Sony A7R in 2023

I recently borrowed an A7R. This is my first time using a professional camera (not a card camera), and it is full frame tensor. So I spent some time to learn how to use it and how it works under various settings.

The bound len is 28-70mm.

A7R Experience

Advantage

It surprised me. Although it is a full-frame camera from ten years ago, but in most cases the picture quality is still much more better than today’s mobile phones.

High pixels

The A7R’s high pixels (38 million pixels) make the picture very fine, and cropped image still look sharp.

Full frame sensor

The full-frame sensor can get acceptable images in low-light conditions. The following is extreme situation, in very dark situation, shutter speed 1/8s, ISO 1600, aperture F5.6:

Although there is a lot of noise, but even if it is not RAW, just “fine” JPG (not even the best compression mode “super fine”), the noise problem is much better than mobile phones and other devices with small sensor. Of course, I think the blur problem here is also related to the shutter speed. 1/8 is the minimum safe shutter for hand shooting, and my hands also are not particularly stable.

The full frame also have a good blur effect. Here is a 50 mm, F4.5 photo:

It also has good background blur. If it has a larger aperture and longer focal length?

Dynamic Range

In terms of dynamic range, the A7R from ten years ago was also good. Although it is not as good as the current best model, but considering the price and time span, it is acceptable. Relatively good dynamic range can not only capture highlight and shadow details in photo, but can also recover from small mistakes in the previous shooting, but it cannot recover from large over-darkness.

The following is a photo with shutter speed 1/30s, ISO 1600, aperture F4.5, without color correction:

The words on the lantern and the dark parts of the leaves are relatively clear. The purple and blue color in the picture is not the problems of the lens, because of this thing behind it:

Disadvantages

Old firmware

Because the firmware is old, it cannot handle some scenarios and is not smart enough. For example, when shooting neon lights, it cannot automatically match the strobe. In this regard, it is not as good as a mobile phone.

Poor performance at high sensitivities

The highest ISO of the A7R is only 25600, but the highest ISO useful is only 6400. If further, there will be too much noise. Because of the high pixels, the noise problem is not serious when viewing ISO 6400 photos on a smaller screen. But if the light is insufficient or zoom in, the highest value useful is ISO 3200.

Small cache

Due to the high pixel count, a JPG photo is 7.8 MB, and a RAW file is 36.9 MB. So after many shot in short period, the shutter cannot be pressed.

Slow boot

In order to save power, I need to turn off and on again frequently, but it often takes a few seconds to wait because it cannot be written to the SD, and result in the above problem.

The shutter sound is too loud

The first-generation shutter sound of the A7 and A7R series was extremely loud, so loud that it could be heard from a distance of 2~3 meters in downtown areas. And since the A7R doesn’t have an electronic shutter, you must endure it.

Considerations for personal camera needs

Personally, I recognize some demands for a camera:

• Anti-shake, used to combat my hand shake, so that the safety shutter time can be higher;
• More focus points. It is still important to manually shoot focus points, so that I can take photos in different styles;
• Quick focus and relatively high-speed continuous shooting, so select after shots, otherwise the model will easily get angry;
• Large sensor, to bring good blur and details;
• The most important is cheap.

To sum up, I think I can consider A7R2 in the future, the price may be cheaper.