New member: first questions!

[MLHB]

Hello

I'm new here, and looking forward to sage advice and even to being able to contribute from my own experience.

My camera is the A7RM4, and most of my photography is macro, nature and landscape.

My first question concerns upgrading my camera's firmware: I'm apprehensive about this and wonder whether it is necessary. My current firmware is ver. 1.00. It appears that there are completely different ways of doing this, depending on whether the camera is ILCE-7RM4 or ILCE-7M4 (which is a distinction that I don't understand), and I find this rather off-putting!

My second question is about dust spots and cleaning the image sensor. Despite my best efforts, the sensor seems very prone to collecting dust and when a lens is stopped down the task of cleaning up images in post-processing can be quite lengthy. The cleaning function does not seem to be very effective and I wonder whether more can be done.

Advice please!

Matthew

 

[Unframed Dave]

Welcome Matthew. Plenty of videos on "wet" cleaning the sensor on YouTube. It's a bit nerve wracking the first time, but I've done it several times now. Use good quality swabs and fluid, making sure you get the right size for your sensor.

I have found that occasionally, I get a flume which I cannot shift and at that point, I get it professionally cleaned.

Sensor dirt is the only issue I've found moving from dslr to mirrorless. Can't ever remember having to clean any of my nikons.

 

[Phil Vetra]

I have used a clip in filter in my a7riii from Kase Filers from here " https://kaseoptics.com/products/kas...-alpha-cameras-mcuv-neutral-night-nd64-nd1000 ". Then when I got my a1 I found that it fit and have not needed to clean the sensor. Hope this helps!

 

[iamdlewis]

It appears that there are completely different ways of doing this, depending on whether the camera is ILCE-7RM4 or ILCE-7M4 (which is a distinction that I don't understand), and I find this rather off-putting

Not to sound too duh but if you have an A7R4 then you should follow the instructions from the A7RM4 as the A7M4 is not the camera you have. Sony has several different types of A7 cameras.

I can say that you really should be on the most recent firmware version as there lots of improvements including features since v1. You will probably need to update to v3 and then do the newer update path for versions after that. Think the version after 3 resets all the menus and custom buttons.