F55: Sony F55 vs Canon C700 impressions
- Thread starter starcentral
- Start date
Never say never.. but I must have seen a fair few pictures of the camera .. and it really is long and I dont like the rounded front bit at all..and looks like a cassette player.. I,ll be the first to admit its a bit of an odd way to think.. but really its true.. I would not buy a camera that I didnt think looked sexy.. that I actually like to look at.. same goes for a car or house..
abreu-canedo
Well-known member
If you looking AT the camera, you doing it wrong.
Eric Coughlin
Veteran
...or woman.
anatusa
Veteran
its a big difference between selling your show to Netflix and when you shoot for Netflix
This sort of dovetails into the "who's got the power on the set?" thread. If a director wants a certain DP and the DP wants an Alexa, then that's probably what the network will cede to.
But, if Sony funds the production via their studio, they're likely to insist on Sony cameras ... unless they get a big name director who wants to shoot on film.
You dont take your camera out of the bag.. and look lovingly at it.. all pimped up in its finery.. you doing it wrong
Well it takes all kinds.. most cars work these days.. but would you buy a really ugly one.. that you had to see everyday parked in your yard.. or live in some horrible lime green pebble dash house.. with pink lace curtains .. its not just a laundry basket.. it has to look good and have to like to touch it..ahem .. morning Vicar.. more gin..?
Jim Martin
DVXuser Sponsor
You're beating a horse that doesn't exist......
abreu-canedo
Well-known member
You dont take your camera out of the bag.. and look lovingly at it.. all pimped up in its finery.. you doing it wrong
Ha! That's funny.
But yeah, none of my cameras really look that good. But I try to make up for that by looking right through it. Just making sure the stuff in front of it looks good...or bad, depending on the needs of the project
paulcurtis
Veteran
Hey Dennis,
It's been a while (not had much time lately), but you're still in pursuit of your camera goals i see! I write this here as a coda to the various conversations we've all had on DVX and i hope others don't find this totally irrelevant to this thread.
The time and opportunity was there for me to look at changing cameras and perhaps ecosystems. So I looked at the C700 but found it very difficult to justify it.
I think we both shared some similar goals about things just looking right without messing around. And if i've learnt one thing over the decades, it's that whilst you can take an image and bend it and work with it and massage it to get somewhere towards a point. That takes time and time is money as well.
My criteria took into account workflow and also the need for RAW, not desire, the need. I feel once you have access to that then all codec based images look 'thin' by comparison. Most cameras treat raw as a second class citizen though, and that was always an issue. I mean you set up a shoot, you carefully light and create atmosphere and you point something at it and then just record a 'version' of it. I always think you should take away everything you can from a shoot. Also with pretty much all codecs, the shadows suffer incredibly. When you are compressing, all systems throw away data that is supposed to be unneeded and pretty much all codecs attack the shadows like mad. I like tonality here and used to jump through hoops with exposure levels to try and maintain that.
So i ended up with an Epic-W, i was never a fan boy, but in the short time i've had it and only one 'proper' shoot, it's lifted a veil from my eyes. I can shoot what i see. I'm not faffing around over or underexposing. I can see at a glance the distribution of light. The basic image out it is pretty much just correct. All grading can be metadata. Seamless workflow in Premiere. Proxies and all. I've stopped caring about pixels now. Couldn't care less about 444, 422 because it doesn't matter any more. The images just look real, well organic. I feel i'm freed from some of the technical aspects of babying an image to avoid certain problems.
Price wise, it's cheaper than C700. So from that perspective i have no idea why anyone would go for this unless they are being dictated to (studio, channel or something they have no control over). I'd considered the F55 as well, but again, once loaded up it's quite a bit more expensive.
A real contender was the Varicam LT, but i just don't see the support for it. In post either. It may have a wonderful colour gamut but i'm back to building particular pipelines for specific colour work.
Our destinations these days are still mostly Rec709/sRGB, some DCP and eventually more Rec2020. That's it.
So i really struggled with the C700. But i also remember our past conversations and IMHO i'd take a look at that Red eco system.
It's not perfect, nothing is, but in my sphere it's less imperfect than the alternatives!
cheers
Paul
It's been a while (not had much time lately), but you're still in pursuit of your camera goals i see! I write this here as a coda to the various conversations we've all had on DVX and i hope others don't find this totally irrelevant to this thread.
The time and opportunity was there for me to look at changing cameras and perhaps ecosystems. So I looked at the C700 but found it very difficult to justify it.
I think we both shared some similar goals about things just looking right without messing around. And if i've learnt one thing over the decades, it's that whilst you can take an image and bend it and work with it and massage it to get somewhere towards a point. That takes time and time is money as well.
My criteria took into account workflow and also the need for RAW, not desire, the need. I feel once you have access to that then all codec based images look 'thin' by comparison. Most cameras treat raw as a second class citizen though, and that was always an issue. I mean you set up a shoot, you carefully light and create atmosphere and you point something at it and then just record a 'version' of it. I always think you should take away everything you can from a shoot. Also with pretty much all codecs, the shadows suffer incredibly. When you are compressing, all systems throw away data that is supposed to be unneeded and pretty much all codecs attack the shadows like mad. I like tonality here and used to jump through hoops with exposure levels to try and maintain that.
So i ended up with an Epic-W, i was never a fan boy, but in the short time i've had it and only one 'proper' shoot, it's lifted a veil from my eyes. I can shoot what i see. I'm not faffing around over or underexposing. I can see at a glance the distribution of light. The basic image out it is pretty much just correct. All grading can be metadata. Seamless workflow in Premiere. Proxies and all. I've stopped caring about pixels now. Couldn't care less about 444, 422 because it doesn't matter any more. The images just look real, well organic. I feel i'm freed from some of the technical aspects of babying an image to avoid certain problems.
Price wise, it's cheaper than C700. So from that perspective i have no idea why anyone would go for this unless they are being dictated to (studio, channel or something they have no control over). I'd considered the F55 as well, but again, once loaded up it's quite a bit more expensive.
A real contender was the Varicam LT, but i just don't see the support for it. In post either. It may have a wonderful colour gamut but i'm back to building particular pipelines for specific colour work.
Our destinations these days are still mostly Rec709/sRGB, some DCP and eventually more Rec2020. That's it.
So i really struggled with the C700. But i also remember our past conversations and IMHO i'd take a look at that Red eco system.
It's not perfect, nothing is, but in my sphere it's less imperfect than the alternatives!
cheers
Paul
JPNola
Veteran
starcentral
Veteran
Hi Paul, nice to hear from you and yes I too have had a very busy year advancing into more commercial work and especially stills shoots where I'm hired as photographer but mostly hired for providing and setting up mighty fine lighting , so I have stayed off the forums quite a lot this year as some may have noticed.
Your example of working with RED is EXACTLY how I feel about shooting stills with Canon RAW. I just shoot, I don't write blog posts, articles, or "how to exposure guides" for Canon DSLR shooting... I focus on the ART side of it and the results are always pleasing. Jim Jannards inspiration for RED in 2006 was also because he came from a stills background shooting RAW. Jim knew that shooting JPEG on a camera looked like ****, and RAW was the only way to approach the "look" that shooting on film did. Address the color science, record at 24 frames per second, and RED is born.
Glad to hear you are enjoying your new RED Epic. I still want to pick up a cheap RED camera one day, maybe next year but the last thing I need is another camera.
, so I have stayed off the forums quite a lot this year as some may have noticed.Your example of working with RED is EXACTLY how I feel about shooting stills with Canon RAW. I just shoot, I don't write blog posts, articles, or "how to exposure guides" for Canon DSLR shooting... I focus on the ART side of it and the results are always pleasing. Jim Jannards inspiration for RED in 2006 was also because he came from a stills background shooting RAW. Jim knew that shooting JPEG on a camera looked like ****, and RAW was the only way to approach the "look" that shooting on film did. Address the color science, record at 24 frames per second, and RED is born.
Glad to hear you are enjoying your new RED Epic. I still want to pick up a cheap RED camera one day, maybe next year but the last thing I need is another camera.
hehe! it really is long though.. funny Canon just cant seem to get their s35 video camera,s to look good.. are they all designed by the stills dept ? .. serious question.. there just has to be a reason.. its not rocket science ..
Isnt that REC button too low.. it stands out from the body and will get knocked for sure.. and the big selection KNOB. .. again too low and bound to get bashed..
Ben Scott
Veteran
I know it's all funny and I know the specs don't match an Epic-w and I know it's pricey, but meanwhile this camera is going to be used on a whole bunch of high level projects and is going to gain a fair bit of traction as a rental.
Pretty certain there will be a big price drop soon anyway.
Pretty certain there will be a big price drop soon anyway.