Hey, my name is Matt Johnson. This is the Sony A7 IV. And today I'm going to be reviewing this camera from the perspective
of a wedding filmmaker. So if you film weddings and you are
considering buying this camera, this video should be very helpful to you. But before I get started,
for the sake of ethics, this video is not paid
or sponsored by Sony in any way, and they will not see it
until it's uploaded and off. This camera is sadly
going back to Sony in a few days. Also, because I respect your time,
I'm going to spoil the conclusion of this review right now
and tell you that the seven four is a camera that excels in both photo
and video quality, and it also very closely resembles
the camera that I love, the A7, S3. That is except for one glaring issue
that may be a deal breaker for some of you. That main deal breaker is that the A7 four
is incapable of recording in full frame at higher frame rates
than four K at 30 frames per second, while it is capable of recording in four K
at 60 frames per second. It does it with a super 35 millimeter,
one point five times Cropp, which in short, sucks. That said, whenever
I filmed a wedding with this camera, I used a wider lens than I typically use
to compensate for the crop. And I was easily able to work around it. So if you have the budget to invest
in lenses that will work around this for Taseko crop, and especially if you
want a camera that can do photo and video. Well, I think this is a stellar camera,
especially for the price. So let's get into this actual review now, because I have a lot of thoughts
about this camera and a lot of theories. And it's going to be fun
to talk about starting off, as I said, in the initial conclusion
for this review. This camera shares a ton of similarities
with the A7, S3. So I'm going to be referencing
my review of that camera a lot. And if you want to watch that review all stuff in the corner
and down in the video description. Now, starting off with the build quality,
you can actually tell that this is a camera that Sony has tried
to save money creating. So that way they can hit a lower price
point than the A7, S3. And that may make you think that they've
gone with a lower quality camera build. But that's actually not true. Instead, to save money, Sony didn't bother at all to come up
with an entirely new camera body. Instead, they pretty much straight up
copied the A7. S3, yes. The A7 four has nearly the exact same body
in styling as the A7 seven S3. And I'm going to warn you now,
if you have multiple bodies like I do, you better make darn sure that you look at
what the camera says on the front and also at the top model
before you pick it up, because it's very easy to grab the wrong camera
if you don't look closely enough. In the short time that I've had this
camera, I found myself reaching for it and then realizing, oh, actually picked up
my seven s three. Wait a second. Where's the A7 for? It happens. It's
a ridiculous problem to have, but I do want you to be aware of it. So back to the build quality then, because this camera
share so much with the A7, S3. This means that it's actually a
very well-built, very high quality camera. You get the same flip around screen. You get the same great weather ceiling,
which caveat there. The weather ceiling is good. As long as you keep the hot, you cover on. If you want to hear about my seven
s three dying from rain and being revived, I'll link to that video in the corner
and down in the video description. You also get a full size
HDMI port, just like the a7S3. But I'm warning you, this camera does
not support external ProRes Raw recording. That's another thing that helps
keep the price down below the of S3. What else is there? Oh, you also have a USB port which
enables you to use the camera as a webcam. This should make for pretty easy live streaming of wedding ceremonies
with this camera, which is nice. So otherwise, at least as looks go. Aside from the badging,
the main difference between the body of the 874
and the A7 S3 is that Sony has opted to modify
the exposure, dial and turn it into just a regular programable dial,
which makes it far more useful. And they've also changed
the mode dial at the top. There's now a second
dial below the main dial that controls whether the camera is in photo
or video mode or slow motion. And cue video mode. I actually love this change
because it makes switching between the modes very simple. And it's easy to tell at a glance
if I'm shooting photo or video. But let's be honest, though, I never really shoot photo
unless I'm shooting time lapses. So my camera is rarely ever
switching from the video mode otherwise. Like I said, this camera
is essentially the same on the outside. So let's now turn our attention inward. No, we're not getting philosophical here. I want to talk about the innards of this
camera, not the innards of your soul, because this camera does have
some really interesting new features that I really wish
that my A7 S3 had as well. First things, though, whenever you open up
the menu, you're going to be greeted by the now familiar new Sony menus that are a huge upgrade
over previous cameras like the A7 three. In addition, this also means that my
A7 has three menu and custom button set up video will apply for the most part
to the eight seven four as well. So I highly recommend watching that video. If you've recently bought this camera and you want to learn one of the quickest and most efficient ways
to set up for filmmaking. They'll also be linked in the corner
in the video description. Now back to the menus. You're going to notice
a lot of other familiar things that Sony has pulled from the
A7 as three things like chocolates, white balance for smooth white
balance shifting, which I love. But let's talk about what's new. The first thing you'll notice
is that because the A7 four has a much larger 33 megapixel sensor,
it is now capable of using the APEC crap mode
when recording in four k. Unlike the A7 S3,
which only has a 12 megapixel sensor and therefore cannot cropp in an access
apsey mode when recording in four k. Only when recording in HD,
the A7 four can access Apsey Cropp mode at any time to enable you to punch in on
anything that you're filming. The A7 four can also access APC Cropp mode
whenever you don't want it to either, namely
whenever you switch to four. Kazuko. But can you tell me a little bit
or anyways, the next big change for the A7 for is something that I actually think
is pretty dang revolutionary. And I absolutely wish
that my A7 S3 had it as well. If I could ask for like one thing
via firmware update Sony. This is it. Give me that. This feature is called
Focus Breathing Comp. And when Sony first told me about it,
my job was literally dropped. OK, so here's how it works. Do you remember how some of Stoney's
lenses have focused breathing? If you've ever used a 35 millimeter GM,
I'm sure you've experienced this. This focused breathing is where your lens will get wider or tighter
as you change your focus. And this is something that plagues
both a lot of sonis new GM lenses, as well as many lenses
from other camera manufacturers as well. And up until now, there really wasn't
any way to fix this focused breathing unless you specifically made a point
to purchase lenses that had little or no focus breathing. Notice that I said now, because Sony, through a mixture of science
and witchcraft, has managed to come up with a way to fix focus
breathing with the seven four. It's crazy. Now, as a caveat,
the way this works is that you have to use Sony native lenses because the camera has to be able
to communicate with the lens to do it. But as long as you're using a native
Sony lens and you have focused breathing compensation turned on in your camera
menu, what the A7 for is going to do is it's going to know which lens is on it,
and then it's going to know the amount of focus breathing that that lens exhibits
at different focus points. Then the camera is going to use Sony's
proprietary clear image zoom technology, which enables the camera to near Los
lessly zoom in and out of the image that's being recorded. And in essence, cancel
out the focus breathing. This happens in real
time. It's instantaneous. And if you're somebody that loves Rack
focusing, this feature is going to be your new best friend. And so if you've been thinking
about buying one of Sony's Linzess, but the fear of focus breathing
has been holding you back. If you have any seventy-four, you don't
need to worry about that anymore. Focus breathing conversation
is going to fix that for you. And it's pretty dang revolutionary. Now, moving on here,
closely related to focus breathing. Let's talk more about Focus,
specifically AutoFocus. And this is another area
where the A7 four has taken a big jump over the A7 three
because the A7 four has the same autofocus system
that is an ace of an S3 and a one. Meaning, do you now get not only face
detect autofocus, but you also get I detect AutoFocus,
which is fantastic and scary. Accurate. So AutoFocus is great. But what about manual focus? Wait a second, Matt. This isn't it.
Let's review. There's a camera view. What is manual focus
have to do with anything? Well, Sony has actually included
a really cool new feature in the A7 four. That's going to be really helpful to you
if you use manual focus lenses. This applies to autofocus lenses as well. But manual focus is really where I think
you're going to see a lot of the benefit. The 074 has a new feature
called Focus Map, which in essence changes the color of the screen to show you
which parts are in focus and which are out of focus. Now, you may be thinking,
Matt, Sony cameras already have that. It's called focus peaking. But you're a little wrong because you can think of focus map
as a highly advanced form of focus. Peaking C focus peaking can only tell you
the part of your image that's in focus. It cannot measure anything else. Focus map, on the other hand,
can measure your focus in 3D space, meaning it's
going to artificially color your screen. But the colors are going to coordinate
with the in focus and out of focus. Parts of your image is going to change the
color of different parts of the screen, depending on whether something is in front of the plane of focus
or behind the plane of focus. Objects in the foreground will be orange
and red will objects in the background will be blue, and objects that are perfectly in focus
won't have any color at all. You'll just see a normal video. This can be super helpful,
especially if you're manual focusing, because you can then tell at a glance
if you need to adjust your focus. And the colors are going to help tell you if you need to focus closer
or further away. This should be super helpful
if you're manual focusing and also if you're
using AutoFocus with a gimbal. I think this could help as well. Thinking about Gimbel's and stabilization. Now, let's talk about Ibis. Just like the A7 has S3
with the eight seven four, you get standard and active image
stabilization mode. Standard mode is the same
you'll get from the A7 three. While active mode is going to provide
even more stabilization, the more closely resembles something like Panasonic or Canon's
level of stabilization in the AR5. But this active stabilization
is going to come at the expense of a one point one times
cropp to any image that you are recording. Now let's talk battery life. The A7 for uses Sony's newer NPF
Z 100 batteries, the same as the A7 three
and the ace of an S3. I have not had a chance
to do any extensive battery life tests, but from my anecdotal experience filming
two days of a wedding with this camera, to me, the battery life
does feel longer than the ace of an S3. I don't think it's
a monumental difference. But whenever I was filming with the A7 for a while,
Rachel was filming with the A7 S3. I noticed that Rachel was burning
through batteries faster than I was. Now, this may have had to do with her
taking longer shots or recording more clips. So this is not a super scientific
analysis, but in my general opinion, I think that the battery life
is better with the seventy-four and it more closely resembles
the very good battery life of the eight, seven, three versus the slightly worse
battery life of the A7, S3. Another thing you are undoubtedly going
to deal with at weddings is lowlight. Couples love having darker
wedding receptions. So having a camera that's capable of handling
those low light situations is important. Thankfully, I'm happy to tell you
that the A7 four has very similar, if not better, low light
performance than the A7 has three. Wait a second, Matt.
How does that work? Out it's better at least
until you get up to ISO 12000 800. The reason that the eight seven four
is better at some of these lower ISOs is that unlike the A7 S3, the eight seven four does not have a dual gain ISO sensor with the eight seven
, S3 ISOs 6400 through 10000 or so actually get quite noisy
before the camera hits ISO 12000 where it gets very clean again
whenever the dual gain ISO kicks in because the seven four
does not have a dual gain ISO sensor. This means that those lower ISOs up
to 10000 are much cleaner. But once you get above ISO
twelve thousand eight hundred, that is where the A7 S3 starts
to pull away because it is cleaner. That said, though,
the A7 force still pleasantly surprised me because when I was filming the dance floor
at this wedding, I was cranking my ISO up to 16000, 25000, 600, even 32000. And it was still very usable
even at these high ISOs. So the ace of Infor
gets my stamp of approval for low light. Don't be afraid to film in the dark
with this camera. Now, aside from low light, let's talk about other aspects
of image quality, because this is an area where the A7 for
is also very similar to the A7, S3, and also a huge upgrade
over the eight seven three. First, just like the A7, S3, this camera now records in one bit
and it is beautiful. You get fantastic colors
and a lot of room to shift and modify them when color grading. Likewise, the eight seven four has similar high dynamic
range to the eight seven S3, meaning that if you shoot in a profile
like Aslaug three , you're going to
not only get gorgeous colors, but also gorgeously exposed
highlights and shadows. I have an entire video
showing how to easily film in Aslaug three that I would highly recommend
watching if you buy the eight seven four, because that is the picture profile
that I would recommend for this camera. I will link to that video up in the corner
and down in the video description. Of course, though,
if you don't want to film in Aslaug three, I'm also very happy to tell you that
this camera also includes Sony's assignees tone picture profile, which can give you
a great image straight out of camera. Also, I've created a set of video
presets called Who Is Matt Lutz that I've specifically tuned
to work with many picture profiles, including Aslaug, three and Ciottone. And I've tested these Leitz with a 074
footage, and they make it look awesome. I will link to who is Matt. Let's down below
if you want to check them out. Now, we've made it to arguably one of
the most important parts of this review. We need to talk about the good and the bad
whenever it comes to video formats and frame rates with this camera. First off, the good news. Exactly like the A7, S3 and A1, the A7 four is capable of
recording in Xbox X, AVC, HS and Zve CSI formats
with the same bit rates. So you're going to get very high quality
footage with this camera. And I'm glad that Sony
did not skimp on this. And more good news if you choose to record in four K
a twenty four or thirty frames per second. The A7 four will oversample
a seven K image down to four K in camera, which means your footage
is going to look super sharp. Plus, if you choose
to record in four K 60, the camera will also oversample
a four point six K image for it. So that can look pretty sharp to now
ready for the bad news. OK. The bad news is that Sony has chosen
to drop the sensor whenever you record in four
K at 60 frames per second . Instead of recording in full frame, the eight seven four will record
with a one point five times crop. Meaning that your 24 millimeter lens
will become a 36 millimeter lens and your 50 millimeter lens will become a
75 millimeter lens, et cetera, et cetera. This feels like a big step back to me,
because if there's one thing that I've been hearing filmmakers ask
for years, it's that they want a camera that is capable of recording
for at 60 frames per second in full frame. The A7 has three gave us that. But what hurts is that
it really feels like this crop on the
A7 for is an artificial limitation that's meant to keep people
buying the A7 S3. When Sony first showed the A7 Four to me,
they talked about how they wanted to keep the quality of the footage as high as possible
with no pixel blending in for K sixty. Hence the one point five times crop. But at the same time, Sony has also shown
that they're okay with making cameras like the one that can record in full frame
for K at 60 frames per second. Even with pixel bending and no crop
and the image quality is still quite good. You can tell me if I'm crazy in the comments down below,
but I'm betting that most filmmakers want a camera that records in four
K at 60 frames per second without a crop, even if it's pixel bent. So why is Sony doing this? Why have they chosen to crop this
camera in four K six so it's not overheating,
which I know you may be thinking, but. Sony has said they're using the exact same
cooling system that's found in the seven three in the eight seven four. So it should definitely easily be able
to handle Fourcade 60 frames per second. For as long as you want it to record. Unfortunately, I haven't been able
to test the overheating because it started
to get cooler here in Texas. But I will tell you that whenever
I filmed a wedding with this camera,
I had zero issues with any overheating. Even when recording in four cases
so often throughout the day. So with that, here's my theory for why the A7 force Krofft
in four case 60. My theory goes back to the A7 three,
because I feel like Sony knows they screwed up a bit with that camera
because they made it too good. The A7 three came out after the A7, S2. But it wasn't necessarily
meant to be better than it. But what happened is the eight seven
three ended up cannibalizing a lot of the sales of the A7 S2
because it was way too close in quality
and even better in many ways. I think that Sony doesn't
want to make the same mistake with the eight, seven, four
and the seven S3. So they've intentionally made
a big difference between the two cameras by making the four K sixty on the A7 for
have a crop this way you look at the eight seven four and then you look at that
a seven as three. And if you want that
full frame for K sixty, you got to pony up
some more cash for the A7, S3. And in a Sony vacuum,
or if they were the only company making Kamras, this
artificial limitation makes sense. But other camera companies exist. It feels like Sony is ignoring
that their biggest competitor, Cannon, has the AR six
for a similar price. That includes four Kazuko in full frame. Now I am much less concerned
about overheating with the seventy-four versus the AA6. But Cannon has been aggressive about firmware updates
to improve the overheating of that camera. And while it's still not enough
for me to recommend the AR six, it is much improved over
whenever the camera launched. And then you look at Panasonic
and they're like, what, overheating? Granted, they've had cropped for case
with their S1 and s one camera since 2019. But I have zero doubt that their next full
frame camera that they release will be recording at minimum
for Kazuko in full frame. Now back to the seven four versus
the seven s three. Even if the eight seven four in a seven
has three, both had four K 60 frames per second in full frame. The seven is three is still capable of
going far beyond that by recording four K at 120
frames per second, which I feel like
is a sizable enough change that would differentiate the seven s
three from the eight seven four. But that's just my opinion. Regardless, all this talk of Super
35 millimeter Cropp and four K 60 is just that tulk. Because if you invest
in the seven four and fully know what you're getting into,
you can prepare and work around it. Whenever Sony sent me this camera,
I knew about the crop. And so for the wedding I had coming up,
I knew I would need wider lenses. When I film weddings, I'm usually either on a twenty four
or fifty millimeter prime lens because I knew that I would be shooting
a significant portion of the wedding in four K Sexo with this one point
five times Cropp, though I chose to borrow a friend's 16 to 35 f 2.8 goblin's, because that suddenly gave me a lens
that at 16 millimeter would become twenty four millimeter
with the crop, and a 35 millimeter would become fifty two point
five millimeter at the crop. So I was effectively able
to offset the crop and mimic my twenty four and fifty millimeter lenses
with this one lens. And this is where things
get really interesting, because I went into this wedding
thinking that I was going to be consistently aware of the crop
and need to work around it. But what's weird
is that with this wider lens, I didn't find myself
thinking about the crop all that often. Instead, all I had to do was remember that
if I switched to shooting in four case sixty, I needed to make sure
that I set the lens to 16 millimeter. And if I wanted a tighter shot that mimics my fifty millimeter,
I would zoom the lens in all the way. And once I started using this wider lens
and stopped thinking about the crop, I was amazed at how similar
the A7 four felt to the eight seven three. I was getting many of the same exact shots
that I get with the A7, S3. The bit rate was the same.
The video formats were the same. The colors were the same. Same dynamic range hech
the body was the same. This camera feels eerily
similar to the A7, S3, and this is a very good thing. So let me put it this way. I went into filming a wedding
with the A7 for thinking that I was going to be annoyed
and really struggle with using it. But within an hour, it felt completely natural
and I was very happy to use this camera. And honestly, if you told me that I had
to shoot more weddings with the seven four or there wasn't any seven three anymore,
I wouldn't be upset. I could still easily work with it. And I think you could do now. Big crop
take over. I've been positive. I've been negative. Let's end on a happy note
with some good news. The. First piece of good news that I have for
you has to do with memory cards for this camera. Flip open the card slot door on the side and you are going to see a difference
between the ace of an S3 and the A7 four. You still get dual card slots. But unlike the A7, S3,
which has card slots that do double duty and accept both SD cards
and see if express type cards, the seven four , on the other
hand, has one card slot that will accept SD cards
and see if EXPRESS cards while the second card slot
will only accept SD cards. I assume this is a way
to keep the price down. And you're probably thinking, Matt,
how is this good news? Well, it's good news because regardless
of which frame rate or bit rate or format that you choose to record in,
all of them are recordable to SD cards. Yes. You do not need to spend
any extra money buying a Sieff Express type A card for this camera. You can record everything to normal,
affordable SD cards and more than that. You don't even need to spend a lot
of money on super fast v ninety SD cards because the A7 four can only recorded up
to four K at 60 frames per second. You can actually get by recording for K
at 60 FPS to normal. Very affordable. V 30 SD cards. Now speaking about saving money,
not only with SD cards. Let's wrap up this review
by talking about the price of this camera. Unfortunately, Sony has not revealed to me
the exact price, but they said it was going to be somewhere
between 2500 and 2800 dollars. I don't think this is a bad price,
especially whenever you consider the competition. But I do think that it's close
enough to the A7, S3, at 3500 that I think you're going to need to heavily consider
which one of these cameras to buy. And that brings us
to the conclusion of this video. As I said at the start,
in the first conclusion, the A7 four is clearly a hybrid camera that excels
with high photo and video quality. And from the general build to the overall
quality of the footage that you can get from this camera, it's very similar
to my favorite camera of all time. The A7 is three. And when I filmed a wedding with the eight
seven four, I quickly found myself forgetting I was using a cheaper camera
than the A seven S3 . So should you buy the eight, seven, four? If you were a photographer
who once a hybrid camera that can shoot photo and video, I think the A7 four
is a better choice than the A7 S3, because it has nearly triple
the megapixels and for video, as long as you have some weiter lenses
for four K 60, like the 16 to 35 GM, you should be good to go. Also, if you already own an A7 seven S3
and you're considering buying a second body to use
as a wedding ceremony, camera or backup, I think that the A7 four
is a good choice as well. That crop in for K sixty
might actually be useful during a wedding ceremony where you're stuck in the balcony
half a mile from the couple. But if you're primarily a filmmaker
and you don't already own an seven as three and you rarely
find yourself taking photos, if you can afford the extra money
for the A7, S3, having four K and four K 120 in full
frame is incredibly nice to have. And I think it makes the A7 S3 completely
worth it over the A7 four. Lastly, what if you're on a budget
or you're just getting in to filmmaking and 2500 ish dollars is too much to ask? In that case, I would look at the
A7 three or a seven. See, there's still great cameras with a lot of great features
and 1500 to 2000 bucks. They're also much more affordable. Plus, we can hope that Sony will drop the price with the
A7 for releasing with that. Thank you so much for watching this review
of the Sony A7 for. It would be a huge helped me. If you consider liking this video
and subscribing, if you want to see more videos
about filmmaking in the future. In addition, if you shoot Sony or
any other camera brand, for that matter, and you want better colors
and your videos, I would highly recommend checking out my Who is Matt?
Let's Color Presets. They work very well with all the cameras
I've talked about today. Lastly, if you happen to be a wedding
filmmaker like me, considering this is a camera of you for wedding filmmakers,
you probably want to book more couples and film more weddings. And I would love
to help you out with that. I've created a free guide
that's going to walk you through some practical steps that you can take
right now in your business to book more couples
and film more weddings. It's a completely free gift to you. You can download it at the link
down in the video description. Thanks so much for watching
and have a great day.
