Camera advice

Drew_TNBD

The Fuji video performance is decent. My father-in-law works for Fuji and when I was in Japan I looked at the Fuji XT-20, XT-2, Panasonic GH4, and the Sony a6500.

What swung it was the Fuji stuff felt a bit tiny in my hands, the Panasonic was an MFT sensor which I wasn't keen on, and I managed to get a used a6500 for £800ish, which was a very good price. I then picked up two Nikon lenses for £130ish (55mm 3.5f Macro lens and a 50mm f1.4) and grabbed an adapter. All in all I came in at under £1100 for a very good setup for film and photography. Price was too hard to ignore.

The only issue being that I had to download a hack for the a6500 to give me the English language option!!

holnrew

Do I really need the snazzy features as a beginner? How long will it take before I feel like an entry level DSLR isn't good enough?

I think I'm ruling out Fuji based on expense.

ThePrettyDamned

holnrew said:

Do I really need the snazzy features as a beginner? How long will it take before I feel like an entry level DSLR isn't good enough?

I think I'm ruling out Fuji based on expense.

Although Sony is deemed king of low light, that's only in full frame sensors. 

However, what sort of night photography do you do? If star trails, iso isn't that important as you just set long exposures. If you're freezing things and need shutter speed on your side, perhaps different. 

If you have a 24mp crop sensor (I chose that as I know it, I shoot with a d7200 which has a 24mp sensor) and you export a photo shot at iso 12,800 to 6mp you get a great quality shot. Because reducing size averages pixels, the noise is largely eliminated. 6mp does decent prints, and is bigger than most websites will display (squarespace is limited to 2500 pixels on the longest side for example - a square would be about 6mp).

@Drew_TNBD has made a good point - he liked how the Sony camera felt, as well as the features. That's a big deal - as much as I love the fuji kit, when I compared to an a7ii I preferred the feel of the Sony. Then compared to a nikon d750 and the d750 trounced everything for handling and matched the a7ii for image quality in any light. It's all horses for courses, and it's a good idea to test some. Today I held an entry level canon and struggled to use it... I am too used to the nikon layout, and it's only subtly different! 

@Drew_TNBD that's one hell of a deal! Even if you did need to hack it (lol). 

Rocker

Thread hijack, apologies and all that but as this is a camera thread ----

Mrs Rocker has a compact film camera that is showing signs of having reached the designed obsolescent stage and anyway film processing is getting harder to find.  So I checked the interweb and, without actually trying them in a shop, am looking at 

Canon PowerShot SC620 HS

Also 

Canon PowerShot SX720 HS

The 620 sells for €250, the 720 for €350.  Reviews seem to suggest the 720 is the better camera, well they would wouldn't they , but issues like physical size and ease of use come into the frame.  The 620 looks like it will easily slip into a bag so it could all come down to that.  The oft suggested Fuji X E2 sells for close to €1K in Ireland, so it is priced out of our league.

holnrew

ThePrettyDamned said:

holnrew said:

Do I really need the snazzy features as a beginner? How long will it take before I feel like an entry level DSLR isn't good enough?

I think I'm ruling out Fuji based on expense.

Although Sony is deemed king of low light, that's only in full frame sensors. 

However, what sort of night photography do you do? If star trails, iso isn't that important as you just set long exposures. If you're freezing things and need shutter speed on your side, perhaps different. 

If you have a 24mp crop sensor (I chose that as I know it, I shoot with a d7200 which has a 24mp sensor) and you export a photo shot at iso 12,800 to 6mp you get a great quality shot. Because reducing size averages pixels, the noise is largely eliminated. 6mp does decent prints, and is bigger than most websites will display (squarespace is limited to 2500 pixels on the longest side for example - a square would be about 6mp).

@Drew_TNBD has made a good point - he liked how the Sony camera felt, as well as the features. That's a big deal - as much as I love the fuji kit, when I compared to an a7ii I preferred the feel of the Sony. Then compared to a nikon d750 and the d750 trounced everything for handling and matched the a7ii for image quality in any light. It's all horses for courses, and it's a good idea to test some. Today I held an entry level canon and struggled to use it... I am too used to the nikon layout, and it's only subtly different! 

@Drew_TNBD that's one hell of a deal! Even if you did need to hack it (lol). 

Yeah i think I'm gonna have to take a trip to Cardiff next week

RaymondLin

It entirely depends what kind of stuff you are shooting and your quality requirement. I follow
a bunch of youtubers and some just use a canon G7X and it's perfecrly fine for what it is.  Casey Nestat used to use a Canon 80D because of the flip screen mainly.  Lots of people now uses the Sony A7Rii because of the IQ and size for a FF set up (even though the lenses are hardly small or cheap).

thomasross20

If doing YouTube vids defo get one that can have a mic connect. 
Yeah, you can clap hands and sync but it's just an extra faff.
TBH my camera is on auto mode 99.99% of the time.
It's been great the last few months for high quality photos and videos. It's a Canon something or other. 

Drew_TNBD

holnrew said:

Do I really need the snazzy features as a beginner? How long will it take before I feel like an entry level DSLR isn't good enough?

I think I'm ruling out Fuji based on expense.

holnrew said:

Do I really need the snazzy features as a beginner? How long will it take before I feel like an entry level DSLR isn't good enough?

I think I'm ruling out Fuji based on expense.

Well like i originally said, a camera phone is good enough for beginners.

If you're interested I have a Canon 650D that I was going to keep as a backup. But if you're in the market, you could buy that for a cheap price. It's a great beginner camera and has two lenses with it. The kit lens and a nifty fifty style pancake lens.

holnrew

Thanks for the offer, but after playing around today I've gone for a Nikon, they just feel right. Only the D3300 but I put the money saved over a better model toward a 35mm lens. Bought from John Lewis so I've got a good warranty too.

I should think that's plenty to play with for the next couple of years!

stickyfiddle

Great choice! Spending money on lenses is always a better long term bet than bodies anyway.

holnrew

Thanks. That's​ what I was thinking, they don't really go out of date or depreciate as much.

RaymondLin

holnrew said:

Thanks. That's​ what I was thinking, they don't really go out of date or depreciate as much.

You got it right.

If you buy the right lenses, some of them go UP in price.

Think...Canon 50/1.0, Canon 1200mm. Canon 200/1.8

They are expensive lenses in the first place but to buy one now you are looking at silly money.  The latter 2 on the list are consider unicorns, not many around.

ThePrettyDamned

Great shout! You'll get ace shots from it. It's almost the same sensor as in my camera and it's absolutely fabulous compared to my old d200. And the d200 took great shots! 

The 35mm dx is small, sharp and fun. You'll love it. Happy snapping! 

holnrew

Thanks guys. I'm looking forward to taking some right shit pics over the next few days

One thing i noticed is that all the EVFs I tried, bar the one in the lumix G7, seemed to flicker a lot, I'm not sure I could get on with one. Is it something that varies person to person?

RaymondLin

holnrew said:

Thanks guys. I'm looking forward to taking some right shit pics over the next few days

One thing i noticed is that all the EVFs I tried, bar the one in the lumix G7, seemed to flicker a lot, I'm not sure I could get on with one. Is it something that varies person to person?

The best EVF i think is in the Fuji X-T2, with over 2 million dots and with the grip in boost mode can do 100fps refresh rate.

ThePrettyDamned

holnrew said:

Thanks guys. I'm looking forward to taking some right shit pics over the next few days

One thing i noticed is that all the EVFs I tried, bar the one in the lumix G7, seemed to flicker a lot, I'm not sure I could get on with one. Is it something that varies person to person?

I hadn't noticed on the fuji second gen (eg xt1, xe2), Sony a7ii or Panasonic gx80. 

But it could be a sensitivity thing maybe. Did you try them indoors? If so, you could have been witnessing the flicker of fluorescent lighting. 

Don't worry. Take crap pictures. Then take more. Then keep taking them until things start getting better and you'll grow fast. 

olafgarten

holnrew said:

Thanks guys. I'm looking forward to taking some right shit pics over the next few days

One thing i noticed is that all the EVFs I tried, bar the one in the lumix G7, seemed to flicker a lot, I'm not sure I could get on with one. Is it something that varies person to person?

I have a Sony NEX6, haven't noticed any flicker. It's probably due to fluorescent light.

holnrew

Ah that makes sense. 

Drew_TNBD

If you're in video mode, then your shutter speed needs to be roughly twice the speed of your frame-rate. Otherwise lights could cause flickering.

ThePrettyDamned

holnrew said:

Ah that makes sense. Fluorescents here flicker at 1/50th of a second. So use a shutter speed of 1/50th or 1/25th - they flicker between green and purple so if you don't allow it a multiple of full cycles, you'll get partly green images. 

The worst kind of lighting. You can gel flashes green to match, but your shutter speed always has to sync with the cycle. Hate them. Even if you match the cycle they have a habit of wrecking skin tones to the point where you need to use individual curve channels to correct them. 

Avoid fluorescent tubes basically!