San Diego — Sony introduced Thursday the latest edition of its Alpha-series DSLR interchangeable-lens camera family, incorporating a 24.3-megapixel Exmor R APS-C image sensor.
Sony model ILC-a77 II builds upon the previous SLT-a77V by offering an advanced ISO range, improved AF system and adding a JPEG extra fine mode, previously found on the higher end SLT-a99V.
The a77 Mark II will arrive in June for $1,200 suggested retail for the body only, and $1,800 with a 16-50mm f/2.8 kit lens.
The camera will include Sony’s advanced Bionz X image processing chip, with a range of speed and functionality benefits.
Sony also elected to drop the sweep Panorama 3D still-image-taking capability found in previous Alpha-series models.
The a77 II’s ISO range has been bumped up to 100 to 51,200 with noise reduction standard and high selectable modes.
The auto-focus sensitivity range has also improved over the a77v to -2 EV to +18 EV (at ISO 100 eq), while offering direct manual focus control (AF-A/DMF selectable). The camera offers a whopping 79 AF points with 15 cross points, a benefit afforded cameras like the a77 Mk II that uses a translucent mirror technology.
Other changes include an improved Superior Auto advanced auto shooting mode, and intelligent auto mode.
Picture effects modes have also been expanded with toy camera and water color illustration effects among some of the additions.
The a77 II also includes nine scene-selection modes.
Shutter speed has doubled over the a77v to 1/8,000th of a second. The camera will shoot up 12fps in full resolution in continudous shooting mode.
Up to 28 RAW frames can be recorded in continuous mode and up to 26 in continuous advance priority setting per burst.
Also added to the camera is Auto Object Framing, and 1.4x smart zoom at 8MP resolution.
LCD monitor resolution has increased from 921,000 dots to 1,229,000 dots, and selectable wind noise reduction has been added for video recording.
Like the a77v, the a77 II includes an OLED eye-level electronic viewfinder and will record up to FullHD 1080/60p video.
