RX10 iv any good for airshows?

I’m considering getting an RX10 iv. Yes I know they are no longer in production but I have seen some advertised as “nearly new.”

I’m tired of lugging around my Canon Mirrorless with a 100-400 L lens (which gives me a range of 160 to 640 mm EFL.) Firstly because of the weight and also I often want to shoot at a much wider angle and changing lenses is a pain.

I have a Panasonic FZ1000 ii but it doesn’t offer a good enough AF and the 400mm EFL max is too short. Hence looking at the RX10 iv.

One of the main reasons is to shoot fast moving jets at air-shows, so I’d like to ask those who have real world experience the following:

• Do you think the zooming speed would be fast enough or a limitation? With my 100-400 mm I have manual zoom control so I can zoom as fast as my wrist action can.

• Can it track focus (of fast moving jets) whilst I am simultaneously zooming?

• Shooting at 10fps when the buffer fills up roughly how long does it take until it can go back to shooting? I shoot raw and jpg simultaneously.

Thanks for any help.

davesurrey said:

I’m considering getting an RX10 iv. Yes I know they are no longer in production but I have seen some advertised as “nearly new.”

I’m tired of lugging around my Canon Mirrorless with a 100-400 L lens (which gives me a range of 160 to 640 mm EFL.) Firstly because of the weight and also I often want to shoot at a much wider angle and changing lenses is a pain.

I have a Panasonic FZ1000 ii but it doesn’t offer a good enough AF and the 400mm EFL max is too short. Hence looking at the RX10 iv.

One of the main reasons is to shoot fast moving jets at air-shows, so I’d like to ask those who have real world experience the following:

• Do you think the zooming speed would be fast enough or a limitation? With my 100-400 mm I have manual zoom control so I can zoom as fast as my wrist action can.

Click to expand...

It's slower, but at the fastest setting, is probably enough

davesurrey said:

• Can it track focus (of fast moving jets) whilst I am simultaneously zooming?

Click to expand...

No, it won't focus or shoot while zooming

davesurrey said:

• Shooting at 10fps when the buffer fills up roughly how long does it take until it can go back to shooting? I shoot raw and jpg simultaneously.

Click to expand...

Approximately 1 fps. But at least it has a very large buffer.

Yes!

I shoot at 5FPS to insure focus lock between shots. I typically do not shoot RAW.

Prop planes should be shot at a slower shutter speed to get a nice prop blur.











--
Jerry
http://www.flickr.com/photos/av8tor045

To my experience tracking of the aircrafts at 600 mm equivalent was not optimal (often only a few 'dancing' green dots of the Phase Detect AF). But with a little help of Topaz, results are okay. Picture of the Fokker Four have been taken at the air show in Werkhoven (the Netherlands) as celebration of Liberation Day (2nd WW)


Fokker Four

View attachment 51fc07481c9f4671b3cbe461abc22af8.jpg
Fokker Four


Two and a bit of the Fokker Four

--
Ab

davesurrey said:

I’m considering getting an RX10 iv. Yes I know they are no longer in production but I have seen some advertised as “nearly new.”

I’m tired of lugging around my Canon Mirrorless with a 100-400 L lens (which gives me a range of 160 to 640 mm EFL.) Firstly because of the weight and also I often want to shoot at a much wider angle and changing lenses is a pain.

I have a Panasonic FZ1000 ii but it doesn’t offer a good enough AF and the 400mm EFL max is too short. Hence looking at the RX10 iv.

One of the main reasons is to shoot fast moving jets at air-shows, so I’d like to ask those who have real world experience the following:

• Do you think the zooming speed would be fast enough or a limitation? With my 100-400 mm I have manual zoom control so I can zoom as fast as my wrist action can.

• Can it track focus (of fast moving jets) whilst I am simultaneously zooming?

• Shooting at 10fps when the buffer fills up roughly how long does it take until it can go back to shooting? I shoot raw and jpg simultaneously.

Thanks for any help.

Click to expand...

You might want to take a look at my flickr below...plenty of images of aviation with my loved RX-10m4. There you can see what to expect.

Hope it helps!;-)

Digital Nigel said:

davesurrey said:

I’m considering getting an RX10 iv. Yes I know they are no longer in production but I have seen some advertised as “nearly new.”

I’m tired of lugging around my Canon Mirrorless with a 100-400 L lens (which gives me a range of 160 to 640 mm EFL.) Firstly because of the weight and also I often want to shoot at a much wider angle and changing lenses is a pain.

I have a Panasonic FZ1000 ii but it doesn’t offer a good enough AF and the 400mm EFL max is too short. Hence looking at the RX10 iv.

One of the main reasons is to shoot fast moving jets at air-shows, so I’d like to ask those who have real world experience the following:

• Do you think the zooming speed would be fast enough or a limitation? With my 100-400 mm I have manual zoom control so I can zoom as fast as my wrist action can.

Click to expand...

It's slower, but at the fastest setting, is probably enough

Digital Nigel said:

• Can it track focus (of fast moving jets) whilst I am simultaneously zooming?

Click to expand...

No, it won't focus or shoot while zooming

Digital Nigel said:

• Shooting at 10fps when the buffer fills up roughly how long does it take until it can go back to shooting? I shoot raw and jpg simultaneously.

Click to expand...

Approximately 1 fps. But at least it has a very large buffer.

Click to expand...

Thanks Nigel. Not too sure what you mean by "approx 1fps? Hopefully not that it would take 100 secs to clear the buffer of 100 shots?

Jerry, those fast moving jets shots are the ones I worry most about but you seem to have mastered them.

Yes 5 fps seems about right.

Great set of shots BTW.
Thanks.

Ab, thanks for your reply.
What sort of keeper rates did you get with these prop planes. It's really the faster jets that I am most concerned about.

Alban88 said:

davesurrey said:

I’m considering getting an RX10 iv. Yes I know they are no longer in production but I have seen some advertised as “nearly new.”

I’m tired of lugging around my Canon Mirrorless with a 100-400 L lens (which gives me a range of 160 to 640 mm EFL.) Firstly because of the weight and also I often want to shoot at a much wider angle and changing lenses is a pain.

I have a Panasonic FZ1000 ii but it doesn’t offer a good enough AF and the 400mm EFL max is too short. Hence looking at the RX10 iv.

One of the main reasons is to shoot fast moving jets at air-shows, so I’d like to ask those who have real world experience the following:

• Do you think the zooming speed would be fast enough or a limitation? With my 100-400 mm I have manual zoom control so I can zoom as fast as my wrist action can.

• Can it track focus (of fast moving jets) whilst I am simultaneously zooming?

• Shooting at 10fps when the buffer fills up roughly how long does it take until it can go back to shooting? I shoot raw and jpg simultaneously.

Thanks for any help.

Click to expand...

You might want to take a look at my flickr below...plenty of images of aviation with my loved RX-10m4. There you can see what to expect.

Hope it helps!;-)

Click to expand...

Thanks Alban,
Yes your flickr account shots are very helpful...and very beautiful too. Congratulations.

davesurrey said:

Digital Nigel said:

davesurrey said:

I’m considering getting an RX10 iv. Yes I know they are no longer in production but I have seen some advertised as “nearly new.”

I’m tired of lugging around my Canon Mirrorless with a 100-400 L lens (which gives me a range of 160 to 640 mm EFL.) Firstly because of the weight and also I often want to shoot at a much wider angle and changing lenses is a pain.

I have a Panasonic FZ1000 ii but it doesn’t offer a good enough AF and the 400mm EFL max is too short. Hence looking at the RX10 iv.

One of the main reasons is to shoot fast moving jets at air-shows, so I’d like to ask those who have real world experience the following:

• Do you think the zooming speed would be fast enough or a limitation? With my 100-400 mm I have manual zoom control so I can zoom as fast as my wrist action can.

Click to expand...

It's slower, but at the fastest setting, is probably enough

davesurrey said:

• Can it track focus (of fast moving jets) whilst I am simultaneously zooming?

Click to expand...

No, it won't focus or shoot while zooming

davesurrey said:

• Shooting at 10fps when the buffer fills up roughly how long does it take until it can go back to shooting? I shoot raw and jpg simultaneously.

Click to expand...

Approximately 1 fps. But at least it has a very large buffer.

Click to expand...

Thanks Nigel. Not too sure what you mean by "approx 1fps? Hopefully not that it would take 100 secs to clear the buffer of 100 shots?

Click to expand...

Yes, I’m afraid so. Imaging Resource reported:

Raw+JPEG: 107 frames total; 105 seconds to clear

Of course, you can keep shooting while the buffer is (slowly) written to the card. So you can shoot the next burst while the last burst clears.

davesurrey said:

Ab, thanks for your reply.
What sort of keeper rates did you get with these prop planes. It's really the faster jets that I am most concerned about.

Click to expand...

Regarding in-focus about 40% I guess. It also depends how far away the plane is or in other words how big a part the plane is filling the frame.

When I was researching buying my first "real" camera, it was primarily, specifically for shooting airshows and the like, and the RX10 IV was a strong contender for a time, and for the reasons you mentioned (going wide and long without swapping lenses).

I ended up not going with it because of the limitations, mainly not being able to track autofocus while zooming. It's perhaps less of an issue with airshows, where you can often just stick with a zoom distance, but there's still instances (like when the Thunderbirds do a "sneak pass") where it's a definite liability.

However, it definitely wouldn't have worked for me, personally, because I also need it for when the AFB here, Davis-Monthan, does the Heritage Flight training. I go to the Pima Air & Space Museum (across the street), and they flight paths of the aircraft goes right over the museum. For this I absolutely need track AF while zooming. I mean, I probably could have made it work, but it would be frustrating, and I'm sure I would have been disappointed in my purchase.

My suggestion to you would be to consider the Canon RF 100-400mm. It's more of a "budget" lens, and perhaps doesn't do as well in clinical "test chart" situations, but those that use it seem happy with real-world results. It's also a bit slow at f5.6-8.0 (it hits f8 at 259mm, btw), but that's not too much of an issue. f8 on a Canon 1.6x crop sensor is f12.8 full-frame equivalent, which is just past the point where diffraction can start having a negative impact on your image quality, but I daresay it'll still give you better images than the RX10 IV. Most importantly, for your purposes, it's smaller and way lighter than your EF 100-400mm. With your R7 it's 2.75lbs, whereas with the EF 100-400mm you're closer to 5lbs (camerasize.com has it at 4.85lbs, but I don't know if that includes the adapter). The RX10 IV is only marginally lighter at 2.4lbs. Even if you stick with your R6 MkII, I'm sure you'd get better images than the RX10.

Yeah, you don't get a wide angle, meaning you'd still have to swap lenses, but for the actual airshow part of the day, you'd get better results than the RX10, and your arms won't be as sore and tired as you'd be holding the EF 100-400mm all day. I see you also have a Sony RX100 VII, which is tiny and light, so if you don't want to swap lenses on your R6 or R7, just use that for your wide angle shots of the static displays at the airshows. Same 1" sensor as the RX10, so your shots would look the same.

At the last air show I went to (first one with my first real camera, the a6700 and 70-350mm lens) I didn't have my RX100 VII or Sigma 10-18mm for my a6700. Instead I used my Nikon J5 with the 6.7-13mm wide angle zooom (18-35mm equivalent), which is still quite small and better than a cell phone. The Sigma 10-18mm would have been nice to use (that's why I bought it - photographing aircraft on display), but I also didn't have to swap lenses in the dusty desert, which has me apprehensive anyway.

Digital Nigel said:

davesurrey said:

Digital Nigel said:

davesurrey said:

I’m considering getting an RX10 iv. Yes I know they are no longer in production but I have seen some advertised as “nearly new.”

I’m tired of lugging around my Canon Mirrorless with a 100-400 L lens (which gives me a range of 160 to 640 mm EFL.) Firstly because of the weight and also I often want to shoot at a much wider angle and changing lenses is a pain.

I have a Panasonic FZ1000 ii but it doesn’t offer a good enough AF and the 400mm EFL max is too short. Hence looking at the RX10 iv.

One of the main reasons is to shoot fast moving jets at air-shows, so I’d like to ask those who have real world experience the following:

• Do you think the zooming speed would be fast enough or a limitation? With my 100-400 mm I have manual zoom control so I can zoom as fast as my wrist action can.

Click to expand...

It's slower, but at the fastest setting, is probably enough

Digital Nigel said:

• Can it track focus (of fast moving jets) whilst I am simultaneously zooming?

Click to expand...

No, it won't focus or shoot while zooming

Digital Nigel said:

• Shooting at 10fps when the buffer fills up roughly how long does it take until it can go back to shooting? I shoot raw and jpg simultaneously.

Click to expand...

Approximately 1 fps. But at least it has a very large buffer.

Click to expand...

Thanks Nigel. Not too sure what you mean by "approx 1fps? Hopefully not that it would take 100 secs to clear the buffer of 100 shots?

Click to expand...

Yes, I’m afraid so. Imaging Resource reported:

Raw+JPEG: 107 frames total; 105 seconds to clear

Of course, you can keep shooting while the buffer is (slowly) written to the card. So you can shoot the next burst while the last burst clears.

Click to expand...

That does sound glacial but I better check what the specs are for my Canon R7.

Am I being naïve in thinking that is very low compared to a mirrorless camera like the R7?

Thanks Planterz for your comprehensive reply. It's much appreciated.

The more I learn about the RX10 iv spec the less it seems to be a camera that would be good for the sort of shooting I do at air shows, which is a big disappointment as I was hoping it was an ideal solution.

I may well stick to my R7 and even perhaps look into replacing my 100-400mm Lii and get the RF 100-400mm if the IQ is similar.

Another option that occurred to me is the new Sigma 16-300mm. 300mm on a 1.6x crop sensor is 25.6-480mm.

25.6mm is roughly cellphone width - Samsung Galaxy Ultra is 23mm, iPhone Pro is 24mm, Pixel is 25mm, iPhone basic is 26mm. You might have to back up a bit to photograph a B-52 or C-5 that's on the tarmac, but it's doable. And you won't have to swap lenses.

480mm isn't a bad length for airshows. At distances where you need 600mm and longer, you're often going to be fighting against atmospheric distortion anyway. It depends on the location and conditions of where you're at, of course. 480mm is "enough", and remember that your R7 has a 32MP sensor, compared to the 20MP one of the RX10 IV. I don't know how the math exactly works out, but 480mm is 80% the distance of 600mm, and 20MP is only 62.5% the size of 32MP. Unless there's some math that I'm missing (and there probably is), it seems to me that you'd have more pixels-on-plane with the R7/Sigma combo than the RX10 IV would give you. Even if that's not quite the case, you'll get better pics (and more keepers) with the R7/Sigma combo. If you're considering the RX10 IV, you're obviously not expecting professional-quality results, and more "looks good on Facebook" results, and I think you'd be happier with the R7 + Sigma 16-300mm combo than the RX10 IV.

Compared to the RF 100-400mm f5.6-8, the Sigma is f3.5-6.7. Much brighter at the wide end, not that it'd be an issue outdoors, plus you'd probably be stopping down for depth of field anyway. f6.7 with a 1.6x crop sensor is FF equivalent to f10.72, which is where diffraction might have a noticeable negative effect when pixel peeping on the dense 32MP R7 sensor, but unnoticeable at typical viewing sizes. Better than the f8 (f12.8) of the RF 100-400mm, and I wouldn't recommend stopping down at all at full zoom.

I do not know if the R7 will autofocus while zooming with the Sigma. I know that some (all?) Sigmas won't do this on Sony cameras, but Sony puts limits on 3rd party lenses. The new 300-600mm f4, for example, wouldn't focus/track while zooming. Tamron is an exception, but Sony owns 15% of the company. I don't know if the AF/zoom limitation with Sigma is artificially imposed (like the 15fps burst limitation) by Sony, or because Sigma doesn't have access to the algorithms that Tamron does. Even if the Sigma 16-300mm doesn't track/AF while zooming, it'll still be faster to zoom in/out and refocus than it will with the Sony RX10. You just might not be able to get the smooth zoom like you can with native lenses. A potential issue with video, less of an issue with photos.

The R7 + Sigma 16-300mm combo is a hair lighter than the R7 + RF 100-400mm, and again slightly heavier than the RX10, but barely more than half the weight of the R7 + EF 100-400mm.

Whether the Sigma 16-300mm will give you better pics than your RX100 VII at their widest, I don't know. Both are compromised at their widest because that's just the nature of superzooms. It's not impossible that your cell phone could give better results - this is one situation where the small sensor (with huge depth of field despite bright aperture) of a cell phone can actually be an advantage over "proper" cameras.

davesurrey said:

Thanks Planterz for your comprehensive reply. It's much appreciated.

The more I learn about the RX10 iv spec the less it seems to be a camera that would be good for the sort of shooting I do at air shows, which is a big disappointment as I was hoping it was an ideal solution.

I may well stick to my R7 and even perhaps look into replacing my 100-400mm Lii and get the RF 100-400mm if the IQ is similar.

Click to expand...

Yeah, that's why I saved up more and went with the a6700 and 70-350mm I have now. I also very, very heavily considered the R7, but went with the a6700 (and the E mount lens ecosystem) for a number of reasons.

I love the a6700 for its small size and versatility, but I'm also thinking of saving up for a dedicated airshow/planespotting/wildlife setup. The upcoming R7 II could be a definite contender (with the EF 100-400m like you have, or the RF 100-500mm), even though sticking within the Sony E mount ecosystem might make more sense.

Not so sure I'm going to be happy with the Sigma, based on a quick search of reviews. I'll do more search tomorrow.

Perhaps your suggestion of my R7 kit and the Sony RX100vi when I need wider is the best one IMO. It's all a compromise.

Ok that's me out of here now as passed midnight here. Thanks for your help.

Well I eventually decided to get an RX10 iv in as nearly new condition as I have seen for a good price.

I have taken on board all the feedback I got here but at least it has given me an idea of its limitations. And if I decide it's not for me then I'm sure i can sell it on with minimim loss.

davesurrey said:

Well I eventually decided to get an RX10 iv in as nearly new condition as I have seen for a good price.

I have taken on board all the feedback I got here but at least it has given me an idea of its limitations. And if I decide it's not for me then I'm sure i can sell it on with minimim loss.

Click to expand...

Keep it in good condition and it might even increase in value. Even if you sell for a slight loss, consider it a "long term rental" for whatever the difference is. Or "long term hire", as you Brits say. That never made sense to me. You hire a person or possibly an animal, but if it's an object, you rent it. Sorry, I've been watching a lot of "QI" and "8 out of 10 Cats" lately (jeez I miss Sean Lock) and I have to decipher the occasional colloquialism.





Anyway, before you shoot an airshow with it, I'd highly recommend going to an airport (Heathrow, Gatwick) and trying it there for practice. RAF Lakenheath or Middenhall would be even better, since you'll see the more "interesting" aircraft flying in and out of there, and their higher speeds and smaller sizes will be closer to what you'll see at an airshow.