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Archive 2020 · EM1x + 300mmpro/1.4xTC vs. Sony A6400 + 200-600mm

galenapass
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p.4 #1 · p.4 #1 · EM1x + 300mmpro/1.4xTC vs. Sony A6400 + 200-600mm

fadeslayer wrote:
I revamp this thread but... After 2 years with Sony A7RII and 100-400mm GM, and 2 years of A9, one with 100-400mm GM and the last 14 months with 200-600, I am seriously considering jumping all-in to Olympus EM1x + EM1 II/IIi, with 8-25f4, 40-150, 300 pro with 1.4x and maybe 100-400mm, all for a bit more than my whole Sony kit (which is only few pieces - one body with grip and 3 batteries, 24-105, 200-600, an heavy tripod I could sell keeping lighter one I have) if purchased as used. I am suffering handholding A9 with grip and...Show more →

Yes. If you are having issues with the A9 AF reliability (which you should not) it will not get better with the Oly gear.

Sep 18, 2021 at 08:45 AM

fadeslayer
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p.4 #2 · p.4 #2 · EM1x + 300mmpro/1.4xTC vs. Sony A6400 + 200-600mm

I am having no fun shooting A9 and 200-600 anymore, apart from the blackout free EVF...

Sep 18, 2021 at 08:52 AM

osv2
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p.4 #3 · p.4 #3 · EM1x + 300mmpro/1.4xTC vs. Sony A6400 + 200-600mm

i would not want to handhold the a9/200-600 all the time, so i can certainly understand that, but once you look at what the true equivalence really is, how does the weight actually compare?

make sure that you are comparing actual physical dof, not the numbers on the lens barrel: https://www.dpreview.com/articles/2666934640/what-is-equivalence-and-why-should-i-care/4

the near/far af thing happens on a number of milc platforms, not sure how that is with m4/3, but you won't get more accurate af with m4/3.

Sep 18, 2021 at 09:04 AM

lawa222
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p.4 #4 · p.4 #4 · EM1x + 300mmpro/1.4xTC vs. Sony A6400 + 200-600mm

Yes, you're sort of crazy. The Olympus will be even much worse in the autofocus situations you describe.

The most important thing I've learned in bird photography is to lower my expectations when I run-and-gun. Even with magically good cameras and telephoto lenses, to regularly get really nice shots of most types of birds, you need to be patient or sneaky and get very close. Think hunting - not birding.

If you want the Oly to downsize, go for it. You'll just need to get a little closer and a little better light.

Sep 18, 2021 at 09:07 AM

fadeslayer
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p.4 #5 · p.4 #5 · EM1x + 300mmpro/1.4xTC vs. Sony A6400 + 200-600mm

Last shooting session was in a mount peak nearby my home, in Italy, at 1700 meters of altitude.

Common kestrel, flying in the blue sky, no apparent fog and no excessive heat waves, not the likes I am used to here in northern Italy.

The bird was flying up and down, left and right, often doing hovering in place to search for preys on the grass. Distance was ~30 meters, sometimes 50 meters.

AF set to Zone AF without tracking. AF sentitivity to 3 (but tried 5 and 2).

Manual mode, ISO auto (max 1600), f/6.3, 1/2500 to 1/5000s.
Continuous AF with 10fps, electronic shutter (never used mechanical).

87 shots, no single shot but one in focus. Extremely frustrating.

It looks like my set is worsening every day after dat... Because I shot common swifts coming in with success in urban surroundings...

Handholding: em1x with 300 pro would give me the same angle of view of 600mm, but with 1kg less and almost 10cm less length, with 1 1/3 ev more light coming in (so canceling ISO advantage of A9), probably giving up some AF capabilities...

Adding to the equation the fact that always I carry binoculars and sometimes even fieldscope...

In perspective, buying the 150-400 to gain reach and light would be much more feasible than 600 GM, so another doubt..

I am really torn...

I surely need to reset things and start again learning my Sony from scratch, and on the same time get some Olympus test days (if any, with covid almost all events are cancelled) to get hands on equipment and see how they handle...

Sep 18, 2021 at 09:34 AM

galenapass
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p.4 #6 · p.4 #6 · EM1x + 300mmpro/1.4xTC vs. Sony A6400 + 200-600mm

You either have something set wrong, or you need to send in your equipment to Sony for a check up. What you describe is more like Olympus AF than Sony. Below is a shot of an Osprey inflight with an EM1x and 300mm pro. Good light. What I am not showing are the other 12 frames that were out of focus.

You should rent some m4/3 equipment first and try it before jumping systems. I re-read your post and you made several points:

(1) "I am suffering handholding A9 with grip and 200-600". I take this to mean that you are having trouble with the weight. A good monopod should take care of this for you. Oly will be easier to handhold. That is true.

(2) "I am quite struggling with AF reliability of my A9, I mainly shoot like a birder so sudden subjects showing up far or unexpected". The Oly system will NOT be more responsive than the A9. Period. I know this from experience. If you are having trouble with the A9, I would suggest that it is because you are not using the right settings, as noted above.

(3) "f6.3 means very high ISO too often for my liking, where with 300 pro I would keep it a stop and a 1/3 lower for the same DOF". I don't want to get in a debate about sensor size/pixel size and noise but suffice to say you will get better noise performance with the larger, newer sensor - despite the aperture difference on the 300pro vs 200-600. The EM1x and EM1iii are using old sensors. Oly has not updated their m4/3 sensor for years. I instantly noticed better noise performance with the A9.

Of all the reasons that you have noted, the only valid reason to move to m4/3 is for weight. I would wait and see if Panasonic and/or Olympus come out with a new camera using a new sensor before considering a move. My opinion. All of this does not mean you can't get good pictures with m4/3, but dealing with the increased noise and slower AF is challenging. When I hear that someone is having difficulty with the A9, alarm bells start to ring in my head.

Sep 18, 2021 at 09:43 AM

osv2
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p.4 #7 · p.4 #7 · EM1x + 300mmpro/1.4xTC vs. Sony A6400 + 200-600mm

fadeslayer wrote:
Last shooting session was in a mount peak nearby my home, in Italy, at 1700 meters of altitude.

Common kestrel, flying in the blue sky, no apparent fog and no excessive heat waves, not the likes I am used to here in northern Italy.

The bird was flying up and down, left and right, often doing hovering in place to search for preys on the grass. Distance was ~30 meters, sometimes 50 meters.

AF set to Zone AF without tracking. AF sentitivity to 3 (but tried 5 and 2).

Manual mode, ISO auto (max 1600), f/6.3, 1/2500 to 1/5000s.
Continuous AF with 10fps, electronic shutter...Show more →

the 300/4 lens on m4/3 has the same dof as f/8 on ff, and that applies to light-gathering as well, because ff has a bigger sensor... the 300/4 gathers less light because it's on a smaller sensor.

it's all clearly demonstrated in the link i posted, you won't get better p.q. with m4/3.

Sep 18, 2021 at 01:07 PM

johnvanr
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p.4 #8 · p.4 #8 · EM1x + 300mmpro/1.4xTC vs. Sony A6400 + 200-600mm

Sep 18, 2021 at 01:44 PM

fadeslayer
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p.4 #9 · p.4 #9 · EM1x + 300mmpro/1.4xTC vs. Sony A6400 + 200-600mm

galenapass wrote:
You either have something set wrong, or you need to send in your equipment to Sony for a check up. What you describe is more like Olympus AF than Sony. Below is a shot of an Osprey inflight with an EM1x and 300mm pro. Good light. What I am not showing are the other 12 frames that were out of focus.

You should rent some m4/3 equipment first and try it before jumping systems. I re-read your post and you made several points:

(1) "I am suffering handholding A9 with grip and 200-600". I take this to mean that you are...Show more →

Regarding point 3, f4 on oly 300 pro gathers light as an f4 lens, only that the smaller sensor means that TOTAL light coming to sensor is therefore less, but exposure-side you get an equivalent ISO quality than my Sony with 200-600 at 600mm f/7.1, if DXO numbers mean anything (you take absolute dBs and you see numbers).

I can accept that focus capabilities are poorer with Sony, but if I gain the sufficient reach to make AF system catch focus right (with, with A9, many times I fail because I cannot get closer to subjects - I repeat, I am quite a birdwatcher and ornithologist than a pure photographer, I need identifiable subjects rather than exposition-quality images, even if I am gratified if I can get those and I won't complain

) I can accept poorer noise rendition, I use Topaz Denoise AI when needed.

I surely need to try first hand Olympus body and lens, and as I said reset my Sony settings and "approach" and start from scratch. Maybe AF failure is given to my body/lens combo having something to fix, or maybe user error (surely many user errors are in place, but it can't be that in the beginning it worked very good and constantly it kept worsening until very unsatisfactory behavior like the last sessions), or maybe distance from subjects is too far (but, other friends with only 450mm equivalent lens - nikon D500 with 300pf - got far more keepers than me at the same distance).

I will keep on investigating...

I don't have any budget to invest more in Sony equipment, so eventual switch would get with current resale value of my pieces, no way I will ever be able to buy GM fast primes.

And for my interests it's out of the question relying on hides and static photography to get closer to subject, at least not in a predominant way, I need to photograph what I see when I see it, sometimes I would rely on temporary hides, but it would be 10% of times at most. Here in Italy it's not like Florida. Here, as to say, grey herons take flight at >100m of distance, so it's quite a lot more difficult than photographing subjects in a "roaming way" than many other European countries (it's not me to say this, but much of our nature photographers, that therefore use hides and the likes, as it should be for a common nature photography)

Thanks for all your responses, I got hint to get relaxed and investigate more and more before doing unpredictable switches.

Sep 18, 2021 at 07:54 PM

George Welch
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p.4 #10 · p.4 #10 · EM1x + 300mmpro/1.4xTC vs. Sony A6400 + 200-600mm

Hi Mike,

I somehow missed the thread when you initially posted it. A well thought out and presented topic.

I agree with all of your comments but would add as a difference with the Olympus files:

When you can get pixels on the subject, the Olympus files, even from the 8 year old sensor are wonderful to work with. If you get any distance between you and the subject and need to crop - there is no contest, the Sony files are much better - every time.

The AF for action and BIF is not even close either - Sony the clear winner here.

Olympus’s implementation of bird eye focus works, but IMHO only for slow birds. For quick birds and busy backgrounds, it’s useless.

The portability size of the Olympus system is still its hallmark, although the weight of the Nikon 500 PF I just picked up the other day and my D500 is noticeably less, with about the same form factor. Of course the action focusing of the Nikon mirrorless system is still not quite there yet .

Thanks again, Mike, for the wonderful original post.

Cheers,

George

Sep 19, 2021 at 04:51 AM

Lupin 3rd
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p.4 #11 · p.4 #11 · EM1x + 300mmpro/1.4xTC vs. Sony A6400 + 200-600mm

MirrorlessComparison.com has ranked which are (in their opinion) the best cameras for birds in flight: ( link).

Spoiler Alert: Sony A9ii takes the win.

What's nice is that they update the rankings as new cameras come out or older cameras get firmware updates. So it's worth bookmarking and checking periodically.

Sep 22, 2021 at 10:13 AM

galenapass
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p.4 #12 · p.4 #12 · EM1x + 300mmpro/1.4xTC vs. Sony A6400 + 200-600mm

Lupin 3rd wrote:
MirrorlessComparison.com has ranked which are (in their opinion) the best cameras for birds in flight: ( link).

Spoiler Alert: Sony A9ii takes the win.

What's nice is that they update the rankings as new cameras come out or older cameras get firmware updates. So it's worth bookmarking and checking periodically.

Thanks Lupin. No surprise there I guess. This AF-C data was collected by Mathieu Gasquet. Somewhere on YouTube there is a video of him and some other photographers shooting kites. I was surprised by how slow moving and predictable the birds in that location were. In that video many of the kites were flying such that he was only panning the camera. I find that the Olympus AF-C really starts to fail when the bird is flying directly at or away from the camera, or if the action is quite fast. If that video was representative of most of his data, I think we should take that into account as well. But, for one person to do the tests in a systematic way...that adds a lot of value to the comparison, IMO. Thanks for posting.

Sep 22, 2021 at 10:54 AM

galenapass
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p.4 #13 · p.4 #13 · EM1x + 300mmpro/1.4xTC vs. Sony A6400 + 200-600mm

George Welch wrote:
Hi Mike,

I somehow missed the thread when you initially posted it. A well thought out and presented topic.

I agree with all of your comments but would add as a difference with the Olympus files:

When you can get pixels on the subject, the Olympus files, even from the 8 year old sensor are wonderful to work with. If you get any distance between you and the subject and need to crop - there is no contest, the Sony files are much better - every time.

The AF for action and BIF is not even close either - Sony the clear winner...Show more →

Thanks George, agree with what you are saying. Now that I have been away from Olympus, I may pick some gear up again, but only for travel photography.

Sep 22, 2021 at 10:57 AM

Paul_100A
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p.4 #14 · p.4 #14 · EM1x + 300mmpro/1.4xTC vs. Sony A6400 + 200-600mm

galenapass wrote:
Thanks Lupin. No surprise there I guess. This AF-C data was collected by Mathieu Gasquet. Somewhere on YouTube there is a video of him and some other photographers shooting kites. I was surprised by how slow moving and predictable the birds in that location were. In that video many of the kites were flying such that he was only panning the camera. I find that the Olympus AF-C really starts to fail when the bird is flying directly at or away from the camera, or if the action is quite fast. If that video was representative of most of his...Show more →
Precisely!
Folks have different opinions, criteria, and standards of what 'satisfactory results' are for anything and everything... photography related topics hold true and BIF subtopic also holds true.
There is a post at DPR wherein the OP states he has no issues capturing BIF with his gear and so asks what issues others, whom seem unable to capture BIF with their gear, are having.
Well...I say...any half decent/poor AF system and skilled camera operator ought not have many difficulties capturing BIFs at a long distance and travelling parallel to the camera on a reasonably consistently same plane of focus.
My skill set added with the AF performance of my current camera gear affords me to capture a high numbers of well AF'd BIF images when captured at a long distance thus giving me low/no detailed images. A complete waste of my time to come home with perfectly, miniscule sized, well focused blobs of detail-less subjects.
The closer the BIF's get to the camera, and/or the more Z-axis, the more OoF images I get in return and I will say that I am very often able to have a bird occupy center frame and fill the frame for much of the burst. In other words I can and often do provide the camera/AF system with plenty to bite on if it so chose to do so or could do so.
For static/perched birds the AF system of my gear is perfectly satisfactory. I rarely get 100% focused images in a burst but I normally get something from each burst.
BIF...not even close.
I want AF to work on BIFs that are close enough to fill the frame and are center frame, occupying the currently selected AF target points. That's never happened with any reasonable level of consistency with my Olympus gear.
Back to the point...Oh sure, I post a few sharp (and sometime detailed) BIF images but those are the rare/fluke images picked from the 90%+ OoF BIF images filling the card.
I challenge anyone considering arguing against my opinion to post (or provide links) results of burst sequences, using their Olympus gear, the likes of which, FM member, arbitrage often does....80-150 images of a BIF burst sequence with hardly more than a few not in focus, travelling on Z axis, and not at 400 yards distance. I get the opposite...about 3 images in focus per every 100 OoF.
I dare and welcome anybody to prove me wrong. I would then gladly know that I am in error with regards to my expectations and skill level with my Olympus equipment and that I indeed have room for improvement and no reason for complaints against my equipment's capabilities.

Sep 22, 2021 at 12:32 PM

fadeslayer
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p.4 #15 · p.4 #15 · EM1x + 300mmpro/1.4xTC vs. Sony A6400 + 200-600mm

Sep 22, 2021 at 05:29 PM

fsi22
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p.4 #16 · p.4 #16 · EM1x + 300mmpro/1.4xTC vs. Sony A6400 + 200-600mm

Sep 22, 2021 at 05:36 PM

galenapass
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p.4 #17 · p.4 #17 · EM1x + 300mmpro/1.4xTC vs. Sony A6400 + 200-600mm

fadeslayer wrote:
I have pretty tons of sequences with A9 of birds flying parallel to me where subsequent photos are in focus and out of focus, with 200-600 racking nearer and farther continuously, under a bright sky (kestrel, magpie, small songbirds), at >20 feet. Disappointing so much. So I fear changing system, but weight of hanging 200-600 with gripped body for more than 20 minutes is getting more and more bothering, and such failures (both due to inertia of that long lens to rise and due to AF failure to focus) make it worse every session, than I don't enjoy shooting anymore....Show more →

OK, then how do you explain the high success rate on that review website, and the many, many shots here on FM of BIF with the Sony A9? In addition, all the reviews which state consistently that it is a great camera for BIF? If everyone else can get good results and you can't then I think you need to figure out why. It does no good to repeat the same complaints over and over. I and others have made some suggestions here. Time for you to do some problem solving. If weight is an issue, get a monopod/tripod like everyone else.

Sep 22, 2021 at 06:38 PM

Imagemaster
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p.4 #18 · p.4 #18 · EM1x + 300mmpro/1.4xTC vs. Sony A6400 + 200-600mm

galenapass wrote:
OK, then how do you explain the high success rate on that review website, and the many, many shots here on FM of BIF with the Sony A9? In addition, all the reviews which state consistently that it is a great camera for BIF? If everyone else can get good results and you can't then I think you need to figure out why. It does no good to repeat the same complaints over and over. I and others have made some suggestions here. Time for you to do some problem solving. If weight is an issue, get a monopod/tripod like...Show more →

Mike, some people (you know who) just complain about any gear they use, usually because they don't know how to use it properly. They go on and on, but never seem to have the time or interest in posting example photos (with exif included) to help those they are asking for advice to clearly see what the problem might be and offer helpful advice.

If they can't be bothered to do that, I can't be bothered to help them.

Sep 23, 2021 at 12:25 AM

Imagemaster
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p.4 #19 · p.4 #19 · EM1x + 300mmpro/1.4xTC vs. Sony A6400 + 200-600mm

Paul_100A wrote:
I challenge anyone considering arguing against my opinion to post (or provide links) results of burst sequences, using their Olympus gear, the likes of which, FM member, arbitrage often does....80-150 images of a BIF burst sequence with hardly more than a few not in focus, travelling on Z axis, and not at 400 yards distance.

Maybe you could lend Arbitrage your gear and get him to test it for you. I never take 80 - 150 images in a burst.

Sep 23, 2021 at 12:37 AM

fadeslayer
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p.4 #20 · p.4 #20 · EM1x + 300mmpro/1.4xTC vs. Sony A6400 + 200-600mm

galenapass wrote:
OK, then how do you explain the high success rate on that review website, and the many, many shots here on FM of BIF with the Sony A9? In addition, all the reviews which state consistently that it is a great camera for BIF? If everyone else can get good results and you can't then I think you need to figure out why. It does no good to repeat the same complaints over and over. I and others have made some suggestions here. Time for you to do some problem solving. If weight is an issue, get a monopod/tripod like...Show more →

I had many sequences OK, I would say that with 100-400mm I had 50% success in BIF with ZERO previous experience, but reach was a problem. So I swapped lens with 200-600, and in the beginning I was quite satisfied, both for AF and IQ. Lately, something went wronger and wronger, and I struggle to get focused shots in full bursts, but sometimes it works like a charm for 60% of shots. Definitely something to check here, I agree.

I have a question still: could sensor dust affect autofocusing?

Sep 23, 2021 at 09:46 AM

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