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Table of Contents

Chapter 1 In a Nutshell

1.1 What's New?

1.1.1 A new 24 megapixel sensor

1.1.2 Sony's Best Focus Tracking

1.1.3 Much better Out-of-Camera .JPGs

1.1.4 4K and Other Video Features

1.2 Features that should have been on the Original A6000

1.3 Other Noteworthy Features

1.3.1 14-bit RAW

1.3.2 Can shoot 2 Kinds of videos simultaneously

1.3.3 Three Different Low-Light Modes

1.3.4 Handheld High Dynamic Range (HDR)

1.3.5 Peaking Color

1.3.6 Face Detection and Improved Eye AF

1.3.7 Downloadable Apps

1.4 Software for your Camera

Chapter 2 Essential Configuration

2.1 The Function Button

2.2 Reassignable Buttons

2.3 Some Essential Customizations

2.4 Suggested Configuration for Shooting Kids and Pets

2.5 Suggested Configuration for Video

2.6 Suggested Configuration for shooting portraits

2.7 Suggested Configuration for Landscapes

2.8 Suggested Configuration for Legacy Glass

2.9 What’s Incompatible with RAW?

2.10 My Personal Camera Settings

Chapter 3 Quick Guide for the Impatient User

3.1 The Two AUTO Modes

3.1.1 “Intelligent Auto”

3.1.2 "Superior Auto”

3.2 P,A,S,M Modes

3.3 Focusing Essentials and Face Detection

3.3.1 Other Focus Area Choices

3.3.2 Face Detection

3.3.3 Focusing Modes

3.3.4 Focus Confirmation

3.3.5 Quickly Switching between Wide Area AF and Spot AF

3.5 Things You Probably Didn’t Know about Playback Mode

3.6 Configuring the DISPlay

3.7 Quick Guide for Video

3.8 Center Lock-On AF

3.9 The Panorama Mode

3.10 Remote Methods

3.11 The “Images Remaining Counter”

3.12 Lens Nomenclature

3.13 Available APS-C Format Lenses

3.14 Viewfinder Eyepiece Diopter Correction

Chapter 4 Using Legacy Glass

4.1 Essential Stuff – Read this First

4.1.1 For Manual Focus Lenses

4.1.2 For Autofocus Lenses

4.2 A Short List of the Most Popular Adapters

4.2.1 Sony A-mount Lenses

4.2.2 M42 / Pentax Screw Mount

4.2.3 Leica M / Zeiss ZM

4.2.5 Canon EF (EOS)

4.2.9 Minolta MC/MD

4.2.10 Olympus OM

4.2.12 Medium Format Lenses

Chapter 5 Wi-Fi, NFC, and Apps

5.1 What is NFC?

5.2 Setting Things Up – Smartphone Functions

5.2.1 Install PlayMemories Mobile

5.2.2 Transferring an Image To your Smartphone

5.2.3 Configuring NFC on your Smartphone

5.3.1 Send (resized) images to your smartphone for social Media

5.3.2 Smart Remote Control

5.4 Uploading Files to your Home Computer

5.4.1 Configuring PlayMemories Home

5.4.2 Initiate your Download

5.4.3 Throughput Rates

5.5 Applications

5.5.1 If your camera is connected to your computer via USB

5.5.2 If your camera is connected to the internet via a Wi-Fi router

5.5.3 Apps Currently Available

Chapter 6 The “Recording” (Camera icon) Menu Settings

6.2 Aspect Ratio

6.4 Panorama Functions

6.5 (Movie) File Format

6.6 (Movie) Record Setting

6.7 Dual Video REC

6.8 HFR Settings

6.9.1 Single-Shot Advance

6.9.2 Continuous Advance

6.9.3 10s, 5s, and 2s Self-Timers

6.9.4 Self-Timer Continuous

6.9.5 Bracketing

6.9.6 Bracketing for HDR

6.9.7 What exactly changes when you bracket?

6.9.8 White Balance Bracketing

6.9.9 DRO Bracketing

6.10 Bracket Settings

6.11 Flash Mode

6.11.1 Flash Off

6.11.2 Auto Flash

6.11.3 Fill Flash

6.11.4 Slow Sync

6.11.5 Rear Sync

6.11.6 Wireless Flash

6.12 Flash Compensation

6.13 Red Eye Reduction

6.14 Focus Mode

6.15 Focus Area

6.15.4 Flexible Spot (S, M, or L)

6.15.5 Expand Flexible Spot

6.15.6 Lock-On AF

6.16 AF Illuminator

6.17 (Movie) AF Drive Speed

6.18 (Movie) AF Track Sens

6.19 Exposure Compensation

6.20 Exposure Step

6.21.1 High ISO Noise Levels

6.21.2 Multi-Frame Noise Reduction (MFNR)

6.21.3 AUTO ISO Settings

6.21.4 Specifying Auto ISO Boundaries

6.21.5 Greater-than-25,600 ISO Values

6.22 ISO Auto Min. SS

6.23 Metering Mode

6.23.1 Center-weighted and Multi-Segment Metering

6.23.2 Spot Metering And AEL

6.23.3 A Different Method of Handling Difficult Lighting

6.24 White Balance

6.24.1 Auto White Balance and Pre-Set White Balance

6.24.2 Tweaking the Pre-Set White Balance

6.24.3 The Color Temperature setting

6.24.4 Custom White Balance

6.25 DRO / Auto HDR

6.26 Creative Styles

6.26.1 Frequently Asked Questions

Contrast Setting

6.26.2 Saturation Setting

6.26.3 Sharpness Setting

6.26.4 Combining Settings

6.26.5 B&W Mode

6.27 Picture Effect

6.27.1 Toy Camera

6.27.2 Pop Color and Posterization

6.27.3 Retro Photo

6.27.4 Partial Color

6.27.5 Soft High-Key

6.27.6 High-Contrast Monochrome

6.27.7 Soft Focus

6.27.8 HDR Painting

6.27.9 Rich-Tone Monochrome

6.27.10 How do these effects differ from before?

6.27.11 Miniature Mode

6.27.12 Watercolor and Illustration Mode

6.28 Picture Profile

6.28.1 Gamma Options

6.28.2 The Nine Profiles

6.30 Focus Magnifier

6.30.1 AF with Focus Magnifier

6.31 Long Exposure NR

6.33 Center Lock-On AF

6.34 Smile / Face Detection

6.34.1 On (Registered Faces)

6.34.2 Smile Shutter

6.35 Soft Skin Effect

6.36 Auto Object Framing

6.38 Scene Selection

6.38.1 Portrait

6.38.2 Sports Action

6.38.4 Landscape

6.38.6 Night Scene

6.38.7 Handheld Twilight

6.38.8 Night Portrait

6.38.9 Anti-Motion Blur

6.39 Movie / HFR

6.40 SteadyShot

6.41 Color Space

6.42 Auto Slow Shutter

6.43 Audio Recording

6.44 Audio Rec Level

6.45 Wind Noise Reduction

6.46 Memory Recall

Chapter 7 “Custom” (Gear icon) Menu Settings

7.3 Focus Magnification Time

7.4 AF in Focus Magnification

7.6 Marker Display / Marker Settings

7.7 Audio Level Display

7.8 Auto Review

7.9 DISP Button

7.9.1 Graphic Display

7.9.3 Histogram

7.9.4 For Viewfinder (Rear LCD only)

7.10 Peaking Level / Peaking Color

7.11 Exposure Set. Guide

7.12 Live View Display

7.13 AF Area Auto Clear

7.14 Disp. Cont. AF area

7.16 Zoom Setting

7.16.1 Differences between CIZ and Digital Zoom

7.17 Eye-start AF (A-mount only)

7.18 FINDER / MONITOR

7.19 Finder Frame Rate

7.20 Release w/o Lens

7.21 Release w/o Card

7.22 Priority Set in AF-S / AF-C

7.23 AF w/ shutter

7.24 AEL w/ Shutter

7.25 Silent Shooting

7.26 e-Front Curtain Shut.

7.27 S. Auto Img. Extract

7.28 Exp.comp.set

7.29 Face Registration

7.30 AF Micro Adj. (A-mount Lenses Only)

7.31 Lens Comp.

7.31.2 Chromatic Aberration

7.31.3 Distortion

7.33 Function Menu Set.

7.34 Custom Key (Shooting and Playing Back)

7.34.1 All Assignable Functions

7.34.2 Bright Monitoring

7.34.3 More on Eye AF

7.34.4 Flash Exposure Lock / Hold

7.35 Dial / Wheel Setup

7.36 Dial / Wheel EV Comp

7.37 Zoom Ring Rotate

7.38 MOVIE Button

7.39 Dial / Wheel Lock

Chapter 8 Wi-Fi Menu

8.1 Send to Smartphone

8.2 Send to Computer

8.4 One-Touch (NFC)

8.5 Airplane Mode

8.7 Access Point Settings

8.8 Edit Device Name

8.9 Disp MAC Address

8.10 SSID/PW Reset

8.11 Reset Network Set.

Chapter 9 Apps Menu

9.1 Application List

9.2 Introduction

Chapter 10 The “Playback” Menu Settings

10.3 Image Index

10.4 Display Rotation

10.5 Slide Show

10.5.1 PhotoTV HD and Bravia Sync

10.7 Enlarge Image

10.9 Specify Printing

10.9.1 Printing the Date on the image

10.9.2 Cancelling DPOF files

Chapter 11 The “Setup” (Toolbox Icon) Menu Settings

11.1 Monitor Brightness

11.2 Viewfinder (EVF) Brightness

11.3 Finder Color temp.

11.4 Gamma Display Assist

11.5 Volume Settings

11.6 Audio Signals

11.7 Upload Settings (Eye-fi card only)

11.9 Mode Dial Guide

11.10 Delete Confirm.

11.11 Display Quality

11.12 Power Save Start Time

11.13 NTSC/PAL Selector

11.14 Cleaning Mode

11.15 Demo Mode

11.16 TC/UB Settings

11.17 Remote Ctrl

11.18 HDMI Settings

11.18.1 HDMI Resolution

11.18.2 24p / 60p Output

11.18.3 HDMI Info. Display

11.18.4 TC Output

11.18.5 REC Control

11.18.6 CTRL FOR HDMI

11.19 4K Output Select

11.20 USB Connection

11.20.1 PC Remote Software

11.21 USB LUN Setting

11.22 USB Power Supply

11.24 Date/Time Setup

11.25 Area Setting

11.26 Copyright Info

11.28 File Number

11.29 Set File Name

11.30 Select REC Folder

11.31 New Folder

11.32 Folder Name

11.32.1 If Standard Form is Selected

11.32.2 If Date Form is Selected

11.33 Recover Image DB

11.34 Display Media Info.

11.36 Setting Reset

Chapter 12 Movie Mode

12.1 Video Nomenclature Simplified

12.2 So How Do I Know What Video Format to Choose?

12.3 Choosing a Frame Rate and a Bit Rate

12.4 What is "Super35"?

12.5 4K Shooting

12.6 Capturing a 4K Freeze Frame

12.7 Manual Control in Movie Mode

12.8 Slow-Motion Videos

12.8.1 The in-camera way

12.8.2 The higher quality way

12.9 S-Log2 and S-Log3 Primer

12.9.1 The Gamma Curves

12.9.2 Gamma Curve Nomenclature

12.9.3 HDTVs have Much Less Dynamic Range

12.9.4 S-Log2 and S-Log3

12.10 Shooting 2 Video Formats At Once

12.11 Playing back Videos

12.12 External Microphones

12.13 External Display

12.14 Monitoring Video and Audio

12.15 Importing your Files to your Computer

Chapter 13 Wireless Flash and Advanced Flash Topics

13.1 Introduction

13.2 Flash Models

13.3 Bounce Flash

13.3.1 Diffusing your Light

13.4 Wireless Flash

13.5 As Simple As It Gets

13.6 The New Wireless Protocol

13.7 Groups and Channels

13.8 Will the Control Bursts Affect Exposure?

13.9 Manual Flash Mode

13.9.1 To Put the 60 Into Manual Slave Mode

13.9.2 To put the 43 into Manual Slave mode

13.10 A Portable Studio Setup

13.11 High Speed Sync (HSS) flash

13.12 To Probe Further

Chapter 14 DRO and HDR

14.1 Dynamic Range Optimization

14.1.1 How it Works

14.1.2 More DRO examples

14.1.3 Frequently Asked Questions about DRO

14.1.4 So When Does DRO kick in?

14.1.5 When DRO is bad

14.1.6 Combining with Sunset Image Style

14.1.7 DRO on Your Computer

14.2 High Dynamic Range (HDR)

14.3 DRO vs. HDR

Chapter 15 Digital Imaging Topics

15.1 Introduction

15.2 An Introduction to RAW

15.3 The Bayer Filter and Demosaicing

15.4 How Your Camera Creates A JPG

15.5 RAW, TIF, and JPG Compared

15.6 JPG Compression Artifacts

15.7 Any Other Upsides to Shooting .JPG?

15.8 RAW Processing using catpure One Express

15.9 RAW Processing using Lightroom or Adobe Camera RAW

15.10 Image Size and Resolution

15.11 “Hot Pixels”

15.12 Memory Cards

15.12.1 Memory Card Corruption Issues

Chapter 16 Additional Resources

16.1 Some Cool Accessories

16.1.1 Vertical Grip

16.1.2 3^rd Party Batteries

16.1.3 External USB Battery

16.1.4 Dirt Cheap Battery Chargers

16.1.5 My Favorite Memory Card

16.1.6 Underwater Housings

16.1.7 Leather Cases

16.1.8 External Microphones

16.1.9 And more…

16.2.1 Books on Other Cameras

16.2.2 An Introduction to Sony’s Wireless Flash (video)

16.2.3 Ways to ‘Wow!’ with Wireless Flash

16.2.4 25 Ways to “Wow!” e-Booklet

16.2.5 Advanced Topics 2

16.2.6 Back-Button Focus

16.2.7 f2 Cameracraft Magazine

16.2.8 The Friedman Archives Seminars

16.2.9 The Friedman Archives Blog

16.2.10 The Road to China

16.2.11 The Maui Xaphoon

Appendix A A Condensed Guide to the Basics

A.1 Shutter Speeds

A.4 Focal Length

A.6 Program Shift

A.7 The Histogram Display

Brightness range, sensors, and the human eye

Using the Histogram for a finer degree of control

A.8 The “Secrets” of Light and Composition

A.9 Writing with Light

A.10 Composition – The Rule of Thirds

Out of place shot

Classical Portrait

Environmental Portrait

“Hey, Look at Me!”

Appendix B A “Cookbook” for Special Shooting Situations

B.1 Introduction

B.3 Artistic Waterfalls

B.4 Stage Performances / Rock Concerts

B.5 Nighttime Time Exposures

B.6 Shooting in Snow

B.7 Outdoor Group Portraits

B.8 Street Photography

B.9 Sunsets and Silhouettes

B.10 Nighttime Sports

B.11 Product Shots

B.12 Christmas Lights

B.13 Candlelight Shots

B.14 Star Trails

Appendix C Cheap Yet Secure Backups

Appendix D Tip Cards