Hi, this is Wayne again with a topic “Sony’s new $2,200 camera vs. an iPhone 14 Pro”.
Vlogging is hard, oh my Atlanta. First, you have to have something interesting to convey. Then you have to figure out a compelling way to show it man, and then you like got ta, know how to use a camera and like any way to make. Even one part of that process easier is a win and Sony thinks it could help with everything. But the story: this is Sony’s newest camera, the zve E1.
It packs incredible specs into a really tiny design. In fact, it is the smallest full frame camera you can buy right now and it is aimed right at content. Creators, I’m Becca, welcome back to full frame buds. Sony makes a lot of cameras, but the Z V Line has always been the most user friendly and compact. Historically, this lineup featured an aps-c or a smaller sensor with the zve E1 Sony has put a full frame sensor and its brand new AI processor, from the just released photography, oriented a7r Mark V into a form factor that users of this lineup will recognize. It has a tilting screen physical switches for moving between photo video and slow motion.
Video, a zoom toggle under the shutter button, firm doors that protect the ports and SD card slot, a windscreen that slides onto the hot shoe for its mic and a plethora of buttons. All located, on the right hand, side for easy operation with your right hand. Internally, the larger 12 megapixel back illuminated CMOS sensor brings 15 stops of dynamic range up to 400 400 and nine thousand six hundred ISO. That can’t be good. 422.
10 bit 4K 120 frames per second or fhd 240 frames per second internal video recording, both of which will come in a later firmware update the larger e-mount for use with the most premium lenses Sony makes and, of course, a much larger price tag come on. Those are impressive specs for a camera that is this size, but what’s more important is that you actually know how to use them. Taking a video with a phone is incredibly easy.
You hit that big red record button and then your phone adjusts its magical little settings to flatten out the highlights and shadows optically stabilize the image to minimize shakiness, and now there are even cinematic modes that blur backgrounds to create depth. It is painless and it is simple and we can see a lot of those same design cues in the zve E1. The screen is fully touch screen and loaded with familiar icons such as the Big Red Dot.
That starts and stops the recording. It uses an AI processing unit that recognizes a scene in just exposure. It selects which mic pattern to use to best capture audio and it even adjusts the amount of image stabilization.
It applies to create a smooth image and Sony. Also added a cinevlog mode drama, but more on that later, it is so clear that Sony wants folks to be able to pick up this camera and just get filming with it. So for the last week I took it everywhere with me and I let it do the thinking which means that I didn’t use s-log or any color profile that I would have to color down the road. I didn’t attach any external mics and I left it on auto with the included hot shoe uh little dead cat thing.
I didn’t put an ND filter on it. I didn’t put it on a gimbal. I just took it in and out of my bag all week and filmed everything that I would film with a phone, but instead with this as a professional videographer, I have some notes, but as an everyday user I’m impressed Patrick’s Day, I haven’t heard a single bag. Pipe a little concerning all of this footage is straight out of the zve E1. There is very little on the user side that you need to do to make it look great in good light. Colors are true to life, they are just Punchy enough and the system handles Shadows quite well.
The details are also crisp and create video that you feel like you could just Reach Out And Touch. I’M really happy that Sony isn’t over sharpening the image at night, though, you can see the camera doing some smoothing to Shadows to combat grain and noise, though it does feel like with every new camera. We get one stop closer to better low light performance. For example, this was shot at 10 000 ISO, and that is completely usable, something that I couldn’t say about a camera.
A few years ago I bought some pizza. I only took the autofocus off once to shoot through this fence, otherwise the system was able to find faces or lock onto points I chose with ease. The new AI processor can also find figures such as shoulders and then lock onto the back of heads when a person then turns around their face is quickly in Focus. I love this and it works incredibly well. Just a casual three mile walk home from where ain’t. Nothing to it folks, the AI processor also helps with audio.
I didn’t need an external mic, the Brooklyn Bridge. It is not a quiet place. There is traffic on both sides, there’s always a big Breeze and lots of tourists, but this camera did a very good job of canceling out. All of that, the best part of walking the Brooklyn Bridge is getting past.
The midpoint on like you’re on the Brooklyn side, and it just like empties out and you don’t have to share your Bridge with everybody and their brother anymore. However, when bigger breezes or the sound of an engine do hit like, on top of this Ferry, you can really hear the camera working to keep out unwanted sounds [ Applause ], give this a few firmware updates, or maybe a Next Generation chip, and I think it’s Going to be incredible, though, the zve E1 has four stabilization modes off standard, active and dynamic, Dynamic crops into the image quite a bit, but utilizes the five axis in body stabilization and electronic image stabilization to create really stable footage. I stayed in this mode for most of my testing, but did change to the standard stabilization when filming myself, so I could get a wider shot, though at night the stabilization can get a bit jittery much like the mics in three to five years. I could see users no longer needing external gimbals at all and now my two favorite gimmicks in the zve one beginning with the one that I hate, auto framing using subject recognition. The camera automatically crops the frame to keep a subject in the center. Much like Apple’s Center Stage, the camera’s movement feels completely unnatural, and I just don’t see a use case for this in my life. A great gimmick on this camera, though, is cinevlog. With the push of a button. The camera puts a 2.35 to 1 aspect ratio on your footage. It locks the frame rate at 24 frames per second. It applies a creative look which I kept at a cine tone and it sets the the autofocus transition speed to medium help me, but I think I’m addicted to cineblog. No everything looks 150 cooler, even if I have absolutely no use for 2.35 to 1 footage, but is all of that enough to get content creators who predominantly use their phones to make the leap to a full-frame camera.
I think It ultimately comes down to more than image quality, but here are side-by-side video samples with the zve1 and the iPhone 14 pro. At first glance, it’s actually hard to tell these two cameras apart, but when you look a little closer, you start to see that the details truly fall. Apart with the iPhone still not to mention the depth of field, you get with a full frame sensor and when it comes to filming folks faces holy cow, the iPhone just wants to even the image right out, whereas the Sony really holds on to the Shadows. It’S just like the iPhone paints a picture of what it thinks the world should look like, whereas the Sony captures what is actually there. The sunset was not that yellow the iPhone, simply brightens everything up like in these shots.
It was getting dark outside the sky. Was a much deeper blue? I am impressed with the iPhone’s performance, though, and once it starts to handle the Shadows a bit better. This competition could actually be viable for now. My larger concern with the zve E1 is its lack of consideration for vertical video and holy cow. Its app is a mess like we need to get this together Sony. So if I have spent the better half of the last decade trying to convince all of my family and friends to just shoot horizontally when they’re filming video – and I mean even now I’ll admit that most of the video I watch is vertical 9×16 and with the Zve1, there’s just not a great way to film vertically, unless you have a tripod that does that well or you’re going to hold it in your hand, which I guess the image stabilization will help with that. But I think what Sony could do is either create a mode that when shooting in 4k, you know puts letterboxes or crops to 9×16 which, yes, then it wouldn’t be 4K.
But I mean it’s social, I don’t think you really need 4K or if they put some sort of tripod mount on the side of the camera like a quarter inch Mount. I think the fx3 has one so that you could just you know, Mount your camera sideways on a tripod or I don’t know if a gimbal, if you could balance it this way and now, let’s talk about the app Sony recently released the new creators app, but Even attempting to connect the camera to the app before you even get to transferring images is painful. In fact, I wasn’t able to do it at all.
I kept getting this error and I mean there’s just like no accessories to even click and I’m not the only one with problems. This new app has a 1.7 star rating in the App Store with folks experiencing similar problems. To me, Sony should really take notes from GoPro and especially insta360, on creating a solid app experience. They can literally teach the camera illiterate. How to edit 360 footage. The least Sony could do is make an app that can transfer images from a camera to a phone. As a videographer, though, the zvee one does a hell of a lot right, video straight out of the camera is crisp, it is in focus and the camera does a pretty good job of recognizing a scene and exposing for it properly and its small form factor allows You to take it anywhere turn it on quickly and get film doing incredibly good footage with ease with me, but you don’t have to pay that much money for a really solid entry-level, full-frame camera. The a7c came out two years ago and it has continued to be my go-to vlogging camera. It is ever so slightly larger, but has a similar full frame sensor, a Sony e-mount for Great Glass and the added bonus of an evf for a more Pro feel when you’re using it all of the footage that had the zve E1 in it was shot with.
My a7c that I’m using right now that I’ve had for two years. I love this system so much and better. Yet you can get one used for like 1500 bucks. Now you won’t get the new AI processor unit. You won’t get the dumb down menu system. You won’t get gimmicks such as you know the AI tracking feature or cinevlog God I mean you put 2-1 on anything, and just you have my heart for anyone.
That’S just trying to dip their toe in full frame. Videography or you know, take a step up from their smartphone. I think you should look at the a7c first.
In case you didn’t know we have a vergecast channel now, which is sweet. You can actually see the voices behind the podcast uh hope to be on there. Sometime soon, maybe I don’t know and uh yeah we’re blasting off on Tick Tock y’all, I you know I am actually having a lot of fun.
Creating content over there. So um never thought I’d say that anyway, I’m Becca, I hope, you’re well and we’ll see on the next one buds. .