Review on Sony SLT-A65V 24.3 MP Digital SLR Camera - Body Only: Translucent Mirror Technology Unleashed by Jennifer Dammann

I received the camera body alone, not with so called 'kit lenses' as I would like a better choice of lenses than what comes with the kit. I purchased the following lenses and external flash with this camera: Sony 55-200mm f/4-5.6 SAM DT telephoto zoom lens for Sony Alpha DSLRs Sony 16-50mm f/2.8 standard zoom lens for Sony A-mount cameras Sony 50mm f/ 2.8 Macro Lens for Sony Alpha DSLR Sony HVL-F43AM I didn't buy the Sony Alpha HVL-F43AM flash for the Alpha DSLRI all at once, so I'm still waiting for the macro lens and flash. I've tried telephoto lenses and standard lenses before, but only on inanimate objects. The combination of the camera and these two lenses was fantastic! Hoping to get some portrait shots once the macro/portrait lens and flash arrive. I'm in no way a professional, but I do have some basic photography knowledge. Like most people who don't make a living from photography, I can't justify spending thousands of dollars on a camera body and thousands more on lenses so this camera and the lenses I bought fit my budget as I well know i won't see super professional results but the results are excellent for the money invested compared to other cameras. The only drawback I see so far is the somewhat high noise at ISO settings of 1600 and higher. I try to keep the max around 400 ISO. Haven't tried the noise reduction feature yet, so maybe I can get good results with it, at least at 1600 ISO. I'm not going to take that many low light photos and I should be much better off with the lenses I have than with the kit lenses in low light. but so far I am completely satisfied with my purchases.-------------------------------------- ------------- ---- ----31. January 2013 - Here is my follow-up review after getting the Sony 50mm f/2.8 macro lens and Sony HVL-F43AM flash. and spent more hours on the camera trying out different features. My wife and I and one of our daughters went to the local botanical garden last weekend (yes, mid-winter isn't the best time to look for flowers to photograph). !) and I took my camera with me with a 50mm f/2.8 macro lens mounted on it hoping to find bugs and flowers on our garden walk. I managed to find two bushes with flowers (but no insects) and was amazed at the macro photography when I got home and looked at it on the computer monitor! Colors were natural with no saturation issues and the image was very sharp in the focus area. As the lens is also a 50mm fixed lens I took photos of the surrounding countryside and some portrait shots of our daughter which also came out fantastic. to switch on and off. I had no idea what to look for to find GPS location data until I did a series of web searches. As far as I can tell, GPS data is not visible in real-time; It is only available AFTER you have taken a picture and appears on the camera screen when viewing saved pictures. The data is also embedded in RAW and JPG files that can be used with Google Earth to show where the photo was taken. Outdoors with the camera in a fairly open area with a few trees, it can take about 10 minutes for the camera to lock onto the GPS satellites. This feature wasn't on my list of features I was specifically looking for, but it's nice to have. The Sony HVL-F43AM was tested on our black cat and with a macro lens on a small troll. Dolls that my sister-in-law wanted to sell on eBay. No complaints about flash shots or the flash itself. The panorama photo function was tried and it put the photo frames together very well, but since you have to be constantly moving (panning) the camera to use this function, there is of course some motion blur when you zoom in as a result of a panorama shot. This is a feature I don't use very often, so it doesn't bother me. The camera's battery life is excellent, and I recommend getting a spare battery if you're taking a lot of photos at once. I can't wait for the battery to charge. Be careful with fake Chinese Sony batteries. I bought mine from B&H Photo as they have a genuine McCoy Sony battery (from what I've read in the reviews, you're taking a chance with Revain). The memory card I bought with the camera is a SanDisk SDSDX-032G-AFFP model. which works very well for both videos and photos at 10 fps. BTW, I've set up the camera to save RAW and JPG images in case I'm not happy with the way the camera's JPG image is generated. Previously, JPG images were excellent 90 percent of the time, so RAW images have not been changed. Some people have complained about the quality of the JPG, but that must have been in the first version of the camera before all the firmware updates because I don't see any problems with the JPG results myself. I hope this review helps you with your purchase decision. or not to buy this camera along with lenses and flash which I also bought.