I was a happy owner of Elan IIE/EOS 50E, then the camera was stolen. Now I am looking for Elan 7E/EOS 30, but I read about a) problems focusing in low light and b)white AF assist beam instead of IR, which is allegedly distracting for subjects. Since I am shooting lots of concert, is this realy a big problem? How annoying is that white light? This really worries me...

-- Alen Borovicanin (al@gi-zrmk.si), November 24, 2001

Answers

I don't own a 7E, but I do find the white AF assist light annoying. Depending on the concert it might be very inappropriate. It might even get you "asked to leave" from some places.

But most concerts subjects are fairly well lit and you usually aren't close enough for AF assist light to work anyway. The Elan 7E has a custom function that turns it off. You can allways use an external speedlite's AF assist, even without the flash, since the Elan 7E has a custom function that turns that off too.

In low light the Elan IIe has a bit better AF even with out the assit light.

-- Jim Strutz (j.strutz@gci.net), November 25, 2001.

They're *extremely* annoying.I was shooting a day-long kendo competition recently where the officials finally ejected a chump whose Canon or Minolta drew repeated(and unheeded) complaints.Occasional p&s flashes were far less distracting than the incessant, intense winking.This was in a well-lit gym, so at lower light levels, this might buy you a ticket out the door.

-- Gary Watson (cg.watson@sympatico.ca), November 28, 2001.

as jim mentioned. turn the assist off via a custom function. you can also put an external flash on the elan 7 and set a custom function to just use the flash's red autofocus assist light, but not fire the flash. or you could get the expensive wireless transmitter ($200) made for controlling the 550EX and 420EX, which will also give you a red focus assist beam. in the end though, the e7's autofocus does kind of suck in low light. its a shame, cause its such an extremely quiet camera.

if you were a happy owner of the elan 2e, maybe you should just pick up another one. you could likely get a good price on used ones and maybe find new ones at some places too. you could also look at the a2/eos 5. it focusses much better than the e7 in low light, is almost as quiet with shutter noise, and has a red focus assist light (although it won't work with the ones on canon flashes). the eos 5 is a good camera and can be purchased for about the same price as the e7, but be forwarned that the command dial loves to break on this camera.

-- josh (aceofspades002@yahoo.com), December 01, 2001.