How the F35 Camera Dock Communicates - Unlocking the Missing Features

James, this whole project was a colossal undertaking, and I'm blown away but what you were able to achieve.
Curious to know what came of your work in the end?
Did you package it all up into a small plate/box between the recorder and camera and did it work reliably?
Have you moved on from the F35?
Did you get any pictures of a finished prototype/product?
 
Viddovation said:
Pimp my ride.



... Well, first and foremost, I'll be applying this to my camera and recorder rig. Beyond that... it really depends on the community. It's not going to be free - even though the computing chip is only about $30 there are other hard costs, including the dock board, wiring, housing... and I'm not sure how much these conveniences are worth to everyone.

From the side of my labor... I'm reluctant to simply give away the software. It's essentially been a summer of a job. Here's the flat truth: If Sony or I handed the protocol information to an experienced coder, they could write a program like mine in a couple days, and debug it in a couple more. The real labor was reverse engineering the protocol without Sony's whitesheets.

I have real costs in this project, beyond the time - specialty equipment I purchased, as well as two SRW-1 recorder units I acquired for the reverse engineering. Without at least one of them, the project would not have been possible.

So, in a way, I really don't know.


What would all of you like? How much are these feature worth? How would you want it packaged? Would you need it to be switchable between different recorders? Which recorder would you use it with? Do you want the protocol information for your own projects? I'm happy to listen to ideas.
Click to expand...

Did you ever end up making these protocol available to buy? Or a complete solution?

C
 
Archduk3 said:
Did you ever end up making these protocol available to buy? Or a complete solution?

C
Click to expand...

Apologies all. My life moved another direction and I no longer have these toys and never released any products for this.

In 2018 I did post a data reference thread for the VTR dock protocol, which is great place for anyone else looking to get started coding for the F35/F23:
dvxuser.com/forum/sony-video-cameras/sony-f35-f65/367938-sony-f35-vtr-data-protocol-reference

Good luck everyone!
 
Viddo,

Not sure if you remember we thought the IF box had a digital handshake with the big IF board in the IF box so you couldn't just plug the dock connector from the IF box into the dock and get dual link. Turns out it does work, shorting pins 8 and 9 on the dock connector will activate the "IF Box" connection and turns on the video outputs.

So if anyone is wondering if they can use the IF box dock part without the IF box yes it works, connect pin 8 and 9 to each other and the camera will see IF Box
 
hi, very interesting!! when you say the dock connector, does it means the connector part of the if box or the one of the camera? it doesn't seems working for me when i link the out 8 and 9 direct on the camera dock
 
yachacha said:
Viddo,

Not sure if you remember we thought the IF box had a digital handshake with the big IF board in the IF box so you couldn't just plug the dock connector from the IF box into the dock and get dual link. Turns out it does work, shorting pins 8 and 9 on the dock connector will activate the "IF Box" connection and turns on the video outputs.

So if anyone is wondering if they can use the IF box dock part without the IF box yes it works, connect pin 8 and 9 to each other and the camera will see IF Box
Click to expand...

Could this be used to the the Wet dock to stop freaking out as well you think? My only issue right now is having to unseat the wet dock, because I can't go between 4444 12 bit, and 422 10-bit while having it attached...

C
 
Could power recycle fix this? Or a switch inside the codex wet dock to turn it on and off to re-init with the camera.

This is my understanding:

There are 2 simple light switches on the F35 dock connector, two pins turn it to IF BOX or another 2 pins to VTR.

To turn on IF box is simple, connect the two pins. The dock goes into a "dumb mode" where is it outputting the mode of the camera. In this mode I do not think the REC Light or VTR features will ever work, IF box was added for on set monitoring as after thought. To the camera, once in IF box mode, it needs no further information to turn on the signal over the SDI connections following the mode of the camera head.

VTR Mode is activated by a simple two pins also, HOWEVER after VTR is set a much more complex back and forth of information from recorder to the camera is needed. All of which are required to make any signal cover over the sdi connections. This is what Viddovation was working on and cracked, the SRW recorder code. You need the camera in SRW to get REC Light. Anything other than the Sony IF box uses the SRW mode. The codex wet dock acts like a SRW to get all the record functions on the camera working. I haven't seen it but I'm pretty sure the OBX acted the same way. The Panavision Genesis does not have IF Box mode, the Panavision Genesis made IF box shows up as SRW when connected to F35.

Video did make the assumption that the IF box was as complex as the SRW mode to get signal going. He was not like me, dumb and blind testing I just shorted pins down in different combinations until I found the switches - could of easily blown up at least the dock board but I got extra. Why my discovery is a little important is anyone down the line wanting to get the camera to act like IF box is connected, it does not need fancy handshake of the SRW.

But in theory all you need is a switch in your line to turn off and make the SRW restart its handshake.
 
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