Sony ILCE7S/B Alpha a7S Mirrorless Digital Camera

Sony ILCE7S/B Alpha a7S Mirrorless Digital Camera

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• NP-FW50 Lithium-Ion Rechargeable Battery (1080mAh)
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Buy Now : Sony ILCE7S/B Alpha a7S Mirrorless Digital Camera

Brand : Sony
Category : Electronics,Camera & Photo,Digital Cameras,Mirrorless Cameras
Rating : 4.1
Review Count : 114

Sony ILCE7S/B Alpha a7S Mirrorless Digital Camera

• The media could not be loaded.  The a7s is an interesting addition to Sony\'s new line of full-frame cameras. It follows the standard a7 entry-level full frame camera and the a7r. Just as the `r\" in a7r stands for resolution--as in high resolution--the \"s\" in a7s stands for sensitivity. In fact, the a7s puts such a focus on low light sensitivity that it results in some serious trade-offs in resolution.*** The Sensor ***The a7s is a 12.2 megapixel low-light sensor, which essentially amounts to 4K. That\'s not great resolution for photos, but this version of the a7 clearly was meant for video recording in as many situations as possible. While the camera can natively record 1080p video to an SD card in a variety of formats, it cannot record 4K without an external device that costs nearly as much as the camera body itself. This is unfortunate, and a little silly, since the camera supports Sony\'s XAVC-S codec for higher bit rates, which it users in its 4K prosumer camera, the FDR-AX100. That said, the a7s can output both 1080p and 4K uncompressed through the mini HDMI port. That\'s great if you still have two grand left over after buying the a7s and really need that added video quality.*** Lens Options, Problems, and Solutions ***That said, you\'re in for another disappointment when it comes to lenses. Sony released five relatively expensive full-frame e-mount lenses that work natively with their a7 line. While some have received better review than others, the worst of the bunch starts at $500 and you can expect to pay as much as $1500 for the higher-end glass. Those prices shouldn\'t come as a surprise for both Sony fans and professional photographers alike, but the lenses offer relatively slow apertures for their class.You might think you can overcome that problem by purchasing standard e-mount lenses, but there\'s a serious trade-off. Standard e-mount lenses either offer some pretty insane vignetting or require you to crop the sensor significantly. On a camera like the a7r, this crop makes for smaller but still usable images. On a lower-resolution camera like the a7s, however, they\'re just a hair above 1080p. Images that small are virtually unusable, and if you plan to record 4K video with the a7s you\'ll barely get anything of value when using a standard e-mount lens.The good news, however, is that you can adapt all sorts of lenses to the a7s without any trouble. Sony\'s LA-EA4 adapter--which costs about $350--allows the use of Sony A-mount lenses with full autofocus capabilities and no need for APS-C sensor cropping. Samyang/Rokinon also provide inexpensive, quality manual focus lenses that work well with this camera. If that\'s not enough, you can pick up inexpensive adapters for older manual focus lenses--like Nikon--and you\'ve got a cheap way of overcoming the annoying APS-C crop factor. None of these are perfect, but it\'s an issue Nikon and Canon both have with their specialized APS-C lenses as well. Unfortunately for Sony, they don\'t have quite the large range of full frame-compatible lenses that you get with many other manufacturers. Hopefully we\'ll see more in the future.*** Image and Video Quality ***If you\'re buying this camera, you probably don\'t care too much about the drawbacks and are more interested in the video and images this camera can produce--notably in low light. Fortunately, there\'s a lot to like when it comes to quality. The a7s can see in the dark, and does so with reasonably low noise levels. At high ISOs, it retains detail better than the Canon 5D Mark III, as evidenced from DP Review\'s direct tests, as well as my own casual testing. Furthermore, it produces beautiful images with great detail and color even in poor lighting situations. Video quality is pretty much identical to the images the camera captures. It\'s very clear Sony intended to make a video camera that looks like it was intended for photography.*** Video Codecs and Frame Rates ***You get a lot of choices with your video, too. Although the AVCHD codec provides relatively low bit rates of 24-28mbps, XAVC-S nearly doubles it with 50mbps for all 1080p frame rates. Additionally, you can record at 120fps at 720p for some nice slow motion and can dually record 720p video as a reference when creating a higher quality file. While XAVC-S is a marked improvement, the a7s provides just half the bit rate of Canon\'s 5D Mark III. The codecs are different, so how this actually affects the quality remains to be nitpicked. Besides, if you\'re buying the a7s for its uncompressed output this is pretty much irrelevant anyway.*** Build Quality ***The inner-workings of the a7s certainly has its major advantages and drawbacks, but on the outside it looks and feels fantastic. I\'ve always found Sony\'s mirror-less cameras to have excellent build quality, but the a7s seriously raises the bar. It looks great, it\'s hardly much bigger than its mirror-less siblings, and has several intelligently-placed buttons and dials. You can set custom functions, make small exposure adjustments, and access manual settings without the need to dive into any menus--most of the time, at least. The camera and its lenses are also weather-proofed so a little rain isn\'t going to kill it. It also features an articulating LCD screen and viewfinder so you can pretty much see what you\'re shooting any way you want.*** Battery Life ***Sony advertises battery life at 320 shots. They don\'t mention how that translates to video, but from what I\'ve seen so far it\'s looking like a little over two hours on a single charge. Sony seems to have realized battery life is an issue with the a7 line and included multiple charging methods. Not only does the package include an external battery charger, but you can also just plug in the camera via USB. Despite the ongoing need to buy peripherals to get the most out of the a7s, at least you don\'t have to when it comes to your batteries. On top of that, my a7s included two batteries so I can have one charging and one active. According to the manual and everything I\'ve read, I was only supposed to receive one. I\'m not yet certain if this was my luck or an intentional last-minute addition.The good news? It might not be shooting photos and video that sucks up the battery life. Most of Sony\'s cameras now have wireless features and NFC, which apparently contribute to the problem. Users of the a7 line have reported that enabling Airplane Mode allowed for many more shots. I have yet to confirm this, but some users are reporting more than four times what Sony claims the battery can handle.*** The Bottom Line ***Overall, the a7s offers a series of compromises. You can get some great video and images in just about any lighting situation if you\'re willing to sacrifice resolution. For some, these trade-offs are essentially meaningless. I\'m one of those people. For those who want a camera that handles photos and video in low light at high resolutions in a tiny package--well, that\'s too much to ask right now. With Sony, you have to sacrifice one of those things. If you can pick one, they make an a7 model with compromise of your choice.
• I am a professional photographer and I have owned every other A7 camera including A7, A7S, A7R, all the gen 2 versions and now the gen 3. I currently shoot on the A7riii. If you\'r reading this review then you likely already know enough about what this camera\'s amazing low light performance and want to know if this camera is still relevant in 2019.The short answer is really depending on what you plan to use it for. At the $2,000 the answer is no for all scenarios. For $400 more you can purchase the A7sii and that\'s a significant upgrade which I will go into further below. However if you can find this camera for around $1,500 or less, then the answer is YES!If you\'re an advanced amateur or getting into the photography or the video business, then this is a great camera. It is small, light, and powerful in low light situations without having to own flashes and other light modifiers. For video, most videographers will need a gimbal for smoothing out shake anyways so having IBIS (from the A7sii) may be redundant for your purposes and you can save some money with this camera. However if you are a working video professional, then most likely you should skip over this generation and go for the A7sii or the A7iii for 4k and 6k downsampling capabilities. However if you need a backup camera or a camera for personal projects, it still holds its value well.I used this camera mostly for photography stills as a backup for my A7rii. While this camera is primarily geared towards video, in my experience shooting stills with this camera is great despite what others may tell you about autofocus and video. It\'s definitely not a main camera for photo stills (12MP is too low to deliver to a client) but works well as a secondary or backup camera for low light situations. Even today the A7s holds up well as being a legendary low light king that\'s unmatched by few others. Possibly the reason why the price is still around $2000 is because there\'s no other camera out on the market besides the mark 2 that can match the same type of low light performance. The A7Sii is essentially the same camera with 1 stop better low light ISO performance in a better body with IBIS. The IBIS may not directly affect image quality but it allows for far longer hand held stills and smoother video so that it essentially boosts the low light image quality by leaps.Low light - This is this camera\'s strongest selling point. Low light beast. This camera will shoot in situation that no other camera can shoot in, and shoot it cleanly. People who don\'t know about this camera are constantly asking me to \"turn on the flash\" or \"you\'ll never get that photo\" and then are amazed when I show them the results. Simply put this camera is superb in producing \"natural light\" photos in low light without the distracting flash or harsh flash lighting. It\'s a unique look that few other cameras can really replicate.Dynamic Range - This camera has amazing dynamic range. It\'s like having layers and layers of color and data hidden under each fold. You can literally shoot once and bring out colors and details you never thought were there. The files are extremely malleable for editing. This is especially true for shooting in low light. Low light shadows anddark areas can almost ALWAYS be brought up for additional details hidden in the shadow.AF - this is the main concern most people have with using this camera for stills. True, this camera has no phase detection AF and it\'s all contrast detection. However it\'s AMAZING contrast detection. I\'ve honestly never had issues with it as it is fast, accurate, and works in the dark. The camera was made for low light use so consequentially the sensor\'s ability to see in the dark and focus in the dark is excellent. I\'ve had cameras like the A7rii and A7ii which have hundreds of \"advanced hybrid PDAF/CD\" sensors utterly fail in low light. The A7s is always dependable in seeing where sometimes your eyes can\'t.Battery - The gen 1 and gen 2 A7 cameras all have issues with battery life. It\'s a consequence of the small W batteries and it wasn\'t addressed until the gen 3 Z type batteries were introduced. But for stills photography where you don\'t need the camera to be on for 30 min at a time, it was sufficient with a second backup battery. When shooting video you have the camera on for hours at a time filming and will need to attach a second screen, mic, and extra batteries. For photos, get into the habit of turning the camera off when not shooting and turn it back on when you\'re ready to shoot.Megapixels and Image quality. This is my primary issue with the camera. 12 megapixels. Even though it\'s 12 beautiful megapixels, it is unfortunately not enough. 12MP is the size iphone cameras shoot these days. I am constantly wishing there was JUST BIT MORE megapixels squeezed in there to play around with. Often it comes when I need to crop photos down for better composition. I shot this in tandem with a A7rii and I could crop the hell out of the A7rii\'s 42MP files to get to my liking. The A7s\'s 12mp files are almost at the limit of what\'s deliverable to the client. Cropping even 20% gives you 9MP which is understandably tiny. The standard in the industry is 24 megapixels and 12 is too little to deliver to a client. Furthermore, used with beautiful Sony G Master lenses you really can\'t make proper use of the lens\'s resolving ability. Small tiny details and textures are lost because the 12MP sensor can\'t record all the details. However with 12MP you have nearly unlimited image storage with a 64gb card size. The file sizes are tiny, under 16mb per file as RAWs. For things like Instagram where you\'re limited to a 1080x1080 size, then it\'s good enough, but for anything serious, it won\'t be.At the end of the day you want to know if you should buy this camera. At $2000, the answer is no. For $400 more you can get the A7sii which with IBIS makes a lot more sense to a photographer or videographer. However around $1500 it\'s definitely worth it as a backup camera or a main camera for an aspiring photographer or videographer. I would say get one just to experience how good a true low light camera can be!***If this review was helpful, please give me a helpful vote! Thanks!

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