If you are already vested in Sony, stick with it. I have a lot respect for Sony they freed us from the cold war days with Canon and Nikon. You may find a few +'s with canon but Sony has many positives also.
Chat with Reverend Abitrage.. he will guide you.
duncang wrote: Pius Sullivan wrote: duncang wrote:
I just had the opportunity to spend a few hours using the R5 100-500 combo today shooting birds and was very impressed with the accuracy of the bird af system - easily beats my a1 in terms of identifying the birds body, head and then eyes. The a1 was getting hung up on the grass or background, struggled to track the eye consistently and is quite embarrassing by comparison.
In one case I was shooting a raven or crow and it flew against a dark background where I could no longer see it and was about to stop pressing the shutter when I noticed the camera was still tracking its eye (blue focus box). No way the a1 or a9 can do that - in fact the a1 would not even be able to track the ravens eye in flight like the Canon does - it was a good 60 meters away.
I have not yet got the images from the R5 to compare actual focus accuracy or iq but for those folks who have both cameras where does the R5 fall down for birds/animals - ignoring the obvious 30fps and rolling shutter.
The evf seems fine and I didn't notice any lag or blackout and rolling shutter distortion also seems to be a none issue. Just a shame Canon don't make a 200-600, the 100-500 is just a bit on the short side.
A super nice small and light rig the R5 + 100-500 though. Sounds like the R3 is going to be 24mp - that's a real shame.
I think your analysis of the R5 is spot on with respect to tracking and BEAF, don't know how it compares to the A1 . The R5 has no issue keeping up with fast birds in flight. I have photographed lots of fast birds IF with the R5.. harlequins, merganser, kingfishers, killdeer, swallows, kestrels, purple martins, red-winged blackbirds and buffle heads to name a few. I didn't find any issue tracking fast birds with 1.4 or 2x converters on the 600 III or the 400 DO II. The 100-500 is a great lens and so is the 200-600 if use within its design specs (good light for birds IF).
What I really like about the 200-600 is the internal zoom, extra weight but worth it to me. These lenses are no match for the f/4's or f/2.8 primes in early mornings or late evenings at the local estuary.. Rolling shutter with the R5 has never jeopardized my bird IF photography. I would post some images for you to check the image quality but I don't want to ruin "RoamingScott's" eyesight... plus this being a Sony forum its not appropriate to post R5 images. Think the image quality is very close between the A1 and R5 but I do notice the blacks from the A1 seem to have a grayish look to me but that just might be me.
Thanks, no problem - I will be getting the R5 images I took so no worries there but just wanted to confirm my initial impressions of the af - I had seen it on YouTube but it seemed even better in real life. I don't expect there will be any material difference in iq and I have a 5K display so I am sure that if there is any I will notice it ;-). Colours - I expect to be similar with really nothing that can't be adjusted in post.
As far as lenses go the 200-600 is what got me to Sony in the first place - I just got lucky they then came out with the a1. And unless Canon do something with similar reach and speed not sure I would switch even for the better animal/bird tracking and a 50mp 30fps R3.
Now if Canon came up with a similar 200-600 f6.3 that would be interesting but that seems very unlikely. Nikon - well they do have a 200-600 on their roadmap and sounds like there is a camera coming.
Fantastic what these cameras can do these days and always great to see and experience what is possible. Anyway good job canon on the af tracking - sets the benchmark for everyone else.
Jun 20, 2021 at 12:56 AM
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he will guide you.