I chose
In my last post, I expressed the decisions that would lead up to my next camera. I did go and spend about an hour or more with a consultant (he was so much more than just a salesman) at Calagaz Photo in Mobile. If you live in this area and you have any camera questions or concerns, that’s the place to go. I had made a list of requirements in the new camera. My current interests are waterfalls, wildlife (land, air, water, animals, plants), landscapes, and very elementary astrophotography. I have become interested in exposure bracketing and focus stacking, having watched a series of videos where those techniques were used, but the T5 didn’t have those capabilities. I have also decided that I want to start a side business in real estate photography, and exposure bracketing will be a critical function for that. I wasn’t married to the Canon line, but I do have quite an investment in the lenses I have, and I’d be starting back with just a kit lens if I changed brands. I also knew that even within the Canon line, changing lens formats would require an adapter, and that’s not a deal-breaker, just another piece of equipment to buy.
The camera I brought home is the Canon R6, so yes, I stayed with the Canon line, but the lens format is different, so I did need the adapter. It’s also mirrorless. As it turns out, the article I read that led me to believe that mirrorless cameras don’t have a viewfinder was either really old (I didn’t think it was that old, but “old” in technology could be a couple of years) or the reviewer was comparing a pretty low-end “vlogger’s” camera. The R6 having a viewfinder made it the right choice for what I wanted.
The R6 has a full-frame, 20-megapixel sensor, compared with the ASP-C (cropped) 18-megapixels in the T-5. While that doesn’t sound like much, that’s a lot more pixels in every file. It’s almost 300 pixels more across and almost 200 more pixels vertically per image. I’ve wanted to be able to do some creative cropping in some of the shots where I just couldn’t stand in the right place to get the shot I wanted, and I ended up with a shot that just wasn’t as sharp as I wanted it to be. This sensor should help with that.
The R6 also has a couple of exposure improvements that will give my astrophotography a boost. The ISO level goes up to 102400. If you weren’t aware, that’s immensely sensitive to light. The T5 stopped at 6400, which is not a bad level, but again this will be beneficial in astrophotography. The shutter speed on the R6 can operate at 1/8000 second. When I tried it with ISO at about 400, the image showed nothing — there wasn’t enough time to record anything with the sensitivity set that low. However, this may be useful (well, maybe not that fast a speed) in shooting birds in flight.
Burst mode — Oh. My. Gosh! Burst mode is amazingly fast, because there is no mirror to manipulate. I believe I’ll be able to do some great panoramic shots and stitch them together using burst mode. I may also be able to finally get that shot I’ve always wanted of a pelican hitting the water. That’s my dream shot.
It’s a lot quieter than a camera with a mirror. A LOT QUIETER! It’s by no means silent, but the mechanical sound of the picture-capture process won’t be nearly as distracting as it has been before.
The display screen is the same size in both cameras, but there is a lot more information available to display on the R6’s screen to help me make a good set of choices for the shot. With the T5, I had to manually (push a button) switch from the display screen to viewfinder. The R6 makes the transition from display screen to viewfinder active when I raise the camera to my eye. The display on the R6 starts with the sensitive screen folder into the camera. As I fold it out, I can either leave it extended, in which case the transition to viewfinder doesn’t happen, or I can articulate it up or down so that I can hold the camera far over my head and still see what I’m shooting at or down to my ankles and see the subject. Or I can flip it 180-degrees and fold it back against the camera, which will allow that transition from screen to viewfinder. That’s just a cool feature!
It has wireless image transfer, to my computer or to an FTP site. I tried it. It was incredibly slow, and I wasn’t impressed. All the same, it’s good to know it’s there in case I ever need it. I think, though, that I have a setting I need to change. I took 46 shots and imported 92 images – 46 raw files and 46 jpegs. I know some people shoot in both modes at once, but I can’t say I see the value in it, when exporting from Lightroom or Photoshop as JPG is so easy.
At this point, having brought the camera home with me, I fully expect that my photographs are going to be really bad for a while, as I learn how to use it, but the learning curve should be less steep than it was moving from the Powershot to the T5. I just need to find some places where I can practice and learn those techniques I need to learn, but I’m really looking forward to it. So far what I have is 92 pictures of my living room from my couch, and they’re not even interesting enough to bother posting one.
But stay tuned!