FS7: FS7 Vs A7R II

F

Filippo Chiesa

Well-known member
Very, very interesting (I think)...
I compared my FS7 with my A7R II.
I used the Shogun external recorder in UHD ProRes HQ + Prime Circle 25 mm f/2.0 lens at f/5.6.
Same conditions for both cameras (A7R II cropped in Super 35).
Obviously, the FS7 output is 10bit, while the A7R II output is 8bit.
I'm a bad guy, so I added a gradient filter in DaVinci.
Can you see real differences?
Please download the ProRes HQ files and let me know.

http://we.tl/gRutfaFDNf
 
How have you found the overheating issues in the A7rII when recording UHD?

I'm sorely tempted and would go for that over the A7sII because with my current A7 I find myself mostly shooting stills anyway.
 
Personally I would never be able to tell those apart. They are so close if not to say "identical".

It's one reason I offered to buy someone's A7RII if they go for the F5 production kit bundle and decide they don't want the A7RII camera that comes with it.

You did a FANTASTIC job making them as close as possible in-camera too it appears.
 
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Nice.

What you pay for with the FS7 is that its good enough in almost all situations. Its got 10 bit 422. Its got some decent slowmo. Its got decent DR and Lowlight. Its got pretty good rolling shutter. Its got 4k when you need it. Its small enough for most scenarios but still has ND and XLR.

With most cameras, even more expensive ones, there is usually a few gotchas that could really hurt, like the canons and slowmo (and formfactor), or the smaller sonys and rolling shutter/overheating, or the bigger sonys because they are big, or the "oh so many" cameras without ND or XLR.

I recently tested the FS7 against my F3 to check out the IQ, and while I think the F3 is a really good camera and the IQ is close (not counting subjective things) the FS7 can deliver all of it pretty much right out of the box while the F3 needs some serious mindpower for a good setup.
 
stokstad said:
Nice.

What you pay for with the FS7 is that its good enough in almost all situations. Its got 10 bit 422. Its got some decent slowmo. Its got decent DR and Lowlight. Its got pretty good rolling shutter. Its got 4k when you need it. Its small enough for most scenarios but still has ND and XLR.

With most cameras, even more expensive ones, there is usually a few gotchas that could really hurt, like the canons and slowmo (and formfactor), or the smaller sonys and rolling shutter/overheating, or the bigger sonys because they are big, or the "oh so many" cameras without ND or XLR.

I recently tested the FS7 against my F3 to check out the IQ, and while I think the F3 is a really good camera and the IQ is close (not counting subjective things) the FS7 can deliver all of it pretty much right out of the box while the F3 needs some serious mindpower for a good setup.
Click to expand...
The F3 is a fantastic camera, much more better than the C300.
The images are incredible if you use the 4:4:4 10bit uncompressed output + Gemini DPX recorder.
 
Ben Scott said:
How have you found the overheating issues in the A7rII when recording UHD?

I'm sorely tempted and would go for that over the A7sII because with my current A7 I find myself mostly shooting stills anyway.
Click to expand...

I used it in Shanghai for one week (40° C - humidity 94%).
No problems at all.
Probably if you use it in continous recording for 30 min. during summer in a sunny day, you could have some problem.
 
That's great to hear. It's never going to be my A camera but I might use it for some car mount stuff.

As with all these things, once the internet gets a sniff of someone having an issue it becomes exaggerated somewhat.
 
I was looking for something like this, well done, Filippo!

I've compared the FS700 and A7s extensively, the FS700 is sharper and the noise is better. The A7s has a very strange weave type of noise with blobby purples and splodges of colour in the shadows.

I can see a much better handling of noise on the A7rII, but it still has colour splodges in the shadows but nowhere near as bad at the A7s. The FS7 is sharper though, you can see that in the fine lines of the cabling but the FS7 appears to have some in camera sharpening here too, i can see the artefacts.

Good job on matching exposure, they seem to be pretty much the same, the gamma curve is slightly different as the blue sky is darker on the A7rII but shadows and clipping appear very close.

I've taken both images into Nuke and side by sided them. I've also looked at the raw YUV data as well, this shows the banding and gradations across luma and the colour difference channels.

What makes you think that FS7 recording is 10 bit? To my eye they're the same in terms of what's in those files. They're both 8 bit, heavily dithered but they really appear to be 8 bit.

I'm curious, if you're recording via HDMI at UHD then isn't the FS7 8 bit as well?

cheers
Paul
 
Filippo Chiesa said:
I used it in Shanghai for one week (40° C - humidity 94%).
No problems at all.
Probably if you use it in continous recording for 30 min. during summer in a sunny day, you could have some problem.
Click to expand...
I just used my A7RII for a week in Shanghai too, at late evenings with 20-22°C and very light or no wind, disabled IBIS and noise reduction, crop mode, internal UHD 25p 100MBit/s, fully moved away (opened) LCD, on tripod and it always shuts down after 12-20 minutes. Same indoor. It's safe to record 30min at less than around 15°C or - that works always, even continiuos for "hours" (tested several times 45-50min) - without internal recording and triggered recording on Odyssey (not camera, would heat as international recording). That's just my with several tests and at real situation verified observation. Maybe mine is a little earlier produced and they improved something?

It's absolutly not reliable at internal UHD recording (or external triggered with camera), or better: it's reliable at shutting down...


@Filippo
Many thanks for the comparison! Did you trigger recording with camera or on shogun?
 
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starcentral said:
... It's one reason I offered to buy someone's A7RII if they go for the F5 production kit bundle and decide they don't want the A7RII camera that comes with it..
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I think that'd be A7SII, rather than RII. $200 difference at retail.
 
Its an exciting time to be a filmmaker! :-)

I have seen films shot on the Canon 5D II that is graded better, composed better, and tells a better visual story than i may never will with any camera.

But i got the FS7 because of the ability to shoot for hours in the same sitting. Some of my work demands this, and these jobs alone pays for the premium of having a proper camera. As a bonus, this proper camera is much faster to work with in documentary environments.

The FS7 does not necessarily compete in image quality, obviously, but as a tool used in daily labour.

It is possible to build an architectural masterpeice using nothing but rocks to hammer nails into wood. But man, a hammer or nail gun makes it all the much more enjoyable to work with.
 
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