The NEX-5, being made as small as possible, turns out not to have had enough. The NEX-7 ( shipping soon – see my preliminary review here) shows that a “ photographer’s” camera simply has to have a minimum number of physical controls. I’ve now been using the 5n for several weeks on my home turf, after working with it at a Sony press preview event in August, so I have become quite familiar with both the camera’s pluses and foibles. Rather, what I will do is look at the camera’s features, and examine how well they function. These are available on Sony’s product web sitein considerable depth. I’m not going to list all of the NEX-5n’s features and specs. The sensor, processing engine, rear LCD, and ability to accept accessories such as the LA-EA2 “A” mount lens adaptor and FDA-EV1 high resolution electronic viewfinder are new as well. Though the NEX-5n looks like the previous NEX-5, it is virtually a new camera in most respects.
This gave Sony’s NEX cameras a real leg-up over MFT among users of legacy lenses.īefore Nightfall – Clearview, Ontario. Focus peakingwas also added at this time, which really made working with manual focus lenses much superior to with any other mirrorless camera. It wasn’t too many months before Sony announced a firmware upgrade for the NEX-3 and NEX-5, and this went a long way toward addressing the issue of the hobbled user interface. The MFT brigade gets this, and has models with accessory or built-in EVFs, while Sony, because they didn’t anticipate the NEX’s appeal to this segment, didn’t plan for it.īut, if nothing else Sony is quick on their feet. Though the cameras had a so-called “smart accessory shoe”, it wasn’t smart enough to accept an eye level electronic viewfinder, because – “ Hey, snapshooters don’t need no stink’n EVF.” But the more advanced photographer simply isn’t satisfied with doing photography at arms length. But the NEX cameras were hobbled by more than just a poor user interface. Sony’s NEX cameras were also borne along by the whole mirrorless tide, with Panasonic and Olympus also making strong head-way with Micro Four Thirds. Serious photographers discovered that the image quality was very good, that the size was really appealing, and so sales to the enthusiast market subsequently took off. This meant a dumbed-down user interface, though I never really understood why they saw this as necessary.
The back story on this is simply that Sony originally conceived the NEX series as step-up cameras for the point-and-shoot crowd. But I was less than impressed with the NEX-5’s user interface. In my First Impressions Reviewof the Sony NEX-5I was impressed with the technology of reducing an APS-C sensor camera to Lilliputian dimensions. In addition to “ What a difference an “n” makes“, the subtitle of this report should also read “ What a difference a year makes“.
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