FS7: New Sony F7 XDCAM 4K Super 35mm Camcorder

downloaded it. looks great and grades nicely. Played nice with the vision colour IMPULZ slog3 luts. correcting the white balance on the clip of the girl was all painless and looked great too. Am now genuinely extra excited.
 
Ben Scott said:
by the way for mac users I hear the Sony card reader currently doesn't work on Yosemite, but the cheaper Lexar one does as it is plug and play.
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That's the reason I update OS X always after a first revision of new version. If you run for update you're basically running for problems.
 
Babu said:
Liam which Swit batteries? Have a link? That stinks. I also have 3 party batteries I ordered in preparation for the camera :/
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RatLabProductions said:
Good to know which batteries work or don't work. I think to be safe I will just grab some BPU-60s and then wait till official work before buying the aftermarket big brick ones.
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DSM U-84.

I ordered the new Swits with D-tap but my dealer sent the camera with three of these. He sending over a BPU-90 tomorrow and whatever else he can lay his hands on.
 
Babu said:
Liam which Swit batteries? Have a link? That stinks. I also have 3 party batteries I ordered in preparation for the camera :/
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Viddovation said:
By the way, my SWIT S-8U62 battery is working just fine with the PXW-FS7. I don't know whether Liam had a different SWIT battery, or exactly what his story is.

What I can say is the SWIT has a cable built into it with the Sony EX1/EX3 style power plug on it. Fortunately, this camera uses the same plug for it's 12v power input.

You must use this tail and plug into the 12v external power port. If the tail remains plugged into the battery, then the power is routed through the battery ports, and the camera looks for an electronic data signature that the battery is an official Sony battery. Thus you get the fail message. The camera does no such authentication on the 12v power port.
View attachment 93014
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Sadly, no cable on my Swits.
 
Viddovation said:
-The VF cable seems like it could get in the way. On the otherhand, The length of the cable means you could place the VF a lot of places, even on the dumb side of the camera if desired.
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Congratulations on the new arrival.
With regard to the VF cable - can you measure exactly long it is? I'm looking at flying mine on a Ronin and wonder if the VF would stretch to the top bar....I'm probably a week or more away from delivery, but trying to get all the extra bits lined up. Thanks!
 
Viddovation said:
I have to go do an unrelated gig shortly. Some first impressions though:

-I like the body build overall. The placement and design for the majority of the ports is pretty smart. The XLRs are tucked so that the cables won't stick out obtrusively, and the HDMI port is recessed in a way that with careful cable selection you should have good protection against damaging the port or the cable pins.
-The camera comes with a basic wifi module that allows for camera setting control (rec, stop, iris, gain, much more) but won't stream video. Apparently there will be a $2k wifi module that streams video, and the camera package includes a bracket for that unit, should you buy it. The included adapter is a little USB nubbin. I don't particularly like how it sticks out of the camera, or that the usb port cover pops off entirely and would be fairly easy to lose. Then again, being able to control your $8k camera settings via remote wifi is pretty much magic, so I can't complain too much.
- You also get a standard infared remote. It's not the old beige one included with the EX1/EX3/F3... but the buttons are fairly similar none the less. The infared port is only on the back, so not useful if you needed to control the camera from in front. But the wifi via smartphone would do the trick there.
- The 180p slow motion works right out of the box. No waiting on future firmware. 1080p of course. I haven't stress tested it, but as advertised, it's not on a buffer, and runs until you press stop. Just like S&Q on the EX1/F3 it records to your container frame rate, meaning it will automatically play back in slow motion.
- The S&Q button is very convenient.
- The menus can feel a bit slow. If you've used the FS100 and the F3, you likely remember the F3 menus just felt more responsive. The menus here are a bit slower like the FS100.
- You get a little baggie with some spare port covers, including the WLAN one. Guess they realized people might lose them.
- You don't seem to get a microphone! And there's no internal. I've attached my old F3 stock microphone though, and it fits in the holder perfectly.
-The VF cable seems like it could get in the way. On the otherhand, The length of the cable means you could place the VF a lot of places, even on the dumb side of the camera if desired.


CORRECTION: There is an internal mic. No physical switches... Choose between internal/external via menu.
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I agree 100% with all of the above.

I'll also add, beware using Swit DSM U-84.

And I'll also add, the grip handle is passable, and will no doubt be a useful accessory, but I can see it staying in the bag more than being attached to the camera.

Finally, the Metabones Ultra is superb. Very well built. Can't see myself taking it off!
 
By the way, can anyone recommend a good quality 'dumb' ef to e mount focal reducer?

I have a bunch of EF mount modded Contax Zeiss and my current electronic EF mount I use on my A7s is so temperamental that it makes me not want to have any electronics in the chain to balls up.
 
Liam Hall said:
I agree 100% with all of the above.

I'll also add, beware using Swit DSM U-84.

And I'll also add, the grip handle is passable, and will no doubt be a useful accessory, but I can see it staying in the bag more than being attached to the camera.

Finally, the Metabones Ultra is superb. Very well built. Can't see myself taking it off!
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If you take off the grip, how do you do things like change aperture, activate focus punch-in, etc?
 
There are on-camera controls if you remove the grip.

So happy for all who have received their cameras. Played with it again today at PhotoPlus in NYC.

I did find out a few other answers to some questions today. For those who purchase the back, ProRes will be a free unlock. Its development is tied to the development of ProRes for F5/55 so all three cameras should be expected at the same time. The $1999 for the attachment essentially includes the ProRes encoder and ProRes license in addition to its other features. It just requires a software unlock. Likewise the internal 4K upgrade will be free.

Shipments of the body are ramping up and the package with lens as well as the attachment are still on schedule for December.

I forgot to ask Juan the status of the Metabones adapter bundle.

Ned
 
skimmel said:
If you take off the grip, how do you do things like change aperture, activate focus punch-in, etc?
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There is a dial on the body that does aperture changes. There are assignable buttons on the body as well. One is labeled "User Menu" which I find silly since there is a dedicated "Menu" button -- so I assigned it to do the focus punch-in. There's a 4x and an 8x punch.

I love using a histogram, and was disappointed to see how deeply buried it is in the menus. On the other hand, you a get a waveform and vectorscope, so at least it's all there.

Be very cautious about any 3rd party batteries that don't have a tail to use the 12v in. I think the batteries are a profit center for Sony, so they have electronics in them and if your 3rd party battery doesn't match the Sony signature exactly it's going to reject it.

There is UHD out of the box. I beleive Ned is referring to the wider 4096 variation of 4k as being a later update.

EDIT: One other very interesting feature. The camera apparently has a gyro and can detect whether it's level or not. It display a set of two levels in the viewfinder... side to side, and front to back. In essence, even if you don't have a bubble, you can get an approximation of whether you're level. Seems a convenient feature.
 
Viddovation said:
There is a dial on the body that does aperture changes. There are assignable buttons on the body as well. One is labeled "User Menu" which I find silly since there is a dedicated "Menu" button -- so I assigned it to do the focus punch-in. There's a 4x and an 8x punch.

I love using a histogram, and was disappointed to see how deeply buried it is in the menus. On the other hand, you a get a waveform and vectorscope, so at least it's all there.
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Thanks! So, there's no custom button to open a histogram? Can you customize a button to open the waveform? To activate peaking? (Sorry for all the questions, once I get a users manual to look at I'm sure this will all be clear.)
 
skimmel said:
Thanks! So, there's no custom button to open a histogram? Can you customize a button to open the waveform? To activate peaking? (Sorry for all the questions, once I get a users manual to look at I'm sure this will all be clear.)
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I'm learning as I go here...

The peaking has a dedicated button on the viewfinder, as does Zebras.

If you have the handgrip attached, you've got 6 assignable buttons total. Without it, there are only three on the body.
Both peaking and "Video Monitor Signal" are available to assign. "Video Monitor Signal" used as an assigned button loops: None/Histo/Wave/Vector. There's not a direct histo only option.
 
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