mastering autofocus on the Canon R3 (in depth walkthrough)

[@ToneRoss]

This was super helpful! Please keep making R3 videos. No one else on KZbin is making helpful content on how to use and set up this camera. Thank you!

[@joshrexford]

So glad it was helpful!! Much more R3 content in the works 🤙🏼 if there’s anything specific it’d be helpful for me to cover, let me know!

[@davepastern]

there's "whistling wings photography" that has a bunch of stuff on the R3, also Pangolin tours has several videos on the R3. Jan Wegener has several videos on the R3 too and I think Duade Paton will be coming out with some R3 videos in the near future. Depends on what you consider "useful". For me as a wildlife (birding) photographer, Josh's AF video isn't really too helpful, but I was curious to see his AF setup.

[@MrX-dh5ji]

I would love to see you do an episode featuring the newest features added to the R3 from the latest firmware update. Thanks, I love your channel. You explain things very clearly.

[@davepastern]

@@MrX-dh5ji what updates LOL? Canon has done fuck all...

[@tvieso]

Dude, genius on the AF-ON button customization. Thanks so much for that tip and really all of your videos. It's a bit fast sometimes but you explain things very well where others don't explain why they are doing something.

[@joshrexford]

So glad you found value man! Thanks for watching 🙌🏼 and ha yeah trying to balance the speed thing…if I slow it down I get comments saying to speed it up or watch at 1.25x 😅 but genuinely appreciate the feedback!

[@peterkenyonjr]

Awesome. I copied this for my R6ii. The single spot, one-shot thing in the back saved me a button customization. I can now use my video record button for autofocus spot change with the dial and keep the multifunction for multifunction. Love it. Thanks! PS... Dude, that last tip about the Q menu and using info button at the spot focus menu to turn on and off tracking per the spot. Huge! I was wondering why the hell sometimes tracking stopped and sometimes it didn't. Game changer. Also, I might be picking up an R3 if I can swing it for my main camera. Hence the reason why I watched this video. Glad I did because the R6ii is very similar.

[@_SYDNA_]

Yes !!!! Robot focus with back-button on demand! Thank you. So much to learn but maybe this is a camera that I can make work for fast action sports in limited or funky light. Thank you for thimking this through and going through this for us. Hard to pull the trigger on something at this price point and frugal pixels without some in-depth walk throughs. I'm starting to see what the designers had in mind though. Thanks again. Nice work!

[@ThatGuyInVegas]

Thank you. There are so many options on this camera; this was helpful.

[@JGZphotography]

One item of importance is the R3 ability to save the menu settings to the memory card. This way you can return to the customized settings or even transfer the settings to a second R3. Just remember to rename the folder. There are many combinations for the custom settings. While I cover many sports, I have adapted the same settings for other photo genres. It's mind boggling, and not everyone will agree on a single setting.

[@atomcreates]

Super video, thanks for sharing all this info so clearly and concisely. I’m about to sell my 1DX Mk iii and buy an R3 and this was so helpful.

[@tomdoolin2415]

Thanks for sharing your knowledge

[@twistedjourneyy]

This was amazing. I cannot thank you enough!!

[@soniajimenez5105]

The R3 setting really forced me to learn this camera! I’m basically going to have your video on repeat 🔁 😅

[@joshrexford]

Ha nothing like diving into alllll the menus to really help you learn a camera right? 😂

[@colinfieldgate4719]

Wow. Such a completely different (and to me foreign) way to set up the R3. I shoot action primarily and people not so much. I rely on the AF On button to control where I want the camera to focus and initiate tracking. For me it’s a game changer, and yet you turn if off! Are you a previous focus and recompose photographer? I wonder whether starting with the R6 has shaped your thinking.

[@vdpijll]

Thanks for this enlightening R3 video! English is not my main language, because of the fast speaking it sometimes escapes me (listening again does wonders)

[@jbmhr]

You can change the playback speed to 0.75 in the settings at the bottom of a video. English is my only language but this still helps a lot in technical videos.

[@BruceLeroyUK]

You should have 10x your subscriber number. Very useful. Thanks bro.

[@joshrexford]

Means the world my man, so glad the video was helpful!

[@PhotogenicProperties]

Great content..thanks for sharing.

[@paulsmith8438]

Hi I wonder if you could go over t your setup slowly and let me know how you got to these buttons etc. I have a head injury so learning is a little more difficult. I do sport and wildlife and found that tracking to be a huge issue with my R3. Many thanks. Paul

[@Mark-cm5dv]

Absolutely super helpful, thank you so much for doing this video.

[@DAVE_WHITE]

I have to try this tomorrow just found your video I have been shooting the R7 R6 R5 and no real issues until I got the R3 I thought the dam focus was broken We will see how your settings work for me tomorrow..

Hi Josh, thank you so much for the helpful video! I have just started using the R3 beside the R5 and I already love it! What a fast workhorse. One thing I don't understand: When using the tracking AF mode on the R5 I can easily switch between faces/heades with the joystick. On the R3 I saw the arrows to switch between faces once but I don't know how to activate it or how it does exactly work. Can you help me?

[@D4ni3lS4nk3]

good video, thanks for making it and uploading it

[@bcb76]

Very helpful video - thanks!

[@DKTheMac]

Such a lifesaver! These settings also work for the R6 Mark II. No one has made videos about this yet for it either. You’re awesome! Do you use these exact setting for video as well or are they slightly different for video? Will this be in separate video?

[@joshrexford]

SO glad it’s helpful!! And I use pretty similar settings for video, although I tend to gravitate more towards auto-tracking vs setting a spot focus and in video it’s always in continuous/servo!

[@howardholtzman1331]

Great video, but the music in the background is a huge distraction.

[@patrickcallow2888]

Awesome, thank you so much for this.

[@EssexLadOutdoors]

After pressing Af-on, will it then switch back to tracking etc.

[@skypixel74]

Danke Für Deine Erklärungen, du machst tolle Videos! Weißt Du wo man den Spot AF mit der Spot Belichtungsmessung koppeln kann, das ging konnte man bei der DX III machen.

[@janebeautifullight]

Thanks super helpful but where is your mode button if you have used mode for ISO

[@ramprasadsambara]

Good tutorial. However, you haven't elaborated on the button which you have assigned 'recall function'.

[@joshrexford]

I have a whole section specifically about that function in this video: kzbin.info/www/bejne/gGq1dKSrqqaCmbMsi=h5KLd6hVcWdflak5

[@michaellitty8718]

I have what may seem like a beginner question but I'm coming from a video world, working on my flash photography skills. When I want to use a flash in a very dark situation, sometimes the camera will brighten for a second to autofocus before taking the photo with the flash and sometimes it just pops off the photo with the flash without focusing. There doesn't seem to be any rhyme or reason to it. How do I tell the R3 to prefocus before flashing every time?

[@PatARobinson]

Picking up an R3 in a few days-watching this is pumping me up!

[@samuelj.6186]

DSLR guy here... Shooting with 5DMIV and D850... Looking to go mirrorless some time soon... with the r3 or r5, is there no need to back button focus?

[@joshrexford]

There definitely isn't a NEED because the tracking is so fantastic, but I still set up my R3 with a back-button option to allow me a bit more precision when it comes to the focus modes I choose.

[@1jim58]

@@joshrexford, depending on the subject location there may be a situation where back button focus is needed, if you disable the focus function on the shutter release button and use back button focus it allows you to use manual focus for subjects that might have items interfering with focus without the autofocus being enabled when the shutter release is pressed.

[@PatrikJVogel]

Wo hast Du das alles gelernt ? Ich habe die R3 seit einer Woche. Grüße aus Germany

[@soak000]

Hi Josh, firstly, thank you for this tutorial. I have watched this over and over and waiting for the arrival of my R3. I have the 5/6/7 so not totally unfamiliar with mirrorless. I plan on using the R3 for team sports (baseball, basketball, etc.). I am not a fan of BBF but looking at your video, it seems like you have the shutter button programmed to basically enable all kinds of tracking modes. So with spot focusing, does it mean that once I have my spot on the player I want to track, and keeping the shutter button half way pressed, the camera will continue to track using subject detection and focus with AI Servo? Coming from 1DX II that I used for many years, where I basically tracked manually using a small cluster of focus points. Does this make sense? Thanks again.

[@joshrexford]

So glad it's helpful! And yes you're correct - once you have the spot on the player, as long as you have tracking enabled and continuous focus (AF-C) on, you can simply half press hold the shutter and the camera will track the player! Then, as shown in the video, I have my AF-ON button on the back set to a single point/single focus so I can switch back and forth from tracking to a quick focus-and-hold when I need that.

[@soak000]

@@joshrexford Thank you very much for taking time answering my question. I plan on setting it up your way and see how it goes.

[@soak000]

@@joshrexford What did you have * programmed as register/recall previous setting? I use that feature a lot to get to something very specific. I am just curious.

[@joshrexford]

Happy to help! And I actually talk all about that feature in this video here! kzbin.info/www/bejne/gGq1dKSrqqaCmbMsi=Wsxe7-ymAhDmCEa5

[@soak000]

@@joshrexford Thanks!

[@stkuj]

I've been looking at the R5 & R6mkii...why do you feel the R3 is superior?

[@thatperson8586]

What I liked was the sensor. Little to no distortion when panning or fast moving objects are being photographed, silent shutter mode with artificial light is no issue, so no banding or flicker and I really liked the sound of eye af, which I don't use too much TBH.

[@KristineDzendzel]

This is very helpful but you talk so fast I had to keep stopping and rewinding.

[@Pixel_n_Chip]

I like his style of go to the point without talking anything else unrelated. You can change the speed to 0.75X if you want to listen it slowly.

[@Hal_McKinney]

What lens is that you have here?

[@patrickcallow2888]

Looks like the 28-70 RF. Beautiful (and heavy) lens.

[@thatperson8586]

@@patrickcallow2888 Yeah, looks like it. Great lens, but using that on an R3 for 12 hours will break your back.

[@bertnase9933]

This noise in the background is really annoying! Sorry, can't watch it finally...

[@joshrexford]

Fixed that for future videos. Sorry about that.

[@billmckim532]

You repeat yourself a lot

[@_SYDNA_]

Thank you for repeating yourself a lot. There was a lot to absorb here.