The Sony A7 IV’s hidden “divider frame” is a fantastic feature for timelapse and macro shooters
Feb 8, 2022
John Aldred
John Aldred is a photographer with over 25 years of experience in the portrait and commercial worlds. He is based in Scotland and has been an early adopter – and occasional beta tester – of almost every digital imaging technology in that time. As well as his creative visual work, John uses 3D printing, electronics and programming to create his own photography and filmmaking tools and consults for a number of brands across the industry.
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I’m not sure if this is a new feature that’s been added in a recent firmware update or if it’s just remained a well kept hidden secret, but the Sony A7 IV has a pretty cool feature that will be very valuable for anybody who shoots timelapses, macro or landscape stacks, or anything else that requires you to shoot a bunch of images at a time in sequence.
It was spotted by the folks at LensVid and it’s called the Divider Frame”. Essentially, it places a new image on your memory card that is simply a black frame with a big bright arrow on it. Its purpose is as the name sounds, to act as a visual divider between one set of images and another – very handy when you need to quickly and easily split different sequences of images once they’re all on the computer.
Useful huh? What makes it even more useful is that LensVid has provided instructions for setting it up as a custom function key. Then, if you’re regularly shooting in sequences each time you go out (common for macro or landscape stacking, timelapse, hyperlapse, etc) you can easily access it at the push of a button without having to sift through menus. LensVid writes:
So how do you add this? the only way that we could find (and feel free to let us know in the comments if you know of another way of doing this) is to assign this function to a button on the camera.
This is how we did this:
- Setup
- (3) Operation costumize
- (A) Custom key/dial set
- Choose a key to assign
- (Red camera menu) Shooting menu
- (8) Selection / memo
- Create divider frame
Head on over to LensVid to see their complete post about the Divider Frame. How would you use this feature with your photography?
[via LensVid]
John Aldred
John Aldred is a photographer with over 25 years of experience in the portrait and commercial worlds. He is based in Scotland and has been an early adopter – and occasional beta tester – of almost every digital imaging technology in that time. As well as his creative visual work, John uses 3D printing, electronics and programming to create his own photography and filmmaking tools and consults for a number of brands across the industry.
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6 responses to “The Sony A7 IV’s hidden “divider frame” is a fantastic feature for timelapse and macro shooters”
I’ve done this for years to split image sequences, hold your hand over the lens and take a photo and you’ll get one black divider frame.
That is how I have done it too. I would love to have this feature on a custom button though!
Unfortunately, this appears to be only 7 IV, and not on the 7R IV that I have…
Using your hand in front of the lense instead of doing a setup of 20 manipulations deep into Sony menu?
Are you insane?
You don’t assign your camera’s function buttons to perform useful tasks you wish to utilise regularly?
You use your function buttons for tasks you can do just as fast and easy without them?
No, I don’t “waste” them, I utilise them for features I access regularly that are otherwise a pain in the ass to keep switching around. Good job trying to put words in my mouth though. :)