Sony A7SIII = $3500, 10-bit 4K120p internal, 16-bit 4K60p RAW out

The only positive thing about that is it suggests the camera may have more than he reports but not less
 
Sonyalpharumors has definitely started posting BS in their effort to do a rumor-a-day on the A7SIII.

BUT they made a 2nd post today with supposedly leaked sensor info that makes a lot of sense. It's a 48MP quad Bayer sensor that will be unable to take 48MP stills on the A7SIII (a little cripple hammer for the photogs there). But it can do HDR using the quad Bayer arrangement, it will have 23ms rolling shutter in the 14-bit readout mode. This looks legit to me.

dc7bcdfb374020517236e066ffc0f0695a54067a1e22271cdd7494bb4c9fec0d-Kopie.jpg
 
ahalpert said:
Sonyalpharumors has definitely started posting BS in their effort to do a rumor-a-day on the A7SIII.

BUT they made a 2nd post today with supposedly leaked sensor info that makes a lot of sense. It's a 48MP quad Bayer sensor that will be unable to take 48MP stills on the A7SIII (a little cripple hammer for the photogs there). But it can do HDR using the quad Bayer arrangement, it will have 23ms rolling shutter in the 14-bit readout mode. This looks legit to me.

View attachment 139704
Click to expand...

If that's a fake, it's a really good one. That is the Sony font and layout style for manuals and documents.
 
Sony has always been known to preserve their upgrades and new models for the future since the beginning.... I have had at least 1 Sony camera in my ownership for about the last 10 years starting with the a7sii (actually was pretty groundbreaking at the time), then the a7rii, fs5, and now I have since moved onto RED cameras but I still rely heavily on my a7rii for all my high end photo work and it is still going strong. The A7rii should have had the ability to record 4k/60fps and 1080/120fps to an external recorder a long time ago (or at least the A7riii or A7r IV) but they have been saving that spec for the A7siii, which should have come out 1-2 years ago to compete with the Black Magic Pocket 6k, Panasonic GH5 / S1H, etc. as the sensor on the A7r had the ability / bitrate to record 4k resolution at higher frame rates to an external recorder. This helped preserve the life of the FS5 which then became the FS5ii which basically included all the raw and external recording upgrades you had to purchase as an "expensive add-on" for the FS5 and only added one truly new feature "a baked in Sony Venice LUT" which offered less latitude than shooting S-log which kind of defeated the whole purpose of the Sony LOG workflow. The FS7 was industry standard for a while for corporate, weddings, doc's but even that camera grew ancient before it was updated (mkii) as BMP6k had at the time 6k/60fps, raw/pro-res recording directly to SSD's, 12-bit color and much better color science all for way cheaper price. Yes, it doesn't have XLR ports, or timecode, etc. but if you honestly look at the work people are producing with the very cheap Pocket-6k you have to agree the imagery it produces is every bit as good or damn near close to a RED camera if exposed properly. Even still, the updated FS7 now the FX9 is full-frame, offers 6k recording but if you look close there are a lot of little catches such as it still lacks true Raw recording (without adding the expensive and very large external recording module), still it has a few nuances in terms of color science in the way it renders greens, and that camera is still limited in what you can record externally to monitors. Even if autofocus is what you rely on and is your argument for the FX9, Canon has been doing that well for the last 5 years and I still think I would choose a C300ii over an FX9. Another thing to consider, is Pro-Res Raw is great but its not the same thing as true internal RAW which RED, Black Magic, Arri, and Canon all offer in 2020. The color science is also still much better on all of those cameras unless we are talking "Venice" but at that price point I would think I would buy a RED or used Arri. Long story short, Sony has had the technology to compete with all of its competitors since the beginning, heck some cameras out there are using sensors that really are designed by Sony or at least manufactured in the same warehouses using the same materials (i.e. Kinefinity, Z-Cam, etc.). It's been their choice to "lay low" and capitalize off of FS5/FS7, A7r, A9 and A7iii sales to the general masses for the last few years, marketing old technology as new and thriving off of their high priced lenses, that unfortunately E-mount users are stuck to rely on. Personally, I owned a ton of E-mount glass (i.e. full loxia kit, full batis kit, and a bunch of g-master and Zeiss branded Sony glass) and none of it made me ever go "wow" compared to the likes of vintage Leica-R, Zeiss Contax, Canon FD, or even Canon-L Glass which can be had for the same price or less and is more universally accepted on various camera platforms. The resolution and detail was there but Sony glass always felt cold and lacked the "luster" you can get from vintage glass. Unless you rely on autofocus (which I do not for my video work) I think Sony glass would be my last choice. I am seriously not trying to bash Sony, as my business grew up on their cameras and lenses but after repping them for about 5 years and watching them develop their mark ii, iii, iv cameras which didn't really offer much of anything other than depreciation and a higher price tag, I kind of got tired of being strung along. I quickly realized how important glass is in making pretty images and after I decided to switch glass and start using mount adaptors on my Sony's I think that is when I started taking a closer look at the performance of their camera bodies as well versus competitors. In the realm of high resolution Photography Sony is still relevant and probably the best outside of medium format photography such Hasselblad or Phase-One but I wouldn't even give them a second look for video at this time. The a7siii can come out and it can offer 6k or 8k/30fps recording to the masses to check everyones boxes, and it can finally have 4k /60fps, which is honestly outdated considering cheap cameras are offering 6k/40-60fps these days, but honestly I don't know if that's good enough. 10-bit color is great for travel videos, vlogging, instagram, and your YouTube channel, but it doesn't come close to touching 12-bit or 16-bit raw from the likes of a RED camera, Canon, or Black Magic for post production work. High resolution is meaningless if the image quality, dynamic range, and color science isn't there for increased flexibility in post production. Resolution is just a format size not a definition of image quality and more people need to realize that. I would be more happy if Sony made the camera shoot 12-bit internal Raw at up to 5k/60fps and 2k or 4k/120fps as I don't need 8k if its going to be 8-bit or 10-bit and especially not if it is XVAC. Focus on improving overall image quality, (i.e. dynamic range, skin-tones, highlight roll-off, bit-depth) and a more flexible RAW codec rather than giving me "more K's".
 
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3 exclamation points indicates truth - and hey they were right about the release date. Maybe they got something else right too.

I'll tell you this - everyone on the BM thread was excited for the possibility of AF. And then they dropped a 12K camera without it...
 
ahalpert said:
3 exclamation points indicates truth - and hey they were right about the release date. Maybe they got something else right too.

I'll tell you this - everyone on the BM thread was excited for the possibility of AF. And then they dropped a 12K camera without it...
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If BMD had done that and the AF was less than stellar, they would have a dud and wasted an opportunity, incur wrath. Servo zoom and AF is out of their comfort zone, image making is not.
 
Tom Roper said:
If BMD had done that and the AF was less than stellar, they would have a dud and wasted an opportunity, incur wrath. Servo zoom and AF is out of their comfort zone, image making is not.
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I'm not saying that they could have or should have done that, it's just what some people wanted. People also want flying cars.

All the regular ghouls on dvxuser were pining for a P6K with Canon AF. The folks who are excited for the 12K prize IQ over all else. I wish that were me, but it's not. I mean - I prize IQ. But a cheaper body with good AF makes 50x as much sense for the business I have.
 
I'm a p4k user who would like to upgrade to a p6k. The only thing that could drive me away from BM right now is the lack of AF: if any other brand brings out a <$4k camera that matches the image quality of the p6k but also offering really good AF (with eye-detect and all that), I'll probably switch brands. But it's not easy for BM to develop a good AF system because it is, indeed, out of their expertise right now.

Luckily for them, the advantage they have in terms of image quality is not easy to close either. BRAW on big sensors with lots of DR is very hard to beat.
 
The R5 comes close to what you want perhaps. Just not a lot of RAW codec options. Probably crappy rolling shutter in 8K. And of course the overheating issue.

The A7SIII could be interesting...might have RAW out...not sure
 
This makes me curious. Do most cameras run on an Android based system? A different custom designed system based on some other OS made for the mobile market?

Anyone? Bueller? Anyone?
 
It looks like Canon uses a proprietary OS called DRYOS and Sony is based on Linux? I'm not enough of a computer guy to parse the implications for programming a controller though...

From https://photo.stackexchange.com/questions/35185/what-operating-systems-run-on-todays-dslrs:

Canon
So far what we know based on ML work

DRYOS version 2.3, release #0023

5Dm2
500d/T1i
50D
DRYOS version 2.3, release #0039

7D
1Dm4
DRYOS version 2.3, release #0043

550d/T2i
DRYOS version 2.3, release #0044 or #0049

5dm3
EOS M
DRYOS version 2.3, release #0047

60D
600D/T3i
1100D/T3
I'm generalizing but I see in Canon P&S they tend to reuse DIGIC processors so a quick check on a Wiki indicated that DRYOS is used.

It isn't specifically mentioned but ML developers indicate that they think this DRYOS is a derivative of uLTRON. They also did indicate that some concepts in DRYOS could be compared to or understood from VxWorks.

Sony
BusyBox 1.4.2 (Linux Kernel)

NEX-3
NEX-5
SLT-A35
BusyBox 1.13.4 (Linux Kernel)

SLT-A99

SLT-77

SLT-65

NEX-7
 
So, what does that mean to you? Regarding the relation of cameras to phones + how easy it would be to program a controller?
 
Samuel H said:
I'm a p4k user who would like to upgrade to a p6k. The only thing that could drive me away from BM right now is the lack of AF: if any other brand brings out a <$4k camera that matches the image quality of the p6k but also offering really good AF (with eye-detect and all that), I'll probably switch brands. But it's not easy for BM to develop a good AF system because it is, indeed, out of their expertise right now.

Luckily for them, the advantage they have in terms of image quality is not easy to close either. BRAW on big sensors with lots of DR is very hard to beat.
Click to expand...

The Red Komodo with an RF mount is going to have a phase detect AF. If Red perfects the AF it will be on top of my list.
 
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