The Sony A1 is the company's flagship camera with a price tag to match, so you would hope that its performance would be flawless. But photographer Jamieson Dean is not happy with the IBIS and demonstrates his findings in a YouTube video below.
• Update: Sony A1 Firmware Update Version 1.10 seems to have fixed this issue without actually identifying it specifically.
The crux of the issue is that the camera's in-body stabilization can take many seconds to engage, particularly if the camera is lowered or not left in video mode. This is obviously crucial for wedding, event and sports photographers who will often have to react quickly to events.
The difference between the stabilized and unstabilized footage is painful to see, and a reminder of just how much we have come to rely on image stabilization, a 'quiet revolution' in camera design that's just as important as the huge gains in high ISO performance in today's cameras.
We observed the Sony A1's patchy stabilization in our own Sony A1 review, but did not immediately make the connection between the degree of shake and how long the camera had been running. Following Jamieson Dean's video, however, we've put together some unedited clips of our own that show the video steadying up considerably after a few seconds (or not at all in the first clip).
We would hope and assume this is the kind of glitch that can be fixed with a firmware update and does not necessarily indicate a longer term problem with the Sony A1.
We have contacted Sony to see if it is aware of this issue and whether it has an official response, and we will update this story when we have more information.
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