First, I would like to say that I am quite happy with my A99.


Anyhow, I thought that I’d test out the high ISO performance of the A7III by taking some handheld photos of the St. Louis Ballet dancers in the dark backstage environment during our last Nutcracker production run. I must honestly say that even though the high ISO images are a little soft, they’re still much better than what I could have achieved years ago using high ISO film (hand held). Plus, I think that the softness adds to the romanticism of the ballet photos. I’m sure that the A7S camera series would be better suited for the backstage environment, but considering that I bought the A7III for video purposes, I am unexpectedly and delightfully surprised at the high ISO photo quality. What I miss though, is the option to set the auto focus range, which is something that I always use on the A99 when shooting backstage.
I’ll dig through a few of my favorite photos and post them. I'll start with a few quiet backstage moments with the Saint Louis Ballet.
Since I don’t own any FE mount lenses, all of the photos are taken with A-mount lenses using the LA-EA4 adaptor.
Sig
-The calm before the (snow) storm.
A7III, 24-70 ZA, F 3.5, 1/320, ISO 20000 -Young angels patiently waiting for their next entrance.
A7III, 24-70 ZA, F 2.8, 1/80, ISO 1600 -The loyal and trusted stage hand attentively waiting for his next task.
A7III, 70-200 G, F 3.2, 1/160, ISO 20000