Just got a new camera - Sony F35

I beleive that at least one of the "cheap" $20k F65 units offered "AS-IS" on e-Bay was being sold off by a liquidator after returning from a lease. If the liquidator isn't industry specific, it's not necessarily uncommon for them to not bother testing units and simply sell "AS-IS". On one hand, you could argue they're losing money by not testing a potentially good unit - but by genuinely not testing and selling AS-IS they eliminate post-sales responsibilities should the unit not perform perfectly. And if you don't have industry specific knowledge, you may not know that something is defective if it passes a simple power-up test.

Just to say that those sales may have been genuine and of a fully working unit. But also that the seller would not have been responsible if there were any costly defects.

A deal like that pretty much requires that you bypass e-Bay, and contact the seller. If you can arrange a physical visit for inspection and purchase, at the cost of airfare and time, you may snag a very good deal. And if you buy in person, no need to use e-Bay, so you can negotiate an even lower selling price to cover your airfare. The risk is that on arrival your testing discovers a defect, and you decline to purchase, while still being out the airfare and time.

Sometimes it's a good deal. But it's always a risk.
 
Yes I find with expensive professional items sometimes it is worth paying a little extra for a lot of extra piece of mind - I am finding this with my F65, silly things can go wrong very easily and it is good to have nice people to work with to sort it.
 
The damaged F35 listing is back on ebay! This time with a buy it now of $3,250 (or best offer!). So that seems to suggest the seller did fudge the bidding on the last go-round.

I put in a best offer (almost certain to be rejected!) and apparently there's one other best offer pending (almost certainly offering more than i am!).


EDIT:
My offer has been rejected! I've placed a new one! For approximately $4 more!

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Sony-F35-Di..._Cameras&hash=item234081de6a&autorefresh=true
 
3k was the price he gave me outside of ebay. I think the $5500 F35 full working camera is such a better deal. Only reason to buy the broken one is if you wanted that viewfinder and the parts.
 
yachacha said:
3k was the price he gave me outside of ebay. I think the $5500 F35 full working camera is such a better deal. Only reason to buy the broken one is if you wanted that viewfinder and the parts.
Click to expand...

Someone needs to explain that to him in very simple terms - despite the fact that it *was* at $150k camera body, it isn't today - and as he wants to sell AS-IS on a unit that has clearly been dropped from a substantial height...I'd say $1,500 is a much fairer price for that sort of deal. Let's be honest - if he could have had it repaired for under $2k, he'd probably have it done. I expect Sony would bill that repairs at some multiple of that... it could easily be over $10k in a repair bill. Which obviously makes no sense.
 
That thing took a hell of a smash.

FWIW one of the backlights in my C30 went out, you can only replace the entire panel at a cost of $3000
 
We imagine it to be purely cosmetic - those cameras are pretty tough, I can't think a smash which does that will leave the internals unharmed.

One of these interesting curious, people always think of the ALEXA as a very "solid" camera compared to the F65. In fact, the F65 (and possibly F35) is a magnesium alloy, for lighter weight. The ALEXA is cast iron.
 
hahaha whose gonna do the F35 vs Alexa smash test! Start at 5 feet and keep going up to 25ft drops.

Alexa feels like a solid metal block, F35 feels solid but not as "metal". The bigger thing for me, is connections that don't break. HDMI, micro HDMI, micro usb, even cheap XLR ports are ticking time bombs. Cables are going to get ripped out of cameras a lot more often than cameras getting dropped. Think about what would happen to a SDI if you yanked it, the cable breaks camera is fine, or if you yank an HDMI - total disaster. Also how you secure your viewfinder will go a long way in making a "solid" rig.
 
Both Cast Iron and Magnesium Alloy are very strong, Magnesium Alloy however is a more expensive, "high tech" metal. Just pointing out that it is curious how people deride the Sony cameras for being "plastic" when they are anything but (not counting Z1s here)
 
What is worth understanding is that cast iron provides excellent heat dispersion, which means it acts as an optimal heat sink. Using a cast iron design makes the Arri cameras heavier, but also means they need less fans. For studios switching from heaving S35 cameras with film mags, a quiet camera is more valuable than a light camera for general purpose photography. The Arri D21 didn't have any fan whatsoever.
 
The rear half of the D-21 is basically just a heatsink - if you view it from the top you can see right through it.

I find the choice of cast iron interesting - from my experience using it as cookware, it is also excellent at STAYING hot for a long time.

With the F65, it seems a lot of noise actually comes from the recorder.
 
SJX said:
Is alexa really cast IRON?
Click to expand...

Yes - if you've ever picked one up it's pretty easy to believe :)

Or, certainly parts of it anyway. I'm trying to find the source for this, but it definitely said iron, possibly steel. I was surprised at the time, as I thought it would be aluminium or similar.

I think the AMIRA may be different.
 
Not recommended, I assume you're talking about the -9 and -18 settings?

You would be compromising the camera's dynamic range in a very extreme way. Costing yourself a lot of headroom. The feature was designed to allow focus pullers to check focus with the lens wide open, without needing to put another filter in.
 
Yes, that is what I meant, and I did find out a little while ago about it being for focus pullers - something I wouldn't have thought of! I was just wondering if it would be a means of overcoming the lack of built in NDs. I guessed there'd be a loss of DR but was wondering just how bad that would be.
Steve
 
At -9db, pretty bad I'd think. I used to dial in -3db on my F900 on occasion, but technically it isn't a good idea as you're effectively limiting what the camera can do. The F35 behaves best with +3db, which is what extended mode does
 
WOOOOOOW!
Thank you all very sincerely for this thread, I feel like this could be published as an eBook ;)

So I came here by accident while I was celebrating being just about able to place a pre-order for the new FS7, finally a camera that checks all my boxes. But seeing the material you all are getting out of these $8k used F35's.... it's just amazing. Better skintones and consistently beautiful, "organic filmic etc" images then I've personally seen coming out of Epics, F55s, etc..

It's always seemed like every camera under $15k has had some crippling weakness for me until the FS7, on paper it checks my boxes as an exclusive documentary filmmaker. The image doesn't really wow me (has some of that blueish Sony video going on) but it looks pretty decent and the form factor is a winner.

But now I want to just buy a F35 >.< However, can you advise me, how difficult is it to adapt an F35 to verite run'n'gun filmmaking? The image looks amazing but am I fooling myself into believing I can make the ergonomics work?

I would need for it to be able to be shoulder mounted at least some times, and sometimes deal with XLR mics.. Is the weight and form factor too difficult for documentary? Would the F23 or SRW9000 make it doable? Or should I just get a 5lb FS7 with the 1lb Sony 18-105 and have a lightweight camera with good ergonomics and sacrifice IQ for usability.

Thanks very much for your advice in this matter and thank you for uncovering this hidden market anomoly. 7 years is a long time but still... $250k -> $8k?!? @_@
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top