Sony Photography News and Rumors

Charts Courtesy of The Last Word

Today The Last Word confirmed that the Sony a7RIII uses spatial filtering, which is called the “Star Eater” algorithm, with some dark field photos that DPReview sent him for testing. This is disappointing news for those of us that enjoy astrophotography or do it professionally. I have shot cameras with the “Star Eater” algorithm in the past during astrophotography season and gotten satisfactory results, but losing a few hundred or so stars to this algorithm is disappointing. When you take a photo of the night’s sky you always want to capture every last bit of information available.

I was leery about the first report of “Star Eater” being solved because it was not a technical analysis. Even DPReview had to send files to someone technical to get the truth behind the problem, which I commend them for because there are lots of blogs just looking for clicks on this issue and sales based on it being resolved. Let’s hope that the community continues to come down hard on Sony about “Star Eater” so that they truly resolve it in a future firmware update. Spatial filtering simply isn’t needed for the vast majority of photos and we should be able to turn it off in camera. Until this is fixed I will continue relying on my Fujifilm GFX and X-T2 for shooting astrophotography.

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Sony a7RIII: B&H Photo / Amazon / Adorama
Sony 24-105mm: B&H Photo / Amazon / Adorama

The Sony a7RIII fits in an interesting spot between medium format cameras and the rest of the full frame cameras on the market, where you have to spend big money on big glass to get optimal results, but save a little on the body its size. Sony made some leaps forward with their cameras this year that were expected and unexpected, but they also took some steps backward. Excluding an intervalometer from the a7RIII is inexcusable in 2017 and the inability to use an on-camera app for the feature can be frustrating. Sony really should add functions like this in via a firmware update in the future.

digitalphotopro – On The Road: Live From The Sony a7R III Media Event In Sedona

sonyalpha.blog – 18 secret features that will make you upgrade from A7rII (or A9!)

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Sony a7RIII: B&H Photo / Amazon / Adorama
Sony 24-105mm: B&H Photo / Amazon / Adorama

The Sony a7RIII is selling very well, but so far the only stand out feature seems to be speed. While I enjoyed my time with the Sony a9 the only thing I miss about the camera is it’s amazing AF speed and if the a7RIII is even remotely close in performance I will be completely satisfied with my purchase. For some, the 42MP will be a huge step up, but if you owned the previous a7RII you shouldn’t notice much of a difference.

As for pixel shift, the technology produces some amazing results, but the one-minute minimum photo length is very limiting. I would be interested in seeing a comparison between pixel shift and HDR detail recovery in the near future since both methods have to be done manually after the fact. There are a few different tricks photographers can use to get additional detail from their photos, but most don’t take the time to do them because they are very time-consuming.

albertdros – Sony A7RIII Pixel Shift Function Demo

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Sony a7RIII: B&H Photo / Amazon / Adorama
Sony 24-105mm: B&H Photo / Amazon / Adorama