Returning the Shogun for the 7Q+ for a7s

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evolvmedia

Member
I've had my Shogun since xmas day and although I like it, i've decided today to return it and purchase the 7Q+. Convergent Design announced today they are giving away for free two 256GB ssds with a new purchase of the 7Q+. I can't wait around for Atomos to hopefully fulfill their promises with all the features they should have had since day one. The lack of internal playback is unacceptable in addition to all the other bugs, quality of build and so on. In addition the 7Q+ offers a ton more features over the Shogun with the most important being downscaling from 4K to HD. Hopefully I can do a full review of both units side by side next week.

Just thought I'd share.
 
I'd been kind of thinking that might start happening. We've been beating up cd for more than a year for doing similar things but the reality is one is almost a 1.9 product and one is a 0.7. I'm not sure if I was really expecting atomos to deliver on all promises day 1, had hopes. But it's almost like they need to go through the same challenges cd eventually already solved.

with the 4k to hd, you mean fs700? Didn't think there was 4k2hd for the a7s?

ah, you might mean outputs to monitors etc...?
 
If the shogun wasn't still drastically cheaper for me, I'd probably be considering this as well. Post your findings but I'm pretty sure I can guessed the outcome already.
 
Interesting...tempting now. I also look forward to hearing about your comparison. I wonder if Mitch can tell us how long this offer will last.

Maybe someone can answer my question regarding RAW capture from the Shogun and 7Q+ with a Sony FS7? Once Atomos makes it possible to record RAW, owners don't have to buy any upgrade whereas with 7Q+ owners the purchase of the Sony FS7 RAW upgrade will be required?
 
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caseywilsondp said:
If the shogun wasn't still drastically cheaper for me, I'd probably be considering this as well. Post your findings but I'm pretty sure I can guessed the outcome already.
Click to expand...

The price spread is small. In point of fact when you factor in the media that is provided it is actually cheaper now to buy the Odyssey.
 
caseywilsondp said:
If the shogun wasn't still drastically cheaper for me, I'd probably be considering this as well. Post your findings but I'm pretty sure I can guessed the outcome already.
Click to expand...
Shogun = $2000 with no media, or with two 256GB SSDs, about $2250.
Odyssey7Q+ = $2300 with two 256GB SSDs.

They are darn near neck and neck, with the Odyssey7Q+ having a bunch more features. If you want more drives, yes, you'll end up spending more on the 7Q+ setup pretty quickly. But two 256GB SSDs is about 80min of 4K ProRes, or over 5 hours of 1080p ProRes.

The 7Q+ is a beast. I also have the FS700, so the RAW features of the 7Q(+) are worth spending $800 on the codec. For an $800 price difference against the Shogun (and having dual SSDs) means you can capture 4K RAW up to 60fps and even a 4-sec 120fps burst (Shogun tops out at 4K 30 RAW), as well as 2K RAW up to 240fps. That's awesome. The ultimate cherry on top is that the RAW mode also offers FS700 RAW to ProRes conversion, which Atomos still isn't sure they'll be able to pull off with the processing power of the Shogun.

I know these are FS700 features and not the A7s, but I think it helps highlight the extra flexibility and functionality of the 7Q+
 
There is no 4k2hd for a7s yet, i emailed asked before. They said currently not planning to make 4k2hd for a7s, unless many ppl request it.
 
goodgoings said:
Interesting...tempting now. I also look forward to hearing about your comparison. I wonder if Mitch can tell us how long this offer will last.

Maybe someone can answer my question regarding RAW capture from the Shogun and 7Q+ with a Sony FS7? Once Atomos makes it possible to record RAW, owners don't have to buy any upgrade whereas with 7Q+ owners the purchase of the Sony FS7 RAW upgrade will be required?
Click to expand...
We are not stating an end date at this time. In all honesty we have not decided on one.

RAW capture from the FS7 on the Odyssey7Q+ does require the purchase of the FS RAW Record Option for $795. It is a one-time cost.

Currently the FS RAW option gives FS7 users:
- 4K RAW to 60p
- 2K RAW to 240p
- 4K RAW to 4K ProRes to 30p
- 4K RAW to UHD ProRes to 30p
- 4K RAW to 2K ProRes to 60p
- 4K RAW to HD ProRes to 60p
- LUTs for S-Log3, Rec709, Rec709(800%)

All of the above options are functional now, with more features to come for the FS RAW Record Option via firmware update at no additional cost.

The Odyssey7Q+ has two SATA drive ports while the Shogun has one. This means that it is mathematically impossible for the Shogun to be able to record 4K RAW above 30p or 2K RAW above 120p.
 
Andrew Stone said:
The price spread is small. In point of fact when you factor in the media that is provided it is actually cheaper now to buy the Odyssey.
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Like I said, for me. With an educators discount I could get several terabyte drives and be under $2000. Also a lot of the features suggested jshbckr are indeed great for some cameras, but ultimately useless for my a7s. Glad he likes it though.
 
caseywilsondp said:
Like I said, for me. With an educators discount I could get several terabyte drives and be under $2000. Also a lot of the features suggested jshbckr are indeed great for some cameras, but ultimately useless for my a7s. Glad he likes it though.
Click to expand...

The Odyssey recently went through a hardware revision, the Odyssey 7Q+ which was largely upgraded to allow the Sony A7s to send UHD (4K) via HDMI to the new Odyssey 7Q+.

Sounds like you are sold on the Shogun. I mention this for others with the A7s camera so they don't get confused.

One thing that doesn't really get mentioned that will be of huge benefit to A7s operators is the scopes on the Odyssey. The tools on A7s for reading brightness levels have A LOT to be desired. So if you need to figure out where your fleshtones are at or middle grey, you will have an easy way to do it now with the Odyssey.

Convergent Design also have a very good relationship with Sony which goes back to their nanoFlash development days. They have a history of continuing development of their product right through its lifecycle and you can receive some comfort knowing they will be making attempts to leverage as much as they can out of Sony to continue to make their product better with Sony products going forward. They have proven this time and time again over the past half decade.
 
Let's not forget that when the 7Q came out, it was very similar to the A7S in terms of features. Give the Shogun a chance, I love it.
 
Andrew Stone said:
The Odyssey recently went through a hardware revision, the Odyssey 7Q+ which was largely upgraded to allow the Sony A7s to send UHD (4K) via HDMI to the new Odyssey 7Q+.

Sounds like you are sold on the Shogun. I mention this for others with the A7s camera so they don't get confused.

One thing that doesn't really get mentioned that will be of huge benefit to A7s operators is the scopes on the Odyssey. The tools on A7s for reading brightness levels have A LOT to be desired. So if you need to figure out where your fleshtones are at or middle grey, you will have an easy way to do it now with the Odyssey.

Convergent Design also have a very good relationship with Sony which goes back to their nanoFlash development days. They have a history of continuing development of their product right through its lifecycle and you can receive some comfort knowing they will be making attempts to leverage as much as they can out of Sony to continue to make their product better with Sony products going forward. They have proven this time and time again over the past half decade.
Click to expand...

I'm only sold on the shogun based on price. the odyssey seems like a great piece of hardware with devs that are involved with the community which is great. the shogun also has scopes and false color, though im not sure if you were mentioning that as an odyssey vs. odyssey 7q+ difference.
especially with the drives being offered, i would seriously be considering one over the shogun. i love the screen and the cheap media, but unfinished firmware and very plastic-y build leave much to be desired.
 
Very cool.

Mitch
thats twice you've alluded to the shogun not being able to do some types of hfr due to inability to do two drive raid. They sell a raid caddy for it described as raid 0. I assume via some mechanism it can work wether it's a single sata channel or not (thunderbolt over sata daisy chain or some such?) I don't have one for a visual inspection. Can you reconfirm what you are saying in the White paper about 7q being the only raid capable recorder?
Cheers
 
timmytimetravel said:
Very cool.

Mitch
thats twice you've alluded to the shogun not being able to do some types of hfr due to inability to do two drive raid. They sell a raid caddy for it described as raid 0. I assume via some mechanism it can work wether it's a single sata channel or not (thunderbolt over sata daisy chain or some such?) I don't have one for a visual inspection. Can you reconfirm what you are saying in the White paper about 7q being the only raid capable recorder?
Cheers
Click to expand...
I will confirm it.

The dual hard drive raid caddy that Atomos says is coming for the Shogun would be for increased record time, not for increased data rates for recording. There is a single SATA connector on the Shogun, and that is the bottle neck. It is a mathematical impossibility for 4K RAW in 10-bit or 12-bit to cross a single SATA bridge at anything higher than 30p. Likewise it is impossible for 2K RAW to go above 120p. This is math and it is one of the principle reasons there are two SATA ports for dual SSDs on the Odyssey7Q and Odyssey7Q+.

This would limit RAW recording frame rates for
ARRI ALEXA (30p max)
Canon C500 (4K/QHD 30p max., no 2K 4:4:4 possible due to dual-link requirement)
FS7/FS700 (4K 30p & 2K120p max.)
... along with any other cameras outputting similar high data rate files.
 
Mitch Gross said:
I will confirm it.

The dual hard drive raid caddy that Atomos says is coming for the Shogun would be for increased record time, not for increased data rates for recording. There is a single SATA connector on the Shogun, and that is the bottle neck. It is a mathematical impossibility for 4K RAW in 10-bit or 12-bit to cross a single SATA bridge at anything higher than 30p. Likewise it is impossible for 2K RAW to go above 120p. This is math and it is one of the principle reasons there are two SATA ports for dual SSDs on the Odyssey7Q and Odyssey7Q+.

This would limit RAW recording frame rates for
ARRI ALEXA (30p max)
Canon C500 (4K/QHD 30p max., no 2K 4:4:4 possible due to dual-link requirement)
FS7/FS700 (4K 30p & 2K120p max.)
... along with any other cameras outputting similar high data rate files.
Click to expand...

I guess they could lightly compress the RAW signal, say 3:1, like how Blackmagic apply compression to their RAW in their Ursa to allow it to shoot 80fps RAW, whereas it can only do 30fps at uncompressed RAW? I mean, Atomos are a bunch of ex-Blackmagic folks, right? If Blackmagic can find the chips needed to do that, maybe Atomos can too?

Of course, you'd probably have to wait until 2018 for it to be actually able to play those files back in a Shogun.

And again... might need too much CPU power, and be impossible.

Actually, Mitch, would it be possible for you guys to do that? Lightly-compressed 60fps RAW would be super-awesome. Not sure if it's possible though. You guys stated that the processor in the Odyssey7Q+ is larger than that of any other recorder though I'm not sure how that directly relates to compression ability. EG Shogun might have a less powerful chip that is better at the specific task of lossy RAW compression.

Ah man, can't we just petition Sony to let the Odyssey store their stupid RAW files in their original compressed form? Due to weird licensing agreements, they won't let you do that, right? What Sony is doing seems an awful waste of CPU cycles and disk space. Not very good for the environment :)

Bruce Allen
www.boacinema.com
 
As noted previously, adding compression is a large processing task. It can also be detrimental to material if it already started as compressed and then went through a decompression phase once, as would be the case with the Sony FS RAW. Recompressing could lead to artifactwing, known as concatenation.
 
jshbckr said:
Just my two cents, obviously money is always a factor, but when I've been sold *only* on price... I have usually ended up disappointed. There is usually a reason why something better costs more.
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I really should have said mostly. I believe it will get full functionality, and once it does it will meet my needs completely with the a7s. No need for higher frame rates, or raw even. More affordable drives and a top notch display are perfect for my needs in the near future. If the 7q+ had been priced more closely when I purchased it would have been a serious contender, especially considering how much more complete the firmware is.
Is it a better device? Maybe. I've never used it and can't say how nice the screen is or it's live monitoring options, but having complete firmware obviously makes it better now.
 
Mitch Gross said:
As noted previously, adding compression is a large processing task. It can also be detrimental to material if it already started as compressed and then went through a decompression phase once, as would be the case with the Sony FS RAW. Recompressing could lead to artifactwing, known as concatenation.
Click to expand...

Understood. That said, the Blackmagic Ursa manages it in realtime at 80fps, and the Blackmagic 4K camera manages it at a lower fps, so there obviously are chips out there that can do it, pretty cheaply and with low enough power requirements.

I am aware of concatenation and the dangers of re-compression. But I think 3:1 is pretty harmless, especially with a nice saucy 12bit or more raw signal at a very high bit rate.

I don't need perfect uncompressed raw. All I want is to get away from the crappy built-in FS700 color matrix. 3:1 or even 6:1 raw would work fine for me.

At 1:1, I have only 20 minutes of 60p footage per 2x512GB drive pack, right? And they have to run in RAID. Using Convergent Design's storage, I fear I'd need to spend $3180 on storage, minimum, to have something workable. And the DIT would have to be frantically copying stuff.

Uncompressed raw also slows down DIT processes, offload processes, etc. And all processing of the footage downstream gets slowed down as well. 3:1 would be way cool. Just saying!

When you get into a real workflow, the cost of SSDs (for a smooth 60p RAW workflow I guess you'd need 6x1TB drives = $8370!!) plus on-set storage, backup, etc of all those uncompressed raw files (I like having multiple backup copies, at different sites) means it might be cheaper to get a RED Dragon... an Ursa, etc. Basically, you have to be pretty convinced that the FS700 will get a significantly better image than all of them.

Bruce Allen
www.boaicnema.com
 
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