The Sony A7 thread [Merged]

[Guest malland]

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Just want to thank the moderator(s) for merging the seven A7/A7R threads into one,since it saves times and avoids having to wade through parallel discussions.

 

—Mitch/Paris

Tristes Tropiques [WIP]

[Guest malland]

...Also, and this'll grate, of all the hold up and show photographers that say even the Leica blog showcases, how many are crisp, edge to edge focused, full DR smooth tonal transitions etc? Almost none in the M camp. Quite the opposite. Blurry, emotional, crushed blacks, gritty, earthy etc. Leica S seems different,covert polished, studio, tonal dexterity etc. always puzzles me that the M crowd talk "S" but shoot "TriX", if you see what I mean?

Interesting thought, but the point is, in my view, that with the M9/M-E/M240/M-M you have the choice of going either for the "medium-format look" or the "35mm aesthetic," and that for the latter it's great, in terms of flexibility, to be able to start with a pristine file that you then process to what you want — in other words there are different forms of "crushed Tri-X" possibilities. One issue in learning to process M-Monochrom, is to master the destruction of pristine, exquisite look that it offers: for example, when you go for high-contrast, you can still keep rich mid-tones.

 

—Mitch/Paris

Tristes Tropiques [WIP]

[K-Photo]

Jochen, ja, das macht keinen Sinn. But you can contact a moderator to let them know about this mistake.

 

—Mitch/Paris

 

Doing this by mistake ?

 

I've opened a thread and maybe I'll get an explaination.

 

http://www.l-camera-forum.com/leica-forum/ueber-das-leica-forum/305208-zusammenlegung-der-sony-threads.html

 

Btw., I like the new style of writing one half german und die andere Hälfte in Englisch like Du getan hast. :D

 

Jochen

[steveclem]

Thanks jd.

 

So the search continues for holy grail of non-Leica digital cameras for Leica M wides.

 

 

Why do you want or need an alternative for wides when you have the superlative M and MM ?

 

Not necessarily aimed at you Mark but all this stress over the performance with wides is skewed to my mind. Use the Sony for R lenses, longer lenses like the 75 1.4 etc and leave the wides on the machine they work best with.

The M aint so good with longer or R lenses, the Sony aint so good with wides, see where this is going?

[andybarton]

Apologies if this merging has caught a German thread.

 

I will go through the thousands of posts and move them back later.

[MarkP]

Not taken personally Clem. I posted it as a general comment regarding the hype because I do indeed have the superlative M and Monochrom . Having said that, I was considering selling my now virtually unused M9 and getting an A7R (only if it performed well with all of my Leica lenses which seem not to be the case.

 

But it is clear from all of this activity that there is a strong demand for an affordable and reliable, high quality M-mount EVF camera.

[MarkP]

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Wake up call:

 

 

http://www.ronscheffler.com/techtalk/?p=224

 

 

 

Muahahahahahahahaha....

 

Hmmm.

 

Well thats the equivalent of playing Julia from Pampered Menial (who remembers Pavlov's Dog from the 1970s) - no faster way to shut down a party

[jonoslack]

HI There John

 

That's not really how I read him.

 

My interpretation of what he's saying is that the RF on the M(240) is better than anything to date. Quiet a few people have made this observation (I asked Leica directly, and they confirmed that the RF is new, and could not be retrofitted to my M9P and Monochrom). So, something is new.

 

Certainly is something new - it's undoubtedly 'more accurate' than previous rangefinders. Tim and others have also suggested that focusing with the RF is usually more accurate than using the EVF - I don't think this is a reflection of any limitation of the Leica EVF . . . (although of course it does have limitations). I think the focus peaking works very well.

 

The RF is still only good for hitting the best focal point in the middle of the frame. Nothing more. For off centre subjects, you focus and recompose, and take your chances one the subject being in focus - if the plane of best focus is a straight line perpendicular to the direction of the camera, and if hitting the exact spot is critical (a shallow depth of field lens like the AA 90 or 75), then you have a problem. You will either need to lean back slightly, or bring (guess) the focus in slightly as the subject will be slightly closer.

 

.. . . . . or practice - I'm pretty clear which way the focal plane wanders with different lenses, but the honest truth is, if your subject is moving, then recomposing is not an option, and nor is focus peaking or an EVF. There isn't a real solution . . . . except to ensure that you have a static subject and a decent tripod (in which case the EVF on the M is as good as that on the Sony). . . . .

 

 

Either way, it's a guess, and if the plane of best focus wanders, as Tim suggests is more common than we might think (the 35 Summilux ASPH (FLE) being a case in point), then you have a real problem.

 

I love Tim's articles, and I deeply respect his quest for the very best image quality - but to me it sometimes seems like angels dancing on the heads of pins.

 

I can see lots of reasons for the Sony A7r (I have one on order), but honestly, if I'm on a shoot I get very few out of focus images, and I'd much rather use an RF than an EVF (even a really good one like those on the Sony or the Olympus E-M1 which I also have).

 

I'm increasingly doubtful about the corners on the Sony (I still don't really believe that microlenses alone - without lens specific firmware - is going to do the trick). But I'll wait and see on that one.

 

. . . . . . .but to me it still boils down to whether or not you like to shoot with a Rangefinder - simple as that - if you do, then the Sony is no alternative to an M, and if you don't, then the Leica M is a really serious waste of money - I can't see that the image quality is going to be different enough to be a deciding factor (unless the corners on the Sony don't work for wides).

 

All the best

[Guest malland]

. . . . . . .but to me it still boils down to whether or not you like to shoot with a Rangefinder - simple as that - if you do, then the Sony is no alternative to an M, and if you don't, then the Leica M is a really serious waste of money - I can't see that the image quality is going to be different enough to be a deciding factor (unless the corners on the Sony don't work for wides)...

Absolutely, about shooting with a rangefinder, As Edward Karaa has suggested the A7/A7R are really aimed at the Zeiss lenses designed for these camares. As for the image quality of the Sony vs the M-digital cameraa, what you state in true in general, but not if you like the the (special) image qualities of the M-Monochrom or believe, as I do, that the M9/M-E have a unique color rendition (on which you and I have agreed to disagree).

 

—Mitch/Paris

Tristes Tropiques [WIP]

[Lightwrangler]

That's not the A7R and not sure which adapters. My understanding is that the adapter is a critical part if the IQ chain. But I've never used even one adapter, so I've gone for the best for my back to back testing next month.

 

It's certainly not the adapter. And the A7r is predicted to perform even worse.

 

Just have a look at the Summicron 28 samples at f 2.0. The edges are smeared like hell, while the center is quite ok. It's definitely the predicted corner problem with RF lenses.

 

'cron 28 ASPH A7 Corner:

Welcome, dear visitor! As registered member you'd see an image here…

Simply register for free here – We are always happy to welcome new members!

 

'cron 28 ASPH A7 Center:

 

Picture from Ron Scheffler: http://www.ronscheffler.com/techtalk/?p=224

 

Longer lenses look better, but to be honest even the 'lux 50 ASPH does not really shine on the A7 yet.

 

Mike

[andybarton]

With apologies, I have now moved over 150 posts from this thread back to the German side of the forum.

 

Earlier, I merged all threads relating to the Sony A7 with English titles, not realising that this long thread on the German side ALSO had an English title. If there is a rogue stray post left, let me know and I can move that too.

 

In future, could people who see multiple threads that could be merged, please, please ask a Mod before they get to 7+ threads and 1600 posts. DON'T just place a post in a thread, as Mods do not read every post in every thread in every section.

 

Thanks.

 

[Guest malland]

Thanks for the effort on this, Andy; and for unscrambling the German-English omelette. Some of us, who complained about the seven parallel threads, should indeed have contacted you. Sorry.

 

—Mitch/Paris

Tristes Tropiques [WIP]

[andybarton]

No problem. Just half an hour of my life I will never see again...

[NJH]

Who else makes a really high quality 70-200 F4 zoom apart from Canon? I don't know about anyone else but a single body that can take a lens like that when you need it but swap out to lightweight compact normal focal length lenses when you don't is a big deal. Still an open question though to what degree this system delivers on that promise.

[edwardkaraa]

But dwbell, most of the zooms are about f4. The primes are not so fast either, for primes. And, I think it would be a stretch to think these kit like lenses from Sony-Zeiss are going to compare to Zeiss or M lens primes. It just seems such a bore. Why would I shoot these snoozers when I can mount (on the camera I mean) a M lens or an R lens on the M240.

 

I'm starting to think I'll just stick to the RX1...

 

The 55/1.8 and 85/1.8 are not particularly slow. The 35/2.8 was designed as a pancake lens so that it doesn't affect the sales of he RX1. A 35/2 will follow in 2015. A 24mm should also come by end of next year at the latest, as well as a macro lens. What more de we need?

[IkarusJohn]

John,

 

information coming out on parallel threads suggests that the Leica wides will be a problem on the A7R. Like me you use tour 21mm and 28mm a lot so I think this will be a problem. I'm not going to buy an A7R only for 50mm to 135mm. However I will keep my order until this is clarified.

 

Regarding your comment about central focusing with the rangefinder you would recall that in the days of our film SLRs, more critical focusing was done with the centre split prism or the surrounding micro-prism collar and then recomposed. So nothing has really changed although obviously with the Leica its only the rangefinder prism or hyperfocal technique.

 

 

ps. you really should go and have a play with the M240 if you haven't had a chance to do so yet. I think you would be very surprised.

 

Cheers Mark.

 

I haven't actually seen anything yet taken with the A7R. Can you point me in the right direction. The stuff linked so far has be A7.

 

My F5 allowed the focus spot to be moved wherever I wanted, even with manual focus lenses and focus confirmation. That was 20 years ago?

 

I'm not holding out - just waiting for something more substantial than a snap judgment from the LCD monitor, which apparently only showed vignetting. Having said that, if it doesn't work with wides, I'm not interested.

 

The M(240)? With yesterday's EVF, a first generation sensor, and a fixed focal point, and a huge price the camera doesn't do it for me. To be honest, I'm still not over the ease with which they abandoned the CCD sensor on the M8, and the crap about the mini-M.

 

You and I are in service industries. If you have an unhappy patient, you go the extra mile. A client of mine says jump, I ask how high. Don't know about you, but much like Leica, I charge at the top of the market, because I'm a specialist. I don't treat my clients with the arrogance and conceit Leica treat sits loyal customers.

 

I don't begrudge Leica their prices. But their attitude to their customers and new products, I loathe. Look, I don't mind people saying these are electronic products with a limited shelf life, though I view that attitude with pure contempt. Anything can be repaired, if you want it hard enough, and to my mind, we've paid for it. It seems to me that the only things Leica makes on the M(240) is the case and the profit.

 

I will switch to Sony in a heartbeat, if they can make this work. They're an electronics company, and I'd be very surprised if they bury their heads in the sand, hoping a problem will just go away, the way Leica has done. I've spent a huge amount on Leica over the last few years. I love my M9P and my Monochrom (and the glass), and it infuriates me that they cost so much, and at some point before I'm ready, Leica will just dump me. They already don't support the firmware on my digital cameras, and one of them is less than a year old.

 

Their product planning, quality control and long term support disgusts me. Having said that, so far, Customer Support in Solms has treated me really well. Can't complain. Similarly, the local distributor and dealers have been fantastic (as you well know).

 

But the rest - meh. I think they understand pricing, but they don't get how that fits with the obsolescence of electronic products.

 

Sorry for the rant, but I'll be sticking with my M9 & Monchrom (and my beautiful M3). Any further digital won't have a red dot, unless Leica seriously reconsiders what it's doing - unlikely with the amount of money they're making. I can't afford to throw away a $10,000 every few years because Leica hasn't properly secured spares, and can't manufacture anything better than yesterday's technology, won't support the firmware with further upgrades, and will just walk away without flinching.

 

Cheers

John

 

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD

[IkarusJohn]

It's certainly not the adapter. And the A7r is predicted to perform even worse.

 

I'm sorry, I must have been asleep under a rock somewhere - where was the A7r

predicted to be worse, by whom, and based on what?

 

I'm not defending this camera (I love my M9P and Monochrom, and using the rangefinder), but this looks like it might be a useful addition. I will cancel my order without hesitation if wides don't perform well with it.

 

I'm still waiting to see a single image taken with a Leica wide (21 Summilux or 28 Summicron would be great) with the A7r. If I've missed it, can someone point me in the right direction?

 

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD

[MarkP]

Cheers Mark.

 

I haven't actually seen anything yet taken with the A7R. Can you point me in the right direction. The stuff linked so far has be A7.

 

My F5 allowed the focus spot to be moved wherever I wanted, even with manual focus lenses and focus confirmation. That was 20 years ago?

 

I'm not holding out - just waiting for something more substantial than a snap judgment from the LCD monitor, which apparently only showed vignetting. Having said that, if it doesn't work with wides, I'm not interested.

 

The M(240)? With yesterday's EVF, a first generation sensor, and a fixed focal point, and a huge price the camera doesn't do it for me. To be honest, I'm still not over the ease with which they abandoned the CCD sensor on the M8, and the crap about the mini-M.

 

You and I are in service industries. If you have an unhappy patient, you go the extra mile. A client of mine says jump, I ask how high. Don't know about you, but much like Leica, I charge at the top of the market, because I'm a specialist. I don't treat my clients with the arrogance and conceit Leica treat sits loyal customers.

 

I don't begrudge Leica their prices. But their attitude to their customers and new products, I loathe. Look, I don't mind people saying these are electronic products with a limited shelf life, though I view that attitude with pure contempt. Anything can be repaired, if you want it hard enough, and to my mind, we've paid for it. It seems to me that the only things Leica makes on the M(240) is the case and the profit.

 

I will switch to Sony in a heartbeat, if they can make this work. They're an electronics company, and I'd be very surprised if they bury their heads in the sand, hoping a problem will just go away, the way Leica has done. I've spent a huge amount on Leica over the last few years. I love my M9P and my Monochrom (and the glass), and it infuriates me that they cost so much, and at some point before I'm ready, Leica will just dump me. They already don't support the firmware on my digital cameras, and one of them is less than a year old.

 

Their product planning, quality control and long term support disgusts me. Having said that, so far, Customer Support in Solms has treated me really well. Can't complain. Similarly, the local distributor and dealers have been fantastic (as you well know).

 

But the rest - meh. I think they understand pricing, but they don't get how that fits with the obsolescence of electronic products.

 

Sorry for the rant, but I'll be sticking with my M9 & Monchrom (and my beautiful M3). Any further digital won't have a red dot, unless Leica seriously reconsiders what it's doing - unlikely with the amount of money they're making. I can't afford to throw away a $10,000 every few years because Leica hasn't properly secured spares, and can't manufacture anything better than yesterday's technology, won't support the firmware with further upgrades, and will just walk away without flinching.

 

Cheers

John

 

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD

 

Oh I agree with everything you have written.

 

You're right that the images seen so far are only for the A7, so we need to wait for the A7R images to come out but I'm not holding my breath.

 

Regards,

Mark

[jonoslack]

The M(240)? With yesterday's EVF, a first generation sensor, and a fixed focal point, and a huge price the camera doesn't do it for me. To be honest, I'm still not over the ease with which they abandoned the CCD sensor on the M8, and the crap about the mini-M.

 

HI John

I hear what you say about Leica (although I don't agree with it all). This remark is sad though. It seems to me that if Leica had released the M(240) without EVF at all, and with the right colour profiles . . then lots of people like you would have been more than happy.

 

Much improved shutter (quieter, smoother, less lag).

Much improved rangefinder

Better buffer

Weather-sealed

Better WA lens profiles

 

Basically, it answered all the issues raised by the M9, and I'm afraid the CCD/CMOS argument really is a chimera - exacerbated by the fact that the colour profiles in the first firmware version were not right.

 

The 'mini-m' marketing was a catastrophe, the X-vario being the victim - if it's the kind of thing you want it takes very good pictures, but to call it a 'mini-m' was so outrageous that it's resonances are unlikely to stop.

 

But I really do think that if you're expecting Sony to provide a decent solution for mid to wide angled M lenses (whether from Leica or anyone else), then you're living in a fool's paradise. Sony are in the business of selling Zeiss lenses - not in making it easy for you to use your Leica lenses.

 

There seems to be a kind of consensus around here that the gapless/angled microlenses are there for the likes of us M users - I'm sure that they're there so that Sony can produce proper profiles for their own lenses . . . of course I could be wrong - it's possible that Sony will spend huge amounts of money on firmware so that other people will sell lenses instead of them . . . possible

 

Having said all this - I have an A7r on pre-order - but I'm not expecting to use it with Leica lenses - especially having seen the horrid mess the 28 'cron creates on the A7.

 

all the best

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[edwardkaraa]

Yes, for the part of the market that is not interested in the rangefinder and the uniqueness of the M-Monochrom image quality and the M9 color rendition. WIth respect to the latter it's the M240 that is the low-hanging fruit imho.

 

—Mitch/Paris

Tristes Tropiques [WIP]

 

Exactly my view. The M9 has a very special CCD color rendering at base iso and in terms of high iso not worse than the M with the latest raw converters. It might actually be better if you take the M high iso banding in consideration.

 

The Monochrom is in a class of its own.

 

The M240 apart from a few refinements to the RF mechanism has a very bland CMOS rendering and even a step backwards in terms of color shift due to the non offset microlenses.

 

If I was buying a Leica right now, I would go with the ME or the Monochrom. The M is an unfinished product IMHO.