Sony A1 4K wildlife test footage

Doug Jensen

Doug Jensen

Carbonite Member
I shot this video last Sunday evening to test the video quality and auto-focus performance omy Sony A1 and to see how it compares to my Sony FX6. Overall, I'm happy with the footage and image quality, but the AF performance is far inferior to the FX6. The AF just cannot be trusted and there were a lot of garbage shots I didn't put into the video. This video is mostly just the usable stuff that I can sell as stock footage. Not once did the AF recognize any mammal or bird eyes or faces, even though I had it set for those modes. I see Sony has just released new firmware, so maybe it will function better next time. Who knows?

Also, I shot this at the end of the day with a very slow lens (200-600mm) so ND filtration was not needed, but if it was bright light it would have really been a hassle. Another thing I found to be a hassle is the inability to angle the EVF to a comfortable angle. The picture quality of the EVF is outstanding, but I'm too old to lay on the ground when I want a lower angle! :)


 
Looks great as usual, Doug. Very interesting to me that the AF was far inferior to the FX6. My a7sIII does a really good job with this - though honestly haven't tried using much with animal eye detection - so may give that a test soon.
Assume this was all Slog 3 and then graded in Resolve?
 
Thanks. Yes, it surprised me how poorly the AF worked for video when it is so amazing for stills. Maybe the new firmware will help.

Not S-LOG. Not even a picture profile. I shot some quick tests of all the different profile options a few days ago on the same scene, and then looked at them without knowing which was which. The one I liked best was just the plain old out-of-the box look of the A1, with some grading in Resolve to help it out.
 
Thanks Doug. It will be interesting to see if you progress with the A1. I have been positively surprised by my A7Iv & A7sIII. I will also be interested to hear your opinion of the S1H vs the Sony mirrorless in terms of image quality. It seems the latest wave of mirrorless from Panasonic, Canon, Sony are more similar than different.
 
Well, I might be done shooting video with the A1. I've got other cameras that are better suited for video so the A1 will be used mostly for stills. But it is good to know it is capable of getting nice results when I need a very good camera in a small package. As to the question of which camera has better image quality, the A1 or S1H, my gut tells me the S1H is better. It really is a gorgeous camera. Someday maybe I'll put them side by side, but that can't happen for months due to my travel schedule. My FS7, F55, and S1H, and a ton of PL lenses are all going up for sale this fall when I am back home.
 
Hey Doug, I wanted to comment on your AF findings. I have two A1’s and an FX6. I also owned an A7SIII for about a year and a half.

I’m on a shoot right now that I’ve been on for six days and this shoot is a mixture of wildlife footage, people footage, landscapes, aerials, etc. For this project I’ve only pulled out my FX6 twice since I’m required to shoot stills and video.

First off, the A1 doesn’t have Animal or Bird Eye AF in video. It does let you select those options when in video mode just like when in photo mode, but there isn’t actually Animal Eye AF or Bird Eye AF for video in the A1 which is also true on the FX6 and A7SIII. That’s why the camera isn’t focusing on bird or animal’s eyes for you. It’s not doing it because that’s not a feature outside of the various photo modes. The only Sony camera today that can track animal eyes or bird eyes in video is the Sony A7IV. So when you were thinking the focus wasn’t working in that regard, it’s actually because it wasn’t supposed to.

When it comes to AF in general, the A1 in my experience is way better than the FX6 or even the A7SIII. In fact, Sony themselves said when they released the A1 that it was their best autofocus camera to date, both for video and for stills. Since I’ve been using one for almost a year and because I recently picked up a second one, I am comfortable backing up that claim. I am betting you’re just not used to how to work with the A1 for video AF because as you’ve said in another thread, this is the only Sony mirrorless camera you have much experience with. I’m betting that you’re just not used to how they work compared to their cinema line.

Personally, I much prefer the AF in the Alpha line over the Cinema line. Once you get used to it, for me at least, it’s way faster to setup and use, not to mention how many more options it has. Video tracking on these cameras is insane, including for animals which I’ve been shooting all week with the 200-600. Others who work with both types of cameras will often feel the same, like Philip Bloom for example who often says how much easier and more intuitive the mirrorless line is than the cinema line. I think it just comes down to using them enough to know how they work.

Overall the A1 is a beast. I use mine all the time, so much so that I sold my A7SIII recently to buy a second A1, both of which work incredibly well with my FX6. Hopefully you’ll give it some more time to get comfortable with how it works because if you would, you would see how powerful they are for video AF.

Also, as a side note, Sony released a firmware update earlier this week further improving Eye AF on the A1 as well as giving the 8K a 10-bit 4:2:2 upgrade from the 10-bit 4:2:0 that it previously could only do.
 
As another related side note, the AF in Canon's mirrorless' is light years ahead of any cinema camera they ever released.

It's not even worth thinking about - that's how drastic the difference is - so I was surprised to hear that the FX6 sounded like it had better AF than the A1 but I wasn't going to question it because I simply don't know about those two.

But the AI AF systems in Sony mirrorless' that I have used in my life starting with the a6400 up to the a7SIII were almost unbreakable.
 
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Joshua Milligan said:
I am betting you’re just not used to how to work with the A1 for video AF because as you’ve said in another thread, this is the only Sony mirrorless camera you have much experience with. I’m betting that you’re just not used to how they work compared to their cinema line.
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Joshua, you could very well be correct about everything in your post and I appreciate your comments. So, I'm not necessarily disagreeing with your assessments, but I'll just make a couple of points of my own:

1) If Bird and Animal modes do not function in the video mode, then they should be grayed out and non-selectable when the camera is configure for video. There is absolutely no indication onboard the camera, that I have seen, that says they don't function. If what you say is true, that is a major firmware **** up by Sony.

2) Touch-tracking on the A1 is a joke compared to the FX6. It doesn't lock on very well to whatever subject I tap on, and it loses the tracking far too easily when there is movement. What settings do you suggest I try on the A1 that will make touch-tracking perform as good as or better than what the FX6 can do?

3) You say that you think the A1 focuses better than the FX6, but how do you know you are using the best combination of settings and techniques on your FX6? I might be shortchaning the A1, but it is possible that you are shortchanging the FX6, right? I wish we could have the "Camera Olympics" where we both could stand side by side and shoot the same subject matter and then compare the footage in post. Or even better, record the on-screen displays of each camera because watching how the focus boxes move during shooting tells you everything you need to know.

4) I wouldn't take Sony's word about which camera has better AF unless they have the footage or other evidence to back it up. I know what I've seen with my own eyes. For stills, yes, I agree, but not for video.
 
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Hi Doug, what A1 firmware version are you on ? Also I've heard contradicting accounts of the 200-600 AF performance, some swear its great and others swear its sluggish. I think the answer lies in the complexity of the A1, there are a myriad of possible settings for the AF and virtually everything else in that camera. I've been shooting with mine constantly since Mar 20, and I still haven't set aside a few days to go through all the various settings, so I'm sure mine could be better optimised for my purposes ( interiors and hospitality ), but I'm so impressed with it both for stills and video that I'm most likely going to get another A1 and wait for Sony to bring out an FX9mkii
 
Murph100 said:
Hi Doug, what A1 firmware version are you on ?
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It was running V1.1, so I will concede that AF performance might have been better if I had been running 1.2.
Version 1.3 was released a few days after I shot this video and my camera is running 1.3 now, but I have not had any time to do further testing. I agree with you that the dozens of settings and hundreds of possible combinations of those settings does make it difficult to be sure you have chosen the right combination for your shooting style and subject matter. The settings on the FX6 are complicated, but far easier to navigate and figure out. The mirrorless cameras are a mess due to their primary purpose being for shooting stills, with video being tacked-on as an afterthought. I'd like to have a switch on the A1 that completely changed the camera to stills or video -- with no overlapping menus and other settings being visible that don't apply to mode you are using. I think an A1 with FX6 menus would be a killer camera.
 
Doug Jensen said:
I'd like to have a switch on the A1 that completely changed the camera to stills or video -- with no overlapping menus and other settings being visible that don't apply to mode you are using. I think an A1 with FX6 menus would be a killer camera.
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You can kinda get there using the Custom dial on the top, its working ok for me, again it means time sitting down and configuring it to what you want. I really would love to see the A1 sensor in an updated FX9, its such a cracking sensor, with sensible dual ISOs and tons of scan options without the compromises you have on the FX9. Please Sony please !
 
Yeah, thanks for that suggestion and I already make good use of the 1, 2, 3 positions on the Custom Dial with a lot of memorized configuration settings. But when I go into the menus there is still a ton of stuff shown that has nothing do with video, and vice versa. I want a switch that essentially hides every setting that doesn't function in the video mode when I'm using the video mode, and vice versa.
 
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