(SR3) New A-mount mirrorless camera to be launched soon?
According to Photorumors “Sony will release a new mirrorless camera with 3 CD (CMOS) sensors. Each of the sensors will be 6MP and the combined ISO will be up to 819 200 (up to 16mp combined image size). The camera will have an α-mount, contrast AF, 1.5x crop factor. It seems that working models are already floating around to selected individuals.”
I received a similar rumor over one month ago and I didn’t post it because I thought it was a joke. But another source just gave a new information that Zeiss developed servo lenses with Alpha mount for that camera! I am starting to believe there is something true behind all those rumors…
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Comment from Milos Janata: Same as useless megapixels :)...
Comment from Sky_walker: That's assuming that Sony uses 1995 tech...- Comment from Sky_walker: Yep. I heard that relation is roughly 10...
- Comment from Sky_walker: 3CMOS ;) easier to remember ;)
+ that's...
Mafiosito
2 years ago |24 mgpxl & hundred thousands ISO for the coming a77 is starting to make sense… just thinking
GF1
2 years ago |Mirrorless and A mount doesn’t make any sense plus the “3 sensors” thingy are for camcorders only so far because that way you will get better colors but less resolution (Which doesn’t matter for camcorders since 1920x1080p resolution 2mp~ is all what needed)
This is properly Sony second attempt to make a Camcorder with big sensor like the NEX-VG10
john
2 years ago |Mirrorless in ALL mounts by ALL manufactures makes PERFECT sense.
Only a matter of time
Alex F.
2 years ago |Guess you have never seen Sigmas dslr cameras then…..
Brian
2 years ago |I hope it’s a retro look rangefinder type.
Panfruit
2 years ago |DO they make rangefinder video cameras?
Walt
2 years ago |Except for being mirrorless it’s not new. The Minolta RD175 which I bought over 15 years ago was three sensors in a full DSLR. Very good camera for it’s time, though it was pretty bulky. I used it for nearly 10 years until Minolta finally brought out the 7D. I’d not mind seeing some new efforts at 3 sensor cameras.
Milos Janata
2 years ago |Lovely rumor, this device could make me happy:)
Rob
2 years ago |A video cam using three large sensors makes a lot of sense given the 6 megapixel sensors are relatively easy to build nowadays. However, their use to build composite images in the 16 megapixel range stretches the imagination. That may build on current SONY technology like the twilight function, or high iso where stacked images are processed in-camera to produce relatively noiseless images. Stacking AND interpolating (using multiple images of the same scene, like autostitch does in overlapped areas, but offsetting pixels during processing to produce virtual high megapixel images) might be a viable strategy for producing extremely high iso images in the range and size suggested. This would really be a genius move if they can pull it off!
mma173
2 years ago |Hope the sensors will have different exposures; unlike camcorders in which they have different channels (RGB).
HY
2 years ago |How could A-mount be used on a mirrorless camera? Flange distance issue ?
kurth
2 years ago |think foveon
misu
2 years ago |I think enlarging a 3ccd prism system to dx format is doable. the camera would have to be huge, heavy and very expensive. and probably good. an f23 costs 150k and has a special kind of glass in the prism to ensure optical quality, and still is not on par with f35 which uses a single ccd (not a bayer pattern).
I wonder if the half mirror system could be adapted in to a prism substitute in order to reduce weight and costs.
Sally Brouer
2 years ago |i think it is something like the minolta rd 175 or rd 3000. old minolta technic!
WyldRage
2 years ago |Being quite curious about the Sigma SD1, the rumored Sony camera sounds very interesting. With IBIS (if possible), a GPS and the cheaper Sony prime lenses, I could forget everything about Foveon.
JB
2 years ago |Is rumour to be video camera? or DSLT?
john
2 years ago |Its a new revolutionary holographic camera @$1500
Images cam only be viewed with a Sony HG5428-g holographic projector estimated price $25K.
Afique
2 years ago |Hope they will make 3 finder retro,electrical and live view it will be awsome..wait new a700 from last year but nothingD:
acolyte
2 years ago |It seems that working models are already floating around to selected individuals.
No pics? tch
So Sony wants to release NEX 4, A77, NEX 7, FF, and this camera one after another?
Did they have that much resource? If so why wouldn’t they gave one of them earlier? -_-
Ezio
2 years ago |can someone explain to me what servo lenses are?
Nobodi
2 years ago |It seems that the only shot of confidence SonyAlphaRumors had was based on the fact that two seemingly independent sources contributed the same information. But that could be totally baseless. Just because you receive the same rumor from two different sources does not mean that those two sources and independent. They more likely than not share a common source. That’s what makes rumors rumors.
hanugro
2 years ago |When you say alpha mount it means a mount, e mount, or yet a new mount? How would fit 3 aps sensors on dslr/t body? It will be huge and very expensive.
Panfruit
2 years ago |It obviously could only be a video camera with an A-mount. It is not a still camera, if it exists.
hanugro
2 years ago |I would welcome video only device using a-mount. At the very least, it will increase the value of a mount lenses.
I don’t really interested in video but I admit that having ability to record a short clip of full HD dSLR is a feature that is nice to have.
Carlos
2 years ago |Does anyone konw Minolta RD-175 and it´s 3 CCD? http://www.mhohner.de/sony-minolta/onebody/rd-175
b shaw
2 years ago |like kurth said, think foveon
hanugro
2 years ago |Foveon is still 1 sensor with 3 different color receptor on top of one another in that 1 sensor. This article mention using 3 sensors.
Sky_walker
2 years ago |Imagination!
Instead of 3 layers in Foveon you use 3 different sensors behind beam splitter which receive their own, uninterrupted portion of light. This means:
1) Best color precision of all currently made cameras (even Foveon will fall down in front of this, as it’s 3rd layer receives somehow interrupted light), and outstanding high-iso performance for the cost of lower resolution. Here you won’t use Bayer pattern.
2) or you get very high resolution with huge dynamic range, something beating Canon 7D by miles. Though still you’d have to use Bayer pattern here.
In either scenario such camera can be best APS-C tool ever created for still photography!
(ok, AF most likely will be problematic if they won’t put phase detection sensors onto the primary sensors, make them integrated, but well… I do MF in most cases anyway
)
extra|ordinary
2 years ago |This is quite a rumor. I’d certainly be interested to see what, if anything, materializes out of it.
Anonymous
2 years ago |Can’t Sony just focus on one thing? Sure, plenty of options are great, but they seem to have way too many things going on now and they’re starting to leave things half assed done. They need to release the specs of the NEX lenses already and make some pancakes for it, instead of leaving it half done. If this rumour is true, wouldn’t a camera like this cannibalize the sales of the NEX? What will happen to SLT? Geez, Sony.
Ezio
2 years ago |if only more people studied physics through high school and university, specialize and excel in the subject of Optics and Mechanics, and also joined Minolta/Sony (which isn’t easy) to help design more lenses….
Oh right, it stopped at the word Physics cus all those numb nuts out there can’t understand math.
Catastrophile
2 years ago |They are testing the water, and based on sales they make informed decisions about continuing/discontinuing. For example because the sales of A55 are much better than A580, there will probably be no A750 with the A77.
JB
2 years ago |Source of these sales results? The A580 is only on sale in certain countries.
Catastrophile
2 years ago |even in the parts of the world where the 580 is available, its popularity or sales are just not comparable with those of the A55, let’s not be in denial just because we prefer the traditional design of the A580.
Sky_walker
2 years ago |Yep. I heard that relation is roughly 10:1 for the A55 win.
Though I guess it’s bit overshot, more like 8:1, but still…. difference is really big.
ttt
2 years ago |That is true.
Walt
2 years ago |The RD-175 used three CCD’s which were two green offset at half pixel and one striped red/blue. The pixels on the sensor were also rectangular. The sensors it used were originally video sensors but the camera did not do video, it is a DSLR which shoots quality stills only. So yes, a three sensor design can be used effectively for stills.
The RD-175 used OVF, had no display on camera to show the shot either before or after, no back LCD at all. You shot RAW and did not see it until you processed it in your computer using Minolta’s software. It’s conversion multiplier (to 35mm equivalent) was 2x.
And the RD-3000 was a vectis mount digital, not a DSLR and not three sensors but one. And extremely annoying to those of us shooting the A mount DSLR RD-175 when it came out as the replacement for the RD-175 as to use it would involve buying a new lens set and all. Thus it was not very successful.
Froo
2 years ago |The RD-3000 used two sensors, and it was a full DSLR. But for the wrong system. One of Minolta’s bigger mistakes, not making it an A-mount camera — in fact, it’s up there in my top five list of “huge Minolta mistakes”.
David
2 years ago |Sounds like more uninteresting crap. By the way, doesn’t 3×6 = 18?
Catastrophile
2 years ago |maybe the discrepancy is due to overlapping of the images on the 3 sensors (basically like what you have when you do pano-stitch).
Carl
2 years ago |An RD-175 for a new generation?
Actually, I’ve seen some picks from the 175, and it had surprisingly good image quality considering it’s vintage.
This one, assuming it exists, will probably be a camcorder and not a still camera, though.
linux
2 years ago |If this is true, this might be the A77 o_0. 3 sensors give you many options. You can imagine using them one after the other to easily reach 10+fps in a high fps mode (@6MP) or combine the data from the different sensors in order to get higher DR or higher iso like the new feature of the mid-range alphas, but this time not only for still subjects. And that it would help for high quality video is obvious. it might even be used for 3D stills and movies.
jg
2 years ago |linux wrote: “3 sensors give you many options [...] that it would help for high quality video is obvious”
Why is that excactly?
jg
2 years ago |Joseph S Wisniewski’s perspective:
“… in the very early days of solid state sensors, they built the cameras just like tube cameras, with beam splitters and three CCD chips. All the color filtering was done by the filters.
This gave the highest sensitivity, about a stop and a half better than the first “color filter array” single sensor systems, and a stop better than later systems. But it had several major disadvantages. [...]
insanely poor color accuracy
+ large, heavy, expensive, poor performing lenses
+ poor shutter performance
= the rumor about a Sony 3 sensor camera is bunk ”
http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1000&message=37470849
linux
2 years ago |That’s assuming that Sony would want to have only 1 color per sensor, which isn’t the only possibility.
jg
2 years ago |Linux wrote: “You can imagine using them one after the other to easily reach 10+fps in a high fps mode (@6MP) or combine the data from the different sensors in order to get higher DR or higher iso like the new feature of the mid-range alphas, but this time not only for still subjects.”
That would be possible only if the three sensors were perfectly aligned and the picture field on each sensor were identical. Is that possible?
Sky_walker
2 years ago |That’s assuming that Sony uses 1995 tech, which is silly at least.
Take a look at NEX-5. Noone a year before it’s release would tell that it’s possible to put APS-C sensor in interchangeable lens body.
So I think mr. Wisniewski is wrong here, and the rumor is actually very possible + I have hopes for body being in size of A700 (maybe bit bigger, but not much), though certainly it’ll be heavier due to prism weight.
Joseph S. Wisniewski
2 years ago |Sort of like where I was, years ago. We actually tested some of those combinations: the lime/magenta set, the HRD set, the offset focal planes, and the polarizer. The integral 80A and color IR were thought experiments.
http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1018&message=31886507
I think a higher volume version of one of my industrial colorimetric camera designs would sell to product and fashion photographers. I’d love to take the two RGB sensor, two filter Taplin & Berns style colorimetric platform (I’ve described it elsewhere) and have a filter wheel (more likely a sliding strip or belt of filters) in front of both sensors.
Sensor 1
no filter
magenta (for RgB, may be helpful for Taplin & Berns colorimetric processing)
80A (for better incandescent shooting)
UV/IR pass, visible cut
850nm IR
a rotating polarizer
Sensor 2
no filter
lime green (for rGb, necessary for Taplin & Berns colorimetric processing)
80A (for better incandescent shooting)
UV pass with dichroic visible/IR blocker
80A with 4 stop ND
4 stop ND
720nm IR
695mn IR
Sensor 2 gets a +/-2mm focus shift ability, so we can do:
* two planes of focus when in visible mode (DOF extending focus stacking, or DOF reducing, with the right math)
*parfocal visible/IR, visible/UV, visible/UV/IR,
*correction of longitudinal CA in visible mode
There’s so much fun math you can do with this. Differencing a simultaneous polarizer and no-polarizer capture lets you compensate for the “band of dark” you get when using a polarizer on too wide an angle of lens. It also lets you increase, or invert the polarizer effect. Make athletes look more sweaty. Turn a lake or river to molten metal…
RB
2 years ago |Yepp, I agree. Usually, we are locked in our thinking to what we know. And we forget that the flipping mirror is just a stupid workaround for the shortcoming of film, which sensors don’t have. In other words: If the exposure of film wouldn’t be a one-way road, there wouldn’t be any need to invent a SLR…
Now, when you eliminate the mirror (which is, frankly speaking, just an archaic relict from the times of film), you have plenty of space left between the classical position of the film and the rear end of the lens. Space which you can use creatively and more useful as with a dumb mirror — for instance with a beam splitter to expose three sensors simultaneously, opening Pandora’s box.
mugen
2 years ago |maybe ‘mirrorless’ means SLT
Sky_walker
2 years ago |if it’s 3x CMOS than there will be no place for Transculent mirror as you need to put beam splitter between the lens and sensors.
Sahaja
2 years ago |Maybe they’ll have a prototype of this RD-175 update to show at the CP+ Camera & Photo Imaging Show in Japan in February.
Benj
2 years ago |Sounds vaguely similar to the Foveon X3 sensor technology used in Sigma cameras.
Emopunk
2 years ago |Interesting, altough it would just be some hype.
Milos Janata
2 years ago |Hype is that current compact camera sensors would have 210 mpx if we enlarged them to apc size retaining same pixel density. i know it’s a little OT :] but it deserves it’s own article.
Emopunk
2 years ago |The great think about this option would be that overal pixel count would not go above 20mpx, at least it’s what I hope. Who would need 25mpx aps-c sensor?
Milos Janata
2 years ago |That is the question… Who needs 25 mpx? Anybody here?
Carlos R B
2 years ago |If it has as good or better DR and noise, why not? for landscapes is better more resolution.
Camaman
2 years ago |Sounds like that A700 game changer and hundreds of thousands of ISO feature they have been talking about…
john
2 years ago |I don’t think so.
Sony just got finished saying the A700 replacement A77? would be SLT design not mirrorless.
Dulaney Ward
2 years ago |Actually, Sony did NOT say that tha A700 successor will be an SLT; rather, they said it would “incorporate SLT technology.” That’s a very different statement. I expect that the A77 will be another animal altogether.
Sky_walker
2 years ago |Yep, I hope so.
You remember the rumor about combined OVF and EVF? Like… where dark OVF viewfinder was enforced by EVF? Despite of mistakes made in schema drown by rumor author I believe that it might be doable and certainly it’d be the best way for employing translucent mirror in DSLR camera. It’d be uber-happy from something like this.
Steve
2 years ago |I think everyone should read the photorumors site.
After I did this rumor made more sense.
john
2 years ago |So what about the rumor of A77 being 24 MP?
All smoke and no mirrors?
Adi
2 years ago |This is not the rumored A77, but another camera.
Dr. Tom
2 years ago |I think they are just releasing another video camera that is mirrorless with alpha mount lenses.
Emopunk
2 years ago |Dr. Tom, I really hope you’re wrong, but the thought was in my mind too for a second
Could someone explain why it says contrast AF? Aren’t SLTs based on pd AF?
Mistral75
2 years ago |Because this one would have no translucent mirror to reflect part of the light onto a phase-detection AF system, only a prism to strip the light.
anonymous
2 years ago |If it is really an a-mount mirrorless, then there will be plenty of space between the sensor and the lens. Then they could place a polarizer filter into that space that would automatically adjust itself.
Hut
2 years ago |I agree with the rangefinder comment. Thats all i care about.
Emopunk
2 years ago |Ok. So it seems we’re not talking about A77.
Catastrophile
2 years ago |actually if this rumor is true, then this camera ought to be the A700 replacement and that goes very well with what Sony said in the latest interviews that the long delay in replacing the A700 will be forgiven when the specs of the replacement are announced (the specs will blow away the A700 owners). Otherwise if there is going to be a conventional-sensor A700 replacement (A77 or A750) plus this rumored camera as a new line, then you can expect a lot of frustration that the A700 replacement doesn’t have the ISO 800,000 of the new line camera, and that will be not in accordance with what Sony said recently that the A700 replacement will combine all the technologies Sony has currently (ie no other Sony APS-C camera should be superior in features or capabilities to the A77/750).
clivengu
2 years ago |I do somehow agree with Catastrophile… It does more sense if this is an A700 replacement.. “so called A77″… If this is not, then A700 replacement will need another 1 more year to be realised..
2010= SLT technology…+ EVF, Test & evaluate!
2011= 3 Sensors with ISO 800,000. Test market & evaluate!
2012= Combine innovation from the previous 2 years to make the Invincible A77!!! (at the same time End of the world!)
If Sony continue doing this.. the replacement will never ever be completed. IF this rumor’s true.. I hope this will be the answer for everyone.
sonyboy68
2 years ago |Sony will be so innovative in the future that we will be amazed. Definively no other brand can be so original.
SonyA700
2 years ago |LOL
So? Nie!
2 years ago |If such camera exists and it is first and foremost a stills camera (not video).
I suspect that it will not actually have 3 seperate sensors, It would require a beamsplitter as the image circle of the lenses would not cover 3 sensor, it would make the body bulky to hold the 3 sensors, a beamsplitter *might* not fit between the lens and sensor given the space available due to the mount. If a beamsplitter fits it certainly will be mirrorless.
Te sensor could be multilayered similar but nor equal the foveon or employ 2 steps of pixel binning like: 6 to 12, 12 to 18mpx. But that also would require some nifty engineering with the Bayer filter / AA filter.
Sky_walker
2 years ago |It will be beamsplitter. It was said by original rumor author, let me quote:
“Sony will bring a 3ccd (in fact it is a 3cmos) camera before 04/2011! a-mount, but NO mirror. The mirror space will be used for the prisma. Contrast AF, crop 1.5, 3 X 6mp (uses 16 mp), ISO up to 819 200.”
And, yes, it will have 3 separate sensors (:D!)
Carl
2 years ago |It wouldn’t necessarily be a big camera if they folded the light path.
I’d guess it would be fairly hefty if they used a solid dichroic prism block rather than pellicle mirrors and colour filters, but it’s anyone’s guess how they’d make such a camera without seeing a design patent for it.
john
2 years ago |It appears that defining what cameras are,DSLR,DSLT,Mirrorless,MultiSensorBeamspitterTechnology
MSBT is going to get more complicated.
Sky_walker
2 years ago |3CMOS
easier to remember 
+ that’s kinda the name they use already, for their video camcoders.
ron
2 years ago |… and the noise from 400 as it is now
Milos Janata
2 years ago |looks like we should start using logarithmic ISO.
iso100=1, 200=2, 400=3, 800=4, 1600=5, 3200=6, 6400=7, 12800=8, 25600=9, 51200=10
So ISO 819000 = newISO 14
Panfruit
2 years ago |My ISO goes to 11.
Sky_walker
2 years ago |And my ISO goes to…. wait, does it count a usable ISO or just ISO? Cause useless ISO is still… useless ISO, no matter how many settings they put in camera.
Milos Janata
2 years ago |Same as useless megapixels
Daniel
2 years ago |Nice… Sony have become the playground for encouraging rumors…for gadgetry and electronics…but no serious updated photography gear…while other brands have serious cameras out there I think Sony users have their dreams, hopes, imagination, instead to play with. There’s no excuse for rhe pass of one, maybe two years, continuous waiting…and nothing sure…no release date for the succesor of the A700.
I’m not sure about this three sensor rumor…rather than the technological difficulties it would be the price that would be of an issue…there would be more components that would cost more of course..I don’t know why but I’m wondering if this is the reason why Sony previously said that it would be targeted to pros also, becouse it would come at a “premium” price…
I’m not sure that this is going to be the A77…
Thundercats
2 years ago |Hopefully they will announce this thing (and A7X) at the CP show next month. Canon seems ready to announce their two new Rebel models at this time. Swapped out the 700 for 580 a few weeks ago. Took the 580 into the mountains last weekend. Even though it got more than a few splashes from snow and rain, it is still performing flawlessly. Great camera.
john
2 years ago |All these rumors are very interesting but….
I’ll believe it when it’s on the store shelves.
Is Sony the most innovative camera manufacturer today? | Photo Rumors
2 years ago |[...] The latest rumor is that Zeiss will be developing new servo lenses with Alpha mount for the upcoming 3 sensor mirrorless camera. Sony is expected to release also two high-end point and shoot cameras and a new 500mm f/4 lens with new control buttons (15x image magnification is one of the new functions that will be added to this lens). Here is a prototype of the 50mm f/4 lens: Sony 500mm f/4 lens prototype more Sony lens prototypes [...]