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Hands-on with the Canon EOS R5

09 Jul

Hands-on with the Canon EOS R5

Canon has just announced the EOS R5, a 45MP full-frame mirrorless camera that we have to confess we’re pretty excited about. It’s the spiritual successor to the company’s 5D-series of do-everything DSLRs, and offers a mix of speed, resolution, autofocus capability and video features that will appeal to a lot of different types of photographers.

We’ve been fortunate enough to get our hands on a pre-production model leading up to the official release, so follow along and get an up-close look at Canon’s newest high-end mirrorless camera.

Build and feel

The EOS R5 feels very well-built. Its bottom and front plates feel metallic, and the other parts of the body feel more plasticky. We suspect this is to ensure a better signal for the camera’s built-in 2.4 / 5.0Ghz Wi-Fi antennas, and frankly, polycarbonate could prove to be more durable in the long run.

Canon claims the EOS R5 is sealed to the same degree as an EOS 5D Mark IV; no official figures are given, but there are visible gaskets around possible points of moisture or dust ingress. Overall, we think the R5 succeeds at feeling solid while being appreciably smaller and lighter than an average high-end DSLR.

New sensor

At the heart of the camera is an all-new Canon-designed-and-manufactured sensor, and its 45MP of resolution makes the EOS R5 the highest-resolution mirrorless camera Canon has to offer. Canon claims that increases in readout speed mean that rolling shutter won’t be a major issue if you want to use the silent electronic shutter (more on that in a moment). Canon also claims that EOS R5 should offer around one stop of dynamic range improvement over the EOS R. Of course, we’ll be looking at this more closely when we have a final copy.

The shutter

As mentioned on the previous slide, the EOS R5 has a silent electronic shutter that can shoot bursts of images at up to 20fps with full autofocus and autoexposure. You can always switch to the mechanical shutter – shown here – if you’re in a situation where artificial lighting could cause banding. You can also choose whether you want an electronic first curtain shutter (EFCS), to minimize any chance of shutter shock, or a fully mechanical shutter to prevent truncating your out-of-focus highlights if you’re using high shutter speeds.

Using either EFCS or the mechanical shutter limits you to 12fps with AF and AE. A deep buffer means you’ll approach 100 shots per burst before the camera slows down, regardless of your image quality settings.

Also visible in this view are the front custom button, which defaults to depth-of-field preview, and the cover for a remote port.

In-body stabilizer

Resting behind the R5’s shutter and supporting the new sensor is Canon’s first-ever in-body image stabilizer. With the right lenses, Canon claims it offers a jaw-dropping eight stops of shake correction, and the lowest rating with current RF lenses is still an impressive six stops. We’re particularly anxious to see how well it works to stabilize video footage, since video is another one of the EOS R5’s standout features…

8K video capture, rear screen and controls

With few exceptions, video shooters tend to prefer fully articulating touchscreens; and it’s a good thing the R5 has one, because it looks to be a serious video shooting tool. Capable of up to DCI 8K/30p capture, including in Raw, the video specs are the best we’ve yet seen (of course, we’ll have to wait until it’s tested to know for certain).

Otherwise, around the back of the camera is a well thought-out array of controls that will be pretty familiar for existing Canon shooters. Of particular note is that the R5, along with the R6, are the first RF-mount cameras with AF joysticks and a rear jog dial, both of which are staples of Canon’s higher-end DSLRs. The AF-ON button is a bit small for our tastes, but is in a good spot.

Thoughtfully, Canon’s also added menu options for the behavior of the eye sensor below the viewfinder. You can set it so that if the screen is flipped out, the eye sensor is deactivated, so you won’t accidentally trigger it if you’re shooting stills or video from the hip. Conversely, you can make sure it’s always enabled, if for example you want to be able to check critical focus at a moment’s notice for video shooting. And speaking of that viewfinder…

OLED electronic viewfinder

The EOS R5 comes with a 5.76M-dot viewfinder that uses an OLED panel and offers 0.76x magnification. It has a default refresh rate of 60fps, but you can boost it to 120fps in the menus; doing so will give you a more lifelike view of the world, and overall, the EOS R5 gives a great viewfinder experience. For glasses-wearers, the eye point is approximately 23mm.

Top plate controls

The EOS R5 comes with a top plate control scheme that’s all-but-identical to that of the older EOS R. This means you get an easy-to-read OLED display of settings that you can choose to light up if needed, and a mode button that you press before turning the rear dial to change your exposure mode. Incidentally, if you want to swap to video shooting, you hit the ‘INFO’ button on the rear of the camera to do so.

Everything else is pretty straightforward; the movie recording and M-Fn buttons can be customized in the menus, the deep grip is comfortable and your index finger will fall naturally over the shutter button. It’s a comfortable camera to hold.

Ports and connectivity

Along the side of the camera are a full suite of ports. For video shooters, you get headphone and microphone jacks for audio and a micro HDMI port for video and audio output. Micro HDMI ports tend to be a lot more fragile than the larger options, but then again the EOS R5 offers a plethora of options for in-camera recording.

The USB-C port is a high-speed, USB 3.1 Gen 2 port that allows for quick file transfer and in-camera battery charging using Canon’s USB Power Adapter PD-E1. You also get a dedicated flash sync port, and on the front is a better view of that proprietary port for Canon remotes that we got a glance at earlier.

Storage

The EOS R5 has one CFExpress card slot and one UHS-II SD card slot. The CFExpress slot is of course the faster option, and is the only type of media you can use if you want to record 8K video in Raw or All-I encoding. If you’re using one of the latest and fastest UHS-II SD cards, you can still get an awful lot of performance out of the camera, but expect the buffer to fill more quickly if you’re shooting bursts with Raw and JPEG files going simultaneously to the SD card.

Battery

A new, higher-capacity LP-E6NH battery powers the EOS R5, but the camera retains backwards battery compatibility with LP-E6N and LP-E6 units as well (but you may see reduced battery life or lose USB charging with the older models).

If you keep the LCD and EVF at their lower refresh rates, the camera is rated at 490 / 320 shots per CIPA, respectively. The higher refresh rates are beautiful to behold, but battery life drops precipitously to 320 / 220 CIPA-rated images for the LCD and EVF, respectively.

Tucked inside the battery compartment is also a gold-plated connector: this connects to two different battery grips for the EOS R5 / R6 cameras. One of which, exclusively compatible with the R5, comes with an ethernet hookup for wired uploading of images as they’re being taken.

Hands-on with the Canon EOS R5

And there you have it, a full tour of Canon’s EOS R5 mirrorless full-frame camera. We’re still awaiting a production copy that we can begin to test fully, but in the meantime, what do you make of it? What do you want to know about it that we haven’t yet told you? Let us know in the comments.

The EOS R5 will be available at the end of July for $ 3899 body-only, or $ 4999 with the RF 24-105mm F4L.

For full details, read our Canon EOS R5 initial review

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

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DPReview TV: A quick hands-on look at the Sony ZV-1 vlogging camera

26 May

Sony just announced the ZV-1, a modified version of the RX100 series aimed specifically at vloggers. We take a look at six important features you may have missed from the announcement.

Subscribe to our YouTube channel to get new episodes of DPReview TV every week.

Introduction
Built-in microphone
Sony 'real time' autofocus
Audio monitoring
Recording time limits
Color profile tweaks
Image stabilization
See you soon!

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

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Hands-on with the Sony ZV-1

26 May

A creative concept?

The Sony ZV-1 is a new compact camera explicitly designed with vloggers and ‘content creators’ in mind.

From a hardware perspective it’s essentially an updated riff on the RX100 V(A), but with both ergonomic and feature changes to make it easier to operate from the ‘wrong’ side of the lens. As the distinct naming indicates; it’s not part of, nor intended as a replacement for, the RX100 series.

If you think of yourself as primarily a photographer, the ZV-1 is probably not designed for you. Instead it’s a camera purpose-designed for generating to-camera video for platforms such as YouTube. But that doesn’t mean it’s just a frivolous novelty.

Compared to RX100 V(A)

At its heart, the hardware of of the ZV-1 overlaps a lot with the RX100 series. It takes the 24-70mm equivalent F1.8-2.8 zoom and 1″-type 20MP stacked CMOS sensor from the RX100 V but mates it with the autofocus improvements of the Mark VII.

However, the controls and handling are quite different, with no control ring around the lens and a very different button arrangement, designed for a very different way of working.

It’s worth noting that, unlike the RX100 series, Sony isn’t using its ‘Cyber-shot’ branding on this camera, and that the official model name is DCZV-1, rather than ‘DSC,’ denoting digital stills camera.

It continues to use the same NP-BX1 battery as the RX100 cameras.

Video capabilities

The ZV-1’s video capabilities are very similar to those of the RX100 VII: it can shoot 1080p footage at up to 120p or UHD 4K footage at up to 30p. There are also high-speed modes shot at lower resolution and upscaled, allowing capture at up to 960 fps (1000 fps in PAL mode).

Like other recent Sony consumer cameras, all this footage is 8-bit. Log and ‘HLG’ modes are available, but will offer less flexibility than 10-bit footage would. Sony tells us it can also record video for longer (which we’ll get to later).

The other improvement that comes from using the RX100 VII’s processor is that the ZV-1 can apply digital image stabilization to its 4K footage, on top of the IS provided by the lens. The camera can also write shake information into the metadata, so that the Imaging Edge software can apply digital correction after the footage has been shot.

Back-to-front ergonomics

The first thing you’re likely to notice about the ZV-1 are its unconventional ergonomics. There’s a large dedicated [REC] button that sits immediately behind the shutter button. The significance of its size and position isn’t necessarily obvious until position the camera facing towards you, held at arms-length with your left hand.

It’s designed to be operated with the index finger of your left hand, while the zoom rocker is controlled with your left thumb.

Face the audience

Its focus on creator-to-camera content means the ZV-1 has no built-in viewfinder: after all, there’s no point including an expensive component if you can’t see it.

Instead it has a fully articulated touchscreen LCD, to make it easy to operate when it’s pointing towards you. As you’d expect, this display shows a mirror image of what the sensor is capturing, when faced toward you.

The touchscreen lets the user tap-to-track but like many recent Sony cameras, has very little other function.

Ports

All the ports are arranged on the right-hand side of the camera (left-hand side as it faces you), meaning that they’re on the opposite side from the articulating screen.

These include a mic socket, HDMI out and USB connector, over which the camera can be powered, while recording. Crucially, these can all be used without clashing with the flip-out screen.

Upgraded microphones

The lack of viewfinder frees up space for a comparatively complex three-capsule microphone, set into the top of the camera. Sony says this setup is designed to be directional to pick up the sound of someone in front of the camera,

The camera comes with a wind screen (often referred to as a deadcat, though this one looks more like a deadmouse) that can be attached to the top of the microphone recess, to reduce the risk of wind boom from air blowing directly onto the mic. The deadcat attaches via the hotshoe, which means it can’t be used with anything like an external LED light.

The deadcat covers the power button, which doubles as the charging indicator, which makes it hard to see.

The ZV-1 also has an offset hotshoe on one side of the camera, allowing a shotgun mic to be fitted. It’s got all the pins of Sony’s Multi-Interface shoe, meaning it can be used with a host of accessories, including microphones or, theoretically, Sony’s XLR adapter.

Face focused AF

Critically, the ZV-1 features the latest version of Sony’s AF system. This will focus on whatever you tap to focus on, and will use its face and eye detection system if that thing happens to be a face. The AF system will continue to track the subject, even if they look away from the camera and their eyes and face can’t be recognized.

That persistence is especially important for this kind of product, where you can’t afford for the camera to lose track of your face, and you’re usually going to be too busy to monitor or correct any errors.

Face Priority AE

The ZV-1 has a series of designed-for-vlogging features, to make it easy to get the desired result, with minimal interaction with the camera or its settings.

The most basic of these is Face Priority Auto Exposure. This does exactly what you might expect: it ties the camera’s metering to the face detection system, and prioritizes the exposure of the presenter’s face over the metering of the scene as a whole. It’s designed to respond rapidly to changes in exposure so that faces remain correctly exposed even if the light changes.

Sony also says its adjusted the camera’s color response in the ‘Standard’ Creative Style with a particular focus on making (a variety of) skin tones look more attractive.

Background defocus mode

Sony is keen to stress that Background Defocus mode is not a filter or a shallow depth-of-field simulation. Instead it’s a mode that automatically opens the aperture up to its widest setting, to give as shallow a depth-of-field as possible.

It’s a one-click option that means vloggers don’t have to learn to think in terms of aperture values. And, because the camera knows its target is the widest aperture setting, it’s able to respond almost instantly: adjusting the ISO and ND filter to compensate for the change in aperture, rather than slowly progressing through all the steps in between.

By default, Background Defocus mode is assigned to the ‘C1’ button on the camera’s front right corner, making it easily accessible if you’re shooting with the camera held at arm’s length with your left hand.

Product showcase mode

Perhaps the feature that makes this camera’s intent most clear is the ‘Product Showcase’ mode. This is designed for creating the kind of video in which you talk to camera and hold up the item you’re describing, to show some detail of it.

Product Showcase mode is designed to prioritize things that appear near the camera and override the face detection when they do. This means you don’t have to hide your face or wait for the camera to refocus on the object you’re trying to show your followers. Again, it’s designed as a mode so that you don’t have to manually tune the autofocus response.

What’s missing/odd?

The ZV-1 is primarily a video camera, designed to be operated selfie style, which makes it easy to understand why photographer-friendly features from the RX100, such as the EVF and control ring haven’t been included.

But video shooters are likely to note the lack of a headphone socket. While it’s true that most to-camera video isn’t shot with headphones on, it seems like an odd omission to provide no way of listening to the audio levels before you press that big red button, or properly review a clip after it’s been recorded (the internal speaker is pretty quiet).

Similarly, the inclusion of Log and ‘HLG’ video modes feel a bit half-baked, given the camera’s output is all 8-bit. We’re not expecting much of the ZV-1’s footage to go through extensive color grading, but more experienced video shooters should be aware of this limitation.

You might think it’s cool

The ZV-1 is a little bit thicker than the RX100 V and Sony says the use of more composite materials in its construction improve heat dissipation. You can see this composite panel when the screen is flipped out. Despite this, the camera will only record footage for five minutes at a go in its default state. You need to disable the overheat shutdown function in order to record for longer periods.

With this done, we’re told the camera will keep recording almost indefinitely (or, at least, to the capacity of your memory card). But it’ll be interesting to find out just how hot the camera gets, and how long you can comfortably hold the camera before needing to consider the optional VPT2BT bluetooth selfie grip thing.

We’ve not yet been given a battery life figure but, as we say, the ZV-1 can be powered over its USB connector if necessary.

Overall

As the branding hints, the Sony ZV-1 isn’t particularly intended for stills photographers. But for the many, many people creating (and, in some cases, making a living from) facing-the-camera content for social media, the ZV-1 looks like a powerful tool.

We’ll have to spend more time with the ZV-1 to find out how well it behaves as a stills camera, beyond its core role, but (as evidenced by the vlogging functions added to Canon’s G7 X III) there is a niche for such a product. Unlike the Canon, the Sony can’t directly stream its video to YouTube, though the latest version of Sony’s smartphone app lets you transfer videos (including 4K) once you’ve captured them.

If you’re not able to take advantage of the initial discounts being offered in some markets, $ 799 might seem quite expensive. But it’s worth noting that the removal of the EVF helps bring the list price down by $ 200 compared to the original MSRP of the RX100 VA and within $ 50 of the Canon’s launch price.

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

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DPReview TV: Nikon P950 hands-on review

18 Apr

Nikon’s Coolpix P950 features an incredible 24-2000mm equiv. zoom lens. But other than taking closeup photos of the moon, what’s this camera that looks like a small bazooka good for? Quite a lot, it turns out.

Subscribe to our YouTube channel to get new episodes of DPReview TV every week.

Introduction
An epiphany
Limitations of a huge zoom
Handling
Image quality
Battery life and startup time
Raw capture
Image stabilization
Flare control
Framing challenges
Electronic viewfinder (EVF)
Macro
Low light issues
Versus the P1000
The obligatory moon photo
Video capabilities
Chris needs a science intervention
Who's it for?

Sample photos from this episode

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Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

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Affordable anamorphic: hands-on with the Sirui 50mm F1.8 1.33x

12 Apr

Affordable anamorphic: hands-on with the Sirui 50mm F1.8 1.33x

The Sirui 50mm F1.8 1.33x Anamorphic is interesting for more than a couple of reasons, but the thing that makes it immediately attractive is that at $ 700/£660 it’s a lot more affordable than almost all other proper anamorphic lenses for filmmakers using interchangeable lens camera systems.

The lens is designed for APS-C and Super 35mm sensor sizes and comes in mounts for Sony E cameras, Fujifilm X and for Micro Four Thirds models. When used with a Super 35-sized sensor we get the equivalent of a 56mm horizontal field of view, while on a Micro Four Thirds camera this converts to an approximate 75mm horizontal field of view.

On E mount

The a7R IV may not be the ideal Sony camera for shooting all types of video, but it does include an APS-C/Super 35 crop mode, which is where it produces its best quality 4K video. This cropping might be a bug bear for some videographers, but it makes the camera a good match for this lens. It’s possible to use crop mode with FHD resolution as well, but since the camera produces better FHD footage in full sensor mode, we’d recommend sticking with 4K.

However, to see the footage de-squeezed live it’s necessary to use an external monitor with that capability since the feature isn’t built into the camera.

On X mount

Offering this lens in X mount makes a lot more sense now than it would have just a year ago – Fujifilm has upped its video game considerably with the X-H1, X-T4 and new firmware for the X-T3. The Eterna mode makes nice video straight out of the camera, but we also have F-Log and decent data rates too.

The Fujifilm X-T3 doesn’t technically need the grip to shoot video, as the body had both mic and headphone ports, but the grip makes the system easier to hold with the weight of the lens on the front. As with the Sony, you’ll need an external display with an anamorphic preview feature to see the de-squeezed image in real time.

On Micro Four Thirds

Users of the Panasonic GH5 have a couple of choices over the way they use this lens. It has an Anamorphic Mode that uses the 4:3 sensor area to capture video for de-squeezing in software afterwards. As this mode uses almost the whole sensor, the final image contains 18+MP of data to work with.

When you use this mode with the Sirui 1.33x anamorphic lens the wide aspect gets de-squeezed to a 16:9 format with a higher resolution than you’d get shooting in the normal 16:9 video mode, while the in-camera de-squeeze preview feature allows us to see what we are shooting via the rear screen.

To get the wide, cinematic anamorphic look that most will be expecting you need to shoot in the normal 16:9 mode, with Anamorphic Mode switched off. Even with Anamorphic Mode off you can still use the de-squeeze preview on the rear screen and inform the IS system that you have a 1.33x anamorphic lens attached.

The GH5S can also capture anamorphic footage using its 4:3 region, however, due to the nature of its multi-aspect sensor, the resolution isn’t quite as a high as the GH5 in this mode. Like the GH5, it can also show a de-sqeezed preview of the anamorphic image in-camera.

Fit and finish

The lens is constructed from 11 elements arranged in 8 groups, and features a 10-bladed iris. It certainly isn’t big but is long and thin, and weighs more than you might expect. It feels very solidly made and is nicely finished in a semi-matte black paint.

The focus and aperture markings are shown only on the top of the lens, and distances are indicated in both feet and meters with paint sunk into engraved characters.

Front element

The front element of the lens has that characteristic square baffle opening that we often see on anamorphic lenses. As with many single focal length anamorphic lenses the squeezing element is mounted onto the front of the basic optical design of the lens.

Front element

When viewed from the front, the circular iris of the lens appears elongated into an upright oval shape. This is because we are viewing it through the anamorphic element mounted on the front of the construction. When viewed through the rear the iris is shown to be round – well, a nearly round decagon at least.

The size of the front element, and its flat design, makes it a magnet to the flare so many film makers love. The flare appears in oval rings accompanied by thin blue lines that shoot horizontally across the frame. The blue tint seen in the front element appears to be designed to enhance the blue-ness of that line.

It is easy to overdo this effect so that the flare becomes the subject rather than whatever you are shooting, so caution is advised.

Aperture and focus rings

The aperture range on offer spans F1.8-16, while the closest focus is 0.85m / 33″ which is just close enough to get a decent tight head shot. Of course the aperture ring is clickless so exposures can be adjusted during recording without disturbing the audio track. The aperture ring turns smoothly with plenty of resistance to prevent accidental rotation, and you can get from one extreme to the other via a twist of about 90°.

The focusing ring takes a twist of 143.6° and must be turned to the left to reach infinity. The ring is quite stiff and the fine ribbing on the barrel may not always be enough to get a firm grip.

Image format on APS-C

When used with a camera recording in 16:9 mode the de-squeed image works out to a ratio of about 2.35:1, similar to the classic CinemaScope look. The black letterboxes above and below help illustrate the difference between this aspect ratio and the standard 16:9 video format.

Image format on Micro Four Thirds

This is a grab from footage recorded in Anamorphic Mode on the Panasonic Lumix DC-GH5. In this mode the camera records from the whole 4:3 sensor, so the 1.33x anamorphic effect only de-squeezes to 16:9, but it is a higher resolution 16:9 format image than you’d get recording in 16:9 with a normal lens.

Shooting in 16:9 with this lens on a Micro Four Thirds camera will also result in a 2.35:1 CinemaScope aspect ratio, albeit with a longer apparent focal length than on an APS-C/Super 35 sensor.

Trademark blue flare

Here’s an example of the blue-line flare that is a characteristic of this lens when aimed close to a light source. Some people will love it, and others will find it a distraction. As with most things, moderation might be the best policy.

Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)

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Hands-on with the latest Nikon Z lenses, AF-S 120-300mm F2.8

29 Feb

Hands-on with the Nikkor Z 20mm F1.8S

The Nikon booth at WPPI is bustling with visitors hoping to listen to a free educational session or get their hands on some of the latest Nikon gear – we’ve at least done the latter, and taken some photos to share with you. Nikon announced these two Z lenses earlier this month and the 120-300mm F2.8E telephoto zoom last month, and this is our first change to get up-close and personal with them.

Let’s start off with the Nikon Z 20mm F1.8S, pictured here on a Z7 camera body. The 20mm F1.8S looks right at home in Nikon’s growing lineup of S-series prime lenses for its mirrorless system, with solid construction and a large, well-damped manual focus ring. The silver ring near the base is indicative of its ‘S’ designation.

Hands-on with the Nikkor Z 20mm F1.8S

A peek at the front of the lens reveals – well first of all, some dust – but also that the Z 20mm F1.8S uses a 77mm filter thread. The optical construction comprises 14 elements in 11 groups, with three ED and three aspherical elements. It also employs Nikon’s nano-crystal coating to combat flare.

The Z 20mm F1.8S can focus down to 20cm (7.87″) for a maximum magnification of 0.19x.

Hands-on with the Nikkor Z 20mm F1.8S

At the rear of the lens, we can see a rubberized gasket surrounding the large metal Z-mount. Like all of Nikon’s S-series primes, the 20mm F1.8S is sealed against dust and moisture. You can also get a glimpse of the lens’ nine aperture blades, which should produce some brilliant sunstars (we’ll investigate further when we get a copy to evaluate).

Hands-on with the Nikkor Z 20mm F1.8S

On the side is the sole control point on the Nikkor Z 20mm F1.8S aside from the focus ring – an autofocus A/M switch. The Z 20mm F1.8S balances very well on the current Z6 and Z7 bodies, and should be a particularly useful lens for astrophotography and video. Or, place it on a Z50 and get a 30mm-equivalent field of view on Nikon’s APS-C Z-mount offering.

The Nikkor Z 20mm F1.8S is expected to be available next month, March 2020 for a suggested retail price of $ 1049.95 USD.

Hands-on with the Nikkor Z 24-200mm F4-6.3

Next up, we have the Nikkor Z 24-200mm F4-6.3 lens. It’s intended as a do-it-all travel zoom, complementing the existing Z 24-70mm F4S and 24-70mm F2.8S lenses Nikon has already released for the Z system, and offering the greatest zoom range of any Z-series lens to date.

Hands-on with the Nikkor Z 24-200mm F4-6.3

Here it is at full zoom; its length nearly doubles, but thanks to a reasonable 570g (1.26lb) weight, it doesn’t become ungainly or off-balance on full-frame Z-series cameras. Also visible in this image is a ‘Lock’ button that keeps the lens locked into the wide-angle position for travel, to help combat ‘zoom creep’ from the occasional bump or jostle while you wander around. There’s also a slim but customizable and well-damped manual focus ring near the base of the lens as well.

Hands-on with the Nikkor Z 24-200mm F4-6.3

From the front of the lens, we can see that the Z 24-200mm takes 67mm filters. This lens has a complex optical formula of 19 elements in 15 groups, and uses a special Arneo coating to reduce flare. The minimum focus distance is 50cm (19.69″), giving a maximum magnification of 0.28x. A total of seven aperture blades should produce some pretty nice sunstars on this lens as well.

Hands-on with the Nikkor Z 24-200mm F4-6.3

A rear gasket on the Z 24-200mm F4-6.3 is physical proof of Nikon’s claims of ‘drip and dust resistance,’ which is always a nice touch on a lens that is really designed to travel with you wherever you go, for just about any focal length you might need.

This lens also comes with built-in stabilization, which Nikon says works in tandem with the in-body stabilizers on the Z6 and Z7 cameras. If you want to use this on a Z50 which doesn’t have an in-body stabilizer, you can still expect up to 5 stops of compensation. This will definitely come in handy when you get to the maximum 300mm equivalent reach on an APS-C sensor.

Nikon has said that the 24-200mm F4-6.3 will be available starting in April 2020 for a suggested retail price of $ 899.95 USD.

Hands-on with the AF-S Nikkor 120-300mm F2.8E

First announced back in September, then with a release date given in January, we’ve finally gotten a chance to see the Nikon AF-S 120-300mm F2.8E FL ED SR VR in the flesh metal. No surprise, it’s a pricey optic at $ 9499.95 USD, but one that we expect will be put to good use by a variety of sports, action and wildlife photographers. Those letters in the name stand for electromagnetic diaphragm, fluorite elements, extra-low dispersion elements, short-wavelength refracting element and vibration reduction. Oh, and there’s Arneo coating to combat chromatic aberrations as well as flare. In other words, there’s a lot of optical technology in this lens.

Here, you can see the lens mounted to the company’s latest sports DSLR flagship, the D6.

Hands-on with the AF-S Nikkor 120-300mm F2.8E

In this view, you can see the name plate, serial number and a window displaying focus distance on the top of the lens. There’s also a customizable ‘Memory Set’ button on the side.

But speaking of focus distance, the lens can focus down to 2m (78.74″) at all focal lengths, for a maximum magnification of 0.16x.

Hands-on with the AF-S Nikkor 120-300mm F2.8E

Around the side are all of the control options on this lens. There’s an autofocus mode switch, a focus limiter, vibration reduction switch, a memory recall switch and a switch for the focus confirmation beep. Mounted right on the tripod collar are also lugs to which you can attach neck straps; Nikon is touting this lens as one you could use handheld if needed.

Being able to use a lens like this handheld is always a plus – but bear in mind, it weighs 3.25kg (7.17lb) so a monopod is probably still a good bet for extended shooting.

Hands-on with the AF-S Nikkor 120-300mm F2.8E

Around the front, we have a massive front element with fluorine coating to help repel moisture and oil. The filter thread is pretty sizable at 112mm, but many users will simply keep the lens hood on, which somewhat tempers the need for protective filters.

The AF-S Nikkor 120-300mm F2.8E has an optical formula of 25 elements in 19 groups, and a nine-bladed diaphragm. Nikon claims a high degree of weather-sealing as you’d expect from a lens of this caliber.

That’s a wrap

And that’s a wrap from the Nikon booth at WPPI 2020 in Las Vegas. If you missed it, we also have a dedicated hands-on look at the Nikon D6, pictured above. Let us know what you think of Nikon’s latest lenses and cameras in the comments below.

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Hands-on with the Nikon D6 at WPPI

27 Feb

Hands-on with the Nikon D6 at WPPI

The Nikon D6 is the company’s latest full-frame, high-speed sports DSLR, and we’ve just had the chance to get a look at one in-person at the 2020 Wedding and Portrait Photography Expo in Las Vegas. While the camera was operational, we weren’t allowed to capture any images with it – only images of it, for now anyway. Let’s take a closer look.

Behind that lens, and grip and front function buttons

No surprises here, Nikon’s not going to mess with a good thing – as someone who’s used the D5 extensively, I can confirm that the D6’s grip feels very familiar indeed, and is very comfortable. Those front function buttons are all very well-placed for easy access.

While we weren’t able to take the lens off this pre-production unit, the D6 comes with the same 20.8MP resolution of the D5, but a new Expeed 6 processor boosts burst shooting and should help with high-ISO performance, especially shooting JPEG.

Top plate

Top-plate controls are all-but identical to the D5’s as well, though we can see there’s now a polycarbonate cover around the hotshoe that likely houses the camera’s wireless antennas. On the top left shoulder, the ‘Mode – BKT – Metering’ controller is a bit more raised-up than we saw on the D5, and that’s really about it up here.

Rear plate

The rear of the camera is likewise going to be familiar to previous Dx-series users. Like, really familiar. Looking at the D6 and D5 side-by-side, the only difference I can find is the painting of a microphone symbol by the Fn3 button on the lower left corner. This means that this is likely the default button for recording audio notes to accompany images.

The side ports also look familiar, but there has been one change: the headphone jack and HDMI ports of traded positions, but that’s not likely to trip anyone up. Change just for the sake of change isn’t always the wisest choice on this type of camera. Many users will be picking one up and immediately setting it up exactly like their older D5’s and D4S’s and going out shooting. These types of professionals rarely want to reprogram their muscle memory.

Card slots

The Nikon D6 is the first camera in the series to eschew the use of CompactFlash cards entirely. Whereas the D5 could be configured with either dual CF or XQD cards, the D6 only accepts dual CFExpress cards. We think this is a good thing; these cards are durable and incredibly speedy.

We’ve been reliably informed that production sample cameras will ship without gaffer’s tape (applied to prevent show-attendees from sneaking in a card for unauthorized test shots).

Viewfinder autofocus

This is where Nikon’s concentrated most of its efforts. The autofocus system in the optical viewfinder is all-new, with 105 points, all of which are cross-type and use what’s called a ‘triple-sensor arrangement.’ The coverage area is very similar to that of the D5, though Nikon claims that the area of coverage is ‘1.6x denser’ than that of the D5. The whole array is sensitive down to -4EV, with the center sensor sensitive to -4.5EV.

In our brief hands-on with the D6 and the new AF-S 120-300mm F2.8 lens (which we’ll be featuring in a separate slideshow), the camera focused impressively fast from both near-to-far focus, and based on ‘Demo’ image review on the rear display, incredibly accurately. The D5 has been a benchmark for absolute autofocus performance for some time, and if Nikon’s made the D6 even better, that’s an impressive achievement. When we get a full review unit, expect lots of real-world sports AF testing.

Wireless connectivity, rear screen and burst shooting

The Nikon D6 comes with built-in wireless connectivity, which is likely to be well-received by end users (no more being forced into attaching an expensive external accessory). Hiding down at the bottom of the screen, you can also see the camera is set to its new maximum burst speed of 14 fps with autofocus and auto exposure. Firing off a handful of bursts, blackout is very well-controlled, and 14 fps is still going to be plenty fast for many types of action.

The rear screen is touch-sensitive, as with the D5, but there’s a new ‘swipe’ functionality in playback that brings up connectivity options right there to streamline the process of sending images off after they’ve been taken.

Hands-on with the Nikon D6 at WPPI

The D5 has been a personal favorite of mine for professional shoots for a long time, and it’s still one of my top choices for wedding photography today. I would expect the D6 to continue in this tradition – if the viewfinder autofocus system can get me even better results in even lower light, this will be a wedding-and-event photography winner. After all, that’s probably why it’s being showcased at a wedding photography expo.

Let us know what you think of Nikon’s latest professional DSLR in the comments.

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Hands-on with the Fujifilm X-T4

27 Feb

Hands on with the Fujifilm X-T4

Long-rumored, much-anticipated and inevitably leaked, the Fujifilm X-T4 has finally landed. Although it shares a lot with the existing X-T3 (which we’re told will continue to be sold alongside the X-T4), the new camera brings with some major changes, most notably in-body image stabilization and an all-new, larger battery. But smaller updates abound, at least one of which have the potential to be added to the X-T3 via firmware. So, let’s take a closer look.

Stabilizer

Alright, let’s get the major update out of the way first. Without a major increase in size over the X-T3, the X-T4 incorporates a sensor-shift image stabilizer that’s good for up to 6.5 stops of shake reduction with 18 of Fujifilm’s current total of 29 lenses. We’re told the remaining lenses will all be stabilized to a minimum of five stops.

This comes down to the image circle each lens projects. Most XF lenses, particularly the early ones, simply weren’t designed to project an oversized image circle for stabilization in the first place. And a smaller image circle means you simply can’t move the sensor as far before a degradation in image quality. In these instances, five stops is honestly pretty impressive.

New shutter mechanism

The X-T4 also comes with a new shutter mechanism, which unlocks burst speeds of 15 fps with full autofocus and autoexposure. (Like the X-T3, it can also do up to 20 fps with the electronic shutter, and 30 fps with the electronic shutter and a 1.25x crop.) This new shutter is rated to 300,000 actuations, comes with new ‘shock absorption’ hardware, and we must say, is impressively quiet.

Behind that shutter and mounted to the new stabilizer is the familiar 26MP X-Trans sensor that’s currently in the X-T3 and X-T30 (and the new X100V), and we expect image quality to be broadly similar (meaning, very good).

Updated ergonomics for video

While most of the headline video capabilities from the X-T3 carry over, the addition of stabilization makes the X-T4 a much more compelling ‘run-and-gun’ video camera. As such, Fujifilm has tweaked the ergonomics a bit: there’s now a dedicated Still / Movie switch under the shutter speed dial where the metering options used to live. In this view you can also see that the customizable rear command dial is more pronounced and a more rounded, protruding AF ON button makes an appearance.

Speaking of AF ON, Fujifilm has told us that the X-T4 uses an entirely new subject tracking algorithm that incorporates color information as well as the object’s shape to improve tracking ‘stickiness.’ We’ll take a closer look in our full review, but our initial impressions are that the X-T4’s tracking is vastly improved over the (already quite good) X-T3’s. We hope that latter camera will get a firmware update with this new version, and given Fujifilm’s track record of firmware updates, we’re optimistic.

Also, that pattern on the rear screen isn’t shattered glass, we promise. It’s…

The fully articulating screen

…a (somewhat plasticky) leatherette pattern on a new, fully articulating screen mechanism. It sits flush with the rear of the camera, so you have to dig your thumb into the depressed area on the right side to flip it out. In this view, you can also see that Fujifilm has retained both the 8-way AF joystick and the customizable four-way controller on the rear of the camera.

The fully articulating screen

As you would expect, the screen flips out to the side and can rotate forward 180 degrees for vlogging and down 90 degrees for shooting from high angles. It’s a familiar design seen on many competing cameras, unlike the less-traditional two-axis tilt design of the X-T3.

To an extent this is key to the whole camera. The X-T3’s screen is arguably a better choice for stills shooting, in that it stays in line with the camera’s lens and supports both landscape and portrait shooting. The X-T4’s screen arrangement is the preferred style for video shooting.

Drive dial controls

The drive dial has seen some minor tweaks, with the ‘HDR’ function now easily accessible, and of course the ‘Movie’ mode that was on the far left of the X-T3’s dial is absent.

Just to the right is a new eyecup, which we’ve been told has been updated to be ‘40% more rigid’ and stay in place more reliably than the previous one.

Total top-plate controls

Here’s a full view of the X-T4’s top plate controls. It’s worth mentioning that the customizable function button on the top plate has been shifted forward, between the power switch and the exposure compensation dial, rather than being crammed next to the shutter speed dial.

The grip has been tweaked to be a little bit deeper and more comfortable to use with larger lenses.

Ports

Moving to the left side of the camera, we can see that Fujifilm has done some tweaking regarding the ports of the X-T4. Gone is the rigid removable port door of the X-T3, with soft rubberized doors taking its place. We’re a bit disappointed by the loss of the dedicated headphone port: like the X-T200, X-A7 and X-T30, users must now use a USB-C to headphone dongle. At least there’s one included in the box.

Card slots

On the other side of the camera are two UHS-II compatible card slots hidden behind a removable door. This is also where you’ll find the serial number of the camera as well as the stamp for its country of manufacture, which may vary, camera to camera.

Battery

The X-T4 is the first Fujifilm camera in quite some time to use a new battery design. This one is dubbed NP-W235, and is CIPA rated to 600 shots when using the camera’s ‘economy’ mode and 500 shots in ‘normal.’ This is a good boost over the X-T3’s rating of 390 shots with the NP-W126S battery.

Getting a grip

The X-T4 also has contacts for the optional VG-XT4 battery grip, for those of you who simply must have a battery grip. Just like the grip on the X-T3 and X-T2, this new grip will hold two batteries, giving you a total of three (including the one in the camera) when it’s utilized. It also includes a dedicated, on-board headphone socket if you don’t like ‘dongle life’, and with a USB PD rated charger, you can charge all three batteries over the camera’s USB-C port.

Hands on with the Fujifilm X-T4

There you have it: Fujifilm’s newest 26MP, 4K-shooting, image-stabilized camera. Is it everything you hoped for and more? Or were you just hoping for more? We see it as a minor-ish update (or even a potential branching of the lineup) that will have a big impact for an audience clamoring for IBIS. And if you don’t need IBIS, we’re pleased that the slightly smaller and still supremely capable X-T3 will continue to be sold alongside it.

Let us know what you make of the new camera in the comments.

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Hands-on with the Olympus OM-D E-M1 III

12 Feb

Hands-on with the Olympus OM-D E-M1 Mark III

The Olympus OM-D E-M1 Mark III takes the familiar design of its predecessor and inherits many features from the company’s pro-level E-M1X. Olympus positions the E-M1 III as a pro-level camera for those who want a more compact alternative to the E-M1X but don’t want to compromise build quality.

The E-M1 Mark III is available in a number of kits. For just the body, it’s priced at $ 1799 (in the US, a trade-in program will initially knock $ 200 off of that). There are also a pair of lens bundles: you can combine the body with the 12-40mm F2.8 Pro for $ 2499 or with the 12-100mm F4 Pro for $ 2899.

Sensor and image stabilization

The E-M1 Mark III may use the same 20.4MP Four Thirds sensor as its predecessor, but several things around it have changed. First and foremost is the processor, which is known as the TruePic IX. Olympus says that the TruePic IX allows Handheld High Res Shot and Live ND features as well as new autofocus features to be added to the Mark III. The E-M1X can do many of those things already, but it has two processors to work with.

The image stabilization system is more robust on the Mark III, and the Mark II was already very good, with its in-body IS able to reduce shake by 5.5 stops. The Mark III can reduce shake by up to 7 stops using its internal IS mechanism and, with select stabilized lenses, hit a whopping 7.5 stops. Olympus says that some photographers have taken 4 second exposures, though we imagine that they had hands of stone to pull that off.

Olympus has updated the dust reduction system (officially known as the Supersonic Wave Filter) with a new coating to keep pesky dust spots out of your photos. The camera also has an all-new shutter unit that is rated to 400,000 cycles.

Thoroughly sealed

Olympus’s high-end cameras are well known for their build quality and weather sealing, and the E-M1 Mark III is no exception. While its magnesium alloy body gives the camera a very solid feel, it doesn’t feel heavy. Like its predecessor, the Mark III does a good job of fitting plenty of control points without the camera feeling too cramped.

Manufacturers use the word ‘weather-sealed’ pretty loosely, and E-M1 Mark III is one of very few camera to carry an IPX1 rating (or any rating, for that matter). Olympus claims that you don’t even need to use a rain cover. The company has plenty of weather-sealed lenses available, including the new 12-45mm F4 Pro, which too has an IPX1 rating.

Revised controls

The most significant change to the controls on the E-M1 Mark III is the addition of an eight-way joystick, which you can use for adjusting the focus point. To make room for the joystick Olympus shuffled a few buttons around, but the same controls are there, including the rocker which lets you quickly switch between two groups of camera settings. The addition of the joystick allowed Olympus to change the AF-point selection button into one for ISO.

There’s just a small change on the camera’s top plate: the shadow/highlight adjustment button now handles exposure compensation.

The electronic viewfinder is, sadly, the same as before. It has 2.36 million dots and still uses an LCD panel, unlike virtually every competitor who has moved to OLED. If you wear polarized sunglasses, be prepared to have to take them off to compose photos through the EVF.

The camera’s fully articulating 3″ touchscreen is unchanged as well. It has the usual touch features you’d expect, including the ability to move the AF point. The eye sensor that automatically switches between the LCD and EVF has improved, however: there’s an option to disable the eye sensor when the LCD is flipped out (and this option will be coming to other recent Olympus models through a forthcoming firmware update).

Ports, storage and connectivity

At first glance, the sockets on the left side of the E-M1 III look exactly the same as on its predecessor. You’ve got your 3.5mm mic and headphone jacks plus micro HDMI and USB 3 (with a Type C connector) ports. (There’s a flash sync connector on the front plate, as well.)

That USB port not only supports in-camera charging: it supports up to 100W of Power Delivery. If you have a ‘powerful’ USB PD charger or power bank, it can fill up that BLH-1 battery in as little as two hours. But wait, there’s more: The camera can also be operated while connected to a USB PD compatible power bank, allowing for extended shooting while on the go. Olympus points out that you cannot charge the battery in the optional HLD-9 grip from a USB PD source.

Over on the other side of the camera are a pair of SD card slots. Slot 1 supports UHS-II media, while slot 2 is just UHS-I.

Lastly, there have been some connectivity upgrades. The E-M1 Mark III now supports the 802.11ac standard – which adds a 5GHz band – as well as Bluetooth.

Battery and grip

The OM-D E-M1 III uses Olympus’s venerable BLH-1 lithium-ion battery. Officially, the camera can take 420 shots per charge (presumably with the LCD) according to the CIPA standard, but you’ll almost certainly be able to take a lot more.

In addition to using a USB PD compatible power bank, you can attach Olympus’s optional HLD-9 grip, which gives you approximately 840 shots per charge. Since this is a not a new grip, there’s no joystick for moving the AF point.

New bells and whistles

The E-M1 III inherited a large number of features from its big brother, the E-M1X, and we’ve highlighted some of the more interesting ones below.

First up is Handheld High Res Shot. The Mark II let you produce 50 Megapixel Raws by combining 16 exposures, but you needed a tripod. You can now hand-hold the camera to get similar results, namely improvements in resolution and noise. The quality won’t be as quite as high as using a tripod, but there’s still a definite improvement. The camera attempts to correct for moving subjects in the scene, though no camera with this does that perfectly.

Next is Live ND, which combines multiple exposures to replicate the effects of up to a 5EV neutral density filter. There’s also an improvement in noise for non-moving areas in the frame, since the camera is combining multiple shots.

Astrophotographers will be pleased to learn about the Starry Sky AF mode. The camera offers two flavors of Starry Sky AF: accuracy priority and speed priority. The former takes multiple ‘focus scans’ to locate stars and distinguish them from noise. The speed priority mode does as its name implies, with Olympus claiming that you can even hand-hold the camera and take star photos.

Speaking of autofocus, the E-M1 III has new and improved face and eye detection algorithms which, based on our initial testing, is quicker and stickier than on previous Olympus cameras. Switching between faces is also easier.

One feature that didn’t come over from the E-M1X is its ability to detect planes, trains and automobiles, though we can’t imagine that feature is in terribly in high demand.

Video

The E-M1 Mark II already had pretty good video specs, and not a lot has changed on its successor. It continues to offer both DCI and UHD 4K, with bit rates of 237 and 120Mbps, respectively. There’s also a Full HD 120 fps mode that can be replayed in slow motion.

The camera continues to offer the OM-Log400 profile for more flexibility when color grading, and 4:2:2 output to an external recorder.

New to the Mark III is the ability to control the ‘strength’ of image stabilization in video. Exposure settings and white balance for video can be completely different from those for stills.

Audio capture has been improved, with 96 kHz / 24-bit recording when using a compatible external mic. When you’re using an external mic there should be less white noise, according to Olympus. If you’re using the company’s LS-P4 PCM recorder you receive the higher quality audio capture as well as test and slate tone functions.

Wrap up

Although it has some useful new features, such as a ‘live’ ND filter and a much-appreciated joystick, the Olympus OM-D E-M1 Mark III isn’t a huge leap over its predecessor.

And that’s not necessarily a bad thing, as the E-M1 Mark II was a very well-designed camera, with excellent build quality, a broad feature set and effective in-body image stabilization. Olympus has improved the weather sealing even further on the Mark III, to the point where it can claim an IPX1 rating, and its Image stabilizer can reduce shake by an amazing 7.5 stops with certain lenses. We do wish that the EVF used an OLED panel, rather than an LCD, however.

The camera’s new features, such as Handheld High Res Shot and Live ND, are fun to use and produce great results, and the Mark III’s autofocus improvements seem to live up to their billing. Photographers who are out shooting for a long period of time will appreciate the E-M1 III’s support for USB PD compatible power bricks. And if you capture a lot of video, the improved audio quality when using an external mic (and especially Olympus’s PCM recorder) is a pretty big deal.

Would we recommend that E-M1 II users rush out and trade in their camera for an E-M1 III? Probably not, unless you think you’ll be frequently using the new features mentioned above. The E-M1 II is more than adequate for most photographers and will save you hundreds, at least until they’re no longer available.

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DPReview TV: Olympus E-M1 Mark III hands-on preview

12 Feb

Chris and Jordan traveled to Costa Rica to test the new Olympus E-M1 Mark III. Will Chris survive the crocodiles? Will Jordan’s audition tape for the next reboot of Baywatch make your head spin? Watch to get answers to these and other important questions.

Subscribe to our YouTube channel to get new episodes of DPReview TV every week.

Introduction
River photography + crocodile photos
Design and handling
Image stabilization
Monkeys!!!
Starry sky AF mode
Pro Capture mode
Displays
Video features
Autofocus
Live ND filter
Conclusion

Olympus OM-D E-M1 III sample gallery

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