Sony a6300 mirrorless camera

Sony has spent the past few years ramming into the full-frame mirrorless camera market. But they've also managed to satisfy the desires of APS-C shooters, primarily through their popular a6000 mid-range mirrorless camera. In March 2016, just two years after the launch of the a6000, Sony released the a6300 with improved features, which still retains many features of the older model.

To be clear, Sony does not intend for the a6300 to replace the a6000, which means that the old camera is still in production and can be purchased at a very attractive price (around $549.00 for the body only).

My camera background p>

Before diving into this review, I want to clarify my experiences with the digital camera to make my point more apparent. The Sony a6300 is the very first mirrorless camera I've owned, aside from my very brief experience with the a6000 for comparison. Until recently, I've shot almost exclusively with Canon DSLRs, namely the 5D Mark III and the 6D. As a result, many of the a6300's features such as its retractable LCD screen and electronic viewfinder might seem like standard features for other mirrorless shooters, but for a Canon DSLR user like me, these are new stuff. who changed my world. With that being said, let's get to the specs of the a6300.

Sony a6300 Key Features

The main improvement with the Sony a6300 is a newly developed sensor with a pixel count of 24MP (same as the a6000) which packs a whopping 425

phase detection AF points

, which is significantly higher than the a6000's 179 focus points. According to Sony, the a6300 has the highest number of phase detection points to date on an interchangeable lens camera, and makes the a6300 the camera with the fastest autofocus in the world .

Video is another aspect Sony upgraded on the a6300, with the inclusion of 4k video recording capabilities, the addition of a mic jack and the ability to record timecode. Along with the autofocus and video systems, the a6300 has a 2.36 million-dot OLED viewfinder, an improvement over the a6000's 1.44 million-dot OLED viewfinder. Battery life is also slightly improved to 400 shots from 360.

Physically, the a6300 is just 2 ounces heavier than its predecessor, though it feels much sturdier with its weather-sealed magnesium alloy construction, which is what the a6000 lacks. An AEL button with an AF/MF switch has also been added to the rear of the camera, something sports and action shooters should find handy. Aside from these few additions, the Sony a6300 doesn't look or feel much different from the a6000.

Overall, these added features of the a6300 clearly appeal to shooters looking to focus on action, sports and video.

Example of an action shot with a Sony 16-50mm f/3.5-5.6 lens.

Advantages of the a6300

While discussing the pros and cons of the a6300, it should be noted that many of the same features are also available on the a6000.

Extremely compact

As a DSLR shooter, the a6300's compact size was particularly appealing. When testing the Sony a6300, I used both the 16-50mm f/3.5-5.6 retractable zoom kit and the Sony 20mm f/2.0 pancake lens, and was amazed that both are incredibly light and basically the same size. There's of course the trade-off between the two lenses being plastic and not feeling as sturdy as a Fujifilm lens, but they both perform very well and weigh next to nothing. Combining either lens with the a6300 results in a very compact and unobtrusive camera system perfect for travel.

A photo of informal food taken at a restaurant table moments before consumption. Shot with a Sony 20mm f/2.8.

Silent shutter

Although many DSLRs offer a silent shutter which is still quite noisy, the a6300's silent shutter feature makes the camera so quiet you wouldn't even know a picture was taken. This is a great feature for those undercover or candid photography moments when you really don't want any sound associated with taking a photo. That said, non-quiet shooting on the a63000 produces a very sharp shutter snapshot, especially when firing at the camera's highest shutter speed of 11fps.

Panorama shot feature that actually works (most of the time)

After constantly trying unsuccessfully to take advantage of panorama shooting on a variety of devices, from point and shoot to cell phone cameras, I was beginning to think that panorama shooting on the go was a myth, until I tried it with the a6300. Unlike other cameras, the a6300 will take and stitch a nearly perfect horizontal or vertical panorama, even when your manual panning isn't perfect. There were a few times where the camera insisted that I wasn't panning straight enough to pan clear, but most of the time even my wobbly panning techniques were good enough for the a6300 to have one direction.

Focus Modes + Face Recognition

The two best features of the a6300 are easily the Face Recording and Eye AF (autofocus) features, which pretty much do what their names imply. Enabling face registration allows you to program the a6300 to recognize and prioritize up to eight faces. This feature is incredibly handy when shooting crowds of people, and the a6300's accuracy in picking the right face is astounding. Eye AF works very similarly, but without the need to register (program them into) the eyes. Simply activate Eye AF on the a6300 and the camera will automatically seek out your subject's eyes and track them using continuous autofocus. This feature is so precise that the a6300 will even lock onto artistic renderings of the eyes, such as a painted portrait.

Example of a portrait shot with a Sony 20mm f/2.8 lens.

Fast Wi-Fi connection

Like many of today's newer digital cameras, the a6300 features Wi-Fi and NFC, to connect to smartphones and tablets for remote shooting, and image transfer wirelessly via Sony's PlayMemories Mobile app. Setting up Wi-Fi on the camera is very quick and intuitive, and Sony's accompanying app also includes a range of other options that can further enhance your shooting experience, such as apps for time-lapse and multiple exposure, among others.

Built-in flexible flash

Fortunately, Sony has retained one of the best features of the a6000 on the a6300: a built-in pop-up flash. Extremely compact and flexible, the small flash can bend 45 degrees to tilt upwards, allowing the flash to bounce off the ceiling. Next to the pop-up flash is a hot shoe mount that can fire Canon or Nikon flashes when used with an adapter.

An accessory that can help make full use of the pop-up flash is

plastic bounce cards

which attach to the a6300 via the hot shoe mount and hold the flash upright.

Example of a night shot with a Sony 20mm f/2.8 lens.

Sony lens options

Currently, there are over 70 Sony lenses that you can purchase to go with your new a6300 body. Options range from inexpensive, compact prime lenses to larger, more expensive zoom lenses. The cheapest main options include the

16mm f/2.8

,

20mm f/2.8

,

28mm f/2

,

30mm f/3.5 macro

,

35mm f/1.8

, and

50mm f/1.8

, all priced from $249.99 to $449.99. Wide-range zooms without a fixed f-stop are also somewhat affordable, such as the

18-200mm f/3.5-6.3

($749.99) or the p>

24-240mm f/3.5-6.3

($998.99)

Sony 18-200mm f/3.5-6.3 ($749.99)

However, Sony's premium lenses are much more expensive, which can be hard to swallow if you're upgrading from a DSLR kit. Larger, high-quality Sony lenses such as the

24mm f/2

and

35mm f/1.4

, prices are over $1,200.00 and up. The same goes for Sony's versions of traditional DSLR lenses such as the

16-35mm f/2.8

($2,248.99),

24-70mm f/2.8

($2,098.00) and 70-200mm f/2.8 ($2,999.99). If you're a DSLR shooter with a range of lenses, you can always invest in a converter box to use your DSLR lenses with your Sony camera body, but at the expense of slower autofocus.

When you buy either the Sony a6000 or a6300, you have the option of buying it on the body only or with a 16-55mm f/3.5-5.6 mount retractable zoom kit E, which is priced at around $260.99 if purchased separately. For its size, range, and overall performance, the kit lens, plus a Sony Prime lens, aren't a bad starting combination, especially if you're looking to keep your gear compact and lightweight, and aren't all totally willing to invest in the more expensive Sony E-mount lenses at the moment.

ISO performance

Sony has chosen to enhance the high ISO performance of the a6300 by including a native ISO range of 100-25600 with the option to extend this ISO standard to 51200. Although the ability to shoot at a higher ISO is excellent in theory, I found ISO 6400 to be the highest I could comfortably push the a6300 into darker environments, without sacrificing image quality too much. Even my RAW photos taken at ISO 6400 were a bit too grainy for my liking, no matter how much noise reduction I did in post-processing.

Disadvantages of the a6300

Sony's bloated camera menu

A common complaint among Sony shooters, which I agree with, is that the camera menu is very difficult to navigate. It really does seem like Sony packed the a6300 with so many features and tried to squeeze them all into one menu, that it can take weeks for Sony's new shooters to get used to using the camera. .

This could easily be fixed if Sony allowed users to customize the menu a bit more, so frequently used features could be quickly accessed. As it stands, Sony only allows custom functions to be assigned to the physical buttons on the camera, and there aren't enough of those.

That being said, the trick to making sense of Sony's menus is to customize them to as many camera settings as possible. Currently, I've customized the buttons and settings on the a6300 set to take pictures nearly identical to how I shoot with my Canon 5D Mark III, making it easy to switch from one system to another.

Example of action shot with a Sony 16-50mm f/3.5-5.6 lens.

LCD sometimes turns off

As for the a6300's LCD screen, I was grateful for its pop-out rotation feature, something sorely lacking on Canon DSLRs. Some other reviewers have complained about the a6300's lack of a touchscreen LCD, but again, that's something I've never had on a camera, so the lack of it doesn't bother me. not.

One feature of the a6300's LCD screen that was annoying was its occasional failures, which usually happened right after the screen was rotated. Often the only way to get the LCD to work again was to turn the camera off and on again. That said, using the electronic viewfinder (EVF) still worked flawlessly, even when the LCD turned off.

It's your turn

Do you already shoot with the Sony a6300, or are you planning to move? What do you like about it, or what hesitations remain? Let me know your thoughts in the comments below.

Summary

Reviewer

Suzi Pratt

Revision date

2016-06-29

Article reviewed

sony a6300

Author's Note

4