Why I'm Keeping the Sony A7S

Kholi- indeed the F35 is a great camera, even today (should be given what it used to cost new! ($250,000)). The F65's color and detail in Oblivion is truly amazingly good. For Sony's (pro|con)sumer cameras, the color science has always been behind Canon. I'm speaking about how clients respond to stills and video, straight from the camera. The FS700 and A7S require more work than the 5D3 to make clients happy. The A7S certainly has some charm/character that the GH4 doesn't have straight from the camera as some models/actresses have liked A7S shots/footage even though the colors were wrong :) (GH4 appears to be more accurate and doesn't have the issue with green).

I suppose what we all want is the A7S's character along with accurate color science, from dark to light with nothing strange in between. It's going to be an interesting day when Canon announces the update to the 5D3 (though most working pros are already pretty happy with the C100/C300 (more DR+slomo+4K will be welcome)).

Looking forward to seeing A7S footage that surpasses this (along with the necessary post work steps required to achieve it):
https://vimeo.com/77580463

Perhaps a thread with videos comparing the best of the best would be a helpful resource (perhaps with community voting to help move the best to the top of the list(s)). The Beauty In Nature video above is the best all-around 5D3 RAW footage I have seen.
 
Oh! My bad, I get you now jcs, sorry I misunderstood. I do agree on that for sure.

Edit edito:

And thinking more about what you said, yeah, if the A7S is going to replace the 5D2 OR 3, there needs to be a straight out of camera profile that really nails everything. If you're shooting Slog2, I'm beginning to think that you're doing it on a personal project, documentary, or b/c-cam. For a 5D replacement, an in-camera solid profile must be setup...

... THAT will be my next goal with the camera.
 
Last edited:
Good profile and LUTs are essential. Look how much better the FS100 was with G-log.

The matte gauze is a problem, I can't get rid of it. I'm going to get some advice from S-loggers and tweak the PP. I can get a glossy shot shooting raw stills without S-log but with S-log on same problem.
 
I'd equate the look of Sony to Nikon in the photographic world. A little starker, colder, gritty. Canon has always appeared to have champion the magazine look. Glossy, bright, warm, fuzzy feelings all over the place. I kinda like that each camera manufacturer has managed to put a signature into their sensors. It's film stock. RED has a look. BMCC has a look. Sony, Canon, Digital Bolex. The A7s definitely seems like the right profile (like Squig pointed out mentioning GLOG) just hasn't been tapped yet but I don't expect the overall Sony look to go away. It's got it's own thing going on. I honestly hadn't looked much at 5Dmkiii RAW yet and I just took a tour. It's extremely nice. Beautiful. I'm making notes over here and I'm looking forward to the dump pricing on those bodies when a successor drops.
 
cyork said:
cpc, those look fantastic. The bottom one looks a little pushed in the skin but that middle shot is wow (the light works well in that shot). I don't have anything shot to match but yeah, working for good skin on the A7s has been tougher coming from the BMCC world for me.

Shaded, sunset light but the I tried to mimic the overall saturation levels in your shots. I don't know, I haven't had a chance to put any pretty people in flattering scenes with awesomo light with this cam yet. I think noise reduction would help smooth out the overall look but heck, I like grain in my shots so it'd be interesting to see grained footage from both wit the same scene and light.
jxegDdE.jpg
Click to expand...

This looks good; and the highlights accentuate the texture of the skin which adds depth.
I also like a little bit of texture over my images (when appropriate), I've been guilty of adding grain in post; and noise generally helps with covering gradation issues.

Also re: Kholi & jcs:
The problem with DNG raw is that it isn't really practical beyond narrative (and music videos, and ads). And I can't even imagine shooting 4K dng raw. Wavelets based raw codecs actually work pretty good from what I've seen. I hope these propagate to lower end cameras (Kinefinity's Kinemini has 2K Cineform raw, and it's very nice).
But I believe the A7S would really shine with 10-bit output; and 4k-to-2k will probably help for better tonality with s-log. Size is a huge selling point for me though (the a7s in the form factor of nex-6 would be a killer), so I am not really thrilled by the idea of having a recorder married to the a7s. Also, 4K prores HQ is in the ballpark of 1080p dng raw in terms of data size. It now occurs to me that the NanoFlash might be a good match for the A7S with its 8-bit 4:2:2 codec (long gop/intraframe selectable in juicy bitrates).
A7s color isn't bothering me at all, I've yet to see anything that isn't workable colorwise. All things considered, the a7s is great for what it is, it is checking a lot of boxes right and I am looking forward to getting one.
 
cyork said:
In other words, money isn't keeping talent out of the game and it sure is nice to lug less stuff around to get great shots!
Click to expand...

This.

I'm really liking what I see from the a7s, but the GH4 also has some very strong points, and the 5D3+RAW, and the BlackMagics... I've got my favorite, but other people prefer other cameras and that's perfectly natural. Also: many with good reasoning, but also some because they just don't know better, but even for those I just try to remember this and think that a few people using the wrong tools in the wrong way for the wrong reasons just makes my stuff look better in comparison (in fact if they weren't there I wouldn't stand a chance, so much to learn yet...).
 
ectobuilder said:
One thing the 70D absolutely destroyed the A7S in was AF when recording video. The 70D with its dual pixel phase detection is the most invaluable feature of any camera I've seen. Putting it head to head with the A7S taught me that acquiring focus on command with no hunting and reliably is more important than a super clean, high iso image such as the A7S. For this reason, for my purposes anyways, I would go with the 70D over the A7S unless it gets super dark.

I noticed during video recording with AF turned on, the A7S doesn't really hunt but has super slow AF or it will get stuck not focusing. I think the engineers, to deal with the lack of phase detection, programmed the A7S to NOT FOCUS in place of HUNTING. In other words, in situations where the Contrast Detection would have hunted, the A7S instead delays the focus until it is sure which direction to drive the focus mechanism on the lens.

The A7S does have a quirk over the 70D however: When recording video, the [AF-ON] function only works when you are in [AF-C Mode], there is no [AF-S Mode] when recording video like on the 70D. The [AF ON] feature implemented on the 70D allows you to drive focus by holding down a button, once you release the button the focusing system does not continue to drive focus. On the A7S however because you need to be in [AF-C Mode], when you release the [AF-ON] button, the A7S will continue to drive focus until you turn off [AF-C Mode] and put it into [MANUAL FOCUS]. This feature was very annoying on the A7S. On top of that, the [AF-ON] feature of the A7S has lots of hunting whereas the 70D has minimal hunting (it hunts only when the lens starts near the minimal focus point or infinity AND your field of view starts completely out of focus). The C300's hybrid AF solves this issue.

I just hope whatever Canon brings out next will be like the 70D (with the hybrid AF) but with the A7S low light and video centric features (i.e. you can magnify the image as you are recording). That would be the killer camera to go for.
Click to expand...

Thanks for that! Really useful information. I think Im gonna finally stick to Canon for a little more, waiting to see what will bring to the table. I love the image of the A7s but the functionality of the 70D is VERY important especially for a wedding videographer!
I also saw what Erik Naso wrote: http://eriknaso.com/2014/07/20/things-that-drive-me-crazy-about-the-sony-a7s/ and....hmm...I had no idea...especially that record button thing....wow...what were they thinking!!! Imagine if it was not a video centric camera....haha...
 
They were thinking you would put the camera on a big rig, surrounded by lots of gear, so any position would be OK for the record button. So they made a great cinema-system-in-your-palm thing, and then shot it in the foot cause hey, a cinema package will be on a rig, right?

If at least you could assign start/stop-recording to C1...
 
The record button is the worst piece of shi# ever. I couldn't even feel it today, had to look for it! It's a bit like one of those buttons you need to press with a paperclip.
 
I think my thumb has re-formed itself and adapted. I can hit that record button just fine but I would def love to move it to the center wheel button or maybe C1 as Samuel mentioned. The actual shutter button is kinda soft and spongy. At least on mine...I like that the record button we did get is a firm press. No accidental stop and starts.
 
C1 would be fine, C2 would be fine, AF/AE would be fine... so many right answers and they chose that weird place on the side...
 
ectobuilder said:
One thing the 70D absolutely destroyed the A7S in was AF when recording video. The 70D with its dual pixel phase detection is the most invaluable feature of any camera I've seen. Putting it head to head with the A7S taught me that acquiring focus on command with no hunting and reliably is more important than a super clean, high iso image such as the A7S. For this reason, for my purposes anyways, I would go with the 70D over the A7S unless it gets super dark.

I noticed during video recording with AF turned on, the A7S doesn't really hunt but has super slow AF or it will get stuck not focusing. I think the engineers, to deal with the lack of phase detection, programmed the A7S to NOT FOCUS in place of HUNTING. In other words, in situations where the Contrast Detection would have hunted, the A7S instead delays the focus until it is sure which direction to drive the focus mechanism on the lens.
Click to expand...

I didn't see it mentioned in your post, but were you using a native e-mount lens on the A7s? If so was it a full frame lens or aps-c? Just curious because I'm considering the A7s and good auto focus when recording video is very important to me. I've read that af works much better on Sony cameras when using native e-mount lenses, and also that af quality can vary depending on the lens although I really don't know how true that is.
 
Last edited:
If auto focus is important you will want native lenses that work with the Sony auto focus system.

The EF Metabones adapter with Canon lenses is very slow. makes sense since it's a completely different system from Canon. It will get lock but takes a while. From my experience it goes past then comes back to far then goes back and nails it. It's kind of frustrating but it works. I think if I was out shooting stills all day I would switch it back to manual and use peaking and magnification.

At least you can control the iris and image stabilization so thats a huge plus.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top