Thursday, August 4, 2011

The Year of Sony?

Rumour has been flying over the net that August 23/24 will be a huge day of Sony announcements.  No less than four camera bodies, and a few lenses will be announced.  For me, it's the NEX-7 that I am looking forward to.  The spec looks extremely good, except I would trade high pixel count for better high ISO performance.  What I like so far of the NEX-7:
  • 3 Million Pixel ViewFinder -- Finally!  I am sold on this feature alone.  I already like the NEX-5, and the lack of a viewfinder has been a huge disappointment.
  • Faster Start Up Time -- I don't know about you, but I know of no other recent DSLR/EVIL camera has a  slower start up time than the NEX.  Even waiting for it to wake up from sleep is an excruciatingly painful. 
  • Base ISO 100 and higher ISO performance -- I really missed ISO 100 when using fast lenses in bright lights.  But, I am not holding my breathe on ISO 16,000.  I will be very happy if it can do clean ISO 3200!
  • Faster auto focus -- Let's face it.  The NEX is probably the slowest focusing EVIL camera out there, so anything better and faster helps
Those are my main concerns and they are enough for me to upgrade.  I am just worried about the price.  If it's over a grand for the body, then I will just have to wait until the price comes down.

Finally, I am very happy to see Sony is revamping they Interchangeable Lens camera line up.  The specs for the A77 certainly looks very impressive.  Wonder what full frame A99 will be like!

Sail Boat -- NEX-5 & Pentacon 200mm f4

4 comments:

  1. Pricing on the NEX-7 is expected to be $1299USD, same as the A77. It will also be the first really high-end EVIL camera. Metal body, dual-controls, AVCHD 2.0. Essentially an A77 in a NEX body.

    Note the NEX-5 replacement is expected to have a clip-on 2.4MP finder and come in around $7-800, it may prove a better choice.

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  2. Ouch! At $1300, the NEX-7 won't be in my radar screen. Hopefully it will be sold as a body only option for cheaper.

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  3. That is the body-only pricing from what I understand, we'll know for sure at the end of the months. Note it's a much higher-end body than the previous NEX's and priced right where a 7-series body should be (the A77 is expected to be the same price, the A700 was around there and the Maxxum 7D was more expensive).

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  4. If that's the case, then it will be a real disappointment. The A77 spec looks really impressive.

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