AF-100 vs AF-100A in JAPAN as for December 2012

Hi all, Sorry I have been adjusting to a new job at Panasonic. I am now in sales, having moved out of Product Management. The AF100A is/was my last product. So the AF100A/105A/101A are virtually all the same except the numbers. The 10bit output is 4:2:2, but I want to clarify that 10bit output. It is an enhanced 8Bit. It has a bit of dithering to it to help in those banding situations. And it does help. It also has the enlarged 2X expanded focus that everyone said they wanted and you can set it up to toggle between the Focus on Red and the Expanded view. It has the 60P built in and the 2.35 display. The only chip that has been changed is the microprocessor. It continues to offer the best bang for the buck in the industry. In other words the cost/performance ratio is very high.

I hope this helps,

Jan
 
Jan_Crittenden said:
Hi all, Sorry I have been adjusting to a new job at Panasonic. I am now in sales, having moved out of Product Management. The AF100A is/was my last product. So the AF100A/105A/101A are virtually all the same except the numbers. The 10bit output is 4:2:2, but I want to clarify that 10bit output. It is an enhanced 8Bit. It has a bit of dithering to it to help in those banding situations. And it does help. It also has the enlarged 2X expanded focus that everyone said they wanted and you can set it up to toggle between the Focus on Red and the Expanded view. It has the 60P built in and the 2.35 display. The only chip that has been changed is the microprocessor. It continues to offer the best bang for the buck in the industry. In other words the cost/performance ratio is very high.

I hope this helps,

Jan
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Thanks Jan.
I guess this settles it.
 
It means that I am now in the sales channel and am no longer in product management. Different set of things to do. Panasonic will be filling my role as product manager when they find the right person. I will be supporting resellers and working with customers on a local basis.

Hope that helps,

Jan
 
Jan_Crittenden said:
... I want to clarify that 10bit output. It is an enhanced 8Bit. It has a bit of dithering to it to help in those banding situations. And it does help...
Click to expand...

Interesting. So those 2 bits aren't really 2 more bits - they are used to somehow dither the image? So the image from the DSP is still encoded in 8bit and those 2bits are then "added"??
 
Actually they enhance the 8 bit signal on its way to becoming the 10 bit. I can see the dithering, but it isn't like a 10 bit signal, it looks like it has more info than the 8 bit but not like a 10 bit. It is improved, but it isn't like a signal out of the HPX250, but better than the AF100. Sorry I am not totally privy to how they did it, it is just a little better.
 
Jan, has the internal signal processing been altered in any way in terms of the way it handles highlights? In particular I'm wondering if the Luma and Chroma clip at the same time or do they clip separately like in the original af100.

Thanks, Tim
 
Jan_Crittenden said:
Actually they enhance the 8 bit signal on its way to becoming the 10 bit. I can see the dithering, but it isn't like a 10 bit signal, it looks like it has more info than the 8 bit but not like a 10 bit. It is improved, but it isn't like a signal out of the HPX250, but better than the AF100. Sorry I am not totally privy to how they did it, it is just a little better.
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Okey, thx!:)
 
Jan_Crittenden said:
Hi all, Sorry I have been adjusting to a new job at Panasonic. I am now in sales, having moved out of Product Management. The AF100A is/was my last product. So the AF100A/105A/101A are virtually all the same except the numbers. The 10bit output is 4:2:2, but I want to clarify that 10bit output. It is an enhanced 8Bit. It has a bit of dithering to it to help in those banding situations. And it does help. It also has the enlarged 2X expanded focus that everyone said they wanted and you can set it up to toggle between the Focus on Red and the Expanded view. It has the 60P built in and the 2.35 display. The only chip that has been changed is the microprocessor. It continues to offer the best bang for the buck in the industry. In other words the cost/performance ratio is very high.

I hope this helps,

Jan
Click to expand...

Could you plz verify for us - is it going to be possible to make a Hardware upgrade from AF100 to AF100A ? or its not possible?

regards
 
Jan_Crittenden said:
While the DSP has not changed per se, the dithering on the output does seem to impact it.
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Darn. All I want for Christmas is a GH3 inside an AF100 body. But I'd settle for an af100 with a menu setting to adjust the chroma clip level.
External recorders are not an ideal solution for me.
 
I agree with Simon.. My upfront intention posting this thread was to give you the community an actual information ( except from google translation from japanese to english :-) of the official release of the AF105A model ( the AF100 model for Japan) with the specs of the "A" model as it was very likely ( which Jan actually confirmed in my thread ) to be just the same specs to be released in the US and UK .. the rest is speculation!
 
Jan_Crittenden said:
Hi all, Sorry I have been adjusting to a new job at Panasonic. I am now in sales, having moved out of Product Management. The AF100A is/was my last product. So the AF100A/105A/101A are virtually all the same except the numbers. The 10bit output is 4:2:2, but I want to clarify that 10bit output. It is an enhanced 8Bit. It has a bit of dithering to it to help in those banding situations. And it does help. It also has the enlarged 2X expanded focus that everyone said they wanted and you can set it up to toggle between the Focus on Red and the Expanded view. It has the 60P built in and the 2.35 display. The only chip that has been changed is the microprocessor. It continues to offer the best bang for the buck in the industry. In other words the cost/performance ratio is very high.

I hope this helps,

Jan
Click to expand...

Jan.. what differences are there between the new AF100A compared to a AF100 with the AG-SFU100G upgrade ?
 
Adamsenoj said:
Has any of the Panasonic A models had a different sensor?
Click to expand...
Yes. The DVX100A had a different sensor than the DVX100.
And the HVX200A had a different and significantly improved sensor block over the HVX200.

A different sensor is basically a different camera.
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This is very much not true. A different sensor is a different sensor, which is only one small part of the overall camera imaging chain. The Red One to Red One MX was a sensor change, but everything else stayed the same.

Now -- I'm not saying that there's any reason to put any credibility in the rumor that the AF100 has a different sensor, or the GH3 sensor, or any other claim that people may be making. We have no information from the company that would substantiate such speculation. I am only correcting some statements that were made that are factually inaccurate.
 
Jan can we send our cameras in for the upgrade? Yes/No/Don't Know/Can't say are all valid/welcomed responses but pretty please with sugar on top, can we get one of them if possible, Panny is just being so quiet about this new/upgraded/tweaked camera and it would be good to get some solid info.

thanks in advance
 
Barry_Green said:
At the bare minimum, the 10-bit output and the magnified focus assist.
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Except it isn't, is it? "It is an enhanced 8Bit." Am I the only one that's a wee bit confused on what that means?

And - not to be too much of a negative Nelly here - isn't expand focus something that could easily be added as a firmware upgrade to the original AF100?

Just not sure how this camera is going to compete with the latest & greatest at NAB in 4 months. But who knows - if the camera produces lovely images, I suppose it doesn't matter too much.
 
Barry_Green said:
Yes. The DVX100A had a different sensor than the DVX100.
And the HVX200A had a different and significantly improved sensor block over the HVX200.


This is very much not true. A different sensor is a different sensor, which is only one small part of the overall camera imaging chain. The Red One to Red One MX was a sensor change, but everything else stayed the same.

Now -- I'm not saying that there's any reason to put any credibility in the rumor that the AF100 has a different sensor, or the GH3 sensor, or any other claim that people may be making. We have no information from the company that would substantiate such speculation. I am only correcting some statements that were made that are factually inaccurate.
Click to expand...

Fair enough Barry. I stand corrected. But there's no more speculation. Jan just laid the cards on the table.

No new sensor, no real 10 bit, it has focus expand, new micro processor and the AG-SFU100G upgrade is now included.
 
jdv said:
Except it isn't, is it? "It is an enhanced 8Bit." Am I the only one that's a wee bit confused on what that means?
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I don't know much more than you do at this point. But "enhanced 8-bit" could mean a few things; I mean, the DSP from the sensor is 19-bit, I think, so it may mean that they're taking the image from an earlier point in the chain, or it might mean they're taking the final 8-bit and doing some up-rezzing on it, or ... well, we don't really know. What Jan said, if I'm interpreting correctly, is that it's not a true 10-bit output as on the HPX250, nor is it the same 8-bit that was on the AF100, but that it's something in-between.

And - not to be too much of a negative Nelly here - isn't expand focus something that could easily be added as a firmware upgrade to the original AF100?
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Absolutely not. Trust me, we went round and round with them on that, and in the end it simply is not a feature that the original camera's hardware could support. We badgered them mercilessly about it. They had me & Bloom and Filippo Chiesa and lots of other guys in there for a preview/first use and that was far and away our biggest complaint, and if they could have done something about it, they would have. They similarly didn't have the feature in the 160/130, and issued a hardware update to address that in the 130A/160A. The AF100A is receiving that same hardware change, from what I can tell.

Just not sure how this camera is going to compete with the latest & greatest at NAB in 4 months.
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Well, again, it competes in its price bracket. What is there that's the latest and greatest at the $4,000 price point? The NEX-EA50? That's a totally different camera. The BMC? Still not out yet, and not a video camera at all but a cine-only product, which doesn't have XLRs, doesn't have phantom power, doesn't have ND's, doesn't have variable frame rates, doesn't do 60p; instead it does raw. Opposite end of the spectrum. I mean, you could argue that it doesn't compete with the latest and greatest of today (the F5, F55, C500, C300, even FS700) and I'd agree with you. But then again, it's not supposed to -- it's 1/10 the price of an F55, 1/8 the price of a C500, and 1/2 the price of an FS700.

So, again -- if someone's got a $4,000 budget and they're shopping for a professional video camera with all the inputs, outputs, and features that they've come to expect from a pro video camera, and they want a large sensor -- what competes against it? Nothing, really. The FS100 is the closest thing in terms of price, and it is missing many of the key features that the AF100 offers, so again I don't consider them direct competitors...

But who knows - if the camera produces lovely images, I suppose it doesn't matter too much.
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Ultimately the market will vote with its wallet. The AF100A is clearly not meant to break new ground and introduce new features like 8000 fps or whatever. It's an evolution of the existing product which is still largely unchallenged in its market segment (meaning, at its price point). That, as near as I can tell, is Panasonic's strategy here. Whether it is ultimately successful or not is up to the buyers, but if someone was looking for Panasonic to introduce an alternative to the C500, then of course this isn't it. This is a $4,000-ish product.
 
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