BTM_Pix

I dunno, I'm not an economist. I'd say that more people are concerned with brand names than ever before though and I suspect that Sony are still more synonymous with things like Walkman and Playstation than cameras as a brand name to the average person in the street than they are cameras. If the consumer world is moving to only taking pictures on phones then if I made phones, I think I might still be trying to get some association going with the professional world so it will be relevant for a while yet. They never really leveraged the Walkman and the Playstation heritage with their smartphones so maybe thats influencing them to be at the vanguard when cameras actually do finally go the way of calculators and alarm clocks and more or less only exist as a function of a phone. With regard to wifi and touch screens, I use wifi and touch screen on my D5 and D500 continuously. The IT aspect of getting the picture away as quickly as possible is huge for us so I'd probably say we use that more than most people. Ditto that the picture has to be QCd instantly before you send it so the pinch zoom is a big win to check subject focus. The D5 may not have one but flip screen on the D500 is a boon for setting up low level remote shots or shooting over the heads of other photographers if you find yourself in a scrum as in the picture I posted. So we're maybe not quite as much in the dark ages as people might suspect. Its just that we might want to have screens that are a bit more robust and wifi that can ftp rather than just transfer to a smart phone etc.

The market is catered for at the moment purely because no one else has seriously tried to challenge it. I'm someone who has been trialling using mirrorless cameras for sport. In that picture, I'm actually using one. The only mirrorless one being used by the way! Its not about us not wanting to change, its about no one offering a serious coherent alternative to Canon and Nikon. And this is where I've found a manufacturer talking a good fight (Fuji) and then not following it through and Sony are now repeating the trick. Sony want to be in that market for the exposure, if you pardon the pun, and the trickle down not the direct revenue from it. Just like Mercedes aren't in F1 to sell F1 cars, Range Rover's ads feature a lot of off roading to sell vehicles that will live their whole life on tarmac etc. Like I say, Sony wants a few thousand actual A9 sales to inspire a few hundred thousand sales of their other cameras by virtue of the "this is what the pros use" routine. To do that, it needs them to be used in a high visibility professional scenario and they don't come any higher visibility than high end sports. Unfortunately for Sony, its difficult to say "this is the one the pros use" when, well, it isn't and as quirky or unpleasant or weird or neanderthal or cantankerous the requirements of this dwindling group of seemingly statistically irrelevant bunch of big handed prattlers may be, we do kind of hold the keys to that particular kingdom. Up the workers!! Don't forget the autograph hunting and the selfies with the players that we also manage to fit in while mindlessly holding our finger on the shutter button. When we are getting ever diminishing returns on our investment, the last thing we are doing is bragging about the price of memory cards let alone anything else. The point I was trying and failing to make about the equipment cost was in response to the global market for sports photographers being 6 x 400mm f2.8 lenses. Or about £60K And the response was about the A9, a camera that Sony are primarily touting as a camera for professional sports photography. I'm not complaining about the A7 at all. You are absolutely right that there are different tools for different jobs but when someone tells you that their tool is right for your job when they don't actually do that job then I think its fair comment to respond. We don't have perfect tools for the job by the way, we have just have ones that are more adequate than other companies new offerings.

Yeah, sorry to hear that @webrunner5 We have similar but less Draconian (and less expensive) situation in the UK for anyone who needs care like that. Price of the care homes has gone up 25% in the past five years whilst pensions have remained the same. Good luck to you and yours

With all due respect, this is very wrong. The 400 f2.8 issue which you continue to reference and described as prattle earlier on was actually my prattle about the A9 rather than the A7 but I thought I'd reply anyway. Sony have produced a camera which they push as a professional sports camera and to say it has made little to zero impact in the field that they claim it will revolutionise would be an understatement. Why? Well, lenses firstly and, once they've resolve that, ergonomics. Unfortunately, whilst professional sports photographers would love to just be able to sashay around with all our gear in a man bag, we need fast long lenses not for some "alpha male" bullshit but because we have to photograph things at distance, in low light and with good separation against often busy backgrounds. We don't use 400 f2.8 lenses because we like having to pay for, carry and wrestle with them but because we need to. To, you know, do our job. So, if Sony want to actually make any headway in the market they push that camera to then who else should they have listened to other than the people that actually work in it? Where did you source your data for the 'half dozen' photographers that might buy it 'unsponsored' ? I'll be shooting a Champions League match tonight along with 50-60 other members of the "shrinking, impoverished and literally dying" demographic that Sony are trying to appeal to with this camera. There'll be roughly £15-20K of equipment being used per metre, none of which will be sponsored and none of which will be Sony, but all those kits will include a 400 f2.8 The total spend on the equipment contained in our oversized weather resistant man bags will be about £1.8m and we will expect to replenish that every 24 months. Thats from this one game in one city. Go and have a look at the sporting calendar and see how many more events the alpha males with the big hands are covering tonight. Even so, we are still small potatoes perhaps financially against the masses but we bring something to the party that is far more important to Sony than the immediacy of getting a few quid off us. I'm in this picture somewhere The worldwide TV audience for this game was around 350 million people. That is 350 million people getting glimpses of Nikon and Canon cameras for 90 minutes. If someone wanted to convince you to buy a camera that the pros use, there really is no more effective means at getting the point across than that is there? Where else are consumers going to see professional cameras being used in those sort of numbers? The English Premier League has an annual TV audience of 4.2 billion people, all of whom are getting regular glimpses of working professional photographers using Canon and Nikon cameras every time the ball goes out of play behind the goal. It is a massive calling card for those two companies and that is why Sony want to be involved. They're not in it to sell a few thousand A9s, they're in it to sell a few hundred thousand of their other ones. So they have to produce a 400 f2.8 and they have to make it ergonomically viable to get real professional sports photographers to use it. And they have completely failed in that respect. That picture is from the 2017 Champions League final, just after the A9 was launched. You'd think a company like Sony would've been able to persuade a few people to shoot with it wouldn't you? Even by paying us to do it? Can't see one can you? And its got nothing to do with the specs, its all about it not being good enough for the job (and that is what it is, a job) that they were devising it for. Hence your dismissal of the balance issue and general body size as wittering is utterly ridiculous in that context. Try balancing that lens with that camera on a monopod and switching it rapidly from eye back to reverse over your shoulder while you use your other body with a 70-200 f2.8 and tell me balance doesn't matter. Try using cameras continuously in that scenario for hours at a time and tell me the camera being too thin doesn't actually hurt your hands, let alone before we get on to button placement and button size. As an economist, you will be able to speculate on numerous possible factors why the A9 has made more or less zero impact on the market Sony intended for it. As the actual intended customer of it, I can offer a completely non-speculative reason for it which is that it didn't have a 400 f2.8 from the get go and its ergonomics and overall performance are not good enough. The Sony A7iii looks like a great camera though even for someone with small hands like me....

Clearest sign yet that you're going all in on the Kinefinity, surely ?

I was like that when I picked up the A9. If I was Sony I'd ban stores from displaying it without the grip as if you're trying to get someone to switch from 1Dx or D5 it feels small in an off putting way ! They've finally done the 400 f2.8 for it which in the pictures I've seen of it they've also not put the grip on the camera. It looks like a Smart Car towing an Airstream.

I've bought canon4kffwithlogandibis.com I'll be putting it on the market in, ooh, 2023 or so?

The company that made the film are called Red Screen Productions. Completely wild guess/speculation but if the company name is a clue then it might be shot on a RED in HDRx mode.

The 120-300mm f2.8 is the one I'd vouch for in terms of pro photography because I have and still do use it in anger. In certain stadiums that have particular shooting positions it actually offers a one lens shooting solution with a D500 in the same way that the 200-400 does on a D5. Video is not something I can attest to its use for but someone does/did re-house them in PL mount so there might be footage around somewhere https://www.ebay.com/itm/Cinematics-Cine-lens-sigma-120-300mm-T2-9-PL-for-SONY-FS7-F5-RED-EPIC-BMCC-BMPCC-/272894807128

HOLY SHIT!!!

Of its type, the Sigma 100-400 does seem to be the favoured one. The scratches on the glass are generally always less of an issue in actual use in my experience. People pay good money to have plug ins that emulate that kind of "character" I haven't done any A/B stuff between Sigma and Tamron lenses in that range as they're both too slow for my application but I can definitely vouch for that 120-300mm f2.8 as I've had one for quite a few years. It is a very good performer even up against the Nikon 300 f2.8 I was using when I bought it. It uses Sigma's 1.4 TC which is smaller than the Nikon/Canon equivalent and has no discernible impact on AF and barely any on IQ and is giving you 420mm at constant f4 whereas you will be at f6.3 with the 100-400 at the long end and for most of its range. I don't know what your application is so whether that is going to be an impact for you either light gathering or separation wise I don't know. You'd also have to factor in that with it being a 300 f2.8 its a bit of a bigger lump so again that may or may not be as much of a factor as the price. Or maybe you should just cave in and buy the Canon 200-400 f4 with its in-built switchable 1.4x TC for £10K and have done with it

Obviously, after asking about your budget I'm going to completely disregard it !!! If you can push the budget and don't mind it being fixed then this 400mm f5.6L is a good value. https://www.mpb.com/en-uk/used-equipment/used-photo-and-video/used-lenses/used-canon-fit-lenses/canon-ef-400mm-f-5-6-l-usm/sku-704965/ If you think you might be in it for the long haul then one of the best routes to 400mm if you are only looking at the f5.6/6.3 area is to get a 70-200 f2.8 and a later generation 2X convertor. The advantage of that is that you get a much better and more flexible lens for when you're not doing this assignment and then can match the reach and quality of the sort of lenses you're looking at with the 2X as and when you need it. You can usually pick up a 70-200 f2.8L in decent condition for around £700 if you shop around and a latest generation 2X convertor for around £250. Another alternative is the Sigma 120-300 f2.8 and their 1.4 convertor which you can often pick up as a package for similar money. There are 3 generations of it but this one (the 2nd) is the best value for money version of it. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Used-Sigma-120-300mm-f-2-8-APO-DG-OS-HSM-Lens-Canon-Fit/232683031372?epid=101725619&hash=item362cfd4b4c:g:-LMAAOSwisZak~mD However....just for balance If you are looking to upgrade later and just want to get in the game for this assignment and don't mind it being rough then you can save yourself a few quid with this Sigma 120-400mm https://www.mpb.com/en-uk/used-equipment/used-photo-and-video/used-lenses/used-canon-fit-lenses/sigma-120-400mm-f-4-5-5-6-dg-os-hsm-canon-ef-fit/sku-711854/

What is your absolute top end budget? And when they say "nothing less than 400mm" do they mean up to as well (i.e. do you need a zoom to cover below that as well or is 400mm the minimum starting point) ?

Some 260fps footage by Philip Bloom.

When they're both being viewed at 8K it might well do I still think there is additional human mojo at play that is wrestling that extra performance out of it but there is a ton of subtlety involved - particularly familiarity of how to shoot it to its best advantage - that is added to the mix. You could also factor in that the extra resolution might even work against it subjectively as far as our own reaction to it goes. I could make them both look identically bad in my role as the anti-Mojo of course

This. The thing to look for isn't so much Mojo but Mego as in it makes you want to go out and use it. That's what concerns me about the A7iii as its a great spec but the only thing I ever feel like shooting after picking up one of their cameras is myself, with a large calibre pistol.

In the interests of balance, I went in another dealer in London and they had sold out of all of theirs.

If it was so definable and attributable to particular cameras then every single "Guess The Camera" thread would have a majority of right answers surely? And they really don't. At all.

The most salient point about Ringo (especially in the context of this analogy) is that he was the best drummer FOR The Beatles even if there are some who maintain he wasn't the best drummer IN The Beatles

I'm not sure how such a personally subjective term as "Mojo" can reasonably be expected to be attributed to a piece of hardware. There are finished images you like and there are finished images you don't and I'm fairly confident that the the least significant consistent part of the whole process will have been the camera. Skilled people find the right ingredients for that whole process by making sure ALL of it is complimentary. The capturing device does not exist in a vacuum so in and of itself it can't really be considered to have whatever passes for Mojo. The Beatles had Mojo aplenty but they also had Ringo on drums remember so its always about the sum of the parts. Everything in front of the capturing device from the lens type, focal length, aperture, lighting and, lest we forget, what the whole thing is actually pointed at makes the final image have Mojo. And as I said earlier, ALL of that comes from the internal circuits of the creator NOT from the internal circuits of the capturing device. Trying to define which particular camera is going to offer instant Mojo (when it is merely an interchangeable part of the whole) isn't, in my opinion, isn't anywhere near a definitive process. If you buy any camera on that basis then I'd definitely say it was a case of buyer beware. Or Caveat Emptor as we say in English contract law.

Interesting. I just went into a large camera dealer in London and was surprised to be offered one from stock as they've had pre-orders cancelled by people switching to the A7iii.

In my experience, the most significant part of the mojo of most cameras still resides within the circuitry of whoever is operating it. I've made enough bad images with good cameras to recognise it. Prefix it with "Then" and it will be interpreted as such but honestly I'm just not going to engage any more with this. Its no coincidence that every thread that I open that you are involved in might as well start auto playing the theme tune from Rocky. English may not be your first language but antagonism might well be.

The only thing I'll be doing "immediately" and with "brilliant logic" is completely disregarding this and any other orders you might feel like giving me altogether.

He didn't ask ME directly to be fair, I was just offering it as a possible meaning to what Jon meant. Which it was up to Jon to confirm really.

I think the ES that @jonpais is using is "Errata Sendorum", which is an old Latin phrase used in English contract law in reference to failing to deliver an SLR Magic Rangefinder