Our past stalks us like a leopard. One day it will ambush our present and kill our future. Until then, we only see glimpses of it. We cannot photograph it, because it hides behind the foliage of time.
But time is changing. Cameras from the future can now travel back to the past.
Last weekend, I time-traveled with my Canon R5 Mark II. With the pre-capture mode, I photographed the leopard that's been stalking me my whole life.
By activating pre-capture mode, I could photograph everything half a second before I pressed the shutter – 15 images of 45-megapixel, raw past.
This method works exceptionally well for action photography. But what I discovered while using it was that it doesn't have to be moments of incredible action, but could be a leopard merely licking its lips or glimpsing up when a bird flies past – moments you register only after it happened. With pre-capture you get a (half a) second chance to capture that decisive moment.
With this mode, you can convert "Sigh, THAT would have been a brilliant photograph." into "Gotcha!" moments.
While the Canon R5 Mark II isn't the first to offer this feature—I've used similar modes on my Panasonic GH6 and Canon R6 Mark II—it's the first to make time travel feel effortless and intuitive.
But there's a catch... Time-traveling is expensive.
After the time-travel weekend, scrolling through leopard images in my office, I found that for every half second of time travel, it cost me several minutes scrolling through ridiculous amounts of identical images. To utilize time from the past, I realized, you must buy fuel from the future – the fuel being our most precious resource: time itself.
But I, for one, don't mind paying the price. I don't mind sifting through the past for that elusive leopard image – the one whose breath I've always felt on the back of my neck. Now, for the first time, I can travel back to the past and photograph the leopards that's been stalking me my entire life.
1. Pre-Capture Configuration: The R5 Mark II offers extensive customization options. While I traditionally configured my R5 Mark I with C1 for portraits, C2 for high action, and C3 for birds in flight, this camera allows for more advanced setups. For instance, you can program one of these C-modes as a pre-capture option. However, the need for 'time travel' often arises suddenly and unexpectedly, leaving little time to switch modes. The way I got around this issue was to assign a custom button as a 'brake.' When pressed along with the shutter during 'portrait' photography, it doesn't take 15 identical images of a past I don't want. But when the action really happens, then I can quickly time-travel back to when the action takes place...
2. Eye-Controlled AF: Despite the hype surrounding the eye-controlled AF, I've chosen not to use it. I found that locking the focus onto the subject in the center of the viewfinder is effective in tracking any subject. I might be convinced otherwise in the future, but up until now I don't see a need for it.
3. Video Capabilities: The R5 Mark II shines in video mode. I've set C3 in the video mode to 120fps 4K, enabling easy slow-motion capture straight from still mode by pressing the video record button. In video mode you can now also do pre-recorded video of either 3 or 5 seconds, which is like time travel in first class.
There are many ways to set your camera, and not one of them is perfect. But I found that most of my photo-safari clients have one thing in common: They don't have their cameras set in a way that makes it easier for them to take brilliant images. The new generation cameras are so intelligent, that if you set it up correctly (i.e. not in Manual Mode), you don't need to worry about exposure or ISO or shutter speed or other settings, and only need to focus on what's important - pressing the shutter at the precise moment that the magic happens. (or in the Canon R5 Mark 2's case, up to half a second after the magic has happened....)
www.heinrichvandenberg.com
www.hphphotosafaris.com
www.hphpublishing.co.za
© 2024 All Rights Reserved
