Since A7R4 is here, taken some shots with it. The 61MP is definitely a big help with distance subject, here are some pics in full size and cropped for comparison.
ke3vg wrote:
Since A7R4 is here, taken some shots with it. The 61MP is definitely a big help with distance subject, here are some pics in full size and cropped for comparison.
Now, that’s what I would call a great cropping ability ! Something that I miss quite a bit with the A9. I am looking forward to its successor with at least 36MP, preferably 42MP.
So, you guys did it, darn it! I have an A7R iv and a 600GM arriving today! Hope the UPS truck does not get robbed!!
If anyone is still looking for a 600GM, Mike's Cameras in Colorado may still have one.
They also received some A7R iv's yesterday.
Good guys. Talk to Brian Rabin or Mike Dobson and tell them Kim sent ya. Brian is the online sales manager, 303.725.2072, and Mike is his supervisor.
Mike's is a small Colorado chain, but they do quite a bit of business, since they don't have a lot of competition there.
I am not associated with them, nor am I getting any kickback, just wanted to pass this along.
kimknapp wrote:
So, you guys did it, darn it! I have an A7R iv and a 600GM arriving today! Hope the UPS truck does not get robbed!!
If anyone is still looking for a 600GM, Mike's Cameras in Colorado may still have one.
They also received some A7R iv's yesterday.
Good guys. Talk to Brian Rabin or Mike Dobson and tell them Kim sent ya. Brian is the online sales manager, 303.725.2072, and Mike is his supervisor.
Mike's is a small Colorado chain, but they do quite a bit of business, since they don't have a lot of competition there.
I am not associated with them, nor am I getting any kickback, just wanted to pass this along.
Congrats, Kim! You know we are just like little kids getting new toys and the heck why not ? With the resolving power of the 61MP sensor, yielding 26MP and AF points throughout the entire viewfinder in the APS-C mode, we don’t even need any APS-C camera for wildlife anymore . This is it! Well, until the A7r V comes out, at least...
AGeoJO wrote:
Congrats, Kim! You know we are just like little kids getting new toys and the heck why not ? With the resolving power of the 61MP sensor, yielding 26MP and AF points throughout the entire viewfinder in the APS-C mode, we don’t even need any APS-C camera for wildlife anymore . This is it! Well, until the A7r V comes out, at least...
Kim, Welcome to 600 GM ( and A7Riv) club, looking forward to see some amazing images from you soon.
Joshua, you are absolutely right, we are kids inside the grownup body, this things really bring back about our enthusiasm about new toys.
This evening , at dusk, I shot some deer in backyard to check the animal eye AF, it was low light but with 600 GM with A7Riv worked beautifully and focused on eye almost 70% of the time. Here are some boring samples.
ke3vg wrote:
Since A7R4 is here, taken some shots with it. The 61MP is definitely a big help with distance subject, here are some pics in full size and cropped for comparison.
Beautiful pics. how would you describe the differences between A9 and A7rIV for capturing BIF? I keep wondering if the A7rIV would be ‘good enough’ for BIF and therefore serve as a one body solution versus my current A9 and A7rIII.
Thanks Mukesh and Joshua.
Unfortunately, the lens got shipped ground and won't be here until I am on the plane to Portugal.
They are calling it back and will deliver it to me when I return. Probably just as well, as I was not planning on bringing it on the trip and would have been frustrated only having it for a day or two before leaving.
Oh, well, at least I got the A7R4! I am just about to go out with it on the 100-400 to see how it compares to my usual setup (A9) up at Dunes park in north New Smyrna Beach.
rji2goleez wrote:
Beautiful pics. how would you describe the differences between A9 and A7rIV for capturing BIF? I keep wondering if the A7rIV would be ‘good enough’ for BIF and therefore serve as a one body solution versus my current A9 and A7rIII.
Exactly what I keep wondering … seeing contradictory answers everywhere, which may just be inherent in the subjective nature of the question.
rji2goleez wrote:
Beautiful pics. how would you describe the differences between A9 and A7rIV for capturing BIF? I keep wondering if the A7rIV would be ‘good enough’ for BIF and therefore serve as a one body solution versus my current A9 and A7rIII.
Bob, the AF performance of the A7r IV doesn’t quite match that of the A9. How close is close? At times, it feels like the camera is less responsive to grab focus. In the first 2 days of my using the A7r IV, I didn’t do pretty much anything else but trying to do BIF or owls in flight, in my case. I got a fair share of OOF images but the ones that are in focus are just great. Would I get less OOF images with the A9. Very likely but it is really difficult for me to tell for sure. The real world shooting circumstances were not the same and they never are.
Of course, the no-black-out viewfinder of the A9 is a just superb. But in my case, since I was using the Oly dot sight for my tracking all the time in the first 2 days, it didn’t bother nor matter to me. One thing that you need to keep in mind, you are not and I will not be shooting BIF all the time. Another factor you need to consider, the owls are small and they are fast flyers. They hunt June bugs and their flight path in this case is not predictable. Falcons are also fast flyers with similar flight pattern, meaning unpredictable. If the birds are not flying and or the size and/or speed of the birds you are targeting is not as fast as those, then the A7r IV should be fine to pull that off. Cranes, pelicans, even eagles, due to their larger size and more predictable flight paths are easier to track. I even trusted my adapted Canon lens to pull the task off back then.
One last aspect for your consideration, you are not only shooting flying birds. In your repertoire you mix, flying and perching birds, right? The cropping ability of the A7r IV is huge. It lets you get the reach, the A9 falls short for my taste. I got the hunch that the A9 II will address that shortcoming. Time will tell, of course.
rji2goleez wrote:
Beautiful pics. how would you describe the differences between A9 and A7rIV for capturing BIF? I keep wondering if the A7rIV would be ‘good enough’ for BIF and therefore serve as a one body solution versus my current A9 and A7rIII.
I'm speculating here, but I think that while it can do well, it won't be as good as an a9 or upcoming a9II, Mark Smith just did this video:
Shalu, up to this point, I have not put my 2X TC on that lens except for stationary targets and on a tripod. Capturing KF in flight, and I know how tiny they are, at 1200mm, is a tall order. And you did it seemingly effortlessly - well done!
AGeoJO wrote:
Bob, the AF performance of the A7r IV doesn’t quite match that of the A9. How close is close? At times, it feels like the camera is less responsive to grab focus. In the first 2 days of my using the A7r IV, I didn’t do pretty much anything else but trying to do BIF or owls in flight, in my case. I got a fair share of OOF images but the ones that are in focus are just great. Would I get less OOF images with the A9. Very likely but it is really difficult for me to tell for sure. The real world shooting circumstances were not the same and they never are.
Of course, the no-black-out viewfinder of the A9 is a just superb. But in my case, since I was using the Oly dot sight for my tracking all the time in the first 2 days, it didn’t bother nor matter to me. One thing that you need to keep in mind, you are not and I will not be shooting BIF all the time. Another factor you need to consider, the owls are small and they are fast flyers. They hunt June bugs and their flight path in this case is not predictable. Falcons are also fast flyers with similar flight pattern, meaning unpredictable. If the birds are not flying and or the size and/or speed of the birds you are targeting is not as fast as those, then the A7r IV should be fine to pull that off. Cranes, pelicans, even eagles, due to their larger size and more predictable flight paths are easier to track. I even trusted my adapted Canon lens to pull the task off back then.
One last aspect for your consideration, you are not only shooting flying birds. In your repertoire you mix, flying and perching birds, right? The cropping ability of the A7r IV is huge. It lets you get the reach, the A9 falls short for my taste. I got the hunch that the A9 II will address that shortcoming. Time will tell, of course.
Colin F wrote:
I'm speculating here, but I think that while it can do well, it won't be as good as an a9 or upcoming a9II, Mark Smith just did this video:
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I still think the biggest hinderance won't be the AF capabilities (even though they won't match the A9) but the EVF slideshow at 10FPS and blackout at 8FPS. I guess the dot-sight is the solution??
arbitrage wrote:
I still think the biggest hinderance won't be the AF capabilities (even though they won't match the A9) but the EVF slideshow at 10FPS and blackout at 8FPS. I guess the dot-sight is the solution??
Let me put it this way, I would not track any BIF whether I am using the A9 or A7r IV without the dot sight. The drawback is, since you rely blindly on the camera to AF, and if for whatever reasons, the camera doesn’t grab focus of your target and you don’t see it since you are looking through the dot sight, you get a long sequence of OOF images . If you look through the viewfinder and notice that, you would stop shooting right there and then after a few images.
As good as the AF performance of the A9 is, it is not 100% fool proof that you will get it to focus on a fast flying target that is already in the air, especially if the target is fairly small in comparison to the whole scene.
! Something that I miss quite a bit with the A9. I am looking forward to its successor with at least 36MP, preferably 42MP. 
? With the resolving power of the 61MP sensor, yielding 26MP and AF points throughout the entire viewfinder in the APS-C mode, we don’t even need any APS-C camera for wildlife anymore 
. If you look through the viewfinder and notice that, you would stop shooting right there and then after a few images.