Sony A7R2 in Silent Mode for Set Stills

[Chris L]

hi, I have researched this quite a bit and finding conflicting information. I will be shooting set stills for a TV show with a canon and soundproof blimp but I want to try my sony a7r2 as well, in silent mode. I know there is banding problems due to flickering light sources. But what about HMI's and Kino Flo's? some say it works fine, some say no. And how about daylight without lighting? same thing, some peeps say they get banding still. My guess is that regular fluorescents and household tungsten are the worst.

Any info would be helpful.

[wallpaperviking]

Would also like to know more about this feature on the A7RII?

 

[Chris L]

Still hoping to hear from some peeps here but I have an update after a week of shooting; Knock on wood, I have not seen any banding problems due to shooting in artificial light yet.

One set was lit with Kino Flos, LED panels, and window light. Looked great.

Another set was lit with Kinos, LEDs, and existing tungsten and flouroscents in a casino, looked great.

And shooting outdoors with LED for fill, looked great.

One question that I have for anyone that did have banding problems, did you see it in the playback on camera? Or did you only see it when back on the computer?

[TonyVentourisPhotography]

I don't have experience with Sony, but I have used silent mode (electronic shutter) on my E-M1 several times recently.  I have not noticed any flicker in most situations. (high ISO, open aperture, lit performances with pin drop silence)  Then again, Olympus has a flicker reduction setting for the viewfinder.  I did not notice anything in the photos under most scenarios, and doing slow shutter panned, or movement shots, I noticed no weird artifacts either.

When using an LED light table to shoot product work on, i DID get screen banding at certain shutter speeds.  They were not in the photos.  However, if I were to reduce my exposure heavily in lightroom I was able to see very mild banding pattern in the light table.

So far though, my results have been no different image wise from shooting with the mechanical shutter in these situations.