Thinking I've made a bad decision

[Ryan5]

I recently moved from Nikon to Sony A7R. I covered a range of work from sport to glamour (studio and outdoor) and corporate photography. I knew that the sport would be a challenge to beat my Nikon 800E and Nikon fast lenses but I was ok with buying a A6000 to pick up the slack. After playing with the A7R and the 70-200 f4 OSS lens I've got to say that I'm really feeling like I made a bad decision despite all of the research and reviews I watched and read prior to making the jump. Unfortunately I wasn't able to hire or test drive an A7 series camera anywhere locally prior to my purchase.

 

My main issue is the ridiculously slow autofocus, regularly unreliable focus (in less than perfect day light) and the ridiculous bazooka sounds of the shutter action. Now I can tell that by now some of you are probably sharpening your knives ready to stick me but I haven't made this post to offend. I'm actually hoping some of you can give me some confidence back to persist with the Sony A7R before I call it quits and go back to Nikon. The modelling photography is the main thing for me if I have to drill down to what is most important, perhaps I should have gone with the A7 Mii instead.

 

What are you thoughts?

[adwb]

You have , I think , bought the wrong body.

If you have the A7r2.body your issues will be addressed, the A7r was replaced very quickly due to the many issues owners and industry reviewers found especially for a working photographer,

I would suggest you try to find a r2 owner near you and get together if that is at all feasible

[Ryan5]

Great advice mate and I'm glad to hear that my thoughts (although painfully late) are in sync with yours. I do have the option to buy a A7R Mk ii second hand but it's just too expensive for me right now and unfortunately I don't know anybody locally that uses one. I can buy a reasonably prices A7 Mk ii second hand locally but then I have to run the risk of losing a heap of $$ on the A7R.... I've even asked people if they want to trade the two bodies but nobody wants to touch the A7R. I wouldn't say it's a lemon but for anything beyond landscape it's useless. In fact I had a few conversations with the Sony Alpha support team and the guy I spoke to each time assured me that he was a glamour photographer and that he used the A7R to great effect and it was based on his suggestion that I not get the A7 Mk ii but instead go with the A7R Mk I. Quite the dilemma and it's already cost me an amazing Nikon now it may cost me a lot of money when I sell this A7R. I hope to get rid of it and cover my costs.

 

Thanks again

[nomad]

I feel with you.

After owning an A7S for a while (mainly for video) and loving it, I bought the A7R for photography. What a mistake!

Lost quite some money selling it and getting the A7R II, but wow, I dig that one!

[pss]

you got the wrong camera, not sure what research you were looking at but even the A7RII is not the fastest AF out there....a 810 or 800 would be better...

there is also the AF issue with the latest A7RII firmware which pretty much makes it hard to use the body with most lenses (mostly the newest ones, incl GM, how much fun is that) in a studio environment or over f 4 or 5.6 since the iris does not open and the AF has to hunt through the closed iris....there is that and that at f8 it switches to even slower contrast detection....for outside shooting this is ok, for studio flash shooting (or any commercial shooting environment really) this is almost unusable....

don't get me wrong, i do love the A7RII and the files it delivers but Sony has to work on firmware, menus and providing improvements for older bodies (like the A7R) 

but it won't be long before the new bodies will be out, so i won't wait for sony to improve on what i have....

[Ryan5]

Thanks for your feedback but as I mentioned I watched a lot of online reviews 9conflicting but interesting) and read a heap of credible reviews (always subjective) and also spoke to Sony Alpha team support on more than one occasion. As a result of all of that I purchased the A7R so it wasn't just an impulse purchase. I clearly purchased the wrong body and am dearly missing my 800E and the truth is I'd buy another one tomorrow if I could sell this damn A7R for a decent price - I know it has potential but I really hate just about everything about it. I was just about to go through the various things I like about it but apart from the size there is not one thing I've been impressed with.

[DavidR]

I replaced my Leica equipment and replaced them with an A7 M II when it first came out.  I love it.  I use it constantly and never had a problem.  I use it with Sony lenses, including the 70 - 200, Nikon, Canon, and Leica lenses.  I had more trouble with three new Leicas.  Hope it helps.  

[porterbasset]

My wife has a Nikon D800e and I had a Sony A7r. To me the A7r was pretty disappointing too. I sure learned a lot about manual focusing with it. Now having the A7rii, I much happier knowing that I do have a decent auto focusing camera with the Sony full frame strengths. In some ways it outperforms the D800e in focusing (much less shutter shock too on the A7rii), but the A7rii is way too slow at writing to the card compared to the D800e. One thing that I really do like about the A7r (but this applies to all mirrorless cameras) is that I'm not having to tweak mirco focusing for each lens. That 36 megapixel sensor on the D800e dramatically shows any lens focusing error, especially with macro lenses and close up shots with shallow DOF. However, if I had purchased the A7r before I grew into the Sony mirrorless cameras (NEX-7, a6000, A7), I would have sold the A7r, cried over the money lost, and stuck with the Canon equipment I had at the time. In the right circumstances, the A7r produces terrific photos, but I shouldn't have to work so hard to get action or low light photos when the competition makes it much easier.

 

You could resort to manual focusing on your A7r like I did for many photos, since the focus peaking combined with the EVF make manual focusing fairly easy to use and very, very accurate. Plus one gets pretty proficient at manual focusing on the A7r after some use. However, I realize this does is not a reasonable solution if you were happy with the D800e.

 

Good luck on where you go from here.

[Username]

It does seem, reading many, many posts on the matter, 

that users of the basic a7-II are well satisfied with little 

or no real problems, while the users of the a7R-II and 

a7S-II are plagued with plagues. One could speculate  

that users of the basic model more easily satisfied cuz 

the price is so reasonable while the price of the R and 

S variants greatly raises expectations .... but it seems 

plain enuf that most of the troubles with the higher line 

models are not merely a case of failing to meet higher

expectations associated with paying twice the price of 

the basic a7-II. 

[addicted2light]

The modelling photography is the main thing for me if I have to drill down to what is most important, perhaps I should have gone with the A7 Mii instead.

 

Besides the fact that the A7 II would probably solve most of your problems, assuming you don't want to sell yet the A7r and you don't mind the af motor making some noise there is actually another solution.

 

Using the LA-EA4 (around 250€, brand new, on amazon) with Minolta or Sony A-mount glass (that is often ridiculously cheap, but of pretty good to jaw dropping quality) you could solve most of the af slowness and inconsistencies. Some inconsistencies will remain, but they are intrinsic, IMO, to how a phase af system works. Remember, though, to use the microadjustment functions in the A7r; it takes a couple of minutes per lens to do so, but it will make a world of difference.

 

Especially for the modelling jobs, I don't think you could possibly go wrong with a Minolta 35-105 first series (super sharp and 20 to 50, yes fifty, €) and a Minolta (same optics as the Sony) 100/2.8 (ultra sharp and around 200€).

 

Other really good lenses are the Minolta 50/2.8 macro, the Minolta 50/1.4 (from f/2 onwards; at f/1.4 there is a bit of spherical aberrations, and most of all the plane of focus is paper thin anyway), the Minolta 35/2 (kinda legendary), the Minolta 85/1.4, the Minolta 200/2.8 (these last two will cost a bit, around 500 to 700€, but they're worthy, and the 200 is apparently still super sharp paired with the 1.4 Apo).

 

About the Minolta 35/1.4 I've read contrasting reviews, from "wow" to "not capable of handling high res sensors", so maybe try it before you buy it.

 

You can check user generated reviews on Dyxum (filter them for 36mp sensors to isolate the ones of A7r owners). 

 

If you can, prefer the RS versions, they have an updated (as in "faster") focus motor.

 

I've just gone this road myself, and even if I haven't had the chance to shoot that much with my newly acquired lenses (the end of the year is always crazy times!) I've been quite impressed for now.

[Ryan5]

Wow that's a very interesting perspective addicted2light and potentially game changing for me. I'm confused though with regard to the Minolta lenses, are they autofocus capable with the adapter or are they only manual? I've seen various reviews saying both, whilst some others say that they autofocus but very very slowly. I'm please go the Minolta route if they autofocus.

[Austrokiwi]

Buying an A7r instead of the A7rII was a huge and easily avoided mistake, so I wonder at the quality of your pre-purchase research.   

[Ryan5]

Buying an A7r instead of the A7rII was a huge and easily avoided mistake, so I wonder at the quality of your pre-purchase research.   

And for the life of me I can't help but wonder if after 10 posts in the thread already, that the best comment you could chime in with (as an advanced member) was a question that had already been established clearly already.... hands down the most unhelpful post in this whole thread - must be a kiwi thing

[addicted2light]

Wow that's a very interesting perspective addicted2light and potentially game changing for me. I'm confused though with regard to the Minolta lenses, are they autofocus capable with the adapter or are they only manual? I've seen various reviews saying both, whilst some others say that they autofocus but very very slowly. I'm please go the Minolta route if they autofocus.

 

 

Minolta glass is available in two lens lines: MC/MD are manual focus, the A-mount are AF. And their AF is not some kind of adaptation with the Sony, but it is natively supported by the LA-EA4 (they are the same as the new Sony A-mount lenses, just usually with older screw-drive focus motors and/or different optical schemes).

 

Minolta made (mostly excellent) manual focus lenses, the MC (later MD) line (well, technically it was called the SR mount, but almost nobody calls it this way...).

 

If memory serves me correctly, it was Minolta that introduced the first commercially available modern autofocus camera (i.e. not some kind of experimental thing like the Nikon F3AF that sold just a few units), the 7000.

 

When this happened, they decided to switch mount, and what now Sony calls the A-mount was borne (like Canon did with its switch from the FD to the Eos lens mount).

 

Obviously the two mounts are incompatible, especially because they share the same flange focal distance, so you cannot adapt old Minolta MC/MD lenses on the AF bodies without some kind of optics in between (essentially a multiplier that lengthen the focal length and gives you the space to insert an adapter).

 

But like I said, Minolta AF glass mounts natively on a Sony A-mount body, or on a Sony E-mount body with the LA-EA4. 

 

And another big plus, IMO, of Minolta glass (both old manual focus and new af lenses) is that they decided to sacrifice a bit of contrast/resistance to reflections across the line to achieve a perfectly matched color response among all the lenses! This can make a huge bonus, again IMO, when working on a cohesive project or assignment, the moment you start color correcting or color grading these shots....

 

Last time I forgot to mention another huge bonus of going the A-mount route: Zeiss glass!

 

If you prefer the "Zeiss look", or just for the sake of shaking things a bit, there are several fantastic Zeiss lenses available in A-mount: the 24mm f/2 Distagon is fantastic, the Zeiss 16-35/2.8 and 24-70/2.8 Vario-Sonnar are seriously really good for landscape, and fantastic for portraiture and such (basically the corners are not exceptional by today standards, but still pretty impressive). And at least to my eyes they don't render harshly / clinically like some new glass does (they're Sonnars after all...), while still being super sharp.

 

And in a "Zeiss format" are available as well a 50/1.4 Planar and a 85/1.4 Planar, and the legendary 135/1.8 (a Sonnar, so with a smooooooth bokeh and scary sharp).

 

Finally some Minolta lenses I forgot to mention that, even if still bloody expensive, might be on your radar: the white Minolta 80-200/2.8 and 70-200/2.8, and the Minolta (also in Sony version) 135 STF (Smoot Transition Focus), a lens with a built-in apodization filter for smooth bokeh in portraiture and such, much like the Fuji 56/1.2 APD.

[Dollanganger]

Sorry to hear about your problem.

 

Honestly, give the A77II a chance. No it's not fully frame but you'll be blown away by the results especially the fast focusing. There's also the new A99II. While I haven't had the honor of using it's reported to be very fast.

 

The Sony A mount models still have the focusing motor built into the body of the camera itself like all (most) film SLRs did. Nikon is the only other company (generally) to even offer this feature in it's high end SLRs like the D800.

 

Any old school Minolta lens snaps right onto an A mount and those Minolta lenses were built TO LAST! They're still top performers. 

[Bellissimo Foto]

I replaced my Leica equipment and replaced them with an A7 M II when it first came out.  I love it.  I use it constantly and never had a problem.  I use it with Sony lenses, including the 70 - 200, Nikon, Canon, and Leica lenses.  I had more trouble with three new Leicas.  Hope it helps.  

Do you have the "black out" period after a shot with the A7mii?  A7ii has that split second after hitting the shutter that there's that blackout and it's annoying

[Zé De Boni]

It does seem, reading many, many posts on the matter, 

that users of the basic a7-II are well satisfied with little 

or no real problems, while the users of the a7R-II and 

a7S-II are plagued with plagues.

 

I guess the reason for this is because A7RII is the choice of pros, many of them migrating from other brands. Therefore they are have more expectancies from the new system and naturally are more critic. The A7 and A7II did not offer enough features to attract pros using high end Canikons.

I don't agree with the suggestions for trying old cameras (A77II) and lenses (Minoltas), mostly because your active on a competitive field where innovation is a key to the business.

I have 2 A99 bodies, 1 A77II and 1 A77 (almost forgot, 1 A900 DSLR!!). I've used all these lenses on it: Sony ZA 16-35mm f/2.8, Sony ZA 24mm f/2, Sigma Art 35mm f/1.4, Sony 50mm f/1.4*, Sigma 70mm f/2.8 Macro*, Sony ZA 85mm f/1.4*, Sony 100mm f/2.8 Macro*, Sony ZA 135mm f/1.8*, Minolta HS 200mm f/2.8*, Minolta HS 300mm f/2.8* and Minolta HS 600mm f/4*.

I tested all them on my A7RII with the LA-EA3 adapter. Lenses marked with * use screw-driven focus (no internal motor) and so they were used in manual focus. The only of these "manual focus" lenses that could justify the LA-EA4 adapter was the 300. I was surprised to see that the 85, 135 and 200 could not give good results as I get in the old cameras from wide to average apertures. I still want to repeat the test in more conditions, but what I can say now is that the FE 70-200 f/4 can outresolve all them and gives me great images on the A7RII and A6000. I keep the 24mm (not so great on the borders) and the 35mm (really great!!) in my A7RII bag, they work fine with the mirrorless adapter.

I cannot stand the idea of a mirror box lens adapter to be used on a mirrorless camera! This is just an improvisation so that you may keep using the glasses that you already rely on while you are still on transition to mirrorless. All those lenses have limited functions on the new system, so if you already blaming on your camera, why should you buy something else to blame on. If the mirror box should be the solution, then get back to a DSLR or SLT body. The A99II seems to combine features from both worlds. I am planning to get one, since I have all those lenses and more accessories, but I wonder if the results of the old lenses on its 42MP sensor will be as disappointing as what I got on the A7RII. I shall repeat my tests before I take this decision. I hope to post it in this forum.

The fact is that I am fully satisfied with the A7RII, despite all the flaws, mainly the refresh time. Truly, I have more expectations on its future substitute, A9, A7RII, whatever.

Now, about your A7R: if you can't get a good price for it, them consider keeping it. As you may notice on my camera list, I keep my old bodies, since I cannot get paid enough for a quite used one (can't get E- score at B&H or 8 in Adorama). The old stuff is still useful as backup or for different setups. My work is quite different from yours, I do mostly nature and still. In the studio I have my repro system always ready, so one A99+Macro is always there. The other A99 I have converted to Infrared. That's my option. I am sure that you may find a better use for your A7R than change it for a few dimes! And I hope you can earn and save enough to buy a camera more suited to your needs.

And just to add more fuel to the discussion about shifting systems: Since 2001, when I bought my first digital I have gone from Nikon (D100, D70, D70s, D200) to Canon (D1s MkIII), back to Nikon (D3X, Fuji IR) and then to Sony (as listed above). My transition to Sony was gradual, I kept Nikon for a while until I got sure that the SLT had good performance. I've always hated mirrors, raising it on 90% of my shots. The mirrorless camera was obvious the advance that I expected. I praise so much what this system allows. The flaws that I may get are nothing as compared to what I've left behind.

[MikeOfBonsall]

It does seem, reading many, many posts on the matter, 

that users of the basic a7-II are well satisfied with little 

or no real problems, while the users of the a7R-II and 

a7S-II are plagued with plagues. One could speculate  

that users of the basic model more easily satisfied cuz 

the price is so reasonable while the price of the R and 

S variants greatly raises expectations .... but it seems 

plain enuf that most of the troubles with the higher line 

models are not merely a case of failing to meet higher

expectations associated with paying twice the price of 

the basic a7-II. 

 

This is very true and wise. One of the reasons I started out with Alpha on the base 7ii. I got an open box from B&H with the base 28-70 for $1650, but paying $1500 more for the S before I was 100% convinced this was a camera for me (moving from EX1) seemed risky.

[addicted2light]

[...] I've always hated mirrors, raising it on 90% of my shots. The mirrorless camera was obvious the advance that I expected. I praise so much what this system allows. The flaws that I may get are nothing as compared to what I've left behind.

 

 

+1

 

More, after Nikon I went to Canon. And once in their camp I didn't just raise the mirror essentially all the times, but thanks to Magic Lantern* and the extensive boost in functionalities it gave me I stayed as well in Live View all the times...so the transition to mirrorless wasn't just "painless", but "overdue".

 

*it really showed that the mods were made by people using the cameras themselves, because they were extremely useful and not at all gadget-y

 

 

Back to the OP question, I forgot to add that to have a preview of the A-mount Minolta lenses performance (nothing beats trying the lenses yourself, but this is the next best thing) you might want to take a look at the following site (it's mostly in German with sections in English, but first of all most of it it's pretty self-explanatory being composed by images with technical data underneath, and secondly Google Translate does a decent job).

 

1) Here he tested the A-mount glass on the A99:

 

http://www.artaphot.ch/minolta-sony-af/objektiv-vergleiche

 

2) Here you can find the technical data and for some lens a few more opinions from other photographers for all the A-mount glass:

 

http://www.artaphot.ch/minolta-sony-af/objektive

 

3) The guy wrote as well an entire book about A-mount glass, and now after a few years has put it online for free:

 

http://www.artaphot.ch/minolta-sony-af/alpha-systembuch

 

Lastly, and about this I tend to disagree with Zé De Boni comment, at least taken what he said as a blanket statement: old glass, in pure optical terms, it isn't necessarily worse than new glass, actually it can even be better.

 

If you don't believe me just check the section about Minolta MC/MD (manual focus) glass of the same site, where he compared, on the A7 and A7R II, old Minolta and Leica lenses against the latest Sony FE glass. Lenses like the 35/1.8 (I've had one, and I can confirm it is a stellar lens) are still extremely capable in pure optical terms, IMO.

 

http://artaphot.ch/minolta-sr/objektiv-vergleiche

[Ambient Lightscapes]

A7R might be good... but as a second or third camera, if you mount a manual wide-angle lens and don't swap it.

Longer lenses can cause shutter vibrations at certain speeds...

 

It is very lightweight and compact... and some people enjoy shooting with manual lenses... as a hobby... Focusing would not be difficult because of peaking and the depth of field...

[lifeofdavid]

I also moved from 10+ years as a Nikon owner and a D800 to a A7r and have a soft spot for it.  I used it for 2+ years doing mostly portraits. I never learned to love the shutter sound but found single point autofocus accurate and really well suited for portraiture. There are some quirks, especially with specific lenses, that you have to take the time to learn but after that the camera is more that useable as a primary body. The image quality is fantastic too. 

[Bruce48trains]

I am so glad it's not just me ! Switched from Nikon full frame only for weight factor.

 

I cannot get a clear, crisp image with this Sony. AND, the menus are not user friendly at all.

 

Going to sell it and go back to my Nikon.

 

Anybody have any suggestions?

 

Bruce

[addicted2light]

I am so glad it's not just me ! Switched from Nikon full frame only for weight factor.

I cannot get a clear, crisp image with this Sony. AND, the menus are not user friendly at all.

Going to sell it and go back to my Nikon.

Anybody have any suggestions?

Bruce

Nikon uses - or at least used to - a lot more default sharpening than other manufacturers, Canon included.

 

With Sony raws as a starting point I generally use something around Amount 35 / Detail 50 / Masking from 5 to 10, plus, if I'm using legacy glass, a 10 to 20 points of Clarity. This gives me a starting point much closer to Fuji, for example, in terms of detail at 100%.

 

Obviously you will have to tailor these settings to your taste / subjects / lenses / ISOs.

 

And please keep in mind I shoot 90% of the times at 50 ISO. If you go higher you probably may want to add a bit of Luminance and Color noise reduction (nothing crazy, 10-15 points should do the trick).

[pfogle]

Sorry to be late to the party, but just wanted to add my 2c worth.

 

I got the A7R used cos it's really not expensive for a full frame camera. I've used it for pro portraits, advertising and studio still life, all with the 24-70 f4 (occasionally the 28mm f2 instead) and never had a problem. It's best on a tripod, and I'm not worried about speed. The lenses are great (no-one looks at corners in my line of work!) and the resolution more than enough.

 

I know it has flaws, but if you can work within them, I think it's a great camera. I'd really love to upgrade, I admit, but moneys too tight to mention

[jonneymendoza01]

you got the wrong camera, not sure what research you were looking at but even the A7RII is not the fastest AF out there....a 810 or 800 would be better...

there is also the AF issue with the latest A7RII firmware which pretty much makes it hard to use the body with most lenses (mostly the newest ones, incl GM, how much fun is that) in a studio environment or over f 4 or 5.6 since the iris does not open and the AF has to hunt through the closed iris....there is that and that at f8 it switches to even slower contrast detection....for outside shooting this is ok, for studio flash shooting (or any commercial shooting environment really) this is almost unusable....

don't get me wrong, i do love the A7RII and the files it delivers but Sony has to work on firmware, menus and providing improvements for older bodies (like the A7R)

but it won't be long before the new bodies will be out, so i won't wait for sony to improve on what i have....

Well said. This is why I still use a Canon for studio work

 

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