Sony A7 IV: Initial thoughts and is it the Sony we have been waiting for?

Many Sony users started with the ever so popular A7 III. When it was unveiled back in 2018, it was by all accounts the perfect camera. It seemed like a cross between a baby A9 and a baby A7sII, wrapped into an affordable package of just $1999. It caught the entire industry by storm and even disrupted other camera releases as a result of it’s price and feature value proposition. For a long time everyone was satisfied by what this camera provided. But of course over time, new cameras get released, and as soon as the other established brands such as Nikon and Canon started catching up in their mirrorless offerings, it was clear that the A7 III was due to have an upgrade.
Needless to say — and cut to today and many Sony users were waiting for another unicorn like the A7 III to come in the form of the A7 IV.

On October of 2021, Sony unveiled the new Sony A7 IV, and although it appeared to be an exciting product, there have been mixed feelings and mixed reviews around this new camera body, so lets discuss some of the pros and cons, and give you my take (as an anticipated buyer) whether it is something that will make it’s way into my camera bag.

Sensor
Its seems these days that sensor size and resolution are a constant talking point of a camera system. And in this camera class and category, I think this new 33MP sensor has been very much welcomed. With the Nikon and Canon entry level mirrorless bodies, giving a sensor of around 20–24MP, this new 33MP inches ahead with a bit more resolution giving the user the ability to crop. What does that mean exactly? It means that users like wildlife and sports can consider this body, for either switching to APS-C mode when shooting, for extra reach or cropping in post, to get that extra detail. This will be useful for just about everyone, and should be a celebrated feature.

Processor
The second feature, that was welcoming news was the inclusion of Sony’s latest processor currently housed in the flagship cameras Sony offers. This provides a much quicker camera experience, and keeps it inline with the current crop of Sony cameras like the Sony A1 or A7sIII. This also provides marked improvements in areas like autofocus, which we will discuss further.

Autofocus
Sony updated this camera with a 759-point phase detect autofocus system which is also offered in the current flagship cameras like the A1 and A7sIII. This will offer things like better AF tracking in realtime, Eye Autofocus, as well as benefits in video autofocus such as the inclusion of eye autofocus in animals. Sony has been working hard on improving there AI driven autofocus tracking and this camera basically gives you the best that Sony currently offers!

Ergonomics and User Experience
Sony made some very interesting and surprising new additions to the camera. First the grip is now up to date to the other new Sony cameras that have been released over the last year or so, which means an increased deeper grip as well as compatability with existing accessories like the dual battery vertical grip.
Additionally Sony made slight changes to the knobs and dials in this body. First the camera now has a toggle switch under the mode dial, for switching between Stills, Movie and S&Q (Slow and Quick) modes, and now offers memory settings for each mode, which is absolutely fantastic!! I wish they would have thought of that for the Sony A1! But oh well….

Additionally where the Exposure Compensation dial was is now a full programable dial. This is huge for those that want extra customization. I’m big on customizing camera bodies, and establishing muscle memory from those settings, to be able to move through things quickly and operate your camera quickly and efficiently. These new features are again VERY welcome. I only wish they would have included these in the Sony A1.

The EVF and Screens were also upgraded. The EVF has a 3.6 million dot screen making it much better than the A7 III which had a pretty terrible EVF in my opinion. This is definitley a step in the right direction, however the rear screen is a different story. Sony provides a fully articulating screen which I think is totally appropriate for a true hybrid camera but the resolution of this rear screen is surprisingly low compared to the competition. Rear LCD’s are a common complaint on the Sony system, and for some reason Sony has refused to provide meaninfully better LCD rear screens, except for the legacy A7rIIIA and A7rIVA. My only suspicion is that perhaps this is the secret to the excellent battery life that Sony provides with its Z batteries. If that’s the case, and they put all their development into the EVF instead, I’ll take it.

The menu system is now updated to the latest version which is featured in the A1 and A7sIII. Personally although the layout is a bit easier to navigate, I don’t see this new menu system to be that much better than the old one, but at least it’s touch sensitive now, which is nice.
A new feature that has been introduced on the Sony A7 IV is the Focus Mapping Feature. Similar to focus peaking, it is another visual aid to focusing, and seems like a very cool feature provding color coding to show where subjects in the frame are in focus. This should come in handy for manual focus pulls, although this feature is only supported by Sony lenses, so this will not work with your vintage manual lenses. I think these types of features are really nice and value adds. Canon has something similar in their line of mirrorless cameras, where there is further visual aid to assist you in focus and I think camera companies should keep doing it.

Hardware Ports, and other enhancements
This is again another plus to the list of things that were asked and given. The A7 IV offers a full HDMI port for video output, which is unique and well received. They also provide an updated USB 3.2 port that now offers charging and plug and play webcam capability, which I think is a nice touch!

Also Sony has included the option to bring down the shutter while the camera is off, which protects the large sensor from dust particles. This is something I really liked at first, when I got the A1, but have noticed it does slow the camera down slightly when turning the camera on and off, and there is a risk of damaging the shutter if you either touch it or let light come in through the lens when the shutter is down, so i’ve since turned if off, and only used it in situations where I might be worried about dust or windy situations. It’s a nice option to have on a camera, but something I wouldn’t use full time.

The Sony A7 IV is housed with Dual SD UHS II card slots. In addition to the Dual SD slots, Slot 1 can also take CF EXpress Type A cards. I’m a big fan of the CF Express Type A cards, and although they are ridiculously expensive, they offer a much faster buffer experience when shooting bursts and also provide a MUCH quicker transfer speed when offloading images onto your computer. This is going to offer added bonuses to the A7 IV for when you need speed. Since it only has one slot, I have no problem recommending this card, if you might shoot fast burts or faster frame video (more on that later in this article). Keep in mind that this is a 33mp sensor camera, which is considered by many as “high resolution” so files will be bigger, which in turn adds load to the camera in performance. If you are looking for a quick and burst filled experience, than the CF Express Card is the way to go, but for 90% of your photography needs a Dual UHS-II setup should be fine, as long as you use V90 cards.

Speed and Shutter
This is where it starts getting a little interesting and starts reminding you of the limitation of this camera in my opinion.
First off the camera can shoot up to 10fps in Compressed RAW format in either mechanical or electronic shutter. If you use Lossless Compressed or Uncompressed RAW formats in stills, then the frame rate quickly goes down to about 6fps. My understanding is that because the camera’s sensor size resolution is high, the sacrifice that needed to be made was speed. The fact that one can’t use uncompressed RAW at the full 10fps is a shame and in my opinion a bad choice by Sony. However I have been reminded by a few Sony users that the quality of Compressed RAW on the Sony Alpha cameras are quite good, so for most situatuons Compressed RAW should be sufficient. I would agree with assessment, and so I guess I can understand the benefits of having a higher resolution over uncompressed RAW coupled with speed, so that is something a potential buyer will have to weigh. For my needs, Compressed RAW will work fine, I think.

A side note on the shutter mechanism; although I have not tried this camera out yet, several reviewers have commented on the shutter mechanism being loud and not much different than the A7 III. I’ll have to hear it myself, but it’s an interesting observation. I find the Sony A7sIII, A7rIV, and A9 II to all have more dampened shutter mechanisms, and assume the A7 IV will inherit that shutter mechanism, but I’ll have to see once I receive a sample copy to test.

The rest of the photography features on the A7 IV are similar to that of the A7 III. So lets move onto video…

Video
This arguably is the most contraversial part of this camera. There were lots and I mean lots of expectations around these features, and everyone basically wanted an A7sIII with a higher resolution sensor, at less than $3000 which obviously is not possible.
So lets start with some unilateral agreement on what is good:

The A7 IV sports a 7K sensor oversampling full frame 4K resolution at up to 30p in 10-bit 4:2:2 with NO pixel binning. Lets stop there for a second and acknowledge that this is a very good thing! This means you are going to get one of the best 4K images a mirrorless camera can offer, with practically no comprimizes in 4K at 30p.
Sony also is offering all of it’s camera codec formats. This is huge. Sony has some very efficient and beautiful codecs, and so having all of the options, really makes this a true video workhorse, with flexibility from 10-bit to 8-bit and 422 to 420, in highly compressed or not so compressed formats. It’s also worth noting that I have found that many of the Sony codecs tend to play quite well on computers, while retaining quality. Keep in mind you also have the ability to leverage the full HDMI port to an external recorder for shooting in various ProRes 422 flavors.

On top of this all you also get all of the color modes, including Slog 3 and S-Cinetone, which are currently available on the A1, A7sIII, FX3 and many of the other cinema cameras that Sony offers.
Something that has been a criticsm of the Sony system in previous bodies, has been it’s “color science”. But over the last couple of years you can see Sony has made some very nice progress in the color department and adding these color modes, offers some really professional options. The standard color profiles out of camera have also shown marked improvments as well.

Autofocus has gotten some improvements as well. Realtime tracking as well as the inclusion of eye autofocus for humans and animals is a very welcomed improvement, and based on the reviews, seem to work flawlessly. In addition to the enhanced AF, there have been two features added. Focus Map which was mentioned above offering a more visual tool for manual focus, as well a new feature called AF Assist, which allows you to switch to manual focus simply by turning the manual focus ring. This feature is only available for Sony lenses, however. But is another nice touch to the progress and innovation Sony has been working on. I only hope that they offer these features in an updated firmware for the A1 and A7sIII, or we will see some angry Sony users.

The Sony A7 IV does have the ability to record 4K at up to 60p but only in Super 35 (APS-C crop mode). This is a MAJOR sticking point to many. First because for a camera that advertises as a true hybrid camera with seemless ability to switch between stills and movie modes, it’s a real pain to think that when you switch to movie mode from stills, and want to record 60fps footage, your focal distance will change. For those shooting a lot of slow motion b-roll and switching from stills, this camera might be a pain for you. Granted it looks like the super 35 recorded video in 60p is gorgeous. So if you are not one of those users that needs to switch constantly between stills and movie then this should not effect you negatively.
I’ll have to admit, this was a bit of a deal breaker for me, because I had considered selling my A7sIII, to get this camera, since I shoot mostly stills but some video. The A7sIII is currently my b-camera to my Sony A1. So naturally looking at the A7 IV as a B-camera for my A1 makes sense, however this limitation does effect a user like me. So what this tells me is that I can’t get rid of my A7sIII, if I want to have a B-camera that can shoot full frame slow motion video and have the ability to switch back and forth between stills and movie without focal range changes to my frame. So although this is a major limitation, some can get around it and you really have to be intentional with this camera, plan your shoots, make sure you have the right lenses and what you’ll use this camera for in any given day, and/or have a lens that covers your APS-C range, if it switches to that mode. The other option is to stay in full frame or bump down to 1080p which gives you the ability to shoot in up to 120fps, and then up-res later. Quality may be an issue depending on your shooting conditions, but it should be sufficient for many applications.

Sony also has a very capable 5-Axis Image Stablization system with things like Active Mode, which provide further stabilization capabilities in camera, as well as the ability to correct camera shake in post using the cameras gyroscope data, in Sony’s Catalyst Browse software. Personally I have never held much stock in IBIS systems. If I’m at a stand still and shooting it comes in handy but I have never relied on it fully for a production, and usually will reach for my gimble.

Comparisons and Verdict

The Sony A7IV is an amazing camera and offers all the modern features a mirrorless camera should offer in 2021. But how does it compare to the competition?
Canon offers the R6 which is the A7 IV competitor in this class. When you compare these two cameras, the Sony beats out the R6 in many ways.
• Higher resolution sensor
• More video codecs
• More in camera color options
• More card options
• Better video quality through it’s 7K Oversampled full frame 4K image at 30p in 10-bit 422 color.
• Unlimited recording capability and no overheating
• A full HDMI connector for recording to external recorders.
• A much broader range of lenses compared to Canon’s native RF lens offerings.

• The Canon R6 however has more frames per second in stills mode and at full uncompressed RAW with 12fps in Mechanical and 20fps in Electronic
• More AF points, and is arguably a slightly more advanced AF system, with Dual Pixel AF, and phase detect points covering the entire frame.
• The ability to record 4K 60p at 10-bit 4:2:2 at full frame with a much smaller crop. 1.07x as opposed to 1.5x.
• Has a better rear LCD screen resolution

I used to be a Canon user and am regularly tempted to buy a Canon R System (and actually bought an R6 before I sold it to help fund my A1 purchase) however whenever I do the breakdown in comparison, Sony always scores higher. Each of these cameras (A7 IV vs R6) has it’s pros and cons, and sacrifices certain features to elevate others.
The Canon arguably has some compelling photography features that reguraly compel me to look at, such as 12fps mechanical and 20fps electronic shutter burst rates, at an affordable cost, coupled with a very cabable AF system. Extremely impressive when you compare a Sony camera that currently doesn’t offer anything above 10fps in mechanical shutter, including the A1 and only offers 20fps and above to cameras priced at the $4K to $6K price range. Mix that with the ability to shoot full frame at 4K 60p; the Canon looks like a nice alternative to the A7 IV…However…if you look at what the A7 IV offers as a full package, and consider the entire eco-system that Sony offers, the Canon quickly falls short, if you are walking into a camera fresh and new.

As far as photography, there is plenty the Sony offers, and although it’s not the quickest camera, it does offer the best resolution in this price range. So when comparing these two cameras, you’ll have to decide the pros and cons in the photography category. In video, again there are pros and cons. The Canon can shoot full 4K at 60p, however it doesn’t have as dense a codec library as the Sony does, and the Canon has a record limit of 30 minutes and tends to overheat. That’s a big deal. Sony also offers a ton more options when it comes to lens choices, both in brand and thirdy party flavors.
I may get a Canon R6 down the road, as I’m still facinated by the Canon system, but I don’t think I would ever switch to Canon full time because of all the reasons stated above, and my only way to expand to lens offerings, I’m interested in like a 35mm or 24mm f1.4 would take me over to the EF range, and I’m not going to be investing in those legacy lenses.

As far as Nikon and it’s Z6 II we land in similar but more clearer waters.

• The Sony A7 IV offers higher resolution sensor
• Offers more video codecs
• More in camera color options
• Better video quality through it’s 7K Oversampled full frame 4K image at 30p in 10-bit 422 color.
• Unlimited recording capability and no overheating
• Full HDMI connector for recording to external recorders.
• A much broader range of lenses compared to the current Nikon Z lenses.

• The Nikon Z6 II offers RAW video output via HDMI
• Offers faster drive speeds of 14fps at 12-bit RAW and 12fps at 14-bit RAW
• Is competatively priced at $1999 compared to the competition at $2499

As you can see the Sony outpaces the Nikon in many areas. Although the Nikon is technically faster their AF slows the overall system down, as well as it’s limited buffer. However it has some really nice mid range lenses, as well as an attractive price of entry. Nikon gets major points on price, as well as great image quality and mostly comparable features. I’ve tried the Nikon Z6 II and really enjoyed the experience as well. The Nikon glass is amazing! Their f1.8 Primes are really nice and affordable. But for the same reasons I wouldn’t switch to Canon are the same reasons why I wouldn’t switch to Nikon. But the Nikon system is an extremely nice package and should be attractive for many users and especially ones in the Nikon eco-system, but when comparing it to the Sony, the Sony still edges past it when it comes to the A7 IV and it’s offerings.

Will I get an A7 IV?

The answer to that is probably. I put in a pre-order, because I would like a B-camera for my A1 for photographic needs. The A7sIII fits that in many ways and the 12mp resolution doesn’t pose a problem these days when most images are posted online, and for those rare moments where large print is desired, I can use the very handy and capable super resolution feature to up res A7sIII images. However it would be nice to have a mid-range camera as my photo b-camera. I am concerned about speed however especially when using it as a B-camera for photography and I am concerned that the only way to achieve 10fps in compressed RAW is by using a CF Express Card. I don’t believe my A1 or A7sIII has that limitation but we’ll have to see. So although I dont plan to sell my A7sIII as I get more serious with filmmaking and video, the A7 IV, might fit nicely between my A1 and A7sIII. So I’ll get one in and give it a try.
An alternative for me would be the A7C. I do like the idea of having a smaller body that meets my photographic needs, so that would probably be my “plan B” if the A7 IV doesn’t workout.

I think the A7 IV seems like a really nice camera but I haven’t found myself as excited about it as I was the A7 III, but that could change when I get it in my hands.