Sony Alpha A7 (ILCE-7) and Sony Alpha A7r (ILCE-7r) vs rest of the world. Part 3.

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6 Responses

  1. you don’t sound overly extatic about those cameras hehe, keep them review parts coming! I got 3 questions regarding those cams:

    1) how is the image preview speed on them? on Nikons I got used to nearly instant reaction to “play” button, next/prev photo preview etc, while on my nex5n it’s really really slow

    2) is the “zoomed-in” preview of photos available? like on Nikons, you could zoom in on a photo and then switch to the next photo with control wheel, all while keeping the maginfied view

    3) I’ve seen the cameras have 1&2 presets, how customizable are those? Can I for example, set “2” to be black&white color preset with red focus peaking, while the “1” stays standard color preset with focus peaking off?

    cheers!

  2. Hi and thanks for reading my blog. I am not extatic, because I want to bring you objective review without marketing crap. Of course, there are always some subjective statements, especially when it comes to design, but most of important informations that I would like to share, are and will be supported by images. I am trying to think well each test, so it takes quite some time to publish them.

    To your questions…
    1) Reaction speed from taking the picture to review it by pressing “play” is very good IMO. Better than with NEX 5N. Maybe not up with Nikon, but I wouldn’t mark that as a problem. However, reaction time from “sleeping” to operational mode is sometimes very, very long and that is very ennoying.
    2) Yes you can, but… That phrase is probably best description of Sony A7 products… you can do most things but… Browsing through the images in magnified view is possible with the front scroll wheel. But to enter magnified view, you have to press C2 button first, which will bring 100% view (at least I think so) and then you should press AF/MF/AEL button or back scroll wheel to reduce magnification and get the idea where you are within the frame. If I remember well, something similar was critisized with Nikon D800E initial firmware, so I believe that Sony will fix that behavior. At least there should be option to use middle of the main dial (ok button) to zoom in step by step. That is not possible for now.
    3) Yes, but 🙂 You can save in your custom settings only items under camera settings section. The complete list should be found in manual, but from important things there are – image size, aspect ratio, quality, panorama size and direction, movie file format, movie size, drive mode, focus area and settings (Af-S,Af-C,DMF,MF), ISO, metering mode, white balance, DRO/HDR settings – what you asked – Creative style (BW for you), Long exposure and High ISO NR, Scene selection, Steady shot, Color Space, and few other mainly video related settings. On top of that camera will save the shooting mode, that you pre-set before memorizing your settings (on the mode dial). As you can see, there is no focus peaking. Focus peaking settings are in the Custom settings section, and it will not be saved in your custom profile. But, you can assign several buttons to change peaking color, peaking level or peaking itself at a single press.
    I am yet to understand (if it is even possible) Sony interface logic and what belongs where. It could happen that some customs settings will be memorized, while others not, but I can confirm that focus peaking settings are not saved within custom profiles.

    Hope it helps,
    Viktor

    • thanks for such detailed answers! It’s funny how big corporations often fail to deliver the mostly software details that make products great.. It’s quite literally an hour of programmer work to add minimum shutter speed option to auto ISO like Nikon has it, yet hundreds of R&D staff, and managers all the way up to the top never thought that it should be added.. heh

    • Adding both – shutter speed or aperture stop range in the settings will actually make all other creative modes redundant. I believe that is the future…
      Nikon has that right, but you’ll find another bunch of nonsenses in almost all cameras. truth is however, that with Nikon and Canon (and Ricoh, Fuji…) you have the feeling that photographers did participate in UI development, while with Sony, you have the feeling it was done by the PlayStation programmers team.

  3. Anonymous says:

    Vypada to ze se Nikkor 14-24 chova v okrajich obrazu vyrazne lepe na A7R nez na D800. Nebyli by nejake RAW-y z A7R s nejakou plošši scenou kde by slo posoudit 14-24 detailneji ? Daniel

    • Hi Daniel and thanks for reading and commenting. I can’t really say if Nikkor 14-24 perform better on A7r than on Nikon D800E. It wasn’t my intention to compare lens performance on different sensors. The problem with UWA lenses and testing on flat target is a distance factor. In reality, most of the UWA lenses are optimized for medium and large distances and their performance on short distances might be field irrelevant. To find flat target at medium or large distances with that large angle of view is virtually impossible, so the best what can be done IMHO is to take test shots of a distant cityscape, where buildings could create good background for judging lens performance character (field curvature, spherical aberration, chromatic aberration, coma etc.)
      I would love to do this with A7r and Nikon 14-24, but I am waiting for the Novoflex tripod ring holder, because the lens is too heavy for E-mount alone, as well as for the good visibilty. I expect the ring to come till the end of January 🙁
      (I hope you don’t mind that I responded in English, but maybe some other follower would like to share info or comments based on this reply).

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