Hey, this is Scott of Photography Banzai. In this video I'll be doing a hands-on with the
Sony DSC-HX80. A neat little digital camera.
Thanks to Camera Craft in Rockford Illinois for allowing me to film there.
This HX-80 is a very small digital camera. Of course they're having a lot of
challenges with great cameras in phones these days. They're trying to
differentiate and this camera definitely has some features you won't find on a
phone. It does have a standard 1/2.3 inch sensor. That is pretty much the
smallest sensor that most digital cameras have these days. Has a viewfinder.
Has a nice lens attached. You know you're not going to get that with a phone. I do
feel there are definitely still uses and reasons to have a small digital camera.
Something like this... This is a 24 to 720mm equivalent lens on it, so
there's an extreme amount of zoom range on it, but the equivalent focal length of 24mm
is pretty decently wide. This camera does have a nice large battery in it, and an
estimated 390 shots per charge. As I mentioned the lens is 24 to 720mm
equivalent, so it's a very very big range. The potential drawback is
the aperture. You've got f3.5 to f6.4 throughout that zoom range. I would have liked to
see something faster, but it is a relatively inexpensive camera for what
it is... so I do understand the apertures are not as large as something a little
more expensive. The lens itself also has some type of stabilization. I do record a
little video you can check out. It appears to work relatively well. I didn't
do any extensive testing, but it does have that stabilization, which is very
nice to have. And especially a camera like this with those smaller apertures.
Of course, a cool feature of this camera is that flip up screen. It's kind of
designed to do the selfie videography and things of that nature. Taking photos
of yourself and a few other people. Flip up that screen. Actually, when you press
the shutter button.. when the screen is flipped up it'll give you a countdown,
which is really nice to have in that situation. So you can see here I'm doing
a selfie with the screen flipped up. Press the button, get the few second
countdown, takes a photo pretty much as easy as it can get
with that selfie stuff... Standard USB port on the camera covered by a little
plastic cover. Here's the lens in a little bit of detail.. When you turn it on
It extends quite a bit, even when you zoom in and out there's even more
further extension to that lens, so it gets very far from the camera. Of course,
you really need that extension for such a huge zoom range on it. You can tell
this camera is designed to be used handheld. It does have a tripod mount, but it's
not in-line with the lens. It also has an HDMI connection, but it's on the bottom
of the camera.. which is a little interesting. The battery door seems decent
quality. It has a switch on it, which is pretty solid. The battery itself is a NPB-X1
x-type battery. 1240 mAh like I said 390 potential shots on it,
which is not bad for a camera like this. Of course one SD card slot, but it does take
those memory stick Sony specific cards, which I'm surprised still exist.
But that is an option if you have those instead of SD cards for whatever reason. The
camera surprisingly does have the electronic viewfinder in it. You have a
little switch that you hold down it will turn on the camera if you pop up the
viewfinder when the camera is not on which is nice. The EVF is very tiny. It took
me a little effort to figure out how to use it properly to get a decent look
through it. Taking off my glasses worked relatively well. I did figure out how to
get a decent view with glasses on. Has that diopter on the top. Very easy to
change which is nice. When you do extend the viewfinder you have to pull it out
by hand so it extends back towards the user and then it'll work as you expect
pretty neat little viewfinder. Of course it is very very small. Just consider that
if it's a key feature for you. It looks nice when you can get a view in there,
but it is very tiny. The camera also has a flash.. A nice little pop-up flash.
Nothing to complain about with that. I did test out the zoom range. You can see
in this clip. Extreme zoom range, especially for such a
tiny camera. I think the best situation to use that would be of course outdoors
in broad daylight.. Nice bright situation. You do have to consider the aperture gets
quite a bit smaller at the extended zoom. I did try this camera out
with selfie video mode. Took a short clip. Also, I used my action camera to film
myself doing a selfie, so a double selfie. I think it turned out alright. You can see
how it looks. Actually works pretty decently well at the 24mm
equivalent. The fully wide-angle of that lens. I think they did a very nice job
with the intended purpose for that selfie stuff and you also have the shake
reduction, which can help. I think this camera will work decently well in that
vlogging situation. Of course you do have to consider quality will not be amazing.
It's 1080p, also the sensor inside is small. You just definitely want to try it out
for yourself if you can before you go out and buy it. Because image quality
will not be something like one inch sensor cameras so the RX100 series from
Sony. Those will definitely have higher quality than this, but I do think this is
a nice option. Especially if you can get it at a decent price. There's a lot of
unique features you won't find in a phone. The EVF the super long-range zoom.
It does have a flash of course. That probably works decently well, I didn't
do too much with it. I took one or two photos with the flash, but it is in there
and it's nice to have. Of course the screen.. you can use it fully extended back
towards the user if you have the lens face towards you for the selfie stuff, but
you can also use it kinda from the hip as they say. Where it's halfway extended
get some nice stabilization in the way that you're holding it. You can do some
panning shots. You have a nice camera maybe on your phone, but it won't do
everything this can do. You do have more control in this case.. a lot of menu
options.. very very few phones have a lot of
manual control to them. So that was a Sony DSC HX-80. A neat little camera. Glad
that I had some time to check it out. So I'm Scott from Photography Banzai.
I hope you found this video interesting. Again, thanks to Camera Craft in Rockford
Illinois. Definitely check them out if you're in the area. Thanks again!