Sony takes aim at professional market with its powerful new a9 camera

SONY’S new a9 camera has been released in Australia and it boasts some incredible power and capabilities.

SONY is the first to admit, when it comes to high-end cameras it was late to the party. But the company has arrived in a big way with its new a9 camera, which was released in Australia on Friday.

The Japanese brand is taking aim at industry heavyweights Canon and Nikon as it attempts to challenge its competitors’ dominance among professional photographers.

To that end, the powerful mirrorless a9 camera boasts some impressive features including a revolutionary image sensor and high-speed processing, giving you the ability to shoot at 20 frames per second.

Technologically speaking, “this is something we haven’t had in the previous line up. This camera is more for fast shooting because that was a space we were missing in,” the head of Digital Imaging for Sony Australia and New Zealand, Vivek Handoo, told news.com.au.

In order to court professional photographers into its ecosystem, Sony believes it needs to excel in three crucial areas: resolution, low light sensitivity and fast shooting environments.

Mr Handoo believes Sony was previously missing from the third category but the a9 represents the last piece of the puzzle for the company’s high-end range.

“I do believe now there is no reason for a professional not to consider Sony as a brand of choice,” he said.

To highlight this fact, Sony gave the camera to renowned Australian sports photographers who captured some pretty amazing shots with the device, which were on display at a launch event in Sydney on Thursday night.

I had a chance to get my hands on the camera at the event and it is certainly an impressive device which is a lot of fun to shoot with.

The rather compact camera boasts in-body image stabilisation, a shutter speed of up to 1/32,000 sec and is capable of full-frame 4K video capture.

The incredible 20 frames per second is enabled by a new 24-megapixel stacked CMOS Exmor RS sensor which means you can shoot at that super fast pace for up to 241 RAW full-frame photos in a row.

The stillness of the camera when operating at such a high output is quite remarkable, and it’s easy to see why the a9 has had such positive reviews after being launched in the US market last month.

An image taken by Australian photojournalist Michael Dodge with Sony’s a9 camera.

With a focus on photography in fast moving environments, Mr Handoo likes the example of golf photography to point out where Sony has reached the front of the pack.

Not only does the 20 frames per second capability mean you can capture every phase of the swing, but thanks to the complete lack of shutter sound — another notable feature — the camera is able to be set-up so it doesn’t disturb the athlete.

“With this camera you could stand next to him and continuously shooting and he wouldn’t even know about it because it’s got a silent shutter,” Mr Handoo said. “This couldn’t have been done before.”

Given its target market, the a9 certainly doesn’t come cheap. The body of the premium range camera will set you back $6,999.00 in Australia, and that’s before you’ve even sprung for one of Sony’s lenses.

The relatively compact body of the a9 is cheaper that many top dSLRs but will still set you back just under $7K.

With the lower-end consumer market being slowly gobbled up by smartphone cameras, it makes sense for Sony to push harder into the professional space.

But the company realises that the consumer market is still an area where technological innovation can drive success.

“Mirrorless technology is pushing the boundaries now, what we’re seeing now is it’s not just about catching up with the dSLRs, it’s going beyond that,” Mr Handoo said.

“Compact is one area where I think the industry is going. More people want smaller bodies but get the same output as the bigger dSLRs.”

You can find the complete list of specs for the newly released Sony a9 here.