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Tim, hope you can post some of these … this is right up my alley, and your post here is encouraging. I'd like very much to reduce my DSLR/SLT kit and end up with just a pair of these smaller mirror-less Sonys and eventually just 4 lenses … the three current ones, and a longer FE prime of some sort when they get to it.I had a lot of fun today. I did a shoot of our local bishop - they need images for the parishes, for press publications, all sorts of things. Dress was from casual to very full clericals with several shades between, expressions had to range from very friendly through pastoral to questioning. Locations were all indoors and I shot most with natural light and some with on-camera bounce as slight fill.
I used two A7Rs. One had a hand grip on and a 55 F1.8 and one had no grip and a 24-70 F4 OSS. I swapped out this for the 35mm F2.8 for a small number of shots.
I used Face Detect for most of them, and most were at or close to wide open. Out of 331 shots I found precisely three that weren't acceptably sharp and about four that were only 'good enough'. The rest were utterly perfect. Shutter speeds ranged from 1/30th upwards.
I have never had a camera that let me place focus exactly where I want it and which nailed it again and again and again. I have never had such a high hit rate on an indoor shoot, often in quite dark chapels and corridors. And I have rarely felt so relaxed whilst shooting something that matters, because it quickly became clear from the LCD that the shots were coming out to the quality I needed. I don't do many portraits because I'm frankly not much good at them, but this was a nice experience! Certainly a lot more fun than a few years back when I had a gig to do official portraits of the last Archbishop of Canterbury and I took along a Phase Back on a DF body for indoor natural light shots, which would have worked had not the largest and darkest storm cloud in the world come over during my 15 minute slot. I ended up using a 5DII and a lot of prayer...
Can't share any yet until there is client approval. But some I really like a lot!
Tim, hope you can post some of these … this is right up my alley, and your post here is encouraging. I'd like very much to reduce my DSLR/SLT kit and end up with just a pair of these smaller mirror-less Sonys and eventually just 4 lenses … the three current ones, and a longer FE prime of some sort when they get to it.
I also would love to better understand how you have the A7R settings configured (face detect focus and swift placement of the focus point), I've been distracted by other life events as of late, and haven't had much time to "play and learn".
Thanks,
Marc
Given that most of your glass is DSLR lenses a lot of Leica R there is no reason why ( except money of course) not to have a A7r in your kit as well for these moments. Obviously money spent but when those pixels of the A7r really gets you there. Something to ponder, I think we will see more 24mpx cams from Sony but maybe not so fast to see another 36 mpx replacing the A7r. I only say this since your are heavily R loaded and its really nice having that A7r as that is the one I mostly shoot myself. Just a thought and since you are not using any AF but manual focus and no flash gear with regard to sync your not going to see a functional difference but just have more horsepower. If I was manual all the time and not needing the speed than I would probably have a second A7r instead. Heck you could almost get one for dirt cheap with a trade, instant savings with a FE lens and sell off the lens. Might want to look into that whole trade up deal going on.A few from Saturday's walk with the Elmarit-R 19mm series I.
This and the Nikkor 18mm produce pretty extreme wide angle for me. It takes a while for my mind to come around to seeing in such FoVs. I'm not quite there yet, but getting more comfortable.
The Elmarit 19 produces some lovely rendering qualities, as does the Nikkor 18. They have a look which is quite different, however. The Nikkor is a bit better on corner/edge sharpness, the Elmarit separates mid-tones a little better. Both benefit greatly from a sturdy tripod—I feel that I need a very sturdy tripod as much or more with an ultra wide lens as I do with a long telephoto, and that it's actually harder to get the most out of an ultra wide (need more pixels, more careful framing, etc.).
fun fun fun ...
Money is part of it ... buying the A7 body-only (at a deal rate since it was a new body from a split-up kit package) saved me $1000 to get into one and experiment with these lenses. At the time it wasn't clear that it would really work as desired, and if it hadn't I'd have simply sold it and the whole lot of lenses to simplify things.Given that most of your glass is DSLR lenses a lot of Leica R there is no reason why ( except money of course) not to have a A7r in your kit as well for these moments. Obviously money spent but when those pixels of the A7r really gets you there. Something to ponder, I think we will see more 24mpx cams from Sony but maybe not so fast to see another 36 mpx replacing the A7r. I only say this since your are heavily R loaded and its really nice having that A7r as that is the one I mostly shoot myself. Just a thought and since you are not using any AF but manual focus and no flash gear with regard to sync your not going to see a functional difference but just have more horsepower. If I was manual all the time and not needing the speed than I would probably have a second A7r instead. Heck you could almost get one for dirt cheap with a trade, instant savings with a FE lens and sell off the lens. Might want to look into that whole trade up deal going on.
Sorry, I missed this response tashley. Thank you very much.Love #5 in prticular
Love this one Godfrey, great light.