Introduction

Ease of Use

On paper at least the Sony A7S offers almost everything that the experienced photographer could want - a 35mm CMOS sensor with very sensible 12 megapixel resolution, interchangeable lenses, an OLED electronic viewfinder, a large and high-resolution LCD screen, full control over exposure via a variety of external controls, and 14-bit Raw file format support, all housed inside a compact and lightweight body that you can just about squeeze into a jacket pocket without a lens attached. Compared to a DSLR, the only notable thing that's really missing is a built-in pop-up flash.

Despite its large image sensor, the aluminium bodied Sony A7S is still quite small and slender, measuring just over 4.8cms in depth, 9.5cms in height and 12.7cms in width, and weighing 446g without a lens, battery and memory card fitted. There's a generously sized textured area for gripping the camera on the front with three fingers, and a large thumb-shaped lozenge on the rear, which makes the A7S easy to literally get to grips with, important as the rest of its aluminum body is very smooth.

Located on the minimalist front of the A7S is the lens mount and a small porthole on the left for the self-timer/AF illuminator, plus the front control dial which is set into the top of the handgrip. The A7S uses the E bayonet mount, but because the image sensor is so large, putting a regular E-mount lens on this camera will cause varying amounts of vignetting (which could be removed in post-processing) or an APS-C crop, which given the limited amount of megapixels on offer isn't a good idea. You can also use Sony's range of A-mount lenses by fitting the LA-E4 adapter, but that adds extra bulk and expense to the overall package.

So it's best to use Sony's new range of lenses with the "FE" name, denoting "full-frame E-mount". We were sent the Carl Zeiss Sonnar T* 55mm F1.8 for review with the A7S. The only other FE lenses that are currently available are the Carl Zeiss Sonnar T* 35mm F2.8, Carl Zeiss Vario-Tessar T* 24-70mm F4 ZA OSS, Sony 28-70mm F3.5-5.6 OSS and the Sony G Lens 70-200mm F4 OSS. In addition, the Sony A7S/A7 can be used with a wide variety of third-party lenses by buying and fitting suitable adapters.

On top the A7S has an external hotshoe, dubbed the Multi Interface Shoe, for attaching one of a range of accessories, including an external flash. Turn the On/Off switch on the top plate and the Sony A7S readies itself for action in a just over a second. The adequately sized shutter-release button has a definite halfway point, determining focus and exposure with a bleep of affirmation and focus points highlighted as green rectangles on the LCD. Note that when you do fire the shutter, it emits a rather loud mechanical sound that isn't particularly well-suited to more candid photography.

Which is exactly where the exciting new Silent Shooting function comes in. As its name suggests, enabling this function (buried on page 4 of the Settings menu) makes the A7S absolutely silent by using a fully electronic shutter to both start and stop the exposure. In conjunction with the incredible ISO range, this turns the A7S into a candid photographer's dream ticket, and is one of the main reasons for choosing the A7S as a stills camera in preference to the A7/A7R, which don't offer this function.

Front	Rear

The A7S uses a 25-point contrast-based auto-focusing system, dubbed "Fast Intelligent AF", rather than the phase-detection systems that DSLRs typically use. Although a little quicker than the A7 camera, the the A7S's AF system does still suffer from a slight lag when shooting in good light or bad. It's certainly not terrible, but it's still enough to limit the A7S's use to slower moving subjects, and it's also not up there with quicker contrast-based auto-focusing systems from the likes of Olympus and Panasonic on their compact system cameras.

When you choose to manually focus, a distance scale is displayed along the bottom of the LCD screen, MF Assist can be turned on to magnify the image and help you get sharp results, and there's also the same convenient Peaking and Zebra functions from Sony's DSLRs that highlights sharply-focused areas of the image on the LCD screen. Go on to take the shot and JPEG or Raw images are quickly committed to memory in a single second, the screen momentarily blanking out and then displaying the captured image before the user can go on to take a second shot.

A round shooting mode dial with a knurled edge and positive action is also located on top of the A7S. This lets you quickly switch between the various shooting modes that are on offer. Sony has included Intelligent Auto scene recognition, which works in virtually identical fashion to the intelligent auto modes of Panasonic's and Canon's compact ranges. Simply point the A7S at a scene or subject and the camera analyses it and automatically chooses one of a number of pre-optimised settings to best suit.

Adding to the A7S's snapshot simplicity, these features accompany face recognition and smile shutter functionality on board, the former mode biasing human faces in the frame and the latter mode firing the shutter when it detects a smiling subject. The Face Detection system automatically adjusts the focus, exposure and white balance for people in the frame, and can even be set to distinguish between children and adults. Smile Detection offers three self-explanatory options, Big, Normal and Slight. Used in conjunction, the Face and Smile Detection systems do result in more hits than misses, especially in contrasty lighting conditions, although all those smiling faces could ultimately freak you out a little! The self-portrait options in the self-timer menu work by automatically taking the shot with a two second delay after either one or two people have entered the frame.

In addition to the regular Program mode, which provides the full range of camera options and additionally allows you to change settings like the ISO speed and metering, is the welcome inclusion of Aperture-priority, Shutter-priority and fully Manual modes which let you independently set the aperture and shutter speed, making the A7S instantly appeal to the more experienced photographer. The ability to choose from 30-1/8000th second shutter speeds opens up a lot of creative potential. There's also very welcome support for the RAW file format, which is really the icing on the cake for serious photographers. Two Custom modes on the shooting mode dial allow you quickly access different combinations of settings.

The proven Sweep Panorama mode lets you capture a panoramic image very easily without the use of a tripod. All you need to decide is whether you would like to start from left or right, top or bottom. Then press and hold down the shutter release while doing a "sweep" with the camera in hand. Exposure compensation is available before you start the sweep, but the exposure is fixed once you depress the shutter button. After you are done with the sweeping, the camera does all the processing required, and presents you with a finished panoramic image. There are two modes, Standard and Wide. Note that if you do the sweeping too slowly or quickly, or you let go of the shutter release button too early, the panorama will be truncated.

Front	Tilting LCD Screen

In the clever Hand-held Twilight and Anti Motion Blur scene modes, the A7S takes six shots in a rapid sequence, typically at a high sensitivity setting and a (relatively) fast shutter speed, and then combines them into a single image that has somewhat less noise than a single shot taken at the same ISO and exposure settings. In our experience, the difference between the two modes is that in Anti Motion Blur mode, the camera is more willing to pick a really high ISO setting to maintain a fast shutter speed, whereas in Hand-held Twilight mode, it will only go as high as absolutely necessary to avoid camera shake at the chosen focal length. If light levels are truly low, however, the A7S will pick a high ISO speed even in this mode.

The small dedicated Movie button on the rear of the A7S allows you to start recording a movie with a single push of a button, and then stop recording by pressing the same button - a lot more intuitive than having to select the movie mode then press the shutter button, as on most compacts. The Sony A7S can output uncompressed UHD 4K, 3840 x 2160 pixel video (30p/24p/25p) at a 4:2:2 color depth without downsampling, but only over HDMI to compatible third party recorders, rather than to a memory card. With no compatible recorders available at launch, we'll have to take Sony's word for it at the moment until products like the Atomos Shogun are launched (at a hefty $2000). The A7S also supports the XAVC S format, which is based on the professional XAVC codec and records full-pixel readout Full HD video footage at up to 50Mbps. In addition HD footage can be recorded at 100 fps in XAVC S mode for slow motion replays.

The A7S can also shoot 1920x1280 pixel video at 60p/50p/60i/50i or 25p/24p in the AVCHD format, and 1440x1280 or 640x480 pixels at 30fps in the MPEG4 format. There's the ability to change the EV level, white balance, metering, ISO speed, DRO/HDR, creative style and picture effect, plus various audio recording options. If you set the shooting mode dial to Movie, you can also choose from Program, Aperture or Shutter priority and Manual modes, giving you full control over exposure for both stills and movies.

The clean HDMI output from the camera also allows video to be viewed on an external monitor or recorded on another device. High-resolution still images can be displayed directly on a 4K television, offering four times the detail of Full HD. The A7S incorporates extensive customizable color and gamma controls, offering the ability to adjust the gamma, black level, knee, color level, and more, as well as use the same S-Log2 Gamma Curve that is found on high end Sony Cinema cameras, plus it offers multiple timecode recording options to meet different workflows.

The Sony A7S can shoot full-resolution 12 megapixel pictures at up to 5fps, quite a fast rate for a 35mm full-frame camera. To achieve the full 5fps you need to set the drive mode to the Speed Priority Continuous option, which locks the focus and the exposure at the first frame. The A7S's regular continuous burst shooting can change the focus and exposure between frames but provides a slower rate of 2.5fps.

The Clear Image Zoom function effectively digitally doubles the zoom range of the attached lens, using Sony's Pixel Super Resolution Technology to increase the magnification. The Auto Object Framing mode uses face detection and the rule of thirds to automatically crop and create more tightly framed shots. The same Pixel Super Resolution Technology ensures that the resulting image is still a full 12 megapixels in size, and the original uncropped image is also saved for easy comparison.

Sony's long-standing D-Range Optimizer and HDR functions are present to help even out tricky exposures, for example where a bright background would normally throw the foreground into deep shadow. You can see from the examples on the Image Quality page that these features produce a photo with noticeably more dynamic range than one taken using one of the standard shooting modes, but at the same time without replicating the often "false" look of many HDR programs, and both offer a wide degree of customisation that's previously only been seen on Sony's DSLR/SLT range.

Top	Side

Completing the top of the A7S is a second prominent dial for setting Exposure Compensation and a small button marked with C1, which as the name suggests can be customised to access one of the camera's key controls (it's handily set to Focus Point by default).

On the back, instead of the bulky optical viewfinder of a conventional DSLR, the Sony A7S has an electronic viewfinder. The OLED electronic viewfinder on the A7S is borrowed from the A7/A7R cameras and is simply excellent. It has a large 0.71x magnification, 100% field of view, and a staggeringly high 2,359,000 dot equivalent resolution, resulting in a display that's virtually indistinguishable from a more traditional optical viewfinder.

As the EVF is reading the same signal from the image sensor as the rear LCD screen, it can also display similar information, with a choice of five display modes. For example, you can view and operate the A7S's Function Menu, giving a true preview of the scene in front of you and quick access to all the key camera settings while it's held up to your eye. The various icons used to represent the camera settings are clear and legible. The icing on the viewing cake is the clever built-in eye sensor, which automatically switches on the viewfinder when you look into it, then switches it off and turns on the LCD monitor when you look away.

The A7S's EVF system also performs very well indoors in low light, typically the scourge of most EVFs which have to "gain-up" to produce a usable picture, resulting in a noticeably grainier picture. The A7S doesn't suffer from this unwanted effect at all, making its electronic viewfinder the equal of and in many areas better than a DSLR's optical viewfinder. The truest testament to the A7S is that we almost exclusively used it by holding it up to eye-level, something that we wouldn't do unless the EVF was of sufficient quality.

There's also a large 3-inch, 921K-dot resolution LCD screen which can be tilted up to 45° downwards to shoot over crowds or up to 84° upwards and comfortably used outdoors even in harsh sunlight, although it can't be rotated to the side. Located above the screen and to either side of the EVF are the Menu and C2 buttons.

Press the Menu button and a number of shooting and set up folders appear on screen, with white text on a black background aiding visibility. The seven shooting folders allow users to select image size, ratio and quality and - if JPEG (RAW and RAW+JPEG also available) - compression rates too, plus features like long exposure and high ISO noise reduction - all in fact activated as a default, and also contains the video quality and audio options, while the six Customise folders allow you to tweak the A7S to your way of working. Wi-fi, Apps, Playback, and Setup folders complete the long list of configurable options. By default the C2 button allows you to position the magnification point when manual focusing and zoom in by up to 14.4x, but as the name suggests it can be customised to another function.

To the right is the chunky rear control dial and a useful one-touch movie record button embedded within the edge of the rubberised thumb-rest. Underneath is the combined AF/MF and Auto Exposure Lock (AEL) switch/button, and underneath that the Function button which accesses up to 12 customisable options that appear on in two horizontal columns along the bottom of the LCD screen. The Function menu proves to be a very handy way to quickly change the A7S's key settings and one of the main ways of setting the camera to suit your shooting style.

Memory Card Slot	Battery Compartment

The traditional round navigation pad can be used to navigate through menus and options, in conjunction with the small button in the middle which activates whatever it is you've chosen. Three of the four directions on the navigation pad can also be customised to provide a quick way of setting various options. The navigation pad doubles up as a control ring that's used to navigate through and set menu options, and usefully also sets the ISO speed by default. The ring is a little small, but it's not too over-sensitive and the ability to take full control of the A7S is very welcome. In total the Sony A7r offers nine customisable buttons and 46 assignable functions, making it very easy to configure to suit your particular requirements.

Underneath the navigation pad is the Playback button, which gives users the ability to dip in and out of created folders of images or the calendar view, view thumbnails, select slideshows and choose transitional effects and accompanying music, or delete shots. Press the shutter button halfway and you're helpfully catapulted back into capture mode. And that's basically it. With a press of the Menu button in playback, users have access to a few in-camera retouching effects, including the ability to crop and sharpen an image and apply red-eye correction. Completing the rear of the A7S is the self-explanatory Delete button, which doubles up as the customisable C3 button (accessing the wi-fi options by default).

As denoted by symbols on the side of the camera, the Sony A7S is wi-fi and NFC capable and the functions can be adjusted in the Wi-fi main menu. You can choose to transmit the images to either a smartphone computer, or a compatible TV set. One cool feature of the wi-fi is being able to link the camera to your smart phone using the PlayMemories Mobile app. You can then use the phone as a remote so those outstretched arm 'selfies' will be a thing of the past. The A7S also features NFC (Near Field Communication) technology (the same technology that's used for mobile payments), which allows you to connect it to a compatible internet enabled device or another NFC-enabled camera by simply tapping them together. You can also use the WPS Push option to locate a hot spot, access settings, edit the device name, display the MAC address or format all settings if you wish.

In addition to the built-in wi-fi/NFC connectivity, the A7S supports PlayMemories Camera Apps. As the name suggests, this is a downloadable service that lets you add new functionality to the camera, either via wi-fi or USB connection. Smart Remote Control, which allows you to control the exposure and shutter release via your smartphone, is preinstalled on the A7S. Other optional apps available include Picture Effect+, Bracket Pro, Multi Frame NR, Photo Retouchand Direct Upload, and Sony plans to provide more new apps in the near future. Note that only some of the apps are free.

The bottom of the Sony A7S features a standard metal screw thread for attaching it to a tripod that's inline with the centre of the lens mount. A lockable plastic cover protects the lithium-ion battery, officially good for 320 shots. In practice we only got around 250 shots when using the electronic viewfinder and LCD screen, which obviously draw on the battery for power. Sony have listened to their customers and now supply an external battery charger and not one, but two batteries with the A7S (the A7/A7R don't ship with an external charger), and you can still charge the battery via the USB port if you wish.

The removable memory card is housed within a compartment located on the right of the A7S (when viewed from the rear), with the A7S supporting the SD / SDHC / SDXC format in addition to Sony's own proprietary Pro Duo Memory Stick format. Positioned on both sides of the A7S are prominent metal eyelets for attaching the supplied shoulder strap. On the left are two unmarked, sturdy plastic covers, underneath which can be found the Multi port, HDMI port, and the external headphone and microphone connections.

Image Quality

All of the sample images in this review were taken using the 12 megapixel Fine JPEG setting, which gives an average image size of around 5Mb.

The Sony A7S produced images of outstanding quality during the review period. The Sony A7S has a very extensive and usable ISO range of 50-409,600. ISO 50-3200 is noise-free, whilst ISO 6400 and 12,800 produce more than acceptable results, and even ISO 25,600 and 51,200 are OK for emergency use. The fastest settings of 102,400, 204,800 and 409,600 are very noisy, but they do let you shoot in virtually complete darkness. The RAW samples illustrate just how much processing the camera does by default, though, as they're much noisier at all ISO values than their JPEG counterparts.

The 312megapixel images are a little soft straight out of the camera using the default creative style and ideally require some further sharpening in an application like Adobe Photoshop, or you can change the in-camera sharpening level. The night photograph was excellent, with the maximum shutter speed of 30 seconds and the Bulb mode offering lots of scope for creative night photography.

The effective Dynamic Range Optimizer function extracts more detail from the shadow and highlight areas in an image, without introducing any unwanted noise or other artifacts. The High Dynamic Range mode combines two shots taken at different exposures to produce one image with greater dynamic range than a single image would produce. It only works for JPEGs and for still subjects, but does produce some very effective results. Sony's now tried-and-trusted Sweep Panorama is still a joy to use. The various Picture Effects quickly produce special looks that would otherwise require you to spend a lot of time in the digital darkroom, while the Creative Styles provide a quick and easy way to tweak the camera's JPEG images.

Noise

There are 10 ISO settings available on the Sony A7S. Here are some 100% crops which show the noise levels for each ISO setting for both JPEG and RAW formats:

JPEG	RAW
ISO 50 (100% Crop)	ISO 50 (100% Crop)
ISO 64 (100% Crop)	ISO 64 (100% Crop)
ISO 80 (100% Crop)	ISO 80 (100% Crop)
ISO 100 (100% Crop)	ISO 100 (100% Crop)
ISO 200 (100% Crop)	ISO 200 (100% Crop)
ISO 400 (100% Crop)	ISO 400 (100% Crop)
ISO 800 (100% Crop)	ISO 800 (100% Crop)
ISO 1600 (100% Crop)	ISO 1600 (100% Crop)
ISO 3200 (100% Crop)	ISO 3200 (100% Crop)
ISO 6400 (100% Crop)	ISO 6400 (100% Crop)
ISO 12800 (100% Crop)	ISO 12800 (100% Crop)
ISO 25600 (100% Crop)	ISO 25600 (100% Crop)
ISO 51200 (100% Crop)	ISO 51200 (100% Crop)
ISO 102400 (100% Crop)	ISO 102400 (100% Crop)
ISO 204800 (100% Crop)	ISO 204800 (100% Crop)
ISO 409600 (100% Crop)	ISO 409600 (100% Crop)

Sharpening

Here are two 100% crops which have been Saved as Web - Quality 50 in Photoshop. The right-hand image has had some sharpening applied in Photoshop. The out-of-the camera images are a little soft at the default sharpening setting. You can change the in-camera sharpening level if you don't like the default look.

Original (100% Crop)	Sharpened (100% Crop)

File Quality

The Sony A7S has 3 different image quality settings available, with Extra Fine being the highest quality option. Here are some 100% crops which show the quality of the various options, with the file size shown in brackets.

12M Extra Fine (7.81Mb) (100% Crop)	12M Fine (3.87Mb) (100% Crop)
12M Standard (2.71Mb) (100% Crop)	12M RAW (12.4Mb) (100% Crop)

Night

The Sony A7S's maximum shutter speed is 30 seconds and there's also a Bulb mode for even longer exposures, which is excellent news if you're seriously interested in night photography. The shot below was taken using a shutter speed of 30 seconds at ISO 100.

Night	Night (100% Crop)

Dynamic Range Optimizer

D-Range Optimiser (DRO) is Sony's solution to improve shadow detail in photos taken in contrasty light. There are 5 different levels and an Auto option.

Off	Auto
Level 1	Level 2
Level 3	Level 4
Level 5

High Dynamic Range

High Dynamic Range Optimiser (HDR) is Sony's solution for capturing more contrast than a single exposure can handle by combining two exposures into one image. There are 6 different EV settings and an Auto option.

Off	Auto
1EV	2EV
3EV	4EV
5EV	6EV

Creative Styles

There are 13 Creative Style preset effects that you can use to change the look of your images.

Standard	Vivid
Neutral	Clear
Deep	Light
Portrait	Landscape
Sunset	Night Scene
Autumn Leaves	Black & White
Sepia

Picture Effects

The Sony A7S offers a range of thirteen creative Picture Effects.

Off	Toy Camera
Pop Color	Posterization
Retro Photo	Soft High-key
Partial Color (Red)	High Contrast Mono
Soft Focus	HDR Painting
Rich-tone Mono	Miniature

Sweep Panorama Mode

The Sony A7S allows you to take panoramic images very easily, by 'sweeping' with the camera while keeping the shutter release depressed. The camera does all the processing and stitching and even successfully compensates for moving subjects. The main catch is that the resulting image is of fairly low resolution.

Standard

Wide

Sample Images

This is a selection of sample images from the Sony A7S camera, which were all taken using the 12 megapixel Fine JPEG setting. The thumbnails below link to the full-sized versions, which have not been altered in any way.

Sample RAW Images

The Sony A7S enables users to capture RAW and JPEG format files. We've provided some Sony RAW (ARW) samples for you to download (thumbnail images shown below are not 100% representative).

Sample Movies & Video

Product Images

Front of the Sony A7S

Front of the Sony A7S

Side of the Sony A7S

Side of the Sony A7S

Isometric View

Side of the Sony A7S

Rear of the Sony A7S

Rear of the Sony A7S / Image Displayed

Rear of the Sony A7S / Turned On

Rear of the Sony A7S / Main Menu

Rear of the Sony A7S / Function Menu

Rear of the Sony A7S / Wi-Fi Menu

Tilting LCD Screen

Tilting LCD Screen

Tilting LCD Screen

Tilting LCD Screen

Top of the Sony A7S

Bottom of the Sony A7S

Side of the Sony A7S

Side of the Sony A7S

Front of the Sony A7S

Front of the Sony A7S

Memory Card Slot

Battery Compartment

Conclusion

If low-light shooting is your thing, then the Sony A7S should be right at the top of your shopping list. Offering a killer combination of massive ISO range, 15-stop dynamic range, sensible 12 megapixel resolution on a full-frame sensor, truly silent shooting mode and autofocusing down to EV-4, the new Sony A7S is the most capable low-light camera that we've ever tested. It does still have a few flaws, most notably the slightly sluggish auto-focusing, in-camera charging, and the still limited number of FE lenses, but all in all the Sony A7S is a great addition to last year's exciting A7 and A7R.

The A7S' 12.2 megapixel sensor provides excellent results from ISO 50-12,800, while ISO 25,600 and 51,200 are fine for making smaller prints and web use. The fastest settings of 102,400, 204,800 and 409,600 are very noisy but astonishingly do let you shoot in almost total darkness. The A7S and the fast Carl Zeiss 55mm f/1.8 lens that we tested it with feel perfectly balanced together, hitting the sweet spot between portability and image quality, and it's hard to resist the lure of shooting wide-open at f/1.8 in combination with such a big sensor.

The addition of 4K video has also earned the A7S a lot of headlines, although it can only do so when recording to an external, expensive recorder, unlike its main competitor, the Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH4. Still, with XAVC S support and a veritable wealth of videographer-friendly options also on-board, the Sony A7S is both a very capable stills and movie camera, especially if you can't get enough of that unique full-frame look.

In terms of operational speed and all-round performance, the A7S delivers on most counts. Shutter lag is only notable by its apparent absence, and image processing times are non-intrusive. This camera really does deliver DSLR-like performance and image quality in a pocketable format, with the continued exception of the auto-focusing speed, which despite improvement still lags behind the very best contrast-based and DSLR phase-detection systems.

In terms of price, the Sony A7S is roughly comparable to full-frame DSLR models from Canon (the 5D Mark III) and Nikon (the D810), while being a lot more expensive than top-of-the range compact system cameras like the Olympus OM-D E-M1 and the Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH4. You really need to decide if the combination of such a large sensor, huge ISO range and small body make sense for you - if it does, then there's simply nothing else quite like the new Sony A7S, making it worthy of our Essential! award.

Ratings (out of 5)
Design	5
Features	5
Ease-of-use	4.5
Image quality	5
Value for money	4.5

Main Rivals

Listed below are some of the rivals of the Sony A7S.

Specifications

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