Hands-on with the Sony ZV-1

The most recent memory stick format was announced in 2011. The last camera I can find with a memory stick port was the A99 mark II which dates back to 2016. I don't even think it even supported some of the final transfer rates Sony was bragging about before abandoning the standard.

All of Sony’s recent A6x00 cameras and this one have Memory Stick ports. You won’t find current UHS-1 or UHS-II ports though.
This is because they all are made from older parts in their leftover parts bin.

Sure, but only by 1 degree off. That wouldn't stop me buying.

Forest and after 5 th product in line Canon and nikon will think about providing a crippled product equal to version 1 of Sony..

I would like to use my AirPods for mics and headphones with my ZV-1. I’m willing to buy Sony’s 1000XM3 buds if they support the ZV-1.

But in the meantime, I’ll use my new Saramonic wireless two mics into one receiver as demonstrated by iJustine and her sister Jena. https://youtu.be/OE7PPWygl2I. On this camera

Leave it to Sony to make a 180 degree articulating LCD that can NOT turn 180 degrees and instead ends up pointing off to the side instead of at the vlogger.
So no headphone jack isn’t the worst of its many problems.

This is a problem in theory only. Like horseshoes, it’s close enough. It’s so close that in operation the difference is irrelevant!

I am sure whenever you buy something and it doesn’t work as expected or as well as similar items, you say Close enough or It kind of works!
If you buy a lens and it doesn’t focus out to infinity, or you buy a car and the doors don’t shut perfectly because they are off a few degrees, you are still happy.
That’s called “Sony thinking”.

That's why I do not buy Canon. Sensors don't have enough DR. We make no compromise. Good enough does not cut it.

I thought something was wrong in the pictures! That explains it.

If you buy a house and the windows were crooked by 2 degrees it wouldn’t have any real world impact either. It would still be a problem.
You could claim being only 70 degrees off (110) wouldn’t have any real world impact.

It sounds like a poorly designed product. I can see people cracking them thinking they should go the full 180. It will never look right, and will drive anyone with the mildest OCD crazy.

@Richard I'm going to try that answer on my next geometry test. :D

Raynoud that would be issue if you sat out to design something and you failed to design.

Sony did not say that they sat out to design 180.deg flip, they designed for 179. You take it or leave it. It's a product like any others.

To give an example Canon sensors may lack on Dr compared to Sony. For the perfectionist like yourself it could be an issue, in real world people use them all the time.

“ they designed for 179”

That’s even more a failure. They purposely designed it to not go the full 180 degrees, but fell short of the design at 176 degrees.

They must have the worst engineers if they couldn’t get this to go 180 degrees like most others in the industry. Can you imagine if a builder told you the corners on you home were close to 90 degrees and really 86 or 94.
I bet a good number of people break the arm frustrated trying to open it be normal.
Every talk to someone who keeps look off to the side and never loos at you? Like this it’s very annoying.

But this whole camera is a kludge. It has an arm that only swings out 176 degrees. It has a memory stick port. It lacks USB 3.0, 3.1 or 3.2. It does not support UHS-2 or the older UHS-1 SD cards. The older LCD is only about 300k pixels.

Lol look at this guy clutching to the weakest points possible to bash this camera 😂

Raynaud, even with all of that, it's the best vlogging camera for anyone looking for a light setup....

Who’s the vlogger that films for 2h????

Yeah what vlogger wants a screen that points directly at him so he can see?

We all know vloggers want a camera with no headphone jack and a display that is cockeyed to the side.

recorded 20 mins in 4k before shutdown in 100 degree room... thats 2x the time of a canon 1" camera, any of them.

you forget lens, this much lighter

Fuji X-A7 kit lens - Fujifilm XC 15-45mm F3.5-5.6 OIS PZ - 136g

The smaller Sony camera actually has a brighter lens than that Fuji kit: aperture 5 mm vs. 4 mm (wide end) and 9 mm vs. 8 mm (long end).

DejayRezme, I think you're looking at this from a photographer's point of view. For a vlogger, the size alone is reason enough to choose this over any of the others. You can just put this on the pocket and move on.

Why would you choose a bigger camera that you can't see yourself to vlog instead of a smaller camera that does exactly what you need and even has a light so you know the camera is filming?

Ok Camera Conspiracy testes this hands on in his usual professional demeanor. But about vlogging he actually knows stuff: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0LbhFu6vYQM

The ZV1 is definitely not designed for vlogging, it's just not wide enough.

I wish someone would make a compact 20-50mm f4 equivalent lens for APS-C Sony or Fuji. That would be perfect for vlogging and most youtube stuff.

I mean what would be really "designed for vlogging" would be a 1" gimbal camera like the DJI Osmo Pocket with 20mm and a variable ND filter. No need for electronic or optical stabilization. No need for an articulating screen either if the camera module can rotate 360°.

I much prefer the sony fov compared to the go pro. The go pro is way too wide.

On top of that, you get zoom, mic and a screen.

DejayRezme
In that video the camera seems easily wide enough and the GoPro too wide. Why would you need wider? Please clue me in.

@DejayRezme
+1 DJI Osmo pocket with 1" sensor may be better deal for outdoor vlogger. But, must need good AF and UI on smartphone app. Hope DJI will come out these kind of product.

@tbcass If you want anything besides the face covering the whole frame you need wider.

I prefer to see the face covering the whole screen. It seems more personal and I take still portraits that way. In Camera Conspiracy's video the GoPro seemed too wide with a lot of extraneous clutter in the background. Same with the Sony on the extension although it looked better with the Sony because the background was out of focus. It doesn't matter to me though because I'm not a vlogger so this camera is not for me. Maybe I just think too much like a still shooter.

I guess it's a question of taste, audience and also beauty. Camera Conspiracy is a good example of someone who's main asset for his vlog isn't his face :D

And if you only see the face and show nothing of the environment you're in then you might as well shoot in a studio with a more pleasing lens. I think a vlog should be more of an "environmental portrait".

In any case it would be better to have the option. So I think you can objectively say the ZV1, while a nice and small camera, isn't well designed for vlogging.

uninformed as always....

https://www.amazon.com/Coupler-Adpater-Replacement-Battery-Cybershot/dp/B078PDCF7D

SONY promises live-streaming this summer.

Siince the camera can be powered with an USB connection, you can use a USB power pack. Unlike the A7 cameras, a dummy battery is not needed. A power pack little larger than a cell phone (20,000 mAH) will power the camera for hours. That's how I use my Sony RX0.

I think it's a fair comment. I was trying so hard to think from the perspective of vloggers that I originally forgot to mention that there's no flash. It's not something that is likely to matter to the target audience for this camera, but I should have pointed it out.

Wouldn't it be cool if the camera had a line of LEDs to provide rudimentary lighting? Would those be too weak or run too hot for something like that to be practical?

Well, a feature of this camera makes it possible to take photos Or videos of subjects With their back directly to the sun and get flawlessly exposed faces! I think it’s called face priority AF. So the need for a flash is greatly reduced, if your snapping people.

Realy would like to know what happend to the ZX1!

Bronco is a real truck being release if you havent seen the recent leaked pics

It's called a dead cat.

thomas2279f:

Well, there's the slim compact from Panasonic, the LX100 II, that doesn't have the overheating issue, but it has a fixed screen so isn't good for vanity video logging--fine for video in many cases though, and better battery life too. I guess it doesn't have the Sony's AF tracking.

And as others have pointed out, there are a number of 1 inch sensored compact Canons that are good for v-logging. But those Canons don't have the bad reputation for overheating, nor are the batteries used quite as incapacious as those in the RX100 models from Sony.

Youtuber put the camera into 100+ degree case and it recorded for 20 mins til shutdown. In anything reasonable the camera recorded til it drained the battery.

https://youtu.be/4YVpsCjHTxs?t=895

What are you talking about Canon not overheating? How about 10 min limit on Canon? Sony Recorded 20 mins in 100 degree housing til shutdown in 4k.

https://youtu.be/4YVpsCjHTxs?t=895

http://thenewcamera.com/canon-g5x-mark-ii-4k-recording-limit/
https://www.reddit.com/r/canon/comments/eplfkf/does_the_g5x_ii_have_the_same_overheating_issues/

This camera doesn’t have a heating problem. At least 5 of the reviewers of the 30 reviewers I watched yesterday tried to melt it down. None could.

@Smith43: you’ve hit on what I believe is a very important use case. Personal vlogging records for my kids and grandkids, and great grandkids. Maybe one a month for each of them. I’m old, I have time in my ‘busy’ schedule, until I don’t! Letting people know you were thinking of them is important! This camera looks to be capable and easy to use. I would like to leave something nicer than my iPhone produces.

Sure, products should be criticized for what they not are - or are you using stills for your quick and easy vlogging?

Lucky Sony not produce car, otherwise consumer need buy 2 car, one for passenger, another for household goods.

To make it a camera that does everything, it will end up being like all other cameras that fail to do anything well.

This is a super light and compact vlogging camera that has most of the things vloggers need and not the stuff they don't. The vlogger showing the outfits or travelling across Asia doesn't need a viewfinder or adjustment dials in the front.

Well, if you look under the hood, this thing has everything the a6400 has minus a couple of dials and animal eyeAF. It has been optimized for vloggers, isn’t that OK? They have wanted such a camera for a long time, I’m happy for them.

I for one prefer Jenna Haze 😀

It's also about sharing experiences. I'm following a motorbike ride from Patagonia to Alaska. At the end of the day, it's a vlog. Someone that filmed their trip. But I'm learning about different cultures and places. It's something I will never do, but can learn from someone else's experience.

rugged fixed lens non retractable please.

No, the Sony RX100VA costs $850 and has 4k, which I don't need. The G7X-2 is not in the same league. I also mentioned a 20-70mm lens which does not exist, right?

The 15-45mm Kit, being 22.5- 67.5mm is at least wider than the garbage 24mm. The ZV1 has a top facing mic, which is pointless no matter how high tech it is, making it not different from the X-A7 when it comes to audio.

The ZV1 has 3 mic solutions - buildt in directional mic, hot shoe mic including the new digital interface mics, traditional analog ”plug” mic that most legacy cameras have and that requires cables with related trouble.

Sure, if you accept adding cable risk and if you settle for analogue.
In my experience the digital Sony mics work very well.

I agree in many situations a lav is good alternative. But even for a lav you have the choice to use the hot shoe for the main unit and avoid cables. I think that it is a good alternative for compact camera setups to keep it simple and avoid cables.
The nice thing with this compact camera is that it supports all 3 scenarios 1) onboard directional mic 2) Hot shoe mic [digital and analoge] 3) traditional analogue cable connected mic equipment

When selfie with 24mm lens, need at least 60-70cm long selfie stick, otherwise only can see big head on screen without background.

@Operon when it comes to size, every inch counts.