FS7: Sony in a C300III World

scorsesefan said:
Good points. A lot of us have been furloughed or can't pick up gigs because they are non-existent and will be for the near future. And no one I know is spending money right now (at least in NYC where we're in lock down). And believe me it's tempting to when you see FS7's on Ebay for <$3000 ;)
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There is an URSA Mini 4.6K locally for nearly half that price, I am extremely tempted to buy one! But got to keep on telling me this is bad bad timing to be buying one. :-/ :-(

NorBro said:
Definitely understood, but it's just an announcement; it's not clear when it's actually shipping.
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Canon said July
 
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JPNola said:
Well, I don't know about the suggestion that Sony is at a standstill. They just introduced an entirely new camera within the last year. I do know that Canon introducing a new camera at this time, during the pandemic, when the industry is at a virtual standstill, is really poor timing. Or let's say "unfortunate" timing.

I can't imagine that many businesses that have seen their revenue drop by 80% and are having to lay off employees are shopping for new gear right now. Most owner/ops have zero income at present.

If there is a time to be in between new releases, this is it. If there is a time to NOT be releasing a new camera, this is it.

The last thing on my mind right now is buying a new camera. My interest level, at this time, in the C300Mkiii is next to nil. I don't even know when I'll have work again.
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I'm sure the thought was announce now, be prepared to ship when everyone gets back to work.
 
Off topic but related: I just read that the Canon R5 might cost about $3,500. Does that sound right to people? I had assumed that the price would reach 1DXmk3 territory or higher...

Aside from the fact that the R5 ticks a lot of boxes and could be a great B/gimbal camera, at 8K resolution you finally reach the territory where you can honestly pull high-resolution stills from your video. I just did another video/stills shoot last week where stills were mostly shot on a 5Dmk3, but we planned to pull stills from 4K video when there wasn't time to switch cameras and reshoot the set-ups. But you're talking 8MP frame grabs... from 8K capture it's approximately 32MP...
 
Is this 300iii a sony killer?

well sony have the imperfect 28-135

imperfect? yep but it is the best lens under $5k by 1000 miles. Or the Fuji pair

C500 and 24-105?
C300 and 17-85 5.6

If you need a production machine with an 'ENG' lense under $5k well the situation is still poor - canon are still screwing themselves wiht a mount that a first year design school kid would lose.

--

As for which camera is best (for production work) well 400mb log codec is really enough so they are equal on the front.

Which one is best to use? Well that would really depend on buttong presses per operation to..
Engage HFR
Have pre roll running
Audio during HFR
AF area
Seeing in the sun
All the usual stuff

180FPS.. its not really interesting - we have had that for half a decade.

so in conclusion.. its still all a mess in the 'real world'

The more I shoot the more I dont really care about MPixels and care a lot about a decent zoom and a low mass camera S35 and bigger is still a fail.
 
ahalpert said:
Off topic but related: I just read that the Canon R5 might cost about $3,500. Does that sound right to people? I had assumed that the price would reach 1DXmk3 territory or higher...
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Canon said that R5 is basically a 5D replacement (in RF mount). I thought it was going to be around $3,300 but, off the current spec release, $3,500 sounds very reasonable.
 
morgan_moore said:
50th is useless for most stills. resolution does not cure this
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Fair point. We had been shooting 125th shutter in 60fps and of course the R5 only does 30fps in 8k. That being said, I've shot plenty of ambient-light portraits with low shutter-speeds and gotten good results despite a lower keeper rate on account of camera or subject motion. Plus, if you're filming fast action, you may be pushing up your shutter speed for the video, anyway. To be sure, pulling stills from video is not ideal, but if you're being asked to do that, you're already in the realm of making compromises.
 
morgan_moore said:
Is this 300iii a sony killer?

well sony have the imperfect 28-135

imperfect? yep but it is the best lens under $5k by 1000 miles. Or the Fuji pair

C500 and 24-105?
C300 and 17-85 5.6

If you need a production machine with an 'ENG' lense under $5k well the situation is still poor - canon are still screwing themselves wiht a mount that a first year design school kid would lose.
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Yeah, I think if your camera lives on your shoulder, there is still much to be said for Sony, not least of which is it will cost you half as much to get the camera to balance on your shoulder with a properly-positioned EVF and a video zoom lens. Meanwhile, you're probably not shooting RAW if you're rolling hours of footage all day. Horses for courses.

That being said, the versatility of the C300III with a smaller usable build, greater dynamic range, internal RAW and 4K 120fps is very enticing.
 
The C300iii is exactly what I predicted it would be. And I think that's a great thing. It's definitely the most appealing S35mm camera anyone's come out with in quite a while.

I'm really interested to see how the market reacts to it. To my mind, in the mid-range Canon now has the most appealing/attractive lineup of all (C500ii/C300iii). The question is, will it be enough to entice people away from all the FS7s they've spent the last few years buying?

So many have stuck with Canon EF glass on their Sony bodies, that it's not inconceivable that they'd switch brands. But the FS7 is so entrenched in the mid-range, I think it's questionable how many would bother switching systems (or even upgrading at all any time soon - since so few clients are really asking for more than the FS7 does already).

I'm really interested to see a head to head comparison of over-under tests comparing the C300iii, C500ii and the Alexa. I'd love to see how Arri's first dual-gain competitor measures up to the king, and it'd also be really interesting to see how the more sophisticated sensor tech, can hold up to the brute performance advantages of the larger sensor on the C500ii.

I think it's actually a bit of a tough decision between the C500ii and its little brother at the moment - each has very strong selling points.
 
DLD said:
Canon said that R5 is basically a 5D replacement (in RF mount). I thought it was going to be around $3,300 but, off the current spec release, $3,500 sounds very reasonable.
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I don't know how the R5 could be $3500 while the 1DX Mark III is $6500, but can't wait to see.
 
Run&Gun said:
That will be impossible. You can't put something between an RF mount lens and RF mount camera without changing the flange depth distance. Of course, you'll be able to use the current adapter if you choose to use EF lenses.
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Perhaps impossible for the R5, but for the whole R line? Not sure about that. I get the flange focal distance problem. EF has something like 44mm, R is something like 20mm, right? But I'd like to hear some sort of elegant ND story from Canon.

I keep thinking of the neutral density filters built into the Fujifilm X100 cameras; the X100V has four stops of ND slipped in there. And those cameras are really compact. https://fujifilm-x.com/global/products/cameras/x100v/

X100V.jpg

So perhaps this is more of something I'd like to see in the R series of cameras rather than the R5. But I'd love to see it.
 
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ahalpert said:
Off topic but related: I just read that the Canon R5 might cost about $3,500. Does that sound right to people? I had assumed that the price would reach 1DXmk3 territory or higher...
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$3,500 sounds about right, as it’s the mirrorless successor to the 5D series. And we’ve just seen Canon be un-Canon like with more aggressive than usual pricing, announcing the new C300 at $10,999 and the 25-250 at $29,999. We may even see it introduced for even less. I have two 5DmkII’s, a mkIII, a mkIV and I see myself buying this (with an EF adapter) as well.
 
Jim Feeley said:
Perhaps impossible for the R5, but for the whole R line? Not sure about that. I get the flange focal distance problem. EF has something like 44mm, R is something like 20mm, right? But I'd like to hear some sort of elegant ND story from Canon.

I keep thinking of the neutral density filters built into the Fujifilm X100 cameras; the X100V has four stops of ND slipped in there. And those cameras are really compact. https://fujifilm-x.com/global/products/cameras/x100v/

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So perhaps this is more of something I'd like to see in the R series of cameras rather than the R5. But I'd love to see it.
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Now I would love to see a built-in VeND system.
 
I don't think at this time that this camera segment is winner take all as much as it's been in the past. I spent weeks shooting the FX9 and its a very usable, great camera with a lot to like. The C300 MKIII is just a 4K S35 C500 MKII, also undoubtedly both great cameras. I predict people who are deep into the Sony ecosystem and have Sony glass and clients who like Sony
will still trade up to the FX9 in droves. The camera is a winner and will sell a lot of units, I can't imagine why it wouldn't. I think the C300 MIII will also move a ton of units, it's not handicapped like most Canons are, FF is vastly overrrated in desirability and necessity and a lot more people are now getting onto the CRL bandwagon, it's a great format and unless you are an
event shooter or long form documentary shooter, the file sizes and media are workable. If you are deep into EF mount glass, the C300 MKIII is enticing. S-Cinetone impressed the hell out of me and I typically hate Sony color science. I, of course, being a Canon owner, prefer Canon color science but I was frankly just as happy with what S-Cinetone gave me so that whole
terrible FS7 color issue has been put to bed. 120fps 4K is meh but appealing to those who like slow motion abuse I guess, so there is that? ;-)

And as everyone has said, many of us are worried about just surviving now, it's the worse possible time to be buying new gear for most, and to be launching new product as the economy will be in shambles for the foreseeable future. I just wrote a proposal that I have been told is happening and with the proceeds, I could buy either camera, entire package with lenses, media and batteries cash no worries. It would be paid for but then I would be cash poor. But even if this project happens, I won't be buying a new camera because this is just one project. When it finishes in four months, I may need that money to live off of if the rest of 2020 is as slow as the first three months, pre-Pandemic were. So there are the economic realities that most of us will have to cope with for the foreseeable future.
 
puredrifting said:
I don't think at this time that this camera segment is winner take all as much as it's been in the past.
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I think this take is entirely correct. I have a lot of clients who are happy to shoot on either C300mk2 or FS7 unless they need 4K 60p. I imagine they will still be happy with those cameras plus FX9/C500mk2/C300mk3 unless they need 4K 120p or maybe the low-light capability of a full-frame camera. And Canon is now pretty competitive on price with Sony.

But of course, specific clients, sectors or regions may gravitate to one camera or another. I hear that the Eva-1 is popular in Europe but I've literally never seen it in NYC even though I shot with the AF-100 on occasion some years back.
 
Now that we've seen some footage, I am no longer in camera FOMO.
 
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