2 November 2024, Sat |
8:18 PM
Sony Middle East & Africa announced the long-awaited addition to its acclaimed Alpha 7S full-frame mirrorless camera series — the Alpha 7S III (model ILCE-7SM3). Featuring a brand new 12.1MP (approx., effective) back-illuminated full-frame image sensor with ultra-high sensitivity and 15+ stop wide dynamic range, a host of impressive video recording capabilities including 4K 120p and 10-bit 4:2:2 color depth, a new heat dissipating mechanism and dual slot relay recording that realizes over one-hour of 4K 60p movie shooting until battery ends, a brand new autofocus system, touch screen interface and side flip LCD screen, the new Alpha 7S III will become the ultimate creative tool for video professionals and all types of hybrid still/video shooters.
“The Alpha 7S III is the ultimate representation of Sony’s passion to solve the pain points of customers in the Middle Eastern region,” said Murat Gebeceli, Head of Digital Imaging, Sony Middle East & Africa. “We are always listening to our customers’ feedback, pushing hard to deliver innovation that goes far beyond their expectations.”
The system architecture for the new Alpha 7S III has been completely redesigned to deliver exceptional video and still shooting performance. The brand new 35mm full-frame 12.1MP (approx., effective) back-illuminated Exmor R™ CMOS image sensor, utilizes a variety of advanced light-gathering techniques to ensure high-sensitivity with low noise, allowing users to shoot in low-light situations without needing large-scale lighting setups.
Professional Video Workflow Solutions
The Alpha 7S III offers in-camera 4K recording up to 120 frames per second, 10-bit depth and 4:2:2 colour sampling, producing stunning video recording. The new camera offers a more flexible and efficient post-production workflow with a variety of advanced movie recording modes such as All-intra and MPEG-H HEVC/H.265 coding (XAVC HS™). The Alpha 7S III makes it easy to integrate video recordings with other professional camcorders by providing three color gamut settings: S-Gamut, S-Gamut3, and S-Gamut3.Cine. Using S-Gamut3 or S-Gamut3.Cine, users can easily match footage shot on the Alpha 7S III with footage shot on the professional camcorders to simplify multi-camera post-production workflow. In addition to S-Log3 gamma curves, the Alpha 7S III supports an HLG (Hybrid Log-Gamma) picture profile, with minimum post-production. The Alpha 7S III also allows 16-bit RAW output to an external recorder via HDMI Type-A, offering additional post-production flexibility.
Improved Image Quality
The new CMOS image sensor and BIONZ XR™ image processing engine in the Alpha 7S III delivers legendary S-series sensitivity with significantly enhanced color reproduction and texture renderings for improved overall image quality. The base ISO has been lowered to 80, resulting in a normal range of 80-102400 (expandable to 80-409600 for video and 40-409600 for stills) to provide more flexible ISO plus wide dynamic range with low noise at all settings. It offers improved image quality by approximately 1 stop of noise reduction in the middle and high sensitivity ranges.
Advanced Autofocus Performance for Hybrid use
The Alpha 7S III offers Fast Hybrid AF by combining phase-detection and contrast-detection AF, giving it the ability to track subjects over a wide area with outstanding speed, precision and smoothness, even when using a narrow depth of field. Fine focus expression is possible with Sony’s E-mount lenses.
For environments with a lot of movement, Real-time Tracking and Real-time Eye AF are available to maintain constant focus on the intended subject. Sony’s advanced Real-time Eye AF improves detection performance by 30% over previous system, thanks to the new image processing engine. It ensures accurate, reliable detection even when the subject’s face looks away. Real-time Tracking is initiated simply by touching the subject on the screen. Simultaneously, Real-time Eye AF is initiated when an eye is detected.
Flexible Autofocus Settings for Movie Shooting
Based on customer feedback, the camera includes several AF features for professional users including AF Transition Speed in seven settings, to easily create rack-focus transitions, and five AF Subject Shift Sensitivity settings, which allows the user to customize how easily AF will switch or stay with the locked-on subject. Touch Tracking allows user to not only initiate Real-time Tracking but also compose and shoot while using a gimbal or while shooting solo. It’s now possible to Touch Focus during manual focus mode on the LCD screen or remotely from the Imaging Edge Mobile application[1].
New Heat-dissipating Structure
The Alpha 7S III’s design has been overhauled to ensure effective heat dissipation and prevent overheating – even during extended continuous recording sessions at 4K 60p 10-bit 4:2:2 video for an hour or more9. A newly developed unique heat dissipating structure, keeps image sensor and image processing engine temperatures within their normal operating ranges, preventing overheating while maintaining compact body dimensions.
Movie Assist Functions
For video on-the-go, the Alpha 7S III is the first Alpha series camera to include Active Mode for supporting especially difficult handheld movie shooting with 5-axis optical in-body image stabilization.
In addition, the Alpha 7S III provides a selection of new Creative Look with 10 presets, that can be used for both photo and video shoots, making it easy to create interesting moods right in the camera to be used as is or customise by the user.
A digital audio interface has been added to the camera’s Multi Interface (MI) Shoe for clearer audio recordings from a compatible Sony external microphone. Used with the Alpha 7S III, the XLR-K3M XLR Adaptor Kit additionally provides 4-channel 24-bit digital audio recording capability in an Alpha series camera for the first time. Like other MI shoe accessories, no cables or batteries are required, providing unrestrained freedom for Alpha system moviemaking.
Outstanding Still Image Photography
The Alpha 7S III carries fast Hybrid AF system with a 759 point phase-detection AF sensors covering 92% of image sensor. The camera can also achieve high AF precision to accurately and reliably focus in light down to EV-6 where subjects are difficult to see clearly even with the naked eye. Continuous shooting at up to 10fps or up to 8fps in live view mode is possible either mechanically or electronically for more than 1,000 uncompressed RAW images.
The Alpha 7S III also includes the world’s first 9.44 million-dot (approx.), 0.64 type Quad-XGA electronic viewfinder with a high-definition OLED display and refined optics that delivers the highest resolution in its class. The Alpha 7S III viewfinder offers a 0.90x viewfinder magnification, 41° diagonal field of view, 25mm high eyepoint for clear, low-distortion corner to corner viewing. It is also dust, fog and moisture resistant, extremely responsive and has switchable modes for different subject types. Every aspect of the Alpha 7S III viewfinder has been designed and refined for a professional workflow.
CFexpress Type A for High-speed Data Transfer
Another world’s first, the Alpha 7S III features two CFexpress Type A compatible media slots, which also support UHS-I and UHS-II SDXC/SDHC cards. It enables high write-and-read speed while keeping the camera body compact in size. CFexpress Type A cards are ideally suited to high-speed continuous RAW still image shooting as well as 4K 120p movie recording at high bit rates, providing next-generation write speeds that can quickly clear the buffers of cameras that generate high volumes of still image and movie data. High-speed data transfer to PC is possible of about 1.7 times faster than that of SD card. The dual slots can be set to relay mode for extended continuous recording of even the high bit rate data.
Revised Menu System with Enhanced Touch Screen
The Alpha 7S III also features a revised menu structure for easier navigation and touch-responsive menu operation for faster, more intuitive control. For creators who shoot both stills and movies, separate settings can now be stored for stills and movie shooting for quick transition between the two.
Advanced Connectivity for Professional Working Environments
The Alpha 7S III has been designed and configured to support photo and video journalists and sports shooters who need to deliver stills or movies as quickly as possible with several advanced connectivity options. The camera supports 5GHz/2.4GHz wireless LAN (IEEE 802.11ac) and offers MIMO (multiple-input and multiple-output) to improve communication quality by using multiple antennas. It doubles the speed compared to the Alpha7R IV. It also carries new USB tethering support. When connected to a 5G (5th generation technology standard for cellular networks) compatible device such as Sony’s “Xperia 1 II” smartphone via USB cable, it is possible to use 5G network for fast and stable FTP file transfer. USB to high-speed wired LAN connectivity also offers stable and fast FTP transfer for both movies and stills. A USB Type-C™ connector that supports fast SuperSpeed USB 5Gpbs (USB 3.2) data transfer is provided, enabling high-speed PC Remote (tethered) data transfer available for smooth handling of large image files.
