Looking for opinions for “new” camera gear

As much as I love my Canon C200, if I was in that position for those needs, Amira or Venice would be my choices. DPAF is great but if your ops can hit focus most of the time, then you can live without it. DPAF is far from perfect and the tracking on fast moving subjects can be good to poor, a lot of variables. 17-120 is a beast of lens and on either of these cameras with V-Mounts, it's going to be old school Betacam heavy but that's life. Amira is the win but the Venice is by far my favorite current Sony camera and it's pretty great too.
 
Last week I was on the Cricket (Oz vs UK) crowd interviews and BTS not action which was covered by the big 2/3 cams.

Honestly I hate lugging my FS7 (+vlocks etc) around and my sack of lenses (10-24, 28-85, 50-300)

If I could afford a 2/3 camera Id go that way every time.

.. or .. dont laugh.. we just bought a sony Z90.

Blasting AF, viewfinder (not externally powered EVF) no rig. goes in a tiny bag.

Honestly the thing makes one SO agile.

Mix that with a GH5 with a 25 1.4 for sit-downs and you are good to go!

Robust? They are disposable in your budget.

S35.. Id look at..

Amera .. great shoulder cam
C200 (300?).. great AF
EVA1.. the lightest MF S35 cam with proper codecs.

Personally I would not want to carry an Amera on a mobile/solo job.

Even with the CN7 one ends up with a sack of lenses.. 70-200 or longer, a wide zoom (11-16) and a 50prime for art interviews.
 
Thanks for that. The may ask for a little cam to use as a backup in case of failure on location, so I'll keep that Z90 in mind and bring up the cost and size if needed as a backup or little b cam.
 
morgan_moore said:
.. or .. dont laugh.. we just bought a sony Z90.

Blasting AF, viewfinder (not externally powered EVF) no rig. goes in a tiny bag.

Honestly the thing makes one SO agile...
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Which is is my theory on the new gear. The quality is getting so good, one can deliver great images from the "amateur" tier product. In go Z90 and S1H and out go Amira and Alexa. At least, some of the time.

PS. Just looked up a YouTube clip that is claimed to be recorded off Z90 into the Atomos via the HDMI. And it looks pretty darn good.
 
Yep I’m not suggesting it a a spare.

I’m suggesting doing some tests before committing to $1m of traditional kit.

At least place an argument why it is a bad plan

I think agility is key to engaging actuality
 
Newsguy said:
We actually have FS7 mk ii’s as “Profile” cameras since we don’t have the lens to use them as ENG cameras, and we use them pretty often.
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Seeing as you already have FS7s and ops who are used to them it may be worth taking a look at Sony's ENG kit developed for the two FS7 models. These 'ENG' bits can be purchased as a whole kit with the BF adapter or just the other pieces required to configure it for an ENG lifestyle. Using a kit like this gives you the very real usefulness and flexibility of an ENG camera and it can utilize the networks stock of existing 2/3" glass for the the predominantly HD ENG work. It also expands the use of the FS7 models in that it allows you the original flexibility of using S35 lenses like the very solid performing Canon 17-120 in HD and UHD but with the addition all the niceties of the HD ENG world many of us became used to such as shoulder mount, drop in dual wireless receiver, external control of audio, important! (Four audio tracks as your XLRs are still free.) Plus you get proxy recording live streaming and or uploading capabilities, TC in/out, genlock etc, etc. All very useful. I've been using an FS7 over the last few years in a similar configuration but with after market bits and pieces to get me there. Using an MTF B4 to E-Mount Super 16 adapter with ENG Lenses, 0.7 of a stop loss, along with a Sony 'V' Mount Sony dual wireless receiver.

Having the ability to swap between the camera's two identities, S35 with a true 4k zoom and B4 Center Crop in HD with really long servo zooms has made the camera a much more useful and flexible piece of kit with out a doubt. The new viewfinder, one of the FS7s original weaknesses is a big leap forward. It's basically the same viewfinder that is available for the F5/F55. This kit offering the all round I/O of time code and genlock totally transforms the camera for multi-cam work. Just having the ability to lock two or three cams TC together for higher end ENG/EFP shoots make life so much easier in post for a start. Especially when there are numerous stop starts on numerous cameras over the course of a day.

For many of us this kit has come too late as a lot of us have already worked out alternative work-arounds. Not the cheapest kit in the world at $6K but from a broadcasters point of view if they need ENG type capabilities it's a lot cheaper than many of the higher end camera options out there. Especially when they realize for HD work if they get the Sony or an alternative B4 optical adapter they can still use their existing 18/22 x ENG glass with their long reach and great zoom servos. Something their camera ops have been used to for ages. As regards to the HD S16 crop resolution with 2/3" glass it maintains a full HD output as the center crop is actually 2178 x 1148 delivering an effective 2.5K resolution which after a 20% loss due to the deBayer process leaves you an effective resolution of 2K.

Chris Young

You can see more here from a couple of NAB videos:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4DZ9ACZHDbU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rvdpOlvf2IA
 
Very surprised by the kludge factor with that build up kit, Sony are normally more elegant about things like this, but it looks like a bunch of spare parts thrown together. None of them seem to really fit the camera. It's anything but sleek and I can see that back half getting snagged on countless doors as you rush through them following some politician or criminal. A for effort, C for execution (maybe closer to C- or D).
 
Update:

So we put together a proposal to go with Amira’s and the Canon 17-120. Not only did they approve it, but they even offered to rent us one so that we could test it out with our workflow and make sure everything played well together. In a hilarious (and sad for me) twist of events, the older cam ops absolutely hated the weight. They held them side by side with the 800s and the 500s and the Amira was significantly heavier. I personally knew it was a heavy combo, but I’m about 20 years younger than these guys. So I can’t fight them over it because when I’m that age I wouldn’t people forcing heavy gear on me.

So because all of this is happening so close to all of these new announcements, they decided that they want the FX-9. Since they know the FS7 they figure that the FX-9 with 17-120 combo will be lighter than the Amira. I explained that while yes it will be (slightly) lighter, it isn’t the same solid build or form factor as a camera 4x it’s price. Image-wise, we will lose the ability to crop into S16 mode on the FX9 which sucks, but when combining it with some full frame glass it should be a nice little cam to work with. The winner in all of this was the company cause now they’re going to save some serious dime.
 
Newsguy said:
Update:

So we put together a proposal to go with Amira’s and the Canon 17-120. Not only did they approve it, but they even offered to rent us one so that we could test it out with our workflow and make sure everything played well together. In a hilarious (and sad for me) twist of events, the older cam ops absolutely hated the weight. They held them side by side with the 800s and the 500s and the Amira was significantly heavier. I personally knew it was a heavy combo, but I’m about 20 years younger than these guys. So I can’t fight them over it because when I’m that age I wouldn’t people forcing heavy gear on me.

So because all of this is happening so close to all of these new announcements, they decided that they want the FX-9. Since they know the FS7 they figure that the FX-9 with 17-120 combo will be lighter than the Amira. I explained that while yes it will be (slightly) lighter, it isn’t the same solid build or form factor as a camera 4x it’s price. Image-wise, we will lose the ability to crop into S16 mode on the FX9 which sucks, but when combining it with some full frame glass it should be a nice little cam to work with. The winner in all of this was the company cause now they’re going to save some serious dime.
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https://steadygum.com

I've posted about this in the support section and while some people are taken aback by the price, it really helps with heavier rigs and I do not regret buying it. And if you're talking about a $50K camera with a $30K lens, it kind of makes it a lot more palatable. Even just a $15K camera... And it will probably be a lot more necessary if you're going with the 9 and a 17-120, as the lens will be very front heavy with that camera. I can actually use my F55/17-120 without sliding it back on the shoulder mount, because it takes the weight of the lens and I'm not having to push back up on it. I've used it twice for post game locker room sound with my P2 VariCam(NFL, you know what a goat F that is) and with it, I wasn't thinking "wrap it up, wrap it up. I could just stand there and roll, roll, roll.

Everyone that I've shown it to and let use it, they all like it. A lot of the guys that I shoot with are older than me(some well into their mid and upper 50's and have been running around with 25lb-30lb+ rigs their whole career). We all have F55's with 17-120's and we were together on a four cam shoot about a week ago. One of my friends has been looking for something for a while to help him(ease the weight and stress on his shoulder) and I had been telling him about the SteadyGum, so I brought it to show him. I let both of them use it and they both said they were going to buy one after trying it out. That should tell you something when a bunch of old network dogs are completely sold on it after only five minutes.
 
To me the C500 seems way better than the FX9 - but I guess you are not after top end data heavy codecs

I you go sony the 28-135 sony lens is full frame and cheap (with IS and AF too) the Cn17 wont cover the full frame of the chip and also doesnt have AF and is heavy - id try the cheapo sony lens before committing to the CN17
 
morgan_moore said:
To me the C500 seems way better than the FX9 - but I guess you are not after top end data heavy codecs

I you go sony the 28-135 sony lens is full frame and cheap (with IS and AF too) the Cn17 wont cover the full frame of the chip and also doesnt have AF and is heavy - id try the cheapo sony lens before committing to the CN17
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Partially true about the autofocus. But if he went with the 500mkII, the 17-120 will focus on it. I actually tried mine on a clients 300mkII. It was really weird having a lens like that with the focus barrel spinning back and forth on its own. Didn’t have the time to get in-depth enough on the settings, but I wasn’t overly impressed with it for tracking fast moving objects, though. Maybe it works better with people and it’s face detection. And it doesn’t work in slow-mo...
 
morgan_moore said:
To me the C500 seems way better than the FX9 - but I guess you are not after top end data heavy codecs

I you go sony the 28-135 sony lens is full frame and cheap (with IS and AF too) the Cn17 wont cover the full frame of the chip and also doesnt have AF and is heavy - id try the cheapo sony lens before committing to the CN17
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I think we are going to get the kit with the lens included. The thing about the 17-120 is that it’s one of a handful of ENG style S35 lenses that has a proper zoom servo and decent focal length. I’ve said it often that for what we do S35 is about the right compromise between nice images and still keeping focus. The full frame will be nice for sit down interviews, but mostly useless for our run and gun stuff.
 
I know and appreciate the lense (didnt know about the af on canon though)

It just seems an odd choice with the FX9 as you will only use half of the sensor which must compromise quality and wont utilise the AF of the camera. And sony make a semi pro, really cheap zoom using the whole sensor with IS, AF and a decent range.

If I had to use that canon lens probably Id stick with the FS7 which is now 'worthless' or consider the F5/55 or EVA1 or varicam LT (too heavy IMO) or stupid shape C300ii or C500i

Overall I can see that this is a hard choice for you with all the new cameras being full frame

I have always thought a 'pro' MFT camera would be best for slightly arty ENG if a decent zoom was made for that format.. it is not!

I think you are choosing on price and rep rather than considering that 'plastic tech' is moving forward and some prosumer kit is in reality offereing an excellent set of specs.. low mass, AF, IS. Not robust but in CN17 world you have the budget for multiple spares and repairs with the cheap stuff.

I have an 18-200 sony lens - everything is horrible about it but I am now admitting that for many situations its actually good, even when I have a trunk of classic glass that I could use instead.

Also have you tried the Z90? !
 
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We have the 18-110 with our FS7s. I really like that lens, but have you ever zoomed with the rocker on those things? It’s really bad. If we shot things and never did live zooms we’d be fine, but we use live zooms a lot in sports and the zoom via the rocker on those lenses is awful.
 
Fair point. I guess the older 28-135 could be worse - I love the zoom on the Canon CN17. I wonder if the Sony lens could be rigged with a focus motor to zoom.

Sticking to the CN17 Id look at the EVA1 ?

That is - i think - the conundrum whatever ones budget - there is some amazing cheap tech around but it is always a somehow lacking vs the pro version at 10x the cost - but also the pro version is often five years behind the curve on the tech front and some of that tech is fast becoming the norm/expectation and is really useful.

The main thing I miss on my FS7 is AF - not cos I cant focus myself in a normal situation but I cant focus (without a puller/motor/ac*) if its on a gimbal or held over my head or hung out of a car window or Im on a 400 and someone is running down the wing towards camera.


*which I have
 
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And that is a thing - the Z90 - using half of me feels like a tourist - not a proper camera person - but half of me questions if my back-busting battery hungry FS7 really delivers much more on zoom range, hand-held stability on a tele and focus accuracy - certainly less
 
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