Sitting here the last morning of my Disney World trip and was woken up by a daughter with nightmares, so decided to put down some thoughts on using exclusively an RX1RII as my one and only camera for the trip. A Pros/Cons list to start
Pros
- Tiny size makes it very portable to carry around. Especially after adding the Fotodiox Pro grip to it, it super comfortable to hold. Combined with the new Peak Design leash (used 95% of the time) and the cuff, it’s lightweight. It all fit into my Think Tank Perception 15 backpack very well.
- Raw files look like they can stand a beating. Haven’t had the time to sit and edit anything, and probably won’t for a while, but files looks crisp, bokeh looks outstanding.
- FF sensor sure has its advantages. High iso looks great, I set the cap to 6400, probably could’ve set it to 12,800.
- 35mm worked out the majority of the time. I contemplated between the RX1RII or even a Leica Q for the trip and I realize now that 28mm would’ve been too wide.
Cons
- I knew this going in, but ideally some sort of zoom would’ve been handy. Some obvious choices, like using a 35mm while on the Kilimanjaro Safari isn’t going to work out and there were some shots where even a 24mm would’ve been nice. Also some portraits where my daughters were with their favorite princesses, being able to zoom in would’ve been nice.
- Battery life is just terrible. I took 4 spares, 2 OEM, 2 generics along with two portable chargers and a dual charger. After the first day I just left all my battery packs and chargers in the room and tried to remember to charge them all overnight. All worked out until today where I had forgotten to recharger fully. So went in with 4batteries of unknown charge status and yeah, after 2 hours all were dead.
- No IBIS is an issue. I set auto iso to 1/125 to reduce blur and it worked out well but used higher iso than I wanted. In hindsight I could’ve set a higher iso value but some shots were ruined because my normal shooting at say 1/60 wasn’t possible since I had to keep SS higher.
- It suffers from the a7rII and before horrible buffer. Several times I would take 3-4shots in a row, try and flip over to video and ran into the Writing to a memory card screen. As any parent knows you need to take 5-8 shots at a time to make sure you get a good one, and the sluggishness hampered my experience. After owning and using an a9, it’s painful.
- The EVF proved to be very useful and extremely cumbersome at the same time. I couldn’t tell you how many times I brought the camera up to my face to realize I’m putting the lcd up to my eye. Having to keep on remembering to pop up evf was annoying. Having a built in finder would be amazing.
All that being said, I don’t have any regrets for the most part. In an ideal world I would brought say an a7rIII and some lenses but with my current traveling situation of a 4.5year old and a 2 year old, it wasn’t feasible option. And yes, what they say about taking a 2 yr old to Disney is true, don’t do it. I probably would’ve enjoyed having say an a6500and 18-105 and it would’ve given me ibis, some zoom for some shots, and better video, but would e come at the expense of a larger setup and I wouldn’t be able to get that FF f/2 Zeiss look. I defiantly know that I left some shots on the table with having a fixed lens, but on the other hand I got a ton of shots that I wouldn’t have been able to get with the a6500 setup or even an a7rIII setup without a serious weight penalty. My backpack was heavy enough with what I carried, I couldn’t imagine carrying a bag with 3-4 lenses and waking the 25,000 steps I was doing, I guess there’s a reason why I saw a ton of Rebels and Nikon d3000’s with kit zooms, and maybe 2-3 guys with FF canons and 24-105’s. I probably also should’ve either carried my Mindshift Rotation bag with belt pack to make removing and storing the camera easier (taking the backpack on and off every time I needed to chase down a kid was annoying)or even worn a belt pack as nerdy as that sounds.
I’ve decided to not buy the RX1RII though after the trip, which I was contemplating. As convenient as it is and as much as I like the files from it, the non built in evf, the slowness of it, and the lack of IBIS and restrictions that having only a 35mm has, it’s a deal breaker for me at the price point. I look forward to my next trip here (which my wife says isn’t for another 4 years to give the girls time to grow up) and can’t imagine what type of camera technology I’ll be carrying then. If I had come here 4 years ago it would’ve been with probably either my NEX-6 or maybe an original a7with 35mm f/2.8. Maybe next time I’ll be able to use a complete setup.
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