Best vlogging camera is here in 2020 – Sony ZV1 analysis and review.

We got here the brand-new Sony ZV-1 or ZV-1, depending on where you're from. This is the brand-new compact camera from Sony, which is made for vlogging. This is completely targeted towards vloggers. I also have here the Sony shooting grip with a wireless remote commander. Let's get these reviewed, look at some of the key features and then we'll share lots of tests. I'll give you my thoughts. I'll try to leave some timestamps down below. So as you can see from all of the branding, it's all about vlogging.

Let's have a look at the camera. Some of the key features here in the box. So you've got 4k HDR, it's aone-inch Exmor RS CMOS sensor which has a 20.1 megapixel resolution, we've got a 24 to 70 focal length with an F1.8 to 2.8 aperture. So that is quite a wide aperture, should give you some nice depth of field. Face detection auto focus with 315AF points. Real-time Eye AF, now this is really good auto focus which tracks your eyes, I'm not sure how well it will do with me because I'm always wearing sunglasses. Face appeal, which prioritizes your face over the background. Focus which you don't really need to know about aperture settings and things like that. You can just put that on if you want a blurry background. That's interesting. Clear voice recording and there is a microphone jack. Amazing, so that way you can plug in an external mic if you want to.

So here's everything that we get inside the box. There is of course the camera itself, we have got some people work, there's an NP-BX1 type battery. Now as far as I'm aware, this is the same battery that's used on a lot of the other RX 100 models. So if you do have one of those, then you're going to be able to use those batteries along with this. Then we've got this little Windjammer which is going to connect onto the hot shoe, and it's going to actually cover the mic that's on this and that should heavily reduce any sort of wind noise. And yes there is the camera.

So, size wise, it does look quite similar to the RX 100 line but this is not the continuation of the RX100 line. This is something completely different because there are some big changes. The first of which is the display. It's a full, swivel out rotating display and it comes out to the side, not the top, finally. (intense music) Now, having the display coming up to the side is so much more convenient, it just frees up that space here on the top. So now you know you can have this Windjammer without it affecting the display, it's going to be completely over to the side. And also if you want to shoot vertically which is something that a lot of people are doing these days with the likes of TikTok, IG stories, so this is actually going to make it a lot more practical having the display pop up onto the side rather than on the top.

Taking a quick look around, you can see some of the buttons on above, there is that dedicated bokeh mode which is the C1 switch. We've got the hot shoe here over on the left and then we've got the main mic area. So, for instance, if we did want to put on this little Windjammer accessory, that's going to now cover that mic and it's going to prevent all of that wind noise which is generally quite a bit of problem everywhere.

Now, we've got a few buttons and dials. I'm not going to go through every single one of these. What I do notice is this thumb grip as well as this grip here at the front. So, this is going to make this easier to hold if you're not using it with a tripod or a gorilla pod or whatever it is. That's really nice touch.

Now, on the right hand side, we've got all the ports. So as mentioned, we do have a mic in. So you're going to be able to connect an external mic onto here, which is great. There's a micro HDMI port here, as well as a micro USB port. I was really hoping for USB type C, I mean, still micro USB. Yeah, that's something that I would have liked. I would have liked to have seen USB type C. There's a part here for your lanyard. We've got the battery compartment as well as the full size SD card slot here at the bottom. And there is obviously the 1/4 inch mount if you want to put this onto a tripod or something. And speaking of tripod or something, we've got the shooting grip. So let's also check this out. This is sold separately, but it is supposed to be something that goes very nicely along with the ZV-1. So, you get the actual grip itself and a case for it as well as a battery. So this is a CR2032 battery, and we can easily connect this on to the ZV-1 so it gives us a proper grip for vlogging. Recording yourself also gives some more distance between the camera and yourself if you want to get a bit more of the background into the shots. Very simple and self explanatory. It also has some legs. So if you did want to mount this somewhere, and then you know may be you get a time lapse or something, Casey Neistat style, then you can just go ahead and drop this somewhere, and that's going to be quite useful as well. Then once you've paired the grip with the camera, you can use some of these buttons. It's just going to make it a little bit easier. So you've got a Photo button, you got a Movie button. There's the zoom buttons as well as a C1 and a lock switch. So, you know, if you are vlogging and you want to start recording, you're not going to have to reach over each time, you can just press the Record Movie button. Right now that this is all set up,

Let's go ahead and let me share outside review and give it a proper test. it was so windy weather. I was using the standard mic that's on the camera, nothing, no attachments. And this was what the sound quality was like when there's a lot of wind. But of course we do have this little windshield that we could connect on to the hot shoe. I heard what the audio is going to be like. But let me know what you think of the difference with the windshield. 

I tried the bokeh mode. So I just tapped that button and now should get more of a blurry background. Of course distance also has a part to play when you want more of as hallow depth of field so we had a decent amount of distance there in the background. (wind whirling) what I've done now is I've got the boke mode on but I've actually switched on the built in ND filter because it is a very, very bright day. There's a lot of sunlight. So in order to be able to get that open wide aperture, you'd have to increase the shutter speed quite significantly, but right now, the shutter speed is not too high. This way we should be getting a nice blurry background. Now, we do have steady shot, so right now it is not switched on. It's going to walk down this pathway. Now we do have steady shot on. This is standard steady shot.

And now we are on active steady shot. I mean I can already see that the footage looks very, very stable. Right back in the car now, it's so so windy today. Probably a good time to test the audio, but a bad time to test anything else because like, oh, my eyes are watering, my ears are hurting, it's crazy. But anyway, I thought we'd talk a little bit about the auto focus.

So, we do have the all eye on auto focus. Now obviously I've been wearing sunglasses, but from what I can see, it's actually been doing a pretty good job regardless. However, if I do take my sunglasses off, then I can see a square that's on my eye. So if I do move around, it's actually tracking the eye. Now this works with humans and animals. Now I tend to wear sunglasses. The reason being is because the screen is off onto the side, even if it was above, then I would be looking at the screen when talking. And this is one of the very classic Casey Neistat hacks where if you've got sunglasses on and you're vlogging.

 you don't necessarily, you know, kind of lose that connection with your audience and you're not kind of off looking to the side. But as mentioned, the auto focus does seem to be pretty good because it's still got a square around my face is still recognizing that this is the face. So although it might not be the precise or layout of focus that you've got when you know, actually it's still picking up. It is picking up my eye even through my sunglasses. So that's pretty impressive. So, yeah, the autofocus, as far as I can see, it looks really really good. You can film in S-Log2 so you can record like this and then you can grade the footage after the fact. So that's a really nice option to have. Although it was pretty buried within the settings, I think it's picture profile seven, which I had to follow YouTube's tool to actually find.

So, I wish it was a little bit easier to access. But nevertheless, it is here. Right, so now we are indoors in controlled lighting, there's a few things that I wanted to test. So right now I am in manual, I am controlling the shutter speed because the lighting is not going to be changing here. We don't have any stabilization on so we do have a bit of a wider angle of view. And the first thing I wanted to test was the external mic capability. So next now we are recording with the standard mic. There is no windshield on and I'm going to now plug in the rode, wireless rode mic sets up that I do have here with a smartLav+ I think it's called. Right, so now what you're listening to is the Rode Wireless GO setup. So this is now connected to the smart lav+, and that's connected into the camera. So that way you can hear what the sound difference is like if you were to use an external mic. And we also have the products how case mode enabled. This is something that Sony has implemented and it's targeted towards those type of video creators. You know, I see a lot of beauty video creators doing this as well, or, you know, maybe for an unboxing a product, they hold up products to the camera. And a lot of the times what they need to do to be able to have it to focus is kind of put that there and then put their hand behind something to be able to catch that. But this mode is supposed to quickly lock on to focus as soon as you bring objects. So I've got a bunch of objects here, and I'm going to just put them close and away, so should be back on me now. And then back to whatever I'm putting in front of the camera. So let's see. Here you go. Back and to me, we'll say I'm talking about this chip. And then I put it close to the camera and then I can put it back. Say I'm talking about this smartphone. I can just put that forward. You can see that smartphone, I can be talking about the cameras, and then I can pull it back. Seems to be working pretty well.

 

Some Negatives aspects:

Now Lets see about points of the button layout and controls, I do like that we now have a record button for video separate to the stills button. That is here at the top, so it's easier to access rather than being somewhere here at the back, so that's quite nice. However, I did find that switching modes was not as easy as I'm used to, there is an extra step. You do have to press this Mode button and then you have this digital dial that you can scroll through to select your different modes. I'm used to having a physical dial which I can just switch on other Sony cameras, not a deal breaker by any means but just something that I think that I should mention. And the battery life, the battery life I found was not great. It is using a pretty small battery. I'm assuming Sony have done this because it's the same battery on other models. And if you're coming from one of those, you're still going to be able to use your batteries which is great, but I do wish this had a bigger battery. Now in terms of my use, I do film in 4K, and you know, I did have Bluetooth enable dso it could connect to the grid and I was starting and stopping quite a bit, I wasn't reviewing every single shot that I took. And with that kind of usage, I got around 20 to 30 minutes of recorded footage before the battery flatted out over a couple of days. So to me that's not great battery life. And if you're thinking of getting this, I would definitely recommend picking up a couple of spare batteries, having those charged to hand so you can easily just pop them in when needed.

The other thing that I  don't like is the fact that we still have micro USB. So when it does come to charging the batteries, yes, if you've got a separate charger, that's fine. But if you are charging via the camera directly then you're going to have to have a micro USB cable. I mean it's 2020, all my devices right now have a USB Type C. So I would have liked USB Type C, micro USB really should be extinct in 2020. Another thing is that if you do have this mounted on a tripod or even the grip, then you no longer have access to the battery and SD card compartment. So what that does mean is that even if you have a plate on here and you need to quickly change your battery, you're going to have to remove that plate that will be going into tripod before you can get access to the battery. And as mentioned, you will be doing this a lot, maybe not to change the memory card but to change the batteries. So if this 1/4 inch pin was in the middle or more towards this side, then that would make life a lot easier. Now having said that, I still really liked this camera. And if you're after a vlogging camera in particular, I think this is probably one of the best options out there.

For pricing, it is coming in at around 700 pounds, it's going to be available from June. And that pricing is roughly about what you'd be expecting for a premium compact vlogging camera. It's cheaper than some of the larger higher end models, the mirrorless but it's a little bit more expensive compared to other compacts. However, based on everything that it offers as a package, I do think it's worth it and I would have no problems recommending this. What do you guys think of the Sony ZV-1?  Drop me a comment below and let me know your thoughts.

Conclusion:

So after using this for about a week or so, what are my thoughts? Well, I have to say this is an amazing vlogging camera. I can definitely recommend it. Having that flip out display on the side makes a massive, massive difference. I'm so glad Sony have finally gone with this instead of the flip up display. And I don't know if it was a case of patents or licensing fees or whatever. But regardless, it's here, I really hope Sony will now get these side flip out swivel displays. For some of their other lines, I use the a7 III right now a lot. And that's something I really do miss having. Now you saw some of the sample footage, and in my opinion, it's really really good, great quality video that you're getting out of this camera. I really liked the shallow depth of field that you're getting on something the size of this, it is F1.8 and having that bokeh button right here, the C1 button just makes it so much easy to activate that, you don't really need to be too technical or anything, you can just switch that on, and it's going to give you that nice blurry background. I actually didn't know that this has an ND filter built in as well. The best way to describe itis sunglasses for your camera. So if you are out and it's very, very bright, you still want that’s hallow depth of field, you want that blurry background, then putting on the ND filter. Again really, really good, and I'm so glad that it's here. Autofocus is absolutely amazing, how quick it was to focus in, it was tracking my eye pretty well, too. But regardless, it's tracking my face really well. So focus is so, so good. And that product showcase mode. I mean, I'm not sure why nobody else has thought of this before or if it wasn't achievable, but if you're somebody who does lots of product showcase shots, you know, where you need to put things up to the camera, then, you know, I've seen it so many times, I'm sure everybody's seen it, where people have to kind of put their hand behind. That is the thing of the past, I was so impressed with how well this focused in to the objects that I wash olding close to the camera, and then focusing back to me as soon as I moved those away. Very, very good. Stabilization really, really good. Of course, stabilization is very important. If you're going to be vlogging, you're going to be moving around a lot. And active steady shot does a really good job.

One thing to bear in mind however, is that when you do have active steady shots enabled, then it does crop in to the frame. Now it's completely understandable why this does this because this uses hardware as well as software to provide that stabilization. But the thing is, if you are holding this handheld, then it is going to be pretty tight on your face. And generally when you want to be vlogging, you do want a wider angle of view so you get bit more of the background in too. And for that reason, I would definitely recommend picking up a gorilla pod or a grip, maybe this Sony grip as well. The Sony grip, how ever,is around 170 pounds. So that is pretty expensive. Now this is a really good grip, you do have these controls, which are really useful and handy, does give you that separation as well. I really like that. And although I did find myself accidentally pressing a lot these buttons on this grip, you do have a lock switch. So that is quite handy and useful. But you don't necessarily have to buy this, you could get a cheap gorilla pod or something, something that's basically going to give you a little bit more separation from the camera lens to your face. So I would definitely recommend that. Now touching on audio, I have to say that the audio quality was really good, very usable, especially using this windshield. So if you do have windy conditions, then this is going to be really useful. As you heard from the examples earlier on, you could hear me clearly even though there was a lot of wind in the background. Now of course you are going to get better audio quality if you do use an external mic. And as we saw from the example of me using the Rode wireless kit, it just made the audio that much better. So if you are serious about your audio, then I would advise getting a separate mic or something, maybe something that you can mount on to the hot shoe as well will be an option.

Now let's not forget that this is also a stills camera and not just the video camera so you can get some really excellent stills on here too. Once again, that's wide open aperture gives you a really nice depth of field and that's very impressive considering the small size of this camera. So that was a lot of the positives. But of course there are some negatives as well.

I hope you enjoyed this analysis blog and found it useful It was fun to actually do a camera review for change rather than just smartphones. So, if you do want to see more of that as well, then do let me know. If you want to see more coverage like this here on the channel and you haven't already, then be sure to subscribe and follow my blog.