FS7: New Sony PXW-FX9 with venice features and 6k full frame

LennyLevy said:
Thanks Chris, That does seem like a reasonable guess as to how they were exposing the FX9 especially as it does look similar to but a little more contrasty than the Venice. However is it as clear what gamma they would be using on the Canon?
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No Lenny I couldn't discern from the video as to what gamma they were using in the Canon but it was obviously one of the "Custom" presets as they were using some kind of encoded XFAVC which is limited to 4K. That's one of the reasons I want to see the two side by side. Just have to suck them and see how they taste! Early days yet.

Chris Young
 
cyvideo said:
Sorry I should have been more specific. This is how I am looking at it. S-Cinetone is a setting under Custom mode not Cine EI. As has already been pointed out S-Cinetone can be almost perfectly matched with the Venice s709 LUT which can be downloaded from Sony. At 31:24 into the video he says we shot in S-LOG3 and "custom defaults." The prime Custom default on the FX9 is S-Cinetone. As Alister Chapman pointed out elsewhere in one of his write ups:

"Within the video there are examples of both S-Cinetone and S-Log3 plus the s709 LUT. So you know which is which I have indicated this is the video. I needed to do this as the two cut together really well. There is no grading as such. The S-Cinetone content is exactly as it came from the camera."

and

"A Venice with s709 is regarded as the default Venice look, and it’s a look that a lot of people really, really like. It’s what comes out of the SDI ports, is what’s seen in the viewfinder and can be recorded to the SxS cards unless you select the legacy 709(800) LUT. s709 is the LUT applied by default to X-OCN from Venice by default."

and

And the PXW-FX9 and s-Cinetone?

"The FX9 has new colour filters, a new sensor, new processing. But it is not a Venice. In Custom mode it has what Sony are now calling “S-Cinetone” which is set to become their new default look for their film style cameras. This once again is based on the Venice look and shares many similarities to the Venice colour science, but it will never be the full Venice colour science because it can’t be, it’s different hardware. But it sure as hell looks pretty damn close to a Venice at it’s default settings with the default s709 LUT applied. S-Cinetone gives the same colours as Venice and similar gamma, but with slightly increased contrast suitable for direct-to-air applications where the material won’t be graded (s709 in comparison is a touch flatter)."

It's this collection of above information that has led me to believe that what CPV were shooting in when they refer to "default" is S-Cinetone. This is exactly what Alister has been describing when writing about the camera, the default on the FX9 now being S-Cinetone which has the same characteristics basically of the Venice s709 LUT. I take it that S-Cinetone being almost identical to the Venice s709 one could call it a 709 look out of the FX9. If you think I'm way off on that judgement call I'll take that on board to re-evaluate but I don't think I am that far off the mark.

Agreeing with Lenny as I mentioned in a previous post until I can get the two cameras side by side on the same scenes on the same day under the same lighting, various lighting setups of course there is no way I could pass judgement on either camera. With regards to Liam's comment about the C500 II being streets ahead of his FS7 well I would hope that would be the case. Totally different generation cameras with quite widely differing sensor and processing technologies that in the case of the C500 II should put it streets in front of an FS7. If it didn't I wouldn't give the Canon a second look. Having not done side by side tests of my own yet CVP's video is the closest thing I have come across putting the two cameras side by side for the sake of a comparison. I'm just saying I'm surprised at what I have seen so far. I have not passed judgement and I never will until I can put the two side by side and shoots tests that are applicable to my workflow requirements. Which currently do not include RAW. Trying to "sell" the idea of a RAW workflow to my client base of broadcasters, corporates and doco producers would be making a rod for my own back. From an idealistic artistic POV a RAW workflow has certain attractions to me. In the hard pragmatic commercial light of day though using my business head and not my artistic heart when it comes to competitive quoting and quick turn around of material RAW doesn't even enter my calculations. Never will in my field. Everyone's workflow and requirements are different. RAW works for some, just not here. I just love having the choices of what look to be two very interesting cameras to evaluate.

Chris Young
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Seems as reasonable a guess as any!

The more I have to ponder the complexities of all the intricate camera settings these things offer, the more I find myself leaning towards the simplicity of the Arris. I just want one gamma/gamut (with its corresponding latitude) to have to worry about. Simplicity is golden - as it lets me worry about the more important things in life, blocking lighting and composition!

(Though to be fair, I may be getting old, or lazy... or both).
 
Grug said:
Seems as reasonable a guess as any!

The more I have to ponder the complexities of all the intricate camera settings these things offer, the more I find myself leaning towards the simplicity of the Arris. I just want one gamma/gamut (with its corresponding latitude) to have to worry about. Simplicity is golden - as it lets me worry about the more important things in life, blocking lighting and composition!

(Though to be fair, I may be getting old, or lazy... or both).
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And that's what I liked about the RAW in the Canon. It gets you where you ned to be faster and with less pain than all the other options.
 
Canon does give you quite a bit less color options, Wide DR for example opposed to 5 or 6 flavors of hypergamma or "Cine" colors. And on Sony where you have Slog2, Slog3 and then a bunch of different gammas each with it's own WB. Canon has Canon Log. I was also very surprised by the test, it doesnt seem like Canon to lie about the performance of their product. Overcharge, yes, underdeliver, yes. But I expected more.
 
Grug said:
Seems as reasonable a guess as any!

The more I have to ponder the complexities of all the intricate camera settings these things offer, the more I find myself leaning towards the simplicity of the Arris. I just want one gamma/gamut (with its corresponding latitude) to have to worry about. Simplicity is golden - as it lets me worry about the more important things in life, blocking lighting and composition!

(Though to be fair, I may be getting old, or lazy... or both).
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There are alot of options but in reality you use very few of them.. Slog.. its Slog3.cine /and the proscribed color gamut.. Venice only has Slog3.. same with fx9 I believe .. 1 and 2 are out the window really .. Hypergamma everyone has their fav one or two options.. 709 will be S Cinetone.. there are only really 3 or 4 choices at most ..
 
Airwolf said:
Canon does give you quite a bit less color options, Wide DR for example opposed to 5 or 6 flavors of hypergamma or "Cine" colors. And on Sony where you have Slog2, Slog3 and then a bunch of different gammas each with it's own WB. Canon has Canon Log. I was also very surprised by the test, it doesnt seem like Canon to lie about the performance of their product. Overcharge, yes, underdeliver, yes. But I expected more.
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That’s not quite true. Canon offers several (4?) “normal”rec 709 gammas with different highlight and shadow curve variations, a wide DR gamma, and 2 Different log gammas. On the color side they offer 3 or 4 color gamuts and 5(6?) matrix options that can be applied to any of the above, (and customized). These matrix options substantially affect how their cameras respond to color inputs, especially skin tones. Finally they make a dizzying array of LUTs that can be hugely confusing... and frankly are rather hit or miss imho.

Without knowing what color gamut, matrix and LUT was used we have no idea what the canon is doing relative to the others. (For instance, the neutral matrix with the rec709 space would in fact cause the desaturation we’re seeing at the extremes, which isn’t a defect, but simply a proper way to set up the camera for certain broadcast scenario’s), or if the LUT doesn’t match the color gamut, we could see similar results.

Edit:here is a comparison of the Canon color matrices.(On the c300Ii) Note in particular the eos standard matrix at the end, which looks most like the heavier saturation of the Venice clips. This matrix is the one I use most often as its colors are the most accurate on a vector scope. From what I can tell it’s not being offered on the c500II, but regardless we can see that canon color science is certainly not “one thing”.

https://vimeo.com/149836985



Finally, CVP sells cameras. This is a review of the fx9, timed for its release. It’s important that they make that camera appear “awesome”. When they do a proper review of a production c500II, I’m sure that camera will shine as well.
 
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Liam Hall said:
I have no idea how CVP managed to get the results they did; I've tested the C500 MKII's XAVC against my FS7's XFAVC, shooting log on both. The C500 looked far superior. I also compared them to RAW Light on the Canon and that was light years ahead. I now need to sell RAW into my clients...
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Apparently Canon is still tweaking the firmware. Maybe they got an early preproduction model? Let's hope so. Because as it stands, these results look absolutely horrid and a cinema camera that will effectively cost close to $20k (once you get all the cards/batteries to use it) should be a lot more flexible with its exposure than this. The C500 II doc shooter will want to shoot XF-AVC often and in unpredictable lighting scenarios. If this is how the XF-AVC performs on this camera, I wouldn't want to shoot in XF-AVC at all unless I'm 100% confident I'm going to nail the exposure. It's almost 2020 and I kind of feel that I shouldn't be having to hit middle grey right on the nose for fear of the footage just falling a part completely. Let's hope this was an early firmware release or the camera settings were incorrect. Part of me wonders if they failed to black shade the camera. That could very well be it, as the C200, C500 and C700 all require black shading. That wouldn't explain the complete loss of saturation and color fidelity though.

Here is the direct link to the exact spot in the video where they test the over and under exposure:

OVER AND UNDER EXPOSURE TEST: Venice, FX9, C500 II, FS7

On another note, underneath that video they provide links to the FX9 full res clips. I downloaded the full 7GB S-Cinetone rushes. I have to say, in the beginning, all the shots of the people look a little "meh" to me. It just looks like FS7 footage. I guess I was expecting a lot more with the skin tones there. The b-roll at the end looks fantastic, but I think that was because of the shallow depth of field from the full frame. The b-roll stuff definitely looks nicer than the FS7. But I dunno, I think I got my hopes up concerning S-Cinetone and skintones. But alas, the FX9 is not really a Venice. It's a souped up FS7 and you can still see remnants of that in the image.

Once again, this makes me want to just pick up a used Amira or go back to Red (ugh).
 
robotfist said:
Because as it stands, these results look absolutely horrid and a cinema camera that will effectively cost close to $20k (once you get all the cards/batteries to use it) should be a lot more flexible with its exposure than this. .
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I don't want to belabor this because I think the CVP test isn't coming close to showing us the whole picture regarding the Canon. While certainly the canon looks worse at 6 stops under and over than the other two, remember this is pushing a heavily compressed file...imagine doing it to an in camera JPEG still and I think about what that would look like. And while the Sony's look better in terms of color they look horrible in terms of color noise and detail at that level of push, and frankly, the FX9 isn't able to even distinguish the bottom two grey steps that the canon, as ugly as it looks, manages to handle with ease. If you think, well I'd never use the Canon pushed 6 stops...tell me, would you use the Venice pushed 6 stops...or the FX9? I wouldn't. Looking at any of these cameras pushed 6 stops isn't an actual example of how anyone would use the camera...it's just an indication of what the deepest shadows look like, in xf-AVC, if they were expanded beyond all hope, and really what we're examining at that point is whatever LUT, Matrix, Gamma, and WB they used for the shot...because that's all baked into the XF-AVC footage, and that really affects what you'd see at the extremes. The over tests are more perplexing, but from my experience, I doubt in the end that we'll see more than a 1/2 stop difference in these cameras in the highlights.

Back to the shadows...If you're wanting to know what the canon camera is capable of, in Xf-AVC, when pushed 8 stops, then head on over to PROAV and see the test they did at the end of their preview. It's an ISO test, but essentially it's taking an extremely dim exposure, and then letting the camera gain up the image 8 stops over base. This shows you something...the camera isn't losing color when it's essentially 8 stops under...it's got plenty of color (this isn't a normalized test like the CVP, so the patches will all get lighter, but the chroma is all there, and the patches are delightfully noise free. In a way you are looking at essentially the same type of test, Except it's one that tests the camera, not the codec.). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7hGP_aTwKU

Frankly, when I look at the normal exposures from the Venice and the C500II, I know which one I'd want work with. The shadows in the Venice are heavy, and the chart looks over saturated in the reds, his skin looks ruddy, and it's losing detail in places the canon isn't... even though the grey patch is exposed properly. I prefer the C500II's open mid tones and shadows and neutral looking chart and skin. And....when you start looking at the ISO tests, the C500 is smoking all of them, regardless of what the announcer's saying.

Not trying to change anyones mind here. I just know that when these tests are conducted well, usually it's really hard to see the differences between most cameras...and so I'm more than a little suspicious of this one.
 
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Barry G said:
Back to the shadows...If you're wanting to know what the canon camera is capable of, in Xf-AVC, when pushed 8 stops, then head on over to PROAV and see the test they did at the end of their preview. It's an ISO test, but essentially it's taking an extremely dim exposure, and then letting the camera gain up the image 8 stops over base. This shows you something...the camera isn't losing color when it's essentially 8 stops under...
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It's 6 stops, not 8. Also, it's an overexposure test. It's never 6 stops under, only 6 stops under 6 stops over.

https://youtu.be/BrRdy4BAYp0
 
Tom Roper said:
It's 6 stops, not 8. Also, it's an overexposure test. It's never 6 stops under, only 6 stops under 6 stops over.

https://youtu.be/BrRdy4BAYp0
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Yeah...no, so there are two tests in the PROAV video, neither is an over/under. The first is a normalized iso test, where the exposure is adjusted and matched to each iso. The second test near the end of the video starts with a very underexposed image at base ISO (400 for rec709), and then ramps the iso (gain) up by 8 stops to show how that renders that underexposed image. (This probably doesn’t result in an 8 stop push.. as the mid grey is probably correct at 6400, or 12,800.. so 6 or 7 stops). This has the net effect of testing the camera’s circuitry versus looking at the codec (and applied color, gamma, matrix settings), which is what the CVP test is looking at. The CVP test is something normally done with raw output(which would test the camera’s abilities), but seeing as the FX9 isn’t currently capable of raw output, they’ve done it with compressed codecs, which is questionable.
 
And they gave a download link in the YouTube comments of that video: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/hj64an5hbve9dyx/AAAd_ZQ3KovbPtSE9oa_VAAna?dl=0&preview=ProAV_FX9_High_ISO_Tests.mov

It all depends on what I'm shooting, but in the interview shot they tested I could see myself using up to ISO 6400 with the high base setting. The 12,800 and 32,000 are a bit too distracting. But then you get something like the bridge in Philip Bloom's latest video where he ramps the ISO up to 32,000 and I'm thinking it's usable there. It's fun to see more and more footage released. Now that some folks in Europe are beginning to receive their camera I'm hopeful for a lot more.
 
Finally a good short glimpse of ISO4000 in real low light. First part of the video is an excellent test of a scene without highlights in the frame and it looks really clean and nice:

 
Agreed the color testing was good to see. Seeing who was involved in this testing I feel sure you can take what they have said as a pretty unbiased honest overview. I know the colors on the FX9 looks good but comments coming from Pawel Achtel like that the FX9 is producing some of the best colors he has ever tested was quite surprising. Pawel Achtel is known locally for being a technology innovator, developer and cameraman and I don't think he would mind the description of being a bit of a technology nerd when it comes to testing like this. If he does I gladly would retract the 'nerd' comment:)

Chris Young

https://24x7.com.au/
 
cyvideo said:
Agreed the color testing was good to see. Seeing who was involved in this testing I feel sure you can take what they have said as a pretty unbiased honest overview. I know the colors on the FX9 looks good but comments coming from Pawel Achtel like that the FX9 is producing some of the best colors he has ever tested was quite surprising. Pawel Achtel is known locally for being a technology innovator, developer and cameraman and I don't think he would mind the description of being a bit of a technology nerd when it comes to testing like this. If he does I gladly would retract the 'nerd' comment:)

Chris Young

https://24x7.com.au/
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I'm really liking the FX9 Chris. The colour is a definite step-up from the F5 and the variable ND and dual ISO is proving very helpful.
 
cyvideo said:
Agreed the color testing was good to see. Seeing who was involved in this testing I feel sure you can take what they have said as a pretty unbiased honest overview. I know the colors on the FX9 looks good but comments coming from Pawel Achtel like that the FX9 is producing some of the best colors he has ever tested was quite surprising. Pawel Achtel is known locally for being a technology innovator, developer and cameraman and I don't think he would mind the description of being a bit of a technology nerd when it comes to testing like this. If he does I gladly would retract the 'nerd' comment:)

Chris Young

https://24x7.com.au/
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Where can the comments from Achtel be found?
 
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