Trend: people are starting to realize that the Sony Alpha 900 is a great camera.
The Sony A900 and the Nikon D3
"If I were an art photographer, especially shooting for fine printmaking, I'd get the A900. Its image quality is superlative, yet it's still reasonably portable, fun and comfortable to shoot with, and easy to use."Sony Alpha 900: Camera Test: From megapixels to viewfinders to sensors, size matters.
"Resolution? Excellent across all ISOs. It was best at ISO 100, with 3230 lines. For comparison, Canon's 21.1MP EOS-1Ds Mark III ($7,500, street, body only) scored 2830 lines and Nikon's 12.3MP D700 ($2,700, street, body only; $3,375 with 24-120mm f/3.5-5.6G ED-IF AF-S VR lens) turned in 2350 lines in the same test."Judging Value
"That's something of what I feel about the D3x and why I cancelled my order. Yes, I can afford it, but I simply find it not to represent good value. After testing the 24MP Sony A900 (which I purchased for less than the equivalent of US $2,500 here in Toronto last month) the thought of paying US $8,000 for a camera that that has the same resolution, the same frame rates, a similar large and bright viewfinder, etc, just seemed to me to be a bad value proposition. The Canon 5DII at well under $3,000 is another current alternative in a full-frame 20+ MP camera."Sony A900 Field Review: And Then There Were Three
"In the light of the just announced (Dec 1, 2008) price for the Nikon D3x (US $8,000) the inherent goodness of the Sony A900 comes into focus (no pun intended). For the cost of a D3x one can buy a Sony A900 plus the exceptional Zeiss 24-70mm f/2.8 lens, the very fine Sony 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6, a Sony A700 body as a backup, a flash, a couple of 16 GB high speed memory cards, and still have enough left over to pay the sales taxes. The same goes for the Canon 5D MKII, though you'll have to pick two or three of your favourite lenses from that company's lens line-up and something like the 50D body as backup instead."
3 comments:
Nice collection of some really telling quotes. I agree that the A900 is a killer camera. Yet, I still need to be convinced about their lens selection, particularly medium, and super telephoto.
True.
Also, they will eventually need to fire up a pro-support program if the goal is to compete with N & C.
That might not be the goal, however -- I expect the price gap between that $8000 Nikon and the $3000 Sony and Canon models points to what is coming. In two years we'll likely see cameras with first-rate pro features under the $2,000 price point. Not much of a need to persuade folks about pro-support if they can afford to have two backup bodies already in the camera bag....
I think they'll quickly find they need a mid-price line in lenses if that's the case, though. Minolta was pretty good at that -- you could get a 135mm f/2.8 for a reasonable price, a 28mm f/2 and so on, rather than pony up for the G lenses or now the Zeiss line. While it's great that the lenses at the plus $1,000 level are there (and a 24mp camera sorta demands that) it would be great if someone could build a reasonable lineup with a few $400 lenses. Which you currently can in the C & N lineups.
tf
I agree with Chris, nice stuff
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