Teddy bear (Taken with instagram)
“It’s time to restart life.”
X-Wing and Vader, Lille and Surrounding Wastelands, 2007 by Cédric Delsaux.
Sony NEX-5N Review
Thought I’d post one of these up as I have a lot to say about the Sony NEX-5N. Both good and the bad.
For those who want to flame me, in advance, I own a Nikon D700, Nikon F3, Nikon D80, and a number of accessories and lenses for those cameras and I also work as a photographer shooting pictures for catalogues and do a variety of street photography. I will be comparing the Sony NEX-5N to some of those cameras detailed above.
Introduction
I got the Sony NEX-5N as a secondary camera for when I am out with friends and family on holidays or just for day outings and did not want to carry the bulk that is my D700 or D80. Upon deciding this, I had a number of options available to me. There was the Olympus PEN E-P3, which some seem to worship so I will tread lightly with that one, the Panasonic GF3, Nikon V1, Sony NEX-C3 and of course the Sony NEX-5N.
Now you may be thinking the 5N and the C3 are in a different class, but I was considering it for its cheap price advantage with a reduction in features that didn’t seem all that necessary.
Why 5N over C3
I decided to pay the premium for the 5N not because of the Full HD 1080 50p video, nor the increased ISO range from 12800 to 25600, but because of its support for the OLED EVF Accessory. “Downgrading” to these Mirrorless CSC’s from real DSLR’s, and having not used a compact much at all in the digital world (I used a lot of film compacts in the 90s and then upgraded to DSLR’s in digital), I found it hard to adjust to the compact-like Live View style shooting and framing, so something like an optional EVF being available made the transition a lot easier.
The 5N has a much more chunkier grip and feels more solid in the hands to shoot with and more comfortable when using it for extended periods of time.
Why NEX over Nikon 1/Olympus PEN E-P3/Panasonic GF3
There were a number of reasons why I had chosen Sony’s NEX series over others such as Nikon 1. Brand favouritism aside, I love having an APS-C/DX size sensor in a small formfactor rather than opting for the smaller Micro Four-Thirds sensors or the even SMALLER CX sensors invented by Nikon. While the other two form factors may be good as well, I generally preferred the much smoother and less noisier bokeh provided by the larger sensor in the NEX cameras. Also the 5N has very good noise performance compared to even my D80, which only went up to ISO 1600.
Contrary to popular opinion, I liked the simplistic design of the Nikon V1 over the rather “consumer appliance” look that Sony gave its NEX series cameras. I also liked the retro styling of the PEN E-P3. While not particularly bad, it wasnt really particularly interesting to look at either.
User Interface woes
To put it bluntly, those coming down from DSLR’s will be in for a shock. A few functions have been renamed, “Lower apertures” in completely Auto mode is labelled as “Background Defocus”, and a lot of the functions you would expect to find under the “Camera” menu option are hidden away in obscure places. It was kind of hard for those wishing to just pick up and jump straight into shooting with this camera as a few quick skims of the user manual were needed to find various functions.
But despite all these gripes, once you knew what you were doing, it was a pretty streamlined interface that worked well, albiet a slight learning curve.
Image Quality
Quite a few of my images posted before this post are shot using the NEX-5N. Feel free to go have a look at the high res versions and decide for yourself whether or not this is a good camera or not. I purchased the NEX-5ND kit, D standing for Double a.k.a. Twin Lens Kit. This package contained the attachable external flash, a 16mm F2.8 prime and a 18-55mm F3.5-5.6 standard kit zoom.
Conclusion
Although not a thorough review that pours in hours and hours of research and info on the finer details of the camera, I have just mainly pointed out the key reasons why this camera took my fancy over the other competitors and we all know Tumblr isnt the place people go to for extensive reviews =D
