Von Wong with Kayla Lindquist and Brian Matiash
Sony a7RII first thoughts & review
Because you asked: Thoughts on the A7r-ii
Just landed in Antigua, Guatemala and dressed up the newest member of my family - The A7r-ii rocking a 24-105 f4, wooden camera cage, SmallHD monitor and a Rode mic for my latest charity video project with VisionLink.
Quick thoughts on it so far.
STILLS:
- Image quality is amazing at lower ISO's with amazing shadow recovery just like the Nikon's. Get's fairly noisy and looses detail quick the minute you start hitting the 6400-ish side of things. Worst than a D800? Not quite sure I'd need to do a side by side comparaison. Huge improvements compared to the A7r.
- Frame rates and buffer significantly better than the A7r... still not quite there when compared to a D800. Filling up the buffer locks up the system, which is a pain... but huge improvements.
- AF is extremely impressive when in good lighting - but disappointing in low light. It suffers from similar problems of all mirrorless systems. It's not quite abysmal but I'm not quite sure I'd trust it just yet for a wedding or high profile event. For my slower-paced planned style shoots though? Definitely good enough.
- Shutter lag is way improved over the A7r kits. Where I would once consider "unusable" has now become tolerable. There's still a delay probably always will be with EVFs... but no worries when it comes to capturing planned action. (Dress toss, sand toss, etc...)
- Noise is MILES better. The silent mode is amazing, and the shutter click is nothing close to how obnoxious it used to be. It's significantly quieter than a dslr.
- Image Stabilization - I've never quite understood image stabilization nor do I really use it but I had some pretty impressive hand-held results with it. I got shaky hands so it definitely can't hurt. No complaints but generally no opinion.
- Where is Small RAW? As awesome as 44mp is , I can't really think of many instances where people always need 44mp. At least the file sizes aren't monstrous but I suppose I shoot with a 80mp Credo so I'm a bit biased.
- Maybe not quite related but... Lightroom isn't compatible with A7r-ii files yet. Capture one works though! //EDIT: update has rolled over creative cloud
VIDEO:
- 4K is amazing. I'm experiencing some glitches when paired with my SmallHD 501 monitor in 4k mode which is killing me, but you do effectively get some pretty amazing in camera 4k which is king. Limited to 5 minutes and eats up about 64gb with 1h of video footage and the system gets fairly laggy in 4k mode but... you get in camera 4k.
- Noise performance in 4k is reduced, wouldn't recommend going above 6400 if you want clean image performance, but when you go down to normal HD you can boost it higher.
- ISO800 in Slog2 is a god-send and so much more convenient than on the A7s.
- Rolling Shutter is significantly reduced compared to the A7s. Not sure what they did but it's better. And that's awesome.
- Follow AF is really really cool. It does a great job of tracking a subject across a huge portion of the frame making it a breeze to track a moving subject.
- Overall, it doesn't replace the A7s in low light... but as an all around shooter- I think its a win.
VERDICT:
It still won't replace your dSLR in all cases, esp sports and low-light focusing performance... but if you're looking for resolution, image quality and a lighter smaller body... It's pretty damn awesome. Would I recommend a switch if you're a pure photographer? Mmm not quite sure yet.
That being said, if you have ANY plans to do video whatsoever in the future (which I think every photographer these days should), this is definitely a toy worth going over to.
This is the first camera I've bought since my D800 3 years ago and I have no regrets. It was definitely worth every penny.
That's all.
The unbiased opinion of the night. Not sponsored by Sony, but lots of love to what they're doing.