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18 The A77 II in a Nutshell

1.1 MAJOR IMPROVEMENTS TO ITS
PREDECESSOR

1.1.1 AUTOFOCUS IMPROVEMENTS

The original A77 was no slouch when it came to focusing, but now Sony
has added more focus points and live-view analyzing intelligence to help it
track a moving subject even better than before.

The A77 II’s phase-detect autofocus array has more AF points than any
other camera to date from any manufacturer -- 79 to be exact. (But not all
of them behave the same way. See Section 3.4).
The ability to autofocus in low light is also greatly enhanced – so much so
that Sony has gotten (that’s a word!) rid of the near infrared focus-assist
LED light in the front of the body.
Finally, as explained in the “Focusing Essentials” section, Sony has added
the ability to analyze the Live View feed, identify what your subject is, and
then use that information to turn focusing points on and off as your subject
travels across the screen. This feature can be a great aid to sports
photographers (well, of soccer players, not necessarily formula one

Figure 1-1: The left photo shows my “home position” for the rear LCD which
works great for horizontal compositions. For verticals I twist it very slightly and
then rotate the camera (right). Make sure that none of the screen support
mechanism is too close to the viewfinder, otherwise the infrared “Eye-start”
sensor will think you’re looking at it and the camera will never time out (hence
your battery will drain in a hurry).

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