Should I buy a Sony A6400 for underwater videos?

Dear underwater videographers,

I am very interested in your opinion regarding buying a pre-used Sony A6400 with a Nauticam housing for videography (no pictures).
Pros:
- compact housing
- large sensor
Cons:
- no image stabilization
- only 30p 4k

I can live with 30p (no need to slow-down videos), but I am wondering about the negative aspect of having no image stabilization and how good white balancing works. Do you recommend to rather buy a GH5 instead of this camera or does anyone have used this camera before for making videos and can share his/her experience?

Thanks a lot!

The first question that popped into my mind is what is your purpose for shooting video? Simply memorializing the trip. Simple and inexpensive will do. If you are serious for the best results, I would go for pro-sumer set up. To that end I wasted time and money on smaller set ups. I now use a top end Sony with a Gates housing. Never looking back! Controlling all the important settings with a zoom through wide angle port is a must. The two camera's you mentioned will give you satisfying results, but not great results.

Good luck!

All a question of Budget and demand for high quality results. I personally wouldn't want a camera without IBIS for Video.

On 2/15/2022 at 8:09 PM, Christoph said:

Dear underwater videographers,

I am very interested in your opinion regarding buying a pre-used Sony A6400 with a Nauticam housing for videography (no pictures).
Pros:
- compact housing
- large sensor
Cons:
- no image stabilization
- only 30p 4k

I can live with 30p (no need to slow-down videos), but I am wondering about the negative aspect of having no image stabilization and how good white balancing works. Do you recommend to rather buy a GH5 instead of this camera or does anyone have used this camera before for making videos and can share his/her experience?

Thanks a lot!

Buy whatever match your budget.

That said, between the two, a GH5 is better and a great kit.

Regarding IBIS, we've talked about it here so many times and everyone has their own idea. Of course it helps to have it but I would add a couple of personal thoughts about IBIS:

** How we did it when it didn't exist?

** It is not a substitute for perfectly balanced equipment, knowledge of camera movements and above all good diving skills.

On 2/16/2022 at 12:53 AM, bill1946 said:

The two camera's you mentioned will give you satisfying results, but not great results.

 please define "not great results"

Below are three people who get what I consider exceptional results with a GH5:

https://youtube.com/c/bugDreamer

https://youtube.com/c/AlexdelOlmo

https://youtube.com/c/GlobalDiveMedia

I think, at least in my case, the limitation is the operator and not the equipment.

Yup. There are definitely people getting excellent results with the GH5 and while it is better than the A6400 it's definitely possible to get excellent results with any camera on the market right now, including most compacts. 

54 minutes ago, hyp said:

Yup. There are definitely people getting excellent results with the GH5 and while it is better than the A6400 it's definitely possible to get excellent results with any camera on the market right now, including most compacts. 

You do need to read the fine print though, different models have different limitations on video beyond just resolution levels, including whether they crop to give the video resolution or if they don't crop whether they use line skipping or true downsampling.   The A6400 downsamples which is good but has a 1.2x crop in 4k 30p.

Actually I'm planning to go for Sony A6400. If you're a Sony shooter and not interested in full frame it's a very solid choice.

How do you want to use your footage? For YouTube and other social media it's more than enough.

I've sold footage for TV production taken by A6000 (not strong in video)

Thanks a lot for your responses. I think I will wait to get a pre-owned GH5/GH5s camera.