Thread: NEX-C3 and me

I originally posted this on our sister site at TalkNEX but it looks like that there isn't much traffic over there so I figured I'd post here as well. I just picked up a "new to me" C3 to go along with my m43 gear. While I love my m43 lenses (and my GH2 for video) I have long had a soft spot for using legacy glass on digital bodies. I use EVFs on my m43 gear and while it works pretty well I really became intrigued when a co-worker brought in his NEX3 (focus peaking especially). At first I didn't care for the feel of the small body but I warmed up to it after playing with it a bit. So, I noticed a lightly used C3 for sale and since I had some balance on my PayPal I decided"what the heck" and went for it. I'm not really interested in going with any NEX lenses as I am satisfied with m43 as my "system". The NEX is going to serve as my manual focus camera. I plan on simply mounting my Konica 24/2.8 (and maybe pick up a Jupiter-8 or something similar) and have at it.

It's on route and as soon as I get it I'll pop back with my reaction to it and some photos.

If anyone has any NEX wisdom I'd love to hear it.

I am a fan of sticking other stuff on the NEX. I'm a one camera person, and the one I bought was the NEX so everything I witter on about is influenced by that. I've been amassing Canon FD (28, 50, 35-70, 135, 70-210) over the past year or so, and it's great fun. I also find it allows me to do things I struggle with on the kit lens. The kit lens on MF isn't actually very easy, its much more user friendly to have adapted lenses on if you want he camera to do something out of the ordinary. There are a couple of great features for manual focus - not just the peaking but also 7 or 14 x magnification. Serious fine tuning.

Be good to see what you do

Ever since I switched to digital I have been carrying the torch for my old Konica S3. I am hoping the NEX-C3 can be a nice reinterpretation of the kinds of things that made my old compact RFs so fun to use. For a while I thought the only way that was going to happen was if I ponied up for an M8 or M9 but the more I thought about it I realized that it dodn't HAVE to be an actual RF.

I was thinking about this and it seems to be that I have a habit of bonding with the unloved and least popular camera gear out there (Panasonic G2 and GF2 being the most recent ones). The NEXC3 seems to follow that pattern closely. It is the little brother and it would appear ignored member of the NEX family. Te reasons I chose the C3 over the 5n are pretty straight forward (the NEX7 wasn't even in the running because I couldn't afford it). First off, I got a 3 week old C3 at a really good price (saving a couple of hundred off the new price). Next, I figured since this was meant to be platform to use my legacy glass the greater magnification of the MF assist vs. the 5n seemed to be a point in favor of the C3. I thought about the 5n's ability to use the Sony EVF (which appears to be nothing short of amazing) but given the price I wasn't going to buy one anyway (see reason one) so again the C3 seemed like a better idea. I didn't find the lack of flash an issue as I almost always shoot available light and the high ISO capability of the NEX cameras seems particularly adept at that available light photography and finally the C3 seemed to have sufficient controls for my needs. I mean when shooting with my Konica 24/2.8 and 50/1.4 I set the aperture on the lens and as long as I can set the soft controls to exposure compensation, metering, ISO and AEL I'll be happy. Even fi i have to do some menu diving it won't be the end of the world...shooting with MF lenses is going to require a slower pace anyway.

From what I have seen of the NEX IQ I am looking forward to what it can do with the Hexanons. It arrives tomorrow so I'll check back after I've had some time to set it up and shoot some images. One thins is for sure, there isn't much info out there on folks using the C3. You can find lots of folks out there using the 5n and 7 but not so much with the C3. Maybe I can add to canon a bit.

The C3 arrived today and I am waiting for the battery to charge. My first impression are...WOW that thing is small. It's also reasonably comfortable and that will improve when I get the wrist strap. The peaking feature is really nice and as a platform for my legacy lenses it is light years ahead of my m43 gear. The flip up LCD is nice. I have never been a huge flip up LCD fan but the sharpness of the 900K+ pixel display is making a strong argument for converting me. It balances pretty well with the Hexanon 24/2.8 and a bit better with the 40/1.8. The setup was easy enough but Sony could use some lessons in straight forward UIs from Panasonic. The build quality is as nice or better than my GF2 despite being mostly plastic. I'll take it out for a spin later (or tomorrow) but I can already tell that my legacy glass will likely not see much time on my m43 gear from now on. If Sony had native lens equivalents to the P14/2.5, P20/1.7 and O45/1.8 m43 would probably have a real fight on their hands.

The proof will be in the images. I'll see how peaking and legacy glass works in real life. I could see using this camera a lot. If IQ lives up to the hype I could easily this replacing all but one of my m43 bodies (that I'd keep for the P14 and P20). The camera, though clearly limited aimed at consumers as opposed to more advanced users seems to be ideally setup for me shooting legacy glass with available light. Right now I feel like I made a good choice.

One of the things that I found after using an E-PL1 for most of a year is that I don't have any great problem using a camera with a stripped down interface. It's not so much that I prefer less controls, but I just tend to work out what I can and can't do with a given camera and go from there.

One of my favourite techniques when I was shooting with my NEX-5 in the past is to flip the LCD up and shoot from the hip in a "rollei fashion", I have the grid lines and focus peaking on and use my desired legacy glass. I had the screen on B&W and used red as my chosen peaking colour, focusing was very fast and accurate. I found this to be very unobtrusive when I wanted to take some street or candid shots.

Originally Posted by Phoenix

One of my favourite techniques when I was shooting with my NEX-5 in the past is to flip the LCD up and shoot from the hip in a "rollei fashion", I have the grid lines and focus peaking on and use my desired legacy glass. I had the screen on B&W and used red as my chosen peaking colour, focusing was very fast and accurate. I found this to be very unobtrusive when I wanted to take some street or candid shots.

Can you set the screen to BW or do you mean set the camera to BW? I'd love to have just the LCD set to BW. No matter I'm looking forward to taking it with me to work tomorrow and see what it can do. Now I gotta get an LCD screen protector for it...I think one of those GGS III snap ons looks good.

I've set the screen to B&W because I'm shooting in B&W, I don't think you can just set the LCD to B&W unless you shoot RAW where it doesnt matter if it's B&W or color. You can however switch off WYSIWYG in the settings.

Originally Posted by Phoenix

I've set the screen to B&W because I'm shooting in B&W, I don't think you can just set the LCD to B&W unless you shoot RAW where it doesnt matter if it's B&W or color. You can however switch off WYSIWYG in the settings.

Yeah, I figured that out after a bit of noodling with it. I like converting to BW using SilverEFX2 but that has been using m43...I'll try BW on the NEX and see how I like it. I like a BW LCD as it improves contrast. Reminds me of my early days using video (old Sony betacams in fact)