Sony a7RII Review - Hands-on, Iceland Landscapes, Weddings

My Review of the Sony a7RII after using for a month, what I love, What I hate and some thoughts if this is the camera for you.

Support my work -

The ONE lens you want -

Recommended Accessories:

USB Charger mentioned NP-FW50 Dual Rapid Battery Charger for Sony

Find and Follow me at:

[aubreyjk]

Easily the most comprehensive A7R II review out there. Great job Toby!

[crazyZayZay]

After hours of watching reviews, you finally help me decide Toby! Will be getting this tomorrow.

[MDMiller]

Just watched A7RII review and while heavily invested in Nikon equipment, wanted to follow the mirrorless stories. I found your overview and reviews extremely will organized and presented, more than any other of my popular youtube subscriptions, by a mile. I was impressed with your impartial experiences even though you had already bought the camera. So, I subscribed to your channel and look forward to seeing your other presentations. Michael, West Hartford, CT

[Txwhitacre]

In a nut shell your review is fair and spot on. I have both the A6000 and the A7rII and you did a fantastic job talking about the good and the bad. Me, I'm satisfied with mine for what it does for me.

[rraul]

oh man!The quality of your videos has improved remarkably. I have been watching your videos for 2 years now. Cheers!

[kevincucci]

Toby, this is one of the best, if not the best video reviews of a camera I have watched in years. The information, quality, and effort put into this is amazing! I love your work, keep it up! Loyal fan here.

[RickMentore]

The most in dept review of the R M2 so far! Very well done Toby. In the future consider doing you reviews out of the studio. You flow was proficient and you seemed relaxed when dispensing your know how.

[fredgarvin]

This should be the gold standard on how to do a youtube video review about anything! Straight to the points with clear detail about the subject. I can't really understand why there are any down votes.

[parikshitmadhukar]

Watching this in 2020, as I'm getting this now at 900$. This camera is still relevant now as image quality is awesome.

[studiofilms]

Toby. Just wanted to send you a quick note to tell you thank you for this review. Perfect balance of good with the bad with just enough information.

[KiranRaszka]

Can't believe you've dropped it already! +PhotoRec Toby

[nagol]

I know part of the camera is having a smaller camera. However, I would buy the battery grip for weddings and not use it when you want the camera to be small. The battery grip with it in airplane mode, you should be able to get through a wedding without changing the battery. If you do have to change it, you won't have to worry about thinking about it as much. The Sony glass is a different experience on the A7R. As much as I love Canon glass, I know if I went Sony again I'd get Sony glass. The Zeiss glass is just so good. It was the best glass I ever used. You don't really need to spend too much. All you really need is a 16-35, 55mm 1.8, and then the Zeiss batis 85mm. I personally like a 135 for portraits, and I'm sure that's coming. Besides the wide angle, you do have to use primes instead of zooms unless you're okay with F/4. I believe I'd be happy with just those 3 lenses, and then 4 if they come out with a 135. When I'm away from Sony, I'm not a huge 50mm shooter, but the Sony 55mm Zeiss is so sharp, it's just too hard to not shoot with it. And considering there isn't a 24-70 2.8 zoom, you get the whole range with the 16-35, 55, and 85.

[jimsaunders]

Great review. I've purchased a preowned A7Rii. Will receive it soon. Watching your review convinces me I made a good choice.

[djhogg]

I have been using Sony Broadcast cameras since 1980 and the Betacam days, Sony makes great cameras.

[Geebax]

Thank your for the review, can you please say which lens you use most with the camera?

[mohammadrabiee]

A fair and nice review of the A7RII . Not seen like this before . Thanks Toby .

[sevenine]

@12:28
Fn key, you can put 12 favs settings. Hover and use dial to adjust etc.
Quick way to things you use most.

Maybe not customize the entire menu system, maybe it's not perfect, but it's there to help your workflow.

[PrabhuSukumaran]

Great review as usual. I am really conflicted between Sony A7 R II and Canon 5D Mark IV after deciding to move from entry level SLR (760D) to PRO. I do have 3 Canon lenses already. However, I see from your review that the autofocus is fantastic in Sony but still confused. Suggestions are welcome to help me decide.

[annamcg]

I love mine! I bought it for wedding low light capabilities. The ISO handling is amazing. I've always love Sony. I switched to Nikon a few years ago and everytime I used it I would miss my Sony alpha. I agree with the 1300 pics and 2 1/2 battery for a 12 hr wedding lol. For the reviews I don't know if I've heard anyone mention how huge of a memory card you will need and a faster one also. But if all I have to complain about is the 42 MP then that's really not much to complain about lol. Thanks for your wonderful review!!

[smartwarden]

About the overheating, there are 2 modes to record 4k, Full frame mode and Super35 mode, there is also the bitrate, which is very important, 60mbps and 100mbps.
The difference between the full frame mode and the super35 mode, besides the crop factor, is the line skipping when reading from the sensor otherwise known as pixel binning, in full frame mode the camera skips lines when it's recording 4k video, which is understandable considering this is a very big sensor with a massive resolution, if no pixel binning was allowed on full frame mode the camera would probably give up after 2 or 3 minutes of recording, people need to understand the huge amount of processing required for this.
Now in super35 mode the camera doesn't skip lines when it's recording 4k which means the camera is processing so much more data than in full frame mode, add to that the 100mbps bitrate and push it even further with the ibis and the camera will simply not be able to handle all that for a long amount of time.
Now, if dynamic range and low light are crucial then one should record in super35, otherwise full frame mode is more than enough and you will probably avoid overheating.
If you must shoot in super35 INTERNALLY then you might consider shooting at 60mbps, again you'll probably avoid overheating.
Many professional videographers are using this camera with external recorders shooting super35 4k at the highest bitrate, they get ProRes and they bypass that 29 minutes limit, and obviously no overheating while shooting a back up mp4 internally that they use for editing instead, it makes work in post a breeze.
I hope this helps :)