RX100 IV, External Recorder & Continuous Recording

B

Bassman2003

Veteran
Hello,

I a looking at the RX100 IV and was wondering about using an external recorder and long record times like a hour or two. Does anybody know if the camera will stay active for that long?

I have a suspicion that it will want to shut down at 30 min or so.

Thanks for your help.
 
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I've actually considered using the rx100 IV for long recordings. I've tested it successfully by attaching my IV to my Atomos Ninja with micro HDMI to HDMI and it records continuously fine with no limit since I'm recording on the Ninja and not the camera body. The only downside is battery life in which I have a Switronix battery I've used for my a7s that I'm trying to just find the right adapter to connect it with.
 
It has the usual 30-min limit. Apart fromt hat, mine records coninuously without any issues... in 1080p, which is what jjasef is talking about as well (I record internal, he records externally). On 4K is where the overheating will shut it down after just a few minutes (much less than 30). No idea if going external will solve this.
 
Thanks for your replies. I ended up going with the RX10 II instead. Mainly as a slo-mo camera but we will see how much else. I purchased an external USB battery to power it for long periods of time which is working great.
 
Samuel H said:
It has the usual 30-min limit. Apart fromt hat, mine records coninuously without any issues... in 1080p, which is what jjasef is talking about as well (I record internal, he records externally). On 4K is where the overheating will shut it down after just a few minutes (much less than 30). No idea if going external will solve this.
Click to expand...

If you use an external recorder there is no internal time limit because you are never pressing the movie button, and the heat issue goes away too. The recording is done using the external recorder, so there is no writing to disk in the camera. And you can power by usb so you can use ac or gigantic external batteries (Anker) and go on for hours. The HDMI output is clean 4K 4:2:2 (8-bit).
 
Question on external recording: when it says 4K/30p HDMI out 8 bit 4:2:2 'uncompressed'; what exactly does uncompressed mean?
 
Ok thanks! So [I'm still learning] what I'm guessing is that means the recorder is basically taking the sensor signal/readout directly, and then compressing it however it is configured to do [like ProRes etc]?

I think trying to wrap my head around the term 'uncompressed' being a different thing from RAW. That type of thing.



EDIT: I'm trying to read and understand this snippet from a site while learning about recorders

"In very general terms, this is what happens inside your camera:

1. Light falling on your sensor is focused by tiny lenses on the photosite.
2. This light passes through a color filter array (All the cameras in this guide have Bayer sensors) to separate Red, Green and Blue information.
3. The sensor converts light into an analog electrical signal that is sampled to form a digital signal.
4. The sampling might also include compression, conversion and other ‘data management’.
5. The digital signal is passed to the circuitry for wrapping, transcoding, compression, and other proprietary activities. Being digital, all these channels of data should have the same source. On cameras that output raw files, the debayering step is omitted.
6. The data is funneled through various ‘pipelines’ for different kinds of recording or ingest. Internal media records the signal meant specifically for it.
7. External signals are usually encoded and packaged to a standard like SMPTE or HDMI. Some use proprietary technology like T-Link, SR Memory, etc, because existing standards don’t have provisions for these special data streams.
8. External signals are transmitted via standard protocols so that the systems reading it can understand the signals.
9. The signal that leaves the camera is ready to be read by an external recording device."

http://wolfcrow.com/blog/comprehensive-guide-to-rigging-any-camera-7-external-recorders-part-1/
 
That Wolfcrow post is essentially accurate, if a bit technical to the point of vague. Try this:

- Light enters lens and is projected at sensor.
- Color filters split light into red, green & blue before each color hits individual photo sites on sensor.
- The more light hits a photo site the higher the voltage.
- Voltage turned into digital data.
- RAW data can be exported, recorded directly, OR
- RAW data can be processed and turned into video, combining color info into complete signal.
- Video can be exported or recorded internally.
- NOTE: Internal recordings (RAW or video) usually compressed.
 
Happy to help. Important thing to understand is that most external recorders can capture better quality than internal recording. It might be ProRes video or it might be RAW data, but it usually is less compressed than what happens in the camera. Of course that also means bigger files to contend with, but also higher quality images.
 
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