Sony ZV-1 _ MOST IMPORTANT FEATURES TESTED!.

So if you're on the fence about buying the brand new Sony ZV-1, this is a video where I test out all the most important features so you can decide if this camera is right for you. So let me go ahead and show you some of the footage that comes straight out of the camera. The colors are looking really good with the out-of-the-box settings. This camera is capable of 4K 24 and 30 frames per second with no recording limit. In fact, I was able to record about an hour of 4K juicing out a fully charged battery without the camera heating up in a well air-conditioned environment. Just make sure to turn auto power temperature to high if you're planning to shoot 4K for over five minutes. In the slow motion high frame rate options, we have 240, 480, and 960 frames per second like the RX100 series cameras. The camera comes equipped with a 24 to 70 millimeter equivalent lens, incredibly versatile with a variable aperture of 1.8 to 2.8 making this camera really good in low light. However, if you're on the opposite end where you have a ton of light, the camera does have a built-in ND filter to help block some of that out. And you might have noticed a tiny little box hovering over our eyes in some of these clips. If you're new to the Sony camp, video eye autofocus has just become a recent phenomenon to help keep you in focus as you're vlogging and it works incredibly well. So the ZV-1 will automatically power on if you open the screen out like this. And when you close the screen door like this with the screen facing out, it will still leave the camera power on. However, when you turn the screen back to the body itself, it will automatically power off the ZV-1. It flips up and out for selfie style vlogging. However, if you try to go the other way, it'll stop just right here. So this is perfect for top down shots. In case you are wondering the ZV-1 uses this type of battery, the NP-BX1 battery. This is the same type of battery that the Sony RX100 cameras use as well. Like the RX100 series cameras, you can charge your ZV-1 with a USB cable. Unfortunately, it's still the micro USB 2.0, I believe, and not updated to USB-C in any way. This grip piece right here comes with the ZV-1 already on. Unlike the RX100 series camera, if you want an extra bit of grip, you do have to buy a separate piece of accessory for that particular camera. So with the RX100 camera, there is a ring here on the lens for you to adjust your focus or to adjust the aperture or shutter speed. The ZV-1 doesn't have anything like that. So if you want to manually adjust your focus or change your aperture, you're going to have to do it through this dial in the back right here. Now, although the ZV-1 doesn't have this mode dial right here for it to switch to different picture modes and movie modes, it does have this mode button right here that allows you to do the same thing through the menu of the camera itself. I would like to note this giant red record button right here so that you won't miss hitting the record button when you're trying to shoot a selfie style vlog. Moving on, Sony streamlined a couple of useful options for creators to just one buttons. The first button by default, the C1 button, is the background defocus, which helps you achieve the blurry background look. Next, the C2 button here is defaulted as product showcase, which disables face and eye detection autofocus whenever you want to show off a product in front of the camera. With any of the previous models, you would have had to cover your face fully in order for you to show a product in front of the camera. Notice how on the bottom screen here, the camera's much more focused on the hat rather than on Vivian. That's because the product showcase is turned on. When it is off, it's more focused on Vivian's face than the hat. Here we are demonstrating the face priority auto exposure. Compared to the old RX100 V and most cameras in general, those typically balance the exposure in the entire scene so the face in front of the camera is usually left pretty dark. But the ZV-1 prioritizes the exposure for the face, keeping it nice and bright in mixed lighting situations like this. And while we have the comparison going, the skin tones of the ZV-1 is much more flattering compared to the RX100 V. Actually, the colors in general on the ZV-1 is much nicer overall. Here's a quick low-light test. In the past, the RX100 V was rated highly amongst vloggers because of its impressive low-light performance. ZV-1 provides that as well and with the more flattering color science. Here's a quick comparison between the different stabilization options. Starting off with me just standing still and vlogging and stabilization turned off, you can see the frame is a little shaky on the edge. Changing it to standard, it's definitely improved. Less shakiness on the edge right here. With active stabilization, it does crop in quite a bit but it's extremely stable. No visible shakes that are too noticeable. Now we are gonna vlog and walk at the same time. With stabilization turned off, the shakiness is a bit jarring if we look at the edges, particularly at the bridge lamp here on the right. With stabilization on standard, it may not look like it has improved much but the edges are definitely not wonking out as much. Not sure if the word wonking is the best way to describe it. With active, it's a lot better. The bridge lamp on the right looks to be staying in place quite well. If you want to use active, I would recommend using an extended pole mini tripod grip to add a bit of reach to fit your whole face back into the frame. As you can see here, it's working out pretty well. So this is going to be a test on skin smoothening right now. It is currently off and I do have an angry pimple right here. So let's see how the camera can fix that. So I'm gonna go ahead and go low right now. So this is low skin softening. This is what it looks like. Natural light is just coming in. No other external lighting is happening. I'm gonna go ahead and switch to mid. And this is what mid looks like. Now, mid is a little bit too much for someone like me. I actually was looking over some of the footage and the mid looks a little bit too much. So this is what mid looks like. I'm gonna go ahead and go high now. That sounded weird, but this is what high skin softening looks like now. So it could be a pretty big drastic change. I don't know if you can tell the difference, but this is a skin softening test for you guys. When it comes to audio, you literally have three options. The onboard mic itself, the three and a half millimeter mic jack, where you can plug an external microphone to, or using a compatible Sony multi interface hot shoe mic. There is a spot on top of the camera for you to mount the mics, which is great. Compared to the RX100 cameras, this would have been where the viewfinder eyepiece would be at, but for selfie style vlogging video camera like the ZV-1, it's not necessary to have this eyepiece. Also, there is no onboard flash like the RX100 cameras, which again, is not necessary for a video camera such as this one. The replacement for the better onboard audio is much more ideal. Now, before we get into the audio test, please take the time right now to have your volume control ready, as the following sounds are recorded with varying levels, so it can be very soft and then it can get very loud. Okay, ready? Let's get into it. All right, so we're currently testing out the audio on the ZV-1 with no microphone, just pure onboard mic right now. There's a lot of traffic happening right behind me, so hopefully you can still focus on my voice. My audio setting level right now is set to 15. There's a bit of wind happening right now, so I have the wind muff on top, so this is what the audio sounds like. Hopefully, it won't catch too much of the wind rustling, rumbling. There's some birds happening right now, but hopefully the audio is still very clear from what I am directing to towards to the camera. All right, so right now we are doing an audio test with the RX100 Mark V. This is the older model. Anyway, same conditions. There's a little bit of wind and draft happening right now. There's some traffic that's happening right behind me, but this is what it sounds like with the RX100 Mark V. Let me know in the comments down below which of these two onboard mic sounds the best. All right, so now we are testing out the audio with the Rode VideoMicro. This is a smaller form factor of one of the Rode Shotgun microphones, something that's a little bit more common for folks to be using with this tiny form factor camera, not so much with the VideoMic Pro+, which is absolutely big. Hopefully this shotgun mic does provide a step up in terms of audio when you're recording with the ZV-1. All right, so right now we're using the Rode Wireless Go, a very popular wireless loft mic. What I really love about this mic is that it is super small form factor, pairs up really nicely with the ZV-1, and I think it's something that's going to be good to do some professional audio recording, especially when you're outside right now. So not much traffic is going on right now. So, oh, here you go. It's finally picking up. I choked on my own spit right there, but I'm trying to talk over as the car are driving by. So hopefully this offers a pretty good idea what this setup sounds like, and I think this is a very solid setup if you're doing any sort of travel vlogs and you're trying to get the best possible audio on location. All right, so now we have swapped out to a Sony multi-interface hot shoe mic, the ECM-XYST, whatever the model number is. I'm not able to really set the audio level settings for this particular mic because it kind of disables that, so it's using whatever the auto setting is. Now, there's a truck happening right behind the camera right now. It's ramping up really loud, but just giving you an idea what the audio sounds like if you're using this microphone while you're talking. And look, wow, there's a lot of traffic going on right now. So I'm trying to talk as much as I can as that sound is happening right behind me to give you guys an idea what the audio sounds like with this microphone. All right, so this is an indoor audio test with no external microphone. This is just purely onboard mic from the ZV-1. I actually raised the audio level setting to 26, which is default when you get the camera out of the box. And this is an indoor audio test with the RX100 Mark V. This is what it sounds like in a closed-off, quiet environment with the AC running. So this is what it sounds like with the RX100 Mark V. So this is what it sounds like with an external microphone, an external shotgun microphone attached to the ZV-1. This is the Rode VideoMic Pro, a directional microphone that's attached on top of the camera pointing at me. I'm about yay close to the camera right now. And again, the AC is running. And this is what it sounds like indoors with a Rode VideoMic Pro on top of the ZV-1. So now we swapped over to the Sony multi-interface hot shoe mic. So this is what it sounds like. The advantage of using a mic like this is that you don't have to plug in anything other than mounting this particular mic on top of the hot shoe directly. And do be sure to let me know in the comments down below which of these mics you think sound the best. Though I don't think it's necessary now because the screen flips out. In case anyone still wanted to use the remote live view on the app of their phone, it's a bit laggy. I would just probably use this to frame your shot and trigger the recording only. Aside from that, you can transfer video files from the camera to your phone. But if it's a long clip, especially if it's 4K, it will take quite a bit of time. Photo transfers on the other hand are fairly quick, albeit only JPEGs are transferable, not the raw files. So a quick note on the touch function of the ZV-1. You can't actually touch to change any of the settings on your camera, but you can touch to focus and touch to enlarge a photo during playback. While this would be more widely used as a video camera, I would touch up on the photo aspects really quickly. The ZV-1 has the new animal eye autofocus. It also has the 20 frames per second no blackout so you can capture photos of high speed subjects. Combine that with the advanced touch tracking autofocus, you won't have to worry about missing focus for the shots. The maximum shutter you can achieve on this camera is a crazy one over 32,000. And yes, you can use an external flash with a hot shoe on top of the camera for all you off-camera flash folks out there. A default time-lapse option is built into the camera software known as the interval shoot function. Lastly, this has been around, but it's a lesser known feature, the smile detection shutter, which if the camera detects a smile, it will automatically take a photo. Perfect for selfies. If you guys need help setting up your Sony ZV-1, I will have a best settings guide right here on the screen. If you guys have further questions about this camera, join my Sony Alpha Fam Discord server. The link's in the description box below. Guys, thank you so much for watching. I'll see you guys in the next one. Peace.