Got my new toy! This is arguably the best lens you can get for the Sony APS-C cameras. It also gives me a better general-use lens than my 16mm, which is a bit of a landscape lens.
I now have the Sigma 16mm f/1.4 DC DN and the Sigma 30mm f/1.4 DC DN.
Meanwhile, the brand new Sigma 56mm f/1.4 DC DN launches next week! I’ll have to get that next year. But it’ll round out the group: wide-angle, standard, and telephoto.
Sell me on the Alpha A7 IIK vs the Canon 70D.
My experience with the 70D has been one endless frustration, tbh. I think perhaps 3/4 or more of the Ireland photos were total trash. By the end of the trip I was bracketing every photo because I didn’t trust the camera to do what I thought I was telling it to do. I mean it’s so bad I spent the entire day before leaving practicing taking photos with it, and it still didn’t help.
I mean, sure it’s a me thing, not the camera, but over and over the menu system and logic and the weird autofocus that always picks the foreground, the underexposed photo after underexposed photo, resetting my file save system settings away from RAW over and over and over… ugh.
Not sure what you’re doing with your camera, but on paper the A7II is a way-better camera than the 70D. It’s two years newer (more recent tech), full-frame vs 70’ds APS-C, 5-axis in-body image stabilization, higher-resolution, smaller and lighter, and the A7II was Sony’s top-of-the-line camera when it launched whereas the 70D was a more budget-minded option in the Canon lineup.
I will say that the achilles heel of the Sony cameras (until the A7III and its huge Zebra battery) is the battery life. I’ve left my Canon DSLR “on” for weeks, and I can pick it up and shoot hundreds of photos. That’s because DSLRs don’t consume any power until they’re tasked with actually focusing/shooting. Sony mirrrorless cameras suck power like crazy when they’re on, especially if you have the screen on. But even with the screen off, they’re always analyzing whatever is coming into the sensor. But you can always turn them off when you’re not shooting, or buy more batteries.
If you don’t have a huge investment in Canon, I’d do a lot more research into the A7II.
Also, if you’re shooting people, Sony cameras have an eye-autofocus function that identifies and locks onto eyeballs instantly. Razor sharp portraits.
It’s typical across all mirrorless cameras, but Sony didn’t help by having a smallish battery. And because a lot of pros like to use Sony cameras for video, that really exacerbated the battery issues.
But @Enidigm, that might be another reason to switch. Because they have no mirror, mirrorless cameras use electronic view finders to display what the sensor is seeing. So you can actually see what is in focus, or how bright the exposure is before you shoot. It’s really cool, because you see what your adjustments are doing in real-time. For instance, crank up the shutter speed, and the image gets darker, and vice versa.
I went with my nephews and nieces on Halloween this year, and I put my aperture to 1.4 and ramped up the ISO, and using my camera was almost like having night vision goggles. It was dark outside, but look through the viewfinder and everything was practically daytime.
I don’t have it with me but i tend to use auto-ISO and select for aperture or shutter speed.
There’s something about the difference between operation from the eyepiece to the screen, and that many/most of the functions in one aren’t reproduced or available in the other.
I mean, the problem me, just to be clear.
I will say, to be fair to Olympus, that the EPL1 Pen mirrorless camera i still have from a few years ago has great standby battery. I just threw it into the car before heading up to Santa Fe and it’s still at 90-100% of battery months after charging it (i’m using a 20mm prime with it, which is great for sharp photos, but not for long distance photography in the mountains).
After i wrote my post above i think i determined what i need is not so much a camera that’s good in the abstract but one that i can use. I did try the A6300 at Best Buy today and was kind of blown away by the autofocus. I literally complained to family (yes) about how to shoot in sharp focus with the 70D i had to set it up on a tripod, zoom in normally, than use the “digital zoom” on the screen to go to 10x past the optical zoom, than use the focus ring to focus manually.
I played with the A6300 with the 135mm lens, and when i turned the focus ring it automatically zoomed in to max digital zoom in the electronic viewfinder. Honestly i almost walked out the door with it right then. But apparently the A6300 is APS-C and doesn’t have in body stabilization. OTOH… that was a nice lens, and it records in 4K.
Here are a couple shots from the 70D
Action photos taken with default “action” photography preset.
… and here is the Alpha 7 II
Nice! You got a great camera!
And that’s just the kit lens, right? There are some fantastic lenses out there that deliver gorgeous photos.
Canon rolling out the prosumer variant of their new mirrorless line
This thread popped up at a great time. I was looking to purchase a very nice gift for a certain lady someone who wants a better camera. I thought mirrorless, especially ones with easier operation would fit the bill.
I landed on both some Wirecutter recommendations as well as those of a coworker. Both of these fit the bill with the Olympus coming in a bit more expensive but obviously with more of a mid-level offering than just a beginner fit. Any thoughts between these two if any of you know?
Or
I guess this might be the opportune thread to bump…
So, I noticed that the Sony A6500 is discounted for Prime Day down to €949 over here. And am thinking about that.
I currently own a Canon 70D. Liking it overall, but I also think the auto-focus is not as reliable as I’d like it to be when using my favourite lense (Sigma 30mm, f1.4), so I always end up taking 2-3 photos just to be sure.
The obvious upgrade when switching to the Sony would be the more compact size, meaning I’d also be more inclined to carry it with me. Will it also be an upgrade over the 70D in every other technical aspect, e.g. lowlight performance when used with a comparable lens? (Low-light performance would be very important to me since I tend to go for available-light photos whenever possible.) Any downsides?
The immediate disadvantage I can see would be the battery performance. With the 70D I can shoot all day and easily up to several thousand photos without having to worry about it dying on me, whereas the A6500 is good for several hundred, i.e. I’d definitely need to buy a second or third battery.
Battery isn’t that much of an issue if you’re just mindful to switch off whenever you’re not shooting. I bought the Ravpower batteries and pack along extra batteries, but the number of times I actually needed to swap batteries during the day I can count on two fingers.
Keep in mind the replacement for the A6500 may come very soon. Sony just released the A6400 earlier this year, and it’s superior in autofocus speed, tracking, and performance. It also doesn’t have the overheat issues when recording at 4K. The only reason it’s technically the A6300 replacement and not the A6500 replacement is because it lacks internal stabilization.
Still, I love my A6500. If you want portability, go for the Sony lenses. I love the Sigma primes, but they’re huge compared to the equivalent Sony lenses.
I also love hiking with my A6500. It’s really easy to carry, especially with this.
I love Sony mirrorless cameras and batteries are not an issue when I shoot hundreds of pictures in a day. But if you actually shoot thousands of pictures a day, then you’re going to need a spare battery or two.
Sony eats battery in standby though. I seem to only get a couple hundred photos in a day with the A7 II before it dies. It’s forced me to obsessively worry the on-off switch all day long.
My A6000 drains the battery when switched off so now i remove the battery when not using.
A full 100% charge did me 410 photos and 10 mins of video the other day, and that includes switching it off constantly.
Has anyone tried this “pixel shift” technology for ultra-high resolution photography? Much like a certain poster chases the perfect laptop, i’m always chasing the perfect camera and my current camera doesn’t have this feature.
Not me. You need at least a Sony 7RIII to do Pixel-Shift, and I have a 6500.
Unfortunately Sony has taken the success of their mirrorless cameras and instead of holding price constant and improving features over time, they’re holding features constant and associating newer features with higher prices. So the Sony camera i got a year or two ago is still the same price as when i got it then, and the higher end Sony bodies with more features are just much more expensive.
However i noticed the Olympus line had this feature as well under a different name. But it appears to just increase effective megapixels by about 2.5x. So even a high end Olympus camera using this technique produces an image that doesn’t even have that same mp as a high end Sony out of the box. Those high end Sony’s can produce something like a 200mp image.
I have an Olympus E-M1 Mark II, which has this feature. However, my version can’t be done handheld, which limits its usefulness, and it doesn’t really work with motion since it’s combining multiple exposures (even moon shots won’t be sharp). Also, I haven’t found many occasions where I needed the extra pixels – for most purposes the 20 megapixels on my camera are enough.
However, it does really work, and it does look impressive. If you tend to do landscapes on a tripod, it’s pretty awesome.
I thought Pixel Shift couldn’t be done handheld because it’s literally just shifting the sensor over one pixel each direction, the combining the results. That’s an impossible amount of steadiness required for handheld.