What do you get when you cross two of the biggest camera trends of the year? That will be the brand new Sony A7C – a small full-frame camera (tick) that is also aimed toward vloggers and YouTubers (double tick).
In the launch’s build-up, Sony promised a “new concept” for its Alpha range. And while the Sony A7C is more like a combination of two existing camera lines – the Sony A6000 series and Sony A7 series – it is still an exciting prospect for anyone who’s been waiting for a full-frame version of the Sony A6600.
Despite having a 24.2MP back-illuminated full-frame sensor, the Sony A7C isn’t noticeably bigger than the highly compact Sony A6600. In fact, the A7C weighs just 6g more than its APS-C cousin (at 509g in total), and is only fractionally taller and wider. That means it’s not a lot bigger than the tiny Sigma FP.
This is all of the more spectacular when you consider that the A7C also packs in five-axis in-body image stabilization (IBIS), thanks to a newly designed system, and Sony’s high-capacity Z battery. The latter has been one of the best new features on Sony’s recent cameras and promises to deliver 680 shots per charge (when using the viewfinder) or around three hours of video capturing.
So what makes the Sony A7C another contender for best vlogging camera? It packs in a lot of the features that one-person video crews look for, including a side-hinged touchscreen, large film file button, and the twin benefit of headphone and microphone jacks to boost the audio quality.
Aside from the pro-focused Sony A7S III, the Sony A7C also goes bigger on video features than any of its A7 stablemates. You get Sony’s wonderful Actual-time Eye AF system, plus Actual-time topic monitoring. It also shoots 4K/30p video (oversampled from 6K, with no pixel binning), Full HD at 120p, and does all this with no recording limits.
A mini Sony A7S III?
Whereas vlogging beginners are better off going for something just like the Sony ZV-1, the Sony A7C does carry a wealth of choices for individuals who like to get a bit extra concerned with their video capturing and enhancing.
There are S-Log and HLG profiles for colour grading your movies, plus a number of the wonderful autofocus transition velocity management that we noticed on the Sony A7S III. You possibly can select from seven totally different AF speeds or from 5 AF sensitivity settings to ensure you get the appropriate search for your movies.
On the downside, the Sony A7C does not supply 4K/60p video recording and is restricted to 8-bit colour depth. The previous is out there on the Panasonic Lumix S5, which may additionally shoot 10-bit video internally.
Like the latter, the A7C can also be launching with a brand new small, light-weight lens that enhances its size. The FE 28-60mm f/4-5.6 weighs solely 167g, bringing the mixed camera and lens weight to solely 676g. For a full-frame camera with IBIS, that is extremely gentle, and makes it about two-thirds the scale and weight of a Sony A7 III when the latter is coupled with an FE 28-70mm f/3.5-5.6 OSS lens.
Naturally, the combination of this size and the A7C’s performance makes it fairly expensive.
It will be out there in October in two different variations – there’ll be a black possibility or a two-tone black/silver model to select from, with each our bodies costing $1,800 / £1,900 / AU$3,299. You can also get the package that includes the brand new FE 28-60mm f/4-5.6 lens for a slightly greater worth of $2,100 / £2,150 / AU$3,899.
This makes the A7C costlier than the Sony A7 III and Panasonic Lumix S5, although the video features may properly justify the fee for vloggers and YouTubers seeking to up their game to skilled high quality. We’ll carry you our full evaluation very soon.