Here’s How Much Sony Autofocus Has Improved in the Past Few Years

Want to see how much Sony has improved the autofocus abilities in its cameras? Photographer Dave Dugdale made this 6.5-minute video comparing the AF on his Sony a7S from 2014 and his new Sony a7R III.

Dugdale shows how the a7S loses face detection autofocus pretty quickly when the subject does certain things to confuse it — fidgeting with sunglasses, moving a hand around a nose and mouth, turning the face to a profile, turning completely around, and moving to the very edge of the frame. The a7R III is able to stay locked onto the subject much better in each of these scenarios.

The a7R III also keeps up with moving subjects much better:

Dugdale says he was inspired to do these tests on the a7R III after he noticed how “tenacious” the AF was in keeping up with faces while creating a new course.

“The AF speed has increased, the a7R III has become tenacious it will not let go of a face,” Dugdale writes.

Dugdale also shares some insight into how the a7R III handles prioritizing autofocusing on objects in the center of the frame versus things closer to the edge.

(via Dave Dugdale via sonyalpharumors)