The Amazing Sony A1/A7/A9/APS-C & Anything else welcome Mega Thread!

nandbytes said:
The RX line seems all but dead now....
The last RX camera was more than 4 years ago now?

They have since come out with some ZV cameras which are not really the same.
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I keep forgetting about those ;)
robj20 said:
Is your camera bag airtight? If not they will be useless.
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Oh, why’s that?
 
JohnMcL7 said:
Yes, the RX1RII was announced way back in October 2015 so over eight years ago now and around the time the A7SII and the A7RII were released.
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I meant the whole RX line in general including the RX10 and RX100 series.
RX1 series has been long dead like you say.

JohnMcL7 said:
At the time I don't think they were good sellers as there's not many about and rarely any discussion on them whereas the Fuji X100 and Leica Q1 cameras seem a lot more popular. Now with the release of the smaller A7C series and the A7CR alongside a more mature FE system makes an RX1 camera even less viable. I say that as a big fan of the RX1rmk1 which I still use although I note the article above the RX1 speculation isn't even a rumour, it's just a wish by the author.
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Well people who didn't have £2k to spend on a fixed lens camera went with Fuji x100 series (all of them were sub £1k) and people who had more than £2k prefer the Leica over Sony (no surprise there tbh)

I had the Sony RX1rii and it was slow and clucky to use. Much like a Leica without the red badge, so might as well buy a Leica :P
 
snerkler said:
I keep forgetting about those ;)

Oh, why’s that?
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Because they absorb moisture to about 30% of their weight. Then it would need drying out.
So you pop one in your bag and it absorbs moisture for maybe 12 hours then it's done.

They're designed to be sealed up.
 
snerkler said:
I always have silicon packs in my camera bags (and also in my storage cupboards at home), I’d have thought if you wipe down your gear if it gets wet and have silicon packs it’ll be fine, never had an issue myself.
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Silicone packs as mentioned are kinda useless. Unless you dry them out and recycle constantly.
For your storage place you can use a small dehumidifier box which works well enough locally.
Just keep your bags open and dry, obviously not open when you're actually using it!

I have a small £2 hygrometer in my storage cube (I use a IKEA kallax to store my camera gear). Just make sure it's at a healthy temperature and humidity level.
Generally speaking though it's better to maintain the overall humidity of your room or area.

Of course you can get a "dry cabinet", basically a humidity controlled storage. But I think that's overkill.
 
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LeeRatters said:
Does that not cause issues though if you don't want to focus on a person in the frame?

I have bbf set up for AF-C and Eye AF (A7Riii) on the lens which is perfect for each thumb. I just use AF as standard and if I want a quick portrait I just hit the lens button with my left thumb and it finds the eye wherever it is in the frame. Also means normal AF on the A7 works the same.
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I have mine set so the shutter button does single shot focus.
I then have the back button set to continuous eye AF tracking.
So the shutter button for hold and recompose. Back button for eye and tracking. Best of both worlds.
 
JohnMcL7 said:
Yes, the RX1RII was announced way back in October 2015 so over eight years ago now and around the time the A7SII and the A7RII were released.

At the time I don't think they were good sellers as there's not many about and rarely any discussion on them whereas the Fuji X100 and Leica Q1 cameras seem a lot more popular. Now with the release of the smaller A7C series and the A7CR alongside a more mature FE system makes an RX1 camera even less viable. I say that as a big fan of the RX1rmk1 which I still use although I note the article above the RX1 speculation isn't even a rumour, it's just a wish by the author.
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One thing that puts me off spending a lot on a fixed lens camera is the fear of contamination. I know it's less likely to happen than with changeable lens kit but if it does happen it's much more difficult to remove.

I always fancied a X100 but having bought a X100f it's my least used camera due to its various shortcomings. If Sony could keep the cost reasonable and make it a responsive and compact camera with a very nice lens I can imagine it selling in niche numbers at least. I wont be buying one though.
 
Just got my refund for my Pergear 35mm f1.4. I've ordered another and it's cheaper than last time. I'll be interested to see if its aperture markings are correct this time. I hope so. If not I might keep it anyway.
 
In pursuit of solving the embarrassing issues I've been having with getting my flash to fire after switching from electronic shutter shooting (without flash) to mechanical shutter (with flash) during my Wedding work, I've decided to pursue the purchase of a Sony branded flash as I read it's a compatibility issue with Godox flashguns. Has anybody got a sony branded flash here who could test whether the problem is still apparent and you have to cycle the camera off and on still, or whether switching modes works as you would expect without the need to cycle the camera on and off, or un-mount / re-mount the flashgun etc.
 
nandbytes said:
Silicone packs as mentioned are kinda useless. Unless you dry them out and recycle constantly.
For your storage place you can use a small dehumidifier box which works well enough locally.
Just keep your bags open and dry, obviously not open when you're actually using it!

I have a small £2 hygrometer in my storage cube (I use a IKEA kallax to store my camera gear). Just make sure it's at a healthy temperature and humidity level.
Generally speaking though it's better to maintain the overall humidity of your room or area.

Of course you can get a "dry cabinet", basically a humidity controlled storage. But I think that's overkill.
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I'm not that concerned about it to go to those lengths ;) I thought the silicon bags kind of worked like the moisture traps you can buy for caravans etc which I use in the garage for my motorbike), guess I wasted my time then. Didn't cost a lot though so not wasted much ;)
robj20 said:
I have mine set so the shutter button does single shot focus.
I then have the back button set to continuous eye AF tracking.
So the shutter button for hold and recompose. Back button for eye and tracking. Best of both worlds.
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Which camera is this? My understanding is that you can have AF-ON for BBF, and then you can have AF either on or off for the shutter, but if you have it on the AF mode will be the same for both back button and shutter button?

The whole point of having BBF is so that it acts as both continuous focus and single focus, i.e. you press and hold the back button for continuous focus, or press the back button to focus and then release to recompose, having the shutter button AF disabled then means that you won't then refocus as you release the shutter.

I don't see how you can have the focus mode set to two different things at the same time, what happens if you keep hold of the back button whilst pressing the shutter, the camera won't know what to do? :thinking:
 
snerkler said:
I'm not that concerned about it to go to those lengths ;) I thought the silicon bags kind of worked like the moisture traps you can buy for caravans etc which I use in the garage for my motorbike), guess I wasted my time then. Didn't cost a lot though so not wasted much ;)

Which camera is this? My understanding is that you can have AF-ON for BBF, and then you can have AF either on or off for the shutter, but if you have it on the AF mode will be the same for both back button and shutter button?

The whole point of having BBF is so that it acts as both continuous focus and single focus, i.e. you press and hold the back button for continuous focus, or press the back button to focus and then release to recompose, having the shutter button AF disabled then means that you won't then refocus as you release the shutter.

I don't see how you can have the focus mode set to two different things at the same time, what happens if you keep hold of the back button whilst pressing the shutter, the camera won't know what to do? :thinking:
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A7C
If I hold the back button it tracks and continuous focuses on eyes. I can then press the shutter button to take the photo.

If I just use the shutter button half press single shot focuses and then takes the photo.
 
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robj20 said:
A7C
If I hold the back button it tracks and continuous focuses on eyes. I can then press the shutter button to take the photo.

If I just use the shutter button half press single shot focuses and then takes the photo.
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Interesting, I didn't even know this was a thing. I still prefer just having the AF-ON button doing everything though, but it's always interesting to hear how others do things (y)
 
TDP published a review of the new Sigma 70-200mm; it looks definitely not stellar on close up crops on high res sensor. Sony GM2 seems to eat it for lunch at most settings except 70mm where both look average at best. I wonder how it translates into actual real life mid-to-long-range scenarios. Closeup performance can be the worst case scenario.
www.the-digital-picture.com

Sony FE 70-200mm F2.8 GM OSS II Lens Image Quality

View the image quality delivered by the Sony FE 70-200mm F2.8 GM OSS II Lens using ISO 12233 Resolution Chart lab test results. Compare the image quality of this lens with other lenses.
www.the-digital-picture.com www.the-digital-picture.com
 
LongLensPhotography said:
TDP published a review of the new Sigma 70-200mm; it looks definitely not stellar on close up crops on high res sensor. Sony GM2 seems to eat it for lunch at most settings except 70mm where both look average at best. I wonder how it translates into actual real life mid-to-long-range scenarios. Closeup performance can be the worst case scenario.
www.the-digital-picture.com

Sony FE 70-200mm F2.8 GM OSS II Lens Image Quality

View the image quality delivered by the Sony FE 70-200mm F2.8 GM OSS II Lens using ISO 12233 Resolution Chart lab test results. Compare the image quality of this lens with other lenses.
www.the-digital-picture.com www.the-digital-picture.com
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Haha you really are a tough one to please, that’s the first time I’ve heard the GM II called average at best ;)
 
snerkler said:
Haha you really are a tough one to please, that’s the first time I’ve heard the GM II called average at best ;)
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specifically at 70mm

www.the-digital-picture.com

Sony FE 70-200mm F2.8 GM OSS II Lens Image Quality

View the image quality delivered by the Sony FE 70-200mm F2.8 GM OSS II Lens using ISO 12233 Resolution Chart lab test results. Compare the image quality of this lens with other lenses.
www.the-digital-picture.com www.the-digital-picture.com

an extreme example but I feel one is needed
 
snerkler said:
Well of course a prime will be sharper, especially a macro ;)
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yes, and in this example they are diverging out too far. Stop it down and weirdly it gets worse. At longer FL the zoom looks much tidier. Sony should have called it 85-200 or even 100-200 :)
 
LongLensPhotography said:
yes, and in this example they are diverging out too far. Stop it down and weirdly it gets worse. At longer FL the zoom looks much tidier. Sony should have called it 85-200 or even 100-200 :)
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I’ll have to check on my computer another time as it looks sharper on my phone stopped down.

I’ve never found the lens lacking in sharpness at 70mm, clearly my standards aren’t the same as yours though ;)
 
snerkler said:
I’ve never found the lens lacking in sharpness at 70mm, clearly my standards aren’t the same as yours though ;)
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It could be close-up performance; these graphs don't always tell the full story. The periphery does not look great, something that also plagues most of canon zooms except the old f/4 IS mk1.

I think it is fair to demand 95% from a £2K lens in 2023.
 
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LongLensPhotography said:
It could be close-up performance; these graphs don't always tell the full story. The periphery does not look great, something that also plagues most of canon zooms except the old f/4 IS mk1.

I think it is fair to demand 95% from a £2K lens in 2023.
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As I say I’ve got no complaints. Charts are useful but they don’t always paint a real world picture. I would always take rendering over perfection in sharpness, within reason of course. Most modern lenses are plenty sharp, and with things like Topaz Sharpen AI you can make most modern lenses bitingly sharp but what you can’t do easily is change the rendering.
 
snerkler said:
As I say I’ve got no complaints. Charts are useful but they don’t always paint a real world picture. I would always take rendering over perfection in sharpness, within reason of course. Most modern lenses are plenty sharp, and with things like Topaz Sharpen AI you can make most modern lenses bitingly sharp but what you can’t do easily is change the rendering.
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sharpen ai is a complicated case. It *can* get very close but never as good as the real thing. It can deal with a single issue at a time, be it a very minor motion in a single direction or minute defocus. Anything more and it just doesn't play nicely. Soft smeary corners is one area in particular where sharpen AI tends not to deliver; it will deal with centre accordingly and that's not enough for corners. You can run a second layer with much tougher motion blur settings (that seems to work better) then mask. This improves it a little but is still a very far cry from proper rendering in the first place. By this point you have wasted 5-10min in the best case per image, as this is all quite manual and tedious. And now you have an images that is basically AI so can't be submitted to competitions, etc. So all in all you are happy to have it available but prefer not to needed it more than a handful of times a month.

I think "rendering" has a somewhat reduced impact or significance outside of portrait / subject photography at or nearly at wide enough apertures, particularly when we consider modern premium lenses. I am not aware of a single such lens that has poor contrast and colour gamut at say f/4 or 5.6, so in the absence of flare all differences can be bridged by very minor tweaks in RAW editor. We actually start out with very flat profiles, essentially a LOG so we can edit the hell out of them as WE like, not the camera. The significant remaining difference is the resolution, and flare performance. These things are important when printing larger, or else why do we buy 50-60MP cameras in the first place? 24MP A7III or the new A9 is already an overkill for web, a wedding album or newspaper spread if you don't. I bet the Sigma zoom will be more than enough on 24MP. I know because Canon f/2.8 II zoom is much worse but is still plenty for 6K at any aperture, except the bloody 70mm.
Rendering aspects matter on lenses like the f/1.4 or 1.2 primes. Take 85mm for example and every single model is fairly distinct to start off, and they progress differently until they become rather similar by around f/2.8 or f4. That is effectively portraits, cinematography, probably not landscapes or product photography for the most part.
 
robj20 said:
A7C
If I hold the back button it tracks and continuous focuses on eyes. I can then press the shutter button to take the photo.

If I just use the shutter button half press single shot focuses and then takes the photo.
Click to expand...
Have you turned off AF with shutter in the menu, I hadn't when I first setup my A7C for BBF so it would track and BBF on the AF On but refocus on the half press.
 
JRJ said:
Have you turned off AF with shutter in the menu, I hadn't when I first setup my A7C for BBF so it would track and BBF on the AF On but refocus on the half press.
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Not that I know of, and I haven't noticed it refocusing on the shutter button either. The back button just seems to take priority when used.

I'll have a play later and also try now the settings I've used.
 
LongLensPhotography said:
sharpen ai is a complicated case. It *can* get very close but never as good as the real thing. It can deal with a single issue at a time, be it a very minor motion in a single direction or minute defocus. Anything more and it just doesn't play nicely. Soft smeary corners is one area in particular where sharpen AI tends not to deliver; it will deal with centre accordingly and that's not enough for corners. You can run a second layer with much tougher motion blur settings (that seems to work better) then mask. This improves it a little but is still a very far cry from proper rendering in the first place. By this point you have wasted 5-10min in the best case per image, as this is all quite manual and tedious. And now you have an images that is basically AI so can't be submitted to competitions, etc. So all in all you are happy to have it available but prefer not to needed it more than a handful of times a month.

I think "rendering" has a somewhat reduced impact or significance outside of portrait / subject photography at or nearly at wide enough apertures, particularly when we consider modern premium lenses. I am not aware of a single such lens that has poor contrast and colour gamut at say f/4 or 5.6, so in the absence of flare all differences can be bridged by very minor tweaks in RAW editor. We actually start out with very flat profiles, essentially a LOG so we can edit the hell out of them as WE like, not the camera. The significant remaining difference is the resolution, and flare performance. These things are important when printing larger, or else why do we buy 50-60MP cameras in the first place? 24MP A7III or the new A9 is already an overkill for web, a wedding album or newspaper spread if you don't. I bet the Sigma zoom will be more than enough on 24MP. I know because Canon f/2.8 II zoom is much worse but is still plenty for 6K at any aperture, except the bloody 70mm.
Rendering aspects matter on lenses like the f/1.4 or 1.2 primes. Take 85mm for example and every single model is fairly distinct to start off, and they progress differently until they become rather similar by around f/2.8 or f4. That is effectively portraits, cinematography, probably not landscapes or product photography for the most part.
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I didn't know that images that's had Topaz Sharpen applied can't be entered into competitions, however I don't enter competitions so it's not an issue for me.

Sure, stopping down does negate some of the rendering but not entirely depending on what's being shot. As for why people buy 50-60mp cameras, a lot of the time it's for the ability to crop rather than print large (y)
 
snerkler said:
I didn't know that images that's had Topaz Sharpen applied can't be entered into competitions, however I don't enter competitions so it's not an issue for me.
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So any "AI" tool usage is not allowed for competitions.
This is why I think Adobe is very careful with the tools they provide in LR because it's used by everyone and adding tools that's classified AI may render is useless for people looking to enter competitions etc

I don't like T&C's of most competitions and sometimes it's being judged by people I don't rate too highly myself. So I don't enter into competitions. However as a general concept, I'm not against entering competitions.
 
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nandbytes said:
So any "AI" tool usage is not allowed for competitions.
This is why I think Adobe is very careful with the tools they provide in LR because it's used by everyone and adding tools that's classified AI may render is useless for people looking to enter competitions etc

I don't like T&C's of most competitions and sometimes it's being judged by people I don't rate too highly myself. So I don't enter into competitions. However as a general concept, I'm not against entering competitions.
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I assume there’s a way to check which images have used Topaz AI, but how can I check as I forget which I’ve sharpened?

Also, how can they tell if you just take a print along?
 
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JRJ said:
A7IV turned up yesterday completing a very expensive Black Friday this year, but couldn't turn down a body only for £1500 after cashback from Clifton cameras.
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I'm now content with my setup, just need to add a couple of 128GB V60 cards (not a video person) and I'm complete..... I think.
 
Anyone use an intervalometer on a a7iv or newer Body, theres lots on amazon for around £15 but cant find any that state they are for the a7iv , seen some that say they are for an a7iii just wondering if these would work
 
mav said:
Anyone use an intervalometer on a a7iv or newer Body, theres lots on amazon for around £15 but cant find any that state they are for the a7iv , seen some that say they are for an a7iii just wondering if these would work
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I think as long as they are the correct USB connection, they should be fine. I've used a cheap typical Chinese one on my A7 and A7Riii if I need to.

It's only the A7c series that doesn't have the connectivity as far as I'm aware.
 
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LeeRatters said:
I think as long as they are the correct USB connection, they should be fine. I've used a cheap typical Chinese one on my A7 and A7Riii if I need to.

It's only the A7c series that doesn't have the connectivity as far as I'm aware.
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I'd still love to find one for my A7C.
 
JRJ said:
Have you turned off AF with shutter in the menu, I hadn't when I first setup my A7C for BBF so it would track and BBF on the AF On but refocus on the half press.
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Camera settings that i think are relevant.
Drive Mode: Single Shooting
Focus Mode: Single-Shot AF
Face/Eye AF Set
Face/Eye Priority in AF: On

AF w/shutter: On

Custom Key
Rear 1 Tracking On + AF On

I think that's everything. I have just tested as well and holding the back button tracks with continues AF then half pressing the shutter only does the exposure not AF.
 
robj20 said:
Camera settings that i think are relevant.
Drive Mode: Single Shooting
Focus Mode: Single-Shot AF
Face/Eye AF Set
Face/Eye Priority in AF: On

AF w/shutter: On

Custom Key
Rear 1 Tracking On + AF On

I think that's everything. I have just tested as well and holding the back button tracks with continues AF then half pressing the shutter only does the exposure not AF.
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Sounds like the custom key is over riding the shutter AF then when activated, useful info although 'd get confused having two AF buttons :lol:
 
The A6700 is a really pleasant surprise, it pairs really nice with the 200-600, here is an SEO I took last week, its quite a heavy crop but I am really pleased with it, both images side by side, even the main one is a crop from the original.
 

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I was thinking about vf in the corner cameras yesterday as I used my Panasonic GX9. I think a lot of these have been dropped these days. Looking on Wex Panasonic don't seem to do any now and there don't seem to be any Fuji's either apart from the X100 series. Are Sony with the A6xxx and A7cx ranges, Fuji with the fixed lens X100 range and Leica the only ones selling vf in the corner cameras these days? Apart from compacts.
 
woof woof said:
I was thinking about vf in the corner cameras yesterday as I used my Panasonic GX9. I think a lot of these have been dropped these days. Looking on Wex Panasonic don't seem to do any now and there don't seem to be any Fuji's either apart from the X100 series. Are Sony with the A6xxx and A7cx ranges, Fuji with the fixed lens X100 range and Leica the only ones selling vf in the corner cameras these days? Apart from compacts.
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It makes a lot of sense to me as well, keeps the nose away from the screen.
 
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