Wow, this things feels like a brick. Not a bad brick but just a really solid magnesium alloy framed brick. I like the weight of the original A7 but definitely like the feel of the mark II better and if I had to choose, I’d go with the more solid feel as I think it could withstand some serious traveling.
Other physical difference include the finish. It’s way more premium looking and feeling over the original A7’s shiny plastic like finish. As we all know, the grip is also larger. It feels good but I also didn’t have a problem with the original, however the added real estate for the placement of the shutter button absolutely feels perfect.
On the original A7, there was a little movement between the body and lens. I’ve used the camera in light showers with no problems but the A7II has a much more improved lens mount. The click you hear when mounting a lens sounds confident and there’s absolutely no wiggle between body and lens.
All the button feel similar, with a few feeling more solid adding to the premium aspect of the camera. I thought the screen would be exactly the same however the black borders on the LCD are reversed wit the thicker border being on the right of the LCD. That means the A7 screen protector won’t align with the A7II unless you flip it upside down resulting in an upside down sony logo. I ended up leaving it on for the time being for protection and will change it out later, or maybe not. It doesn’t bother me.
So without a doubt, the camera feels great. I will admit needing to get use to the added weight. It’s not heavy, it’s just different from the original A7, which I’ve been using extensively for a year.
As far as internal improvements go, I can already feel the auto focus has improved greatly in that I don’t feel it’s a concern anymore. We’ll see how it goes as I do more shooting but I’m super happy with it. Start up time is a bit faster. Not by a lot but it’s definitely less annoying.
And then there’s IBIS. This is why I decided to sell my A7 and upgrade. Any help in taking care of camera shake, I’m all for it and I think it’s definitely worth it for me. Especially when I’m shooting in constantly changing scenes/light and without the ability to set a minimum shutter speed but want to keep my lens wide open, the added image stabilization will give me more confidence that if it does go down to say 1/30th of a second, I’ll still be ok. I don’t venture too far below 1/80th for handheld shots because I absolutely hate blurry images, so now that I can feel more comfortable at lowers shutter speeds, I’ll worry less and focus more on composition.
So there you have it. My first impressions of this beast. I have a shoot on Saturday so I’m excited to put this guy to work. I’m already a fan of the quality of the A7 so I’m sure I’ll be just as happy, if not more, with these files.
I've posted more photos on my blog:
http://www.hellomikee.com/?p=5674
