Which Sony Cameras Have Eye Af

The list of features in Sony's flagship a1 are extensive, but one of the standouts for me is the add-on of a dedicated bird eye autofocus organisation. Before the a1 came forth, Sony's most recent mirrorless cameras had an Eye AF mode that was switchable between man and animal. Existent-time human being heart tracking is and has been for some time, near uncannily authentic. Existent-time animal eye tracking is truly first-class with state mammals. Tin can the new Bird Center AF fashion live upward to standards set past the existing eye-tracking modes?

I purchased my Sony a1 at a regular retail store. Although I got my easily on i of the first in Canada, there were nonetheless many journalists and Sony Artisans that had their hands on an a1 before me. Every fourth dimension I saw a report posted, I would look for some information on the bird eye autofocus style, keen to see whether it was going to alive up to the existing high bar, and the hype during the a1 launch.

What I constitute was a mixed set of opinions. Tony Northrup published an initial video almost the a1 where he said that bird eye AF was somewhat mediocre. But others, such as Sony Artisan Chris Dodds was saying it was truly excellent. Was this just a case of Sony sponsored shooters blowing smoke? In the end, I decided I was only going to be able to answer this question with some hands-on time.

Real-Time Center AF for Birds – Impressions

All of the images on this page were shot with my own Sony a1, along with the splendid Sony 200-600mm f/5.6-half dozen.3 Thousand lens.

Real-Time Heart AF Subject Switching

In well-nigh situations I leave Middle AF turned on in my Sony cameras, then I switch the discipline as needed. Fifty-fifty if in that location are no eyes in the photograph, such as when photographing landscapes, autofocus still works just fine. With my a9 Two camera, I only had to switch subjects between human and beast, which I usually did with a custom setting in the menu system.

With the a1, I chop-chop realized that this was no longer going to be the nigh efficient manner to piece of work. In a wildlife-rich environment, you might want to repeatedly switch quickly between animal and bird eye AF modes. To set up this problem, I assigned existent-time centre AF subject to 1 of the custom buttons on the acme of the camera, next to the shutter button. C1 or C2 will work fine for this. Now, with my eye to the viewfinder, I tin can quickly switch eye AF modes, cycling through human->animate being->bird.

Living as I do in the Yukon, I like to keep a camera adjacent to me when I'm driving anywhere. You never know what kind of wildlife is going to pop out in front of you. When it does announced, yous might have only a few seconds to go a shot. Without having a custom button to switch centre AF subjects, y'all could hands notice yourself in the wrong way and wasting valuable time diving into the menus to fix it.

This is all less of a problem if you only shoot people. In which case you can go out the eye AF subject set to human. If you like to shoot wildlife, though, you will find yourself wanting to switch back and forth between animal and bird bailiwick mode constantly. Honestly, I wish Sony had simply added birds to the real-time animal eye AF style instead of giving it a split mode. Let'southward promise we don't run into more modes added in the future with increasingly granular subjects. Fish eye AF mode, anyone?

Does it Work?

Once I had the setup dialled in, I was very pleased to see excellent initial results with the bird eye tracking. While working on photos for my guide to backyard bird photography, I spent many hours in a photo blind in my yard, giving me ample time to draw some initial conclusions.

Honestly, later my first few hours working with information technology, I was blown abroad. Working with very pocket-size birds it would consistently pick out and lock onto an eye with merely the same accuracy equally I had seen when using the human or animal eye AF modes on my older a9 Ii. Every bit birds would sit on a perch and turn their heads left to right, then the center-tracking box would leap instantaneously to the opposite eye as it became visible. Sometimes information technology feels similar cheating, it is that good.

Does Bird Size Bear on Accuracy?

Having seen at least one of the Sony pros testing the bird eye AF style on larger birds such as owls and eagles, I was curious whether the size of the bird would affect accuracy. Having now worked with the a1 for several months, I tin can categorically state that the size of the bird has absolutely zero outcome on the AF accuracy. It remains merely as accurate with small-scale songbirds every bit it does with larger raptors.

But what about size within the frame? This was a surprise to me. I had expected to run into far greater accuracy when a bird occupies a larger proportion of the frame. However, in practice, I saw no such results. I was constantly astonished to see the eye-tracking box appear on the eye of a tiny bird that occupied a tiny portion of the frame. The more I used information technology, the more comfortable I began to be with using a much larger autofocus area in the frame. Confident that the system would nevertheless pick out the eye.

Does Bird Centre Contrast Bear on Accurateness?

A black eye in a black head. I expected it to struggle with this one, merely there were no issues.

My assumption before using this organisation was that it would be considerably more than capable of picking out high contrast eyes. For example, I expected information technology to take footling trouble finding a black centre on a white bird, just for it to take issues picking out a blackness eye on a dark bird. Again, I was wrong with my preconceptions here. I didn't meet any detail issues with darker birds, or birds with night eyes within dark-feathered heads.

Does Bird Angle to Camera Bear on Accuracy?

Does it still piece of work when the heart is non side on to the photographic camera? Yes.

What nearly bird angle to the camera? The eye of a bird looks very different when the bird is facing the camera. Can the a1's bird eye AF mode all the same selection information technology out and lock on? The short reply is yes. The slightly longer answer is that sometimes it takes a little longer, and jumps from one eye to the other when both are visible.

Small birds are usually twitchy, constantly moving their heads left to right. When a small bird is facing you, moving its head, you will see the tracking box leap from i eye to the other every bit the camera tries to make up one's mind which one to prioritize. In reality, this doesn't really affair. Both eyes are roughly in the same plane of focus and it makes no deviation which i it chooses.

Honestly, I was simply impressed to see it working at all because the AI organisation must surely accept a tougher job with this scenario. A bird can look distinctly united nations-bird-like when viewed from the front, instead of the side. Still the arrangement would repeatedly surprise me, and allow me to capture fabulous moments similar the ane in a higher place.

Does Bird Breed Affect Accuracy? – Uh Oh…

100% failure with swans. To the a1, a swan is plain non a bird.

The championship of the post did say I was going to tell you the good and the bad. So far it has all been practiced. Very good, in fact. Merely here we practise become to the bad. When photographing the annual swan migration here in the Yukon, the bird eye AF completely failed. Every time.

sony a1 bird eye af mode — Is information technology a bird? Is information technology a plane? Well, it's not a bird, according to my a1.

I'k not saying it struggled, and sometimes missed focus. I'thousand maxim that it completely, 100% failed to institute that a swan was a bird. It didn't matter whether I was filling half the frame with the swan's head, making the eye obvious and enormous, it simply did non recognize a swan as a bird. Instead of seeing the magic dark-green heart-tracking box announced over the eye, it would think for a second and then default dorsum to standard AF tracking modes.

This was disappointing. Clearly, the AI system that analyzes the subject area within the frame, has been programmed with many different bird photos. But what Sony has done, is concentrate on more common regular bird shapes. The system seems to have no trouble with big raptors and small songbirds. Nor does it have whatsoever issue with a swimming duck that has its feet submerged. Thus proving that it doesn't necessarily need to see the whole bird, to establish that it is, in fact, a bird.

It seems that Sony forgot, or at least has non however gotten around to, programming the bird eye AF arrangement with long-necked birds. I take only tested this theory with swans, but I would guess that it would struggle in the aforementioned style when faced with something like an ostrich or a flamingo.

Conclusion

The real-time-bird center AF on the Sony a1 is a lot better than I was expecting it to be. With the vast majority of birds, information technology does a frankly incredible job of finding an heart within the unabridged frame and locking onto it wherever the bird moves. At times, it felt similar I was adulterous, and it certainly helped me to get a larger proportion of sharper images than I had previously experienced with my Sony a9 Two or whatsoever other photographic camera for that matter.

For wildlife photographers, this is a big step in the right direction, but it's not perfect. At the moment the AI organization that analyzes the subject in the frame has not been fed with enough information nearly non-standard bird shapes. It will fail if y'all betoken it at a long-necked bird like a swan, for example. I'm sure that Sony's next firmware update will add some more "cognition" to the bird AI in the a1, but for now, this is something to consider.

That said, if you lot happened to love photographing swans (or similarly shaped birds), you lot are in no worse of a position than you were before the a1 when at that place was no bird heart autofocus mode. And, as y'all can see from my images, you can nonetheless get great photos of these birds using the incredible standard tracking AF mode.

Finally, I would similar to run across Sony ringlet the bird eye tracking into the animal eye tracking way. I'm guessing that for now, having it separated speeds up the AI assay of the subject. But it can be a pain in the ass for a wild animals photographer who finds themselves in a subject-rich environment, constantly having to switch back and forth between bird and animal subject mode. If you find yourself presented with a risk encounter, it's easy to raise the photographic camera to your eye with the wrong subject selected.