A7 R III or a6400?

I hope the title got your attention.

I want an a6400. I'm really holding out to see what the a7000 (or whatever) will be, but I've been waiting 8 months.

I want it primarily and almost exclusively for video, aside from a light walk-around when I'm on vacation and don't want to drag the EOS R around.

Here's my problem/dilemma. The A7 R III used can be bought for a song right now. Literally only few hundred dollars more than a new a6400.


I've owned and still own an a6000 and an a6300. No great investment in lenses, only a sony 18-105 E PZ, which is APS-C, of course, and I still own a NEX VG30 camcorder that came with the 18-200 E PZ which is a very nice video lens given good lighting and I use it occasionally on the a6300 too.

I don't want to give up any video features but damn. Only a couple hundred dollars more for a R III?!? I'm really torn now. Should I sell out and buy a 24-70 (or something along those lines) and an R instead? I could justify the money difference in my head, but I don't want to give up anything for video as that is STILL the primary reason for the upgrade.

You can also buy the A7 II with a kit lens for almost the same money as the a6400 now too. NEW.

Thanks for listening. What would you do?

So, I am not sure where you are seeing a7 IIIs for cheap used, I surely haven't, and I've been watching them. If you've found a source that has them just a few hundred over the a6400, would love to know where. The a7 rII is going cheap .... but that is a generation older. Where are you seeing these prices.

The a6300 had one issue I didn't like for video. It would randomly stutter step focus mid shot. I finally just went manual, because it felt annoying. Shot manual, the video was gorgeous. I probably should have slowed the focus speed down, might have helped. Not sure if the a6400 has fixed the issue... or if it would be an issue for you.

If you can really find used a7 IIIs cheap, let me know.... my A6300 is messed up and in need of replacing.

here's the deal with the R3 for video.... it does FF well and APS-C very well. It's simply a more flexible tool, although the A6400 likely focuses better. You can mix and match APS-C and FF glass to see what you like better.

With the R3, you have more choices. 10-18 vs 17-28 f2.8 for video. That's going to be my defacto lens for video. I felt that the 10-18 f4 seemed good, but Tamron 17-28 has way too many advantages for 200g more. 4x more light amount, DOF, low light ability when it comes to stills, it's simply too many advantages.

I do a lot of video these days and the Tamron 28-75 has been amazing, practically a native lens with fantastic optics, and small size. I use a gimbal a lot and the size makes a huge difference because your arm becomes a pivot, and weight changes are amplified. You can get the entire 17-75mm f2.8 range for under 1KG, which I think is amazing. Of course, you can play with primes or electronic zooms like your 18-105. The 16-50 is ultra small and with CIZ, you have an effective 16-75mm (24-100 FF equivalent in a 100g package), which is pretty nifty. You have even bigger advantages with FF glass, the 17-28 + aps-c mode = 17-60mm f2.8 in range...... that's super nifty for a single lens.

I did this video with the FE 28 f2 and gopro:

https://vimeo.com/3356​64824

Each of the footage should be really noticeable. There are some B roll shots of the ducks, I simply cropped + CIZ to give me a 60mm+ FOV, as I couldnt get physically close to them. Really convenient having that feature, use it all the time, I have a remote mapped to the crop + Zoom in zoom out controls, so I can do that without touching the camera. When you have an electronic lens, even better, it'll max out all the optical zoom before applying the clear image digital zoom.