Some people ask, what’s up with the Sony A700 vertical grip? Why is the shutter button not at the corner of it?

The answer is ergonomics.

Xian Jin, with a Nikon D80, Nikkor AF-D 85mm F1.8 and the MB-D80 battery grip. Notice that his right hand is higher up. In fact, he is pulling the camera up so that his left eye will be able to look through the viewfinder.

Me with Asyraf‘s Canon EOS 1Ds Mk I with Canon 50mm F1.8 Mk II. With this, the vertical grip is built into the body. Personally, it felt like I wish my left eye was at the same level as my nose to hold this more comfortably. My right hand certainly felt like it was reaching for the top level of a cupboard.

The 50mm is a slow focuser with the 1Ds, but that’s another story.

However, this is not so with the Sony Alpha 700, Sony Carl Zeiss 16-80mm F3.5-4.5 DT and Sony VG-C70AM portrait grip. (This is not mine; it’s George‘s.) My right hand no longer feels awkward, and I can lower my elbow, for better stability. Also, more of the camera’s weight is held by my right hand.

Thanks to KJ for taking this shot.

Also, the joystick and all buttons accessible by the right hand are duplicated on the vertical grip. This is different from say, the Canon 40D, which has fewer buttons, and you cannot reach the joystick when in portrait mode without stabbing your eye first.

An added bonus is that the Drive, WB and ISO buttons which are originally harder to reach with the right hand in landscape orientation are now very easy to reach with the left hand. Also, the Fn button of the A700 can be reached with your left thumb in portrait orientation!

A normal landscape orientation grip. Note that the distance between both hands is almost the same in both landscape and portrait grip!

That said, I will not be getting the vertical grip so soon. I don’t have space in most of my camera bags for it, and I can make do with the chunky grip of the A700. Sometimes, I prefer to rotate the camera clockwise (with vertical grips it’s always anti-clockwise.)

Okay, this is old news, and I’ve been running around with a Sony Alpha 700 with Version 2 patched in, but here it is anyway:

Click here for Sony Alpha 700 Version 2 firmware update.

I quote the page:

The Firmware update improves the following issues:
* The picture sharpness is better under low contrast conditions.
* Noise is reduced when working at high sensitivity ISO setting.
* The flash control is better at close range with a non-ADI control lens.

Unfortunately, I did not have a controlled environment to test the before-and-after pictures. Also, I rarely ever flash at close range with a non-ADI control lens.

David Kilpatrick over at Photoclub Alpha has published a great article about the Sony A700’s improved Advanced Dynamic Range Optimizer. I have to agree, as I’ve seen amazing results with the new DRO (on the Sony A100, DRO was meek and humble.)

DRO set on Level 4 or 5 looks like a HDR image, with less fakeness! I’ll post my own pictures in a separate post.

Click here to read Advanced DRO – the A700�s magic bullet

And now, for geeking on a different mount – the Four-Thirds mount has a new professional body in the form of the Olympus E-3!

I have to admit, I really like its specifications, and after touching one in real-life I am convinced it is awesome.

It’s got a white-balance sensor! Wireless flash is finally supported, with compatible flash units. Highlight/shadow spot metering is interesting.

Kelvin WB can be set from 2000K to 14000K (insane!) when competitors go from 2500K to 9900K only.

Of course, there’s always good ol’ One Touch WB (you can bind the Fn key to that). This would make it the JPEG shooter’s dream.

Its 2.5″ LCD screen may seem old, at 320×240, and not as bright as the Sony A700 (at 640×480). However, it swivels! Perfect for the random times when you’d want to camwhore with it.

And yes, Live View is not fun when you don’t have a swivel screen. Thank goodness the E-3 has that! In addition to that, when pressing the AEL/AFL button to trigger AF in Live View, the screen freezes its last frame and shows you which AF point is being focused on. This is unlike the Canon 40D, which blacks out while focusing. (Canon has by far the worst implementation of Live View AF, this generation.)

The grip is rubbery. It is also chunky, like my Sony A700. It also goes into the fashion of having separate vertical grips, yay! The buttons are all over but are in the right place.

The E-3 claims to have the world’s fastest AF with the Olympus Zuiko Digital 12-60mm F2.8-4.0 SWD. Having tried it, I’ll believe that claim! In Live View, however, it seems notably slower, despite seeing it focus in the viewfinder as you press AEL/AFL (minus the mirror flapping bit.)

Honestly, I did not feel disappointed with its AF, unlike some other more expensive professional-level bodies which I tried.

The Olympus Zuiko Digital 50-200mm F2.8-3.5 SWD, equivalent to a 100-400mm F2.8-3.5 on film.

However, I do have a gripe with it. I’d like to be able to set different AF modes for Live View and uh… viewfinder mode.

I’d want to use S-AF[MF] (Single AF, with Manual Focus Override) for viewfinder mode. Half-pressing the shutter should AF, and this is the amazingly fast AF they advertise of.

I’d want to use MF for Live View mode. NOT S-AF[MF] because, if I focused on something using AEL/AFL but did not shoot, and waited for the moment and pressed the shutter all the way down, using S-AF[MF] would REFOCUS if the object had moved out of the AF point, causing a random shutter lag, very unbecoming of dSLRs! Thus, MF is best for Live View, where I tap AEL/AFL to focus anyway.

Fortunately, the AF mode is on the top-left ala the Canon 1D series, but it is a hassle to press the Live View button and then change the AF mode accordingly.

A good reason to go into the Olympus line is for the Four-Thirds lenses, like this here Olympus Zuiko Digital 14-35mm F2.0. With a 2x crop factor, it feels like a 28-70mm of film, or about a 18-50mm of APS-C. Yes, F2.0! You don’t ever get F2.0 zooms elsewhere.

Unfortunately, the Four-Thirds system is still new, and you won’t find second-hand lenses, and third-party manufacturers don’t make much Four-Thirds-mount lenses, possibly due to the different range. However, you can get an adaptor for most mounts to the Four-Thirds mount, but that means the lens has to be operated manually, preferably one with an aperture ring.

A few months back, there was a competition on ClubAlpha.net, Sony’s official Alpha forum. Take a picture of yourself with the A100, it said.

I shot this with my Sony A100 with Sony 18-70mm F3.5-5.6 DT at 70mm F36 (to get as much of both of us in focus.) Of course, this was not valid because the camera itself was not in the picture. (That’s my Minolta Dynax 7 used as a frame.)

40mm F36. This time, the Dynax 7’s back was opened and it was set to a 10 second exposure (to give me enough time to get into the reflected frame.) The apparent mirror in the frame is a real mirror held to the back of the camera!

Needless to say, I didn’t win anything because I wasn’t (apparent) in the shot, or the camera wasn’t in the shot.