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Another false dawn for Sony A6100?


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You should be able to get a good deal on an a6000 John, but I would miss the level indicator and might miss the higher resolution viewfinder. I had a brief play with an a6000 in a shop, but was unable to select the magnified view.

 

I'll see what the reviews have to say about the a6100. Pixel densities are continuing to increase, yet dynamic range etc seem also to get better. The files would eat more disc space, but there's more scope for cropping.

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You should be able to get a good deal on an a6000 John, but I would miss the level indicator and might miss the higher resolution viewfinder. I had a brief play with an a6000 in a shop, but was unable to select the magnified view.

 

I'll see what the reviews have to say about the a6100. Pixel densities are continuing to increase, yet dynamic range etc seem also to get better. The files would eat more disc space, but there's more scope for cropping.

 

By "magnified view" do you mean the manual focus assist?

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Yes,I use mainly manual focus lenses, and my first move is always to take a peek at the magnified view. I guess that I should have dialed in manual focus, when the focus assistance would have kicked in, but the menus are different on the a6000.

 

There is a rumour that, despite its lower resolution, the a6000 viewfinder is better in some respects to that fitted to the NEX6/7, but I would want to be sure that it is good enough for manual focus before splashing the cash.

 

Another, quite different, option for me is to use a Canon auto focus adapter and my Canon 24-105 lens. A Chinese made auto focus adapter has just come onto the market for around £50. If it's any use it might be worth experimenting with for that kind of money. The 24_105 suffers from distortion and CA, but my copy is sharp across the zoom range on a FF camera, so should perform well on the crop sensor.

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Yes,I use mainly manual focus lenses, and my first move is always to take a peek at the magnified view. I guess that I should have dialed in manual focus, when the focus assistance would have kicked in, but the menus are different on the a6000.

 

There is a rumour that, despite its lower resolution, the a6000 viewfinder is better in some respects to that fitted to the NEX6/7, but I would want to be sure that it is good enough for manual focus before splashing the cash.

 

Another, quite different, option for me is to use a Canon auto focus adapter and my Canon 24-105 lens. A Chinese made auto focus adapter has just come onto the market for around £50. If it's any use it might be worth experimenting with for that kind of money. The 24_105 suffers from distortion and CA, but my copy is sharp across the zoom range on a FF camera, so should perform well on the crop sensor.

 

I use the magnified view (Manual focus assist) all the time with my old manual focus lenses. While a real boon, Sony's "focus peaking" isn't always 100% accurate, I find.

 

CA definitely can be a real problem with legacy lenses. Sometimes I can't get rid of it all and end up ditching the occasional image. Actually, I tend to put the manual lenses on my 14 MP NEX-3, which doesn't even have a viewfinder. I've sold a lot of images taken with that little camera, including one yesterday. The original Sony SEL18-55 lens still works fine for me on the NEX-6. My copy is sharp across the frame at mid focal lengths and CA is not an issue. Not sure what I would do with 36 MP. Sounds to me like it might be typical Sony overkill.

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I would agree that the contrast detect feature is not entirely reliable, sometimes you get false positives, so a magnified look is preferable. I do use it if the camera is at an inconvenient height to use the viewfinder, and if there is a strong clear pattern of red appearing as I move the focus, it's normally OK.

 

Some, but not all, of my older lenses do have a bit of a problem with CA, but so far I've been able to deal with it in Lightroom. The worst offender by far is my new Rokinon 12mm f2.  It's not a problem in every shot, but high contrast zones to the edge of the frame are very prone.

 

Re the new camera, I would have preferred a really clean 24 MP sensor rather than the 36 that appears to be on offer, but let's see what the pundits have to say about it. I recently took a series of shots with my Canon 5D11 and I was glad to be able to crop quite drastically, the extra few MP, compared to the NEX6, came in quite handy.

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