FS7: Issues I've noticed with the FS7 this far, questions you may have the answer to!

C

corycross

Well-known member
Hey everyone!

After owning this camera for the past 3 days and only getting to play with it for a few hours the first day, and today a few hours, I have ran into a few quirks that I see others managed to get through but I haven't understood completely yet.

So, if cache is turned ON, it disables zebra and peaking... very strange.. I am shooting cine ei by the way, S-log 3.


  1. The Waveform monitor is not showing up in the cameras view finder. It seems that when some settings are activated in the FS7 menu, it disables others and this has been a bit confusing.
  2. I am not able to move the magnification box around when trying to critical focus.
  3. Adobe Premiere CS6 doesn't seem to want to take the 4k files into it. Any suggestions?
Thank you, other than these things, I was able to test out the camera by filming some stuff around the house in lower light. I'm use to documentary/ quick filming styles and got this so I could get into commercial/ film work which is a learning curve but I seem to feel comfortable with it. If I can begin to understand the above questions/statements that I have found while playing with this camera then it could make life a bit easier. I purchased the vimeo series of understanding the camera but it doesn't seem that questions were answered fully or while he was going through settings, some of my camera settings were disabled.

Allllright, thats about it. Thank you!
 
I found a bug too: If you switch CODEC from XAVC-I to MPEG422, two things will happen:

1. the available record time displayed on the status screen will remain the same as for XAVC-I
2. recording will start, but then after 3 seconds, a media error will occur.

I found that I could nurse it into working by first selecting XAVC-L and THEN selecting MPEG422 after that. Then the available record time went up to a little more than 4X and recording was successful.

FW 2.0. Apparently there are still bugs. Or maybe the Lexar XQD card that B&H sells as accessory for this camera is not compatible.

The first time this happened, the camera locked up such that when I switched off the camera, I found it still on 15 minutes later when I returned. Initially, I was finding that the camera would not record at all, and I switched it off and Googled the problem. When I returned, I found the viewfinder still displaying image, but the switch was clearly in the OFF position! Had to remove the battery to reset it. Had this happened at a shoot, I would have lost the recording.
 
I would suggest getting Doug Jensens Videos and field guide for the FS7. This will help you come up to speed with the camera way faster than trying to figure things out by yourself.

Available here:
http://www.vortexmedia.com

Yes there are still some bugs, but Doug explains the work arounds very well.
 
corycross said:
Hey everyone!

After owning this camera for the past 3 days and only getting to play with it for a few hours the first day, and today a few hours, I have ran into a few quirks that I see others managed to get through but I haven't understood completely yet.

So, if cache is turned ON, it disables zebra and peaking... very strange.. I am shooting cine ei by the way, S-log 3.

  1. The Waveform monitor is not showing up in the cameras view finder. It seems that when some settings are activated in the FS7 menu, it disables others and this has been a bit confusing.
  2. I am not able to move the magnification box around when trying to critical focus.
  3. Adobe Premiere CS6 doesn't seem to want to take the 4k files into it. Any suggestions?
Thank you, other than these things, I was able to test out the camera by filming some stuff around the house in lower light. I'm use to documentary/ quick filming styles and got this so I could get into commercial/ film work which is a learning curve but I seem to feel comfortable with it. If I can begin to understand the above questions/statements that I have found while playing with this camera then it could make life a bit easier. I purchased the vimeo series of understanding the camera but it doesn't seem that questions were answered fully or while he was going through settings, some of my camera settings were disabled.

Allllright, thats about it. Thank you!
Click to expand...

Wouldn't it make sense to search the forums first before posting ? All the problems you describe are well documented here.
 
broughtonfilm said:
Wouldn't it make sense to search the forums first before posting ? All the problems you describe are well documented here.
Click to expand...

I have looked at others whom have posted the same issues but after following their answers, I was still not able to see waveform. I didn't see any posts of Magnification, and I did read else where about premiere not being compatible with the recording format and that I'd need to do some other post work. Just seeing if there are any updated solutions or people could walk me through this.

I purchased the Doug Jenson video and I thought after watching it I learned a couple things, most of it was self explanatory and him, nor I understood the quarks about this camera (the issues I've posted).
 
After being on the phone with Sony and reading contradicting ways of turning waveform on, they helped me out with that.. Seems to be that the magnify button will not move around the image right now (which is a shame!).

Other than that, its a lovely image and great camera.
 
basspig said:
I found a bug too: If you switch CODEC from XAVC-I to MPEG422, two things will happen:

1. the available record time displayed on the status screen will remain the same as for XAVC-I
2. recording will start, but then after 3 seconds, a media error will occur.

I found that I could nurse it into working by first selecting XAVC-L and THEN selecting MPEG422 after that. Then the available record time went up to a little more than 4X and recording was successful.

FW 2.0. Apparently there are still bugs. Or maybe the Lexar XQD card that B&H sells as accessory for this camera is not compatible.

The first time this happened, the camera locked up such that when I switched off the camera, I found it still on 15 minutes later when I returned. Initially, I was finding that the camera would not record at all, and I switched it off and Googled the problem. When I returned, I found the viewfinder still displaying image, but the switch was clearly in the OFF position! Had to remove the battery to reset it. Had this happened at a shoot, I would have lost the recording.
Click to expand...
Basspig that is very strange. I only say that as since I had purchased this camera I have been switching between Mpeg422 and XAVC-I when I needed slowmotion and not encountered any issue. This was my only option for Slow-mo pre Vegas Pro 444 update as I couldn't use XAVC-L. This past weekend same thing and I was using Lexars 1333X. Sorry to hear that
 
Which firmware are you running in which the Lexar cards work okay switching modes? I had the camera lock up on me in stages last night. First it wouldn't record at all in MPEG422 mode. Then I switched it back to XAVC-I, but found it would not record there either. So I tried powering it down and that's when I found it still with an image on the VF but no status screen, when I returned 15 mins later. Had to remove battery to shut it down. When I powered back up, still would not switch from XAVC-I directly to MPEG422 properly (the available time displayed was still 15 minutes on the 32GB card in MPEG mode! and when I started recording, I'd get a media error after 3 seconds.) Only after I tried switching to XAVC-L and THEN switching to MPEG422, did the time display show a change to 64 minutes. Then I was able to record without errors. This kind of thing makes me nervous when it comes to a shoot. I need to know that when the players are on stage and I press that Rec button, that it's gonna record!
 
I would reapply the firmware or something because all does not sound right with your camera. By the way I'm not sure if you can record different codecs to the same card, if that is the issue? Never even tried it.

I have the Lexar 64Gb cards and a Sony 128Gb one.
 
basspig it was while using every firmware the camera has had. Im running 2.0 since release.
 
Ben, the camera came with FW 2.0 from the factory. I assume it was correctly installed.

You do raise an interesting question about mixing CODECs on the card. Maybe it's a database issue that Sony didn't contemplate users recording and changing formats throughout the day? I'm going to experiment with that. I noticed it was working correctly after dumping the card contents and reformatting, such that MPEG422 was the first recorded file afterwards. Could be coincidence, or there might be something to it. Never read anything that says you can't record both formats to the same card though!
 
I have no idea with the FS7 but most cameras I have used in the past have not allowed you to mix recording formats on the same media.
 
I never had that issue with XDCam EX, which is why this seemed strange to me. I used to mix overcrank 720P and 1080 24P on the same SxS card on a regular basis.
 
I was starting to think that was true, so I did another test this afternoon. Shot some 4K then switched over to MPEG422 and shot some HD. Now that thing that's limited is Thumbnail view can only play the clips that are in the format that the camera is currently set to record in. So clips of the other format are black with a red 'x' in them. Otherwise, it works.

The lurking question is: why didn't it work last night? And why did the camera freeze up?

I shot some very nice looking MPEG422 1080 this afternoon, while testing various exposures for S-Log 3. I found that overcast daylight needs no ND filter at 1/48th shutter and F4. It looks washed out in the VF and even a bit washed with the S-log 3 LUT enabled for the VF, but it grades perfectly with no blown areas.

I wish I could get the LUT that Sony uses for the VF and install it in my Shogun recorder so that screen will give me a more graded look. There must be one available for download somewhere, but it eludes my search efforts.
 
Doug Jensen said:
You can definitely mix all frame rates and codecs on a card.
Click to expand...

Just what I suspected. Shooters need to be able to work in multiple CODECs and it wouldn't make sense to prevent that.

Why my camera locked up the other night is still a mystery though. They are becoming more computerized, and so software bugs are increasingly likely.
 
I've had my F55 for two years now, and my FS7 since last November, and I do not recall either one ever locking up on me. I know it happens sometimes, but in my experience it is rare.
 
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