Sony RX10M2 does the night... And day. A short review

[tsk1979]

The first time I pointed the camera towards the Stars, was with an APS-C sensor equipped Canon 350D. The year was 2006, and I had just discovered "Star Trails".

At that time, I was amazed, how the camera could capture so much invisible to the eye.

As years progressed, the ISOs creep up, and I got into the Milky way, and star fields, and even some deep sky. Next came the D7000, and finally, the full frame A7.

Recently, I had a chance to use RX10M2 as a companion camera. The versatility of a 24-200 zoom is amazing. But what about its sensor.

So, while A7 did most of the heavy lifting, I decided to point the RX10 to the heavens.

Well, all I can say, is that sensor tech has come a long way. Sure, its not a patch on full frame, but what this sensor can do is staggering. 10 years ago, this is the kind of result an APS-C sensor on the 350D used to produce.

Well lets get to the actual images. All shot at F2.8 wide angle of course. EXIF embedded

Biggest challenge? Autofocus. The damn distance scale when comes on manual focusing on the LCD screen is not accurate. When it says infinity, it may not be infinity. But at other times I could nail the focus using the same.

Other thoughts?
As long as you are not going to pump up the ISO(very much possible with F2.8), the sony 1" sensor is amazing. However, you cannot be liberal with the sliders on your RAW program. Pushing up shadows brings up noise. Being used to A7, it seems quite a bit, but when I look at my old 350D images, again, the dynamic range and noise performance of this sensor is truly amazing.

Lets go to the images again. The first image was processed in lightroom. Its ISO 100, but has strong processing. Looks overdone on screen, but I have seen this looks very good on canvas. You can see the noise in the clouds. Again EXIF is embedded

In this ISO 100 image, I have steered clear of the heavy duty pulling, and its totally clean

The following image is also ISO 100, and I have used Camera Vivid profile. This photo highlights how the colors can get a bit off. The polarized deepens the blue, and to get blue perfect, I got a tinge of "lime" a bit

Lets change the subject a bit and go to DOF. 200mm F2.8 gives you shallow DOF, and bokeh is quite good too.

The next image was actually 5-6 shots, all of them OOF. Finally I focussed on the foreground and could nail focus. Achillis heel of the Sony RX10 series. Auto focus with a polarizer on. Sometimes its quick. Other times it hunts with the patience of Ahab stalking moby ****.

So while Sensor technology has gone to space age nuclear, the Contrast detect AF tech is still your coal fired thermal plant.

Well that's about it. All I can say is that I am impressed. I have read the reviews of Sony RX10M2 and M3, but using something yourself is totally different. Since I do lot of night stuff, it can never be my primary cam, but as a companion came, the RX10M2(M3 even more so) is the perfect camera along with your specialist full frame.

I use a Tamron 15-30 on A7. Now if I had to change lenses every time I wanted to go narrow, I would miss so many shots. However, with a second camera, its literally point and shoot.

Daytime performance is stellar, lens is stellar, IQ is phenomenal.

Downsides? Autofocus. This is big. Sony, get your act together. Your sensor tech has literally run away. AF tech is like that child who missed the 9(3/4) platform to Hogwarts. Learn from Panasonic. Or even Oly. Please fix it.

Some would say the colors are off, but it shows up only sometimes. Its not like Sony is producing Alien colors. Yes, some shots get a little weird. But a lot depends on how you process, and trust me, I am no expert.

If you want to see more of the Sony RX10, I took out all the sequences shot with RX10 from my Timelapse film Altitude and put it into the Sony RX10 only timelapse

Full timelapse with A7 milky way and stuff is here

Ask away any questions you have! But don't ask me ease of use of menus etc., I have been shooting sony since NEX 5N, so it seems easy to me. Familiarity has bred no contempt. I have even started liking the timelapse app(surprise surprise). And battery life? Well, its good enough. With car chargers nowadays and powerbanks, I would worry more if I had a "long battery life DSLR" which cannot charge with USB



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Tanveer
My galleries - http://tanveer.smugmug.com,
My photography page on Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/TanveersPhotography

 

[tbcass]

Your review is pretty much spot on although I wouldn't rate the AF as low as you did. I'd put it neutral because it's AF is quite good in most situations, falling down in poorer light, especially at the long end.

 

[quicky422]

Nice review! I really like my RX10M2!!

Where did you shoot that wonderful scenery? It sure helps to have no light pollution and no distortion from the atmosphere!

And, the time-lapse, was the panning done within the App?

 

[tsk1979]

The pictures are from the High altitude Himalayan region of Ladakh, and Zanskar.

These are among the most sparsly populated regions in the world, and once you get away from the capital of the region (Leh, India), its basically light out.

The milky way shoots are from a 16400ft high mountain lake system called Kyun Tso twin lakes.

They sit on a tabletop plateau flanked by a mountain range towards the north where you cross through a 17000ft high mountain pass.

When you descent, you can zoom and see both the lakes.

And this is the mountain pass

Moonless nights mean absolutely dark sky. There is not even a little bit of glow on the horizon in any direction.



The area is also the home of Hanle high altitude telescope and Gamma ray array.

Being near India China border, access is restricted to Indian citizens only, though large parts of the region are accessible to foreigners, and they too are equally dark.



Infact, the pic with A7 I showed off was taken from a 16500feet mountain pass called the Baralacha La, which is on a highway(Manali Leh). At night, there is no traffic at all.



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Tanveer
My galleries - http://tanveer.smugmug.com,
My photography page on Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/TanveersPhotography

 

[tsk1979]

Yes, its quite good when you are testing it in a showroom or something with well defined objects. When you are out shooting, with a polarizer on(which a lot of the landscape shooters have), the performance is not good.

Evening is worse(even without polarizer), and as the haze descends and kills contrast, it hunts like crazy.

Last but not the least, what do you compare with? Well lets compare with Sony of 5 years ago. If you look at improvements in sensor performance, they have left the AF performance far behind. That is why I rate it low.

If sensors are now 2X better, the AF system is maybe 1.2X better. That is why it gets a low rating from me.

 

[Michael Fritzen]

Evening is worse(even without polarizer), and as the haze descends and kills contrast, it hunts like crazy.

Hi,

shooting side by side some weeks ago my RX10 and my A99 on hikes in the Alpes under pretty overcast/cloudy/hazy conditions I can tell you that the RX10's CDAF was not that much behind A99's PDAF when pointing the active AF point (flexible spot on the RX10 and single spot S-AF on the A99) to a low contrast area like peaks almost hidden in the mist.

When there's a uniform/unicolour "mess" where our eyes are hardly able to discern structures - not the image as a whole but the (small) focus area - it's no surprise that an AF system also has a hard time to get a lock.

 

[Murphster]

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Tanveer
My galleries - http://tanveer.smugmug.com,
My photography page on Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/TanveersPhotography

Great review. Very detailed and informative.

You are lucky to be able to access that area.

In the photo above, it looks like a white road. What is that? It is actually a road or is it an area that was carved out by glacial activity, or?

Thanks

 

[tsk1979]

[No message]

 

[tbcass]

That's one way to look at it. I simply rate it based on a wide variety of conditions I photograph in. In 90% of those conditions it focuses well but it's focus tracking, once locked, is mediocre. I also own an A77ii which locks on in all but the darkest conditions while it's tracking is very good but not great. I rate the A77ii very good to excellent and the RX-10iii neutral but since it rarely fails to lock I can't rate it poor.

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Tom
Look at the picture, not the pixels
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Misuse of the ability to do 100% pixel peeping is the bane of digital photography.