mas24 Loc: Southern CA

The a6300 was released. And, before you know it, the a6500 was released. Now, the rumor is the a6700? Sony is really rolling out a6000 series cameras. And making money on them.

Blair Shaw Jr Loc: Dunnellon,Florida

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MISTER and enjoy your new toy.......BOOM!

mas24 Loc: Southern CA

Two new Sony firmwares, to improve eye focus on animals, and not just people. How convenient, before your Africa trip.

gessman Loc: Colorado

First, Happy Birthday to Joer. Second, there are two kinds of "eye-autofocus" of which I'm aware. Canon put one kind in some of their last few cameras of the film era. You looked at one of the multiple boxes in your viewer and the camera focused on that spot. That feature didn't make it into their digital cameras. Then there's Sony's current version where a green square locks in on a subject's eye and stays locked in until you change it. If IBIS and Sony style EyeAF is really what you want in a single APSC body, you need to revisit the specs on the a6500 because you apparently missed something. I'm pretty sure my a6500 has both IBIS and EyeAF, Sony style.

joer Loc: Colorado/Illinois

Thank for the birthday greeting.

I considered the A6500 because of the IBIS but decided on the newer A6400 even though it does not have it. Suspect the focus will be much better in the latter as well as other subtle improvements. I will soon find out since it is expected to arrive on my door step tomorrow.

I can live without IBIS because most of my lenses have OSS and I have the A7R3 to fall back on if needed.

Low Budget Dave

The a6500 is certainly an improvement in the eye-autofocus (compared to my A6000), but the a6400 is a whole new ball-game. When Sony introduced the A6400, they even re-named the eye-AF system to indicate that it is a new feature. (I think they called it "Speed x AI", or something like that.)

Anyway, not only is it continuous, (including real-time tracking without the need to map it to one of the buttons), but the next update is supposed to be able to sense animals eyes as well. I will believe it when I see it, but that feature might not be available for the A6500.

When Tony Northrup compared the AF systems of the various cameras, the a6500 was similar to the Fuji X-t3, hitting around 25% to 35% (while shaking the camera and the subject.) The A7Riii was hitting about 60% in focus, while the A9 and the a6400 were roughly 100% in focus.

I didn't review the methodology, but that is roughly the same feeling I got from trying out the cameras in the store...

joer Loc: Colorado/Illinois

Thanks Dave for the comments.

alamomike47 Loc: San Antonio, Texas

I have the full frame Sony cameras. But have thought about adding the 6400 for use on the street.

I have enjoyed all of my Sony cameras. I had a a6000 when I decided to buy the a7RM3. Got rid of all the APS-C glass.
I grew up in south central Illinois. My Father loved photography and had many of his photos published in the Springfield paper in the 50's. BTW I'm a seasoned citizen also a septuagenarian.

AlamoMike

gessman Loc: Colorado

Sure, you likely made a good choice since you have OSS lenses. Owning no Sony lenses, I got the a6500 in hopes it would work well with my Canon lens, most especially my very sharp 400mm f/5.6 "L" which I've had for many years that doesn't have IS, and it does - puts IS on a lens that I needed it on. I already had an a6000 and only got the a6500 really for that one lens. I use it with the Sigma mc-11 and it focuses as fast with the a6500 as I needed it to so I lucked out. I'm getting too stinkin' old to be tossing around a lot of dollars at camera gear the use of which may come to a screeching halt at any moment. For more reach, don't forget Clear Image Zoom (CIZ)

gessman Loc: Colorado

I avoid shooting people when possible but my brief experience with it is that the eyeAF in the a6500 is better than 25% to 35% and if I understood what you said, as for as mapping it to a button, it arrived on mine mapped to the center back button and that's where it remains. Now, I haven't tried shooting someone who's onshore jumping up and down from a boat on rough water while shaking my camera, so... The way you described it, it sounds like the uninitiated 100% continuous involuntary eyeAF on the a6400 could be a PIA for me, locking onto people's eyes I don't even want in my image. I haven't watched Tony's video but I'll go look it up. I like the idea that it might be in a future firmware update since I do try to shoot animals now and then but I want to be able to control the eyeAF and not just have it out there deciding on what it's going to lock onto by itself. Perhaps I misunderstood what you said and maybe will understand better after I watch Tony's review. I hope so and hope they add animals to the mix. I haven't understood why it won't already lock onto an animal's eye. Looks to me like an eye is an eye?

joer Loc: Colorado/Illinois

I believe the auto eye tracking on the A6400 can be turned off and used in the conventional way.

gessman Loc: Colorado

I kinda figured that would have to be the case. I just felt I should not let it stand that the 6500 didn't have eyeAF and let others get the wrong impression. I watched one video about the 6400 by Tony but it was apparently not the right one. I began another one but was interrupted. I will finish it today. The AF seems to be a step up in the 6400 just from what little I saw. Your bird shots are magnificent and I'll be looking to see how you do with the 6400 and those elusive little bif you're after.

I gotta tell you, I had the urge to catch some chickadees in flight a couple of years ago and spent an afternoon seeing what it took to get it done and what I actually wound up doing was the opposite of what I thought it might take and how I began the effort. I've always had pretty fast reflexes but those chickadees were just laughing at me. I finally caught up with them but wore myself out before I perfected my technique so the outcome up to that point wasn't what I wanted and I haven't revisited the effort since - perhaps this summer.

I don't get many birds where I am as you do and even with ten feeders scattered around that doesn't change much. I finally took down all but one feeder to concentrate the traffic into one area. There must be a bunch of cats in the area that I don't see because the canopy is thick, full, and mature, plenty of water and should be attractive to birds except for one thing - there's no natural foods like nuts or berries.

Here's a url to some of the results of my effort that afternoon, which you may have already seen, if you'd care to have a look, and I'd be happy to discuss my technique with you if you're interested. I'm a bit skeptical about even the enhanced ability of the AF in the 6400 to totally close that gap and keep up with small, flighty bif consistently but maybe you can look at what I did and hone the finer points and get some better quality shots than I did that day:
https://www.uglyhedgehog.com/t-432635-1.html

joer Loc: Colorado/Illinois

The A6400 arrived Saturday. After going over the menu several times went out to the blind to try it on birds. The light was not ideal and the birds were not cooperating. I did get a few shots.

The auto focus is seems very good although I didn't get a chance to test it thoroughly.

Unfortunately Capture One could not read the raw files until converted to tiff. I hope they do an update quickly. I suspect the ability to process will be improved once the programs can read the raw files.

Now comes the daunting task of customizing the buttons to make it as similar to the A7R3 as I can. There is always too much to choose from the menu.

(Download)

gessman Loc: Colorado

A great start for sure. Will be looking forward...

joer Loc: Colorado/Illinois

Most like 6700 as a replacement for the 6500 but the only ones that know are not saying.