is an EVF an advantage over a DSLR’s optical viewfinder?

[Kneedragger95]

You get to see a real-time view of what the cameras sensor sees, not what the mirror inside a DSLR sees.

So you can see if the image is exposed how you would like before you take the shot, rather than snapping a shot and then checking on the LCD screen afterwards

[jurbie]

GravelBen said:

jurbie said:

There are quite a lot of motosport photographers shooting Fuji...

I haven't seen any rally photographers using mirrorless but thats good to hear, they've obviously improved the AF enough to be competitive. I've been thinking about a Fuji X as a smaller/lighter alternative to the DSLR for hiking trips etc, they seem like nice kit.

To be fair 'a lot' might be an exageration but there's certainly a few high profile shooters out there and more are coming around to it. The main sticking point is possibly guys like me who shoot other stuff and need good all round equipment. Put another way, I've yet to see anyone shooting mirrorless pitchside in the Premier League and I'm not so committed to the mirrorless cause to be the first.

[Tony1963]

Kneedragger95 said:

You get to see a real-time view of what the cameras sensor sees, not what the mirror inside a DSLR sees.

So you can see if the image is exposed how you would like before you take the shot, rather than snapping a shot and then checking on the LCD screen afterwards

And that’s it, nothing else? I still don’t like them, so a combination of a tight wallet and not wanting to buy into mirrorless at what is still an early stage just puts me off.

[jr502]

GravelBen said:

I haven't seen any rally photographers using mirrorless but thats good to hear, they've obviously improved the AF enough to be competitive. I've been thinking about a Fuji X as a smaller/lighter alternative to the DSLR for hiking trips etc, they seem like nice kit.

I switched from a 7dii to an Xt-3 and I honestly wouldn't go back. The only thing the 7dii had over the Xt-3 was a button I could program to a preset shutter/iso/aperture, which was handy to have set to a fast ss, so when out and about on walks if I saw something fly/run out it was ready. Auto focus is better on the Xt-3 and I don't get why everyone complains about battery life, even when shooting sports like a football game it's not an issue.