We have talked about Sony’s claims in the past. Specifically, their claims regarding AF performance on their upcoming A7R II with adapted Canon lenses. In case you had not heard, Sony claims that the performance would be ‘almost’ as good as it was on an actual Canon camera.
We had seen a few videos showing this improved performance, but none quite got the message across like the one that I am sharing with you today. Most of the other videos that we have seen show someone waving a camera around with audible AF confirmed tones ringing. Sure, that sounds great, but that doesn’t really SHOW us the performance.
In the video below, Lucas Kurt demonstrates the AF performance of the Sony a7RII with the Canon 40mm STM lens. With our view from behind the camera, we can see what is happening on the LCD, letting us actually see how the camera is handling the lens.
I don’t know about you, but I am thoroughly impressed by what I saw in this video. As I mentioned above, it’s one thing to hear a bunch of AF confirmation tones from a camera, it’s another to see the camera AF and track subject live from its LCD. The a7R II is becoming more and more attractive to me every day.
I don’t know how much longer I can hold out and not order one. In case you are like me, teetering on the edge of financial oblivion, but still wanting to take the plunge, you can find the a7R II pre-orders over on B&H here.
What are your thoughts on this video demonstrating Canon lens AF performance on the a7R II? Were you impressed? Does it make the camera more attractive to you? Leave a comment below and let us know what you think!
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Any chance the Sony A7 II performs the same?
Nice! If they could put this in lets say the A7000 or the next A7 (24mpix is enough for me). It could be a sweet transition from canon to sony. Or keep using both systems.
Nice! I had heard some rumblings among a few Sony shooters I know that Canon had become their favorite “third party” lens. I kind of get it now… that does look pretty native. And that’s always the hesitation in using an adapter, and particularly one with a Canon lens, so everything has to be either mapped electronically between the systems or kludged.
This will be good for still photography but not sports.
It is just a 40mm lens. The test would be even better if it is from a 70-200mm and other zoom lenses. Then focusing from far to near objects. Bigger lens are hard to focus, because of the bigger focusing lenses that needs to be moved. Zoom lenses need more power for its focusing motors that is why the bigger battery from the original designed camera can handle them. If sony can speed up focusing even on the zoom lenses, then the other problem is how long the battery can last. Surely it is going to drain the battery fast with focusing and IS turned on.
Not bad at all. I’d like to see off-center AF performance and some basic hit-rate work in a variety of conditions, burst vs. single shot, moving subjects, etc., but for an adapter, that’s a huge step up from Sony.
I am sure all of that will come once the camera is actually available. Still, what we see here is impressive and light-years better than the current A7 lineup.
Which adapter was being used here?
It looks to be one of the Metabones adapters.
wow sony is full force ahead. impressive stuff.
Is it a hardware or software change on the A7RII that gives the increased performance? Would be nice to see a firmware improvement to something like the A7II in this area, though guessing Sony might not be too quick to add that since it’s a differentiator for the higher $ model.
I think it is a mix of updated algorithms and software, in addition to updated hardware. I would think that some software improvements could be coming to the A7 II, but the hardware stuff may prevent such a drastic improvement to the A7 II’s performance.