All news about the new Sony A99II at Photokina

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Photokina opened his doors today and plenty of bloggers and SAR readers are sending us their hands-on reports and impressions. This post will be continually updated with new informations.

Photokina A99II newsfeed:

Hands-on with Sony a99 II at Dpreview. There is finally some small info about the new menu:

Sony has refreshed the camera’s menus to make them both easier to navigate and to remember. Some associated features have now been clustered together – you can find all the movie options in the same place, for instance.
The tabs as the top of the menu are also now color coded, to help you recognise and remember which section of the menu you’re in. Whether this is be visible enough to help you recall where a particular setting is remains to be seen but it’s great to see Sony taking steps to address their menu system.

Sony A99 II Hands-On First Impressions: Time with Sony’s new professional speed demon (Imaging Resource):

“The autofocus system was very quick and seemed to lock onto targets as well as track them fairly well.”

Sony A99 II Continuous AF Tracking Demo video on Youtube.
First Look by Adorama Learning Center.
A99II hands-on pictures at Photographyblog.
Tony Northrup v-log about the A99II (He says it’s a more interesting camera than the new Canon and Nikon DSLR)
Sony a99 II autofocus and buffer demo on SAR.
Italian A99II hands-on video by Ridble on Youtube.
Something else: First 1 Terabyte SD card announced (more info at Mirrorlessrumors).

Preorders:
The camera will be available for preorder tomorrow (September 21) at 11am New York time at BHphoto (Click here) and Adorama (Click here).

Poll:

Will you buy the new Sony A99II?

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Official Press material:
Original coverage post on SAR.
The full press text can be read here at SAR
Official A99II page can be seen at Sony UK.
Image samples at Sony.net.
Brochure available for download (PDF).
The full video of the Photokina announcement on SAR.

The Sony A99II official videos from Sony

Loxia 2.4/85 image gallery and first review: “significantly outresolves Sony’s 42Mpix sensor”

loxia

You can now preorder the new Zeiss Loxia 85mm FE lens at BHphoto (Click here).

Zeiss also published a full Image Gallery shot with the new Loxia 85mm lens on Flickr (Click here). The leaflet with the full technical details can be downloaded at Zeiss (Click here).

And DearSusan (Click here) published the first and yet only full Loxia 85mm review:

To sum things up, this new Loxia is mostly a stellar performer, from a technical point of view.
Though the f/2.4 max aperture might not turn heads at the pub, it is at least a fully usable f/2.4 in which aperture is used purely as a means of light gathering and depth of field control, not to control aberrations. And the Sonnar design certainly lives up to its sweet-bokeh reputation.
The Loxia 85 significantly outresolves my 42Mpix sensor and should be future-proofed for the next couple of generations of megapixel lunacy that manufacturers will inevitably inflict upon us in place of better handling

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DxOmark tested the FE zooms on the Sony A7rII and the leader is….

bestzooms

DxOmark tested almost all FE zooms on the Sony A7rII. And the best lens is the [shoplink 47257]70-200mm f/4.0 G[/shoplink]. I suspect the real leader will be the [shoplink 48791]new 70-200mm f/2.8 GM lens[/shoplink] once it gets tested. By the way Sony…when are you shipping the lens again?

The top ranked zooms are:
70-200mm G at [shopcountry 47257]
24-70mm GM at [shopcountry 47915]
16-35mm Zeiss at [shopcountry 49023]
24-70mm Zeiss at [shopcountry 49022]
28-70mm Sony at [shopcountry 24940]
70-300mm Sony at [shopcountry 47527]
24-240mm Sony at [shopcountry 34245]
70-200mm GM at [shopcountry 48791] (not tested yet and probably the real top ranker)

DxOmark also posted the full 70-300mm FE results and the good news is that the lens beats the competition:

Against rival models from other makers, the Sony is a very competitive performer optically. Indeed, it is a slightly better performer than the $1,600, L-series Canon equivalent, introduced in 2010, and is several leagues ahead of the Nikon.

fe-70-300mm

 

New Sony 18-110mm hands-on video by Cinema5D and Newsshooter

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To read all details and see the MTF graph and optical design of the new Sony 18-110mm f/4.0 OSS PZ E-mount lens click over at Sony UK. And here are two hands-on reports from Cinema5D and  Newsshooter:


Hands On With Sony 18-110mm F/4 from cinema5D on Vimeo.


Newsshooter at IBC 2016: Hands-on with Sony’s new 18-110mm f/4 PZ E-mount lens from Dan Chung on Vimeo.

The new Sony 18-110mm E-mount lens preorders will start on September 12 at BHphoto.

My time with the Carl Zeiss Loxia 21mm & Batis 18mm by Andrew Mohrer

The following is a guest post from Andrew Mohrer (Andrew-mohrer.squarespace.com). To write a guest post on SAR follow the instruction on that page.

My time with the Carl Zeiss Loxia 21mm & Batis 18mm

Before we get started I want to thank everyone for checking out my new website! I’m happy to finally have this site up and running. I also want to welcome all to my first ever lens review! I have plans to add some more prints very soon so keep checking back if your interested. If you’ve just stumbled across my work and don’t know much about me, let me tell you a little about my story…

Read more

DxOmark tests the new 85mm GM lens and says it has Otus-level image quality!

Gm-Otus

DxOmark published the full Sony 85mm GM lens test. And it says the lens has an “Otus-level image quality”:

After the somewhat mixed results for the Sony FE 24-70mm f2.8 GM on the A7R, the second lens in the company’s new GM series, the FE 85mm f1.4 GM, has achieved a much more convincing performance, albeit on the latest-generation Sony A7R II with its new 42-Mpix sensor. Indeed, on the newer Sony body, the 85mm f1.4 is rated at a level similar to the Zeiss Otus 85mm f1.4 (on a 36-Mpix Nikon D810), which lens is considered the benchmark in today’s optics for full-frame cameras. The Batis remains an option, given its competitive price and performance, but that takes nothing away from the outstanding performance of the Sony FE 85mm f1.4 GM.

Sony 85mm GM store links to BHphoto, Amazon, Adorama, BestBuyAmazon Germany. Calumetphoto.de. WexUK. Jessops.

The 85mm GM lens is not officially the best rated E-mount prime lens at DxO:

prime_table

DxO also tested the 50mm f/1.8 FE lens and writes:

Sony is working hard to fill gaps in the lens lineup, and until now, an affordable 50mm lens had been sorely lacking. While it’s unsurprisingly not in the same class as either the Sony Zeiss 55mm f1.8 or the Zeiss Loxia 50mm f2, its optical performance is comparable to the best of similar offerings from rivals. While there’s always room for improvement—it would have been great to see better uniformity, particularly at wider apertures, for example—the Sony does stand out in several areas. It has excellent control of troublesome lateral chromatic aberration as well as class-leading low levels of distortion. If you’re a stills photographer looking for a reasonably-priced 50mm with decent image quality for your Sony alpha mirrorless camera, then this model isn’t likely to disappoint.

Sony 5omm store links to BHphoto. Amazon. Adorama. FocusCamera. Calumet Germany. Amazon.de. WexUK. Jessops.

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