Thanks all for the suggestions and guidance. The right deal came from Roberts Camera on eBay in the form of an A1 in excellent condition. That gets me the new menu system and a 26MP surplus.
FYI, Roberts is a top-notch purveyor with bricks-and-mortar, web site, and eBay presence. I have bought several used items including Nikkors Ai-S 800 and 70-200E. They are pushing Sony Alpha bodies pretty hard at the mo. I was tempted by their several A9ii offerings but, fortunately, madness prevailed.
Congrats on getting the A1, it's a great camera, a notch or two above the A9 II for sure.
The new menus are nice, but in usage, what I like the best is the touch functionality. This makes moving around the menus much faster in many cases. Also, I never liked the menu button placed on the left of the camera, which makes perusing the menus difficult with one hand. On my A7R III, I programmed the trash button to also be the menu button to circumvent that. On the A1, the menu icon is in the bottom-right corner of the screen, and I can tap it with my right thumb to return one level up.
@Manu-K1 Yeah, I appreciated your earlier post but thought "no way that's going to work out for me." Surely, eBay moves in mysterious ways. I'm now reading up on the capabilities of this monster. Looks like I get pixel shift...heh, heh.
I received my A1 today! This adds to my collection of the premier camera model from various manufacturers in their respective era: Leica IIIb, Leica M4, Canon 1Ds, Nikon D3X, D4, and Sony A1. I won't describe the feature set of the Sony (we all know), but wanted to describe my impressions versus my A7ii which is now 11 years old—trusty but obsolete in so many ways.
Haptics and Handling: Buttons are better contoured (esp. C1/C2) and depress smoothly. Pinky finger is not left hanging in space. The screen GUI is pretty spiffy and responsive. Controls and switches have instant feedback. Top-deck dials are great (less menu diving), and the lock buttons are perfect.
Build: Metal feel is super satisfying, with no creaking plastic panels. Memory door is improved over the flimsy A7ii but is still plastic. Please see the Canon 1 Series or Nikon single-digit DSLRs to see how to do it right.
JPEG engine: I can already see excellent highlight protection, and attractive gradation to pure white. Noise appears strongly at ISO 12,000 as can be expected, but just at the pixel level (overall color tone remains very good).
AF: It's awesome, of course. I only tested the Sigma 45/2.8 C which is a real problem child on the A7ii. There's evidence that the A1 fixes the reliability problems through sheer brute force.
Menu system: Definitely S-tier. Me like. Must download the manual to understand custom control procedures.
IBIS: It works real good. Pin sharp images with handheld Sigma 45C @ ˝ sec
First processed pic on a windy afternoon with spotty sunlight:
A7V, in my opinion, is the better camera in almost every single way. Yes, you will see just a minuscule amount of distortion on certain things like a basketball or baseball, moving at high amounts of speed, but other than that, it's great. I don't think anyone who isn't a die hard photographer would notice that anyways. Yes, the menus are much better, but honestly, who cares about that? For video, it's not even close, the A7V smokes the A9II. I would use the A7V exclusively as my still's camera if I didn't need the occasional high megapixel count, at which time I use the A1 II. Grab an A7V, you won't be disappointed.
The A1 continues to impress—as it should in this rent district. Random observations follow. I'm starting to remap some of the buttons but there is a heap of possible customizations. ISO 50 gives smoother tonality at the risk of lost highlights. I stacked four exposures at ISO 100 to similar effect which is possible if the subject is motionless. Fully electronic shutter is pretty eerie: not sure if that works with flash. I have a HVL-F60M coming from B&H to test the matter. Meanwhile, the Nikon SB-5000 works nicely on the A1 with mechanical shutter although the flash does not fully seat due to Sony's abrogation of the ISO standard with their MIS design (pun intended). I don't reach 1/400s but do reach 1/320s without shading, and that's pretty amazing. I only ever saw that effective X-sync with the old Canon 1Ds.
currently shooting with a zve1, great for videos but sucks in bright daylight and desperately needs a viewfinder. the sony a7v is on my list in the very near future!
ross.thomas wrote:
A7V, in my opinion, is the better camera in almost every single way. Yes, you will see just a minuscule amount of distortion on certain things like a basketball or baseball, moving at high amounts of speed, but other than that, it's great. I don't think anyone who isn't a die hard photographer would notice that anyways. Yes, the menus are much better, but honestly, who cares about that? For video, it's not even close, the A7V smokes the A9II. I would use the A7V exclusively as my still's camera if I didn't need the occasional high megapixel count, at which time I use the A1 II. Grab an A7V, you won't be disappointed. ...Show more →
If you are talking about distortion under electronic shutter with non-stacked sensors, the problem is not limited to distorted balls and bats. Subjects faces if they are in some degree of motion and especially if they are close to the camera are badly distorted with electronic shutter and a non-stacked sensor. Because the A7 is partially stacked, it may be a bit better than other non-stacked sensor designs, but I would be very surprised if the distortion of faces and bodies were completely removed.
The problem with non-stacked sensors & electronic shutter extends to facial expressions. Facial expressions happen quickly. Because there is a delay between the first exposure of the face and the last exposure of the face, a non-stacked sensor can record a distorted version of whatever facial expression the subject was making, essentially merging two different facial expressions.
If you stick to mechanical shutter with the A7V, these problems of course don't occur. But if you want to use electronic shutter with people or motion, you are better off with a stacked sensor as in the A9 or A1 series of cameras.
