Jim Kasson analyzed the A7rIII spatial filtering and found out that is “behaves” the same way it does on the A7rII. So his conclusion is that the A7rIII also eat stars. This statement goes against the findings from Drew Geraci who said last week:

“Very Excited to share this side by side comparison of the A7RIII (full production model) shooting Astrophotography at 3.2″ and 10” at ISO 12,800 utilizing the Sony 16-35mm GM lens. As you can see in the side by side comparison, with ALL noise reduction turned off in the main menu, you can easily see that all stars are present and accounted for when blown up at 100% resolution. The star-eater is no more.
Download RAW images here: https://www.dropbox.com/…/ejyad8…/AAApFpv-kmRWfslWZ0-69awRa…
Password: star”

While Jim Kasson did yet not test this on real start shoots I really do trust Jim. And I worry that at the end he might be right. Unless Sony did something on the A7rIII we don’t know about. I hope further testings can confirm if the A7rIII will or will not eat stars.

Preorders:
Sony A7rIII at Amazon, Bhphoto, Adorama, BuyDig, FocusCamera, Calumet DE, Wex UK. Photo Porst Neuwied. Sony Netherland. Sony Australia. Sony Japan.
Sony 24-105mm at Amazon, Bhphoto, Adorama, BuyDig, FocusCamera, Amazon DE, Calumet DE, Wex UK.

Join the A7rIII facebook group to discuss the camera features and tests!

Albert Dros shared his “First Day” findings with the new Sony A7RIII:

The camera feels good, lot of faster than its predecessor.
Sound of the shutter is different. Sounds a bit ‘smoother’, like there is less vibration going on.
The resolution of the viewfinder and the screen are better. This is really noticeable if you’re used to the A7RII.
Touch-focus is great
Focus-magnify during AF is great, works well together with the Touch-focus.
Custom menu makes me work faster not having to go through dozens of menu pages.
The eye-piece sensor is better.

Preorders:
Sony A7rIII at Amazon, Bhphoto, Adorama, BuyDig, FocusCamera, Calumet DE, Wex UK. Photo Porst Neuwied. Sony Netherland. Sony Australia. Sony Japan.
Sony 24-105mm at Amazon, Bhphoto, Adorama, BuyDig, FocusCamera, Amazon DE, Calumet DE, Wex UK.

Join the A7rIII facebook group to discuss the camera features and tests!

Sony 24-105mm at Amazon, Bhphoto, Adorama, BuyDig, FocusCamera, Amazon DE, Calumet DE, Wex UK.

Marc Alhadeff posted the detailed review of the new 24-105mm lens. I did actually preorder this lens before to read any review and I was worried that once first reviewes would be released I might would be disappointed. But luckely this doens’t seem to be the case:

The Sony 24-105 F4 was longly awaited by Sony users as a key trans-standard zoom

Sony has delivered a superb lens , much better than the Sony FE 24-70mm F4 Zeiss OSS, way above the Sony FE 24-240mm F3.5-F6.3

• The lens is always excellent in the center and corners are just 1 grade below but can always reach the very good grade
• Bokeh is very nice, with beautiful blurry background
• Very good resistance to flare, no CA
• Very nice results in video with nice blurry background
• Construction is very good  and lens is equipped with all relevant knobs : button than can be assigned to eye AF, AF/MF switch, Optical stabilisation

The tradeoff made to sacrifice distorsion (quite important) for sharpness is a good one to my opinion as those will be automatically corrected by a lightroom lens profile very soon

With its correct price tag of 1350 euros, I expect this lens to become the standard high quality zoom lens for A7RIII/A9 if you don’t want to invest in the Sony FE 24-70mm F2.8 GM

Highly recommended !

Preorders:
Sony A7rIII at Amazon, Bhphoto, Adorama, BuyDig, FocusCamera, Calumet DE, Wex UK. Photo Porst Neuwied. Sony Netherland. Sony Australia. Sony Japan.
Sony 24-105mm at Amazon, Bhphoto, Adorama, BuyDig, FocusCamera, Amazon DE, Calumet DE, Wex UK.

Join the A7rIII facebook group to discuss the camera features and tests!

Darren Soh from our Sony A7rIII FB group (join here) shared some more findings on the A7rIII Pixel Shift Mode (Click on images to enlarge). First let’s see that image of a jogger in the Park:

Darren writes: “100% crop comparison of one shot (left) and pixel-shifted image (right). A glitch in the matrix occurs when any changes happens between the four exposures – here, a jogger is running by. Even his shadow is recorded as a glitch.“

Of course this was expected. It’s nearly impossible to avoid such artifacts on moving objects. Maybe some future algorithm could make it possible to remove moving objects from the frame. But for now you have to deal with these kind of issues when you don’t shoot absolutely static objects.

That said the new Pixel Shift model really delivers superb results. Darren writes:

(image on top) 100% crop comparison of one shot (left) and pixel-shifted image (right). Notice the elimination of moire in the staircase grille.
(image below) 100% crop comparison of one shot (left) and pixel-shifted image (right). The gain in microcontrast is astounding.

Sony and Sigma preorders:
Sony A7rIII at Amazon, Bhphoto, Adorama, BuyDig, FocusCamera, Calumet DE, Wex UK. Photo Porst Neuwied. Sony Netherland. Sony Australia. Sony Japan.
Sony 24-105mm at Amazon, Bhphoto, Adorama, BuyDig, FocusCamera, Amazon DE, Calumet DE, Wex UK.
Sigma 16mm f/1.4 E-mount at BHphoto, FocusCamera and Wex UK.

You can check out full size samples shot on the new Sigma lens at Sigma Canada and Sigma Global.

For $449 you get this new fast lens at BHphoto, Adorama, FocusCamera and Wex UK. Shipment start is November 22.

Sigma CEO Yamaki-San talks about the new lens:

Albert Dros (video on top) tested the Pixel Shift feature and concludes:

This function is not a gimmick, it really works. Will I use it as a landscape photographer? I will definitely try. I love to shoot images with as much detail as possible. In reality I will often not be able to use this function because of moving subjects. However, as I am blending images lots of times I can definitely see this function being integrated in my photography. Think of very fine stones on buildings, churches, mostly ancient structures. I would sometimes see slight moire when shooting these. Shooting with Pixel Shift completely eliminates the moire. I could blend a pixel shift image with ‘normal’ images to overcome the moving scene issues. There are definitely possibilities in which I will use this technique. It’s super fast to activate anyway, and if you have your camera on your tripod waiting for a sunset, why not shoot a pixel shift image while you’re waiting?

Darren Soh (Click on image on top) shared his Pixel Shift test findings on our Sony A7rIII Facebook group:

A7rIII pixel shift comparison.
Because of the 1 sec lag in between each of the four exposures, pixel shift imaging has unfortunately been quite limited. Once you are shooting outdoors, many things can happen in the +/-4 secs that you need to get the shot. So I decided to shoot my bookshelf instead. But even then, at 100% the differences were quite subtle.
So this is what I did. I up-rezed both 16 BIT TIFF files that came from the Sony Imaging Edge software in Adobe Photoshop using the new Preserve Details 2.0 algorithm and only then (with an approximately 95 MP file) did the differences show.
So I learnt something today – if you used pixel shift successfully, you’ll be able to interpolate the resulting file 100% with little loss in detail.
Amazing indeed, if only Sony would cut the lag time in the future.

Eddy Hagen (Click on image on top) sent me this:

I got my A7R III yesterday and today I wanted to test the Pixel Shift Multi Shooting. I’ve taken a few pictures and there is definitely a big difference. Attached is a screenshot from Photoshop, at 200%, with at the left the regular image, at the right the PSMS. Both images were converted with the default settings in the Imaging Edge software. The subject is part of an artwork, a screenprint.
I’ve just send out a tweet about it (@insights4print), by mid next week I’ll publish a full report on this at https://www.insights4print.ceo.

Preorders:
Sony A7rIII at Amazon, Bhphoto, Adorama, BuyDig, FocusCamera, Calumet DE, Wex UK. Photo Porst Neuwied. Sony Netherland. Sony Australia. Sony Japan.
Sony 24-105mm at Amazon, Bhphoto, Adorama, BuyDig, FocusCamera, Amazon DE, Calumet DE, Wex UK.

Join the A7rIII facebook group to discuss the camera features and tests!

Dpreview added the A7rIII to their Studio Comparison Tool. SAR readers are welcome to discuss their findings. Seems like the A7rIII has more chromatic aberration and bit more sharpness than the previous A7rII. Noise handling seems to be improved too (Note the Canon in this comparison only goes up to 12800 ISO):

Preorders:
Sony A7rIII at Amazon, Bhphoto, Adorama, BuyDig, FocusCamera, Calumet DE, Wex UK. Photo Porst Neuwied. Sony Netherland. Sony Australia. Sony Japan.
Sony 24-105mm at Amazon, Bhphoto, Adorama, BuyDig, FocusCamera, Amazon DE, Calumet DE, Wex UK.

Join the A7rIII facebook group to discuss the camera features and tests!