More from Gustav on Sony Alpha in 2010

[kingfisher]

Gustav (Kingfisher on Photoclubalpha, ijsvogel on Dyxun), from the Netherlands) has long impressed me with his astute and well-informed predictions about future Alpha cameras. With his A900, he takes wonderful shots of kingfishers from a blind,

Dulaney

thanks dulaney , but i have a A700
but i hope in the future i have also a A900

gustav

[Winedarksea]

Hi Gustav--thanks for getting me straight about the camera. The images you capture with that 700 are magical.

Dulaney

[Mark K]

Sony's market share is a real shock to me. Despite their effort to flood the markets with low end models, I find myself difficult any one to a beginner. Recently I thought a550 can break the ground but the lack of video and only recommended conclusion from DPReview do affect the market, at least people around me.
In recommending a dSLR to a lady shooter, prize, size, features and popularity is a thing. I do not know how much longer and how much market share will Sony to loose before it recognizes it.
Mirrorless cameras have attracted so much attention. I really hope Sony will do a better job by attracting more people to come. I also hope a newer dSLR will balance the market demand for video and other gimmicks , as cybershot HX5 has all these essential elements.

[peterottaway]

I would suggest that you read the full DPR review on the A 550 and then the comments posted in response on the Sony D-SLR forum.

For those who speak about the lack of video, I would ask how many of you are using it on a consistent basis after a month ?

My principal camera these days is the A 850 because of the quality of results I obtain plus it's simplicity of use. I can concentrate on the photography not on menus, buttons and dials.

[Winedarksea]

Peterottaway. it the short term, it matters not that buyers of dslrs with video use the video function very little. What matters, and matters supremely, is that the market, and the market-driven reviewers, such as those at DPR, have spoken. The market, and therefore those reviewers, demand video. You have to know that most buyers will look at little else other than the conclusion: "Highly Recommended" or "Recommended," unless of course they check the features list to make sure it has video. And for the reviewer, lack of video plummits the camera into the lower realm. Only independent-minded and thoughtful reviewers such as George Schaub at Shutterburg have resisted this mantra.

So it is now a foregone conclusion: pretty much every dslr well into the foreseeable future will have video. It is necessary to sell cameras. And people will do amazing things with it. I don't think it will be me, and perhaps it will not be you, Peterottaway, but others will pass us by--at least in this regard.

Dulaney

[bfitzgerald]

George Schaub, this is the guy who gave a rave review on the A330

I thought I was reading a press release from Sony when I browsed that, granted..I am overly critical, on the other hand it's hard to swallow some of the idiotic design choices that were made on these models. These cameras are many things, comfortable isn't one of them

[peterottaway]

Oh, I fully expect future Alpha models to have video of some sorts but just as long as it does not reduce the quality or ease of use for stills photography. Not only that but within 20 years the engineers and designers will have actually worked out to do both decently in the one body.

I do think that the present body shape is ergonomically poor for video shooting - something like the Pentax 645 would be much better.

Also many of the D-SLR cameras on offer suffer badly in their user controls, so however good the engineering solutions become a bastardized camera remains a bastard. Disregarding Barry F's mostly justified complaints for a moment, the designers are trying to cram too much in and so you have complex multiple sub menus and switches, dials and buttons being used for multiple purposes. Plus the actual actions that a particular control is being used for seem to be all over the place.

I would like my next camera come with a DVD so that I can log into my computer, tick the boxes and then download an individualized Firmware to my camera. In my case this would be along the lines of stills yes, video no, Raw yes, Jpeg no, reset button yes, program controls no etc.

[UrsaMajor]

George Schaub, this is the guy who gave a rave review on the A330

I thought I was reading a press release from Sony when I browsed that, granted..I am overly critical, on the other hand it's hard to swallow some of the idiotic design choices that were made on these models. These cameras are many things, comfortable isn't one of them

On the contrary, the A330 is quite comfortable, and the design choices appear to be excellent.

Perhaps that is not true for you, and it is definitely not true for me, but it appears to be true for the market at which Sony appears to have aimed the camera. I gave an A330 to my daughter-in-law for her birthday in September, and she loves the camera. Why? She is less than 5 ft (<150cm) tall and slender - the camera fits HER. She is moving up from a P&S, and finds the user interface very friendly and helpful.

In a conversion with "the Alpha guy" at a local SonyStyle store, he said that when he shows the Alpha line of cameras to women, almost every one of them will select either the A330 or the A380 because THEY find them comfortable, and the cameras will do what THEY want. The exceptions are the women who are larger than average, or who are experienced photographers looking for more features related to manual control.

As a British friend from the 1960s was fond of saying - "Horses for courses".

Now if Sony will only bring out a replacement for the A700 that is as well suited to THAT market as the A330 is to its market . . .

With best wishes,
- Tom -

[bfitzgerald]

Couple of points here.
I would say the ratio of male to female buyers for DSLR's is probably 5 to 1 if not even more. To make a product aimed at a far smaller group is simply asking for trouble (I would add, seen plenty of women with 450d's, and D40/60's etc)
To make 3 of them is a complete disaster from a commercial perspective. (you simply put off male buyers, your major market)

On the control and handling front, sure, if people want to have compact handling in a DSLR, great. However, most compacts have pretty bad handling and control layouts, with much menu diving. Granted, at this level, on body controls are less than higher end models. But to stand here and say it's got good controls and layout, is mind boggling. Want to change the AF point, before you simply pressed the back controller, now..you have to dive into the menu system to simply do this simple task. I know of no other SLR design that makes you do this, you either have the rear control pad, or an AF button used in combination with a control dial. This is such basic stuff, it's impossible to miss it!
Removing the flash raise button, is completely insane too.
AEL button removal makes spot metering and CW metering crippled and near useless, another insane design choice. Locking settings and exposure on scene modes is also incredibly dumb.

Now if Sony had made a Dynax 5 type series of DSLR's, then I would not object, despite the weedy grip and being a bit too small. The sad part about all this, is that a 2001 super budget film SLR, is better designed handling and control layout wise (not the P "Panic" button placement, clever..but useful to newer users), note the AEL spot toggle, note the AF button which means you can change AF points with ease! It's got a flash raise button, and a DOF preview, and does 3fps v 2.5. Wow, back when makers actually put a bit of thought into design.

How on earth Sony expect to grab a big market share with these feeble offerings, is a mystery. I just hope they don't repeat the same mistake. People are hand over fist buying traditional "boring" DSLR's, not Sony simple and cute ones. Lessons to learn here.

[Birma]

...Removing the flash raise button, is completely insane too.

While I agree with the other missing items (that seem very odd things to miss on any slr) I'm not so hung up about the flash raise button. I'm quite happy with raising the flash myself on the A100 and A700. I actually don't like the "button press and flick up" option on other makes/models. Perhaps that is just me.

[Greg Beetham]

Yep Birma, I agree, the manual flip up is the best, I really dislike cameras with the auto popup flash. (although on some you can disable that in the custom menu).
Greg

ps. I'll take your word BF on the other details of these models, I have ignored them once I found out that Sony changed the battery size to a new smaller type, and started using some rinky dink on-off shutter button switch...also used on the other newer cameras like the A550 etc. another retro Nikon like feature....

[bfitzgerald]

I like a manual raise flash too, but the flash on the A230-380 is not designed this way! It's an auto pop up job. Just stuff like this, that makes no sense at all. I hate to think how much money Sony wasted on focus groups..no doubt many did say they don't use flash raise button, or the AEL one. I wonder if they were asking "compact users" or people who use or have an interest in SLR cameras??

My local photo dealer was a Minolta one back in the 80's and 90's. I remember he tried to sell me a Dynax 3000i, and I was not impressed at all, no built in flash, P mode only (with a high speed mode I think), pointless, no point buying an SLR, if you don't have decent controls and half decent features. Ditto on the 5000i too, ok it had a flash, but you had to buy those silly cards for A and S priority. Pointless crippling was happening even back then! Ok these new Sony models are not as bad as that, but we've been through the dumb down stage decades ago, and it didn't really work that well. Just taking off buttons in the hope new users won't get confused sounds like a solid idea, but it's when they do get used to it, problems start, and frustrations grow. If you don't know what it does, "don't press it", or read the manual (ok the Sony manuals are not good), that's another point, don't try to make an easy to use camera if you can't hire someone to write a half decent manual!

And don't start me off on that "newbie" aperture and shutter speed display, it's more likely to confuse than to educate.

Sony need to learn easy to use and simple are not the same thing.

The new on/off shutter position, well it's down to taste, but maybe DK is right, it's more cybershot than Nikon. How to make a camera look cheap in an instant, add a painted cheap looking silver shutter/on/off button! I sure hope they keep that off the A7xx. Some strange choices from Sony in more than one way....any Canon 7d users not buy because the power switch location?? Unlikely

[KevinBarrett]

While I agree with the other missing items (that seem very odd things to miss on any slr) I'm not so hung up about the flash raise button. I'm quite happy with raising the flash myself on the A100 and A700. I actually don't like the "button press and flick up" option on other makes/models. Perhaps that is just me.

Ditto. The flash-raise button is completely unnecessary for me, as I almost never use the pop-up flash. In the cases I do, it's just intuitive to pop it up with a flick.

[Heidfirst]

Couple of points here.
I would say the ratio of male to female buyers for DSLR's is probably 5 to 1 if not even more.

there was an article recently somewhere on the web saying that in the Japanese market in the last year there were more women DSLR buyers than that - in fact that women were taking far more family photos than men.

[Winedarksea]

I certainly agree that there are far more women using dslrs today than Barry could imagine. The world it is a-changin'.

Dulaney