Sony Second Generation Vlogging Compact Camera

2023.05.23

Today Sony continued expanding their lineup of specialized vlogging digital cameras with the lowest-level yet to capture the video-equivalent of the point&shoot market. This, of course, goes head-on against cellphones which are the de-facto standard tool of most vloggers.

The new Sony ZV-1 Mark II is a minimalist digital camera desinged for vlogging above all else. It has a similar design to the original ZV-1 and follows it in name more than capabilities. It is built around a similar 20 MP Exmor RS sensor with 2.7X crop factor and slightly narrower ISO 125-12800 sensitivity range which expands down to ISO 80. This sensor boasts a 315-Point Phase-Detect AF system and is capable of 24 FPS at full-resolution with a fairly deep buffer that can handle 170 JPEG images or 80 RAW files per burst.

A new extremely wide and bright 18-50mm F/1.8-4 lens makes its debug on this camera. Interestingly, this is a focal-range that Nikon announced years ago but never released. This gives the widest field-of-view of any digital camera with a fixed zoom lens. Its predecessor has a more conventional stabilized 24-70mm lens. One might be surprised that the ZV-1 II lacks an form of optical or mechanical stabilization but it is reasonable for the use case. Video capture requires at least 1/24s shutter-speed and so stabilizing an 18-50mm lens would only be useful for 1-stop at the long end.

As a Point&Shoot model, the Sony ZV-1 II omits any form of manual control and choice of metering. Its entirely electronic shutter can capture images between 1/32000-1/4s, which is the shorter slower shutter-speed seen on any camera yet. Automatic exposures do not tend to work well at long shutter-speeds, so this is consistent with the rest of the feature-set.

Sony expects to sell the ZV-1 Mark II for $900 USD or $1200 CAD. This makes it quite expensive for such limited features and a relatively common 1" sensor. It will definitely add versatility over a cellphone due to its wide zoom lens and better image quality from its larger sensor.

• Digital Camera