The Sony A7III full-frame digital mirrorless camera body is on sale with some enticing accessories at B&H Photo for $700 off, only $1,298. With a kit lens it's probably an even better deal. $1,300 for a highly featured new FF camera body from a major maker is a good deal any way you cut it.
...However I'm not exactly certain I would recommend it. There is indeed a difference between the FF and APS-C 24-MP sensors; you can tell. It's just that...it's not that much of a difference. I'm sure in some situations you'd be glad to have the larger sensor. But in a lot of situations, I don't quite believe that viewers in general would notice all that much. And the high-res FF sensors—40-MP and above—are so good that I think it's smarter to go all the way if and when you get a new FF mirrorless camera. I don't know if you would agree.
And the better that smartphone cameras get, the more camera you need to strongly differentiate your results. My friend Jack has been singing the praises of this transformative little SmallRig cage for his iPhone 15 Pro Max. There's a shutter release button in that grip, and you can reposition the grip on the long side for verticals. There's one with two handles as well. He says it's extremely handy and a delight to use, although he notes that you lose a little of the advantage of total invisibility; it turns the iPhone into a real camera in more than one way, in that people notice him more when he's got the phone in the SmallRig. If an iPhone 15 Pro Max was one of your cameras, something like a Canon EOS R5 might be better as the other one.
But still, there's cost to consider.
Mike
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Featured Comments from:
hugh crawford: "If you’re a collector or merely an accumulator of old lenses, the full frame Sonys are a pretty wonderful way of using them. APS-C cameras are less wonderful in that respect."
Jack Mac: "The SmallRig addresses several issues I have had with using an iPhone as a serious camera replacement.
- Holding a naked iPhone as a camera is not natural. It’s not fun. The SmallRig handle makes an iPhone easier to use as a serious camera.
- It’s too easy to smudge the iPhone’s lenses. The SmallRig has lens protection that makes it easy to keep your fingers off the lenses. But remember to wipe clean your lenses before you slide your iPhone into the cage.
"If I’m just taking one quick snapshot, I don’t need to use the SmallRig. But now when I am out doing serious shooting, the iPhone in a SmallRig is my primary camera.
"A photographer friend who saw me use a SmallRig asked me if I thought it made for sharper pictures. It doesn’t make better pictures; it makes taking pictures more fun. If I’m having fun, I take better pictures. Now he has a SmallRig too."
Brian B: "For what it's worth, B&H has the Nikon Z7 [refurbished —Ed.] for just under $1,400, or with the 24–70 ƒ/4 lens for $1,650. A great deal for 45 full-frame megapixels! (Via diglloyd.)"
John Krumm: "I've accepted the fact that most of the reason for me owning a full frame camera vs. APS-C or Micro 4/3 is not to impress viewers, who do not look at images at 100 or 200 percent magnification, but to satisfy my own need for pixel peeping, which it does. Fortunately, it's a decent camera too! "
Rob L (partial comment): "What is nuts right now is that it's cheaper to get a really great full-frame body—the A7III new, or Z6's, Leica SL's, Panasonic S5's used or refurbed—for way less than the best crop-frame bodies. And with crop-frame lenses not having much of a cost differential from full-frame, there's a lot of choice (or confusion!) around."
Alan: "Dynamic range is often an issue for me and my Micro 4/3 and APS-C cameras can not match my 10-year-old and counting original A7."
John Camp: "I have a full-frame Nikon Z7II with 45 MP and an APS-C Fuji X-T5 with 40.2 MP, and on a large Apple Studio monitor I'll be damned if I see any difference on similar photos; that might change with prints, but I suspect they'd have to be especially large prints to see anything at all. I prefer the Nikon because I've had Nikons since the 1970s and the Z7II (and the Z6) are definitely a solid part of the whole Nikon ecosystem, and felt instantly familiar to me. The Fuji is quite different (the lenses are more compact, for one notable thing) and many people sing their praises, but I have to think before I shoot.
"For me, that's now the difference between high-end APS-C and FF—the way the camera handles and how your brain reacts to it. The actual photos, not so much. If you're an older person like me, and were once satisfied with film, I believe that Sony A7III would do anything you want."
The IQ of my 24mp FF Q is certainly better than that of my 16mp crop GR- but nowhere near what you'd think it would or should be (ie- often negligible)!
Posted by: Stan B. | Thursday, 14 December 2023 at 03:05 PM
"There is indeed a difference between the FF and APS-C 24-MP sensors; you can tell. It's just that...it's not that much of a difference."
The big difference is in the lenses; size, weight, cost, and, of course whether one already has some of one or the other.*
"And the high-res FF sensors—40-MP and above—are so good that I think it's smarter to go all the way if and when you get a new FF mirrorless camera. I don't know if you would agree."
I don't. Over the years, I had accumulated the original A7, an A7 II, and A7R II. For my purposes, web galleries, 8x10 books and up to 16x20 prints, the only thing that stood out about the larger MP of the R II was the larger files, to store and process.
I realized when editing them that I wasn't aware which MP size sensor the images had come from.
I bought an A7C, love it, and sold the other three months ago. No regrets, just enjoyment using the A7C.
Remember, it's the linear resolution that we can see. With the 42 MP sensor, it's 7952 wide vs 6000 for 24 MP. That's about a 1/3 increase in resolution, not the "almost double" my brains says when it sees the MP counts.* \;~)>
That's probably why I saw so little improvement in 33 MP A7R II over A7 II.
* DPReview makes noise about light gathering of larger vs. smaller sensels, which would favor 24 MP FF over APS and 24 MP FF over 42 MP FF at higher ISOs/lower subject brightnesses. I don't know enough, or have relevant practical experience to say more about that.
Posted by: Moose | Thursday, 14 December 2023 at 06:13 PM
Eh, My "elderly" D810's IQ holds it's own against the new big rez FF cameras and is much more enjoyable as a camera than anything I've ever held from Sony. In the old days, the Minolta cameras had some interesting features and some seriously good glass (I have a lovely Super Rokkor 50/2 from the early 50's labeled Chiyoko in LTM that is better than anything Leica made at the time. _Anything_. Or Canon. Or Nikon. Or Zeiss. It is that good.) But once Sony bought them, they turned into the camera equivalent of those white boxes that said "GENERIC" on them at the grocery store. Perhaps they even tasted the same but why buy them? I'll stick to my Leica and my Nikon's instead. So much better and so much more fun.
Posted by: William Lewis | Friday, 15 December 2023 at 12:24 AM
We all worry way too much. I shot some mountain bike races in deep forest cover at ISO 3200 with an Olympus m4/3 body and lens. They looked fine unless you pixel peeped and I didn't even bother applying much noise reduction. The pics were probably better than I could have achieved with 400 ISO film. The pics were not up to Nat Geo publication standards of course but I can live with that. You do the best you can with what you choose to afford.
Posted by: Robert Roaldi | Friday, 15 December 2023 at 10:47 AM
Many of us are creatures of habit, and I like the familiarity of my lenses, especially my 3 Zeiss lenses.
The amount of film I shot over the past 30 years far exceeds my use of my digital cameras. I prefer to shoot black & white medium format film, with a Fuji GF670,a GF670W, and my 6x12 Gaoersi. The only digital camera I currently use is a Fujifilm X100 I had converted to infrared.
I am planning to go overseas for a year, and want a small lightweight digital camera. Over the years I accumulated about 15 lenses, all manual primes & only m-mount. I love some of these lenses.
When I use my Avenon 21 or Russar 20 I know what the image is going to look like. With an APS-C I don't get that look because these become 30mm(+) points of view, and that's not what I am used to when these are on my cameras.
Lenses are popping up everywhere, there's a plethora of new Chinese companies, some making very good lenses, and the major camera manufacturers of course try to convince us we must use the newest sharpest lenses for our newest cameras.
In considering cameras, as much as I dislike Sony products (I lived in Japan and my Japanese friends called Sony laptop computers "time bombs" because they would always fail just after the warranty expired!), I was thinking about the new Sony a7Cii. Was. Until I read a couple comparison articles. The earlier a7C is now priced 30% less, and many of the changes in the update are focused on video, which I don't care about. As for the stills quality, it's improved, but not necessarily enough for an owner to update. Then I saw a chart which showed that the dynamic range of both cameras is similar. And a couple reviewers said that the stills images are not better enough to warrant an upgrade... hmmm...
Reviewers too often review with the assumption that all of us are going to rush out and buy new lenses when we buy a new camera, and too few reviews include older lenses.
For me, I love Fujifilm products, and considered the XE & XPro cameras, but there's that problem of my lenses not looking like my lenses. Only once have I printed over 18", so the quality of the best APS-C cameras will suffice, but I want to use my lenses the way I've always used them. For that I must go full frame.
Posted by: Daryl Soate | Friday, 15 December 2023 at 11:13 AM
The high megapixel FF cameras give a lot of flexibility. I have a new A7CR 61 MP camera - it's no bigger than most APS-C cameras and I can crop my 50mm shots to a 26 MP APS-C 75mm field of view or my 90mm lens to a 26MP APS-C 135mm FOV.
Posted by: Jeff Korr | Friday, 15 December 2023 at 12:47 PM
'And the better that smartphone cameras get, the more camera you need to strongly differentiate your results.'
An excellent observation I think and one I hadn't considered before. In the past our phone cameras were a supplement to our "real" cameras. For many of us it's now the other way around. In purchasing a real camera the question becomes, what is it that I'm trying to do that my phone camera can't.
This might be fertile ground for TOP to explore. OK, you have a good phone camera. What are its limitations and how can you address those with a real camera? One's "real" kit might become more specialized than general purpose, as most cameras were in the past.
For example, a birding camera. I'd pick an OM1 and the 300mm Pro lens with 1.4 teleconverter and maybe one general purpose zoom. The phone could probably do everything else. As opposed to my current EM5iii and at least a half dozen Olympus lenses, a kit that mostly never gets used.
Posted by: Terry Burnes | Friday, 15 December 2023 at 12:55 PM
There may not be much difference in cost between full-frame lenses and APS-C/M4/3 lenses, but there's a considerable difference in size and weight. That difference is important to many of us.
For myself, I've always preferred small cameras. And I'm not a small guy, either. Before age shrinkage set in, I was 6';2'/230 pounds.But I happily abandoned my Nikkormats and Nikon F2 for the Olympus OM system in 1978 and never looked back. Today I have several Fuji cameras, including an X-H1, but the tiny and lovable X-T20 is the most used.
I routinely make 16x20 prints and find it difficult to imagine how the image quality could be better. In fact, I've made a number of 48-inche-wide prints from 16-mp Oly E-M5 files that look great to me.
Posted by: Dave Jenkins | Friday, 15 December 2023 at 01:04 PM
Steeply discounted: Over here in Yerp during "Black Friday" a person could keep Bezo's revenue stream alive by spending a mere 750Euro for a brand new Sony A7II. And two days ago the Tamron 35mm f/2.8 could be had new for 135Euro.
Posted by: Christopher Perez | Friday, 15 December 2023 at 01:45 PM
With adapters for my Sony A7II, I've brought out the wonderful qualities of a Canon FD 200mm f2.8 !!!!!, 200mm Micro-Nikkor, 105mm f4 Micro-Nikkor, 55mm Micro-Nikkor, 105mm f1.8 Nikkor !!!!, and the surprisingly delightful 50mm f2.0 Nikkor.
Posted by: David L. | Friday, 15 December 2023 at 02:35 PM
hugh crawford sayeth: "If you’re a collector or merely an accumulator of old lenses, the full frame Sonys are a pretty wonderful way of using them."
Hey hugh, you left out User of old lenses! I do accumulate, but with the end of use. Some end up being used very little, as they turn out to not do interesting things. Others are a delight.
I mix and match freely between 20+ old lenses, going back to the mid '60s and 20+ contemporary Alt lenses from LensBaby, and now TTArtisan. I keep looking at Lomography's offerings, but the right combo of image qualities and price hasn't happened for me yet.
"APS-C cameras are less wonderful in that respect."
Really agree, for both of my Alt menageries. It's not just cropping the "worst" parts of the image circle, it's loss of the transitions in the middle distance from center.
Also, if you put the center sweet area off to the side, it would be cut off. This year's tree is on the porch, but not up 'til tomorrow, nor fully decorated for a few days, so here's a little holiday cheer from last year.
Posted by: Moose | Friday, 15 December 2023 at 08:47 PM
Part of the reason the Nikon D700 was so wonderful for me was that it was full-frame, and only 12 megapixels. Made more difference back then than today, I'm sure, but that meant lower noise in low-light conditions, which is much of my life.
Posted by: David Dyer-Bennet | Saturday, 16 December 2023 at 01:26 PM
"And the better that smartphone cameras get, the more camera you need to strongly differentiate your results."
I was recently asked by young woman about getting a camera. I asked why she didn't just use her 'phone camera. The answer seemed to have something to with style/appearance.*
For my own curiosity, I took a few comparison shots, iPhone 13, JPEG plus Raw, vs OM-1. The difference was actually greater than I had anticipated.
Remember when you could take your C-41 film to a drugstore or a camera store, with quite different results? The drugstore versions were all pumped up in contrast and saturation. Skies, for example, that were blue, with fluffy clouds, became whitish blobs.**
The iPhone JPEGs were more sophisticated versions of the same idea - make it POP!. They change color, saturation, and other things I find hard to name.
iPhone Raw files are much more realistic/true to life, but require a lot of processing to be any good. And then, they are far less attractive than the µ4/3 files.
No wonder, really, as we are dealing with tiny sensors with eensy sensels. The iThingie photos do look great on the thingies, although less like the actual subjects than I had imagined.
Shooting something at home, matching AoV, etc., where the result may be compared to the subject, was an eye opener for me. I didn't shoot people, so skin tones weren't part of the test.
* After two weeks trial, she seemed ecstatic with an old Samsung WB650 long zoom P&S, so I sold it, with card, extra battery and external charger for almost nothing. I guess I think something you buy feels more valuable than a freebie?
** Resurrection via scanner and proper processing can be a revelation!
Posted by: Moose | Saturday, 16 December 2023 at 02:30 PM
Daryl Soate saith: "I was thinking about the new Sony a7Cii. Was."
Yup. As with some others' comments, I use my A7C almost exclusively for older, MF lenses, having sold off my AF FF E-Mount lenses with the other A7 bodies. That renders second control wheels and improved AF moot. And then, shooting with these Alt lenses makes larger MP count pretty meaningless, too.
Posted by: Moose | Saturday, 16 December 2023 at 02:40 PM