Sony a7 V video studio scene: what do you really need?

We’ve taken a look at how the Sony a7 V performs when it comes to stills, now it’s time to turn our attention to video. The company’s latest hybrid is once again in front of our studio scene, and we aim to see how the 4K footage it delivers stacks up compared to its predecessor and competitors.

The a7 V’s 4K/24 video is oversampled from 7K capture by default, with no option (or real need) to drop down to a subsampled or line-skipped mode. Thankfully, the footage from that mode has good levels of detail and is competitive with the oversampled modes from cameras like the Canon EOS R6 III and Panasonic S1II. However, both those cameras have higher-resolution recording options (7K for Canon, 6K for Panasonic) that allow you to capture a good deal more detail, something the a7 V lacks, but that could be helpful when you’re shooting subjects with very fine detail, or want some room to crop in post.

Moving up to 4K/60, the story is slightly more complicated, as the a7 V has an “Angle of View Priority” mode that you have to turn on if you want to get full-width recording at higher framerates; leaving it off will incur a 1.17x crop. While Sony says that enabling the mode turns off noise reduction, we didn’t see a major difference at base ISO. With Angle of View Priority on, the a7 V’s 4K/60 footage is a touch more detailed than that from the Canon or Panasonic.

The a7 V requires a 1.52x crop to record 4K/120, thus using less of its sensor (and changing the framing more) than the S1II with its 1.24x crop, and the EOS R6 III with its subsampled but full-width 4K/120 recording. As with 4K/60, with Angle of View Priority off, there’s a further crop, adding up to 1.79x.

All that said, the a7 V’s 4K/120 footage is substantially more detailed than the EOS R6 III’s, and is competitive with the S1II’s. We also don’t see an observable reduction in detail going from the 4K/24 APS-C mode to the 4K/120 mode.

The ‘missing’ pieces

There’s been a lot of discussion about the features the a7 V is ‘missing,’ compared with its rivals. But it’s worth considering whether these are relevant to you or are just people point-scoring about brands.

Whereas Panasonic and Canon allow open-gate shooting, capturing the whole sensor output, the Sony only shoots in 16:9, UHD 4K. If your workflow requires higher resolution capture, the use of anamorphic lenses or you’re trying to compose for both vertical and horizontal delivery, simultaneously (which is an aesthetic challenge, even when it’s technologically possible), then those other cameras will be a better choice.

Likewise, if your shooting benefits sufficiently from the increased workflow complexity and storage challenges of shooting raw video (the advantages of which are much less pronounced than in stills shooting), then this isn’t the camera for you. But a great many people find that shooting high quality 4K footage is more than sufficient for their needs, and the a7 V appears competitive in this regard.