Interesting read Godders, many thanks!
On 26/1/14, Godfrey DiGiorgi, discombobulated, unleashed: >Hmm. To my ear, this guy is making noise about things which are >completely inconsequential. Most of what he calls problems are not, and >the notion that it is difficult to manual focus with an EVF that has >excellent focus peaking and magnification like the A7 implies that his >expectations are that the camera will do all the work for him. To me, >that's simply the wrong attitude: don't waste your time with lens >adaptation and ANY camera if that's your expectation. But, eh?, he's a >writer looking to make a buck and it's DPR. 'Nuff said. > >I bought a Sony A7 specifically to use with my kit of Leica R and Nikkor >SLR lenses, a "one-size-fits-all" body that can take any SLR mount (as >well as some RF mount) lenses via adapters. I know these lenses, ancient >tho they are, can produce the imaging magic I wanted, and I conjectured >that I need the format to see it. While I've been adapting them to other >formats for a long time and they work well, they simply don't work as >well as they do on their native format. I figured the format must have >something to do with it. > >I specifically chose the A7 body over the A7r body. I figured 24 Mpixel >is enough, 36 is likely too demanding for my old lenses and unnecessary >anyway, and that saved me $1000. I wish they'd done the same all- >magnesium construction on the A7 too, but they went composite on the >front panels. Oh well. > >Yesterday was my first shooting walk with the camera. I'd spent time >before it arrived reading the manual and figuring out how to set it up, >yesterday I had two goals in mind: shake out the configuration and see >how well it did with the Leica R 50 and 90 mm lenses. I shot mostly with >the 90mm lens, and made some adjustments to the configuration as I went >along. > >Aperture priority doesn't work in the context of Auto-ISO? Nonsense, it >works fine. It just has a fixed floor exposure time for pushing up the >ISO, and it's a little low for longer lenses. So switch to Manual then, >or shutter priority (same thing with adapted lenses). > >Actually, Manual exposure mode is VERY usable with this camera and Auto- >ISO. It's very much like TAv mode on the Pentax bodies: you set the Auto- >ISO range limits, pick your shutter and aperture settings, and go shoot. >The sensor is quite clean, you can easily use 100-6400 without even >thinking about it, and head further into stratospheric sensitivity >without worrying too much. That's six stops range on Auto-ISO, minimum. >And you have EV compensation, up to 5 stops +/-, to work with. > >The way I've got it configured now, I only very rarely need to go into >the menus and fuss about ... a good thing given the crappy menu system. >All the controls I need are now accessible quickly through external >button presses (sometimes a bit weirdly positioned, but my fingers can >adapt) or turning dials. The EVF is almost as good as the one in the E- >M1 ... I think the Olympus EVF optics are better. I can flip the focus >magnification and peaking assists on and off easily, I can set the ISO, >focus, aperture, shutter time, and EV compensation all directly, etc. >The way I have the camera set up, it feels for all the world like I'm >shooting with my favorite old Nikon FE2 with MD-12 motor drive--but >smaller, lighter, handier, and with instantaneous viewfinder feedback >pre-exposure and post-exposure review. The shutter even sounds similar. > >And the results? My hunch is so far working out ... I think the A7 >24Mpixel sensor is an very good match to the Leica R and Nikkor SLR >lenses (and probably by extension to Pentax, Olympus, Canon FD, Minolta, >etc, lenses). I compared some exposures made on film with the Leicaflex >SL/Summicron-R 90mm combination to similar photos made with the A7 by >imaging them on my full 27" computer screen. They have the same look and >feel, something I didn't see adapting these lenses to smaller formats, >and the corner/edge renderings (where you see the most problems with >adapted lenses on FF sensors) are near-to-identical on lateral CA, >'smearing', etc. The Summilux-R 50/1.4 does about the same. I'll be >testing the 24mm soon, hopefully that will hold up as well, and after >that I'll be testing some of my M-mount lenses (I expect more issues as >the mount registration is much shorter, adaptation is fussier*). > >At this point in time, I have little but praise for the A7 used for >these purposes. Sure, it's a clunky little POS in some respects, and >Sony would do well to hire a couple of photographers to aid in the >design of camera ergonomics and menu layout, but the bottom line is that >it can be configured to work very nicely indeed, and the image quality >is indeed delightful. > >* I hear that three of my M-mount lenses do perform well on it: the >Ultron 28mm f/2, the M-Rokkor 40mm f/2, and the M-Rokkor 90mm f/4. If >this is true, given that the mount adapter is much shorter and these >lenses much shorter than the SLR lenses, it seems I will then have my >long-sought-for digital equivalent of a Leica CL back in hand. I'm just >waiting for that mount adapter to arrive... :-) -- Cheers, Cotty ___/\__ Broadcast, Corporate, || (O) | Web Video Production ---------- <www.seeingeye.tv> _____________________________ -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List [email protected] http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
