Sony PMW-F3 Review: First and lasting impressions (Creative Video, UK)

I agree, this has no useful info, its just them trying to sell a product
 
Man you guys are harsh. I posted this in the clips thread a day or so ago. It has some nice video of the RUF museum at the end.
 
I watched it. Can't see the need for rails, shoulder support, cineroid, arm mounted led light, matte box, follow focus, Vmount battery and so on for the shot.
I'm kind of tired of watching online videos of people telling to me that I need to spend money PIMPING my camera in order to get nice footage.
In my very humble opinion a person who spends £35.000 for having such a rig and shoots with XDcamEX codec is just interested in looking cool with his camera.
The first thing I'd buy for my F3 after lenses and batteries would be a Ki Pro Mini.
 
No I'm not bashing anything and above all I don't really mean to offend anyone.
I realize I might sound harsh because I'm not a native English speaker, I apologize if I did.
 
Alright my mistake. I watch the video and all I see is some guys that get to play with a great camera before I do and I'm so jealous. Plus I like the planes. :)
 
Those shots don't sell the camera very well. Very video looking, like all digital cameras of course. I wish someone would come up with something else. Maybe a spinning diffusion filter in front of the sensor or something. :D

Seriously, the only camera I have seen that starts to look different, or more film like, is the Ikon but it has that post flow problem.

Sony is really digging a hole for itself here. This thing is simply overpriced by $5000.

Will someone PLEASE come out with a new Spirit film scanner that would cost me $100/hour instead?!
 
I don't think the video was all that bad. I mean, they were merely showing you how you can take this little $13K camera and pimp it out to a bigger price, really that's just showing what can be done. To me, the test footage was very anti-climatic, not bad, not not bad at all, but not something that truly shows off what this sucker can do. And again, how do you truly measure that? A Ki Pro Mini would be nice, but they don't exist for purchase or testing yet. A Nano Flash would be swell, but it's limited to 8 bit. The Sony SR-R1 would be ideal but it's not even in prototype form yet. Truthfully people, these videos are what you make of them. Having edited a few AF100 test videos myself, I now fully understand the gauntlet you run when you release test footage. To be quite honest, all this playing with digital gear has made me really miss film.....
 
LeavingTheCandy said:
LOL! That's funny---Joe, by the looks of the camera in your Profile pic, you're all about the pimp-factor too!
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Come on let us be civil, the photo on Joe's response appears to be a rather ordinary Panavision rig not what I would called "pimped" As for the video yes it was produced with commercial interests in mind and while not the most fantastic footage it did represent some of what a F3 can do. I for one appreciate the effort that goes into posting info and videos on this site, many people here make all of or part of their livelihood by doing "commercial" work so please let us not put down a video because some one might be trying to sell something with it.
 
Joe Walker said:
To be quite honest, all this playing with digital gear has made me really miss film.....
Click to expand...

You really miss not seeing "rushes" until a couple weeks after you shot them? And trying to get the colors to come out right? Timing the film? Trying to line up a special effect frame with another frame when you can't see either while you're shooting them?

I don't miss film at all.
 
HAHAHAHHAHAHA......yes that pic was 2004 when I was working on this film shot here in Bama, called Constellation. I was with the 2nd Unit...I think, and we had three Panavision G2's, and an amalgam of Panavision lenses. While the cameras were "pimped" out, the G2 is like their oldest sync camera they offer, and you can get those fairly cheaply. Duke, what I miss about film is how simple the cameras are/were. As Barry Green has said before, all you had was a start/stop button, a frame rate dial, and maybe if you were lucky and had one of the late gen models of something, a way to change shutter angle and that was it. I never had to wait long for rushes, I usually did the overnight thing, and most of my coloring was done with a first light in Da Vinci and then my heavy stuff was usually done through a Quantel at this local shop we used to have here. Granted all of that was so ungodly expensive, it wasn't even funny. My first short film that I financed myself and shot on Super 16mm cost me somewhere between $10K and $12K!!!

Back on topic, to me, I'll be the first to admit, I think right out of the gate, the Sony F3 is a little overpriced for what you're getting. However, I do think it's biggest (no pun intended) saving grace is it's sensor. Which to me is the one thing that Sony talks about the least. If I'm reading the specs correctly, the Sony F3 sensor is larger than the RED MX. Granted it's not by much but that's a pretty significant factor to me.
 
i thought the review was ok but no real opinions offered as to how it feels when using it or impressions of IQ but just features that you can read about in a PDF. still was worth the watch though. thought the ending video samples were bland but still "something" to see from this cam.

this thing does seem overpriced. im really curious to see how well it sell against the other new offerings coming out now.

david
 
No disrespect meant toward Joe...just kinda laughing at that rig.

I am with you Joe about the sensor. I'm not sure why everyone is dissin' the price. Anyone price a Red lately? (if they bless you enough to allow you get one after holding your $$ for a year)
Yeah, yeah--4K, uncompressed, blah blah blah! When's the last time you delivered a 4K project?

I'll take this thing hooked to a KiPro ALL DAY LONG--Shoot,plug-in,edit! RedRocket be damned!
 
When they first announced the proposed prices for the F3 the price sounded expensive, but when the prices came out at $13,300 and $18,950 I thought that was justified.


  • Sensor bigger than Red MX, AF100, 7D, T2i, GH1, etc.
  • Bigger photo sites
  • SNR of -64db!!!!
  • Extreme low light sensativity
  • 4.2.2 and 10 bit out for (relatively) cheap external recorders
  • It uses adapters with cheap class 10 SDHC that should handle all speeds.
  • No 12 minute file limit
  • No aliasing
  • No moire
 
Duke M. said:
When they first announced the proposed prices for the F3 the price sounded expensive, but when the prices came out at $13,300 and $18,950 I thought that was justified.



  • Sensor bigger than Red MX, AF100, 7D, T2i, GH1, etc.
  • Bigger photo sites
  • SNR of -64db!!!!
  • Extreme low light sensativity
  • 4.2.2 and 10 bit out for (relatively) cheap external recorders
  • No 12 minute file limit
  • No aliasing
  • No moire
Click to expand...

I took one out but hopefully all that will apply to the S35 NXcam as well for 5 or 6 grand. Add an external recorder and you might have a mini F3.
 
I read Alister (Sony Guru) Chapman's description of the F3's noise level. Its reputed to be the same at +6 gain as the EX1 at 0.

His thought was that the sensor was so low noise that they could change the gain settings to give it a broader range and lower noise level. I

worry that the NXCam won't have the same gain or noise levels. Other than that what other downgrade would there be if you listen to some claim that AVCHD isn't really a down grade (unless it ships with a crumby version, which I doubt.)

I'm keeping my fingers crossed though. The F3 won't be out before this movie wraps, so I can wait until this summer.
 
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