SONY A7s - Electronic Shutter

[Manoli]

A recent article in the German FOTO magazine reports that the A7s is the the first 7 series to be fitted with an all electronic shutter ( not just EFC) resulting in a totally silent shutter. Apparently Sony would (or could) not answer their question as to whether this could be retro-fitted to either of the previous Alpha-7's.

Anyone have any input on this ?

[Jim Kasson]

A recent article in the German FOTO magazine reports that the A7s is the the first 7 series to be fitted with an all electronic shutter ( not just EFC) resulting in a totally silent shutter. Apparently Sony would (or could) not answer their question as to whether this could be retro-fitted to either of the previous Alpha-7's.

Anyone have any input on this ?

A global shutter would be great news, but don't you think if Sony had it in the camera they would have made a big deal of it at the announcement?

Jim

[Manoli]

I completely agree with you, Jim. That's what is so surprising - apparently it is so advertised on B&H ( haven't had time to check it though) - will be looking into it ...

All best,
M

[Manoli]

Well this is how it's reported on 'sonyalpharumours'

http://www.sonyalpharumors.com/surprise-or-mistake-sony-a7s-has-full-electronic-shutters-says-german-fotomagazin/

The 'Additional details' under the Amazon link is

Silent shutter mode for discreet shooting:
Silent shutter mode is ideal when discretionary shooting is required; like capturing a recital or wildlife. Activating the silent shutter eliminates the use of the mechanical shutter and therefore shutter noise by utilizing an electronic shutter in its place.

http://www.amazon.com/Sony-Compact-Interchangeable-Digital-Camera/dp/B00JIWXTXG/

Not exactly as originally reported ..

[Jim Kasson]

Well this is how it's reported on 'sonyalpharumours'

http://www.sonyalpharumors.com/surprise-or-mistake-sony-a7s-has-full-electronic-shutters-says-german-fotomagazin/

The 'Additional details' under the Amazon link is

Silent shutter mode for discreet shooting:
Silent shutter mode is ideal when discretionary shooting is required; like capturing a recital or wildlife. Activating the silent shutter eliminates the use of the mechanical shutter and therefore shutter noise by utilizing an electronic shutter in its place.

http://www.amazon.com/Sony-Compact-Interchangeable-Digital-Camera/dp/B00JIWXTXG/

Not exactly as originally reported ..

That could just be using progressive readout of the sensor data like they normally do for video, but for still images. While it would be silent, it would suffer from motion artifacts under some conditions, unlike a global shutter.  For use on a tripod with still subjects and long lenses, it could offer an improvement in sharpness by eliminating camera-induced vibration, but the time involved in reading the data out could be much longer than the "shutter speed". But that's true with a focal plane shutter, too.

The key spec would be how long to read out a complete frame's worth of data.

Jim

[Adam L]

Was this first introduced on their RX1?

[Jim Kasson]

Was this first introduced on their RX1?

The RX-1 has a leaf shutter. It is very quiet, but not silent. If there's an electronic shutter, I can't find it on mine.

Jim

[michael]

This looks to be conceptually the same as the electronic shutter mode on the new Panasonic GH4.

Michael
 

[Vladimirovich]

This looks to be conceptually the same as the electronic shutter mode on the new Panasonic GH4.

Michael
 

that was already in GH3

[GLJ]

that was already in GH3

Or even in the earlier G5 ..

[Vladimirovich]

Or even in the earlier G5 ..

probably... I changed from GH2 to GH3, so had experience only w/ those 2