Pre-shooting: a unique advantage
In addition to 40fps shooting, the Canon EOS R6 Mark II has a 30fps RAW burst mode with pre-shooting. When this is enabled, the camera starts buffering images when the shutter button is half-pressed, then saves the contents of the buffer – up to half a second's worth of images – when the shutter button is fully pressed. It's the perfect option for shooting unpredictable subjects and in situations where you can't see the subject until the last moment.
Teddy took advantage of this function when photographing Louise-Anna Ferguson in a bike park. To get a dynamic shot of her mid-jump, Teddy set up at ground level underneath a wooden ramp. While he could hear the bike approaching the ramp, he was unable to see Louse-Anna until she entered the frame.
"She was riding quite fast, and I was shooting blind, so it was super helpful to have the pre-capture," he says. "Even if I could potentially have made the shot without this function, it gave me the confidence that even if I didn't press the shutter button at the right moment, I could go back half a second."
Having the pre-capture function available along with the enhanced Dual Pixel CMOS AF II subject detection and tracking gave Teddy more flexibility to frame the shot. He wanted to freeze Louise-Anna in the middle of a clearing between the trees above him, something which the camera's new Flexible Zone AF made even easier.
This function enables the size and shape of the Zone AF frame to be customised. It allowed Teddy to create an autofocus zone that matched the area that Louise-Anna would be jumping into and ensured that the camera wouldn't lock onto other parts of the scene. The EOS R6 Mark II detected and tracked Louise-Anna's head, even though she was wearing a helmet and mask.