Who’s buying the Sony a1MK2?

If you would like to post, you'll need to register. Note that if you have a BCG store account, you'll need a new, separate account here (we keep the two sites separate for security purposes).

Are you buying the Sony a1MK2

  • Total voters
    124
Member's gallery
Well, took the MK 2 out today for a trial run, it was a bitterly cold day today -16 so not a particular fun day to photograph but I wanted to get a chance to photograph a Snowy Owl that has been hanging around in an area that I photograph quite frequently, found the Owl but never got a decent opportunity for a good perched shot in early morning light.

Also had a bit of a seniors moment at one point, somehow I had inadvertently enabled a creative profile ( B&W ) and I couldn't figure out why my viewfinder was and all captures were in B&W :ROFLMAO: geez.

Honorary first shots with the my new MK 2.
Northern Saw-whet Owl by Jose Raposo, on Flickr

DSC06422 by Jose Raposo, on Flickr

DSC06214 by Jose Raposo, on Flickr
 
Member's gallery
Jose Raposo said:
Well, took the MK 2 out today for a trial run, it was a bitterly cold day today -16 so not a particular fun day to photograph but I wanted to get a chance to photograph a Snowy Owl that has been hanging around in an area that I photograph quite frequently, found the Owl but never got a decent opportunity for a good perched shot in early morning light.

Also had a bit of a seniors moment at one point, somehow I had inadvertently enabled a creative profile ( B&W ) and I couldn't figure out why my viewfinder was and all captures were in B&W :ROFLMAO: geez.

Honorary first shots with the my new MK 2.
Northern Saw-whet Owl by Jose Raposo, on Flickr

DSC06422 by Jose Raposo, on Flickr

DSC06214 by Jose Raposo, on Flickr
Click to expand...
I really like the first shot. Birds in snow covered evergreens are my favorite birds shots. If it was -16° I don’t think I’d be outside with my camera though 😊
 
Member's gallery
Jose Raposo said:
Well, took the MK 2 out today for a trial run, it was a bitterly cold day today -16 so not a particular fun day to photograph but I wanted to get a chance to photograph a Snowy Owl that has been hanging around in an area that I photograph quite frequently, found the Owl but never got a decent opportunity for a good perched shot in early morning light.

Also had a bit of a seniors moment at one point, somehow I had inadvertently enabled a creative profile ( B&W ) and I couldn't figure out why my viewfinder was and all captures were in B&W :ROFLMAO: geez.

Honorary first shots with the my new MK 2.
Northern Saw-whet Owl by Jose Raposo, on Flickr

DSC06422 by Jose Raposo, on Flickr

DSC06214 by Jose Raposo, on Flickr
Click to expand...
How was it with grabbing that snowy’s eye in flight and hanging onto it?
 
Member's gallery
armchicago said:
How was it with grabbing that snowy’s eye in flight and hanging onto it?
Click to expand...
I would have to check on this sequence but on a series that I took a couple of days ago , a sequence of approx 30 frames, when the owl is looking directly at me and everyone of them are in sharp focus. Saw the same sort of thing shooting a Northern Shoveler on take-off all sequences were tack sharp on the eye.

Going out tomorrow to photograph Kestrels, that will be a great test for the AF of the MK 2, they are pretty fast fliers.
 
Member's gallery
Jose Raposo said:
I would have to check on this sequence but on a series that I took a couple of days ago , a sequence of approx 30 frames, when the owl is looking directly at me and everyone of them are in sharp focus. Saw the same sort of thing shooting a Northern Shoveler on take-off all sequences were tack sharp on the eye.

Going out tomorrow to photograph Kestrels, that will be a great test for the AF of the MK 2, they are pretty fast fliers.
Click to expand...
Cool. Can’t wait to try mine… wife insisted it get wrapped and go under the tree though, so I have a few more days to wait! 😂
 
Member's gallery
Steve said:
Mine is all set up and ready to go - now I just need to find some time to get out. I have a feeling that won't be till early Jan. For now, I'm just chasing my cats around with it - they are less thrilled about the camera than I am :)
Click to expand...
Merry Christmas, Steve! Do you anticipate updating your a1 set up book for the added features of the mark 2? Been reading the manual but prefer your style!
 
Member's gallery
armchicago said:
Merry Christmas, Steve! Do you anticipate updating your a1 set up book for the added features of the mark 2? Been reading the manual but prefer your style!
Click to expand...
Yup, working on it. However, it'll take some time - I need to use the camera a LOT more. I'll be taking it to Galapagos and Serengeti in Q1 2025, so I should have it dialed pretty well after that :)
 
Member's gallery
Steve said:
Yup, working on it. However, it'll take some time - I need to use the camera a LOT more. I'll be taking it to Galapagos and Serengeti in Q1 2025, so I should have it dialed pretty well after that :)
Click to expand...
Sounds great, I am sure it'll be very thorough and useful! However, if I had the camera I would be very interested in a quick setup guide for wildlife. As things are, mine may be the only preorder not fulfilled yet. Upon getting the 300mm 2.8 I went back using the a1... pre-ordered the make-2, because the a1 seems to underperform compared with the z9 in acquiring and maintaining focus in spite of the excellent lens. Maybe it's only my settings.
 
Member's gallery
Steve said:
Yup, working on it. However, it'll take some time - I need to use the camera a LOT more. I'll be taking it to Galapagos and Serengeti in Q1 2025, so I should have it dialed pretty well after that :)
Click to expand...

If it includes detailed experiences with pre-capture I will purchase it even though I don't have an A1
 
Member's gallery
I know a bunch of you hang out at FM also. But I thought I'd share a few interesting things that are being discussed over there diving into the more technical side of the A1II. One is the recently released data from photonstophotos for DR and dual-gain. The initial test was done on files produced in mechanical shutter and found the dual-gain ISO had increased from ISO 500 to ISO 640...this sounded like good news for anyone who shoots mostly above 500 as you gain 1/3 stop noise performance at all the higher ISOs. But it turns out that if shot in ES the dual-gain stays at ISO 500 as it is on the A1. So probably no change in ISO although some say there is.

The second thing is card writing/buffer performance. The A1II is doing a couple things different. One is that it doesn't do the second step down to ~9.5FPS when buffer is full. It just does the first step-down to ~16.5FPS and then continues on from there so if you are doing a really long burst while buffer is filled this is an improvement.
Also the camera is writing to the card faster so it has gone from 617MB/s to 760MB/s and can now clear the buffer in 7.3s instead of 11.1s. Nice improvement.
Dave tested with both Type 2 and Type 4 CFe-A cards and there was no difference.

Here is the link to Dave's hard work: https://www.fredmiranda.com/forum/topic/1885349/
 
Member's gallery
DavidT said:
Most likely and the losses aren’t enough for leadership to hold people accountable.
Click to expand...
I thought the same about UPS until my wife informed me otherwise. At my wife’s job they ship primarily through UPS and relatively high value items that are $2k per shipment. When UPS doesn’t deliver the item or loses a package, responsibility falls back on the sender, not UPS. UPS might credit them $100 on a lost/missed delivered package but that’s it and honestly, they could care less.

The only way UPS accepts responsibility is if the shipper buys insurance but that’s is an extremely expensive and kills profitability so much that’s it’s pointless to stay in business. They determined it was cheaper to eat the occasional $2k loss than buy insurance.

Her experiences with UPS are eye-opening to say the least.
 
Member's gallery
arbitrage said:
I know a bunch of you hang out at FM also. But I thought I'd share a few interesting things that are being discussed over there diving into the more technical side of the A1II. One is the recently released data from photonstophotos for DR and dual-gain. The initial test was done on files produced in mechanical shutter and found the dual-gain ISO had increased from ISO 500 to ISO 640...this sounded like good news for anyone who shoots mostly above 500 as you gain 1/3 stop noise performance at all the higher ISOs. But it turns out that if shot in ES the dual-gain stays at ISO 500 as it is on the A1.
Click to expand...
Is there a measurement around for the ES DR? Could not find anything about ES DR on PhotonsToPhotos.
 
Member's gallery
arbitrage said:
In the FM thread where they were discussing the photonstophotos data someone sent Bill a second series of files (in ES instead of MS) and the dual-gain was at 500.

Here is the post: https://www.fredmiranda.com/forum/topic/1885166/0#16714755
Click to expand...
I get a kick out of how much time and energy people put into this stuff. Just use the camera, the specs like this mean nothing to me. To me does the camera deliver the results I’m looking for? If so nothing else matters. My 2 cents
 
Member's gallery
I found this like shared on FM. I think it does a good job of trying to make sense of the new sub-AF options in the A1II that A1 shooters upgrading need to figure out. People with newer cameras like A93 already will have learned this stuff.

ILCE-1M2 | Focusing on the eyes of an animal or bird | Focus Setting Guide | SONY

Learn about convenient functions, ways of usage, and setting examples. Refer to the tutorials when setting up the camera.
support.d-imaging.sony.co.jp support.d-imaging.sony.co.jp


I’m still waiting for an A1II. I declined my one out of the first batch due to holiday travel. Now my dealer met with Sony this week and they have no clue when the second batch is arriving. I’ve been promised one out of the second batch and all my dealer could tell me is that when it comes to the A1II patience is required. 🤣🙄
 
Member's gallery
arbitrage said:
I found this like shared on FM. I think it does a good job of trying to make sense of the new sub-AF options in the A1II that A1 shooters upgrading need to figure out. People with newer cameras like A93 already will have learned this stuff.

ILCE-1M2 | Focusing on the eyes of an animal or bird | Focus Setting Guide | SONY

Learn about convenient functions, ways of usage, and setting examples. Refer to the tutorials when setting up the camera.
support.d-imaging.sony.co.jp support.d-imaging.sony.co.jp


I’m still waiting for an A1II. I declined my one out of the first batch due to holiday travel. Now my dealer met with Sony this week and they have no clue when the second batch is arriving. I’ve been promised one out of the second batch and all my dealer could tell me is that when it comes to the A1II patience is required. 🤣🙄
Click to expand...
Thanks for sharing. So it sounds like the new a1 is selling better than many thought it would.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top