I got a new (well it is actually quite old) camera

I bought my first Sony A7SII way back in July of 2017 which was actually even then pretty late in the game for that camera. It was released in October of 2015 so it was hard to think about buying a 2 year old camera brand new. But I did, as I had some film projects in mind that would really have benefited from it’s stupid good low light capability’s.
I bought this camera for it’s video abilities with honestly barely giving its photo abilities a stray thought as I had a few Nikon bodies at the time.
I also had originally bought it new rather than buying a used body mostly because despite being 2 years old it was still quite a hard camera to find on the used market. When you did manage to find one the seller would be asking for basically new prices. (A camera that holds its resale value… WHAT?)
So buy this older camera brand new I did.

Side note it was really weird to buy a new camera that hadn’t been announced like the day before. Even going way back to buying my first Digital SLR (the Canon 10D) I often buy cameras when they are brand new to the market. I actually used to try my best to time my new camera purchases to be on the bleeding edge of the technology. Obviously I would skip versions in between and what not but most of my new camera purchases were either a pre-order situation, or way too often I managed to luck out somehow and get something in the first week or two after they were announced.

So for me to walk into Fusion Cine and be like “Yo I want this camera?!” and have the counter person be like “Sure here ya go Yo! Now give me money” was a bit of an odd experience to say the least.Though I had it for only a few short months, I liked it.

I took the camera camping

I took it on Family Vacations

I photowandered with it.

I of course had a small handful of chances to play with it’s High ISO beast mode.

While 12mp is not a lot (particularly compared to the beast mode 36MP that the D800 has) it was not far off from the Nikon DF’s 18MP that I was shooting a metric shit tonne with at the time.(like literally I blew through a shutter and had to have it replaced in less than two years)
While I was basically just getting to know the camera, the Sony A7Sii was becoming my solid carry around 80% of the time camera.
Then that November, less than 4 months after getting this camera, a home invasion happened and sadly my new & barely used Sony A7sII was part of the massive amount of gear that was stolen that night.
After that I was (and still have been to a certain extent) in complete flux as to what being a Jerk With A Camera actually meant to me. So the thought of spending new camera money on another A7SII just didn’t seem that high on the list of todo’s. I did add a saved search on Craigslist to keep an eye on the used market, but i was like most folks, looking to see what Sony would do with the much rumored release of the A7S III which seemed destined to happen spring of 2018 as new camera’s often help drop the price in the used market. And in this holding pattern I sat. and sat. and sat. But as of this writing in Late March 2020, almost a full 5 years after its initial release, there has been nothing but rumors and speculation on that camera, so the value of the A7SII has really been holding higher than I was willing to pay for what would be a specialty use camera.

That was before the last of my DSLRs finally kicked it. (see previous post) and I was a jerk without a camera. I had been thinking about using this as an opportunity to bounce back to The Canon EF lens mount for a bit more compatibility with all my Cinema gear and having only one or two actual nikon lens left and no Nikon camera body left to put them on, it seemed like a no brainier to basically trade my Nikon mount Sigma art Lenses for Canon ones.

So after looking at new and used Canon Dlsr’s and the the new Canon Mirrorless lineup I was less than impressed with any of it for the prices. The New R series looks ok but nothing jumped out to scream you need to spend 2500 + EF adapters to get me.
Then when i had all but given up (I even pulled out my original canon 10D to see if that was an option and wow that brought back memories) when that craigslist search that I have had running for over 2 years finally paid off.

Someone had posted for sale a used A7SII with the Sigma Ef to E mount adapter for less than an entry level Canon RP or DSLR would begin to cost.
I had actually serendipitously sold all my leftover nikon gear in a huge lot that morning and less than an hour later I took that cash and bought this well used Sony A7SII.

Number of shutter actuation’s is quite low at 21,815 of its expected 200,000 as it was used for mostly video work and the screen is in bad shape but I legitimately remember barely using the rear screen the first time round (spoiler alert, it is because it is basically useless) instead opting for the eye view finder or an external monitor 90% of the time.
The Sigma adapter is quite good and recognizes all my sigma art glass just fine.

I admit I had to look up my notes and consult a few youtube videos on setting up the custom buttons and working my way though that tremendously brutal sony Menu system, but i managed to get my two shooting modes of video and photo boiled down to the Custom 1 & 2 Dial and reworked the auto focus (which will still need some getting used to) options to the C1 button.

Now being that we are all in quarantine I haven’t had much of a chance to do much other than take photos of Corbin’s birthday but it works and it was cheap so what can I say other than being old technology is not a bad thing when you were pretty damn good to start.