Just broght the Sony FS100 AM I HAPPY ?

J

jideobi

Active member
NO

I currently own the panasonic GH2 and I wanted to upgrade so I brought the Sony FS100.
I have had the camera for a few days now and all I can say that this is the worst camera I have ever owned.
Boy does this camera have problems or what
Colour reproduction is horrible the camera has a crazy obsession with the colour RED
I used to own the canon 5d k II and I sold it because of it's aliasing issues I must admit the the fs100 is not as bad but it is defiantly worst that than the gh2
When the highlights clip things get very nasty very quickly yellow becomes the new white sprinkled with a dash of halo
When you put an vari nd on this camera just make sure you have Dan Aykroyd's phone number
In terms of resolving detail a hack gh2 is superior
The two good things about this camera is it's great in low light and I like the shape and size
 
Return it right away and get a FS700 when it´s available.
I also switched from the GH2 to the FS100. Both have their advantages. The GH2 is ultra sharp but suffers from banding like hell and even at ISO 200 I had to use neat video to vlean up dark and especially coloured parts of the image because the noise was so strong.
 
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Hey Jideobi

You want to broght your cam back to dealer so you can has refund.
 
@Felixger Thanks
Today I have learnt three things
1. Always test out a camera for a least a day before buying
2. Because great cinematographers are producing great images with a camera doesn't mean I will
3. The grass is not always greener on the other side
 
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Give it time, learn how to use it in a proper way, its been stressed here many times that you should adjust the picture profile per lighting/ subject situation. The FS is not a bad camera at all, but work around the issues and weaknesses it has and make money with it, mine was paid off with the 1st job I used it.
 
You can't possibly learn how to use FS100 in just few days. Both GH2 and 5D2 are WYSIWYG cameras. You take any DSLR out on the first day and that's pretty much the best image you'll ever get. Not so much with FS100 or any other higher end cinema cameras.

For the record, I've thought of returning my FS100 when I first saw the footage it produced.
 
As a confirmed shoulder mount camera operator, let me try to understand this. You spend a great deal of money on a product that produces material that doesn't look good. Surely that smacks of bad design? Expecting a new user to have to set up the camera menu tweak able items before you start getting good pictures seems amazing! I would have assumed the default settings would give great images leaving excellent ones for adjustments made by the operator under shooting conditions.

Rather like buying a sports car for mega money and having to tweak it before you can blow off your neighbours Ford family car? I can see the technical basis for this issue - but surely this also means the manufacturer got the defaults very, very wrong if it's so bad a brand new one might make people send them back as not up to scratch?
 
Come on now......Let's not feed the ....

Anyone that owns the camera know's it takes great imagery right out of the box.

OP bought the camera, It's the worst camera he's ever owned, He's returning it. I'm sure he'll be happy with his GH2.
 
even with no pic profile (turned off), if you light, expose, and shoot properly, you can create stunning images. but then you would have to have some knowledge about all of these things. knowledge that can't be gained by simply getting a dslr for christmas and turning it on.
 
cheezweezl said:
even with no pic profile (turned off), if you light, expose, and shoot properly, you can create stunning images. but then you would have to have some knowledge about all of these things. knowledge that can't be gained by simply getting a dslr for christmas and turning it on.
Click to expand...

You mean the little book that comes in the box doesn't cover all that?

Next you're gonna tell me if I buy a Les Paul 6 string I won't be able to play better than Eric Clapton in 3 days.
 
I bought a new NEX FS100 myself a few weeks ago – loving it so far

I started out with a 550D (T2i) and kit lens two years ago, learnt how to shoot from the Internet, progressed through to a 7D with L lenses and full rigging - Genus Matte box with Formatt ND filters, Bravo follow focus, pro fluid head tripod, Marshall monitor, R44 sound recorder, NTG-3 etc - upgraded to an FS100 a few weeks ago.

For me it ticks all the boxes – everything immediately felt ‘right’ to me... I can ‘feel’ the DSLR heritage in the camera’s design but it offers so much more.
 
Heh, well I am one who DID NOT like the default settings out of the camera. Did one small shoot with them just to see how they faired and the red was out of control, COMPLETELY agree with that statement. So much so I bought a color chart and tuned the colors till I like them better. It's better, but not perfect. I tend to use more picture profiles for different situations to help with that.

The rolling shutter alone is a huge plus on the FS100, and it allows me to do some handheld work with our action films.

I can understand the frustration because there are certain things with the image handling you learn to understand and work around, but, I think the final outcome is a wonderful image most of the time. It's just different, and I think partly to do with the 3DLUT being used.

Definitely try Cinegamma2 and not the default when you start the camera. Check out the settings Frank (postmaster) posted in another thread and see if you like what you get better. Frank has shown how wonderful of an image you can get out of the FS100, but I really feel it takes good custom settings to get the absolute best. And don't be afraid of a little underexposing as well, there is a lot of detail in the shadows you can pull out. The FS100 has I think 10.5 stops whereas I think the GH2 is around 8 or 8.5, so there is more to get out of the image.

You might be surprised to find out how great an image you can get if you tune it to what you like. It's why I've kept my FS100. For under $10k it's been the best up to this point I have used, and I owned an AF100 as well.
 
For me the bigger picture is that I feel that sony are becoming too lazy.
Leaving us to spend hours upon hours to find solutions to their problematic cameras.
what help has sony provided in all this
if we don't put our foot down things will only get worst
 
jideobi said:
For me the bigger picture is that I feel that sony are becoming too lazy.
Leaving us to spend hours upon hours to find solutions to their problematic cameras.
what help has sony provided in all this
if we don't put our foot down things will only get worst
Click to expand...

Uh....yeah, like say the FS700? Things are DEFINITELY getting worse around here because of Sony and
their lazy ways.
 
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