Kit #12: The Alpha Dog
Total cost: £3,965
Camera: Sony Alpha A7 IV (£2,399)
The Sony Alpha A7 IV is one of the most sophisticated mirrorless cameras on the market. Built around a 33MP sensor, it’s essentially a high-end all-rounder, with top-class autofocus and 10fps burst shooting. As you might imagine, that sort of thing tends to be music to the ears of travel photographers.
One of the advantages of the Sony Alpha full-frame mirrorless system is that it has a five-year head start on its main competitors – Canon R, Nikon Z and Panasonic S all came along much later. This is one of the reasons the lens choice is much wider – but also, to Sony’s credit, it has always been exceptionally open to allowing third-party manufacturers to develop lenses for its systems. So you can look beyond just the Sony brand for great lenses – and that’s exactly what we’ve done with this kit for the Sony A7 IV.
Body-only, this is the most expensive camera on our list. The images it captures are absolutely stunning, and it more than justifies its price-tag in our view, but it naturally won’t be an option for everyone.
Lens: Tamron 28-200mm F/2.8-5.6 Di III RXD (£799)
We’ve already met a fair few superzoom lenses throughout this guide, but it’s rare to see one that manages a maximum aperture of f/2.8. But, so it goes with the Tamron 28-200mm F/2.8-5.6 Di III RXD, an all-in-one zoom lens that also manages to be quite competitively priced, not to mention lightweight at 575g. So what, you might reasonably ask, is the catch? Honestly not much – there’s no stabilisation to speak of, and some users may find themselves wishing for 24mm rather than 28mm. But the image quality is thoroughly decent for a superzoom, with the help of in-camera corrections, and who can argue with that?
Lens: Samyang AF 50mm F1.4 FE II (£767)
Most travel photographers will appreciate a good nifty-fifty, and the Samyang AF 50mm F1.4 FE II is a lovely example. Samyang is known for its manual-focus lenses, but this one is fully AF-equipped, and in practice it acquires focus quickly and silently, only starting to hunt every so often at the smallest apertures. Well-priced and bokeh-licious, this is just a downright fun lens to use.