Something personal first:
Every time I post a “bigger than usual” rumor I confess that I do hit the “Publish” button with quite a mixed feeling. On one side it’s nice after a long work of digging and searching to share a news to you folk. On the other side there is certain anxiety caused by many factors. First it’s hard for me to use right words because and right arguments in a non native language. I hope you are always aware of that. I often see that your “perception” of a rumor often differs a bit (or a lot) depending on what kind of words I used or not. So I am going to be very careful within that post :) Than of course the biggest anxiety is that a rumor turns out to be wrong. I have been mostly right on SR5 rumors I posted in the past but I know well that all my long work will get messed up if I do one very big mistake only. And the day may come this will happen. I know for certain that there are different “elements” that have interest to spread wrong rumors. There are many reasons to do that (and I may explain them in detail in a future post). And that’s why the biggest work I do on SAR is not the writing of the article, but the long an patient work of waiting and searching and again waiting and trying to find out more from different sources.

Technical aspects of the “E-mount FF”
After posting the E-mount FF rumor sceptical argued that 1) an FF sensor wouldn’t fit within the current E-mount 2) FF E-mount lenses would be almost impossible to make. I am glad that David Kilpatrick wrote that article on Photoclubalpha (Click here). It’s a very technical summary that clearly explains you that “it is possible“. And Sony itself (read Toru Kotsumotu at DC.watch) said that the NEX mount has been designed with Full Frame sensor in mind. Again, thanks to David for your very well written article!

The Sony strategy around the “E-mount FF”
I will sum up in very short what I heard from trusted sources:
1) There will be soon a Sony official news related to the E-mount FF. Actually from what I heard it looks like Sony “anticipated” and pushed the E-mount FF development.
2) At least the first E-mount FF camera is not something interesting for 98% of our readers. They will be Camcorders. To make it even more clear. No NEX-7 alike E-mount FF camera is coming right now. But I have been told it is “on schedule”.  And there are different prototypes, some with E-mount FF and some with A mount FF. I will have more info about that within that week!
3) For now Sony decided to NOT introduce any E-mount FF lenses. The initial strategy is to use current Alpha mount lenses via a “special adapter” and other Full Frame lenses (read Leica and so on) via adapter. It is my personal understanding that current E-mount lenses are NOT designed for FF. But current E-mount lenses will work in crop mode on future E-Mount FF cameras.
4) There is no info yet if Sony will ever design FF E-mount lenses for that system. My very personal suggestion for Sony on that point is….Do it!!!

Why I do believe the “E-mount FF” could be a (too slow) revolution.
The Canon/Nikon domination in the Full Frame world is almost absolute. It is my believe that one way to become competitive is to offer something completely new like it would be by launching a Full Frame mirrorless system. Now I believe to know through my sources that Sony is going to do that…but my fear is that they will do it too slowly. It would have been nice to have E-Mount FF lenses right from the start (but again they will not!). The risk is they will still “give” Nikon and Canon the chance to catch up after some time. The current limited NEX lens range is an example of how Sony should NOT act. The cameras are extremely popular but the camera owners can’t buy the right lenses for it. Sony missed the chance to expand considerably their market share explosively and they misses some “easy” earnings too.

So like it was with the SLT and NEX (APS-C) introduction Sony will again “start a new revolution” but with the risk that they will be “too slow in fulfilling it“. Let’s hope they will listen to the voice of the real customers…you!

Big hug,
Andrea (the Admin)

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P.S: Thanks to all the donators for covering my server upgrade costs. I now removed the donation button I posted on Friday. Thanks again!

Short update about the video specs leaked by the Chinese website Xjrumo (Translation here) . My sources told me it’s 100% sure that these are not the specs of the A99. But there is a surprise…these specs are pretty damn close to another “camcorder model”. That sounds good too :)

UPDATE: It may be related to the new E-A mount hybrid camcorders. I am not sure yet but I hope to learn more about it soon..

Reminder: These are the specs translated by one of our chinese readers:
1) AVCHD2.0 format ,below 1080p it have the Bit rate of 50Mpbs,4:2:2Sampling （other model coming next year has 4：2：0）
2) 1080P with the highest 120fps,at 720P, the highest is 240FPS
3) MP4 format still 35Mbps
4) center focus all the lens can use the biggest Aperture. others still F3.5
5) except P model, A,S model can also auto-focus but M model still MF
6) 4 times zoom in during 1080P can be captured
7) multi-recording can take a 2.4Megapixels during recording
8.) HDMI can be Non-destructive Output new shoe can fit the wireless(bluetooth) mic
9) except the high speed model,other model Maximum recording time is 29min 59s
10) Time code support

Short update about the new Sony E-mount Full Frame story. Sony is about to launch the first E-mount Full Frame cameras. Those are actually (expensive) camcorders. More compact NEX-7 alike cameras will arrive in 2013. I will have more info to post soon. Meantime a link to a must read article: Photoclubalpha.com.

Reminder: I am working on all fronts now, A99, NEX, E-mount FF. Sources can send me info anonymously by using the contact form on the right sidebar. No identification is required. You can also create a fake email account and send me info directly at sonyalpharumors@gmail.com. Thanks!

And here are many new pics of the upcoming NEX-5R. I am also working on new A99 and E-mount FF rumors. Will post them soon too don’t worry! I am working as much as I can in every free time I have! Invite your friends to follow SAR. it’s going to be a hot rumor time from now until Photokina. Here is our RSS feed and Twitter stream and the Facebook comunity! First Sony announcement next week (August 28th!). More announcements will follow. One for the A99 and one for a super epxensive E-mount FF.

And here we have the first real images of the new NEX-5R and NEX-6 cameras. Click on the pictures to see the full size version! These are pictures found by the nice guys from chinese.vr-zone.com. As a reminder. Sony may announce the new cameras and lenses on August 28th. This is the list I got from reliable sources:

NEX-5R: Looks almost exactly like the [shoplink 8452]NEX-5n[/shoplink] and has the flip screen from the NEX-F3. It has a completely newly designed 16 Megapixel APS-C sensor with Phase Detection AF pixels. It has WiFi connectivity and APP support. You can surf on Internet with it. Price around $700 with kit lens.
NEX-6: It’s a mini [shoplink 8454]NEX-7[/shoplink] with integrated viewfinder. Compared to the NEX’7 it has an EVF with less resolution and same newly designed 16 Megapixel APS-C sensor. It has WiFi connectivity and APP support. Price between the NEX-5R and NEX-7 (NEX-7 is currently priced at $1200 at Amazon so my guess is around $950 and $1000).
Sony 16-50mm f/3.5-5.6: It is a pancake zoom with OSS and power zoom.
Sony 11-18 f/4.0: Normal (non pancake) zoom.
Sony 35mm f/1.8: Fast non expensive prime lens as big as the Sigma 30mm lens.

Stay tuned on SAR!!! Don’t miss the next big Sony news and follow SARs RSS feed or follow me on Twitter and join the super friendly Facebook comunity!

P.S.: In moment like this I am happy to see again that my rumors were correct :)