Moving up to full frame, A 7rV versus A7iv? thoughts welcome

[Zia sony]

I have several of the apsc sony cameras, latest is A6600,anyone have experience with7 Rv and 74? Will be doing a little bit of birding, but mostly landscape and portrait.. Recently rented a 7rv from Borrow lenses and was amazed at the auto focus.Thanks for any thoughts.

[FunWithCameras]

The A7IV is a general purpose camera - it's a decent starting full-frame camera, but not specialised for any particular thing.

The A7RV is a specialist camera, focused on resolution - which means it gives you the most pixels and the greatest amount of detail.

Funnily enough, these cameras have about the same frame rate, and neither is great at running in electronic shutter mode.

I haven't owned an A7IV, but if you are budget constrained, and only want to buy one body, but have need of pretty good stills and pretty good video, then this is a reasonable choice.

If you can afford to concentrate on stills, and you are willing to pay more for the body, and you don't need a super fast frame rate, then the A7RV may be for you. The new AF really works. (interestingly, I've seen a few people putting it down without ever having tried it, but they seem to be convinced that their current camera can do everything the A7RV can do - I think we can guess who they are trying to convince...)

There are other bodies in the Sony range. Possibly the other key ones are the A9 - specialising in speed, and the A1 - combining speed and resolution with the highest price - mainly for people who want to carry just one body that can do pretty much everything that the others can.

I am currently using the A1 for speed, and the A7RV any time I don't need enormous speed. The A7RV has made me question how much speed I need, although that question had begun to arise before the A7RV came on the scene - sometimes I don't need 30fps, or 20fps, or even 15fps. Sometimes even 3fps is enough.

If you can afford the A7RV and still have some budget for lenses, and you are mostly interested in stills, then the A7RV is a fabulous camera. If it's more than you can sensibly afford, the A7IV may well be a smarter choice.

[thebeardedgroundsman]

The A7 range maybe aimed as a compromise for stills and video, but 33Mp on the mk iv is not to be sneezed at.

I take stills only, and would dream of owning the A7Rv ( I have an A7Rii) but I think I would be tempted to go with the A7iv and spend the extra on a better lens, particularly if I didn't have very good FE lenses already.

Personally, I don't like a fast frame rate - I have my burst speed set to low and get my fair share of keepers.

[FunWithCameras]

On 4/4/2023 at 2:13 AM, thebeardedgroundsman said:

The A7 range maybe aimed as a compromise for stills and video, but 33Mp on the mk iv is not to be sneezed at.

I take stills only, and would dream of owning the A7Rv ( I have an A7Rii) but I think I would be tempted to go with the A7iv and spend the extra on a better lens, particularly if I didn't have very good FE lenses already.

Personally, I don't like a fast frame rate - I have my burst speed set to low and get my fair share of keepers.

Yeah, I had my A1 set on 20fps when I started, and it can be massive overkill - I have things like 40 frames showing 2 seconds of an Aldabra tortoise - those guys don’t move much in 2 seconds 🙂   The one time I do like a fast burst is BiF (gives plenty of choices of wing position), but even 5fps can be enough a lot of the time.

[jeffj3]

I have both.  Just recently purchased the RV. Still love the IV.  The RV shutter is so quiet. HUGE files though.  The viewfinder is definitely a plus in the RV too.  What's your budget?  I'm thinking you'd love the IV to start and eventually save up for an RV in the future when they start going for good used pricing.  

[Architeuthis]

I have A7R5, but no A74. I think it is a matter of budget: A74 is an excellent camera, but A7R5 is even better. As far as I know there is nothing that a A74 can achieve that the A7R5 can do. In case you need to save on lenses, in case you take the A7R5, take A74. Otherwise A7R5 is the way to go...

Wolfgang^

[FunWithCameras]

On 4/7/2023 at 2:08 AM, jeffj3 said:

I have both.  Just recently purchased the RV. Still love the IV.  The RV shutter is so quiet. HUGE files though.  The viewfinder is definitely a plus in the RV too.  What's your budget?  I'm thinking you'd love the IV to start and eventually save up for an RV in the future when they start going for good used pricing.  

Well, you do have the options of two sizes of reduced resolution RAW if you want smaller files, but I have no intention of using reduced resolution "RAW" for my own shooting (I must point out that I'm shooting for myself, not professionally!) - I love getting all the pixels, where I can choose to scale them down, or crop them away. I thoroughly enjoy starting with 60Mp and having choices...