Normally, I will not use any EOS model in its Program AE mode for shooting motorsport events, especially those involving the racing cars and motorcycles in action as the camera tends to choose a much higher shutter speed after taking into account the brightness of the shooting condition, the ISO speed of the film and the lens' focal length. I broke this rule of mine when testing the EOS-1v during the Malaysian leg of the 2000 season of the FIM World Motorcycling Championship in April. And did so again in the AFOS championship with the EOS 5 and EF 75-300mm IS USM zoom lens. Continuous sequence shots of a race car First shot Second shot     Third shot Fourth shot During one of the races in the AFOS, I remembered that the EOS 5, like any of its EOS siblings, allowed the user to shift the camera's suggested setting either way via the Main Input Dial to get the preferred shutter speed or aperture value. The original setting by the camera was at 1/500 sec. when the focal length of the EF 75-300m IS USM set at its 300mm position. By turning the Main Input Dial, I was able to shift the shutter speed down to a manageable 1/180 sec. (EOS 5 shifts in half-stop increments) required for some of the panning shots. The above 4-sequence photos are among the successive shots when the EOS 5 was used to capture the action in its Program AE mode. The EF 75-300mm IS USM zoom, being the first of Canon's lenses to offer Image Stabilizing feature, is not equipped with Mode 2 required for panning purposes when shooting moving subjects like those in motorsports. For the action shots with the EOS 5, the IS feature of the lens was switched off. If it were switched ON, the lens would think that camera shake was present when used for panning shots and would adjust accordingly to compensate, and this would result in even worse pictures. For the next issue of this column, the EOS 5 will be tested on how well it can adjust to the shooting conditions present when used with the Evaluative metering in conjunction with the auto exposure Shutter-priority AE (Tv) mode. Text and photos by Philip Chong. Copyright 2000 by Canon Marketing (M) Sdn Bhd << Back to Main . 1 . 2 . 3 . 4 .