- Joined
- Nov 3, 2018
- Messages
- 173
This is a highly technical question but a practical one as well. The silent (electronic) shutter is a relatively new concept and many people think of it as just an add-on feature for a special occasion (like shooting in the church, as the camera brochure advertises). Of course, many small cameras today use an electronics shutter exclusively.
The Z7 has a silent shutter mode - it means the camera just turns on and off the sensor output to the memory buffer, thus altogether forgoing the mechanical, focal-plane shutter. (The silent shutter has nothing to do with the mirrorless per se, and a DSLR has a silent shutter too.)
The focal-plane shutter is another complex mechanism of the past, like the complex and bulky reflex-mirror mechanism (that the mirrorless has gotten rid of). The silence is the wave of the future. As I talk about this, I even do not know how fast or slow the silent shutter traversal speed is - Does anyone know?
For a typical focal-plane shutter, it is 1/250 sec (which is the flash sync speed). The so-called JELLO effect is directly related to this speed.
In a typical focal-plane shutter, even if you use 1/8000, it takes 1/250 sec (much longer than 1/8000) for the camera to finish the exposure, because the front curtain must come down to open the shutter and then the rear curtain must come down to close the shutter. That's 1/250 sec. So, to make a truly "accurate" picture, your subject has to be still during that 1/250 sec. This is the shutter traversal speed I am talking about.
I wonder what the equivalent traversal speed is for the silent shutter. I suppose it is appreciably slower than 1/250; that's why the camera manufactures cannot forgo the mechanical shutter just yet. It must be a bit longer for the Z7 than the Z6 since more pixels have to be activated for the Z7. (But then, I do remember the days not long ago when a top-of-the-line SLR camera's flash sync speed is just 1/30-1/60 second!)
In practice, this is what I am curious about::: If you set your camera to the silent mode for a day or so and take pictures just like you normally do, and at the end of this test, look at all the pictures you have taken. Now, how many pictures can you find that you would say - "Oh gee, I should have used a normal mechanical shutter instead of this friggin silent shutter! My picture is totally messed up!"
With the continuous advancement of CMOS sensor technology, I would not be surprised that, in 5 years from now, no high-end single-lens camera comes with a mechanical shutter.
One thing to add is that the current Z7 only offers a "flash" of the EVF to indicate that a shot is taken during the silent mode. And, it offers NOTHING if you are doing the H+ shooting. Sony cameras offer an artificial sound for it in addition to the visual cue.
The Z7 has a silent shutter mode - it means the camera just turns on and off the sensor output to the memory buffer, thus altogether forgoing the mechanical, focal-plane shutter. (The silent shutter has nothing to do with the mirrorless per se, and a DSLR has a silent shutter too.)
The focal-plane shutter is another complex mechanism of the past, like the complex and bulky reflex-mirror mechanism (that the mirrorless has gotten rid of). The silence is the wave of the future. As I talk about this, I even do not know how fast or slow the silent shutter traversal speed is - Does anyone know?
For a typical focal-plane shutter, it is 1/250 sec (which is the flash sync speed). The so-called JELLO effect is directly related to this speed.
In a typical focal-plane shutter, even if you use 1/8000, it takes 1/250 sec (much longer than 1/8000) for the camera to finish the exposure, because the front curtain must come down to open the shutter and then the rear curtain must come down to close the shutter. That's 1/250 sec. So, to make a truly "accurate" picture, your subject has to be still during that 1/250 sec. This is the shutter traversal speed I am talking about.
I wonder what the equivalent traversal speed is for the silent shutter. I suppose it is appreciably slower than 1/250; that's why the camera manufactures cannot forgo the mechanical shutter just yet. It must be a bit longer for the Z7 than the Z6 since more pixels have to be activated for the Z7. (But then, I do remember the days not long ago when a top-of-the-line SLR camera's flash sync speed is just 1/30-1/60 second!)
In practice, this is what I am curious about::: If you set your camera to the silent mode for a day or so and take pictures just like you normally do, and at the end of this test, look at all the pictures you have taken. Now, how many pictures can you find that you would say - "Oh gee, I should have used a normal mechanical shutter instead of this friggin silent shutter! My picture is totally messed up!"
With the continuous advancement of CMOS sensor technology, I would not be surprised that, in 5 years from now, no high-end single-lens camera comes with a mechanical shutter.
One thing to add is that the current Z7 only offers a "flash" of the EVF to indicate that a shot is taken during the silent mode. And, it offers NOTHING if you are doing the H+ shooting. Sony cameras offer an artificial sound for it in addition to the visual cue.
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