turbodude wrote:
timgangloff wrote
turbodude wrote
timgangloff wrote
turbodude wrote
AJay wrote
Watching a Northrup video is like listening to fingernails on a chalkboard. Nonetheless it seems like the R5's autofocus is a tad better at bird-eye detect/tracking but their tests seemed limited -- no BIF other than a crow that Tony decided to shoot at 1/250th of a second. Really?
Another point they didn't bring up nor test is rolling shutter in electronic mode. From what I have seen the R5 does have wing distortion with small birds with fast wingbeats. I'd really like to see the A1 tested at 1/32,000 sec. The A9 can freeze a hummingbird's wings with electronic shutter at that shutter speed. Hopefully the A1 with 50 Mp can do the same. That is amazing and Sony is the only one that can do that.
More tests please... the r5 electronic shutter readout is atrocious. every pro sports photog i know thats tried it immediately switched back to their 1dxmk3. the r5 distorts footballs, soccer balls, and basketballs to a level where no editor will take it as a usable frame. I only know one sports shooter using an r5. I've shot next to him and I think in the 10s of thousands of images have only seen 1 or 2 distorted balls. He shoots for a major national media outlet and has not had any issues with his editors and the r5 files. Another sports guy who shoots for one of the big wires services just got an r5 but I've not seen his work yet. hes likely not shooting in electronic shutter. which nets about 12fps. as stated if using electronic shutter, the r5 is almost useless for sports that have a ball. What sport do they shoot? and is it at the Pro level, as in MLB, NFL, NHL, NBA Read the post above yours. HS and high level D1 and a smidge of motor sports. not sure if he has shot nfl yet. All ES. ahh, i believe that could be the reason he hasnt seen any issues yet. at the pro level, stuff gets funky. its really cripples an otherwise fantastic camera for pro sports use.
Yes, I think it has more to do with the sports he is shooting, basketball and football, than the level as these d1 players are often pro sports guys the next year. He's making it work and the other big 3 wire service guy I am friends with just got the r5. He is in a bigger city and will shoot just about all of the HS, D1 and pro level sports. I'll be curious to hear his take. I think he recently sold the 1dxII I sold him a couple years back when I went Sony.
But, many people don't realize that there are many "sports" guys who make a living shooting sports at a level less than pro and their cameras serve double duty, action and sportrait type images and they simply can't afford the 1dxIII. Many guys make substantial portion of their income shooting youth sports and there are probably a lot more of them than there are guys who shoot pro sports exclusively.
And "sports" doesn't always mean action stuff. Lots of money is made in the team and individual arena (where I make most of my money) and having a fast and accurate eye AF is more important than capturing fast action. So, the r5 successfully fills that gap. Sure, it has some compromises, but it's still a fantastic "sports" camera. In fact, I would never go back to a DSLR for this kind of paid work.
Also, I'd suggest that in this covid era where on field shooters have largely been eliminated, having more MP has become even more important as shooters are capturing images from the stands and are even more focal length challenged. This is one reason the Alpha 1 is on order for me. Our local D1 basketball teams has the media shooting from 4 positions in the stands in a large 18,000 person arena. One of those positions in on the second tier...a long ways from the court. No more baseline shooting.
Bottom line is that I do like the sensor readout speed of the Sony's over the R5, but the R5 is being used to shoot sports professionally even with it's limitations. On the flip side, Canon has some fantastic glass for the R5 that Sony doesn't have, yet. The 300 and 500 come to mind. Many Canon shooters have these lenses already, so the R5 is a better choice for them.