Sony Alpha 7 II real-world sample gallery posted

Pre-order and "This item will be released on December 11, 2014." as seen below:

http://www.amazon.com/Sony-Alpha-Interchangeable-Digital-Camera/dp/B00PX8CHO6/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1417946313&sr=8-1&keywords=sony+a7ii

BTW: Sony A7 has been very well reviewed by almost all the review sites, and most of the buyers already very much know how this A7-2 performed by just look the SPEC.

As far as NX1, even you give it a "GOLD Reward" that may not help its sales a bit..

@Mike FL

Well said and you should get a gold award for that.

This guy on youtube made a comparison with the A7 and the A7R.

To me personally the A7 II sounded quieter and more dampened compared to the other two, but his comment was that it is similar to the A7. Perhaps it was the angle at which he held the camera.

The shutter demo is just after 4:45 min
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FYXXeH_BtRA

I usually prefer Canon's colors.

you can apply any color profile , from any camera on RAW photo ,
you can also adjust your monitor :)

Newton Old:

Contax lens? (Those when very good are Zeisses.)

Akpinxit:

You don't know what you're talking about.

A camera having "good colors" or "bad colors" is a thing of the past.
Today what it counts is the tonal range and dynamic range of the sensor, and in both aspects the Sony sensors excel (on par with the Sony-derived sensors used on Nikon cameras).
So if colors are more muted or brighter depends entirely on your own personal choice.
Just shoot RAW!

walnist:

Better lenses matter too, here's where Zeiss helps Sony.

Many Nikon cameras don't use Sony sensors, for example the D7100 has a Toshiba sensor.

The Nikon D3S through D4S don't use Sony sensors and that series, when combined with better lenses, has better colour than say the D800 above anything higher than ISO 200.

Just shooting raw can NOT make up for the use of a less than optically extraordinary lens.

Also Sony compresses its raws, likely degrading colour a bit--the test being that the Nikon D610 has much better colour than the A7 even though the A7 has native Zeiss lenses.

Bringing up the other issue: A Nikon D810, for example, does not use the same processing computer that say a Sony A7R does. And Nikon's processing computers, likely by Fuji, do a better colour job than Sony's. These processors have a huge influence on better colour.

So:

Sony sensors good, but not the best,

Processors matter.

Better lenses matter.

Shooting raw is only part of the solution.

I hope the camera can more than these samples show. Maybe it is because of ACR. Adobe has no good RAW converters.

RobertS:

"Adobe has no good RAW converters."

Okay, I think some/many would disagree. And there be a difference between raw converters and raw converter profiles.

But what raw extraction software do you like and for what raw file types?

Very true. The amount of disrespect and negativity is just mind-staggerIng. Dpreview makes reviews that are among the most comprehensive, most scrutinizing and best written digital camera reviews available.
When they point to some technical or functional weaknesses, people cry foul and bias, Same thing when a review is positive, then it's again biased in favor of a company. When they post sample pictures, people moan about alleged lack of "inspirational art".

Most people don't even realize they are visiting one of the best technical digital photography Review sites worldwide.
And man people have yet to realize that Dpreview focuses on technical and functional aspects of digital cameras.

I have to say the quality of posts in public forums has massively degraded within the last decade, and I believe IT has something to do with everybody and the cat now being connected with the interwebs, which was completely different 10-15y ago, wen only those truly interested and skilled in a certain domain were actually actively using the Internet.

@ ottonis:
i disagree. if you ask me, quality of dpreview etc falls down (maybe they're tad saved by video reviewers) and average knowledge on forums etc went up.

@ howaboutraw:
10 years of cmos. your call..
http://www.juzaphoto.com/article.php?l=en&t=10_years_apsc_sensor

Come on, the image quality of some of these pictures is not even on the smartphone level. Take DSC00423, a static scene exposed at F4 1/800s ISO4000. By not shooting this at ISO100 1/20s, the amount of light gathered is lowered 40x and dynamic range reduced by more than 5 stops. A typical smartphone sensor is roughly 50x smaller than a full frame one. A smartphone would make a better picture at F2 ISO50 1/40s. And it is not just a theory, the quality of this picture is simply horrible and the brightening further degrades the image.

Some of the samples are not very persuading even if not exposed incorrectly in an obvious way and no postprocessing is indicated, for example DSC00183 at ISO100. I am not sure what is the problem with those.

not exactly : Canon (I don't know for Nikon) offers cheap ~200$ lens with really good IQ (40mm 2.8 , 50mm 1.8 ...) which I can compare to Sony FE 55mm F1.8 ZA Carl Zeiss Sonnar - ~1000$

I had the Canon 50mm 1.8, and it makes a horrible noise when autofocusing. That's one of the main reasons I moved over to Sony, because their lenses don't give me a headache with all the racket.

if the 50mm 1.8 gave you a headache, perhaps pick up a different hobby.

I now have the Sony 50mm/1.8 that is absolutely silent in focusing, which works well for video purposes. We also got the 16-50mm/2.8 on the Sony A mount, which doesn't make awful autofocus noises like the Tamron or Sigma 17-50/2.8, and is also weather-sealed. So we have continued photography as a hobby, no worries. :)

Sam you may well be correct with the IBIS and lenses. All I know with my Olympus, using primes, in menu you select shoot without lens and then with prime legacy lenses you can put in their focal length for the IBIS to have that knowledge. The 5 IBIS on the Oly using this is absolutely superb. I wonder if the 7II has this function, I'd be suprised if not and may well have been missed by the other reviewer or possible anyway.
Not that I am about to get the 7II

The bigger sensor needs much more efficient IBIS than the one quarter of its size m43 sensor. Therefore Oly will beat Sony in this regard. I rather consider this iteration as just a correction of the faults of the first one.

I have found a problem, the A7 studio sample he forgot to turn off Long Exposure NR, Color abberation Compensation and Shading Compensation. Shading Compensation is the main culprit thats why it inflate the ISO 12800 in brightness to make it more lighter.

Sony's literature says that the system uses the Pitch and Yaw stabilization of any OSS E-mount lens, together with the X, Y and Roll stabilization on the in-body sensor system.

For all non OSS E-mount lenses and all Alpha mount lenses on the LA-EAx adapters, it uses the full 5-axis IS in-body system.

It does not specify what IS is used for non electronic/legacy/dumb mount lenses - but 3-axis seems reasonable to assume.

This looks like a very, very interesting camera to me. I just wish it had the AA filter removed to provide similar overall resolution potential as the Rx1R, which remains a very appealing camera to me (but without weather sealing :-( )

First of all, I never say I don't like sony, nor did I said 'major disappointment' or 'Sony fail'. Finally speed priority with AF and EF locked at 5FPS and full PADF tracking at 2.5FPS is still the same. That is blazing fast PDAF tracking? A6000 is blazing fast, D750 is blazing fast, 7DMk2 (is crap) but is blazing fast....A7(s) is not.

As for the IQ if you pay attention to what DPR team has done, then you will realize that they have already do studio test scene. Have you play with it yet? I have and I love to see where you can find the difference between A7 and A7 ii, cos I can't.

I was thinking one of those Hassy NEX's myself

Doesn't say that the photographer was a socialite.

While these generalizations are usually inaccurate, let's be honest, the camera has to be somewhat good to achieve good results. Otherwise it's a ton of luck. The greatest cameraman in the world couldn't make the next month's rent if he had to take pictures with his phone. That's why these cameras keep pushing new boundaries, because they can still be better. The guys who covered World Series XII would have killed to have a 70D.

Why do people feel the need to 'remind' us about the importance of the creative process on a CAMERA REVIEW SITE. Yes we know. But because this is A CAMERA REVIEW SITE, you can expect people to talk about gear and specs and pixel peep. If you don't enjoy such conversation... i dunno.... go and take some lovely photos instead.

The moral of the story is dubious.
Vast majority of photography professionals still use the best kit possible. Why? So their composition talent and "eye" are complimented by the technical quality and possibilities of the equipment. A great composition with bad quality is as much a wasted opportunity as is a dull composition with great technical quality.

@ karlwunsch.
No you are wrong, the vast majority of photography professionals DON'T use the best kit possible!
Actually they don't upgrade as often as amateur gearheads!
Upgrading costs money and is not commercially viable because most of the time there's just little to gain IQ wise. It could change workflow etc. etc.
Only professionals who get "sponsored" might have the latest and greatest more often.
If I had to consider to always have the best IQ I'd have new gear at least every half year.
Probably you mean by best, 35mm camera's, but the ultimate best IQ isn't 35mm.
Then again the best IQ could be with just a smartphone or 1" camera. It just depends on the situation.

@digifan
You seem to confuse "the best kit possible" with "the best kit available on the market". Finance and habits could limit the realm of possible as well.

I disagree with you, but I'm far from calling you wrong, like you do. I do believe, however, that your last sentence is entirely flawed. I'm not a typical DPReview IQ zealot, but I still reckon, that IQ is a very measurable quality and simply cannot agree with what you say there.

I still maintain, that vast majority of professional photographers would strive to get their hands on the best possible kit, that's within their reach and fits their purpose.

There are many photographers who (purpotedly) create with the use of vintage gear, or even hand-made makeshift cameras (Jan Reich comes instantly to my mind), but that is usually an integral part of their artistic expressions and I'm not talking about those.

@Dave, Good for her! And I don't mean that in a sarcastic way. But she's definitely in a very tiny minority, agreed? National Geographic's staff photog's wouldn't be able to claim the same method of business survival.

And I note that you know ONE such person, not a whole company who stays profitable that way. I'm sure there are more like her, but in the overall photo industry, I doubt these people make up even 0.5%.

Different films had different colour casts (Fuji, Kodak, Ilford).
Also each lab had its own system for processing film.
No two labs were the same.

I always hated fim.

Post production is an integral part of photography. In the film days different masters developed their negatives with different solutions, which is similar to the equivalent to modern-day color adjustment.

Cheetah43, I guess you just shoot JPGs straight out of the camera then? That's pure photography.

Not to mention the use of various filters in film days (and now, for that matter). They also alters how the scene is captured.

In fact, every piece of gear from the lens to the film/sensor, to the photo paper or monitor used to view the picture, to the type of lighting available in the area where the photo is being viewed alters the appearance of the images in some way, so there's no such thing as a "pure" photograph, so it's really not worth stressing about (in my opinion, of course).

You could also call altering the light (opening or closing windows, turning on lights, using a flash) before snapping the picture is also "fiddling" with the image. Let's call it pre-processing.

And anybody who considers JPG images pure is wrong. They are just RAW images that have been adjusted using a predetermined set of specifications chosen by the camera makers.

I personally do not understand the "digital allowed me to see what I'm doing" view. Yes the results are immediate which helps, but to say that shooting on film is a bad way to learn would be a disservice to the great masters of the past. There had been great images before digital. One might say that the longer learning curve required by film actually helped force people to learn the basics of exposure and light control.

Nowadays everyone can pick up a phone and snap a pic, but the superb convenience of instant viewing bogs down to a series of trial and error and hope-to-get-lucky. All the stuff on Instagram and Flickr and other photo sites are overwhelmed with poorly-taken images with no regard or even conscience of proper photo technique. Which is fine, since this is all subjective. But if everyone were forced to learn a little bit about the techniques, it would result in a much higher level of imagery.

My job as a full time professional photographer, is to do what the client wants.
There is no sentiment involved….
Digital just simply makes my life easier.

Film was a nightmare.(trannies).
Colour labs were a nightmare, (new dev, or replenished dev made a difference in colour cast)
Costs were a nightmare.
Clip tests were a nightmare.
Putting film through Xray machines at the at airports (flying out, then flying back), was a nightmare.
Making sure that all film had the same 'batch number'.
Having to keep film in the fridge was a nightmare.
220 film with that deadfall paper backing was a total nightmare.
Shall I go on….lol
I can't think of one single good thing that I could say about film, apart for its demise .

Now I use a Sony A65 with a Sigma 17-70 and I'm done.
Plus the camera does great videos….and the clients are happy.

@edgar, I can still think of various instances where film forced people to think and preplan better for a shoot. For example, a roll of film forces you to shoot at a certain ISO (ASA) 36 times. That means considering the required shutter speed and aperture, and choosing an ASA that will do that in the settings given. (Walk into an NBA game with ASA100 and prepare to get absolutely nothing.) The shutter/aperture question will also make people think about their topic and theme (sports: 1/1000s f/2.8, scenery: 1/125s f/9, etc.). A lot of people now just shoot in P mode and can't understand why their sports shots are blurry at 1/125s f/9. In film days, serious photog's had no choice but to actually learn this damn stuff if they didn't want to waste a ton of money on film development. Nowadays people just "DELETE" and try again. As miserly beings, we only take things seriously if it hurts our wallet. ;)

agee but please just read the caption :
"Converted ‘to taste’ using a beta version of Adobe Camera Raw 8.7. Adjustments include: Exposure +1.25 | Highlights -100 | Shadows +96 | Whites -100 | Curves +6 (lights), +7 (darks) | Luminous Noise Reduction +15 | White Balance shift to warm the overall image."

@NicoG -- Yes, but I have already taken the exposure +1.25 into consideration in the original comment. I am truly somewhat perplexed. Perhaps indeed the noise characteristics are different for that sensor when used in DSLR and mirrorless cameras.

+96 shadows is a very strong exposure pull in the dark tones ON TOP of a linear 1.25 exposure push ON TOP of ISO 640! Why they were not shot at base ISO is beyond me, except that maybe the shooter used Auto ISO in aperture priority? Shutter speeds are indeed much higher than I would expect of someone shooting in manual that is for sure.

I think DPReview staff is pushing and pulling in post a lot more lately but there should be more educational material on PP as indeed most are confused on why images with EXIF's showing 'low' to moderate ISO look so noisy, etc.

I also do not find most of these samples as good examples of high dynamic range ETTR'd shots because of awkward selection of in-camera ISO and very fast shutter speeds. A base ISO shot with pull and push seems intentional, but a moderate to high ISO with shutter speed to spare that needs exposure lift in addition to extreme shadow pull...to me that is just underexposure.

Good points, Timbukto.

The Sony DR advantage comes at *low* ISO. At ISO 640, there is very likely little to no real advantage over say a Canon 6D.

Its clearly a photography human error. Why? He left the shadow compensation on that introduce much more noise in Sony.

Pushing an ISO-640 image +1.25 stops shouldn't show any chroma noise? Really?

nope,i can read,i mean
ISO-4000-DSC00413.
looks very bad.

@Einstein...give it a rest!

whats wrong with the colors? I looks pretty realistic to me.

At the end are two landscapes edited "to taste". You see you can still get whatever color you want if you shot RAW. You can apply a color profile to your taste even when you import them on your PC.
Then there are also different color profiles in the Sony cameras if you shoot jpeg and prefer it a bit warmer.

You see there are quite some options. Color is a matter of taste. Some like Sony, some Canon, some Fuji but you can always adjust to "your likes".

It's Winter. Colors will be muted. Sony cameras don't produce any worse or substantially different tonal range than any other cameras in the DSLR, FF and Mirrorless class.

@Zeisschen The fact that RAW can solve almost every color problem is a big misconception, in my opinion. Here is what Ken Rockwell said about colors, and unfortunately, given my experience, I tend to agree:

"Great color is what looks good when photographing real subjects, and I just can't get colors as good from this Sony as I do from my pro cameras. Color rendition is delicate and subjective, and critical when you get serious. You can't just tweak it in a computer; each brand of camera, like each type of film, interprets colors differently."

Ken Rockwell? Color? Great? Really?

I agree with both sides of the opinion as RAW gives us leverage to adjust color, but isn't 100% perfect (what is?). However, I know that the name Ken Rockwell is a little polarizing in photography circles, so it's not a convincing quote as compared to when Philip Bloom says something about video.

@catalin
Sorry, as soon as I read "Ken Rockwell" I had to stop reading ;)

Luckily there is no "color problem". It's mostly Canon users saying that because they are used to more redish/warmer color coming out of their cameras, maybe due to sensors or different glas/coatings used. Sony colors are a bit more on the cooler side and reds and greens are less saturated, just like their TVs.
I'm 100% sure you can edit each channel in post to your likes, the color depth recored by Sony sensors is also quite bit wider compared to most other sensors, so there should be more latitude (like for dynamic range in shadows)

edit:
I'm sure I've read it somewhere on the internet, people creating lightroom profiles for different cameras to make them all look the same. Google it.

Ken Rockwell is not one of my first choice for reference material. Having said that, You simply cannot judge a camera by first takes. I came from the film age, using Velvia on a Toyo 4x5 field camera, slowly migrated to Canon DSLRs when the D30 came out. Went thru various iterations and fell in love with the 5D classic. Next I tried Nikon and the D600. Yes they have their own interpretations of what real world color should look like. But that is it - their viewpoint...nothing more. I find the color rendition of the Sony a7 nothing short of fantastic. Very rich and rewarding colors. Its is more than just the camera, its the light, the time of day, the lens and many other factors. Canon, Nikon and Sony are all fine tools. I just happen to like what Sony is doing with their bodies, the guts inside the bodies....way ahead of the game. Hence I left Canon and Nikon.

It is the person, not the camera.

Hah, I was right! Everyone hates Ken Rockwell! ;) OK, maybe not everyone...

I agree with cheetah43 that it's the person, not the camera... most of the time. The camera still has to be quite capable to do certain things. It's not like we can take an old Kodak DC220 and expect 1Dx results. But definitely the camera operator is more important.

I've once covered a wedding and the bride's brother had a spankin' new 5D3 (at the time) with a 85mm f/1.2 and 580EX II (also fairly new at the time)... and he was shooting in P mode. :D

" Here is what Ken Rockwell said about colors...."

Well that will be wrong then!

Ken Rockwell likes to find 'subjective' excuses to justify his preconceived opinions about particular cameras. He's entertaining to read, but not a respected reviewer.

Lol.

@rrccad,
No, if OSS is turned on (the lens), the camera will use lens' pitch and yaw stabilization while using IBIS for the other three (x, y, roll). I am guessing the photographer used this feature. Or, may be not (had OSS turned off?). Can't tell.

Whatever the case, these samples are very typical of DPR: strange choices.

@rrccad
E mount lens with OSS (Optical Steady Shot):
lens stabilizes the Pitch and Yaw axes, the body takes care of Roll, X and Y.
So it's actually a synergy.

Edit: what EinsteinsGhost said.

I stand corrected... I should have said "in all but one... the geniuses... forgot to test the most salient feature of the camera"

That shot should have been taken at 1/25 and f/11 or so to be informative.

Same applies to many other shots here.

Right so for the most part, according to EXIF on the first shot - this could be done with a normal A7 because OIS was enabled - so kind of really shows not much of anything since the other 3 axis are not really as relevant for this type of shot. correct? minor gains, but really OIS needed to be off to see how well IBIS worked in it's entirety.

Like one sharp shot at a given shutter speed would prove anything.

So people whine about not enough high ISO samples, and we get them here, and now people whine about not having enough slow shutter speed samples. Unreal.

There were some of those 200mm shots taken at 1/20, 1/30, 1/50s - they were blurry. Did you want us to post those?

Also, it was also a very very bitterly cold windy day. So windy the wind was blowing the camera out of my hand. So you can't extrapolate much from that data point anyway (the fact that those shots were blurry).

Also, we had that camera for like one work afternoon/evening. And we were all working on like 10 other things. Please excuse us for not finding the time and inspiration to go set up some photographically interesting shooting scenarios... over time, hopefully we'll have more inspiring shots.

"There were some of those 200mm shots taken at 1/20, 1/30, 1/50s - they were blurry. Did you want us to post those?"

This is informative for me. Thanks.

Are you sure it's informative? Shouldn't we also include the speed of the wind gusts to make it more informative?

There's a reason 'controlled' tests exist to test these sorts of things... ;)

yes, I'm quite sure it's informative to me. Thanks again.

The image was pushed more than 2 full stops. That's not a SOOC iso 640 shot.

Edgar in Italy, If you think this image has great IQ ... well then I don't know what to say. Your sarcasm cannot hide its insufficiency and hardly even mediocre quality.

@ulfie - that's more like an ISO 3200 or higher shot, given the stops of shadow lifting that was done to keep the detail outside the window from being pure white.

Edgar & Jmaverick are absolutely correct; you need to understand the workflow before making misleading remarks. This is why we publish everything we did to the file in ACR.

My remark is not misleading. It's just an opinion: the IQ of the image is not good. Period.

@ufie
If you want to understand why the image looks so noisy, just compare it to the SOOC JPEG and you'll see how much the shadows have been lifted:

http://www.dpreview.com/galleries/reviewsamples/photos/3085736/iso-640-dsc00374?inalbum=sony-a7-ii-real-world-samples

That is your "crisp and sharp" ISO 640 image - albiet with an under-exposed subject.

No @ulfie, your remark is not just an opinion, it's a misinformed statement.

You said: "[The picture] is smeary-noisy as heck for ISO 640 full-frame no less! At this ISO full-frame should be crisp and sharp."

And I'm telling you you can't say 'for an ISO 640 shot'. The definition of ISO is not as straightforward when you add post-processing to the mix. If you lift tones 3 stops, you can't just say that that's how the camera performs at ISO 640. At that point, you have to add 3 EV to the ISO rating, and say it's how the camera performs at ISO 5000.

In other words, as if the camera applied 3 EV extra gain to the original exposure (shutter speed & aperture don't change, of course, when you lift the exposure 3 EV). In other words, for this shot, Dan could've dialed in ISO 5000 to get the same exposure of midtones (assuming it was a 3 EV push he did; I'm not sure, but it's thereabouts). But then he would've blown highlights, so he did it selectively in post.

Make sense?

The cameras don't use the same sensor. Raw latitude should be similar, and it's difficult to compare unless you take the exact same photo, under the exact same lighting conditions, and use an exposure that places some particular highlights at the same 'distance' from clipped in the Raw file - a bit difficult to explain.

But generally, Raw dynamic range and processing latitude should be similar between the two cameras, with the D750 edging out the A7 by an almost imperceptible (to most) margin.

You are right: the lack of uncompressed 14-bit Raw is still an issue with Sony cameras, and is certainly of concern to some (myself included). Sure it won't manifest itself all the time, but every now and then you get strange artifacts around high contrast edges.

Which is why you'll hear some people say that Nikon gets more out of Sony sensors than Sony ;)

However, the compression of the Raw data is not necessarily the reason for any lower DR - unless they're under-quantizing shadows.

You may think you know what you see but you have no clue.

Re-read what what Rishi said and try to understand it. Any camera will display visible noise if the shadows are pushed that much.

You're not going to convince him. He's too proud, or too immature, to accept correction.