Near Nex 7 sighting - in captivity

[artington]

And now ... someone should explain me why Sonystyle still not ship my NEX 7 Kit ... for a pre order done 2 days after the official announcement. This is ridiculous ... (sorry ... after all that months waiting ... ).

Regards,

Frank

Frank, I think you've been hard done by. Don't know the North American / Canadian scene but I'd be inclined to tell Sony Style to *&%$£ and go to Adorama or B+H

[bakubo]

And now ... someone should explain me why Sonystyle still not ship my NEX 7 Kit ... for a pre order done 2 days after the official announcement. This is ridiculous ... (sorry ... after all that months waiting ... ).

I have been in 6-7 stores here in Japan in both Matsuyama and Tokyo and some of those stores I have been in multiple times. They all have the NEX 7 out to play with and I have done so several times. Appears to be no shortage at all. It is a nice camera, but the totally anecdotal evidence of what I see people looking at in the crowded stores is that maybe Japanese are not interested so much in it. I have never seen a single person pick it up and look at it when I have been in stores. Obviously, some people do since I am not there all the time, but the times I have been in stores the NEX 7 and the NEX 5N along with several lenses sitting out seem to be ignored as people look at the m4/3 cameras, Nikon V1/J1, and mostly various DSLRs. The same for the A77, A65, and A35. I have never once seen anyone pick them up or stop in front of them to look at them. All the Sony cameras are just as prominently displayed as all the other brands though.

Lately I have been thinking a lot about getting something smaller and lighter than a DSLR, but that has close to the same capability. That points to either a NEX 7 or NEX 5N+EVF or one of the several m4/3 cameras.

Sadly, Sony and Panasonic seem to be the only companies that have Japanese-only menus for cameras they sell in Japan. Canon, Nikon, Pentax, and Olympus (I haven't checked Samsung, not interested) all allow the menu language to be changed just as Sony and Panasonic also do for the cameras they sell outside Japan. I can read Japanese some and a Japanese Sony/Panasonic camera is something I could muddle through, but the only time when that is barely acceptable is right after you buy the camera and are sitting at home doing the initial setup. In real use I am not sitting comfortably at home with time to figure out things in the menu and with a dictionary handy. When I am shooting I often need to quickly make a change in the menu and often in less than ideal conditions (bright sun shining on the LCD, trying to hold an umbrella, in a crowd with people bumping into me, or any number of other things). Also, it is not just the menu. Any messages, error or otherwise, will be displayed in Japanese and some of them might be important. Katakana is okay although sometimes it is hard to figure out what foreign, often English, word it is an approximation for, but there is also lots of kanji and words that are not used in normal conversation. Think about English. How many people who have no interest in digital photography could be handed a DSLR and be able to explain to you the meaning of all the things in the menu? Lots of stuff in there that requires knowledge of various camera/photographic terms, etc. The Japanese menus are the same way filled with unusual Japanese words that even the average Japanese would not really understand. Also, you would have almost a 0% chance of reselling a Sony/Panasonic bought in Japan to anyone outside of Japan. You couldn't do what you normally do and buy a camera, use it for a year or two, and then resell it to recoup some of the original cost. You would have to buy it and then expect to probably never resell it unless you were sure that you would be living in Japan for the next several years. Anyway, it is another interesting difference between how camera companies choose to do things and how consumer electronics companies choose to do things and one that I can see no benefit for Sony and Panasonic that would cause them to choose differently than all the camera companies.

Anyway, enough about this long-standing issue I have with these companies. I know I sound like a broken record.

[bakubo]

Yesterday I was at a store in Shinjuku that had a NEX 7, NEX 5N, and Panasonic GH2 sitting out with adapters and all 3 had silver Carl Zeiss manual focus RF lenses attached. I played with them for a few minutes. They had focus peaking set for the NEX cameras and it was my first time to try it. They had the peaking color set to white and in the shop it worked really well. Very nice. With the GH2 there was no focus peaking (I don't know if it has it, but was just not turned on) so focusing was much more difficult. I assume the GH2 and the NEX cameras allow a magnified view while focusing, but I didn't know how to turn that on. With the magnified view manual focusing should have been much easier with the GH2 (it was with my old Minolta D7i), but the focus peaking would be faster.

[Birma]

Hi Henry - interesting that they had the cameras on display already with MF lens mounted.

I agree - the focus peaking feature (and the magnified view) really helps with manual focusing. On my Nex 5 I have come to prefer MF over AF completely - but then, I'm typically not doing anything quick fire like street photography. The peaking also works by showing dof as you change aperture, so in a landscape or wideangle shot it will give you an idea how deep you depth of focus is. It can be fooled by lack of contrast in the picture e.g. in low light - obvious I suppose as it is contrast detect AF and the peaking is just highlighting contrast in the shot.

MF lenses are easier to use in this mode, obvious again I suppose , and their well damped MF action gives a much better feel. However, the SEL lenses are better to use in MF than 'normal' (e.g. SAL lens with adapter) AF lenses. The SEL lenses have quite a good focus ring.

[bakubo]

Hi Henry - interesting that they had the cameras on display already with MF lens mounted.

One of the things that I love/hate about Tokyo is that it is so easy to see just about any camera that exists and most of them are sitting right out where you can play with them and no one is there to even hover around you as you do it. Love it because I can easily see and play with anything. Hate it because I find myself being tempted more than when I am not here. I mentioned the Leica M9 sitting out that I played with a few days ago. Also, played with the Nikon D4. Absolutely no interest in either one, but as Barry said, if someone gave me a new one I would happily take it, not even open the box, and resell it. Also, there was a Mamiya 645DF and lens sitting out that I played with a few days ago.