Sony a6000: I Caved and Bought It

I've had my eye on Sony for a while. If you've been following the blog here, you know about my mixed feelings on the matter: Sony is innovating like crazy and I love what they're doing. Their cameras aren't perfect  but they are very, very compelling! I don't like that they use such tiny batteries that need replacing way too often. I don't like that they shut down after about a 20 minute video clip. I don't like that they don't send 10-bit color out their HDMI port (Panasonic GH4 does). The color science is sometimes a little wonky (e.g., strange looking skies). The menus are a little funky, too. But all that aside, their alpha line of cameras are really, really impressive!

And for me, I like APS-C sized sensors for video. They're a great middle ground. Bigger than micro4/3 which always seems to struggle at ISOs above 800 when shooting video. But not so big that you have to stop way down to get a person entirely in focus like on a full frame sensor. And frankly, for cinema, APS-C/"Super 35" is sort of the closest thing to a standard size. Many of the cinema cameras have sensors this size.

The a6000, in particular has been tempting me for months. I know, it isn't a new camera - in fact, it is quite old (released in early 2014). But Sony has added the XAVC-S codec with 50mbps bit rate. No, it doesn't have any log profiles, but I don't think log profiles on 8-bit 4:2:0 or 4:2:2 color sub-sampling cameras actually works out that well in most cases anyway. Once you get that footage into Resolve or any other color grading app, the image is rather fragile. So I don't think I'm going to miss that too much for my work.

I couldn't pass up the holiday pricing so I just placed my order for the Sony alpha A6000 over at B&H. $398 for the body, $198 for the 50mm f/1.8 lens (when you buy with the a6000 body, $249 otherwise). Can't wait to put it to use!