Sony A7C

Misplaced.

Sounds Too Good.

Actually, the A7C is not bad pragmatically.
On paper, A7C seems like an A7 III, with identical specs, but in a much smaller body and a much lighter weight. Sounds great isn’t it?

I was also praising about this thing before I got to use one for days, and the truth was that it neither performed well out in sunny days, nor in low light situations.

The Conservative.

Sony’s mirrorless cameras have been staying famously conservative in color science. They sometimes hide the potential of a picture so deeply that you have to do enough editing to bring out the true version of it.

Right out of the body, A7C’s colors are pale and texture-less, with poor dynamic range at first glance (compared to Panasonic and Canon), it produces relatively terrible JPGs out of the body.

However, once you import the RAWs into Lightroom, you’ll find them unbelievably flexible that you can turn them into anything depending on your “surgery skill”.

Losing Confidence.

When I’m shooting with the A7C, it makes me hate myself. Because pictures displayed on the A7C’s screen were just so shitty that I couldn’t believe they were the same scenes I saw with my bare eyes.

Maybe it’s just me being a shitty photographer.

The drama came when I was trying to save those pics in Lightroom and found out that they weren’t that bad actually. Funny self-redemption.

Not With Light,
Not Without Light.

No you can’t expect to use F1.8 out on a sunny day, which is fair.

On the other hand, A7C’s poor image stabilization is a worrisome feature at night. At a shutter speed of 1/30, the images could get very blurry sometimes, while Panasonic S5 stayed perfectly fine.

Promising Battery.

One thing I love though, about the A7C, was its battery life. I would say its battery performs just as good as the latest Apple Watch. A day and a half in a single charge, or a full day if heavily used (photos only).

Classic Menu.

The menu, Sony users, you’ve been there.
It might be that the A7C I used wasn’t updated yet, but the menu was just as suffering and frustrating as it could possibly get.
I understand that this could be another “you’ll get used to it” situation, and I’ve only used A7C for less than a week. But MAN that menu was one thing I would avoid getting into, so deep and…… dark. It’s like a screaming maze trying to twist you mind.

Overall

Sony’s A7C is a decent camera. It is not a transition from A7 III to A7 IV, nor a cheaper alternative. To me A7C was only an experimental product of compact models for Sony.

It probably does not fit being someone’s first camera or someone’s main camera. The only reason I would purchase an A7C is that I owned an A7R IV or A9 or A1 or something both Sony and promisingly powerful beforehand, and felt like needing another camera for professional reasons.