According to top sources the upcoming next Sony full frame cameras “main feature” will be the low price. What does it mean? There will be no new big special feature compared to the actual [shoplink 8461]A77 camera[/shoplink] (a part of course the bigger full frame sensor and improved EVF). Sony learned from the A77 customer reaction and improved many details. To me that sounds good! I don’t need new marketing bla bla features. The A99 should “just work”. The A99 will very likely feature a new 24 Megapixel full frame sensor. My suggestions? Improve the JPG engine, release the camera with a mature firmware (no more blackouts).

The Nikon D800 is priced at $2999 at Amazon and the new Canon 5DmarkIII at $3499 at Amazon. I think the Sony A99 should be priced at $2499 to compete against them! What do you think?

Zeiss announced some wonderful (and damn expensive) new Cine lenses you can use on your E-Mount camera. The lenses will be shipped in August 2012. The recommended retail price for the Compact Prime CP.2 35/T1.5 Super Speed is €3,700 or US$4,900 (excluding VAT)*. The recommended retail price for the Compact Prime CP.2 50/T1.5 Super Speed and Compact Prime CP.2 85/T1.5 Super Speed is €3,300 or US$4,500 (excluding VAT)*. The Compact Zoom CZ.2 70-200/T2.9 will start shipping in the fourth quarter of 2012 at a recommended retail price of €14,900 or US$19,900 (excluding VAT)*. Press release at Dpreview.

The zoom is really monstrously! On [shoplink 12143 ebay]eBay (Click here)[/shoplink] you can find many CP.2 lenses. And here below you can see an example video shot on the Sony F3:

[shoplink 3032][/shoplink]
Sont expect any FF with optical viewfinder anymore! Bye bye A900 :(

In these days many “sources” contacted me to tell me that Sony has already “selected” the final A99 camera specs. Some A99 prototypes are being shown to managers, dealers and photographers. All sources confirmed that there is no plan to launch the A99 now and that all we can hope is that Sony will give us an official look on the prototype model by end of this month or early May! It is Sony’s plan to launch the A99 in late August/early September like they did last year with the [shoplink 8461]Sony A77[/shoplink].

P.S:: I hope Paul Genge statement will turn out to be truth when he told to David Kilpatrick (Click here):  “wait for the FF SLT– you’ll not regret it’. So don’t buy the Nikon D800 and Canon 5DmarkIII  :)

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Here are the search links to the last FF DSLR cameras with optical viewfinder:
Sony A900 [shopcountry 3032].
Sony A850 [shopcountry 3028].

Good Morning and welcome to the new week :)

Guys, the tension is beginning to grow! According to top sources Sony is about to make a new product announcement within the coming weeks. I am pretty sure there will be a new NEX-C3 successor and I have been told that the NEX-C3 will get massive price drops this week (Check at [shopcountry 7207]). And than there is the new A37. I have no exact announcement date yet but I will know it soon ;)

I am still not 100% sure but there is a fair chance Sony will show “something Full Frame” too. My guess for now is that they will display a new FF SLT prototype like they did with the A77 months before the real announcement.

If you have some info to share drop me an anonymous message by using the contact form on the right sidebar. You can avoid to send me your real name and email address and no IP data gets stored. Would be nice if you use some kind of fake name I can track to see if you are (or will become) a trusted source or not. Thanks!

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Reminder (SR = Sonyrumor):
SR1=probably fake rumor
SR2=rumor from unknown sources
SR3=50% chance it is correct
SR4=rumor from known sources
SR5=almost certainly correct!

Draft.Camera (Click here) says the A37 body will cost 499 Euro. Single lens kit price is 649 Euro and double lens kit price is 789 Euro. I never saw this website before so please take it with a grain of salt. All I know for sure is that the camera is coming soon!

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Reminder (SR = Sonyrumor):
SR1=probably fake rumor
SR2=rumor from unknown sources
SR3=50% chance it is correct
SR4=rumor from known sources
SR5=almost certainly correct!

Rumors are growing and growing and the latest I heard from a source is that Sony plans unveil something “Full Frame” within the next few weeks!!! Don’t get too excited guys, it’s realistic to think they may show a prototype only. As I told you Sony has two different FF cameras in the works. But I guess only one of them will be shown (if the rumor is correct).

But, I have some kind of good feeling that Sony may will accelerate the Full Frame plans after the Canon 5DmarkIII and Nikon D800 announcements. I know there is people within Sony pushing the Japanese managers to release the first SLT camera sooner than Photokina. But please remain with your feet on earth for now! All we can hope is to see a prototype only…ok?

FF rumor history:
A year ago I reported that Sony’s plan was to release a new FF camera in late Spring 2012. The Thai flood delayed the A77 release and Sony decided to postpone the FF camera release because they need time to evaluate the A77 flaws and user suggestions. The latest news was that a new FF SLT camera will be announced in September. Very likely using a new 24 Megapixel sensor. But there are also rumors about a second 36 Megapixel rumor and a FF square sensor. Sony may now be ready to show us some FF prototype or roadmap within the next weeks. Or is there some room for an ulterior surprise?

P.S.: The Sony powered Nikon D800 keeps remaining the most sold camera at Amazon US (Click here). Time to offer something that can compete against it!

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Reminder (SR = Sonyrumor):
SR1=probably fake rumor
SR2=rumor from unknown sources
SR3=50% chance it is correct
SR4=rumor from known sources
SR5=almost certainly correct!

A couple of weeks ago a trusted source told me how Sony is working to bring some major evolution in the sensor technology. We are talking about a completely new generation of sensors which could hit the market as soon as late 2013- early 2014. One of these technologies is the “organic sensor”. The last few months I saw some patents from Fuji and now finally Egami (Click here) found one from Sony. Basically we are talking about a sort of Foveon technology made with organic material instead of current non organic materials. The major flaws to overcome are the slow speed and durability of the material. But Sony seems to have found some sort of hybrid material solution that could overcome the issues. While google translation doesn’t really help a lot to understand how it works I will try to give you a short summary:

1) The sensor is made by a organic and non organic material. That is necessary because organic material has less “speed” than the non organic silicon material.
2) Three layers of organic material are positioned one under the other. This means every single pixel contains all the color data!
3) The advantages are higher color fidelity, higher resolution because of the lack of the Anti Aliasing filter which usually needs to be used on RGB sensors. Currently [shoplink 12209 ebay]Medium format cameras[/shoplink] or cameras like the Fuji X PRO 1, Nikon D800 and Leica M9 do not have AA filters. Another advantage is that organic material has a higher absorption coefficient than non organic material.

As usual keep in mind that most of the patents will never be applied in a real mass production camera. Or it may will take longer than we hope. Anyway, Sony is already on a very high quality level with their current sensors and I am pretty confident that we will see great new stuff in future!

P.S.: The current Sony 36 Megapixel sensor used by the Nikon D800 is almost as good as medium format cameras according to DSRLmagazine testing.

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Links to all mentioned cameras:
Medium format cameras on [shoplink 12209 ebay]eBay (Click here)[/shoplink]. Nikon D800 at Amazon (Click here). Fuji X PRO 1 at Amazon (Click here). Leica M9 at Amazon (Click here).