Sony A7RII: Interview With Sony Alpha Product Manager Kenta Honjo
Small A7rII deal teaser: I have a good news coming soon for our SAR readers. I am preparing a special A7rII discount for some of you. Stay tuned 😉
We had busy days with the Sony A7rII announcement. Now let’s cool down and read some bloggers opinions about the new camera:
Luminous Landscape writes:
In other words.. the whole nine yards. Everything but the kitchen sink. You asked for it, – you got it. Think of a cliche.
This stands in stark contrast with the rest of the industry that doles our new features slowly, an upgrade here, a tweak there, a new feature once a year or so. This is the norm for some companies… keep the development costs low, and keep selling new cameras with a bit of extra chrome and shiny wheels now and then to keep the faithful happy.
But with the A7rII, following quickly on the heals of the A7, A7r, A7s and A7II, Sony has wrapped all of the goodies (and then some) into one package. Available in August for US $3200, it isn’t even priced as outrageously as one might think a new flagship camera might.
Buyingcamera listed the negatives of the new A7rII camera on SonyAlphaForum post:
Weight on the breaking point of being too heavy
Battery (old fashioned lithium-ion, they could at least design a new 2,000mah battery in the same size case)
No true 14bit uncompressed raw (I’m sure they’d have advertised it if it existed). If bandwidth is an issue, they could give you the option of a 1FPS instead of 5FPS mode. This would be great for landscapes.
No dual card slots or the option for redundancy (even if it used the USB port to write to a separate card reader, that’d be something)
Bigger. Both cameras are uncomfortable to me (I have large hands) and I found the previous model slightly more comfortable.
Price. Sony does what it always does and it’s upsetting to know that it’ll be nearly half the price in a years time. I know digital cameras are destined to be this way but sony pricing scheme has always been more annoying than other companies.
Lenses. FE lenses are sealed, no gasket. Some zeiss lenses either have a gasket and no sealing, or sealing and no gasket. I’d rather they just had sealing and a gasket, like canon lenses.
Sealing. Sony sealing usually always sucks and I doubt this is going to be different.
Sonymirrorlesspro writes:
The a7RII has a better autofocus system than the a7II—a much better system in fact, with hundreds of more phase detection points. It’s so fast that Sony even mentioned in their press conference that the a7RII will be able to focus competitor lenses (e.g., Nikon and Canon) at native speeds.
A7r vs A7rII at CameraSize.
Mirrorlessons writes:
First of all, the native sensitivity of the camera is 100-25600 ISO but can also be extended to 102400 ISO. In video mode, the maximum is 25600. The question is: how good is the A7rII at the highest sensitivities? Because if the gap with the A7s has been reduced, the latter might not look as unique as it did a few months ago. Moreover, many users have complained about not having internal 4K recording on the A7s: you need an external recorder, which means a bigger investment. The A7rII can do everything on its own and since the HDMI output is still valid, the external recorder becomes an option for better quality (4:2:2 8bit) and is not a constraint anymore if you want 4K video.
Merlin Ulrich writes:
Soundimagesplus likes the new camera but not the marketing:
Sony get a serious rasberry for one of the most ridiculous advertising BS slogans of all time. ‘Imaging beyond our eyes’ !!! Surely one of the most ridiculous examples of meaningless ad agency speak ever committed to print. A shame since Sony have addressed most of the missing features of the A7r.
Photoclubalpha writes:
If you really think 42.4 megapixels is going to take you to realms far beyond your 36 megapixel sensor, think again. It is the same step up as from 18 megapixels to 21 megapixels, a move Canon made without absolutely transforming the images created, or about the same as from 10mp to 12mp. There’s one big difference – it does not make the jump to any larger common print or repro size. Remember going from 6 to 8? That was from sub-full-page to a decent full page resolution, for US or A-size documents at a touch under 300dpi. 24 megapixels took us to a really sharp A2, 36 megapixels takes us to a acceptable A1, and all that 42 does is to make a slightly better A1 but not 300dpi.
ePhotozine posted a short A7rII hands-on:
The camera is weather sealed, and has a newly developed shutter unit which is designed for vibration suppression, plus silent shooting, and is rated for 500,000 shutter releases! There are currently 13 FE lenses, with Sony planning on having 20 lenses available by early 2016.
More A7rII tidbits:
Evaluated: “Sony, Fix These Things and Win” aka How Does the Sony A7R II Stack Up? (Diglloyd).
A7rII full breakdown at SonyAlphaLab.
Top 7 Game Changing Features of the Sony A7RII by Ilovehatephoto.
Forget 42MP, 5 Axis IS, Silent Shutter: Why PDAF Is So Important To Mention About the Sony A7RII (Patrick Murphy).
A7Rii is actually cheaper than the A7ii (Medium).
Sony confirma que la A7R II llegará en verano por 3.500 euros (Quesabesde).
Some fun: There is really a SAR reader trying to get money to buy the A7rIi through Indiegogo (Click here). Good Luck!
Store links:
In USA:
A7rII at Amazon, BHphoto, Adorama, Uniquephoto.
RX10m2 at Amazon, BHphoto, Adorama, Uniquephoto.
RX100m4 at Amazon, BHphoto, Adorama, Uniquephoto.
In Europe at:
A7rII at Sony DE, FR, IT, ES, NL, BE, CH, AT, SE, FI, NO, PT. Wex UK.
RX100m4 at DE, FR, IT, ES, NL, BE, CH, AT, SE, FI, NO, PT. Wex UK.
RX100m2 at DE, FR, IT, ES, NL, BE, CH, AT, SE, FI, NO, PT. Wex UK.
In Asia at:
A7rII at Digitalrev, CameraPro.
RX10m2 at Digitalrev, CameraPro.
RX100m4 at Digitalrev, CameraPro.
Preorders will be available from June 17 only at 11am New York Time!!! A7rII will ship in August. The RX10m2 and the RX100m4 will be available in July. Full press coverage here at SonyAlphaRumors.
138 Responses
LOL to the gasket/seal complaints. Tell that to the users of Canon sealed lenses with flies inside the lenses.
Or the Canon users with moisture in the LCD panel of their weathersealed camera to be told that the warranty doesn’t cover it.
Lol to most of the complaints, actually. Two of them are entirely subjective, two are exactly the same thing, one is an actual advantage etc. I wonder if this guy has ever used a Sony camera – Sony’s sealing (or lack thereof) has never sucked, starting from the a700/a850/a900 and CZ lenses, which everyone knows perform very well in bad conditions. Also, he should check the prices of Olympus, Pentax and Fuji and Samsung… their prices drop even faster than Sony’s.
Is that true about the price drop of other MILC’s? I don’t really follow the prices of other brands.
Of course. The complaint above makes it sound like Sony is doing something wrong, where this is simply related to product refresh rates, market share, type of product (high or low end) etc. This is true for every company. For me, it is an advantage, I buy when the price drops; I am not making a monetary investment anyway, but buying a tool.
EDGE SMEARING occurs when sensor glass thickness is DIFFERENT from the one that the lens was designed for; it has nothing to do with sensor
Since Sony now has BSI they should design ultrasmall mount shield lens like 18/8, would be fun
People are missing the fact that the crop mode is now 18 MP!
That is better than NEX6, better than Fuji cameras!
Awesome!
Our fine Sigma 19, 30, 60mm, Sony 35, 50mm, they are all going to shine on A7RII!
Can´t wait to try the infamous Sony 16mm too!
This is exactly what I was saying today! Forgive my ignorance, but how did you figure out it’s 18MP?
I’m just gonna leave my Zeiss 55 on there all the time and switch between FF and APS-C, haha. Also, I’m thinking, in APS-C mode, the AF points should give something like 100% sensor coverage, right?
It’s the 1.5x crop factor, squared for the area affect, so 42 divided by 1.5 divided by 1.5 = 18.666
36MP A7R gave us 15.3 MP crop image.
42.3MP A7RII will give us 18 MP crop image.
That is better than Fuji APS-C cameras 🙂
1.5x crop it is not, it’s more of 2.3 crop 😉
The pixel density of FF sensor on A7RII is much lower than that of NEX7 or A6000, so as you can imagine, there is no way in this world you would get 28MP in a crop mode 🙂
Wouldn’t a 1.5x crop leave you with 28MPx?
Nop.
36MP A7R gave us 15.3 MP crop image.
42.3MP A7RII will give us 18 MP crop image.
1.5X is the linear crop, but MP goes as area — i.e., the square.
You’d need sqrt(2)X crop — about 1.4X — to just divide the MP by 2. For APS-C’s official 1.5X crop the reduction is 1/(1.5*1.5), or 1/2.25. However, even Sony’s APS-C sensors are actually a hair smaller than needed for 1.5X crop (though not nearly as small as Canon’s 1.6X crop ones). Thus, the real factor is something worse than 1/2.3. It depends on the particular sensors; exact dimensions of APS-C and FF sensors vary from one sensor design to another, but only by a few percent.
Interesting
Come on:
42 mp / (1.5 * 1.5) = 18.6 mp
36 mp / (1.5 * 1.5) = 16 mp
That is the average calculation. But if you want to come closer to actual numbers you should use 1.53 instead of 1.5.
Has education gone this low only in Western countries, or everywhere?
They teach courses on camera crop factors in your school system? Cool!
Not in Germany…
we had just calculation with areas in school when we were at an age of about 10-11 years. Good enough for crop-factors, today 🙂
I was under the impression that the 1.5x Was the area difference, not the length and width difference. My mistake :p
And while I have an engineering degree, I will also concede that my secondary school education was barely fit for monkeys.
…and we are talking about primary school education knowledge here 😛
Uh, don’t get me started. I guess only former East-European countries and Russia still have a good, quality basic education.
Things we learned in basic schools are now being taught at western universities. Go figure…
Japan, China, HK, Korea
True that, but they went all the way to the extreme, having no personal life, with no ability to get the context of the things and think outside of the box.
Yep! And that means all those ‘expensive’ FF lenses that are ‘so big’ give you twice as many primes for your money. Sony 35mm f1.4 is a Fuji 23mm f1.4 and 35mm f1.4 rolled into one. Batis 85mm is a Fuji 56mm and 90mm in one. Less lens swaps, better images most of the time, less weight…
Not even starting on the IS, 4K, DR, focus, resolution etc.
Sony’s pricing scheme is not because it is a pricing scheme, it is because they refresh cameras really quick compared to other companies AND because Sony, as camera brand, doesn’t hold its value on the second hand market, regardless of how useful the tool is.
Photoclub alpha could explore Sizefixer XL for their print needs and perhaps step away a bit when looking at large prints….?
But looks like Fixerlabs is out of business… 🙁
Well, use PhotoZoom… 🙂
What?? Howcome?
Photozoom is good too but SF XL was really good.
Man! I should have bought when I had the chance…
14 bit lossless files last major flaw IMO, fix this Sony and watch the exodus from canikon…..
Always makes me raise eyebrows when comments are made about a camera that barely no-one has seen in the flesh, let alone used it in real life situations, but some of these are just plain daft!
‘Buyingcamera’ criticisms –
Weight??? It is likely as light as it can be giving the build quality and all it does. What else could be expected?
Battery??? If the worst thing you have to do is monitor battery life and change a couple of times during the day then you aren’t doing much in photography (remember the days of swapping rolls of film?)
No uncompressed RAW??? Maybe, just maybe, one photographer out of 1,000 might find it a limitation in 1 shot out of 1,000, but for the rest of mankind…
Dual card slots??? Just how much battery using processing power do you expect?
Bigger??? You clearly don’t have large hands!
Prices??? If you believe the price will drop in such a way, wait until it does, or will you die if you don’t buy one straight away?
Sealing??? As has been pointed out, there is no such thing as ‘weather sealing’. Even by the other manufacturers, it is marketing spiel unless tested to IP standards and no camera maker will do that.
Soundimagesplus comments –
Ridiculous slogan??? Why pick on Sony as just about every company just has to have a stupid ‘tagline’: Nike – Just do it, Apple iPad – Everything changes with iPad, etc.
Photoclubalpha mini lesson –
Just why do they think they need to point out the obvious to those who know, when those who don’t will ignore it anyway?
ePhotozine repeating waffle –
Weathersealed??? Here we go again…!!!
Perhaps everyone might do better to wait a little while, until the real strengths and weaknesses can be determined, and keep personal opinions as that…personal!
Agreed. Except with the waiting part – won’t change anything 🙂
I’m not sure if it’s a “greatest hits” from the bridge dwelling commenter or if they’re bring paid by Canon or Panasonic … If cRAW, a smaller battery and single slots genuinely outweigh the benefits of a class leading ff sensor in a compact form factor, other brands are available.
heh do they pay for commetns? lol
I really hope so – otherwise some of the commenter here need a lot of therapy…
The concern trolls list of talking points is getting smaller by the day, credit them for having the imagination to think this *hit up as superfluous as it is.
I have schizotypal disorder
Is 10 seconds for changing battery once in 2 hours that difficult?
The main problem with film were the expenses, and that you had to wait till film develops. Changing wasn’t a major concern.
No – it is not difficult…
But if you do a a timelapse during a day or night – it would be nice to have bigger reserves.
And before video-recording some show-events, I replace already a 30% battery, because I don’t know how long the movie lasts.
And it’s easier to handle only 2 batteries instead of 4.
And I don’t want to interrupt my sleeping for changing batteries in the charger during night.
If camera can shut off between shots, you don’t need large battery for timelapse. But having, say, 6 hours instead of 4 hours is a small improvement.
I think it would be worse if Sony introduced different batteries.
Note, someone suggested that A7RM2 can be powered via USB at all!
Currently Sony has a battery for A-mount and a battery for E-mount.
I would prefer having the NEX-5 battery for small bodies and the A77-battery for big bodies, regardless of the mount. Even if the improment is only 50% – it is still an improvement.
Canon:
Rebel: LP-E10
70D/7D/6D/5D: LP-E6(N)
1DX: LP-E4N
Nikon:
D3300/D5300: EN-EL14A
D7200/D600/D750/D810: EN-EL15
D4S: EN-EL18a
If it is true, that it can be powered with USB it is welcome at home. But outside it is not as convenient any more.
there are lots of 3rd party batteries with USB output
“The 4k Logo is very noticeable as well from above”?! Gotta love that Jay SonyAlphaLab guy..
Any idea what megapixel, and what type of AF coverage, the A7RII gets when shooting stills in APS-C mode? Would love to know!
Approximately 28MP with 90% AF coverage.
That’s just based on the crop conversion and location of the autofocus points, nothing published yet.
No. That is dividing by 1.5, that is not the right math. It should be about 18MP.
Ah. Thanks!
No worries. FF is approx 2.3x the area of APS-C, so divide by 2.3 to get a rough guide.
How do I get this camera for free?
A7Rii discount for SAR readers…is that possible?
yep.
i want this so bad!
YEASSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!
Only for a few…not for all. Would be toooo expensive for me 🙂
For you to give SAR readers the opportunity is unbeilivably amazing!!
I hope the discount includes those that have posted in excess of 3,500 comments…plus lots more befor the system began counting.
Who’s covering the discount?
Good idea. We should write a petition to Sony to get the SAR discount shop for SAR readers. You get a percentage of discount based on how many commets on SAR you have and you get more points if you are not a pain in the neck.
Going by that standard some SAR readers would be paying more 😛
given that some of SAR readers are Sony evangelists, why not…
I was one of the first to order an a7r for $199.
Sony canceled my order claiming they were no longer available.
So I should get an a7rii fpr $199 instead.
Or, they could charge you extra because you were one of those scruple less people who tried to benefit from an obvious mistake.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PyfSMNUirTM
I have gone to several Canon blogs and posted favorable comments about the a7rii.
I should get extra credit for action behind enemy lines (*;
Yeah yeah, Sony Ambassador Barry. That would be something… 😛
I saw that Barry, you should get hazard pay. LOL
With all the critisizm I get here…how can the Canon sites be worse?
*ROFL*
Can I ask? Who uses a mode dial so frequently today that it deserves to be on top of the camera unlike, say, an ISO dial, or a shutter speed dial? or even a focusing point dial…
I prefer the ISO dial on the back, where it is more reachable for regular changes.
But there is no ISO dial, its a customizable wheel, which is fine and dandy. What I am asking is, how frequently to people feel they need to change modes as they would need to change something you do frequently…exposure.
There are four dials for exposure, five if you use the 35mm f1.4 or 28-135mm… How many dials do you need for exposure? I like that there is a dial that also changes exposure modes and I like that it’s in the one place that isn’t regularly accessible.
OK. I see what you mean. I haven’t used A7 series yet. For RX1, there is three dials but for ISO you need to press a button to activate it. I would have prefered the mode dial to be replaced with an ISO dial or shutter speed dial because I never use it.
It is also good to set exposure without having the camera on and you know where you at.
What about an additional dial – on the left side of the EVF – with a lock-button?
That would be a good place for a labeled mode-dial.
And the current-mode-dial to be customized (no labels on top).
I use it quite often – in lowlight I often change between M and A.
Fair enough.
I would replace the mode dial in a heartbeat with an ISO dial
Well, buy then a NEX-7 or NEX-5 series. People hated by having to press buttons to get to a menu to then scroll to change modes. And that’s why they came up with the change on the NEX-6 followed by the a6000.
I had them, both, and now own RX1 and RX100. You didn’t have to dig through the menus on NEX to change modes. People who did this didn’t know how to customise buttons properly. They may belong to the same group of people who complained about the Minolta hot shoe which was considerably more solid than the outdated hot shoes we have now.
If you remember well, you had to press Menu Soft Button, then the tile-menu pops up, you had to press mode dial option (the first option in the up-left position) and then another screen pops up where you could scroll to your desired mode. That’s what people hated instead of the straight forward physical mode dial.
Hmmm… Of all things, I still don’t get why Sony can not include a touch screen on it…… Well, I’m still very happy with the new addition.
Now I’m wondering, what are they going to bring to the table for the A7sII, or will there even still be a need to bring one out? Andrea, care to comment on this?
As 4k is now covered, it would be nice to see A7sII (or whatever) as an R BSI FF stills only cam. Are there really that many 4k shooters out there/here? (Oly and Fuji already offer me more video than I use.) And wouldn’t Sony sell more units if some of us could just buy the tech we want and not waste what we won’t use?
Sony believes that touch screen is reserved for a “everyday amateur” user in their NEX 5 series (now a5x00), and yes, I do wish for a touch screen too as it really helps with selective area focusing…. But I’ve waited too long and I’ve given up now
It will feel heavy because the grip is too small for big hand, especially with big lens mounted. Newton mechanics .
A lot of people wanted it to be smaller and smaller and now realize it has to be certain size or optimal size to be comfortable. Panasonic GH4 has the best grip in my opinion
depends on the user! the A7 mark II has gotten a bigger grip compared to the original A7 and people say its more comfortable
but I have smaller asian hands and I find that A7 grip worked just right.
Hidden pro: you can power the camera via USB! Makes it much easier for time lapse and filming.
Headscratch con: still no touch screen.
What makes you say it can be powered by USB? The older cams can’t (except some RX series).
It can be charged with USB, A7R can be too. The camera body doesn’t actually come with a charger (a common gripe for such an expensive body) just a USB charging cable. I own the A7R and have an Anker USB power pack that works just fine, doesn’t really get in the way and keeps the camera running for hours if required, all via the mini USB port..
I know they charge that way (have owned RX10, RX100, A7S, A6000, A7… but the camera is usually inaccessible using the USB charger.
I think he may mean that it will operate when being powered by USB.
With all previous cameras, you have two options:
1) Charge without operation via USB
2) Operation with the battery discharging even if USB is connected. RRC mode is like this – the battery will drain. This sort of makes sense since SDPs are limited to 500 mA, perhaps the difference is that Sony implemented USB CDP detection, and decided at the same time to finally allow for operation when powered by a DCP? And yes, CDP and DCP are different things in the USB battery charging spec. Charging Downstream Port (PC port >500 mA) vs. Dedicated Charging Port (dumb charger)
OK, got it.
Good news, if true!
Hm, so if someone made lets say grip with huge Li-On inside, it could power up camera via USB? That would be interesting..
Re touchscreen, I agree it would have been great but its absence is expected because so far Sony hasn’t made a camera that has both an EVF and a touchscreen.
When the a900 came out it was a similar event like the a7r II.
It trounced the Canon 1ds mark III on 95% of the specs for less than half the price. Then Canon was forced to pull the 5D mark II with video and same MP as their flagship 1Ds. Then nikon came out with the 3Dx at almost 3 times the price and still outsold the a900…. I think this time even if the a7rII will not outsell any of Canikon’s flagships, it will be a much better success than the a900.
Completely different beast. First time I’m hearing pro’s say they are considering leaving Canikon. I’ve never heard that with A mount- ever. You’d get a nod to how interesting the tech was and that was about it. I don’t have to tell people anymore than Sony makes cameras. They are well aware at this point and that’s saying a lot- Sony’s marketing sucks.
At the time of the a900 release, 99% of the pro did not even know Sony was producing cameras such as the a900 and that lasted for few more years.
This time the awareness is different.
I have a con with the rear screen, if its the same as before: why the heck is it just 3″? it doesnt seem much, but the 3.2″ one on my 5D III feels positively bigger. there is room in the back bazel for more. if they can put so much goodis inside the camera body, that should be posibble? second one, also the screen: it has somewhat ugly colors.
Feels bigger — placebo effect.
Why would you ever need large LCD on A7 camera whereas you can playback via EVF which has more resolution?
Well at least the 5D3 has something going for it.
Because you’ll only use the rear screen when photographing at odd angles. Everything the screen does can be done with the EVF. My a77ii screen has remained pointed toward the camera 99% of the time.
Still no 14 bit RAW? Are they kidding me?
At least 13+1 like in A99? I hope so..
How many times it needs to be said – it’s coming as a FW update. Camera is not even released yet. Update will be here faster than you know. Late 2015 ETA. Now tell me why exactly you need this? Because AFAIK there is not a single reason ever to have uncompressed lossless RAW. Man, it’s like monkeys on a tree playing with hand grenade – they don’t even know what is it and why it is used.
There is every reason to have lossless RAW, from the point of view of those of us who have experience working with 16-bit images in Photoshop. Why would so many people be complaining if it were a non issue? Has Sony promised such a FW update?
“Why would so many people be complaining if it were a non issue?”
They are trolling perhaps?
Let’s change the question. How come Nikon was able to give users 14-bit RAW while Sony couldn’t with their own 36Mpx sensor? In the camera world, it’s all about giving users an option, not limits.
Because of Zeiss and Sony lenses. Giving the raw will show the lens true performance, Maybe this will hurt some of the respect.
“SONY A7RII, THE NEW CANON”
The a7rII is really fast. Look how quickly it made you disown your praise for Canon that you repeated here from last year until May and your prediction that Canon will crush Sony once they decide to be serious about mirrorless.
I am consistantly not anyones fan.
I say good things when the are warranted and bad things when they are warranted.
This time Sony did a good thing.
Sony has done many good things but apparently only things that completely appeal to you can be judged as “good” because your judgements are extraordinarily narrow-minded and myopic. Also you’re statements are easily the least consistent, most contradictory statements on SAR – which must put you in the running for worldwide given the oddball comments on here.
Of coarse my judgements are my judgements, who elses would they be.
You act as though you have made some great discovery.
My comments are consistent based on my criteria…I have always wanted higher res than the A77Rii…but this camera has more than enough good qualities that I want this camera AND a higher res camera.
And as things change in the camera world my comments are likely to reflect those changes.
I make value judments by my standards, not yours…if you want to read someone elses opinion, read someone elses comment.
This camera incorporates most of the innovations I was talking about 4 or more years ago, and have continually been talking about.
Most people including yourself have not been ready for those suggestions and have been critcle…now you say they were obviose, then you said they were imposiible…
Today my comments are still not comments you are ready for…and by the time they happen you will have forgotton all about todays conversation, as you seem to have forgotton all our long ago conversations.
From last year you transitioned from eccentric commentator to hardcore SAR troll until Canon announced the 5ds. Your comments harshly criticized e-mount users & fans while praising “CanoNikon.” You predicted that Sony would be buried once Canon released a real mirrorless cameras (versus Sony’s toys) that would feature an EF mount. When that never happened and Canon announced the lame 5ds, you toned it down. Now you’re back on the bandwagon loving e-mount and I hope the camera is all you hope for.
You wrote that Sony must release a camera for EF lenses or they would die (so you can use a lame super zoom). Of course, Sony would not die from this. Sony announced this camera that supposedly improves upon the autofocusing of a-mount lenses without an SLT adapter (with the side benefit of improving the AF speed of other SLR lenses). This is good for everyone of course.
I tend to doubt that this camera will focus as good as natively mounted SLR lenses as per the hype. I will remain skeptical until I test one out, which I fully intend to do. But I will not buy one and then b1tch and whine that Sony must release a firmware update that makes 3rd party / Canon lenses function better if I’m displeased with the adapted performance. This is something I can see some SAR users doing though.
I also very consistently said that unless Sony made E mount fully high speed autofocus compatable with Canikon lenses they would be clobbered when Canikon entered the competition.
If they had not done this that would still be the case.
I have consistently posted for this af compatibility since the day the first Nex camera came out.
To be fair, Barry’s right. This is a very attractive option for Canon shooters now, even if they launch a serious competitor. You can keep you old lenses and have the option of gems like the 55/1.8 and 35/1.4.
Wow, Barry, that almost made me gag. 🙁
Even barry is down. The next sony artisan- anton max berlin.
the hidden 1 and 4 exists for years and years in other cameras..maybe that why no one is talking about it
‘Imaging beyond our eyes’ @ Soundimageplus: This marketing is NOT nonsense! F.i. have I seen a camera with a dynamic range that surpasses anything a current available delivers – several times. Not twice as wide, maybe twenty times….. It was a research camera, costing a lot more than twenty times more………
The same applies for resolution. The later is relative to viewing size and distance eye to image. Take a 50mpix image projected at A4 and viewed from 50cm. More resolution than our eye can see
Color space – not sure we have that yet.
‘Imaging beyond our eyes’ is realistic within 5-10 years. Very valid target for an imaging company with ambition.
Of course it’s nonsense, that’s why it’s called marketing. You act like it’s never happened before when in fact it’s common practice.
I agree by saying it is nonsense. It’s marketing after all.
Minimum shutter speed with Auto ISO.
Like FIVE years after people screamed all over the internet for it.
Well done, Sony…
Sony delivers numerous improvements that photographers and internet trolls alike have been asking for with the a7rII and the complaints still flow.
For Soundimagesplus: the human eye is actually not that great. We don’t see in the equivalent of photographs, we see in the equivalent of highly post-processed video. The brain does a lot of work on the information the eye provides. It’s not an outlandish concept that a sensor could exceed the capabilities of human eyes. It’s the processor that can’t match the capabilities of the brain.
For Photoclubalpha: Why are they complaining about Sony addinga few extra pixels while still (ostensibly) improving low light performance? Maybe Photoclubalpha has such profound skill and acumen that they have never needed to crop down a photo. The rest of us might find those extra pixels useful in some situations. Interestingly, if Sony hadn’t changed the megapixels, trolls would have just maligned them for recycling the old sensor (even if it was a completely different 36 MP sensor).
The real question is: will the a7rII live up to its specifications? If it does, we should all just commend Sony on putting so many improvements and new features into one camera.
There are some fair comments to keep us in the real world, but it continues to be remarkable that sony has put so much into this. The potential for even more through firmware updates is exciting as well (High Resolution Mode, Uncompressed Raw, etc).
Price is a negative point of the a7Rm2? what? But it is priced just about right! The Canon 5DS is priced at 3699USD but it can’t shoot 4K, nor shoot at high ISO as the Sony while the Sony a7Rm2 can do almost anything the 5DS does (except the 8Mpx difference) with less money (and less size/weight)
I say, the 3200USD price tag is just about right.
I agree, internal 4k and decent AF with now hundreds of lenses via adapters. Read that High ISO performance is going to be better than the already stellar A7r. 3200 is around what the Nikon D800E and D810 debut at. Same for the Canon 5D Mk III. Sony has a winner on it’s hands.
They seem to have done a lot of great things with this camera. However, still no 14-bit lossless file format, which is very disappointing. I won’t be buying it primarily because of this.
Recent interview hinted that uncompressed raw is coming via update soon.
A7rII is going to clobber any potential A7s sales. I’m wondering what the A7sII will bring, and when?
We’ll have to see how much better the back lit sensor is in terms of High ISO, Sony may feel there isn’t a need for an A7s II. Of course they could come out with a correctly sized to optimize 8k video A7s II just as well.
anybody knows disadvantage of silent shutter mode compared to regular mode in a7rii?
Now the only real problem of this camera is the battery life, as all other A7. They really need in the next iteration improve the battery life. I have a feeling that the A9 series will come and will be bigger sized, with a better build, better grip, better ergonomics, 2 card slot bigger batery, higher resolution EVF, bigger evf, better weather sealing, 10 or more frames per second. This will come, the strategy changed a little bit about size and weight, they will aim to wedding professionals and so. Maybe a full body with the dual grip.
Hadn’t realised that, sorry!
Gonna buy it.
What grip the a7r2 is taking? is the A72 grip will fit? The A7R mk1 grip will not fit…
Is it clear what grip it will use?
B&H is listing the A7 mkII grip as recommended accessories so I’d say it’s the one.
One more hands-on video.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7_5Cr-eDZEc
I’d like to address the comment by Photoclubalpha. Sony was very clear that the reason for 42mp is that when placed in super35 mode it will produce better 4k video. For most users 42mp is plenty. This camera is about so much more than just upping the resolution.
BSI – Back Side Illuminated. Sounds like glowing ass to me~
I’m not confusing build with materials. I’m pretty sure that Sony would have used the best engineering decisions, so I have no idea just what you expected them to do to make it lighter. If you need a lighter camera then don’t buy an A7rII.
I’m also not sure why the behaviour of one photographer (the ONLY one apparently) should affect the choice of battery size.
Why the pickiness regarding punctuation? Do you have nothing better to say?
You are the first person I’ve ever come across that criticised the A7 series for being too big. Given the lengths Sony have gone to to cram a FF sensor into such a small body and the plaudits they’ve received for doing so made your comment seem somewhat contradictory.
Sony are a business and if they don’t make money then we won’t be able to buy any of their cameras. Criticising their pricing is a nonsense.
Other manufacturers might ‘offer better protection’, but whether such an offer means anything is entirely different. I recall when Luminous Landscape took the A900 to the Antarctic they mentioned that many Canons and some Nikons had failed, but the Sonys didn’t miss a beat. Furthermore, such claims of protecton are not part of the warranty. If there is water found inside then it is likely any claim will be refused.
Perhaps I was a little critical, but if you didn’t want to attract such comments then you might have written your piece differently. For instance, instead of saying, “Weight on the breaking point of being too heavy”, you could have written, ‘I would find the new body a little heavy’. This would demonstrate it is a personal opinion, rather than a fact.
As it is, I repeat my original point, that it is very curious to hear such deeply held beliefs about a camera that almost no-one has seen in the flesh, let alone put to good use. There is no hypocrisy in that.