Thanks, i look forward to checking out these lense rcomendations, you are saying the a7iii will not work with all e mount full frame lenses? Or only the a7?
The A7 is an older generation than the lenses & it doesn't autofocus with at least the ones I have. (85 f/1.8, 100 f/2.8 STF)
I'd read this criticism elsewhere but bought the lenses anyway, knowing that if it was really bad, I'd just have to upgrade- and it was worse than bad, it just didn't work until it decided to, which was random. I suspect the onboard computer & contrast-only AF aren't enough to drive the lenses, or maybe it doesn't put out enough wattage to drive the motor or something - all I know is the A7 doesn't autofocus with my AF Sony lenses. (it'll probably be fine with older generation AF lenses)
The A7Rii which I also have autofocuses with them a treat - the onboard PDAF and I guess more powerful computer makes it quick to focus & the face detect works nicely.
The A7 is old enough now that I don't even see it for sale at the major sites, and the A7ii is well under a grand, so you can just go straight for that. Just do your research before you commit to a body re: which lenses you want.
That said I'm still very happy with the files out of the A7 with my manual focus lenses. The AA filter means it's not as sharp as it could be but that's a minor quibble. The manual focus aids (focus peaking + magnification) make it easy to manual focus.
I'd also like to point out that I'm happy with my Fuji X-Pro2. The colors out of it are great, and they have some nice pancake lenses. The 27mm f/2.8 (41mm equiv) is compact - not their fastest AF lens but decent enough. The 23mm f/2 (35mm equiv) is much faster to focus - but not as compact. They also have an 18mm f/2 (27mm equiv) that's reasonably compact - I have no experience with it.
A lot of people prefer the colors out of the X-Pro1 (vs the X-Pro2), but it's AF performance is less than stellar. I don't know anyone who prefers the colors out of Sony vs. Fuji, but I'm sure someone will pipe in on that front.
My main complaint against the Fuji is that - the dials are nice but they have some issues. The aperture ring gets knocked too easily and suddenly I find I'm no longer in Aperture Priority but at f/16, and the ISO/shutter speed dial is nice, but they'd be better in 1/3 stop increments. But I love having the controls right there without menu diving.
Between the two - I'd buy into Sony if my goal was to use vintage wide-angle or wide-aperture lenses. I'd buy in to Fuji if my goal was to get a light-weight system with a lot of nice primes. Both are at the point where their bodies are coming down in price so you're buying for the glass & color science. I'm happy to shoot both, depending on what I want out of the photos - but you might not have money to burn like I do.
I'm not super familiar with Sony's lens lineup (despite having shot with them for longer - I mostly use it for vintage lenses), but my sense of it is that Fuji has more of the primes you'd expect them to have & Sony has more primes that take better advantage of the full frame sensor (like a wide aperture portrait lens).
Between the two, coming from Ricoh, I'd recommend the Fuji - it has more of the lenses you'd expect. Even though the X-Pro2 (one of the larger Fuji bodies) is larger than the Sony A7, it's lighter & the lenses are great.
Again - unless your goal is to adapt a lot of vintage lenses and want the full frame for that purpose, I'd go with Fuji. I find the Sony only comes out for specialty reasons now that I have the Fuji.
Mostly my camera collection breaks down like this.
X-Pro2 - my go-to camera.
Sony A7 - I use with vintage and manual focus lenses for when I want a shallow depth of field at 35mm and 50mm.
X-Pro1 - My every-day camera, with the 27mm f/2.8 pancake (even if it's a slow focusing package - both the body and lens are slow to focus).
Sony A7Rii - specialty for when I want the look of the 85mm f/1.8 or 100mm f/2.8 OSS and the 42 megapixels of detail.
Ricoh GRDiii - every day carry along with the X-Pro1.
Ricoh GR - mostly stays home.
