Sonyalpharumours has posted a firm rumour that there will be a full-frame NEX. Anyone who understands the design of camera bodies, and the geometry of optical projection, has known from the start that this was possible given the design of the E-mount.
Those who have made uninformed comments (all over web forums!) to the effect that the rear register is ‘too short’ or would cause problems simply don’t have their brains switched on. There is no such thing as a camera body which is too thin or a mount to focal plane register which is too short.
Sony already designs lenses for NEX APS-C which incorporate what amounts to an extension tube to push the rear nodal point and exit pupil positions as far forward as needed for optimum illumination and matching of off-axis ray bundles to the sensor’s microlenses, filter array and cover glasses. That’s why the 30mm Macro is not so very different in size from putting a 30mm f/2.8 Alpha SAM macro on an adaptor (and that’s why we do exactly that here!).
What matters for full frame is a correlation between the clear lens throat diameter (the bayonet mount inside width), the sensor size, and the register.
The NEX system uses an 18mm register. That is the term of the distance between the front surface of the bayonet mount on the body (or rear surface of the mount on the lens) to the sensel layer surface of the sensor. There is a very small adjustment made in all digital cameras for the four physical layers which usually go between the sensor and the lens: the RGB filter layer (so thin it has no effect), the microlens layer (again, no effect), the low-pass or anti-aliasing filter and the infra-red cut and protective self-cleaning outermost glass. These filters may be combined into a single glass but in NEX they remain separate.
The sensor requires an image circle of just under 30mm allowing for assembly tolerances of 0.5mm overall in positioning and conformance of the lens axis. If in-body stabilisation is used, this diameter must be increased to 35mm at least; some Konica Minolta documentation suggests that a clear diameter closer to 40mm was needed for the original AS/SSS.
For full-frame, the required image circle is 44mm and the maximum diameter for in-body stabilisation could be between 49mm and 54mm depending on how Sony’s statements about sensor travel are understood (“5mm in any direction” could mean the total scope is 5mm, or that 5mm travel from axis might be possible). A good idea of the actual travel of an APS-C sensor with IBIS is given by the Pentax K-5, which has a manual sensor shift function allowing the user to move the sensor off-axis for a slight rising or cross front effect – but only by 1.5mm. This sounds more realistic though it would, of course, be a great feature if you could shift a sensor 2.5mm or an extreme 5mm – every lens with enough coverage would become a PC lens!
Now let’s compare these image circles with the lens throat diameter and its distance from the focal plane.
The Alpha system has a register of 44.5mm and a clear lens throat internal diameter around 42mm. Allowing for the orientation of the film plane and the position of control connections and the electronic contact array, the Alpha mount ends up providing an almost exact fit for the optical projection path if a 45mm diameter image circle is needed. Even if a 2000mm non-telephoto lens was attached, its image would cover the sensor without physical shadow vignetting caused by the mount.
It is important to remember that a 44.5mm register allows space for the reflex mirror, but also allows the image forming light to spread out from a rear element positioned over a wide range of possible distances, from just inside the camera body (by about 5mm before the mirror would hit it) to a good three or four centimetres in front of the mount. This allows a larger overall image circle and indeed most SLR lenses produce one greater than 50mm diameter. That’s how the Alpha 900/850 is able to offer in-body SSS, and also why certain lenses show vignetted corners occasionally when SSS is active because their image circle is only just sufficient to cover the sensor in its central, parked position.
This is a very accurate representation of 24 x 36mm sensor areas excluding any of the surrounding assembly, showing that the internals of the E-mount could be modified to fit FF. The white line shows the 24 x 36mm in the sensor plane, relative to the APS-C sensor. The red line shows the 24 x 36mm sensor as it relates to the mount, in the flange plane. The two rectangles are needed to show the size accounting for the perspective of the macro lens used to take this shot.
The NEX E-mount appears to have not much smaller a diameter, but this is deceptive. You need to look INSIDE the mount and study the position of the electronic contact pins. Once these are considered, the actual clear diameter is not 46mm at 18mm from the sensor (apparently bigger than the A-mount) it is 39mm at 12mm from the sensor. The contacts are located 5mm into the camera body and occupy a clear 3mm zone. The outermost contacts in the array are positioned sufficiently far from the extreme corner of a theoretical 24 x 36mm sensor to allow a full frame design, assuming most of the other detail of the darkchamber design is changed to ensure the widest possible clear area.
Ideas about putting SSS and full frame into such a NEX are wishful thinking, unless the camera was to be huge and the possibility of the lens mount innards shadowing part of the image was accepted. There’s just enough room to fit a full frame sensor, and no more.
It is more likely that Sony would introduce a range of new full-frame lenses with OSS, or non-stabilised adaptors for Alpha lenses designed to allow an unrestricted light path. It is also possible that a stabilising optical adaptor could be made, but we’d put that as the least likely option and one which would probably cost over $1000. Sony would more likely to put an electronic pixel-shift IS into a full frame NEX, though at present this only works with video and imposes a slight crop (1.87X) on what would be the maximum 16:9 frame area.
As for suggestions that existing NEX lenses might cover full frame, that is also uninformed speculation. They won’t and don’t. The same applies to the LA-EA1 and LA-EA2 adpators – neither of these would allow Alpha lenses to be used on the NEX and cover full frame, though there are a few wide angle lenses which might just squeeze their image through the small internal baffles. A few of the third party adaptors for lenses such as Leica M might allow coverage, some would not, depending on exactly how the light baffles and inner mount components have been designed. For APS-C NEX, it pays to add baffles which prevent stray light and flare; for FF NEX, the same baffles might vignette the image.
The question of sensor design is another matter, but it can be assumed many owners would use a full frame NEX to host legacy full frame lenses from a wide range of systems. Most of these have a degree of telecentricity which removes corner colour shifts. New full frame NEX lenses would be designed to match the new sensor, so that would not be an issue. Old rangefinder lenses would have no more problems on full frame NEX than they do on, say, a Leica M9. Sure, there would be issues, and weak combinations alongside strong ones.
These would not over-ride the value of a full frame NEX body. Good photographers can use any format well. They do not demand ‘the full frame look’ or believe that any one format is going to change their work in some way to make it superior to others. There’s a place for every format and choice is a good thing. End of story.
– David Kilpatrick
If you like the analytical and practical approach taken to this subject you may enjoy our new international quarterly magazine, Cameracraft, which publishes its first issue in September, replacing the old Photoworld with a bigger, better publication covering all systems and approaches to image-making from film to the future. See our subscription page and sign up to receive it from the very first edition!
Here at PCA we do not often redirect our loyal readership to other sites, unless it’s to buy stuff which earns us enough commission to enjoy a couple of pints and a burger every month!
But here is a review from one the UK’s most respected independent outdoor writers and photographers, Chris Townsend.
Leave only footprints, take only photographs – except that Chris is not that keen on footprints, he’d rather see you keep to paths which do not crush our wildflowers or erode fragile hillsides.
Much of my NEX-7 critique was written while also using a NEX-5n outfit. I was lucky enough to find an opened NEX-5n 18-55mm kit missing its mini flash at a very low price, as new. By the time I had finished completing my NEX-5n system with bells and whistles, the total would almost have paid for a NEX-7.
The final kit consisted of the 5n, the FDA-EV1S electronic OLED viewfinder, the ECM-SST1 stereo microphone, and the HVL-F20S flash. The microphone was inherited from my NEX-5 so maybe doesn’t count. In the NEX-7 review, I start by suggesting that the 7 is really more part of the Alpha A-mount system and not the NEX system. The 7 either doesn’t need, or doesn’t accept, any of the accessories shown.
The NEX-7 finally became available after the 5n kit, and for a while both were used together. Just as the 5n can not use a plug-in stereo microphone or an Alpha system flash, the 7 can not use the NEX microphone or the HVL-F20S flash. Although I had one ‘NEX system’ with two bodies, the NEX-7 needed my HVL-F20AM flash originally bought for the Alpha 900 or one of the larger guns, and my Rode Video Pro mic, bought for the Alpha 77.
That’s why I count the NEX-7 as a hybrid, partly ‘big Alpha’ in heritage. It does not integrate with other NEX accessories, and vice-versa. Sony shows no sign of dropping the NEX Smart Accessory Terminal from 3 and 5 series bodies so this parallel range situation continues. If you’ve bought a mic or a GN 20 flash for your 5, it will not be usable with the 7 you plan to buy tomorrow.
The OLED Tru-Finder
Harking back to the wonderful Minolta Dimage 7i and later the Konica Minolta Dimage A2, the FDA-EV1S slightly resembles the fragile hinged EVF of those cameras. Like them, it can be flipped into a 90° upright position or used at angles between, so the eye looks down rather like using a waist-level finder with magnifier, or a Hasselblad 45° prism.
The finder is supposedly identical to the Alpha 77 or NEX-7. It has a different dioptre adjustment, a small slider which has a huge effect for very little travel. It’s not easy to adjust but stays put when set. If you wear and remove spectacles at random, and use the camera with both the naked eye and glasses, it’s one of the least ergonomic adjustments. The eyepiece surround is a semi-hard plastic and not as comfortable or efficient as a larger soft eyecup (which Sony does not make, but would be so easy to add to the system).
The add-on finder appeared to be slightly less clear and smaller to the eye than the A77. The same goes for the NEX-7 finder. The difference seems to be in the optical train, how the lenses are arranged in the ocular itself. It may even be nothing more than an eye-surround and eyepoint issue. The OLED screen is identical but I do not seem to get precisely the same viewing experience. Maybe it’s also a little dimmer by default to conserve battery power.
In use, the way the finder sticks out behind the NEX-5n rear screen is a bonus. I’d love to get an Alpha 580, my wife Shirley uses one and she is blessed with a small nose. I’m not! The 580 eyepiece is set forward of the screen surface by a good distance. It makes a very uncomfortable viewing position for me, and add-on magnifier eyepieces don’t help all that much. The FDA-EV1S in contrast is almost perfect. The NEX-7 is better because my nose can end up beside the camera not touching it.
In practice, I ended up hardly ever using the vertical viewing position. The finder sits forward when flipped this way, and somehow my hand position wasn’t all that comfortable holding the camera and looking down at a normal scene. Instead, I found the flipped-out rear screen and a waist-level camera position more useful. Then, of course, the EVF gets in the way. The sticking out eyepiece which is so comfortably in use can obscure your view of the screen slightly.
Finally, I ended up removing the finder most of the time. It seemed a bit vulnerable, it reduced battery life greatly, it prevented pocketability with my favourite 16mm lens (or at least, felt even more vulnerable in a pocket) and much of the time I realised I was composing on the rear screen anyway. As a result the buyer of my kit got a very little-used EVF.
It is the best EVF made, or at least on a level with the best other EVFs using new technology. I can work with an EVF. Some just can’t and almost need an optical finder. But I’m not sure I would ever fork out well over £200 (or around $300 before tax in the USA) on this accessory again. I’m looking at getting a 5n back into the fold, especially after going back to my raw files. I don’t think this small accessory should cost more than a lens, and the 16mm optical finder is equally overpriced. Sony’s accessory prices generally are a negative customer experience and do not create evangelists for the system.
The vertically-angled finder was tried, but not used, for this shot with the camera near ground level. It was far more comfortable just to use the rear screen.
Enhanced vision
Somewhere out in webland, it’s been pointed out I’m old and that my opinions on EVFs (etc) may be irrelevant. That’s a bit of an own goal, as EVFs have maximum appeal to those with ageing bad eyesight. Old eyes tend to be longsighted, and can’t accommodate to close focusing, needing reading glasses as well as distance glasses in many cases. Older people find composing pictures on rear LCD screens difficult, they may have to hold the camera right at arm’s length (you see it all the time!) and even then, they may not be reading the screen menus clearly or seeing the picture at pixel-sharp quality.
It’s young eyes which work best with phones and compact cameras lacking a viewfinder. They can focus on a screen held inches away from the eye. So can older eyes with serious short sight – just remove your specs, and you are away!
The EVF, especially in the NEX-7 and as an add-on to the 5n, is a boon to these with presbyopia. Suddenly, menus can be seen sharply and pictures composed and reviewed in better detail. The dioptre slider allows correction for the most common range of near and far sight, though it can’t correct for other conditions like astigmatism. For those who must always wear specs, just removing the eyepiece ‘cup’ can help.
As with the NEX-7, one key step is to disable image review when using the finder. It is disconcerting to have the image you have just shot block your view for even 2 seconds, especially when it prevents photography. The effect is different to having the same happen on the rear screen, because while the camera is to your eye, it becomes your window on the world.
Straphanging
Here’s something not often mentioned, and once again, I end up knocking the NEX-7. The NEX-5n and previous models have simple slot-type strap connectors mounted so that the camera always hangs with the lens down, LCD screen up. Even with a 16mm only, this lens-to-the-ground position protects your lens. You can even walk around in light rain and be confident it won’t get on the glass.
The NEX-7 with its magnesium body shell uses the higher end traditional post and triangular D-ring found on the Alpha 77, Dynax 7D, Alpha 700 and 900. And it does not hang lens down like the 3 and 5 models. The strap also gets twisted more easily. No need to say which I prefer. The cheap connector may be cheap, but it has a better function.
The rear screen mounting
The mechanism of the screen on the NEX-5n is slightly better than the earlier 3 and 5, perhaps because the EVF demands it must be able to move outwards in a slightly different way to be seen clearly for waist-level shots. It is my own view that Sony missed a trick, as the EVF on this camera would certainly have allowed a reversible, fully articulated Alpha 55 type screen and its extra thickness, without impeding EVF use.
Because the rear screens of all the NEX models do not twist to allow vertical composition combined with waist or overhead viewing, it makes less difference to me whether they are hinged at all. This probably reflects the emphasis on video shooting, where vertical composition is not needed. For the still photographer, cameras with articulated screens that can orient for verticals and also aim forwards for composing self-timer groups are most desirable. The screen is there. It’s already detached from the body. All that’s lacking is the correct mechanism, even when Sony has shown they have the necessary rights or patents, and can make them.
Refinements
The NEX-5n in addition to a 16 megapixel sensor offers lens corrections (for JPEG), AF correction for Alpha lenses attached via the LA-EA2, automatic sensing of DMF (manual focus taking over from confirmed AF) with magnification and focus peaking, electronic front curtain shutter, true 50/60p HD1080 video, extended sensitivity from ISO 100 (instead of 200 minimum) to 3200 (instead of 1600 maximum), and high-speed 10fps sequence shooting (this not really matched by the focusing abilities of the camera, any more than the 1/50th second shutter lag is).
To the earlier 3 and 5 models, firmware updates have retrofitted focus peaking with or without magnification, and AF correction for lenses with the adaptor. They can’t add lens corrections, DMF, new video modes, better low light and HDR multishot modes, or change the louder double-action shutter with its 1/20th second delay.
The NEX-5n also has a touch screen. I disabled this function from the start, along with smile shutter. Face detection I leave on as this does help with focus and exposure for many shots. Since I’d parted company with my NEX-5n before using the touch screen, I can’t comment on its value. It’s just something I don’t like using.
The only advance I would argue against is the extension of Auto ISO to 3200 with no ability to control the range. Though 3200 on the NEX-5n is not unlike 1600 on the NEX-7, both these settings are too high to allow a perfectly clean image from raw after the best processing. In-camera JPEGs confirm that. I found the NEX-5n working at 3200 in many conditions where I would have been confident of a good image at 800 or even 400. This obliged me to use manually set ISO, or put up with the 3200 quality.
NEX-5n, 16mm, 1/30th at f/11, closest focus, ISO 3200, ACR conversion from raw
100% clip showing how the presence of sharp detail (wallpaper) reduces the appearance of grain compared to defocused tones (right hand side).
How good is that quality? Compared to the 24 megapixel sensor, I’d still say it’s better than a one stop advantage. One of my magazine reviews (f2 Freelance Photographer) was accompanied by a near double page spread from the NEX-5n shot above taken at ISO 3200. It’s certainly good enough for that. However, ISO 1600 is much better. ISO 1600 is so good that in decent light, you could easily be using ISO 200 off a camera of the Nikon D200 or Sony Alpha 100 era, even at 100% pixel comparison. 3200 is amazing, as you can see. But it’s definitely a grainy look where 1600 can almost be noiseless.
If a firmware update could ever achieve it, I’d like to see Sony put a maximum and minimum auto ISO selection into the NEX models, as they have done in the Alpha 77. Failing that just a maximum limit would be useful.
There is no doubt that the 16 megapixel Sony CMOS is one of the best sensors yet made, and a great balance between pixel count and image quality. See below…
16 versus 24 with ACR
Adobe Camera Raw has the ability to open files with a set of fixed size interpolations from the raw data. In this respect, it is better than Lightroom, which can export files to different sizes on demand but shows (at least from my observation) a slightly lower quality. ACR’s image sizes are slightly arbitrary and clearly are not related to the pixel dimensions of the raw image. You can open a 17.5 megapixel or 25 megapixel image from a 12, 14, 16, 18 or 21 megapixel raw.
When you select an enlarged or reduced conversion, the large image preview and editing window reflects this. Your 100% view changes to be a 100% view of the size you are producing. In the case of the NEX-7, the 24 megapixel image size is the largest option on the list. You can not open to 25 megapixels as you can with the NEX-5n. You can reduce to 17.5, 11.2, 6.3, 2.8 or 1.6 megapixels.
The largest size is always 6144 pixels wide (longest dimension), or the native size of the raw file. So a Nikon D800 image which is 7360 pixels wide also shows up with only smaller options, and rather oddly skips the 6144 24 megapixel choice. With ACR, you can not open or preview a D800 raw at 24 megapixels, only at full size, 17.5 megapixels and the smaller choice.
If the raw file has unusual dimensions – 4:3 or square for example – you may get interesting options. The 21.3 megapixel Dalsa medium format backs show a 6144-wide 28 megapixel maximum size output option. The 16 megapixel Kodak MF backs allow 5120 square or 6144 square output, the largest size being 37.7 megapixels. As these backs have no AA filter and are teamed up with unrivalled lenses, a 16 megapixel Hasselblad 80mm Planar shot scaled up to 28 megapixels is hard to tell from a native Nikon D800+zoom lens image. D800E with top grade prime beats either.
Using the NEX-5n (or the earlier 14 megapixel 3 and 5 models) ACR offers 17.5 and 25 megapixel conversion, viewing and export or opening as well as the native size and the smaller ones mentioned above. It is largely my experience using the resizing functions along with NR and sharpening that makes me prefer the 16 megapixel sensor to the 24.
This view was taken with the NEX-5n and 18-55mm at 55mm, ISO 100, happen to end at f/11 though is was intended to be at f/10 (the non-lockable controls of the NEX-5n did this to me far too often).
This view was taken a few seconds later using the NEX-7 with a different (black) 18-55mm at f/10, all other parameters being similar, and both as raw files.
Here are 100% clip sections of both images. The 5n is top, the 7 is bottom. Both files are 6000 x 4000, the 5n image was exported by Adobe Camera Raw to 6144 pixels wide. Both images use Sharpen 25, Radius 0.5, Detail 50 and zero for both luminance and colour NR. In the very subtle low contrast texture of the lamp-post and the definition of the hex nut, the 7 clearly wins but it’s a surprisingly fine margin.
Yes, the difference is obvious. The 7 wins. Think again – for this clip, I’ve put the NEX-7 native size image TOP and the NEX-5n interpolated 24 megapixel output BOTTOM. What is the conclusion? That the lens you use – even the individual sample of the lens used as no two 18-55mms will perform identically – has far more effect on usable image detail than 24 megapixels versus 16.
Scaling images down in size
When I have been editing NEX-7 images at their native 24 megapixels the NEX-5n upscaled image has sometimes looked better overall, and the native size NEX-5n image nearly always wins. The NEX-7 image misses the mark for me maybe 30% of the time. For all ISO settings above 400, I tend to set the ACR output to 11.2 megapixels. Setting it to 17.5 doesn’t lose the granular feel. ACR’s 2012 process (CS6) has noise reduction and sharpening controls which work faster and better than any of the plugins or other raw conversion programs I’ve used.
Checking as I write: for 66 images just processed from the NEX-7, Alpha 77 and Alpha 580 (16 megapixels) I counted that 33 of the 24 megapixel images had been downsized to 3600 x 2400 pixels or thereabouts to resolve issues with noise or sharpness. Not one of the Alpha 580 images had needed downsizing. The 6000 x 4000 shots could, perhaps, have been downsized to the 4912 x 3264 of the 16 megapixel sensor or the 4076 x 2731 offered by ACR; the 3600 x 2400 size is the minimum for image library Alamy. If you send them anything except the sharpest and most noise-free images, you risk having all your work rejected, your submissions placed in a slow queue, or your entire account deleted for repeatedly less than perfect technical standards.
For stock library use, this image was reduced from 24 megapixels to a slightly cropped version just over 9 megapixels. The 18-200mm Tamron lens at 66mm, with the NEX-7, was used at f/8 and the focus was on the gold pan. A 24 megapixels, the degree of softening on the young girl’s face is beyond the acceptable limit; scaled down, it looks natural when viewed at 100%. Shooting with 16 megapixels instead of 24 will give an impression of greater sharpness, or greater depth of field, when checked at 100% though this is an illusion and two prints made at the same size will show no difference.
Working with the 16 megapixel sensor, across the usual range of conditions from daylight to night scenes, hardly any images need reducing in size to hit Alamy’s QC mark. Working with the 24 megapixel sensor, every image has to go through ‘is this really OK at full size?’.
While I definitely want my 24 megapixel Alphas for studio, tripod, architectural, landscape, artwork copying and similar tasks, having sold both the NEX-5n outfit and the NEX-7 if I was to purchase again it would be a NEX-5n with reservations.
Reservations
After using the NEX-7 interface, especially with the settings lock function, it is very difficult to go back to using the 5n or earlier interface. On all NEX cameras the menus are very easy to navigate, consistent, and reasonably fast. But on all NEX cameras except the 7, the rear controller is much too prone to accidental operation. The vertical straphanging reduces this a bit, as it avoids the control touching your clothing. The action is so light that just brushing against a coat or the fabric inside a camera pouch can be enough to change the aperture in A-Mode, the shutter in S-Mode, or the EV exposure correction (requires a light pressure to the bottom of the control followed by rotation).
It would be good if Sony could make a firmware modification which locked the primary function of rear controller rotation – something like a two-second press on a specified button – while leaving the compass-point click/rotate functions (located North, East, South, West or 12, 3, 6 and 9 o-clock on the controller) available.
The final reservation is where I started, about the Smart Accessory Terminal and how it differentiates the 3 and 5 models from the 7. The 7 fits well into any existing Alpha setup, the lesser models are only a partial match. The terminal has appeal. It’s long been thought that Sony could use it to add other functions, such as a GPS module or a wireless flash commander. No such accessories have appeared yet. Does that mean it’s a dead end, to be replaced by 7-style interfacing – or is the 7 a level on its own?
Sony has provided some kind of road map for lenses and would perhaps be giving too much away if they issued a roadmap for NEX development. It would make planning today’s purchases less of a gamble for existing system owners and new adopters if they could.
– David Kilpatrick
To see NEX-5n specs and prices at B&H follow this link. Clicking on our Amazon or B&H search boxes can benefit this site (many thanks to the person who keeps ordering dozens of academic books from Amazon!).
The Sony NEX-7 is not a NEX at heart. It’s part of the rest of the Alpha system in every respect except its lens mount, and even that can be converted with a choice of two adaptors. A NEX-7 with an LA-EA2 phase detection autofocus adaptor is little different from an Alpha 65.
The NEX-7 does not accept any of the smart accessory terminal add-ons common to the NEX-3 and NEX-5 models, because it lacks the accessory slot. That means it does not use the same flash models, or the same microphones. Instead the NEX-7 has the iISO Minolta flash shoe, accepts all the flash accessories from the Alpha range and is capable of wireless remote flash operation.
Its external microphone, if required, is also from the Alpha system or any suitable 3.5mm stereo jack connected model mounted on a bracket or an accessory shoe adaptor.
Packaging sequence
Click this for an enlarged view of the opened box, which was full of white bits. Though sealed and brand new, the NEX-7 purchased needed a good dusting and blowing before removing its front cap and fitting the lens.
You can’t see here, but when the cap was removed from the body there were specks of the same white packaging filler on the matt black baffle between the lens mount and the sensor. But, once blown clean, the NEX-7 proved remarkably free from dust-on-sensor problems. It’s one of the least dust-prone cameras I have ever used, despite the exposed position of the sensor which is not even covered when lenses are changed or when the camera is turned off.
The dust on the camera may also be seen here. The eyepiece surround is supplied separately packed and sealed. It is not soft rubber, and makes pretty sharp contract with my brow, almost demanding to be shoved into my eye like an eyecup, with specs removed. I found the finder good to use but started removing my glasses permanently when working with the 7 outdoors.
Battery and stamina
Given the relatively short battery life of any camera using an EVF as sophisticated as the Sony OLED device, I feel it’s a pity they did not go the whole distance and have a larger right-hand grip housing the 500-series lith-ion used by the 77, 900, 700, 5xx and other larger more ‘professional’ camera bodies. The little 1050mAh 50-series cell shared with the lesser Alpha 55, 33 and all NEX models is stretched to the limit by a 24 megapixel EVF camera. Third party 1300mAh versions don’t actually seem to last any longer.
What’s interesting is that losing the flapping mirror and mechanical focus and aperture operation, found in the earlier Alphas, has not doubled battery life. You would imagine all this heavy mechanical stuff would drain power fast, but in fact the electronic alternative of live view, with the sensor active all the time feeding a digital viewfinder, proves far less efficient.
Because the NEX-7 uses an external power option with a dummy battery (a Canon approach I have never much liked, always preferring dedicated DC input) it would be possible to design an add-on base with a better power source. But as with other NEX models, the SD card slot lives in the battery compartment and such a ‘power grip’ would either need to be removed to change cards, or incorporate more adaptation to provide a relayed memory slot.
Despite its odd position between the Alpha and NEX ‘systems’ and the clear drawbacks of some aspects of its design, the NEX-7 is a compelling camera. It’s got some of the handling qualities of a classic screw-thread Leica, from the left-hand eye position to its overall dimensions and a reassuringly solid feel. It does not surprise me that so many owners enjoy fitting Leica lenses of all eras; they look correctly proportioned, and in the case of late designs for the CL/CLE they were designed to fit a body which may even have inspired the 7.
Missing the point
The hammering taken by the little battery probably accounts for why no GPS was built in to the 7. This must have caused many buyers and owners much frustration, especially if their previous camera or other camera happens to be an Alpha 55, 65 or 77. The NEX-7 can make these redundant for travel and landscape work, but those are exactly the times you want GPS. The NEX-7 is not so much use in the studio, or for action sports, or domestic shots… the times when you do not need GPS!
This is the one mismatch in the specifications which has caused me problems in making decisions about what to use when, and when gear to keep for the future. It has left me unable to part with other cameras despite the fact that I don’t really need them; and it leaves me obliged to take my A55 or A77, instead of the NEX-7, on expeditions where the NEX-7 might be more convenient. In the end it is what has persuaded me to part with the NEX-7; I have ended up using the Alpha 77 all the time instead.
The other omission in the NEX-7 is in-body stabilisation, not just sensor-movement but the pixel-tracking electronic variant used only for video in the A65/77. This prevents the 7 from being a true alternative to the larger DSLR/SLT models even when the LA-EA2 adaptor is fitted, unless you are very lucky and can find a compatible Sigma OS lens from the period before Sigma decided to drop optical stabilisation from Alpha mount products. It also limits its use with many manual classic lenses.
What you do get is a bigger sensor area used for HD video than on the 77 or 65. It’s interesting that this was possible, as video readout can demand a limited choice of source pixel dimensions for best quality. With a bigger source frame, perhaps the NEX produces better video, but it’s not a difference I can detect.
It would be wonderful if it turned out that the processor and firmware of the NEX-7 allowed Sony to issue an upgrade to add pixel-tracking electronic stabilisation (even with the inevitable crop of video to 1.87X factor). Is there any reason why pixel-tracking can not be used instead of sensor shift for stills? Others are using it. It certainly can work for viewfinder stabilisation with an EVF, as it does with the A77.
Great features of the NEX-7 – that ‘real’ hot shoe, the pop-up flash, the twin control drums, and the EVF – are let down by lack of GPS and video stabilisation for manual lenses, both offered by Alpha SLT models.
Cynics will believe that Sony could have implemented all this, but preferred to limit the NEX-7 and avoid cannibalising Alpha SLT sales. I think they simply didn’t think it through, or realise how the NEX-7 would change the profile of the whole NEX system to the point where some photographers could consider using nothing else. And they may have needed to use the processor power in other ways.
The killer button
While the first reaction to NEX-7 design tends to be delight at the provision of two unmarked, identical control wheels on the top right rear edge the new owner quickly discovers there is one tiny button which changes the reliability and usefulness of the camera beyond all else.
Seen here with the pop-up flash raised, showing also the infra-red remote front facing sensor and the on-off switch surrounding the shutter release, is that very important small unlabelled flat button.
That is the flat black button to the right of the shutter release, unlabelled. You could assume that its ability to invoke a series of the most useful screen menus, to change key settings in a manner close to Sony’s Alpha 700 QuickNavi, would be most praised.
But no. It is the ability of this button to LOCK the camera setting controls – to disable operation of the TriNavi control wheels (rear multi-way optional, and two top as a minimum). Just hold the button down for two seconds, and a message appears saying the settings are locked. That means that if you have set Aperture Priority, f/9, ISO 200, no exposure over-ride then the camera will stay that way until you unlock it and change things. That just needs another two-second pressure, something you are not likely to do by mistake.
The handy tips are not optional (more detailed ones are). The rear screen is bright and very sharp. I fitted a GGS-type glass screen surface shortly after the product shots were taken. That movie record button is a bit of an issue, see later comments.
You do get continued access to the exposure over-ride and ISO change even when the controls are locked, but only with enough deliberate action to prevent your clothing or your camera bag from doing what it does so well on the NEX-5n – setting several stops of underexposure. It rarely goes the other way for me. I’ve had this happen between two shots without apparently touching the camera! The rear controller which handles this function is so light in its action, and indeed the dials of the NEX-7 are equally free.
This single point about the NEX-7 puts it ahead of the NEX-5n and all earlier NEX models for me, despite the fact that NEX-5n images are often better in low light, and all previous NEX sensors seem to produce rather smoother sky noise at minimum ISO.
What it does not lock is the other killer button – the movie shoot red button, placed to catch your thumb or the camera strap or anything else passing. It is ridiculously easy to start shooting video accidentally; it happens often enough on all NEX models, but the 7 takes it to a new extreme. It needs to be included in the LOCK function with the next firmware update, or its operation changed to a two-press action; first press changes to movie mode and crops the finder view, second press starts filming; half pressure on shutter release when in pre-shoot mode returns immediately to stills mode.
It’s surprisingly difficult to hit the movie the button with the camera at your eye when you want to. For a button which is so easy to hit by mistake, it scores top marks for being hard to find when you need it.
The AVCHD-2 file structure makes the situation worse, by putting the camera into video directory mode if you accidentally record a second or two of video. If you don’t immediately hit the delete button and remove this, but instead start shooting stills, it is a bit tedious to get back into the video playback mode and delete the unwanted clip. The fastest way to get there is to shoot another brief instant of video, then playback and delete this and your previous accidental clip; menu diving to change between still and movie playback takes much longer.
Hitting the movie button to shoot short clips, like these taking using the 18-55mm OSS lens and high quality 1080p, is not always easy as you must move your secure firm thumb-position on the grip to press it.
This is a failing of the dual directory structure, which maintains an entirely separate ‘database’ for AVCHD movies, preventing you ever playing back mixed stills and video or accessing both at the same time for file management (delete!) purposes.
While the Lock/Unlock function does improve the handling of the camera, it has mysterious lapses. I’m still trying to work out exactly when and how my ISO setting is changed on a locked camera, nearly always to something unreasonably high. It doesn’t happen often but when it does, it frequently manages to be the next frame after one shot I have taken normally, and done nothing more than drop the camera from my eye and lift it again.
The sensor dilemma
ISO 1600, natural light, handheld – no noise reduction at all when processed from raw using Adobe Camera Raw. A full size version can be downloaded by photoclubalpha subscribers.
This brings me to the question of the 24 megapixel sensor. As with the Alpha 77, it only provides true advantages when used at or close to its lowest ISO setting. On the NEX-7 this is 100 not 50, and the overall performance of the NEX is ahead of the SLT design through the range of ISO up to 16,000 maximum. It’s not a doubling of speed for the same noise level, more a matter of getting slightly better images at the same setting. However, using the Alpha 77 ISO 50 setting puts it ahead of the NEX in practice.
The strength of any AA filter is determined by two factors, its diffracting or diffusing power, and the gap between the filter and the sensor. If you increase the gap, the strength of the filter must be reduced; put it very close to the sensor surface, and a strong filter is needed.
Today’s designers prefer a weaker filter and a larger gap, as this reduces the effect of dust on the filter, a major cause of user dissatisfaction. Anyone who has used a camera such as the Canon 5D MkII which has a very weak AA filter very close to the silicon will know the problem, but that camera takes the effect so far you can often see moiré patterns too. The AA filter is too weak, and video makers often get the camera customised expensively, replacing the front glasses over the sensor with a stronger low-pass.
A second effect of a filter closer to the sensor is that at the corners, the stronger diffraction structure may be further strengthened by the angle of the rays passing through. The distance from filter to sensel is greater with rays at an acute angle than those passing through on axis.
The strength and distance of the filter are also linked to the density of the sensels on the sensor (pixel pitch). The 16 megapixel of the NEX-5n and 24 megapixel sensors of the NEX-7 have subtly different AA filter assemblies. This leads to some lenses performing better on the 5n, some on the 7. Whatever the complex mix of underlying reasons, there are many who would love to see the robust and versatile 16 megapixel sensor find its way into a NEX-7 body because they want to use third-party manual lenses such as the Voigtlander 12mm or 15mm Leica mount designs.
From my point of view, I like the 7. It seems to have a weaker filter and maybe a greater gap between glass and silicon, if the dust-on-sensor results are anything to judge by. I have not noticed any serious colour shift with, for example, the 16mm pancake lens but my experience with the lens is so different from many others. I rate it as one of the better f/2.8 85° angle lenses around, not the “it sucks” offering often implied.
Even after downsizing and crunching for the web, the moiré on the flyscreen of this diner on the run up to the Mojave desert can be seen. If you are a photoworld member you can access a full size, level 12, AdobeRGB version without sharpening or NR and see just how well the 16mm has performed at f/10, a sensible working aperture.
NEX or Alpha?
Apart from issues of stabilisation and GPS, the choice between NEX-7 and the similarly priced Alpha 77 involves a few other considerations.
First of all, there’s weatherproofing or ruggedness. The 77 is a very tough, splash or rainproof camera with a ‘skinned’ body, externally finished to be fairly resistant to minor scuffs. The NEX is a bare metal body without any special attention to dust or moisture proofing.
Then, there’s the duty cycle. The NEX has the familiar basic 1/4000th shutter, admittedly with the electronic front curtain option that doubles its expected life if you use it all the time. The 77 has exactly the same option but based on the 1/8000th shutter only found in top-end Alphas 700, 850 and 900. That gives it probably the longest expectation of shutter life yet in any Alpha, time will tell.
There are a not many functions on the 77 not found on the NEX, but there’s one big physical difference – the rear screen.
Inarticulate viewing
The NEX-7, a major redesign compared to the 3 and 5 series, sticks to exactly the same rear screen frame and hinge setup as those with a minor adjustment to angles and a slightly tougher construction. This is not one of the best design decisions made by Sony, and has drawn some users to other makes.
The articulated screen of the Alpha 77 is not just good for viewing portrait compositions at waist-level or aiming ahead to see yourself when doing a self-timer group or making a video ‘to camera’. It is good for not using at all! Nearly all the time, when not wanted for a specific purpose, the screen of my Alpha 77 stays reversed to the camera. It feels more comfortable, it never lights up when working indoors or draws attention because of its glow, it does not get marked by my hands or face. Same goes for my older 55.
The NEX-7 screen, in contrast, is permanently exposed and also limited in its movement. It is not good for vertical compositions, and it can’t be used for viewing from the front. It also can not be protected by facing towards the camera.
How different the 7 would be, had the screen been designed like the Alpha 77! It would have felt like a pure rangefinder camera with the screen reversed and I’ve considered getting or making some kind of cover just to hide it away. The surface of the NEX-7 screen is very easily marked, and I picked up a single visible scratch line on it within a week. A month later I finally obtained a GGS MkII type glass screen protector (the model labelled NEX-5C is correct) and felt able to use the NEX freely in the real world, instead of treating it as a fragile object.
I use the angled screen occasionally on the NEX-7 or 5n, but don’t use the angled viewfinder of the NEX-5n with accessory EVF. Most times I need an angled screen, it’s because I want to hold the camera overhead, at ground level or at waist level. Not up to my eye.
There is one button press which doesn’t exist on the NEX series, but exists on all the SLT models – switch between EVF and rear screen. With auto switching set, the EVF takes over when you raise the camera to your eye, but the rear screen continues to operate after the camera is returned to strap-hung position. The only way to prevent it from continuing to operate is to use the power save delay setting, and reduce this to the minimum ten seconds.
You can go into the menus, and switch the camera to use either the EVF only, or the LCD only. But there’s no over-ride if you do so. Set it EVF only, and the EVF is the only way to see the menus needed to get back to using the LCD. Set it to use LCD only and there is no quick way to use the EVF, you’ve got to menu dive.
There is not even an option which enables the LCD to cycle, through its display modes, to OFF. The closest I have got is to set the LCD for information display only and turn the brightness down to minimum manual. What I’d like to see is an EVF/LCD button, just as on the A77, because the NEX-7 is basically the same kind of camera. I don’t have to use that button on the A77 as I just reverse the screen, and flip it round when it’s needed.
Though there are many custom functions you can assign to buttons, EVF/LCD switch is not one of them. This may seem like nitpicking, but it is an omission that wastes battery power. Using the ten seconds power save timing still leaves the sensor and the display/s operating far too long. There is no state, unless you use the EVF only option, where the camera shuts off as soon as you take it away from your eye and take your finger off the shutter button.
I find it significant that without taking a single picture, while writing this section of the article only, checking the operation and changing menu settings the battery in my 7 has dropped from 33% to 17% power. The EVF uses more power than the LCD.
Shooting speed
Though the NEX-7 has a minimal shutter lag (20 milliseconds, or 1/50th) between pressing the shutter and achieving image capture, this figure is deceptive. The camera may not be ready to have the shutter pressed, indeed you may not even be able to see and compose your quickly-observed action shot before it is too late.
This may be why Sony has made the LCD/EVF aspect so restricting, and why the default settings use Auto switching and leave power on for 20 seconds before sleep. If you use these settings, the response of the EVF is much faster than it is when the EVF only is selected. The camera is already operating, feeding an image to the rear screen, and switches this image rapidly.
If you are already framing and viewing, shutter timing can be very precise. Indeed, with many subjects I’m so used to SLR-type delays I missed the moment by firing too soon – with the electronic first curtain, the camera sound happens AFTER the shot is taken, which is deceptive. But if you lift a sleeping 7 to the eye and expect to grab a street shot, you’ll be frustrated. It can take two, three seconds or more to get it alive, viewing, exposure set and focus happening. Bike and board action show at Knott’s Berry Farm, Tamron 18-200mm.
The slowest setup is to use the EVF only and set the image review to any time (it does not matter whether it’s for the minimum 2 seconds or longer). If you enable image review, you’ll be locked out for a second or so from taking another image in fast succession, and you’ll also see the image in the finder. This is a case where the functions of the EVF and the LCD need to be separated. The image review needs to be able appear on the LCD and never block the viewfinder or the shooting pipeline.
For fast shooting, disable image review entirely and leave the EVF/LCD set to auto with the power save mode set to longer than the gap between any two shots. I don’t think you should ever need longer than the 5 minute setting and for me one minute is enough. You can set up to an hour but I don’t see much point in this, unless you were waiting and watching unpredictable wildlife with the camera on a tripod.
Though the evidence is nothing more than observation, setting focus peaking may also very slightly delay shooting response, and using a single central focus spot actually seems slower than selecting the 25-point multi area AF (but that so often picks a foreground zone and misses your target).
When you get the NEX-7 set up correctly for maximum fast response and minimum possible interruption or delay, it’s a fast enough camera to use. Much also depends on the lens; the 16mm f/2.8 is almost instant in response, the 18-55mm OSS is hesitant, and the 18-200mm Tamron likes to wake up, stretch, yawn and then focus. Apparently the Sony 18-200mm behaves much the same way.
And then, what counts
OK, I’ve spent a lot of time looking at why a camera which could be nearly perfect falls just short, partly through small details of interface programming and default settings. Most reviews don’t even go into this stuff, apart from describing what can be found in the manual (which you don’t get in a physical form, only as a PDF on the supplied CD).
In practice, the NEX-7 produces stunningly good pictures at ISO settings under 400 and is definitely at its best with either 100 or 200 set. It is after all a high resolution camera, and in old-fashioned terms it is the Kodachrome 25 or the Pan F of the digital world.
A studio shot to show the hazards of electrical fires, with smoke detector. These are not contrived subjects, both ‘energy saving’ bulbs fizzled out this way (one hanging down vertically, the other upright in a large lamp) and the NiMH cell got hot enough to burn its covering and split it, in a charger. The NEX-7 at ISO 100, with a 50mm f/2 Russian tilt-lens, reveals a level of detail well beyond most full-frame DSLRs.
As we have found out repeatedly with DSLRs, there is little point in having expensive lenses and high resolution if the image is not correctly focused. The great strength of contrast-detect AF, and magnified assisted manual focus, is that both offer near-perfect focus regardless of aperture related shifts. You can check directly through the viewfinder by setting AF to DMF, which will automatically magnify the image if you touch the manual focus control of the lens after AF is confirmed.
The 24 megapixel sensor does not reward apertures smaller than f/11; I normally set f/8 or f/9 with the 16mm f/2.8 or 18-55mm, and use f/11 with the Tamron 18-200mm because the reduction in unsharpness towards the edges outweighs any loss of ultimate resolution.
The EVF serves perfectly well if you stick to the kind of subjects the NEX-7 is ideal for. While it has some great functions like Face Recognition including registering up to eight ‘known’ people, that sort of function is mainly for people who buy the 7 because it’s the best and looks the part. It is not really a great people camera despite the Smile Shutter and the convenient built-in flash. The NEX-5N is better because people tend to hang around in low light, indoors as well as out, in the evening as well as the day. The 5n has a near two-stop advantage in real terms for effortless high ISO quality.
Mono Lake, windy summer day; the NEX-7 is great for subjects like this at ISO 100. But so was the Box Brownie… and so is almost every camera made today.
Nor is any NEX model the ideal choice for pets, kids, school sports or the usual domestic stuff. It’s actually a better camera for creative still life, macro, architecture, landscape, fine art found studies, formal portraiture and of course top grade 1080/50-60p video. Unlike DSLRs (even SLTs) the 7 can focus very smoothly during video if the subject changes distance. No camera can be quieter in focusing or stabilisation.
If you do decide to stretch the NEX-7 to the limit, I’ve found that as an example the 70-400mm SSM G when fitted using the LA-EA1 contrast detect focus adaptor works well. Focus is achieved surprisingly quickly and far more accurately than on DSLR bodies without Micro AF adjustment. Still, the lens is almost useless. Beyond 200mm, an unstabilised hand-held tele looks worse through an EVF than I can ever remember with optical finders. You really notice the jerky image and if you use the AF-A DMF function with focus peaking for a magnified manual fine tuning at 400mm, it’s like trying to hand hold a 5000mm lens. If you want to play with this, you need a tripod, and a good steady one at that.
There is no point in having a the best focus or lens quality if the image quality lets you down. I like to use Auto ISO, and find that the NEX-5n for example holds its quality acceptably right up to the high 3200 setting which you can’t limit; it would be so much better if you could stop it going over 1600, too. The NEX-7 also has an Auto range which you can’t customise. It will run from 100 to 1600, and for whatever reason I find it tends to be at the extremes of the range. Far too many images are at 1600, and 1600 simply loses too much detail. With a little care, raw conversion and reduction in image size to under 10 megapixels equivalent can yield an impressive result. But I don’t buy a 24 megapixel camera in order to get 10 megapixels.
I find I use the NEX cameras a lot in the evening or at night, when I don’t want a full sized SLR style camera on me. That makes low light, high ISO performance important. Here’s a shot in San Francisco at dusk, just enough light to hand-hold the 16mm at f/4 and ISO1600. By reducing the image size to 10 megapixels after processing from raw, I get a very acceptable noise-grain structure and excellent sharpness (below).
The greatest contrast is with a camera like the Canon 5D MkIII. I was using this alongside the NEX-7 for a while, and maybe that colours my view. At 1600, 3200 or 6400 the 5D MkIII is still useful for quality images. The NEX-5n does well up to 1600 and is better than the 7’s 1600, at 3200. I was also using the Nikon D4, and various other cameras. Even the Nikon D800 for a while with its 36 megapixels. The NEX-7 needed to be locked down to ISO 800 or under to make use of the full 24 megapixel native size. I would have liked to have limited its Auto ISO range to 100-400, or 200-800.
Why 200? The camera does not have in-body stabilisation. This has been another issue for me, with all NEX bodies. The rest of the world goes mad for legacy rangefinder lenses, legacy manual vintage SLR lenses and similar stuff. I don’t. I bought a couple to try at the longer end and realise from the magnified focusing view that if you fit a 200mm, you will need to use 1/1000th shutter speed or even shorter to get any kind of sharpness.
The Alpha 77 has control over auto ISO range, and has SS, and has in-sensor video stabilisation which by using pixel tracking can cope with any lens you fit even if not identified to the processor. Pixel tracking would have been invaluable in the NEX.
This shot may look superficially OK, but it was hand-held at 0.6s (2/3rds) with the 16mm. I could almost guarantee that with two frames taken, I would get a sharp one doing the same with the Alpha 77 and 8-16mm Sigma. With the NEX and no anti-shake at all, this was the better of two frames taken with careful support though hand-held. Below, 100% clip from the centre. I very rarely ever have to reject images for this reason. The most serious NEX competition, Olympus’s OM-D system, has sensor stabilisation which works with any lens – just the advantage Alpha users have always claimed. Knotts Berry Farm, museum.
Ultimately, the NEX-7 demands both stabilisation in the lens used (which the 24mm f/1.8 CZ and Sigma 19mm and 30mm lack) and constant attention to manual setting of ISO to secure the optimum settings for image quality. You can not even set a slowest shutter speed for Auto ISO.
When you get it right, it’s hard to beat. Turn the viewfinder ‘show effect’ off, so you get Auto Gain in the EVF, set the camera to ISO 100, set a manual exposure for the brightest shot you are likely to encounter and just shoot raw. Push process anything underexposed.
The Tamron 18-200mm lens
The NEX-7 with black Tamron 18-200mm, and Alpha shoe fitting HVL-F20AM flashgun mounted.
I tried two different Tamron 18-200mm lens on Tamron’s stand at Focus on Imaging, one black and one chrome, on my NEX-7. There seemed to be a marginal difference in which side of the image was not quite as sharp, between the lenses, but VC stabilisation could account for this and it was only visible wide open at 200mm.
I bought one shortly afterwards at the show – apparently the last one there – and the performance was much as expected – as good at 18mm as the 18-55mm kit lens, as good at 200mm as the Sigma 18-250mm OS we use on the Alpha 77. It is as good at 200mm as the 55-210mm SEL lens I tried during the NEX launch event in 2011. When occasional shots show unsharpness towards one side for no obvious reason, I’m pretty sure that this is a result of stabilisation decentering a group. Nearly all stabilised camera and lens combos give me occasionally ‘soft on the right’ results, maybe it’s down to my personal camera shake tendencies.
The lens was so useful that I stopped bothering to use the 18-55mm at all, and ultimately sold that. If you are going to have an unpocketable camera, it might as well be a little bigger and have the range of lens you need. I did have to carry my HVL-F20AM flashgun to use on the 7 with this lens, as the pop-up flash is barely able to avoid shadows from the 18-55mm (lens hood removal obligatory). The Tamron 18-200mm – and Sony 18-200mm to an even greater degree – will cast a huge shadow from the pop-up.
This is not just a minor shadow. Lens shade on at 18mm, you have a mound of shadow occupying a third of the frame to the left. You get a shadow in shot right up to just before 200mm with the hood on, and up to around 40mm with it removed. In practice, you can’t use the pop-up safely at settings below 50mm and you can’t use the lens hood if you do.
The HVL-F20AM gives no shadow at all even at 18mm with the Tamron with the hood fitted, and having separate batteries it does not further exhaust the hard-worked NEX-7. Folded down to the off position, it sits neatly above the Tamron lens body. So the recommendation has be Tamron or Sony plus this accessory flash, if you want to go the 18-200mm route.
The Tamron may have an acceptable close-up ability when set to 200mm, but at 18mm it lags behind the 18-55mm and way behind the 16mm pancake. If you are used to the 16mm’s ability to focus on subjects barely a hand away from the front rim, the 18-200mm’s inability to be used for this kind of wide-angle close-up will frustrate you. I would never consider leaving the 16mm behind – or its ultrawide and fisheye converters.
If you set the camera to use auto correction for vignetting, distortion and CA it appears to recognise the Tamron and to apply appropriate adjustments. I don’t know if this is because the Tamron is an authorised SEL lens, and Sony have data embedded in the camera firmware, or because Tamron is used the same identity as the (very different) Sony lens and it’s pure chance that corrections are similar.
I saw several children running towards this scene, but these were the last two. I’ve retouched a badly positioned child and a notice board out of the shot. The NEX-7 with 18-200mm Tamron was only just fast enough in operation to enable this shot. Anything much more spontaneous was rarely caught on time.
Whatever the case, if you want fast viewing and focusing and only shoot raw like me, disable lens corrections in firmware. It is difficult to judge or measure exactly what happens, but I find the 18-200mm tends to have a seek and find action when focused to start with which makes it slow, and that a further ‘wobble’ is created by the corrections as they are applied to the live image. It’s almost like a small auto zooming effect, depending on focal length, and if you zoom the processor may apply a new correction.
The slowest overall combination involves using ‘Effect On’ in the live image, AF, Face Regnition, Object Tracking, Auto ISO, and auto exposure setting like A or P, stabilisation on, and lens correction. This is not specific to the Tamron, but it tends to show the slowing-down effect most.
The NEX-7 will work fastest if you turn all this off and work manually, with manual ISO, manual focus. But of course you can’t really do that in practice. And, if you have used any EVF Sony camera, you’ll know well enough that startup times in tests are irrelevant. You are just as likely to have a second wasted as the viewfinder switches from burn-out blank to normal exposure as you are to have an AF lens do its yawn and stretch routine before finally ambling down the stairs to get breakfast.
Having recently used the Canon G12, G1X and Fujifilm X10, I can confirm that there are substantial benefits to optical finder operation as long as the camera is genuinely able to autofocus during a hasty shutter press. Sony has yet to achieve this, and it does not surprise me that the useful 16mm optical finder designed to pair up with the pancake lens does not fit the NEX-7, which lacks the smart accessory connector. So you don’t have that option with it as you do with the 3 and 5 series. The 16mm optical finder could also be used, reasonably well, with the 18-200mm locked at 18mm (the Tamron lens has a lock).
The comparison in size between the 70-400mm Sony G lens and the 18-200mm Tamron, the Alpha being shown fitted to the 7 via an LA-EA1 adaptor (which does enable it to focus, very accurately and not too slowly).
Comparing A77 use to NEX-7 use, a superzoom on the A77 focuses in the time it takes to press the shutter, with phase detection AF, but the A77 finder is every bit as slow as the 7 thanks to the 24 megapixel sensor and the way it provides your live view. I’d have to rate the NEX-7 plus 18-200mm as the slowest combination I have ever used, and if this camera had been provided to me for review in the guise of a compact with a built-in zoom of this range, I would have dismissed it as unusable from the start.
Such is the appeal of the camera with 18-200mm that I never felt that way. There are a few other ‘likes’ to help, like the Tamron’s filter thread of 62mm matching my Alpha 77’s CZ16-80mm so it can share one polariser.
Finally, like the Sony 18-200mm the Tamron has its OSS and focusing both optimised for video. The slow and occasionally odd behaviour of AF for stills may be due to the smooth, damped AF during video which hardly ever hunts off-target and always transitions between planes without jumping or overshoot. The OSS during video is amazingly stable, and both functions are so close to being silent they make other systems seem crude. This did not prevent focus from eventually drifting for no apparent reason during some long clips.
This video was shot at a photo trade show using the NEX-7 and 18-200mm, hand-held and walking while shooting. The refocusing and stabilistion can both be judged from it.
There is none of the noisy IS you can find in a Canon lens, and when comparing the sound picked up that system’s new 5D MkIII with a 70-200mm IS L lens against other options, the NEX-7 with Tamron 18-200mm emerged as the quietest of all possibilities. It was almost matched by the A77 with an SSM lens, but the sudden and fast focus responses given by the PD-AF systen during video both caused loss of focus with sudden changes, and more audible operation.
NEX-7 with Tamron 18-200mm and Rode Pro Videomic with ‘dead cat’ wind baffle.
The NEX-7 with this lens is uniquely good as an HD camcorder. Even if you bought the lens and never used it for still work, it would be the lens which completes the camera as a decent spec video rig. The same applies to Sony’s own 18-200mm. This isn’t to say you will not encounter some unusual effects if you choose to shoot freehand, to pan with subjects or zoom with AF and OSS active. Occasional distortions or apparent jumps in position of the subject can happen. It’s unfair to criticise any system for this, as the solution is to disable stabilisation and AF, mount the camera on a fluid head tripod, lock in manual exposure settings and shoot like a pro.
Tamron updated my lens under warranty to solve a definite problem with shooting panoramas (the original batch of lenses simply didn’t work – areas of blur and bad stitching). The service is handled in Germany not the UK. It eliminated the problem.
Parting with the NEX-7
Despite everything, after my final two-week trip using the NEX-7 and Alpha 77 side by side (or for different situations) in California I made the decision to sell the 7 and Tamron. I had not been able to afford the camera and the zoom to start with, especially so soon after investing in the Alpha 77. Based only on the three months spent with the NEX, it didn’t make many exposures; a mere 1500 or so. That’s because of the way I use NEX cameras generally. They are my pocket notebook, my out-shopping, business travel or evening out camera.
With the Tamron, or indeed the 18-55mm which I’d sold almost immediately in order to finance the Tamron, the 7 is not a pocket camera or even an under-jacket camera. Whenever I was in an unknown location – a stop on the road, a wildnerness view, a beach with no sign – I used the Alpha 77 and waited for a GPS lock before shooting. I wear an old Lowepro Sideline Shooter belt-pack bag which leaves hands free and places no strain on neck or shoulders, and having first packed it with NEX-7, filter, batteries, cards, 18-200mm, flash, two converter lenses and 16mm I found it was just as happy with A77 and 16-80mm, 8-16mm and 70-300m Sigmas and accessories. It weighs more but proved just as convenient.
Both the NEX and the A77 went through twice as many batteries as Shirley’s Alpha 580 despite not taking as many shots, per camera. EVF cameras are power-hungry. Both definitely lost me shots I wanted to grab and would have secured with a conventional DSLR or a faster compact. Having a shutter response time of 0.02 (1/50th) second means little if you have an aperture-focus-exposure cycle taking seconds when the camera is raised to the eye and first pressure is taken on the shutter.
Both A77 and NEX-7 also went through my stock of 16GB memory cards, shooting raw only, rather too quickly. For the A77 I’ve now bought a 32GB. You do not need to do much shooting to fill up cards with a 24 megapixel camera.
Having packed up the 7 and sent it to its new owner, I very nearly bought another. It’s a camera like that. When you consider that extremely fast response – so fast that unless you retrain yourself, you will anticipate action too early – and the amazing low light AF ability, high resolution, controls and handling, video quality, high grade shutter, near-silent operation… there’s nothing else like it. Then you remember that the A77 and A65 match nearly all aspects that matter except the ‘pure’ mirrorless design and compatibility with all kinds of optics.
I had already owned a NEX-5n with accessory EVF and other kit, and despite liking the quality delivered, decided that this was not the pocketable solution either. For a while I had both together. I’m reverting to a first generation NEX-3 taken in part payment for the NEX-7, which will be happy with my 16mm; I’ve checked some of my 2010 14 megapixel files, and find the Adobe Camera Raw 2012 process and new lens profile handling improve them significantly. I guess my argument is that I had considered a Canon G-1X, but remembered that it’s only 14 megapixels, its noise performance is no better than a first generation NEX, it doesn’t do close focusing the same way, doesn’t have wide and fisheye converters, and if anything it’s bigger.
Reverting to a ‘traditional’ old NEX without the flash shoe and auto-gain live preview means I can’t use it with studio flash. But I never wanted to use the NEX-7 with studio flash (AC main strobe) except for the purposes of testing that function. I have an Alpha 900 and an Alpha 77!
So what advice?
Here’s my view. If you do not own an Alpha SLT 24 megapixel camera, or a compact of high quality, the NEX-7 is a star buy. You just have to be aware that this is absolutely NOT the camera for birds in flight, dogs running, kiddies scooting round the living room, sports, candids or street shooting. All are possible and owners have good examples.
It’s a really great buy if you have some vintage short focal length Leica, Contax or similar glass and want to make good use it without spending twice as much on a Fujifilm X-Pro1 or a Leica.
It’s the only camera of its type that can do smooth refocusing during video, silently, maybe 75% of the time. Unfortunately, the 25% when it wanders off focus completely for no apparent reason makes life with AF video not much better than it is with every other unsatisfactory solution. If you shoot video, you’ll get some of the best ever quality 1080p from the 7, but you’ll end up using a tripod with manual focus and exposure for anything beyond casual clips.
The NEX is a cat, so don’t expect it to do dog tricks. Or obey!
Reasons why I am wrong include the 50mm f/1.8 OSS lens which I don’t have. If I had the cash to hand I might have bought one, and who knows? It might have been a compelling reason to stick with the NEX-7. But I’ve got a great 50mm f/1.4 Sony for the Alpha 77. The adaptor LA-EA2, which puts an Alpha 65-style AF module and SLT mirror on to the body to work with Alpha mount lenses, could also have tipped me in favour. But once it’s all assembled, it’s approaching Alpha 77 size without the ergonomics or bigger battery.
You buy a NEX to do the things a compact system cameras does well, like being small and portable, unobtrusive and precise in feel. It happens, uniquely, to beat most DSLRs in two or three aspects – image resolution and quality including dynamic range, versatile lens compatibility, and focusing accuracy whether AF or manual (based on the near-perfect precision of contrast detection or magnified visual with peaking indication).
If you DO own an Alpha 77 or 65, and thus have access to almost the entire feature set of the NEX-7 already, I suggest that your money – the better part of $2000 or £1400 with a zoom like the Tamron – is better spent on reinforcing your Alpha system if necessary, and acquiring a large sensor compact of the new 1X generation. For my outlay I could, admittedly six months after my NEX-7 purchase, have a spare Alpha 65 body and an RX100.
Here are some parting thoughts:
1) Battery Compatibility – the NEX models share a battery size with the Alpha 55, 37 and similar bodies. If you own a 55 without too much investment in lenses, moving to NEX-7 could be neat. I enjoyed travelling with my A55 and NEX-5 plus a pocketful of small batteries charged up!
2) Electronics Break Down! If I really wanted to go with NEX, I’d be better off buying two NEX bodies, an LA-EA2, having one battery type but also a coherent backup. If I really want to major on Alpha a-mount SLTs, my first backup investment should be a second Alpha body. I have that (A55 and A77) but guess what, I risked two weeks travel and shooting with A77 and NEX and never thought to sling the A55 in the case.
3) EVFs suck. They are wonderful, but if all you have is EVF, you miss half your potential. We are keeping our Alpha 580 and even our 700 and 900 for the moment. See also – Electronics Break Down!
4) 24 megapixels is a dozen too many. Most of the time you only need 6 megapixels, sometimes you need 10 or more. Very rarely does anyone need 24, except if they are shooting sports and wildlife, or something where a crop helps. Guess what the NEX-7 is not so good at. When you do need 24 (or even more) you don’t often need a pocketable camera. Note to Sony: RX100 – 20 is probably too many, too.
– David Kilpatrick
See NEX-7 at B&H (if you use this link or our B&H sidebar adverts, or Amazon ads, we do make something – not a great deal, and it does not cost you anything, but it can add up to help pay site costs).
As Gary says, his e-books do not replace the camera manual and also don’t replace Camera Controls 101 – he writes for the user who already knows which end of the lens fits a screw filter and which end goes on the camera body. His new NEX-7 book fast-tracks into many key features of the camera before backtracking into depth and detail, a great way to introduce owners to making better use of the advanced functions they have bought.
The only downside to the book is the cover, which features a new addition to the long line of bald heads Gary has used for his cover shots (always in the same style) – a penalty for visiting Gary just before the book was going to e-press!
The $26.45 download (PDF, full colour, with additional resources for Kindle and other bw reader platforms) now strikes me as even better value after the last week of wandering through California by car in search of images. The USA is now fairly expensive compared to much of Europe, not affordable as it used to be – and this comes as a surprise, because things like the camera prices at B&H do not give much clue, they are still generally lower. In California at least things like motels (except the most basic), beer, coffee, snacks, entry or parking fees are maybe 50% more than UK costs – so to all our US readers, be assured, now is a very good time to use your NEX-7 skills and take a trip across the pond. You can find an award-winning b&b with one of the best full breakfasts in Scotland for under $75 (£=$1.60) in our home town with a pretty good photographer running it!
In the latest incarnation of Photoshop, CS6, the Photomerge function is faster than ever before and leverages all the context-aware, pixel matching math of the previous versions enhanced to a degree you’ll find hard to believe.
Sony NEX and Alpha cameras have the same technology built-in for their sweep panorama mode, but anyone who’s used this frequently will know that failures happen, like stepped sea horizons and double imaged or squished-flat people.
Photoshop has the menu item Photomerge under ‘Automate’ in the File Menu. It is a panoramic stitching function, but it does not need you to shoot with a tripod or even shoot with care. You can stick a wide angle lens on your camera, take two pictures with radically different vanishing points, and still end up with a neatly stitched perspective.
What you need to know is how to NAME your images or what order to shoot them in. Contrary to what you might expect, Photomerge inherits its geometry from the LAST image in your sequence. So, if you have these three images:
This is the order you need to name them. I shot these with the bottom one first, of course – my level horizon straight-on shot. Then I aimed up, and then up again, overlapping three shots. If I then select these for Photomerge, Photoshop will correctly realise I want a vertical panorama stitch but it will not use the straight-on shot to set the image angle and geometry. It always picks the LAST shot, so I must rename my JPEG conversions 1, 2 and 3 as they appear above.
If your open tabs, or the stacked order of open windows, does not place the target perspective LAST you’ll get the wrong result. Here is what happens if the first shot (the bottom one above) is placed as the first tab in a multi-tab PS window, or the top window in a stack of separate windows, before adding OPEN FILES to the Photomerge window:
I used the NEX-7 with the 16mm f/2.8 SEL wide angle for these three shots. The composite, before cropping, measures a substantial 130MB. This technique enables you to use almost any wide-angle lens to create impossible wide views.
Here is the result when you stack the shots in the right order, so the program takes its perspective cues from the vertically-correct frame (the last one shown at the top):
You have no manual control over the perspective rendering. It’s all down to feeding Photomerge the right images, in the right order. Here is the fine tuned and cropped result:
This is an unretouched merge of the three frames. I’ve been trying this on various subjects, some rather silly, and Photoshop CS6 simply nails the merging even with focus, exposure or tilted camera errors. There are much lower cost programs which stitch images and do it well, but this takes a matter of a few seconds to create a final image equal to 40 or more megapixels. Not bad for a tiny 16mm lens!
Tip: instead of adding Open Images, browse and add one at a time, making sure the perspective-key shot is the last one added.
If you shoot architectural or landscape images, this function’s enhanced performance allows you to leave behind your 8mm. Except, of course, you don’t have one. If you do have an 8mm, welcome to the world of 5mm…
Added example – the next day…
I returned to the building (the other end of it) the day after posting this article because I wanted to add something far more complex, still shot by hand, using the NEX-7 and 16mm, showing just how amazing Photomerge has become. I wanted foreground and background elements, complex geometry and a matrix of shots not just a row of them.
Here is my matrix of shots – every one of these is an 85° diagonal view, 16mm on APS-C:
Here is the result of the Photomerge window before final adjustment and cropping:
This is a 400MB+ Photoshop document and over 200MB in flattened data size. Below is the final crop, with a small rotation and correction of vertical perspective:
This is a 119MB JPEG 6919 x 6013 pixels in size, no retouching has been used and the raw conversions are default with the 16mm E lens profile. Some fringes remain visible, the image could be downsized and corrected further. Remember.. this is the often-criticised 16mm which I find to be an excellent little lens. You can download the full size sRGB JPEG saved to Level 10 quality (14MB file) from the link below if you are Photoclubalpha subscriber. It will not appear if you are not a subscriber.
SONY is sometimes accused of not listening to the Alpha or NEX owner when it comes to what features they include in new cameras, and what modifications they offer through firmware to existing owners. There are two points of view on firmware; some criticise updates, saying the product should have been released with the right stuff inside on Day 1 while other praise those makers who issue frequent and valuable firmware revisions because they ‘supporting the product’.
My view is the latter; if I own a camera, I really don’t care much what bells and whistles are added to its successor in hardware as I know the only way to get those is to buy the new model. But I do value firmware updates and I know that far more could be done to keep the firmware of older models in top condition. I guess they would have to issue a new camera manual and don’t want to improve the user interface or add functions not included in the original!
Sony does listen, but it listens harder to new potential buyers than to existing owners. It listens to the untapped market, to the people who buy someone else’s camera instead of Sony. After all, it’s already got the existing owners. It only needs to listen to them as far as the next camera upgrade goes for the proportion who will be likely to change frequently.
The new NEX-F3 is a perfect instance of listen to the unconverted market. They want an LCD which aims forward so they can film themselves; amateurs only get one take for their home porn movies and can be very disappointed to find they’ve cut the important bits off. I am, of course, talking about guitar porn, cookery porn, motorcycle porn and not the other kind…so Sony has made the LCD flip over the top.
They have in addition made this entry-level NEX 3 model use the latest 16.1 megapixel sensor, generally agreed to be the most versatile all-round sensor on the market, and accept the accessory FDA-EV1S EVF which doubles Sony profits on any camera sold, should be buyer decide later they want an eye-level electronic finder. The battery life has been extended by 18% to 470 shots per charge, and if you buy the higher capacity 1300mAh Japanese made third party cells in place of the Sony 1080mAh ones which cost six times as much, you win twice. Except that I’ll bet the NEX-F3 adds another layer of battery compatibility protection, just like the 5N and 7 did. The third party cell makers had to update their stuff fast and warn buyers that they needed a compatible type, people owning older clone cells found they didn’t work in the new cameras.
Since this camera is the first NEX (or any Sony Alpha/NEX) to offer in-camera USB connection recharging, the odds are not just high that clone cells won’t work. It’s what bookies call a dead cert. Being able to use your iPhone charger (just a different cable) or similar USB mains-plug or in-car 5v adaptor cuts down on all the rubbish we have to carry when travelling.
To keep the distinction between entry level 3 and better 5 to 7 models clear, Sony has restrained the video to 50/60i with final 25p (European) or 24p (US) output. The better models offer full 50/60p as their top quality. But Clear Image Zoom is included, which does a pretty good job for the everyday user of providing a 2X electronic converter with acceptable full resolution sharpness. There’s no microphone input and some new software which sounds horrible is bundled – PlayMemories Home. Sony, just because you got to use words like Play, Walk, Memories, Man, Stick, Station and so on in various products does not mean they have to be repeated in child-like product names for all eternity!
Sony has added the pop-up flash from the NEX-7 to the F3. Is this a good idea? I predict some deeply disappointed flashers.
It rises just so high above the camera, and it’s not absolutely identical to the 7; the position appears comparable. The new F3 will be sold with the usual single or twin kit lenses I’m sure, and not so often with the latest 18-200mm LE (lite version E?) zoom which has been launched at the same time. This lens is a direct counterpart to the Tamron 18-200mm VC III f/3.5-6.3 which I’ve been used since early March. Though Sony has stated that the OSS (VC) is not as efficient as the more expensive Sony SEL 18-200mm, my findings using the Tamron are that it’s modified to be very smooth during video as has the AF action, which is less volatile than other SEL lenses.
Now I’m sure this lens will be very popular – the Tamron version is sharp and quite beautifully finished, with Sony’s rubberette dust attractor grip absent and a slick metal barrel skin with broad easily cleaned rubber ribs doing the zoom and focus work instead. Tamron’s £499 lens looks like £699 where Sony’s £699 will look like £299 after you have handled it with bare skin for a few minutes. Sony should issue silk gloves with all their lenses.
But here is the downside of choosing such a lens as your kit zoom for the NEX-7 and presumably for the F3. The pop-up flash just doesn’t clear the lens well enough and to use flash with the 18-200mm you must buy the accessory FVL-F20S flash which lifts the light source high enough the camera to avoid what you witness below.
You may also be unimpressed by the uncorrected complex barrel distortion of the 18-200mm Tamron at close range, demonstrated here by photographing an A2 printout of an Adobe lens correction target. Actually, the Tamron profile included in the latest Adobe Camera Raw does a nearly perfect job of straightening up this lens at average scenic distances. This profile should also work with the new Sony lens. What’s good about the Tamron is that its lens identity is recognised by ACR and the correct profile auto-selected.
What you are looking at above is the shadow of the lens, at 18mm, with the lens hood removed and the NEX-7 internal flash used. It is possible the NEX-F3 will be a very small amount better than this.
Here is what happens if you carelessly leave the lens hood on! An A2 target is much the same size as a two-face close-up wide angle portrait, or a typical pet shot or party shot; times you use flash. The shadow does not get smaller further away, but you can dispose of it by using focal lengths over 150mm. Wow!
In other words, Sony has listened to what the public wants – pop-up flash and a superzoom they can afford – but in such a compact body, with no pentaprism-shaped top to allow a good ‘lift’ when the flash is popped up the result will be more than a few unhappy beginners. That is some shadow by any standards.
The Alpha 37
And so to the second consumer-focused launch by Sony this month, the also-16-megapixel Alpha 37. You can think of it technically as a NEX-F3 in an Alpha SLT format – same ISO 16000 top but with 100 at the bottom thanks to the SLT pellicle mirror, same 5.5fps regular motordrive, similar 450/500 shots per battery charge depending on whether you use the power hungry EVF or the economical rear LCD.
You can see here how much extra height the GN10 pop-up flash gains compared to the GN6 of the F3 or NEX-7. It should clear many lenses even with hoods attached, and may well prove usable combined with the new SAM lens for the Alpha range – a slightly more compact 18-135mm f/3.5-5.6 using a type of SAM motor which is claimed to be silent and which allows DMF. Remember that earlier SAM designs with the audible motor have not allowed DMF and have even been quite picky about exactly how you set MF instead of AF. The presence of DMF in the new lens indicates that the SAM internal motor focusing may be a lot closer to SSM than to some basic flavours of SAM. I like the idea of this lens, 18-135mms can be surprisingly good though the f/5.6 long end maximum may actually be slower than many 18-200mm or 18-250mms when set to 135mm (they tend to be f/5 at that point).
Is it a Tamron? Probably not. Tamron lens locks move forward to lock the zoom action. Sigma lens locks, though traditionally placed on the left side, move back towards the camera to lock the lens. Sigma has flavours of HSM which allow DMF and others, like the HSM on their 18-250mm OS, which don’t. I look forward to reports on exactly how the 18-135mm works and whether its superior SAM makes it a hidden bargain.
And also, of course, whether the pop-up flash casts interesting shadows!
There is not a lot more to say about the A37 except that it shares most limitations imposed on the F3 such as the video format and bitrates, that it has the usual bells and whistles including an auto portrait crop framing mode, and resembles an A55 body size updated to be more ergonomic. It also has an updated A55 type EVF, not to be confused with the OLED Tru-Finder of the NEX-7, A77 and A65 but identical to the A57. There is a spectacle friendly EVF mode, which as far as I can tell reduces the image area to match the A55 (which wastes loads of its screen as a blank surround). The big improvement made by the A57 was to deploy the full area of the 1440k-dot screen instead of using it as a milky luminescent border for a small image. The downside is that spectacle wearers find the full area hard to see edge to edge.
The rear screen is 2.7″ not 3″, since this is a very compact body, and uses the double hinged up/down tilt mechanism without rotation or forward facing options.
I did not expect to see GPS in this model, but after several expeditions with the Alpha 77 I am beginning to doubt whether onboard GPS as provided by Sony is much help at all. There have been far too many entire shoots where not a single frame has GPS data. It is something I find extremely useful but it’s only useful if it works most of the time. It’s odd to see USB charging introduced in the F3 but not present in this model. Lack of communication between product teams?
The pricing of the A37 will be very competitive indeed.
With all these various May launches – NEX-F3, 18-200mm LE, Alpha 37, 18-135mm SAM – there’s clear evidence that Sony listens first to mass market dealers and to potential new adopters of large sensor interchangeable lens cameras, those moving up from compacts. Everyone who has ever passed an Alpha or NEX fitted with an 18-55mm lens to a compact zoom user will know the reaction – that the zoom doesn’t even begin to zoom, by their standards. They can’t believe you can not frame a face from twenty feet away.
All Sony’s advances are geared to making these larger format cameras more satisfying to the upgrading user.
Now we just wait for them to produce 2012’s models designed to keep the upgrading Alpha and NEX user equally happy.
Side by side on my light table (which collapses with a ‘pop’ when sixteen tons of Nikon is placed on it), and the NEX-7 is given the foreground role to avoid any accusations of using perspective to make it look tiddly.
I’m writing some reviews of the Nikon and other new professional DSLRs for the British Journal, so I won’t say anything about the Nikon’s rather wonderful 16 megapixel full frame sensor or its stunning low light performance. I hope when Nikon read my reports they’ll decide to send me to photograph in the Arctic Circle in December – there would be plenty of light for this beast.
This picture won’t be going to the BJP. I like it because these are equivalents. The Nikon’s 28-300mm VR is admittedly f/5.6 at the long end (and a vast amount better than any Sigma or Tamron 28-300mm or 18-200mm yet made). But otherwise, these are zooms with the same range of angle, both stabilised, both very quiet in both focusing and IS action, both very well-made.
And the cameras are both a real pleasure to use and produce 100% professional results. The difference is that if I stick the NEX-7 combo under my coat, I do not look like a shoplifter or terrorist with a concealed weapon of mass-perturbation.
Watch out for our NEX-7 review soon. I’m not hurrying and it may be a month or more.
The UK’s top camera and lens hire company, hireacamera.com, has invested in a whole new stock of Sony Alpha and NEX gear right up to the 500mm G – their A77s come with 16-50mm SSMs… here, Guy Thatcher explains their enthusiasm for Sony, filmed at the PhotoVision Roadshow in Edinburgh on Tuesday March 27th.
It’s a 1080p HD video shot on the NEX-7 by David Kilpatrick with no accessories apart from the Tamron 18-200mm DiIII VC zoom, which at one point displays a preference for focusing on the better lit, more contrasty background.
Yesterday we received two SanDisk 30MB/s 16GB SDHC cards from Amazon UK – £15.99 each, a couple of pounds more than regular Class 10 cards like the Transcends we normally use on all current Alpha and NEX models. You must have faster than 15MB/s for cameras such as the A55, A580 or NEX-5n not because of video issues, or even because you want to shoot raw bursts – you need it to be sure that shooting sweep panoramas or 3D panoramas will not a) fail b) corrupt your card and lock you out of shooting in the process.
This is what happened to us when using a SanDisk Ultra 15MB/s card which had been fine for all other work. Fortunately we had a spare card, the corrupted card was removed and its file contents recovered using SanDisk’s free program.
The SanDisk 30MB/s card labelled for ‘HD video’ is of course not limited to video and is ideal for any similar use which includes sweep pans, multishot noise reduction, HDR and 12fps bursts (etc). It is labelled slightly differently:
At £15.99 in the offer linked to here (click the image of card or this link) it’s a very good value fast reliable card from a premium maker. Admittedly, we are now seeing the Transcend brand falling to £12-13 for Class 10 which despite their info saying Class 6 or faster (etc) is the minimum you should aim for with Alpha and NEX current generation models. SEE COMMENTS – Amazon changed this offer a couple of days later to the less desirable 20MB/s but there was still a good price on 32GB 30MB/s.
We ordered two of the 16GBs and what actually arrived the next day was a pair of these:
These cards – 300X, 45MB/s, UHS-1 Class 10 – are not listed for sale under the Extreme branding but can be found as the last generation of Extreme Pro, priced at £43.50. Clearly SanDisk is repositioning the prices and labelling of the card range. So, we were apparently sent the latest version of something they’ve still got on sale for £43.50 but we paid £15.99.
It gets more interesting as the real speed demon – the 95MB/s 16GB Extreme Pro which was selling for £80 or so recently – has dropped in price to be BELOW the price of the 45MB/s version which is now marked as having a ‘newer’ version. You can buy the 95MB/s card for only £38.10. We’ve ordered and received one of these, no errors or substitutions.
There is no guarantee that if you order the bargain HD Video 30MB/s card you will get the same switched product as we did with a March 18th order, delivered March 20th, UK. Even if you don’t it is a great price for a card which should guarantee the correct operation of NEX-7, Alpha 77, Alpha 65. The 95MB/s version is one of the fastest SD cards yet made, and will go beyond correct operation to ensure the fastest clearing of the camera’s buffer, fastest image playback or review, and the highest number of consecutive shots when shooting continuous sequences.
Disclaimer: Amazon prices can change on a daily basis, and Amazon USA or other regions may differ.
