The following is a Guest Post from Photochirp. To write a guest post on SAR follow the instruction on that page.

—-

The Sony a7rII is a great camera and I am mostly satisfied with it. There are a few things I would like to be implemented or changed but most of those things exist within a software update and not necessarily a hardware update (of course, I would like dual card slots). I’m not sure how to get the communities support on this, but please let me know what you think of these ideas.

Sony a7rII Specific Firmware Improvements For The Sony a7rII 3.30 Firmware Update

• The battery drains after a while even if the camera is not in use or switched on
• Crop mode should be easier to access, perhaps as part of the quick menu so that it can be quickly enabled for videos
• Video mode crop mode should be separate from photography crop mode, therefore videographers don’t have to continuously change this when taking photographs or making videos ~ This is an extremely important feature for the Sony a7rII
• Lossless compressed raw should be an additional option for the RAW file format ~ Lossy compressed is lossy and uncompressed creates incredibly large files

Sony a7II, Sony a7sII and Sony a7rII General Firmware Improvements

• Better manual focus options ~ manual focus should have the option to go straight to full zoom when you rotate the lens, and there should also be the option to only magnify a portion of the frame e.g. a small, 10x square around the selected focus point or focus area. This would allow you to compose the shot while focusing ~ I believe this is important and would improve the manual focus experience with the Sony a7II, Sony a7sII and the Sony a7rII considerably
• Spot meter should be able to meter the focus point instead of just a point in the centre of the frame, in other words, interlock the focus point with spot focus
• A customizable video menu should allow duplicates of what’s in the stills menu, this would allow people to create their own menu system in an order that did not irritate them
• Facial recognition software should be put to better use for manual focusing, for example, it could automatically move the focus point to the subjects face and when you turn the focus ring, it magnifies around that area ~ This feature is fairly unimportant
• The option to disable electronic first curtain shutter automatically with speeds above 1/1000 of a second. This would help to avoid situations where banding can potentially exist ~ This feature is important as if is annyoing having to disable EFCS (electronic first curtain shutter) with the Sony a7II, Sony a7sII and the Sony a7rII
• Live histogram and zebra stripes should relate to the raw file and not the JPG settings
• Live histogram should be adjustable so that it can display red, green or blue, and not just luminance
• Maximum exposure length should be customizeable like auto ISO, for example, you should be able to have a maximum of 1 minute instead of 30 seconds
• Save settings from the “gear” menu to the custom function settings i.e. “C1” should remember setting-effect has been set to “off” while “C2” remembers setting-effect has been set to “on”
• Customizeable PASM dial, so “P” can become “C3” or whatever you want it to be

Sony a7II, Sony a7sII and Sony a7rII Wi-Fi Firmware Improvements and App Requests

• Send to phone using a network connection already available i.e. connecting to a router, instead of having to create a new network and disconnecting the old network
• An FTP, dropbox and an instagram app, and they should not require you to type in a password each time you use them

Stan Moniz
Evening colors. Shot with Sony Alpha a6300 | AquaTech ATB – 6300 water housing | Tokina USA 11-20mm f2.8

1) Submit your picture with a message and picture here: facebook.com/sonyalpharumors or on the SonyAlphaForum image section.
2) Like and comment the pictures from other readers here: facebook.com/sonyalpharumors/photos_stream?tab=photos and on SonyAlphaForum.
3) A selection of most liked pictures by the community and by me SAR admin will be posted weekly on SAR.

Note: When sending a pic feel free to also add a link to your site to promote yourself!

Ofer (video on top): “Recently I’ve finished working on a new stop-motion USA travel video which I thought you might like (it went a bit viral): https://youtu.be/6FEuUf0YOoI
A few months ago my wife and I honeymooned the West Coast of the US.
Over the period of 35 days and 3500 miles I’ve shot 16.5K stills (=400GB), which I later edited to this 2:45 min stop-motion video. Hope you’ll enjoy it!
Stats: 7 US states, 27 motels, 5 rental cars, 1 car crash, 0 injuries, 7 flights, countless relocating thoughts.
Movie Poster: https://s4.postimg.org/6a1rubagt/poster1920.jpg
Route: Vancouver – Seattle – Portland – Yosemite Park – San Francisco – Monterey – Los Angeles – Zion Park – Bryce Park – Las Vegas – Hoover Dam – Williams – Grand Canyon – Antelope Canyon – Flagstaff – Sedona – Albuquerque – Santa Fe
Equipment: Sony RX1, no tripod.
Music: “Road To Hell” by Sleigh Bells (https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/reign-of-terror/id490170428)
Showreel: www.rozenmanofer.com“

Sony RX10II upgrade a winner (USA Today).
Sony 50mm 1.4 – My First Images (SonyAlphaForum)
Recommended Video Tripods (Explora).
Laowa 105mm FE lens review (ThePhoBlographer).
Laowa 12mm E-mount Kickstarter campaign is about to end soon!
Ewa-Marine U-BXP100: Affordable Underwater Housing for Surf Photography (Adorama Learning Center)
To write a guest post on SAR follow the instruction on that page.

If you wonder what’s Sony’s reasoning behind the E-mount construction just read the recently published United States Patent 9392150 (Click here). It describes in detail the elements and details of the E-mount and what the advantages are. The text is quite complicated to read but in very short this is what Sony writes:

In recent years, in the foregoing small-sized camera, more impressive and advanced expressiveness, in which a subject is sharpened with a blurry background has been pursued as in a camera using 35 mm film (screen size: about 36 mm×about 24 mm).

According to the camera and the optical apparatus according to the embodiments of the present disclosure, the large-sized solid-state image pickup device having the rectangle light receiving section with a diagonal line length of about 43 millimeters or more is mounted on the body mount having an inside diameter smaller than about 48 millimeters, and the apparent shape of the solid-state image pickup device viewed from the front surface side of the body mount is a rectangle in which one or more corners are oblique. Therefore, even if the size is small, high image quality is obtainable.

Sony FE 50mm and 55mm vs Sigma MC 11 and other adaptable 50mm

A7S II Video: Slog 2 & 3, slow motion, Gimbal Pilotfly (SonyAlphaForum)
8 Tips for Safety and Etiquette When Photographing at Night (Explora).
Illustrated Photo Tips with Daniel Norton: Potato Chipping (Adorama Learning Center)
Sony Corporation Acquires a Portion of the Common Stock of Sony Financial Holdings Inc. (Sony.net).
Zeiss 50mm Planar FE review in Thai and English at Pantip.
Carl Zeiss To Celebrate 200th Birthday Of Founding Father (ePhotozine).
To write a guest post on SAR follow the instruction on that page.

The most popular Full Frame camera series of the world just got a new entry: Canon announced their EOS 5D Mark IV and full specs and pricing can be found at BHphoto, Adorama and Amazon. On paper this camera is a “conservative” evolution of the predecessor. Still I believe Canon will sell tons of that camera in DSLR countries like USA. Probably 4-5 times more than a Sony A7 camera. That’s why I think Sony should target that kind of customer by offering a Sony A7 camera that can match or even beat the autofocus system as I think that’s one of the main strong point of the Canon.

Dpreview posted a first impression review and says:

We expect significant, though not class-leading, improvements in dynamic range that narrow the gap in shadow recoverability between Canon and Sony sensors.

Newsshooter writes:

Sony managed to pull off a much better video performance with their a7R II which has an even higher still pixel count. I just wish Canon had managed to do the same here.

Philip Bloom is not very “excited” with the new Canon :)

1.74x crop in 4K on the Canon 5Dmkiv? Well that’s a bit poo isn’t it? Hopefully the MK V in 2020 will be full frame ? #disappointed

— Philip Bloom (@PhilipBloom) 25. August 2016

Sony Ambassador Ross D. Hamamura (www.RDHphoto.net) reports the following:

Sony USA is working on a way to run Canada Sony PRO Service for Canada. When the Details are final , an announcement will be done. So, for now … Sony working PRO’S IN Canada  should have Hope!
And this is a good sign for other working PROS around the world shooting Sony.

That’s great new for our Canadian readers. If you want to read more about the PRO support service check out the US website (Click here).

Thanks Ross!