Mirrorless cameras come of age.

I switched from one of the two industry leading DSLR cameras to Sony when they announced the a9.

We often hear the words “groundbreaking,” “cutting edge,” “revolutionary” to describe new photo technology, and the a9 is all of these and more.

I would call the a9 an “Evolutionary Change” in still image capture. Much like the invention of the negative 1840, roll film 1885, SLR cameras 1949, digital photography 1975, and the first professional DSLR 1994. The Sony a9 is the first Mirrorless camera to fit into any professional’s photographers workflow.

While Sony has attracted many great wedding, portrait and environmental photographers they couldn’t break into the sports and photojournalism market in a big way, that’s until now with the Sony a9.

What were the things attracted to change to the a9?

Auto Focus: The a9 will track continuously a subject’s eye, face or body over 90% of the full frame sampled at 60 times a second using 693 AF points. When shooting a tennis match with the a9, I could freely compose the player in the viewfinder while the focus tracked her eye, it was a remarkable experience.

High Frame Rates: The ability to shoot high frames per second (fps) isn’t something I would not recommend as you create large amounts of data to deal with post-capture. But there are instances where shooting 20 Frames per Second (fps) makes a difference like in Horse racing where you are trying to get all the horses hooves off the ground that’s when 20 fps comes in handy.

I shoot downhill ski racing every year and know that when I photograph racers coming through a gate, I may get one or two peak action photos. At 20fps I should be able to get double that amount with the Sony a9 and can’t wait for this years ski season to start.

Silent Operations: Photojournalists have to fly on the most of the time and to have DSLR shutter noise can interfere with the moment.

But also shutter sound has played a role in rules for photography at events like Golf. During Golf tournaments, you can only shoot after ball contact to avoid the disturbing golfer’s shots.

A silent (electronic) shutter his has implications in other sporting and news events like the start of the Olympic 100 Meter dash, or in the White House during those press conferences where the noise from DSLR mirror and shutter mechanisms dominate the TV networks audio feeds.

I can hardly wait to shoot the US Open Golf this year using an a9 at 20fps silently while the AF system is eye tracking a golfer as he drives off the tee. We are going to see pictures during tournament play we have never seen before.

Battery Life: Has long been an issue with some Sony cameras. It was not uncommon for photographers to a pocket full of batteries while covering events. Sony has tackled this head on with a new battery for the a9.

At this year’s Kentucky Derby with a9 cameras on remote, I got 6-8 hours of battery life, with the rear LCD always on and camera in ready to fire mode. The newly developed NP-FZ100 battery offers more than twice the life of the previous NP-FW50 used in a7’s. There is also an optional VG-C3EM Vertical Grip that can hold two NP-FZ100 batteries for extended shooting situations. This grip, like the grip for the a7 series cameras, make camera handling and vertical shooting comfortable. Note: a7 series grips are not compatible with the a9 because of the slightly larger NP-FZ100 battery

Dual Memory Card Slots: A standard in other professional cameras comes to the a9. It can be configured to simultaneously backup still/movie data, save RAW/JPEG images to different cards, and copy between cards. Lower card slot (Slot 1) supports UHS-II type cards is available for fast transfer speeds.

Electronic View Finder: The a9 has a new high-resolution 3686k-dot electronic viewfinder (EVF) has amazingly beautiful detail, and I found it great to review and zoom in images to check image sharpness through the viewfinder and prefer it to the using the back LCD.

Ethernet/FTP/WiFi: On some tight deadline assignments it’s required to send images directly from the camera to an editor in a different location or country. The a9 has a built-in Ethernet port that does that built in, and while the FTP feature set isn’t what I and others would like it to be for the release of the camera, I am sure the a9 programmers are working on it. FTP transfers can also be accomplished via the camera’s WiFi functions.

And just like the TV Infomercials say “But Wait There Is More” and there is so much more to explore, and I just highlight some of the major features that attracted me to the a9.

And while there is no “perfect” digital capture device, the a9 is I am sure the first in the line of high speed, silent and feature rich cameras by Sony.

For over 60 years now SLR and DSLR cameras have dominated photography. I believe the a9 and Sony have shown us what the future of modern digital still image capture is and will be in the future.

Have a Sony a9 and want to get it set-up fast check my blog here.

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