http://www.photoclubalpha.com/DSLR-A550 (DT 16-80mm F3.5-4.5 ZA) – RAW.lcp

Right click to download this 56Kb file which should be placed in the Lens Profiles/1.0/Sony folder of the directory on your computer which holds Adobe Lens Profiles.

This profile has been created at full aperture and f/8-f/11 depending on focal length, at 16mm, 24mm, 35mm, 50mm and 80mm focal lengths and involved 90 raw captures.

It is possible in ACR/Lightroom to use profiles which are not created on your own camera type. This profile can be applied to any APS-C Sony or Minolta camera using the 16-80mm lens; because the A550 is currently the highest resolution body, the CA data gathered is more accurate than would be possible using a lower resolution body but may need a saved adjustment in defaults. Individual lenses differ slightly and may also need adjustments.

I have checked the operation of the profile on files from A100, A700, A200, A380, A350 and A550 and it’s very effective in removing CA. Illumination is much improved at 80mm (notably). You may prefer to turn the geometric correction down to zero (off) when the angle of view matters more than perfect straight lines – and also, where people are in the shot near the edges at 16mm. The distortion of the lens is optimised to lessen ‘stretched faces’ at the ends and corners of the shot, applying the profile removes this slight barrel distortion and does not improve groups. It’s most useful for horizons, rooms, seascapes, and subjects where a good straight rendering is critical.

It has been suggest I should add a donation button for these profiles. By all means see our subscription page, there’s a downloadable PDF of the latest Photoworld magazine for $3. I could easily have zipped profiles and sold them in the same manner, but that is not why photoclubalpha is here; Adobe provide the software to do this free (OK, I know what the rest of their stuff cost me…) and profiles should be made public domain by creators.

- David Kilpatrick

But Sony may prove yet to be the tortoise – or perhaps to be Brer Rabbit. They could make the finishing line, the goal of a truly useful video DSLR, before Nikon/Canon/Pentax/OlySamPanny get there.

The dream of any camera maker is to sow a few dragons’ teeth and have fully armed warriors spring from the ground, something which Olympus has managed to achieve twice in succession, first with the E-1 and 4/3rds, then with the digital Pen and Micro 4/3rds.

Sony, ignoring Greek myths, has so far gone for the Celtic version and chucked the bones of its dead warriors (Minolta!) into the Cauldron of Bran to rise and fight again. As reanimated corpses go, the Alpha models so far have proved pretty lively. But in all good myths, whether Greek or Celtic, it’s the real live heroes who eventually win. Sony has a couple of real giants in the Alpha 900 and 850, but not much else until a true Alpha 700 successor arrives.

That is what PMA is said to have revealed – without a name, but with a mockup and some tentative specifications:

You may not think these studio packshots from Sony are very exciting. Think again. That, dear Alpha fan, is a magnesium alloy body shell. You can tell it’s built the same way as the Alpha 900 and 700 by the small screws visible outside the perimeter of the body lens mount, and the traditional strap lugs. If it’s not magnesium or mag alloy, it’s a new material to the range and it certainly is not the same stuff the A100-200-300-500 series is made of.

Inside this camera, as with the Canon EOS 550D, there are two activating motors not one. The mirror action and the shutter action are separate. That’s not the case with the recent sub-700 series Alphas which have used a single motor to drive a permanently hard-linked mirror-shutter cycle, a cost saving measure which simplifies assembly but rules out any chance of providing mirror lock up. There is every chance this camera will have MLU.

It also has a full AF mode switch, and a depth of field preview button (presumed, unless Sony has changed the function of the button in that position, which is unlikely); it has a Memory Recall position on the shutter dial. All this says, very clearly ‘A700-900 type internal design’ to match a solid metal, weathersealed exterior shell.

The format

My press information from Sony implies that the new HD-AVCHD CMOS sensor used in the DSLR models is exactly the same sensor as they are using in the EVIL models (the mock-ups above).

Sony press release wording:

In 2010 Sony will introduce a new ultra-compact camera with interchangeable lenses that teams “any time, anywhere” convenience with DSLR picture quality. Exhibited in early concept mock-up form at PMA, the camera features a newly-developed Exmor APS-C HD CMOS sensor. It will also support HD video recording using the efficient and high quality AVCHD format. Shown in mock-up form alongside the compact, easy-to-use new camera is a selection of compatible interchangeable lenses.

Mainstream DSLR range to grow further
Sony also confirms that the current α range will continue to grow with the introduction of further new mainstream DSLR models using the newly-developed Exmor APS HD CMOS sensor and integrating HD video function with AVCHD format.

This seems to be a clear indication that it’s a new HD sensor and not the same as the A550. The term APS-C is hopeful, I have amended this post – my quick measurement in Photoshop of the sensor in the image above indicated (allowing extra for overlap of the mask) that it was 16:9 but I’ve since seen a head-on shot of the PMA mockup which shows it is 2:3 format as normal.

Video

The new camera will have HD video and probably won’t attempt to focus during filming; doing so is a red herring with cameras of this format anyway, as autofocus doesn’t even work reliably with regular camcorders. But it will probably autofocus rapidly from Live View, replacing QV autofocus with a contrast-detect system that actually works, especially when combined with Face Recognition. If it does allow AF during filming, the CZ 16-80mm lens shown fitted here might not be the best choice.

Or might it be OK? Try an Alpha body and work out where the body-driven focus sounds really come from. Some lenses are noisy. But I have just stuck my ear next to several, even vintage Minolta AF designs 25 years old, and turned the manual focus ring. Guess what? They are as quiet as SSM. All that Sony needs is a silent drive motor for the focus in the body, and the ZIP sound will disappear. There is absolutely no reason why a new AF motor generation using silent technology should not transform the apparently ‘noisy’ performance of body-driven optics.

Sony’s use of the AVCHD format is much publicised. So what? It doesn’t say it is the Lite flavour, so that means the camera is probably 1080p and that the files as saved to the memory card will be easily read via the card slots of Sony devices such as Bravia televisions or PlayStation, or played from the camera’s USB connection. It also means that some computer systems and portable players, digital photo frames or PDAs may need the video converting before they can play it.

Sony has almost certainly made sure the format shoots 1080/24p, the industry standard. But I think they have done much more than this. I think the A7xx will be the first video DSLR which allows you to capture a still frame while recording unbroken video, and to do so without a shutter actuation. It may be nothing more than a 1080p JPEG still, extracted and saved in  real time (Nikon allow saving of 720p JPEGs by reviewing the footage and selecting frames, in-camera, on the D3S).

But I think Sony’s recent experiments with auto image alignment (in the two-shot HDR function of the Alpha 550, etc) are a clue to what they may do to create higher resolution JPEGs than 1080p, without interrupting video recording. A software utility which can re-mosaic and conflate two or more video frames is already available:

http://photoacute.com/studio/guide/guide.html#video_import

I’m already using this software to create double resolution images from my A550 raw files – incredible 55 megapixel landscape and still-subject shots made using a set of exposures, with SSS switched on even on a tripod to ensure that each raw records the data slightly offset on the Bayer grid. The report on this will be in the Spring Photoworld magazine.

At the moment, pressing the shutter during filming on a Canon DSLR captures a full res image but interrupts the video and sound for about 1 second. Pressing the shutter on a Nikon DSLR terminates the video and captures a still frame. Sony will, I think, be the first maker to allow instant capture of a still frame during filming without interruption.

For many, the critical factor will be whether or not Sony provides a stereo mic/line input jack, and firmware to control the impedance, fixed gain or auto gain for this (and any built-in mic). Sound has been the Achilles Heel (sorry, Greek legends again!) of video DSLRs. Only the Nikon D3S so far allows external input with mic/line compatibility, and manual fixed gain. All Canon DSLRs to date have forced auto gain even for the external input – and not one of them is compatible with line sources (officially) making the use of external preamps or mixers a matching lottery.

Now if you think all this does not matter, all you want is a good DSLR, I know a nice patch of warm sand with plenty of ostriches to keep you company. I only shoot video on DSLR once every couple of months. When I want it, it’s great to have it. They cost me no more than non-video capable DSLRs and the inclusion of video has zero impact on the way they work as still cameras. I will welcome video on Alpha. I have the lenses for it and I’ll use it!

And the rest

The A7xx will allow studio shooting with Live View and AF, with auto gain to enable modelling lights. It will have its own LED video lighting system, with a new flashgun capable of either flash or a modelling-light/video strength continuous LED output. You will be able to see depth of field through the glass prism optical finder (no QV, no mirror prisms) or to perfect accuracy on the high resolution rear screen, and magnify the Live View image for critical focusing and d-o-f checking.

I’m almost prepared to bet that it will not support motordrive speeds faster than 5fps (or a minor variation on 5, such as 5.5fps) because the 7fps of the A550 was partly enabled by the hard-linked shutter mirror mechanism with its single motor, plus the fixed stop-down of the lens (which does not open and close repeatedly during 7fps shooting). But through the video function of the new HD sensor, Sony will enable some interesting high speed sequence options for stills, with capture speeds dependent on subsampled resolution taken directly from the CMOS. There has been a firm rumour for some time about a Sony prototype DSLR, seen in SE Asia and Australia, which could shoot something like 15fps at a usable resolution (6MP or thereabouts). So a feature like that would not surprise me.

There are new 24mm f/2 (prototype) and 500mm f/4 G (previsualisation) lenses on the way, which leaves another eight for Sony still to work on including a rumoured 35mm f/2 and 85mm f/2.8 Chinese plastic SAM duo. The nasty little 30mm f/2.8 SAM macro, by the way, turns out to be one of the best lenses I’ve ever used despite its horrible cheap skin and clunky focus motor. So if Sony does make 35mm f/2 and 85mm f/2.8 lenses for £199 apiece, do not dismiss them.

This camera will have a superb quality LCD overlay focusing screen like the Canon EOS 7D, maybe even losing the visible ‘wires’ of the Alpha 550 precursor. It will have one of the brightest viewfinders seen in an APS-C DSLR to date. Will the AF module be updated – along with a new in-body focusing motor that works in fully variable torque mode, silently?

Well, if I was a designer at Sony, all this would be happening.

The alternative would be to chuck some more bones in the cauldron and see what kind of zombie jumped out.

- David Kilpatrick

Sitting behind a desk in Scotland while Gary Friedman attends PMA on our behalf. Gary will trash all this errant speculation and provide the real story, extracted from Sony staff under duress (he carries a Xaphoon, it works every time!).

The Alpha System celebrates its Silver Jubilee or 25th Anniversary this month – though left uncelebrated by the inheritors of the Minolta AF legacy, Sony. They have no reason to draw fresh attention to the age of the system, as in four years they have taken it the same sort of distance that Minolta took the world’s first AF system in the late 1980s.

It’s not only Alpha’s 25th birthday. This is also the 25th birthday of modern AF SLR systems – all of them!

This is a multi-page article. See the links at the bottom of the page to Continue Reading after each page.

For Photoclubalpha and the historic Minolta Club of Great Britain, the anniversary does matter. A good many of you out there have been members since the launch of the system, often using the earlier SR and X manual focus systems before that. We still have a 1985 Minolta 7000AF and it’s still working just as it did when new.

25 years before the first Minolta SLRs appeared – a folding Minolta Six of 1935

I don’t mind showing my age to make a comparison. I was 11 in 1963 when I took my first pictures with an SLR camera. My father had bought himself a Pentax S3 – and the camera it replaced was 25 years old, a pre-war Zeiss Ikon Kolibri collapsible 16-on-127 model.

When the Kolibri was made, 127 was the ‘vest pocket’ format of choice. 35mm was on the rise, but 35mm SLRs had not yet arrived. They were as much a thing of the future as digital SLRs were when the Minolta 7000AF was launched.

But within that 25 years, there was hardly a single camera system made with interchangeable lenses that did not become obsolete. Only the ‘frozen assets’ of the cold war kept some systems, like the Exakta bayonet and the Praktina, alive. New brands were launched, from the British Wrayflex and Periflex to the Italian Rectaflex and many German oddities. It was not unusual for an entire system to be come and gone within a few years.

Even in the following quarter-century, the high years of the Japanese 35mm SLR, the succession of lens mount changes was bewildering. Independent lens makers like Tamron and Sigma were forced to make systems using interchangeable mounts not just because the public wanted it. A dozen or more mounts were made for every lens and in the 42mm screw thread fit alone there were endless variants – Praktica LLC (Pentacon Electric), Olympus FTL, Pentax ES and more.

It was more or less a 25-year cycle – the SR system was announced in 1958, and really got underway by 1960. It was to be another quarter century before the AF system arrived. We are now a further 25 years on – can we expect a totally new camera system, once again, in 2010?

Minolta’s SR bayonet mount, introduced in 1958/9, actually remained basically unchanged all the way through to 2005 when the last manual focus model, the X-370S, was available. It survives even now as a mount popular in China where the Seagull range from Shanghai Optical includes Minolta fit models. That mount only ever had one major revision, to add a linkage for open aperture TTL metering. The introduction of programmed exposure and shutter priority was cleverly enabled by using the existing design of lens mechanism and improving its accuracy, while adding a simple reference lug to the ƒ-stop setting ring.

Nikon’s 1959 F-mount proved similarly easy to improve without any basic modification. Both these bayonet mounts celebrated half a century of production in 2008/9 – another landmark, which Nikon was able to celebrate but Minolta of course could not.

The Alpha System celebrates its Silver Jubilee or 25th Anniversary this month.

We have a full length revision of the article which appears in the latest Photoworld now online as a page here.

Read our 25th birthday review of the Alpha system’s history now!

You can also read the edition on-line at YUDU – we have now changed the price for each individual edition to £2.50 (from £3.00) so that if you buy single edition access, a year costs exactly the same as a normal yearly digital subscription of £10. All YUDU subscriptions and sales support the Photoclubalpha website and forum. The price including the printed edition is £25 per year (worldwide).

Click to launch the full edition in a new window.

Each issue now has six sample pages viewable without purchase.

Paul Genge of Sony UK confirmed that deliveries had in fact been made by October 22nd to selected dealers and that ‘both cameras have been available since the beginning of the week’.

However, a Google search showed no for sale items except Hong Kong based grey market shippers. WarehouseExpress still showed a pre-order status for the Alpha 550 and its kits. We have been trying to obtain one for the past two weeks, as review samples were not available. The initial report in Photoworld magazine has been completed with the help of our Photoclubalpha subscribers round the world who already have the camera, and will appear in the edition printed next week.

UPDATE: Monday October 26th – WarehouseExpress had bodies, 18-55mm and twin lens kits all in stock this morning.

- DK

The good news is that all Sony Alpha DSLRs from the 100 on are included in a different list of RECOMMENDED cameras – all are confirmed as being capable of providing adequate images.

Here’s the Cyber-shot blacklist:

Please note at present Alamy does not accept any images from the following Sony digital cameras.

Now Samsung got in there by mistake, I think, but it includes some cameras I once thought were adequate such as the Cyber-shot F-828. Not surprisingly, the similarly specified Konica Minolta Dimage cameras are also blacklisted:

It’s sad to see the A2 and A200 – both providing .MRW raw files which can be of exceptional quality at ISO 64 with careful handling – included in such a list. But this is reality. Earlier this year, I included in our own Alamy submissions a great set of 60 images by my friend Peter Fry who had visited the Caribbean and Central America using a Sony F-828. I liked his people pix enough to feature them in Photoworld, and they reproduced excellently. But they resulted in the first ever total rejection of a batch of files I have had from Alamy.

More controversial is the Alamy list for Sigma – even the latest (or almost-latest) SD-14 and the popular pocketable DP-1 are banned:

Well, in fact I have many images taken on the SD-9, SD-10 and SD-14 on Alamy and submitted as complete batches too, not hiding amongst a submission. My entire set from one trip to Turkey was shot on the SD-9, and all the files were duly taken up to 48MB. They have sold, as well, and no complaints or refunds have ever followed the sales. For owners of the DP-1 expecting to use it as a stock-photo notebook camera, this latest list is a knock-back.

And, in the Kodak list, the DCS760 is blackballed. This beautifully made Nikon F5 based DSLR has one of the best 6 megapixel sensors ever designed, within its limited working ISO range. With a 1.3X factor, it has very large pixels and uses very narrow-cut colour filters producing superb colour quality. I have owned one for a few months, and of course, there are a few Alamy pix from it. I would have to rate the quality higher than my Konica Minolta Dynax 7D or 5D six megapixels in some respects.

Also, the excellent Ricoh GR Digital and GR II are both rejected. Again, I have an entire set of images taken using this GR, an optically superb fix focal length wide angle 8 megapixel compact, which went on to Alamy as a set in the past without question. They are still some of the best-looking files for colour and the performance of that 28mm-equvalent lens. Even the pics with the 21mm-equivalent wide angle converter are up to DSLR standard.

What exactly is sharp enough for Alamy?

Here is an example of what is NOT sharp enough:

This is a picture of Stormont, the Belfast Northern Ireland Assembly building, taken by Ailsa Kilpatrick when she visited the Assembly earlier in the year. She used a Sony Alpha A350 with 16-105mm SAL lens. It’s been straightened up a touch and distortion removed (though it was at the long end of the lens, and this was just a minor verticals correction). Contrast has been increased greatly to give it some impact. The point of focus, as you would expect, is on the columns and facade of the building, but this is the result which Alamy QC rejected, when enlarged to 48MB size (5120 pixels high):

Bear in mind that no capture sharpening or unsharp masking can be used when sending files to Alamy, so some natural softness will be present due to AA filter and deBayer operations. I would have said, looking at the detail shown in the upper egg and dart string of the course above the column’s capital, that although the 16-105mm has produced a slightly ‘dirty’ rendering, it’s well up to the sharpness of any of the 6 or 8 megapixel shots I have filed in past years. But when sent the clip (because this was the image they rejected, taking with it several dozen others which are automatically kicked back if you get one in the batch failed) they confirmed that they upheld their QC decision.

This is no great worry, Ailsa took many other pictures some of which are already accepted and on-line, and many are that little bit cleaner and sharper than this. But when asked, Alamy’s staff stated that standards for QC have not changed. What was once accepted (6 megapixels enlarged to 17 megapixels, the 48MB size required) was still accepted. There had been no shift in standards created by the effect on staff of seeing so many 14, 16, 21, and 24 megapixel files arriving today. I found this hard to believe, because my own standards have changed after using the Alpha 900. My earlier work no longer looks sharp enough!

A few days later, the list of unacceptable cameras appeared on Alamy’s blog. They may not have been willing to be drawn into making any comment about improving standards, but their action speaks louder than words. In the list of non-approved cameras are several mainstays of early Alamy shooters – successful ones as well. The Konica Minolta Dimage A2 and A200, the Canon PowerShot S1 Pro, the Ricoh GR Digital… all these were purchased in their dozens (even sought for on the used market) by travelling Alamy contributors wanting raw files from a lightweight versatile camera with 8 megapixels.

Now that era is passed. If you are planning on trying Alamy, study the example above. It was, I am told, a borderline case but nevertheless not good enough. If you can’t get something visibly better than this (and it makes a perfectly sharp looking A2 print!) don’t bank on getting your Sony Alpha, or any other, images past Alamy Quality Control.

- David Kilpatrick

This magazines uses the same Flash Reader format as the 19 editions of Photoworld and – NEWLY ADDED! – five editions of Minolta Image from the 2002-4 period just before Konica moved in. We have been able to find complete, or very nearly complete, original archive files for these issues and create PDFs to convert for our subscription service.

Photoclub Alpha’s Photoworld quarterly magazine is now available as an on-line subscription without printed paper issues (you can print any pages you want from the Flash-viewable ‘book reader’ format editions, read on-line, or download to read when you like). The cost is just £10.00 per year and gets you the latest issue before it even reaches our susbcribers!

The five editions of MINOLTA IMAGE from 2002-2004 take the archive back to December 2002 with 23 past editions of the club magazine available to read. Your £10 now gets you over 800 pages right away.

You don’t even have to keep checking the site, you are sent an email anytime we add a new edition – or add to our archive of back issues. Already there are 19 issues of Photoworld covering from Spring 2004 to Spring 2009 – the entire history of the Alpha digital system from the Konica/Minolta merger onwards. That’s over 500 A4 pages of reviews, news, tests, portfolios, galleries, how-to-do-it and inspirational articles. To preview what’s on offer (see the covers, contents page and first couple of pages of each magazine free) click the link then click any cover thumbnail. You’ll get a preview of four pages, and the choice of a full subscription or the single issue price of £3. If you pay for the full digital subscription all the issues are unlocked including the next year’s new issues, and each archive edition as we add them.

PW Subscribe

You can also subscribe, worldwide, to both printed and digital editions – this subscription for £25 means you will get the next four printed magazine delivered to your door:

PW Digital + Printed

Here are two comments from readers:

“The current Photoworld copy I received yesterday again is of outstanding quality. It is easily the thinnest magazine I read in terms of mm width, yet content and printing quality are reason for great delight. The printing is so much better then any of the magazines for sale in Germany, it is breathtaking every time.” - Markus Spring

“The best ten quid of any Minolta/Sony owner’s money has to be on YUDU, right now. I have just paid (through PayPal) and have access to every copy (it seems) of Photoworld magazine from early 2004. That’s 19 editions and the on-screen presentation is fantastic, not to metion the opportunity to download and read offline. I love magazines, I especially love photography magazines, and to be able to read the back catalogue of Photoworld is an absolute steal for that price.” - Brian Young

Postal subscription only Paypal options

You can subscribe to the printed edition only (no digital edition access) using our online Paypal subscription service.

MPA’s magazine is free. Only full-time professional photographers are eligible to become members, but you can all read the mag.

- DK

The cost to access all these back issues – over 750 pages, fantastic portfolios, technical reports and tests covering the entire history of the Alpha digital system – is just £10 (by Paypal) and also gets you a full year of new Photoworld issues in advanced of the mailed copy. Or instead of it, if you prefer to subscribe this way. £25 now buys the postal magazine subscription plus the e-version and archives, worldwide.

All future editions of Photoworld will also be published in this form – and if you buy a subscription, you will automatically get an email notifying you when it’s available.

It takes a fair time to prepare and convert each one, I’d love to provide all these free just like the website but we do need to eat!

Here is the separate link the latest issue:

PW 2009 #2

and here is a direct link to the Subscription option:

PW Subscribe

Finally, in response to demand (and to resolve a possible ambiguity) here is an option to buy a subscription covering the digital edition, plus the printed one:

PW Digital + Printed

David