Sony A6000 - needs much more light. A6000 vs 600D

Young Harold · Apr 12, 2015

Hi Folks,

I know I'm a little late to the party but after buying my first 'real' camera after lots and lots of research and scanning this forum I bought the A6000.

Info - KIT LENS ON BOTH. Uv Filter taken off and results did not change. Clean glass on both.

After getting a few good shots I was very happy with the camera but I feel it really sucks in low light. Does anyone else have this problem?

I just shot it against my colleagues 600d inside, both in A priority and the 600d absolutely smashed away my A6000.

After getting very annoyed I decided to stick my A6000 on manual and upped the shutter speed from its suggested 1/80 to 1 second and boom - we have a winner!

Has anyone else found this to be the case in low light? I know the kit lens is bad but really? He also has the kit 18-55 and I zoomed in until we had the same frame and F stop.
I wanted to buy the sigma but worried it won't be fast enough to but cannot afford the 35mm 1.8 as its a hobby at the moment.
I might go back to the shop and shoot it against one of theirs but the lighting conditions won't help me out as its bright flori's!

Thanks in advance and hope the wealth of knowledge this forum has will help me out!

JYPfoto · Apr 13, 2015

You're talking about a 3.5-5.6 lens which if I remember correctly quickly jumps up from 3.5 the moment you start zooming in. Indoors it's not going to cut it, you'll jump up in ISO to make up for it. You have a few options really, get a 1.8 lens or get a manual lens and a cheap adapter. You can probably get a manual focus 1.8 lens and an adapter for less than $80 or so, and because of the focus peaking and manual focus Assist can use it relatively well on the a6000, much easier than MF on a DSLR.

mikethelaserman · Apr 13, 2015

The difference was probably down to the metering modes selected.

If one cam was in "multi" and metering across the whole scene whilst the other was in "spot" or "centre" metering only on the subject, then that would make a world of difference.

Pieterbaan · Apr 13, 2015

It is hard to tell what is going wrong with your pictures without having a sample of it.

But here are some thoughts:

there is a bright light (or bright lit object)in the frame, and the Auto exposure is set to multi and the AE is set to spot on the Canon. The AE will try to find the right exposure for the full frame on the Sony and just for one spot on the Canon. (even the way the exposure is calculated in multi mode is diffrent from one camera to an other.
the camera is set to S mode and you choose a fast shutter speed. The camera tries to find the right apperture (and maybe ISO) to get the right exposure, but fails as there is not enough light in the room.. The Canon is in full auto mode.
There is something wrong with your camera
Your Exposure Compensation is set wrongly
You focussed on a bright object and hold the shutter button half way down and recomposed the expousre settings where kept from the bright light and used in the dark...

Just a few things that can go wrong. So try the following things:

show us the picture that went wrong and that went well (when possible sho the Canon pictures too)
set your mode dial to the inteligent auto mode (the i with a small camera) and try to take the same pictures
Reset your camera to factory standard(the suitcase menu, #6: Setting reset and try again best in inteligent auto.

Other question is: how does your camera work in good light? Are the pictures still to dark or are they better?

dave_bass5 · Apr 13, 2015

Interesting.

I have the a6000 and also a 650D (and a 5DMKIII). I cant say that the 650D is quite as sharp and does have more noise than the Sony, although its close.

Doesn't matter what lens i use, the Sony seems clearer. In fact my son borrowed my 24-70 f/2.8 mkii for a short time when were were at a museum. I had been using it on my a6000, he used it on the 650D, and my shots were better overall, quality wise. Both were shooting raw.

--
Dave.
Gallery @
http://www.flickr.com/photos/davebass5/
Videos @ http://www.vimeo.com/user464364/videos

Young Harold · Apr 13, 2015

JYPfoto said:
You're talking about a 3.5-5.6 lens which if I remember correctly quickly jumps up from 3.5 the moment you start zooming in. Indoors it's not going to cut it, you'll jump up in ISO to make up for it. You have a few options really, get a 1.8 lens or get a manual lens and a cheap adapter. You can probably get a manual focus 1.8 lens and an adapter for less than $80 or so, and because of the focus peaking and manual focus Assist can use it relatively well on the a6000, much easier than MF on a DSLR.

Yes - I shot them both at f4.5. Yes I've limited my ISO at 3200 because it started to get a little nasty and as I use A Priority id rather open the shutter for longer as i have a sturdy tripod & gorilla pod. I was thinking about getting the Sigma 30mm 2.8 and then invest in the 50mm 1.8 later on - Would this help me out? I looked at this route but i bought the A6000 for compactness and legacy glass plus a converter gets a bit lengthy for my uses (I travel a lot with work to various locations around the world and sick of iPhone photos but need something as SMALL as possible with great IQ) - But a good suggestion!

I think i will try to get a second opinion (this was bought from John Lewis UK *Warranty was a deal breaker*) and shoot it against one of theirs and any canon and see what happens.

Thanks!

YH.

Young Harold · Apr 13, 2015

dave_bass5 said:
Interesting.

I have the a6000 and also a 650D (and a 5DMKIII). I cant say that the 650D is quite as sharp and does have more noise than the Sony, although its close.

Doesn't matter what lens i use, the Sony seems clearer. In fact my son borrowed my 24-70 f/2.8 mkii for a short time when were were at a museum. I had been using it on my a6000, he used it on the 650D, and my shots were better overall, quality wise. Both were shooting raw.

Young Harold · Apr 13, 2015

Pieterbaan said:
It is hard to tell what is going wrong with your pictures without having a sample of it.

But here are some thoughts:

there is a bright light (or bright lit object)in the frame, and the Auto exposure is set to multi and the AE is set to spot on the Canon. The AE will try to find the right exposure for the full frame on the Sony and just for one spot on the Canon. (even the way the exposure is calculated in multi mode is diffrent from one camera to an other.

I would have thought this but I was on spot mode (small) and the camera bag it took its reference looked awful, no detail and very underexposed.

Pieterbaan said:
the camera is set to S mode and you choose a fast shutter speed. The camera tries to find the right apperture (and maybe ISO) to get the right exposure, but fails as there is not enough light in the room.. The Canon is in full auto mode.

Both in A I'm afraid (canon AV)

Pieterbaan said:
There is something wrong with your camera

Possible.. (I hope not!)

Pieterbaan said:
Your Exposure Compensation is set wrongly

EXP Comp @ 0

Pieterbaan said:
You focussed on a bright object and hold the shutter button half way down and recomposed the expousre settings where kept from the bright light and used in the dark...

Spot focus on the camera bag.

Pieterbaan said:
Just a few things that can go wrong. So try the following things:

show us the picture that went wrong and that went well (when possible sho the Canon pictures too)

I hope to be able to do this but the 600D is now 'On tour"!

Pieterbaan said:
set your mode dial to the inteligent auto mode (the i with a small camera) and try to take the same pictures

Reset your camera to factory standard(the suitcase menu, #6: Setting reset and try again best in inteligent auto.

Will do!

Pieterbaan said:
Other question is: how does your camera work in good light? Are the pictures still to dark or are they better?

Yes i think its fine in daytime - https://www.flickr.com/photos/hsaxtonmccann/

Thanks Folks.

YH

val1 · Apr 13, 2015

it is probably the lens or other settings. The A6000 should be a tad better in low light but the difference should not be amazing.

Young Harold · Apr 13, 2015

Thanks, will restore it to factory and then try some more shots. If all else fails I will swap it out with a different model. Come to think of it unless it's in direct some I've had to do a lot of work in Lightroom... Something fishy here I think.... Possibly the age old a bad work man blames his tools but I've been a tad underwhelmed in low light. I will try to submit a in edited raw file in low light outside if I can find one today.

Thanks again guys, a very responsive community.

RaghavBaijal · Apr 13, 2015

Young Harold said:
After getting very annoyed I decided to stick my A6000 on manual and upped the shutter speed from its suggested 1/80 to 1 second and boom - we have a winner!

There are too many variables involved here. However, based on your description, I can guess that you are referring to High ISO Noise. Just remember that the higher iso you go to, the higher the noise will visible.

The basic problem is that there is very little light available for the sensor to capture hence the need for higher iso. One solution & also the most often suggested solution is to use a lens which has a wider aperture like the 35mm 1.8.

An alternate solution to the problem is to add more light to the scene. This can be done by popping up the flash on the A6000. Also, the A6000 also has one ace up its sleeve. You can pull the flash back & bounce the flash from the ceiling. This will add light to the scene & help in reducing the iso. Bigger flashes help even more.

Tristimulus · Apr 13, 2015

The base sensitivity of the sensors should be very close so with the same settings both cameras should deliver roughly similar images. Seems like comparing very different settings here...

Utterlyotter · Apr 13, 2015

The much maligned and despised kitzoom is really practical and nifty as a walking about lens during the day, in low light not exactly brilliant though in my experience. Both of the A6000s kit lenses are real lighthogs but good for their intended purposes/price. (If you get them cheaply as a package with the camera that is)

Quite a lot of people do manage to get very good pictures out of them. Do a search on flickr and you´ll see.

zackiedawg · Apr 13, 2015

Young Harold said:
After getting a few good shots I was very happy with the camera but I feel it really sucks in low light. Does anyone else have this problem?

I just shot it against my colleagues 600d inside, both in A priority and the 600d absolutely smashed away my A6000.

After getting very annoyed I decided to stick my A6000 on manual and upped the shutter speed from its suggested 1/80 to 1 second and boom - we have a winner!

Has anyone else found this to be the case in low light? I know the kit lens is bad but really? He also has the kit 18-55 and I zoomed in until we had the same frame and F stop.

Well, first off, the kit lens is definitely not a very impressive lens in low light, so if you're really wanting to test low light shooting often, you'd probably want to pick up something better. That said, low light shooting requires significantly more experience, and skill, and is much more dependent on the correct settings in the camera...so most of the time when new photographers with little experience complain of not being able to get good results, or compare two cameras that should be relatively similar and get wildly different results, it usually comes down to poor settings, or poor understanding of how to expose in low light.

Without seeing the actual photos, there's no way to know EXACTLY what you did wrong, or what settings were different on the Canon. But with almost any APS-C camera today, the differences in low light if everything is shot equally will be very minor...from the worst APS-C sensor to the very best, the differences will be no more than about 1 1/2 stops, no matter what various fanboys want you to believe, and despite all the declarations about one camera 'destroying', 'killing', or 'blowing away' another. In your specific two camera comparison, most tests would agree the A6000 is actually slightly better performing.

I can take the same low light scene, and shoot it with various different metering settings even with the same camera, and get completely different results. Take a dark scene - so dark, you can barely make anything out with your eye - and place a small light source in the center...it slightly illuminates part of one wall. Now, set the camera on a tripod, small light in the dead center of the frame, and set metering to spot meter - the camera will choose a very low ISO, and the whole scene will essentially be black with a tiny point of light. Change metering to center-weighted, and it will raise the ISO significantly, and it will shoot a longer shutter speed to try to account for how dark everything is, but still throw some weight on that illuminated wall and spot of light...the scene will probably have ISO3200 or 6400, shutter speed might be a few seconds, and you'll be able to discern some of that wall by the light, and the majority of the frame will still probably be pretty dark. Now switch to wide metering...and try again. This time the camera takes the whole scene into consideration, seeing almost all blackness - it will crank to its maximum ISO, and likely run the shutter for as long as it can - 30 seconds...now, you may have a scene in which the entire dark room can actually be seen, and that small light will be badly blown out.

Just using the exact same camera and altering the metering mode will give you three completely different shots. And the variance will be in the exposure, in the noise, in the smearing of details, etc. And that's not even considering other factors such as: how low a shutter can you handle if you had been hand-holding? How much high ISO is acceptable versus getting a fast enough shutter speed? How much should you expose the shadows vs the highlights? If exposing highlights, how much shadow noise or detail are you willing to lose? if exposing shadows, how much will you accept blowing out the highlights? And so on.

Low light photography simply requires a lot of practice to gain the experience to know how to get the most out of the camera, and what settings to use for a given situation. Otherwise, if using Auto modes, it can be down to luck...or if using the wrong settings, thinking your camera performs worse than someone else's, even if it's as good or even better.

Glenn Barber · Apr 13, 2015

I have posted separately on a question as to how the A6000 does in lower light focus acquisition vs the A7r vs Canon 70D.

Recently I managed to get my hands on an A6000 and had a chance to do a more direct comparison - checking focus speed and accuracy in lowered room lighting.

I noticed that the A6000 focuses more quickly - and perhaps more accurately than the A7R in the same lighting situation with the same lens - however the aperture of the lens seemed to make a significant difference.

With the A6000 in lowered room lighting, the FE 70200 F4 hunted for focus - but with the FE 55 1.8 and the FE 35 2.8 acquired focus much more quickly without hunting. In the same light the Canon 70D could always achieve quick focus - even with an F4 lens

So it would seem that the A6000 is better than the A7R in achieving focus in lowered light but neither compares to my Canon equipment. That said, an investment in a brighter lens may make the A6000 more useable in lower light.

Young Harold · Apr 17, 2015

Utterlyotter said:
The much maligned and despised kitzoom is really practical and nifty as a walking about lens during the day, in low light not exactly brilliant though in my experience. Both of the A6000s kit lenses are real lighthogs but good for their intended purposes/price. (If you get them cheaply as a package with the camera that is)

Quite a lot of people do manage to get very good pictures out of them. Do a search on flickr and you´ll see.

Thanks Utterly - I had a problem with my unit (lens issue) and with the new one its fine - my flickr too will support your claim I'm sure,

H

Young Harold · Apr 17, 2015

zackiedawg said:
Young Harold said:

After getting a few good shots I was very happy with the camera but I feel it really sucks in low light. Does anyone else have this problem?

I just shot it against my colleagues 600d inside, both in A priority and the 600d absolutely smashed away my A6000.

After getting very annoyed I decided to stick my A6000 on manual and upped the shutter speed from its suggested 1/80 to 1 second and boom - we have a winner!

Has anyone else found this to be the case in low light? I know the kit lens is bad but really? He also has the kit 18-55 and I zoomed in until we had the same frame and F stop.

Click to expand...

Well, first off, the kit lens is definitely not a very impressive lens in low light, so if you're really wanting to test low light shooting often, you'd probably want to pick up something better. That said, low light shooting requires significantly more experience, and skill, and is much more dependent on the correct settings in the camera...so most of the time when new photographers with little experience complain of not being able to get good results, or compare two cameras that should be relatively similar and get wildly different results, it usually comes down to poor settings, or poor understanding of how to expose in low light.

Without seeing the actual photos, there's no way to know EXACTLY what you did wrong, or what settings were different on the Canon. But with almost any APS-C camera today, the differences in low light if everything is shot equally will be very minor...from the worst APS-C sensor to the very best, the differences will be no more than about 1 1/2 stops, no matter what various fanboys want you to believe, and despite all the declarations about one camera 'destroying', 'killing', or 'blowing away' another. In your specific two camera comparison, most tests would agree the A6000 is actually slightly better performing.

I can take the same low light scene, and shoot it with various different metering settings even with the same camera, and get completely different results. Take a dark scene - so dark, you can barely make anything out with your eye - and place a small light source in the center...it slightly illuminates part of one wall. Now, set the camera on a tripod, small light in the dead center of the frame, and set metering to spot meter - the camera will choose a very low ISO, and the whole scene will essentially be black with a tiny point of light. Change metering to center-weighted, and it will raise the ISO significantly, and it will shoot a longer shutter speed to try to account for how dark everything is, but still throw some weight on that illuminated wall and spot of light...the scene will probably have ISO3200 or 6400, shutter speed might be a few seconds, and you'll be able to discern some of that wall by the light, and the majority of the frame will still probably be pretty dark. Now switch to wide metering...and try again. This time the camera takes the whole scene into consideration, seeing almost all blackness - it will crank to its maximum ISO, and likely run the shutter for as long as it can - 30 seconds...now, you may have a scene in which the entire dark room can actually be seen, and that small light will be badly blown out.

Just using the exact same camera and altering the metering mode will give you three completely different shots. And the variance will be in the exposure, in the noise, in the smearing of details, etc. And that's not even considering other factors such as: how low a shutter can you handle if you had been hand-holding? How much high ISO is acceptable versus getting a fast enough shutter speed? How much should you expose the shadows vs the highlights? If exposing highlights, how much shadow noise or detail are you willing to lose? if exposing shadows, how much will you accept blowing out the highlights? And so on.

Low light photography simply requires a lot of practice to gain the experience to know how to get the most out of the camera, and what settings to use for a given situation. Otherwise, if using Auto modes, it can be down to luck...or if using the wrong settings, thinking your camera performs worse than someone else's, even if it's as good or even better.

--
Justin
galleries: www.pbase.com/zackiedawg

Thanks Justin,

I know its easy to blame a 'inexperienced' photographer for mistakes or odd results but my lens was not functioning properly and was given a replacement. The new one is working much better.

I should have possibly mentioned i work with high end tech on a day to day basis, often traveling across the world (hence the small camera) and grasping the concept of metering modes, focusing and the basic settings guide shouldn't have been the issue - I think whats important is was the firmware upto date and such.

I very much appreciate your reply and the knowledge you brought to the post!

Im out shooting as much as possible and trying to avoid over processing despite how easy it is and getting solid compositions.

Could you recommend the SEL35f18 at all?

Thanks,

H

SQLGuy · Apr 17, 2015

The SEL35F18 is a great lens. I used one for a while on my NEX-7 and was very happy with it. It's not cheap, but you do get what you pay for.

zackiedawg · Apr 17, 2015

Young Harold said:
I know its easy to blame a 'inexperienced' photographer for mistakes or odd results but my lens was not functioning properly and was given a replacement. The new one is working much better.

Good to hear. Unfortunately, I was throwing out a possibility without seeing any sample shots to know whether you were coming from an experienced or inexperienced position, and whether your issues looked to be more lens-based. Always hard to give advice and analyze problems with just words to base it on! Hopefully, some of what I wrote can be helpful to those who might not have as much low light experience!

Young Harold said:
Could you recommend the SEL35f18 at all?

Indeed I can - very solid lens, and for me, excellent focal length for a low light prime. I started back with my DSLR with a 50mm F1.7, and always found it just a little too long for my needs - I ended up picking up a 30mm F1.4 and knew that was more my focal length. So with the NEX line, I skipped the 50mm altogether and just went to the 35mm F1.8. Very solid performer, usable wide open, and super sharp even stopped down just 1 stop...stabilization works well, color and contrast are very good. No complaints!

rjjr · Apr 17, 2015

dave_bass5 said:
Interesting.

I have the a6000 and also a 650D (and a 5DMKIII). I cant say that the 650D is quite as sharp and does have more noise than the Sony, although its close.

Doesn't matter what lens i use, the Sony seems clearer. In fact my son borrowed my 24-70 f/2.8 mkii for a short time when were were at a museum. I had been using it on my a6000, he used it on the 650D, and my shots were better overall, quality wise. Both were shooting raw.

I've also found that my Canon lenses on my A6000 produce better IQ than the same lenses on my Canon APS-C bodies. I must admit that I was a bit surprised at that.

I going to try the same comparisons with the new T6s once it's released to compare Canon's new 24MP sensor to that of the A6000. I'm hoping there will be more IQ parity.

Sony A6000 - needs much more light. A6000 vs 600D

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