As a journalist writing photography news for over a decade it takes something rather special to make a new camera feature stand out. I must admit, I can’t but involuntarily roll my eyes when another new camera model surpasses the old one with little more than a few more megapixels to sing and shout about – it’s not quite the photographic revolution I’m hoping for when I see the press release land in my inbox.
However, two features that did genuinely get me very excited in recent times both came from Canon with its Canon EOS R1 and Canon EOS R5 Mark II flagships were launched in tandem back in November 2024.
Both sports powerhouses were launched around the time of the 2024 summer Olympics to show off what the flagships could do. Two of my favorite features that you’ll find on both the Canon EOS R5 Mark II and its bigger brother the EOS R1, is Action Priority and Register Face Priority, let me explain why…
Action Priority is a mode that uses AI algorithms trained on fast-paced sports where a ball travels between players quickly, specifically for three ball sports: Basketball, Volleyball and Soccer (or football as we call it here in the UK). These algorithms will be a godsend to professional sports photographers regularly taking photos of any of the three aforementioned sports as it can accurately predict where the ball is going to be in the frame and I’ve extensively tested it too and been seriously impressed by the results.
Canon’s Action Priority can detect tackles, strikes and passing in football, spiking in volleyball and even alleyoops in basketball. While it’s not perfect, it’s infinitely better than I could do with older autofocusing technology and it’s a great sign of where this sort of technology will go in the future – it’ll only get better!
The second feature is called Register Face Priority and works particularly well when paired with the previously mentioned Action Priority. Register Face Priority allows you to register up to 10 faces at a time, either using a reference on your memory card or by taking a fresh picture through the Register Face Priority menu. You can then rank these 10 people in order of importance – brilliant if you want to focus on your own kids playing on the pitch, star players – hell, it’s even perfect for weddings where you can make the bride and groom the priority for focus and close friends and family after them.
Lastly, there’s a third feature both cameras have called Pre-Capture, which helps you catch the shot even if you didn’t press the shutter button fast enough, as the cameras are always recording a buffer of images to give you a bit of a safety net in those fast, high stakes moments. All three of these features combined make Canon’s EOS R1 and EOS R5 Mark II pretty unstoppable when it comes to ball sports.
You might also like…
Want to know more? Check out our article If I had to start my camera setup from scratch tomorrow, this is the body and lens I'd buy.
You must confirm your public display name before commenting
Please logout and then login again, you will then be prompted to enter your display name.
