Sony A7R III, full review

With the official announcement

A7R III

Sony continues its aggressive foray into the professional photographic segment. The A7 A7R A7S series was a true discovery in 2013, and Sony quickly built on that success in 2015 by offering 3 more cameras: the A7 II, A7R II, A7S II.

I must say that the A7R and A7R II turned out to be the most interesting devices for a photographer: a regular A7 could not offer anything special compared to a budget “full frame” from Canon and Nikon, and the S series was purchased, as a rule, for shooting video – for modern commercial photography it lacked neither speed nor megapixels. Another thing about the A7R and A7R II – the former at a very affordable price offered a superb 36-megapixel sensor with a wide dynamic range, but, however, was too slow for all scenes involving at least some dynamics. The A7R II basically closed the speed question, with 399 phase focus points covering most of the frame, and a new powerful processor that not only detected faces but also focused directly on the eyes of the model.

Added five-axis image stabilization based on sensor shift, resolution rose even higher to 42 megapixels., while maintaining a wide dynamic range, allowing this camera to be compared even with the medium format its lower segment . On top of that, the A7R II was good at shooting video, with solid phase focusing, optical stabilization and 4K detail. It wasn’t all rosy, of course: despite such significant evolution, the A7R II continued to carry the rudimentary traits of the first amateur A7, and there were many. Camera ergonomics remained far from perfect.

The lack of a joystick and touch screen slowed down the shooting quite a bit, with many actions, such as changing the focus point, requiring a series of pushes. Tangled, loosely organized menus didn’t help much in this case. The camera’s autonomy was several times worse than its DSLR rivals, partly because of low battery capacity, and partly because a mirrorless camera requires constant power to the sensor which is quite costly , whereas DSLRs have only small focus and exposure metering sensors working constantly.

One memory card slot in the professional segment didn’t look serious, especially if it’s a slot for not the fastest SD UHS-I cards. Finally, in terms of continuous shooting speed, the A7R II also lagged behind the competition with its 5 frames per second. Another thing is that the simplicity of design above all, the absence of the mirror unit and pentaprism allowed Sony to keep the price much lower than its competitors from Canon and Nikon, and it had an effect – the A7R II became one of the most popular and sold pro-segment cameras worldwide, and even the Japanese earthquakes that put the Sony plant in Kumamoto out of action in 2016 could not prevent this.

And now here comes the A7R III. To Sony’s credit, the corporation took the constructive criticism seriously, so the novelty is nothing like the amateur A7. Forget about the hassle of focusing: the A7R III includes both a joystick AF and a touch screen. One-touch point change. Added the AF-ON button, extremely useful when tracking your subject for long periods of time: if you use the half-press focus on the shutter release instead, there’s a chance of releasing the button after the first shot and losing focus for a moment. Sony also claims to have doubled the effectiveness of its Eye AF function – the camera now tracks more persistently and doesn’t rush to switch to other subjects if your model turns away for a second or covers part of her face. This function also works in conjunction with continuous focus AF-C and continuous shooting: great news for any portrait photographer.

Also, the AF sensitivity in low light is improved by about 1 step, although it continues to depend on the aperture of your lens: up to -4 EV at F1.4, -3 EV at F2 or -1 EV at F4. Recall that -3 EV is roughly equivalent to full moon light. In total the camera has 399 phase focus points and another 425 contrast focus points. All points work when connecting A mount lenses from Sony SLR cameras using the LA-EA3 adapter.

The continuous shooting is also twice as fast. The A7R III can shoot up to 10 frames per second – with autofocus and AE working. You can use both the “silent” electronic shutter and the regular mechanical shutter. Note that using an electronic shutter can result in artifacts, most notably distortion “rolling shutter” effect , but also streaking when shooting under artificial light, etc.d. Burst length: 76 frames when shooting in JPEG or compressed RAW 12 bit and 28 frames when shooting in 14-bit RAW without compression.

Reduced to 8 fps allows you to use the viewfinder in Live View mode with minimal image delay. The viewfinder, by the way, is new, with a very high resolution: 3.69 million. points vs. 2.36 million. on the A7R II. Besides the increased resolution, the viewfinder can now also operate at a high refresh rate: 100 or 120 Hz depending on mode, PAL or NTSC , this should completely eliminate flicker if you’ve noticed it in the A7R II viewfinder and make the picture as smooth as possible.

It also uses a new shutter mechanism that brakes down at the end of the shutter release, which prevents the possibility of micro-smearing from striking the shutter. Even more interesting: the A7R III can shoot 10 frames per second

with flash

(if your flash is good enough for that speed , while even the A9 is limited to just 5 frames per second when using flash.

The sensor on the A7R III remains the same, which doesn’t prevent it from being one of the best 35mm format sensors. It’s an Exmor R CMOS sensor with backlit micro-lens anti-reflective coating. Dynamic range according to the Sony statement is as much as 15 steps, including through the use of 16-bit analog-to-digital conversion ADC – in the A7R II used 14-bit. By comparison, according to independent DXOMark tests, the Sony A9’s range is about 12.5 steps, the Canon 5D Mark IV – 13.5, Sony A7R II 14, Nikon D810, D850 almost 15. These figures refer to “base” sensitivity only: the higher the ISO, the lower the dynamic range becomes. Why it matters: In uncontrolled lighting conditions, the wide dynamic range allows the photographer to “rescue” details that turn out to be over- or underexposed. Essential for all photographers working outside the studio.

A7R III has a new processor, which is still called the Bionz X, and more powerful by about 1.8x, which gives the camera the ability to use more sophisticated demosaicing and noise reduction algorithms. According to Sony, we can talk about improving “noise reduction” by a full step in the medium ISO range. The maximum sensitivity in standard mode is raised to 32,000 ISO, and remains unchanged in extended mode: ISO 102,400. Also the transfer of skin tones has been significantly improved.

The camera stabilizer is also more efficient: the A7R II had a CIPA-measurement efficiency of 4.5 exposure steps, the A7R III has 5.5 steps. Metering was done with a 50mm lens, and at other focal lengths the figures may differ. As before, the in-camera IS can work together with the IS in the lens, which is most useful with long zoom lenses. The A7R III can take four exposures by shifting the sensor by 1 pixel, for processing in the accompanying software.

This mode allows you to surpass the limitations of Bayerian color separation and achieve maximum detail without moiré and false colors. There are some limitations: the camera requires at least one second between shots to expose the sensor, so this mode is not suitable for moving objects. It’s best suited for subjects, interiors and art prints. Second limitation: You can’t do the alignment inside the camera, only on a PC.

The A7R III battery is taken from the A9 – it’s NP-FZ100. When measured according to CIPA standards, it produces 650 shots when using the LCD monitor or 530 when using the viewfinder. That’s almost twice the speed of the A7R II. The same goes for video: at least 100 minutes of recording with focus and image stabilization working versus 50 minutes for the A7R II. There’s a battery grip too, taken from the A9: it’s the VG-C3EM, which holds two NP-FZ100 batteries and about doubles the battery life of the camera. A7R III, like the A7R II, can operate from an external power source connected via USB – AC adapter or universal external battery.

Interfaces: the Sony A7R III is probably the first camera to have 2 USB ports at once: USB 2.0 micro B and USB 3.1 type C. This was obviously done for compatibility with Sony’s existing wired remotes, which are available under USB micro B, and the USB 3.1 C is for quick file transfer and remote shooting from a PC PC Tethering . Unfortunately, Sony doesn’t yet offer anything for wired or wireless LAN connections to the camera and remote FTP downloads, unlike competitors. But there is a port for wired flash sync PC Sync – apparently for those places where radio communication is prohibited.

Sony A7R III with VG-C3EM battery grip : dust and moisture protection scheme

Videography: Sony A7R III has a fairly confident phase focusing, which, complete with a touch screen allows you to shoot a decent quality video: just touch the desired object with your finger on the screen for the camera to focus on it and then track its movements. The A7R III can record 4K video in two modes: either using the full width of the sensor, or using only the APS-C cropped format, also known as the Super 35 format, in video production terms.

The second option is usually preferred: firstly, it reduces the effect of distortion from the rolling shutter, and secondly, the camera does not skip lines, but instead does even “oversampling”, t.e. 5K recording 15MP. up to 4K 8MP compression format. , which provides more detail. Capture speed remains the same: 24, 25 or 30 fps, recording formats: XAVC S or AVCHD 2.0, maximum bitrate when recording to card: 100 Mbps, H codec.264. Can shoot in Full HD at up to 120 frames per second. A7R III can also save 2 files at the same time: a full-size 4K and a small Proxy 720p, this is done for ease of processing on a computer: you first adjust the image using the light 720p, and then simply apply the same changes to the 4K track and send it for export.

There is a 3.3.5mm microphone input, headphones output and HDMI output for clear signal transmission to external monitor or recorder. The camera is compatible with XLR-K1M XLR-K2M handheld mixers, which allow you to use two microphones at the same time: for example, the handheld and the handheld, to record interviews. It will also likely be possible to use the NPA-MQZ1K 4-battery adapter providing more than 6.5 hours of battery life . For advanced processing, the A7R III offers the new S-Log 3 S-Gamut 3 gamut, which provides up to 14 steps of dynamic range.

Older versions are also supported: S-Log 2, ITU709, ITU709 [800%] etc. It has such professional features as time code, user bit, zebra pattern, focus pic. In addition, the camera can record in Hybrid Log Gamma mode, which requires no additional processing when viewed on new HDR monitors and some TV models. Support for image profiles allows you to calibrate color reproduction and apply it to all cameras by loading the desired file from a memory card – this, by the way, works for both photos and video.

2 memory cards: a very important point for those who want to be covered in case of card failure. The Sony A7R III accepts 2 SD cards, but the slots are different: one is compatible with UHS-I/-II standards, while the other only supports the relatively slow UHS-I. Not really sure why, because it can cause problems in continuous shooting photos with duplicate recording on both cards, but it’s done as done. In the A9, by the way, is done exactly the same.

Tiny details: firstly, all disks in the camera are redesigned for ease of operation, especially the disk on the back, which has become much more “tight”, as on the Sony A9. 11 buttons on the casing can be reassigned at will, separately for photo and video. Flicker detection was added in artificial light, eliminating the effects of uneven exposure light or dark streaks and preventing dispersion of light exposure in burst shots. Unfortunately, the ability to install Playmemories Camera Apps is gone, which is unfortunate because they included, for example, automatic uploading of shots to a smartphone, advanced smartphone remote control mode including shutter speed and continuous shooting , automatic time-lapse video creation, and so on.

How the A7R III looks compared to the competition? Obviously, the A7R III’s main competitor will be the Nikon D850. Sony’s camera is faster in bursts: 10 frames per second versus 7, but loses in burst length – in RAW 14 bit the D850 can shoot up to 51 frames, while the A7R III is limited to 28 that’s less than 4 seconds at 8 fps , in JPEG and RAW 12 bit the difference is even greater: 170 versus 76. With the D850, again, both sockets are fast: XQD and SD UHS-II, with the A7R III one of them is slow, SD UHS-I.

Sony’s considerable advantage is the built-in image stabilizer. On the other hand, it loses out on the choice of optics, most noticeably in the long range. If you can borrow wide angle or special lenses macro, tilt-shift, fiche from other systems with adapters after all, it doesn’t work with long range optics: it’s almost impossible to focus manually on a moving target with focal length of 200 or more, and Metabones adapters are not much help in this case either.

Sony’s disadvantages also include a lack of remote shooting solutions, including multiple cameras. Both Canon and Nikon offer accessories for remote file transfer directly to FTP or HTTP servers, allowing remote control of a virtually unlimited number of cameras and literally instantaneous transfer of sources to anywhere in the world, all it takes is an Internet connection. Sony is still only making steps in this direction: in A7R III there is shooting from a PC, but only by USB. The camera has Wi-Fi, but it does not allow you to “connect” the camera with a computer, only to load images already taken and slowly .

If you don’t take extreme uses, the A7R III is already more than competitive. The strong point is video shooting, which will be able to do even those who are not professionals in this field. Shoot an interview or news clip from the scene, make a record for a video blog or save for the home archive of the children’s performance it can easily, although video is still an auxiliary function here.

Overall, the camera looks very solid – we started the review with a description of the A7R II to make it more visible the way Sony has gone in just 2 years. Much of the “legacy” of the amateur A7 is a thing of the past, the list of arguments “against” is much shorter. In terms of image quality, the last A7R II proved itself to be excellent in this area, as mentioned at the outset. How well the A7R III will show itself in real life, remains to be seen, but at first information impressions are positive.

The Sony A7R III goes on sale in America in December 2017. Pre-order is available at any of our retail stores or directly from our website.