Sony 7Rii

Hello world,

Long time no see.

A lot of travels happened, and a lot of pictures were taken, but today I wanted to talk a little bit about that Sony camera that everyone is obsessing about these days. That Sony 7 R ii.

As a matter of fact, I am a Fujifilm shooter these days, and I can’t be happier with my choice. My old good friend Canon, after being fixed, is collecting dust in a cupboard, but not completely forgotten. So why even look in Sony’s direction, you might ask? Well, you know, photographers often get so gear obsessed, so that just by watching another youtube video they think they absolutely need that thing in their lives. That is not what happened to me. I have to teach a class during a photography week event and that class is sponsored by Sony, so I can’t shoot with anything but Sony. And I have no idea how the menu works (as well as a lot of people who are shooting Sony every day to be fair), so I borrowed one for the weekend.

A Heavy Lightweight Mirrorless

I also got a 24-70 F 2.8 lens, which is so big and heavy that it kind of defeats the purpose of a “lightweight” mirrorless camera, but anyway, few of us actually pick up camera gear considering the weight factor.

NTSC

When I turned this baby on, the first thing it said was:  “Running on NTSC”, honestly, I had to ask my friend to explain why the camera is panicking about this and thinks I need to know this as the first thing when I turn it on.

Zebra

Then came the fun of trying to find anything on this menu. It is not such an easy menu to familiarise yourself with. I guess no camera menu is perfect, and it took me time to get used to Fuji, and some things on the Canon menu I discovered like 3 years later, but the first thing that the Sony menu proposes is to turn on zebra. Really? The first thing? And when you’re not in the know, what the hell is Zebra? I mean when you start turning it on, you will figure out that it is the highlights clipping feature, but why would it be the first thing on the menu?

How Do I Focus?

Right, then let’s find out how do we change focus points? Took me 25 minutes until I found the way to do this. So … so much easier when you have a “nipple” or “joystick” to do that, but I guess when you get used to this one, it’s a viable way of operating the camera. Yes, you can download a manual from the Internet, and it will somehow save you some time, but what about being user-friendly?

Anyhow, I borrowed the camera from my office, and they gave me a very nice lens, the only thing was that I didn’t have a photographic project, so I just went roaming around looking for something to shoot.

My husband was in a car meeting, and this guy just came into the frame perfectly.

Shutter Sound

I don’t like the shutter sound of the Sony camera at all. In my Fuji, you can choose the one that you prefer out of 3 different sounds. In Canon or Nikon, you get what your manufacturer offers you. In Sony, it’s somehow this squeaky sound that doesn’t sound appealing at all. But you can switch it off and go to silent mode. The bitrate of the photos goes down a touch, and some features are not available, but how beautifully it works for the scenes like above. People still see you with the camera of course, but you become so much more discreet.

I also loved the feeling of the camera in front of my face. It kind of separates you from your subject like a shield. It is not the same feeling as with Fuji, because not your full face is covered by it. People still see your face, but in the case of Sony, they don’t. Weird fact, I know.

Everyone is talking about Fuji colours, but I always shoot raw, so I adjust colours afterwards anyway. I like how the colours came out in these photos.

A couple of times in the bright sun, the camera would show me that the exposure is okay on my subject, but the final images turn out way overexposed. I don’t know why is that. It was the case both for spot-metering and for centre-average.

I got lots of likes for the photo of this dessert on Instagram. Beautiful separation, and here you can feel the power of the full frame.

I also managed to make this kind of creative shot – a reflection of the coffee cup in my husband’s phone at F 2.8.

The battery life by that time was going down so quickly that I was kinda stressed to shoot anything else. I have an empty battery phobia, I always charge everything all the time. I always have 2 extra batteries for my Fuji, I always have extra batteries for the flash and my phone has a battery in its case.

So I started with the rejection of the camera but finished with thinking that I could live with it.

Do you love it?