- Hey guys my name is Matt Johnson
and Sony just announced a camera
that not many people were expecting, the A7R IV.
The reason not many people were expecting this camera
is of course we have not seen an A7S III yet.
Now I have another video that I'm coming out with very soon
about where the A7S III may actually be
but today I want to talk to you about the video specs
of the new A7R IV and tell you my thoughts about them.
Please keep in mind that this camera was just announced
so I'm sure that some of these specs may change
as more information about this camera comes out.
Now on to the A7R IV video specs.
Let's start with the sensor.
This is a new Sony 61 megapixel sensor
which I realized that years ago people said
that megapixels don't matter.
Well 61 is still a very impressive number
that is getting close to medium format levels of resolution.
And the main reason that I care about 61 megapixels
as a video guy is because that is far above 8K resolution
and so if Sony were to enable this camera to record 8K,
that would be awesome.
Leading up to the launch of this camera
there were rumors saying that that may be the case.
We could be seeing the A7R IV shooting 8K video.
Unfortunately that did not happen
the A7R IV only supports 4K
at up to 30 frames per second in a bit.
I really don't like that 4K at 30 frames per second,
is the limit here.
Especially when you consider how Panasonic
is really pushing things
with their full frame S1, S1R, and S1H cameras
that are shooting 10 bit
at up to 4K and 30 frames per second
and 4K at 60 frames per second with a crop.
There is one exciting thing about this new sensor
from a video standpoint though.
Even though there's no 8K video in the A7R IV,
Sony says that the camera
is actually down sampling 6K video to 4K resolution.
This means that the 4K video
that this camera is going to be recording,
should look significantly sharper
than any full frame 4K video
that we've seen from Sony so far.
Remember when the a6300 came out,
when that crop sensor camera was released,
everyone was raving about how much sharper
the 4K video looked at with it, than with the A7S II.
The reason for that is because the a6300
was also down sampling a higher resolution video down to 4K.
I really am excited that we now have a full frame camera
from Sony that is down sampling from a higher resolution
to 4K as well.
Going back to Panasonic though, I'm sorry,
I feel like I've been doing that a lot
in a video about a Sony camera,
but I feel like it's important for us
to have some context about
the current mirrorless camera landscape,
especially in full frame.
I can't help but feel
that the A7R IV's down sampling 6K to 4K video
would be significantly more exciting
if Panasonic had not just announced the S1H
which actually records in 6K,
no down sampling to 4K required.
Next let's talk about auto focus
and video auto focus on the A7R IV,
is an area where I think that Sony is easily going
to be beating Panasonic
as well as pretty much all other camera manufacturers.
Yes, even including Canon
with their legendary dual pixel autofocus.
The A7R IV has 576 phase detect autofocus points
that covers 75% of the full frame sensor
and it also supports touch auto focus on the back screen
which would work very well for video.
What's more exciting though is that for the A7R IV,
Sony has added a major video specific autofocus feature.
For the first time ever,
Sony has brought eye detect autofocus to video.
I've been waiting on them to do this for a long time
and I'm so glad that it is now possible.
Why is this a big deal, Matt?
Well, imagine you're filming one of the most difficult shots
at a wedding.
The bride walking down the aisle.
You're positioned up at the front
and she's walking towards you and you are rack focusing
as she is approaching.
Some brides walk fast and it is tough
to keep their faces in focus
as they walk closer even with autofocus.
With Sony's eye detect autofocus for video.
The A7R IV is going to track the bride's eye
as she walks closer and keep it in focus.
This is gonna be so useful
and I cannot wait for this to come to other Sony cameras
in the future hopefully possibly the A7S III.
The other thing Sony focused on heavily
in this event was audio
which is a little weird considering the A7R IV
is a very photography focused camera.
They spent a significant portion of the event,
speaking about its audio recording capabilities,
but hey, I'm a video guy I like audio
so I'm not upset about that.
The main feature that Sony was focusing on in their event
is that the A7R IV's hot shoe mount
is now capable of recording a digital audio signal.
According to Sony with all other mirrorless and DSLR cameras
when you put a mic on top of your camera
and plug it into the mic jack, that mic is going to record
an analog audio signal.
The camera then processes that audio signal
into a digital signal and your audio is recorded.
Sony is now giving you the option
to record a fully digital signal
with their new ECM-B1M,
and XLR-KRM hot shoe mount microphone accessories.
They claim that this will result in higher quality audio
with less noise because it is a digital signal.
I'm excited to see how this sounds in the future.
Wrapping up there a few more quick things
that we need to cover about this camera.
First it has a new body style with a bigger grip.
It definitely looks chunkier
than previous A7 series of cameras.
I'm looking forward to a camera that's easier to hold
and more importantly than that,
I want a camera that's a bit larger
so it will dissipate heat more easily.
I'm betting Sony will use the A7R IV body
for the A7S III camera.
So the thought of it being a bit bigger
for high heat generating things like recording 4K video
at 60 frames per second is a nice benefit.
The A7R IV also has improved IBIS, according to Sony
so we can hope that the end body image stabilization
is now better possibly as good as Panasonic.
I'm not gonna hold that hope here
'cause Panasonic's is very good
but any improvement to IBIS is welcome.
Of course the camera also has a S-Log2 and S-Log3
for up to 14 stops a dynamic range
and HLG recording as well.
The A7R IV also has dual UHS-II card slots
where the previous A7R III only had one UHS-II card slot
and one UHS-I card slot.
So that in hand speed is going to be great to see as well.
Lastly and possibly one of the most exciting features
for me to see,
Sony has added the ability
for you to save your camera settings to the SD card
so that you can transfer those settings
to another camera.
Yes if you have multiple A7R IV cameras
you can simply save your settings from one camera
to the other which will save you a lot of time,
syncing up your settings between the cameras.
As someone that owns two A7S IIs,
I'm so excited about this
and really hope that it comes to future cameras,
like the A7S III.
The Sony A7R IV releases in September 2019
for $3500 and I will have links down in the description
if you want to preorder this camera.
So in conclusion, those are the notable video specs
for the A7R IV.
This is a camera that nobody was really expecting right now,
especially considering
that we haven't seen a Sony A7S III yet.
It is a weird time to be a Sony shooter.
If this camera came out a year ago,
I would be much more excited about it
from a video standpoint
but since Panasonic has already released the S1 and S1R,
it's really hard to cheer for Sony
when they're releasing a camera that still
on the records eight bit in 4K
at up to 30 frames per second.
If you are primarily a photographer
that wants to shoot video on the side,
I think the A7R IV with its 61 megapixels
will be amazing for you.
But for me, I'm left waiting for the mythical
and often rumored Sony A7S III
and I am hoping that whenever that camera is released,
it will compete from a video standpoint
with other camera manufacturers,
especially Panasonic with their full frame camera offerings.
I have a video about the Sony A7S III coming out very soon
so please consider subscribing if you want to see that.
With that, thank you so much for watching
and have a great day.
(upbeat music)