The best FF sensor

[ProfHankD]

By now, I'm not saying anything people haven't heard: the Sony A7RII has the best FF sensor you can currently buy.

Actually, it has a bunch of minor improvements over the A7II... but not much compelling to me. That's why I took so long to get one. I could easily mistake one for the other both in handling and in image quality (as long as I'm not viewing the image too large for 24MP). Aside from a 42MP sensor that's great in low light, the video support is probably the biggest step up -- and it can do excellent 4K or 1080 at 120FPS (which is a big deal for some of the stuff I'm doing in my research). I should also mention that I shoot manual lenses nearly 100% of the time and it's great for that, but AF is still quite effective on the A7RII -- including AF of manual lenses via a TechArt LM-EA7.

So, do I recommend the A7RII? Heck yeah! However, Sony has a bunch of body options I can recommend just as strongly given their price points. Pick the cheapest that does what you need... and if you need everything the best, this is the one.

BTW, for social flash photography you're better off with a smaller camera that has a self-contained flash; my low score on that is just because of the bulk of camera and flash.

PS: I own and use more Canon cameras than Sonys, but just because of CHDK and ML; the Sonys are better in nearly every way, just not as programmable. Now that Open Memories is starting to make real progress in allowing Sonys to be programmed....

 

[AlphaPhotography]

By now, I'm not saying anything people haven't heard: the Sony A7RII has the best FF sensor you can currently buy.

Actually, it has a bunch of minor improvements over the A7II... but not much compelling to me. That's why I took so long to get one. I could easily mistake one for the other both in handling and in image quality (as long as I'm not viewing the image too large for 24MP). Aside from a 42MP sensor that's great in low light, the video support is probably the biggest step up -- and it can do excellent 4K or 1080 at 120FPS (which is a big deal for some of the stuff I'm doing in my research). I should also mention that I shoot manual lenses nearly 100% of the time and it's great for that, but AF is still quite effective on the A7RII -- including AF of manual lenses via a TechArt LM-EA7.

So, do I recommend the A7RII? Heck yeah! However, Sony has a bunch of body options I can recommend just as strongly given their price points. Pick the cheapest that does what you need... and if you need everything the best, this is the one.

BTW, for social flash photography you're better off with a smaller camera that has a self-contained flash; my low score on that is just because of the bulk of camera and flash.

PS: I own and use more Canon cameras than Sonys, but just because of CHDK and ML; the Sonys are better in nearly every way, just not as programmable. Now that Open Memories is starting to make real progress in allowing Sonys to be programmed....

Solid review. I agree with most of what you said. I recently moved from the A7II to the A7RII and they are more similar than different.

Just one minor correction: The A7RII can only do 720p at 120fps and (1080p at 60fps). I've found the quality fairly soft at 120fps in the one test I did but it was in very low light.

As for the flash, I do miss having a pop-up flash as I did on my A6000/A6300 but I've heard pretty good things about this small TTL flash (also made by Meike):

Amazon.com : Neewer NW320 Mini TTL Speedlite Flash Automatic Flash Compatible with Sony MI Hot Shoe DSLR and Mirrorless Cameras A6000 A6300 A6500 A7 A7II A7RII A7RIII A7III NEX6 A7SII A7R A7S : Electronics

Amazon.com : Neewer NW320 Mini TTL Speedlite Flash Automatic Flash Compatible with Sony MI Hot Shoe DSLR and Mirrorless Cameras A6000 A6300 A6500 A7 A7II A7RII A7RIII A7III NEX6 A7SII A7R A7S : Electronics

www.amazon.com

--
Alpha-Photographer.com

 

[JimKasson]

By now, I'm not saying anything people haven't heard: the Sony A7RII has the best FF sensor you can currently buy.

Yep.

Actually, it has a bunch of minor improvements over the A7II... but not much compelling to me.

Not so sure about the minor part, but there sure are improvements.

• res
• Dr-Pix
• BSI -> freedom from corner color casting
• PDR at base ISO
• PDAF

Jim

 

[blue_skies]

Agreed, also out today, see this comparison:

Dpreview tests the Fuji GFX and says the advantage over the A7rII is negligible… | sonyalpharumors

DPreview added the Fuji GFX studio samples. The camera uses the Sony 51MP medium format sensor. But despite the size advantage there doesn't seem to be a big quantum leap over the Sony A7rII: “In terms of high ISO noise, the GFX 50S performs fairly similarly to the Pentax 645Z and, as sensor...

www.sonyalpharumors.com

https://www.dpreview.com/reviews/fujifilm-gfx-50s

--
Cheers,
Henry

 

[ProfHankD]

By now, I'm not saying anything people haven't heard: the Sony A7RII has the best FF sensor you can currently buy.

Yep.

Actually, it has a bunch of minor improvements over the A7II... but not much compelling to me.

Not so sure about the minor part, but there sure are improvements.

• res
• Dr-Pix
• BSI -> freedom from corner color casting
• PDR at base ISO

All sensor stuff there... which I agree is impressively better, but it isn't as obvious as one would expect. Honestly, the IQ differences between my NEX-7, A6000, A7, A7II, and A7RII are all surprisingly subtle for "final" images (for me, usually no more than 6-8MP)... then again, all of those Sonys compete really well against Canon "APS-C" and even FF sensors at least up until the 5D IV... and my ancient NEX-7 still looks fine against my new 5D IV. BTW, no question that I feel a lot better about what I spent on the A7RII than what I spent on the 5D IV (which I got because I needed the dual pixel raw).

I'm not saying we've reached a point where sensors don't need to get better... it's more a matter of they need to get a lot better to make a qualitatively obvious difference. For example, in my Electronic Imaging 2017 paper, Refining raw pixel values using a value error model to drive texture synthesis , KREMY obtained as much as a 3EV improvement in raw DR... but it was hard to make that obvious in projected images at the conference! As another data point, every now and then I'll shoot a little with my NEX-5 or even my A100, and I think I could still get away with using either of them for at least some serious work: the worst thing about them is the lack of an EVF, not IQ.

• PDAF

I'm a manual lens guy. I only have a few native AF lenses and rarely use them. AF performance on my collection of screw-drive A-mount lenses is the same (LA-EA4 determines that), my few Canon EF lenses AF comparably well on my A7II and A7RII, and the LM-EA7 also works comparably well on both the A7II and A7RII (but not at all on the A6000 and NEX-7). Again, I know AF is improved, but it isn't obvious the way I use the cameras. (Incidentally, AF performance is also largely a sensor thing.)

Of course I appreciate the level of advanced engineering in the A7RII and commend Sony for having done it. I'm also very impressed with their RX100 evolution (and with the medium-format sensors). If you have the money, these cameras are worth every penny.

 

[vett93]

I only use my Canon camera for birds. A7RII does everything else.

 

[HFLM]

By now, I'm not saying anything people haven't heard: the Sony A7RII has the best FF sensor you can currently buy.

Actually, it has a bunch of minor improvements over the A7II... but not much compelling to me. That's why I took so long to get one. I could easily mistake one for the other both in handling and in image quality (as long as I'm not viewing the image too large for 24MP). Aside from a 42MP sensor that's great in low light, the video support is probably the biggest step up -- and it can do excellent 4K or 1080 at 120FPS (which is a big deal for some of the stuff I'm doing in my research). I should also mention that I shoot manual lenses nearly 100% of the time and it's great for that, but AF is still quite effective on the A7RII -- including AF of manual lenses via a TechArt LM-EA7.

So, do I recommend the A7RII? Heck yeah! However, Sony has a bunch of body options I can recommend just as strongly given their price points. Pick the cheapest that does what you need... and if you need everything the best, this is the one.

BTW, for social flash photography you're better off with a smaller camera that has a self-contained flash; my low score on that is just because of the bulk of camera and flash.

PS: I own and use more Canon cameras than Sonys, but just because of CHDK and ML; the Sonys are better in nearly every way, just not as programmable. Now that Open Memories is starting to make real progress in allowing Sonys to be programmed....

Agree to the sensor IQ in general, but not to your latest paragraph, which may be due to your specific way of shooting. My wife and I use a 5div and A7rii body each for events. The Canon is in many ways preferable to me over the Sony. Much faster to operate, initial AF acquisition a lot quicker, much lower time to switch on and shoot, tracking works better as well as AF in low light (much quicker, especially with DPAF with every lens independent of the focal length or whether it is defocused or not), flash use (Sony's mount is stupid. I always fear to tear of the flash mount when turning the flash head, it is too flimsy), battery etc. High ISO on the 5div is excellent, I see only minor differences compared to the A7rii in real life (slightly better DR). The A7rii is clearly superior at lower ISOs.

If I were not into events I wouldn't need the 5div, the Sony would be sufficient. Overall I see the 5div as a formidable and reliable camera.

 

[Tristimulus]

Agreed, also out today, see this comparison:

http://www.sonyalpharumors.com/dpreview-tests-fuji-gfx-says-advantage-a7rii-minimal/

https://www.dpreview.com/reviews/fujifilm-gfx-50s

--
Cheers,
Henry

The title of the thread says best FF sensor. Two of the sensors here look a bit overly FF...

 

[ProfHankD]

PS: I own and use more Canon cameras than Sonys, but just because of CHDK and ML; the Sonys are better in nearly every way, just not as programmable. Now that Open Memories is starting to make real progress in allowing Sonys to be programmed....

Agree to the sensor IQ in general, but not to your latest paragraph, which may be due to your specific way of shooting.

Yup. I'm primarily a manual lens user -- for which the 5D IV is remarkably awkward. There are also a bunch of insult-to-injury things in the 5D IV, such as the fact that the raw files are balanced based on the values from half the pixels, but contain the sums of the half-pixel pairs, making nearly every raw incorrectly exposed. (This is why processing of the dual-pixel raw can increase DR -- basically because Canon did a stupid.) BTW, the dual-pixel raws use the clipped sum plus one side, making it impossible to accurately recover the actual dual-pixel raw data due to the aforementioned clipping.

My wife and I use a 5div and A7rii body each for events. The Canon is in many ways preferable to me over the Sony. Much faster to operate, initial AF acquisition a lot quicker, much lower time to switch on and shoot, tracking works better as well as AF in low light (much quicker, especially with DPAF with every lens independent of the focal length or whether it is defocused or not), flash use (Sony's mount is stupid. I always fear to tear of the flash mount when turning the flash head, it is too flimsy), battery etc. High ISO on the 5div is excellent, I see only minor differences compared to the A7rii in real life (slightly better DR). The A7rii is clearly superior at lower ISOs.

The Canon 5D IV is and looks very impressive (HUGE with a very nice OVF and excellent, but fixed, rear LCD), is very well-integrated (providing a familiar, tweaked over the years, UI), is pretty fast to use (although it is lens dependent if it or the A7RII+metabones does AF faster), and... well, that doesn't sound entirely positive, does it? ;-) All kidding aside, the 5D IV is a pretty awesome and very "finished-looking" camera, it just isn't as good as the Sonys at what I care about most. I certainly wouldn't hesitate to use my 5D IV for serious work -- provided I didn't need manual focus.

If I were not into events I wouldn't need the 5div, the Sony would be sufficient. Overall I see the 5div as a formidable and reliable camera.

Actually, I've had some minor reliability issues with my 5D IV, but nothing power cycling the camera and re-seating the lens couldn't fix. In any case, the 5D IV is certainly a big step up in the Canon line and I really look forward to using Magic Lantern on it when the port is done. I also look forward to Canon carrying this sensor technology throughout their line, especially in the lower-priced models -- if there's one thing Canon truly excels at, it's getting production cost down by leveraging existing components.

 

[DFPanno]

Yes, great sensor.

The fact that it is not covered with an AA filter certainly contributes to the increased acuity one sees in its images.

Personally I find the A7R IIs images to be distinctly better than the A7 II's I had for a bit. I wonder to what degree the filter contributes to that difference.

 

[blue_skies]

Agreed, also out today, see this comparison:

http://www.sonyalpharumors.com/dpreview-tests-fuji-gfx-says-advantage-a7rii-minimal/

https://www.dpreview.com/reviews/fujifilm-gfx-50s

--
Cheers,
Henry

The title of the thread says best FF sensor. Two of the sensors here look a bit overly FF...

Read the article, that is the point that they make, the 51Mp barely makes a difference, and even the 100Mp is not a dramatical improvement.

It would be versus e.g. the A7r.

--
Cheers,
Henry

 

[JimKasson]

By now, I'm not saying anything people haven't heard: the Sony A7RII has the best FF sensor you can currently buy.

Yep.

Actually, it has a bunch of minor improvements over the A7II... but not much compelling to me.

Not so sure about the minor part, but there sure are improvements.

• res
• Dr-Pix
• BSI -> freedom from corner color casting
• PDR at base ISO

All sensor stuff there... which I agree is impressively better, but it isn't as obvious as one would expect. Honestly, the IQ differences between my NEX-7, A6000, A7, A7II, and A7RII are all surprisingly subtle for "final" images (for me, usually no more than 6-8MP)... then again, all of those Sonys compete really well against Canon "APS-C" and even FF sensors at least up until the 5D IV... and my ancient NEX-7 still looks fine against my new 5D IV. BTW, no question that I feel a lot better about what I spent on the A7RII than what I spent on the 5D IV (which I got because I needed the dual pixel raw).

I'm not saying we've reached a point where sensors don't need to get better... it's more a matter of they need to get a lot better to make a qualitatively obvious difference. For example, in my Electronic Imaging 2017 paper, Refining raw pixel values using a value error model to drive texture synthesis , KREMY obtained as much as a 3EV improvement in raw DR... but it was hard to make that obvious in projected images at the conference! As another data point, every now and then I'll shoot a little with my NEX-5 or even my A100, and I think I could still get away with using either of them for at least some serious work: the worst thing about them is the lack of an EVF, not IQ.

• PDAF

I'm a manual lens guy. I only have a few native AF lenses and rarely use them. AF performance on my collection of screw-drive A-mount lenses is the same (LA-EA4 determines that), my few Canon EF lenses AF comparably well on my A7II and A7RII, and the LM-EA7 also works comparably well on both the A7II and A7RII (but not at all on the A6000 and NEX-7). Again, I know AF is improved, but it isn't obvious the way I use the cameras. (Incidentally, AF performance is also largely a sensor thing.)

Of course I appreciate the level of advanced engineering in the A7RII and commend Sony for having done it. I'm also very impressed with their RX100 evolution (and with the medium-format sensors). If you have the money, these cameras are worth every penny.

A camera doesn't have to be perfect to be useful. That's a good thing. It just has to be good enough for the job at hand. As cameras get better, more of them can do most jobs just fine. There's a well-know former large format photographer, Dan Burkholder, who now uses and iPhone. Brooks Jensen uses, I think, a MFT camera. Guillermo Luijk now uses MFT. Many former medium and large format photographers use FF. As cameras get better, this trend will continue; smaller sensors will be sufficient for more things.

In case it's not obvious, I'm agreeing with on on the above; I'm just coming at it from a different perspective.

With respect to the difficulty of making significant improvements, the better the cameras get, the harder it gets. Say you want to double the resolution of a sensor. It's one thing to go from 1 MP to 4MP. It's another to go from 42MP to 168MP. The doubling time for Gordon Moore's "law" has been falling, and may continue to fall, in spite of multi-billion dollar fabs. Trees don't grow to the sky, and exponential growth doesn't continue forever. To continue to make meaningful improvements, there has to be a discontinuity sometime.

The above paragraph is another statement that supports the thrust of what I perceive you are saying.

Then there's market size. It's usually true that at the upper quality levels, your dollar buys less, and that's true of cameras. In hifi, going from a $100 system to a $1000 system brought more improvement than going from a $25000 system to a $250000 system. In cameras, the same kind of thing is true. Is a P1 100 MP back more than 10 times better than a a7RII?

Always nice to hear from you, Hank.

Jim

 

[JimKasson]

Yes, great sensor.

The fact that it is not covered with an AA filter certainly contributes to the increased acuity one sees in its images.

Personally I find the A7R IIs images to be distinctly better than the A7 II's I had for a bit. I wonder to what degree the filter contributes to that difference.

My experiences with the D800/D800E convinced me that an AA filter is a good thing for most purposes, and that a little deconvolution can compensate for the MTF falloff in the 0.2 to 0.4 cy/px region.

I've also done a lot of simulations of cameras with and without various kinds of AA filters, that reinforce my impressions.

Of course, the whole topic is subject-dependent. A clothing photographer may love AA filters, while a rural landscape photographer my hate them.

Jim

 

[DavidB2]

Yes, great sensor.

The fact that it is not covered with an AA filter certainly contributes to the increased acuity one sees in its images.

Personally I find the A7R IIs images to be distinctly better than the A7 II's I had for a bit. I wonder to what degree the filter contributes to that difference.

My experiences with the D800/D800E convinced me that an AA filter is a good thing for most purposes, and that a little deconvolution can compensate for the MTF falloff in the 0.2 to 0.4 cy/px region.

I've also done a lot of simulations of cameras with and without various kinds of AA filters, that reinforce my impressions.

Of course, the whole topic is subject-dependent. A clothing photographer may love AA filters, while a rural landscape photographer my hate them.

Jim

 

[DFPanno]

Yes, great sensor.

The fact that it is not covered with an AA filter certainly contributes to the increased acuity one sees in its images.

Personally I find the A7R IIs images to be distinctly better than the A7 II's I had for a bit. I wonder to what degree the filter contributes to that difference.

My experiences with the D800/D800E convinced me that an AA filter is a good thing for most purposes, and that a little deconvolution can compensate for the MTF falloff in the 0.2 to 0.4 cy/px region.

I've also done a lot of simulations of cameras with and without various kinds of AA filters, that reinforce my impressions.

Of course, the whole topic is subject-dependent. A clothing photographer may love AA filters, while a rural landscape photographer my hate them.

Jim

 

[vyoufinder]

By now, I'm not saying anything people haven't heard: the Sony A7RII has the best FF sensor you can currently buy.

Actually, it has a bunch of minor improvements over the A7II... but not much compelling to me. That's why I took so long to get one. I could easily mistake one for the other both in handling and in image quality (as long as I'm not viewing the image too large for 24MP). Aside from a 42MP sensor that's great in low light, the video support is probably the biggest step up -- and it can do excellent 4K or 1080 at 120FPS (which is a big deal for some of the stuff I'm doing in my research). I should also mention that I shoot manual lenses nearly 100% of the time and it's great for that, but AF is still quite effective on the A7RII -- including AF of manual lenses via a TechArt LM-EA7.

So, do I recommend the A7RII? Heck yeah! However, Sony has a bunch of body options I can recommend just as strongly given their price points. Pick the cheapest that does what you need... and if you need everything the best, this is the one.

BTW, for social flash photography you're better off with a smaller camera that has a self-contained flash; my low score on that is just because of the bulk of camera and flash.

PS: I own and use more Canon cameras than Sonys, but just because of CHDK and ML; the Sonys are better in nearly every way, just not as programmable. Now that Open Memories is starting to make real progress in allowing Sonys to be programmed....

I'll agree that the Exmor HD is the "best" sensor out there for normal people, but I would argue that the configuration it is used in the A7rii is not the "best" for every situation.

In low light, I would prefer the Exmor HD sensor to have bigger pixels, such as in the a7 or a7s.

 

[OlyPent]

The best? It's not Sony.

16 bit, $40,000.

http://www.flicamera.com/proline/

 

[JimKasson]

The best? It's not Sony.

16 bit, $40,000.

http://www.flicamera.com/proline/

Best FF?

• 10e- noise
• Big pitch
• I didn't find one FF sensor
• CFA?
• Size, weight, power
• CCD, fer crying out loud

Jim

--
http://blog.kasson.com

 

[ProfHankD]

Yes, great sensor.

The fact that it is not covered with an AA filter certainly contributes to the increased acuity one sees in its images.

Personally I find the A7R IIs images to be distinctly better than the A7 II's I had for a bit. I wonder to what degree the filter contributes to that difference.

My experiences with the D800/D800E convinced me that an AA filter is a good thing for most purposes, and that a little deconvolution can compensate for the MTF falloff in the 0.2 to 0.4 cy/px region.

I've also done a lot of simulations of cameras with and without various kinds of AA filters, that reinforce my impressions.

Of course, the whole topic is subject-dependent. A clothing photographer may love AA filters, while a rural landscape photographer my hate them.

AA filters are clearly advantageous with some subjects. ...

You are certainly right about the ability of knowledgable post-processing to virtually negate any disadvantage intrinsic to a filter.

Whenever I think of resolution, I think in terms of Nyquist sampling. I'll skip my long-winded explanation here and simply say that most AA filters should really be much stronger than they are, but humans tend to like the extra detail even if it's potentially wrong detail, as long as it doesn't look artificial. Of course, once the sensor pixel density gets enough past lens resolution, everything works without an AA filter because the lens itself acts as a low pass filter.

In my experience, few legacy lenses resolve high enough wide open to desperately need an AA filter at the pixel density of a 24MP APS-C sensor. However, stopped down to f/8, many lenses do. In that context, I believe the A7RII's 42MP FF sensor (18MP APS-C density) could really use an AA filter for the center of the frame. Most lenses drop in resolution off axis; in the corners, very few of my lenses shooting wide open would need an AA filter.

As I use my lenses most of the time, I think the A7RII would be ok with/without an AA filter. Serendipity also plays a role here relative to the scenarios Jim noted. When I'm shooting people with moire-prone clothing, I'm often shooting with the lens wide open; I tend to shoot landscapes stopped down. Thus, I'm actually using the lens as a bit of a variable AA filter.... ;-)

 

[JimKasson]

Yes, great sensor.

The fact that it is not covered with an AA filter certainly contributes to the increased acuity one sees in its images.

Personally I find the A7R IIs images to be distinctly better than the A7 II's I had for a bit. I wonder to what degree the filter contributes to that difference.

My experiences with the D800/D800E convinced me that an AA filter is a good thing for most purposes, and that a little deconvolution can compensate for the MTF falloff in the 0.2 to 0.4 cy/px region.

I've also done a lot of simulations of cameras with and without various kinds of AA filters, that reinforce my impressions.

Of course, the whole topic is subject-dependent. A clothing photographer may love AA filters, while a rural landscape photographer my hate them.

AA filters are clearly advantageous with some subjects. ...

You are certainly right about the ability of knowledgable post-processing to virtually negate any disadvantage intrinsic to a filter.

Whenever I think of resolution, I think in terms of Nyquist sampling. I'll skip my long-winded explanation here and simply say that most AA filters should really be much stronger than they are, but humans tend to like the extra detail even if it's potentially wrong detail, as long as it doesn't look artificial.

Like that medium format "sparkle" on skin.

Of course, once the sensor pixel density gets enough past lens resolution, everything works without an AA filter because the lens itself acts as a low pass filter.

Not to mention the 100% effective fill factor, which is now pretty common.

In my experience, few legacy lenses resolve high enough wide open to desperately need an AA filter at the pixel density of a 24MP APS-C sensor. However, stopped down to f/8, many lenses do. In that context, I believe the A7RII's 42MP FF sensor (18MP APS-C density) could really use an AA filter for the center of the frame. Most lenses drop in resolution off axis; in the corners, very few of my lenses shooting wide open would need an AA filter.

As I use my lenses most of the time, I think the A7RII would be ok with/without an AA filter. Serendipity also plays a role here relative to the scenarios Jim noted. When I'm shooting people with moire-prone clothing, I'm often shooting with the lens wide open; I tend to shoot landscapes stopped down. Thus, I'm actually using the lens as a bit of a variable AA filter.... ;-)

I think we're in material agreement here, Hank. An AA filter, particularly a weak one like the ones on the rest of the a7x line, wouldn't hurt things much in my estimation, though, and would IMHO net help. OBTW, why are the a7x AA filters anisotropic? Anybody know?

Jim