corrieuys Posted June 28, 2017 Share Posted June 28, 2017 Hi there! Im looking to buy the Sony A6500, but I can't seem to find some info I'm looking for. 1. I'm currently shooting video with the ancient 5Dmk3. How does it compare in low light? On the 5d, once you go past 3200 iso the color noise becomes unbearable. Denoising does help, but the underlying footage is muddy. I know the sony has a much sharper image, so at least if it's as good in low light, it will be a step forward. 2. Does it have 1:1 digital crop on the sensor for shooting in HD? For instance, to double the focal length of your final shot. 3. If it has this 1:1 crop, does autofocus still work in this mode? Thanks! Corrie Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Administrators Andrew Reid Posted June 28, 2017 Administrators Share Posted June 28, 2017 It's better in low light than the 5D Mark III, so ISO 6400 and even 12,800 you can get to look pretty good, but only in 4K. The 1080p mode is worse than the 5D Mark III. So think of the A6500 as a 4K camera only. There is no 1:1 crop mode for HD. But you can achieve this in post with the 4K by cropping out a 1920 x 1080 centre window. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deadcode Posted June 28, 2017 Share Posted June 28, 2017 4 hours ago, corrieuys said: 2. Does it have 1:1 digital crop on the sensor for shooting in HD? For instance, to double the focal length of your final shot. 3. If it has this 1:1 crop, does autofocus still work in this mode? Thanks! Corrie There is a lossless digital zoom in both 1080p and 4K. In 1080p it's garbage, but in 4K 1x-2x zoom is stepless, and perfect quality. In 2x mode the noise kicks in at 2 stops lower ISO values (1:1 sensor crop instead of full sensor oversampling) , so at ISO1600 things starts to get noisy. BUT the rolling shutter is much better in 2x AF perfectly works with digital zoom too, just tested yesterday, with 50mm F1.8 OSS in 1,7x (so FF equialent roughly 125mm F4,5) , facetracking worked perfectly with a walking couple. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul Cryer Posted June 28, 2017 Share Posted June 28, 2017 I very quickly found that shooting anything other than 4K on an A6500 is a bad idea. The 1080 image is soft. Low light is decent enough though, I've been to 6400. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
noone Posted June 28, 2017 Share Posted June 28, 2017 If it is like the FF E mount cameras then it can do variable digital zoom to either 2x (clear image zoom) or even up to 4 times (which they just call digital zoom). Past 2x it will start falling apart but my experience with Clear zoom is that it is quite good for both video and stills and pretty close to being lossless (and especially at lower magnifications). You could use it on an APSC sensor camera to remove vignetting with smaller sensor lenses. You do lose some functions with it and can only use it for video or jpegs, It means you can use a fast prime as a short zoom for instance. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
corrieuys Posted June 29, 2017 Author Share Posted June 29, 2017 Thanks for all the feedback everyone. Its good to know about the clear zoom. Its great that it works in 4k too, as it means I can get a pretty decent overall zoom out of the shot if I crop to HD, which is my final resolution anyway. Noted about the HD quality though. Ive heard its pretty horrific. Lets hope it gets fixed with a firmware update. Im looking to get the 16-70mm f4 zeiss lens. But Ive seen the Sony has a G 18-105 f4 lens for almost half the price. I dont expect it to be as sharp as the zeiss. Can anyone give a rough comparison whether or not it is worth it? Would the autofocus respond as well as with the faster, newer lenses? The zeiss should be sufficient, combined with the clear zoom and post cropping. It comes down to lens performance itself, and whether it will be too much of a step down? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ade towell Posted June 29, 2017 Share Posted June 29, 2017 I tried the 16-70 on the a6300 - problem is if you're wanting to go handheld or just move the camera, anything above 50mm is going to induce pretty severe rolling shutter. Because of this I went for the cheapy kit lens 16-50 for wide shots and predominantly use 35mm 1.8 oss for everything else - and as mentioned the clear image zoom function at 2x makes the 35mm a 70mm with less rolling shutter than the Zeiss 16-70 at 70mm would be. There is a little noise at higher iso but in video mode at least it is quite remarkable how little sharpness is lost with the clear image zoom Also if you're going to use lenses with image stabiliser I'd save your pennies and get a lightly used a6300 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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