5 Sharpen your burst mode skills
Continuous drive mode will increase your chances of success
The light you capture on your sensor is always fleeting, but in some situations it’s more fleeting than others! With a landscape or a static portrait, for example, you may have a relatively relaxed window of opportunity to catch the moment. This might be only a few seconds when the sun breaks through the clouds, but anyone can push a shutter button if they have enough time to react.
When it comes to much faster action – whether it’s sport or wildlife – that reaction time often needs to be much quicker! You may have just a millisecond to get the shot so there are ways you can use the technology built into your camera to help you grab that perfect moment. When faced with a fast-moving subject, make sure you have the right Drive Mode selected. Your camera will offer you various Drive Modes to choose from, and the default setting will be to take one shot each time you press the shutter button. But for rapid action you need to use high-speed continuous shooting, so the camera keeps firing as long as you have the shutter button pressed down and the AF locked on.
A combination of continuous AF (AI Servo or AF-C) and continuous shooting is aways your best option here. However, it’s not simply a case of pointing the lens and keeping the shutter pressed. Instead, try to shoot in short bursts of 5-10 frames, and time these to maximise your chance of achieving critical focus.