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p.37 #12 · p.37 #12 · Pre-orders open! Sony A7R III and FE 24-105mm f/4 OSS lens! | |
johnvanr wrote:
Fair enough. I’ve always made clear that ergonomics is subjective, but you can’t deny that there are many Sony users who say they shoot Sony despite the sub-par ergonomics compared to their previous cameras and who express a desire to get used to it over time, instead of calling on Sony to fix it in future releases.
I would agree that the early iterations of the A7 had some ergonomic choices that were perhaps more objectively questionable. That said, I'm not even sure how much of what I disliked about the first generation A7's could be attributed to "ergonomics" per se. Yes I thought the menus were a bit clunky, but I was also put off by the camera's overall shooting performance (AF, read/write speeds), build quality, loud clattering shutter, and poor battery life. The A9 resolves every single one of those issues to my satisfaction while not costing me anything in terms of ergonomics vis-a-vis my Nikon or Leica bodies. And because it's not the same as either of those systems, it does take some getting used to. For example, I did enjoy the fact that my Leica M240 was much simpler than my A9. But the M240 also had far fewer features that matter to capturing the images I wanted - and even with those fewer features, the camera's software and hardware performance was truly pitiful given it's cost, and the fact that it came out in 2012. As for my Nikons, I do enjoy their robustness and the inclusion of physical buttons and switches for a variety of often used (and occasionally barely used) functions. But I hate how much larger my Nikons are than the A9. My D800E was noticeably larger and my old D3x simply dwarfed it.
The A9 gives me the size of the Leica (and access to its lenses) with the shooting characteristics and electronics reliability I have come to expect from dSLR incumbents like Nikon. It does so while improving over its Sony predecessors in numerous ways, such as (1) a bigger battery, (2) blackout-free shooting, (3) custom memory modes and lots of programmable custom buttons, (4) a second dial for drive and AF modes, (5) stupidly high frame rates, (6) stupidly good AF with nearly 100% viewfinder coverage (!!), (7) a really fabulous EVF, (8) nearly instantaneous everything with respect to shooting and image review, (9) joystick, and (10) a much more robust and solid-feeling camera body.
Are there things I would like to see improved? Sure! The control wheel in the back is way too sensitive to accidental "adjustment." The camera power saving is too finicky - a smartphone connecting to the camera's WiFi transmitter will keep the camera from powering off, as will leaving it free to accept input from a remote. I'd like to be able to put more feature preferences into memory banks 1-3. But none of these are deal-breakers for me - it's a platform that still enables and even encourages me to consistently make the best images I can.
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