CAMCORDERS: New Sony Camcorder Z200

Doug Jensen said:
Me too! I'm working on it. But just like the FX6, there are barely any paint menus to work with. I think I may have come up with some good settings today. If the weather is good tomorrow I'll go out and shoot some real stuff and see how it holds up without any grading in post.
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It’s tough. These were in noon sun, but I can’t seem to find a good middle ground when it’s so bright. If I expose the scene so that nothing clips, the darker birds are very underexposed. Like the bees for example, That same shot with a larger sensor cam, even in cinetone, is more forgiving. I can have the bees decently exposed, and not have that left side clip so hard. In this case, if I didn’t clip those leaves on the left, the beehive was a complete shadow.
 
Newsguy said:
It’s tough. These were in noon sun, but I can’t seem to find a good middle ground when it’s so bright. If I expose the scene so that nothing clips, the darker birds are very underexposed. Like the bees for example, That same shot with a larger sensor cam, even in cinetone, is more forgiving. I can have the bees decently exposed, and not have that left side clip so hard. In this case, if I didn’t clip those leaves on the left, the beehive was a complete shadow.
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Yeah, I could tell the bees were a tough situation, but you should be able to bring the left side leaves down in post and desaturate them so they look better even if the exposure is over the top. But I think most of the birds are overexposed, and that's what i was referring to. If you're pushing stuff to the edge of clipping and then backing off a little, that is not the right way to do it. Especially with S-Cinetone. You don't want anything with S-Cintone to go much over 85 IRE, except for specular highlights.
 
Doug Jensen said:
Yeah, I could tell the bees were a tough situation, but you should be able to bring the left side leaves down in post and desaturate them so they look better even if the exposure is over the top. But I think most of the birds are overexposed, and that's what i was referring to. If you're pushing stuff to the edge of clipping and then backing off a little, that is not the right way to do it. Especially with S-Cinetone. You don't want anything with S-Cintone to go much over 85 IRE, except for specular highlights.
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Thanks for that tip. I was definitely doing it that way. Just pulling back a little bit from clipping. That’s the old school ENG shooter in me. I did know that Cinetone needed to be exposed a bit lower (I expose light faces to about 62%) but I wasn’t aware about the 85% in the high end. Thank you for that, I’ll definitely continue shooting with that in mind moving forward.
 
Thanks for posting. I 100% agree with Doug. The low mids are the key to setting up these type of cameras. If you can raise up the gamma you end up not needing to push on the high end as every scene 'feels' fully exposed.
 
Thanks for posting Doug. Very nice looking footage. Your Doug #6 is a great looking profile.

If I could ask your opinion - What do you think of the camera? More precisely, what do you think of the image quality? Are you having to wrestle with the thing to get great imagery or is it punching at a high level?

I am happy to see how much you were able to dampen the highlights as shown when you shot the early morning sun. It was a very controlled blob of white!

Last thing - how does the dynamic range feel?
 
Bassman2003 said:
Thanks for posting Doug. Very nice looking footage. Your Doug #6 is a great looking profile.

If I could ask your opinion - What do you think of the camera? More precisely, what do you think of the image quality? Are you having to wrestle with the thing to get great imagery or is it punching at a high level?

I am happy to see how much you were able to dampen the highlights as shown when you shot the early morning sun. It was a very controlled blob of white!

Last thing - how does the dynamic range feel?
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All good questions, but I'm not ready to make any official declarations. However, I feel like the image quality is better than my FX6, and the camera is a hell of a lighter and so much easier to use. The thing I love most about using an ENG camera with a good zoom is how quickly you can bang off wide, medium, and tight. That gives you so much freedom. If you ignore shallow DoF, the Z200 beats the FX6 on pretty much every count that matters to me. With a couple of exceptions, such as no picture cache. But I can live without that.

I'm doing a 3-month road trip to Alaska next summer. If there are no new cameras to make me change my mind, I'll be taking the Z200 for video and my A1 for stills. The FX6, Z280, Z750, F55, and FS7 will be staying home. That should answer your questions right there about what I think of the camera.

As for my scene files, it is still a work in progress, but I feel like #6 is getting pretty close for outdoor use.
 
Thanks for your input Doug. I did not want you to go out on any limbs but the impression is very strong! I was thinking while watching your videos that, like you said, if one drops the shallow DOF desire, this camera really looks like a mirrorless in quality. Some shots at long tele do have pretty shallow DOF anyway. 1" is quite a useful sensor size and probably the most utilitarian for single person shooting. To mention that it is at least equal or even ahead of the FX6 is evidence that Sony tried really hard to make a great camera here. Your work is appreciated.
 
To Doug’s point, the other day I was doing live shots for the longshoremen’s strike. I brought both cameras in case they wanted a quick interview, I wouldn’t have to take the FX6 off the sticks, disconnect everything etc. Anyway, they never asked for interviews, but they did want the shot up all day to use as live bumps just showing the cranes and shipping containers (which were miles away from our location).

So the Z200 came in handy, I simply got rid of the fx6 and used the Z200 to give me close up shots of the port, then zoomed it out for the live shots. No need to swap lenses (which wasn’t an option since it was basically “live” at any moment.
 
Newsguy said:
To Doug’s point, the other day I was doing live shots for the longshoremen’s strike. I brought both cameras in case they wanted a quick interview, I wouldn’t have to take the FX6 off the sticks, disconnect everything etc. Anyway, they never asked for interviews, but they did want the shot up all day to use as live bumps just showing the cranes and shipping containers (which were miles away from our location).

So the Z200 came in handy, I simply got rid of the fx6 and used the Z200 to give me close up shots of the port, then zoomed it out for the live shots. No need to swap lenses (which wasn’t an option since it was basically “live” at any moment.
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That's a great example of what the Z200 is all about.
 
Bassman2003 said:
Thanks for your input Doug. I did not want you to go out on any limbs but the impression is very strong! I was thinking while watching your videos that, like you said, if one drops the shallow DOF desire, this camera really looks like a mirrorless in quality. Some shots at long tele do have pretty shallow DOF anyway. 1" is quite a useful sensor size and probably the most utilitarian for single person shooting. To mention that it is at least equal or even ahead of the FX6 is evidence that Sony tried really hard to make a great camera here. Your work is appreciated.
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One thing I neglected to point out in my last reply is that a lot of the footage in my demo videos were shot with Clear Image Zoom. Looks pretty good, right? Almost any shot you see that is telephoto and not in slow-motion uses Clear Image Zoom. I leave it turned on all the time because it looks so good. So when shooting in 4K, the camera has a 30x zoom that goes from 24mm to 720mm (FF equivalent). Let's see the FX6 compete with that!
 
CIZ is one of those un-heralded Sony features that doesn't seem to get much attention in existing models...although in some ways it is as much a "game-changer" as the variable, internal ND
 
markfpv said:
CIZ is one of those un-heralded Sony features that doesn't seem to get much attention in existing models...although in some ways it is as much a "game-changer" as the variable, internal ND
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It is a neat feature that I use once in a while on the FX6, but the more you zoom the softer the image gets. On the Z200 I’ve compared clear image at full vs the FX6 full and it’s quite a bit sharper. I imagine it’s the 5k down sample that’s helping here.
 
late to the thread - been away and busy - but have noticed the Z200. Looks like it has some advantages over the HC-X2s we use for for a variety of events and misc run&gun, particularly variable ND and better autofocus. How many of you guys are planning to get one?
 
Doug, have you used the Z200 with a rear zoom controller very much? How is the action? I have come to really like the CX350's rear zoom action with an old Libec controller. It is as close to a real Canon broadcast feel I have used in camcorder builds.

Speaking of rear controls, I have come to use the rear iris control option on my PX270s over the years. Does anyone know of a way to control iris over the LANC protocol with a controller? Having a wheel to adjust iris on the fly really helps when I use two cameras during live events (wide and tight). I know LANC is a single input on the camera but maybe there is a way with a Y cable or something. Thanks!
 
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