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First time poster. In regards to the Samsung NX1, I'm considering a purchase, but I'm a bit curious about your comment regarding "3. Unnatural motion cadence when panning or recording a moving subject (deal breaker)." Is this in reference to some form of extreme rolling shutter when recording UHD or 4k? I've seen that the 4k rolling shutter is pretty bad on the Samsung but its also not great on the Sony A7 series. However, the Samsung 1080p rolling shutter is one of the best among CMOS sensors. My thought is that during scenes with extreme action or during lots of hand held shooting, I could drop to 1080p to compensate. Or does motion cadence refer to something else? To my mind, something shot at 24 fps at 1/50th shutter speed should be pretty much the same across cameras unless rolling shutter plays a major role in what is perceived by the viewer. I'm very curious in regards to what people are referring to when they reference motion cadence. Seems a very nebulous trait of a camera and I'm very interested in what makes good cadence vs bad cadence that would constitute a deal-breaker for a certain camera.

If A7r II has "good battery life", then NX1's battery life should be "mindblowing battery life from different galaxy". It's just joke that you gave them both "good battery life" when A7r II is so much worse. Cinema4K with NX1 is softer than UHD, so that shouldn't be plus, and 4K with A7r II is cropped which should be huge minus. A7r II also requires good color grading to get useful results, while NX1 looks awesome straight out of box. Screenshot from NX1 video (4K@1080p):

And after shooting with both cameras, I can declare with great confidence that if stills are entered into the equations... at all, you can just start saving your pennies now. ... everyone knows it would have better IQ ... it's FF with a state of the art 42MP sensor. I like taking stills as well and thought that the A7Rii would be the perfect hybrid cam but it's not at all IMO. I just hated using it mainly from an ergonomic perspective. Not fun at all. NX1 is a pleasure to use. I'd rather have an NX1 & a D750 than just an A7Rii. The auto-focus is mythical. -- Try using a D750 ... to me the AF on that cam is amazing ... in any light. The burst speed is truly something to marvel at - better than the 15fps on the NX1? At least on the NX1 you don't have to walk around the block to wait for the cam to finish processing those shots. The A7Rii is without a doubt among the best full frame stills camera currently available -- utter nonsense. Many would argue a D4, D750, D810, 5DMkiii, 5Ds are better cameras. Just depends what you are using it for. Overall image quality is superior on the A7Rii. Colors seem more true to life without the need for tweaking. -- did you get the cameras mixed up in testing? LOL 9. Pleasing colors (Thank you Sony... at last). ... really??? The NX1 seems to have much nicer colours. I've had both cameras as well. A7Rii is better for stills for sure (the end result that is .. not necessarily taking the actual shot), but everything else I'd rather use the NX1. Ergonomically I find the A7Rii terrible in comparison to the NX1. The NX1 seems to have everything in just the right place and feels great to use. The A7Rii also feels drastically underpowered as far as the processor goes and really clunky to use ... like you are waiting all the time for things to happen. It's like they put a V8 in a mini. I don't get why everyone says the AF is that great on the A7Rii either ... it's good for mirrorless but all mirrorless seem to suck really badly when they light goes down a little ... including the Sony's. The NX1 is worse than the Sony for sure but I don't find the Sony in any way near a D750 or the like. The AF is good for a mirrorless cam ... still no where near a DSLR IMO. I also hate the fact that it is near impossible to film outside in 4k on the A7Rii as the LCD & EVF dim so much as soon as you press record. Makes it impossible to see what your actually filming. Only Sony's seem to to do this ... RX100iv does it as well. Doesn't happen in 1080p so probably done to prevent overheating ... perhaps they can hire some soon to be out of work Samsung engineers soon to fix this up Also, at the end of the day, no matter how small they make the FF mirrorless cams, there's no way around the fact the any decent fast & bright (2.8) AF zoom is going to be a monster and totally unbalanced ... bigger cams seem much better suited to shooting these types of lenses. That being said, I don't mind Sony and I'm happy they keep pushing the envelope and things like the 42MP sensor and inbuilt IBIS are awesome. I like the little prime lenses as well. I really wish they bring out a slightly bigger version of the A7 series with better ergonomics, much faster processor and no heating issues. This would be a nice camera.

Yes. Why people are chasing this aesthetic is kind of strange. f5.6/s35mm is what typically works for most films, so to go shallow, I don't get it. I can see using it for certain scenes if that's the way you want to effect your image to fit a particular narrative, but for overall? eh...

Very grateful to all the forum users and the readers of the blog, so merry christmas right back at ya!

I'm a huge fan of the bmpcc. It's the ONLY camera that fulfilled the needs of my FORBES70 prototype camera in terms of DR, low light performance, resolution, compatibility with adapted specialist lenses, solid codecs, etc. since the bmpcc's release there has yet to be anything that comes close to its overall performance when paired with fast modern c-mount lenses. The sheer number of so-called high end cinematographers interested in FORBES70 but who disregard it based on that fact that the internal camera is a BMPCC is amazing. Also those who complain about anything the camera does visually are asking far too much. £800 for the best picture available from any camera in the price bracket where re-mortgaging isn't required to make a purchase. https://vimeo.com/136554487 password : fbs I hope the bmmcc does the same amazing job and better!

As part of a review I am writing for Mac Format magazine (out in the UK January 19th, issue 296) I had an OSMO sent. I couldn't resist having some fun with it, here are my first impressions of the 'steadicam on a stick'. Read the full article

here's some screengrabs from a short film I'm making for Bernie Sanders using the A7S ii with leica 35mm lens in 4k mode. Click on them to see full-size. Pro Gamut, sharpness at minus 5. CINE4. in post color chart, then to 500t lut and also adding in an alexa rec709 lut from film convert and some film grain. I'll make a lut to download if anyone is interested. I feel that even at minus 5 sharpness it feels too sharp of a camera. I'm really impressed by the quality and the stabilization on the sensor is great. Walking with the camera, well it's not going to look smooth unless you use a steadicam or a gimbal. Interested in the Nebula 4200 when it comes out. Also now I have to do a test with the Sony F35, F3, and A7S ii and see which ones I'll sell onto ebay.

The first of several short films I shot on the NX1. Let me know what you think

It should come as no surprise to many here that I have been spending some time filming and taking stills with Samsung's mighty NX1 camera. What some may not realize is that I have also been getting to know Sony's own heavy weight contender... the A7Rii. In this writing are some of my thoughts and conclusions. Pros - Samsung NX1: 1. Excellent 16-50mm S-lens (Clean optics, pretty fast... Great performance for the buck). 2. Feels good in the hand. 3. Excellent user interface (Easy to use). 4. Better than expected low-light (Good up to 6400 iso). 5. Future proof H.265 codec means it is compatible with cheaper/slower SD cards. 6. Good auto-focus. 7. Cinema 4k (Very cool). 8. Great OLED display. 9. Good battery life. Cons - Samsung NX1: 1. Limited lens selection. 2. When recording video you cannot switch back and forth from EVF to rear display panel. 3. Unnatural motion cadence when panning or recording a moving subject (deal breaker). 4. Limited dynamic range (troublesome). 5. External flash requires purchase of second expensive flash unit for off camera use. 6. Internal flash creates shadow when used with kit 16-50mm S-lens. 7. Stock battery grip does not fit correctly (QC fail). Pros - Sony A7Rii 1. Feels like the real deal, solid, well made... Quality (Confidence inspiring). 2. Amazing auto-focus (In a different league). 3. 42MP stills (Wow, just wow!!!). 4. Accessories (Flashes galore, wireless sound with connection though smart hot shoe, grips etc...). 5. Amazing lenses (Zeiss Distagon 35mm with selectable de-clicked aperture... must be seen to believe, Batis 85mm etc... ). 6. Adaptable (Canon lenses focus faster than on native canon bodies). 7. Large EVF (really large). 8. Video motion cadence is good. 9. Pleasing colors (Thank you Sony... at last). 10. Good battery life (With the new firmware I shot all day on a single battery, mix of video and stills). 11. Excellent low-light performance - full frame clean to 12800 and APS-C clean till 25,600 ISO (more than enough, unless you are doing surveillance). Cons - Sony A7Rii 1. Expensive (Body alone is $3200 US) 2. Native lenses are expensive and mostly slow. 3. Rear LCD display should be better at this price point. 4. Non-intuitive user interface (Doesn't Sony make smartphone also?). 5. Battery grip use requires removing the in body battery. 6. Large file sizes means it takes a long time to write to even the fastest SD cards. Let me first add that both are great cameras. And truly fantastic results can be accomplished with either. But that said, there really can only be one winner here. And after shooting with both cameras, I can declare with great confidence that if stills are entered into the equations... at all, you can just start saving your pennies now. The A7Rii is an amazing stills camera. The auto-focus is mythical. The burst speed is truly something to marvel at. The A7Rii is without a doubt among the best full frame stills camera currently available. As to video, after extensive testing I am forced to realign my previous thoughts regarding the NX1. While it is an excellent camera, it is simply out classed by Sony's offering. Overall image quality is superior on the A7Rii. Colors seem more true to life without the need for tweaking. The video motion cadence seems more natural. Dynamic range is much better also, with far better black levels. Auto-focus in video mode is very good on the A7Rii. I need to make a disclosure here, I am not unbiased in this review. I REALLY wanted the Samsung NX1 to blow away the Sony A7Rii. If it had, it would have saved me many thousands of dollars. But in the end, the results where undeniable. The A7Rii is the better camera. If you are on the fence and wondering if it is worth three times the money... Wonder no more. Safe in the knowledge that the new firmware has resolved the worrisome overheat problems that plagued this camera, the only sensible choice is the A7Rii. While the A7Sii does offer 1080p 120fps capture, the A7Rii's ability to deliver super high res stills combined with the flexibility of filming in both full frame and APS-C video modes make it the clear winner for anyone outside of a private eye on a stakeout. Verdict: I find for the Sony A7Rii.

contax zeiss are pretty good, a lot of them are the same designs as the zeiss "Classic line" ZE ZF.2 and the best part for video work is that they have manual apatures but also spin focus the right way. like a zeiss ZE ZF.2 hybrid. some of their coatings are not as modern or flare resistant as the "classic line."

review of SLR Magic's achromats, I thought it could be useful here. http://www.tferradans.com/blog/?p=8334

I'm in awe. The motion is ground breaking, I actually love the robotic look, and it suites this piece amazingly. I love how the system handles all of those tricky lights. Maybe one of the most interesting aesthetics I;ve seen and one that's begging to be used as a pov camera for a robot character like Jonny Five

agree. If black magic fitted the bmcc sensor in a moderately larger version of the bmpcc it would be unreal - particualrly with the bmcc m4/3 to eos speed booster!

When selecting a taking lens for an anamorph it's worth researching what the original taking lens would have been. and if there are various options you want to go for the middle focal length or the one the lenses are typically used on. So researching your cinelux 2x anamorphic lens you'll see that there are many focal length primes available for projection. as far as I can see, the gold cinelux 2x anamorphics could be paired with anything from 42.5mm/2 up to 100mm/2 from a range of primes. They'll have therefore designed the lens to perform best at the mid point. =70mm, (or they may have been designed to work best with a specific focal length to project from a certain distance onto a certain size screen.) However lets assume they went with the most obvious solution - design for 70mm primes with enough performance to cater for a different focal length. So lets say the best performance can be had from the cinelux at 70mm/f2 on s35mm (aps-c for simplicity) on full frame to match the performance closely you'll want a 100mm/2.8 on full frame. So assuming you went with something close to a 70mm/2 as a typical lens it would mean you could get away with using it in aps-c for optimal IQ or when used on full frame you could close down to 70/2.8 and get similar fov and perfomance to that you would expect from the schneider 42.5mm/2 prime (which would be considered 'within spec' by the schneider techs in terms of performance. Performance is always better from projection anamorphics with double gauss designs (all of the schneider projection lenses are of this design). I think the closest 'full frame capable' lens that is affordable and gets close to the optimal 70mm/2 focal length, while also being a double gauss design is a medium format 80/2.8 like a biometar 80/2.8. You will find 75mm/2 lenses which closely match the criteria but they're rare and often made by collectable brands. If you can live with moderate vignette on full frame then go with a late helios 44 - a helios 44-3 or later will have multi coatings that match the coatings on the cinelux very well. aps-c with the helios 44-3 will deliver outstanding results only slightly less refined than my estimated optimal 70mm FL this makes performance even more important since viewers tend to need more refined in focus areas when you're shooting stills. I still think the helios 44-3 is a superb option and only slightly out of optimal spec for aps-c. and only slightly pushing things on the wide end. however the drop in iq will be at the edges anyway and will likely be a desirable aesthetic (particularly for portraits)

Hey, even if people think you're a messed-up idiot, at your funeral they'll be toasting your memory in tears. (And I bought an NX1, and yeah, it's a bad little mofo of a camera).

Yeah, 'motion cadence' is something as non-quantifiable and vague as an image that 'pops'. But it kinda has to do with the organic flow of frames following up eachother. Even though the framerate and shutterspeed are set the same, there might be a different feel to the motion with different cameras. Something you can't quite put your finger on, but kinda know its there. Not science, but magic.

I also wondered what this might mean. I haven't noticed anything strange with my NX1. I like to always keep shutter speed 1/50 (or 1/125 when shooting 100 fps slowmotion) and use ND filter. In my eye the motion seems very natural.

People tend to say that anamorphic adapters "work better with older, simpler glass". I have never understood why, but noticed that my zoom lens produce much worse image then primes. Some say that simple optic schemes work better. Vintage glass has a bunch of character and is usually cheaper then new autofocus glass, I guess these are couple of many reasons why people love it that much. Using autofocus for video that is not blogging is kinda of a no-no, unless it serves a specific reason, and it's very hard to control, so you can rarely find somebody using autofocus for video work. One of the popular choices for Canon is Helios 44-2, 58mil f2 soviet glass, but since you're on Nikon you'd have to use trickier mounting options to get it to work (adapters with lenses inside to get infinity) so I'm not sure it's OK to recommend it to you. Please note that I am an anamorphic noob too and this is just the info I've read on a bunch of forums, but mostly this one, so it can only be a starting point for your further research.

XC10 is quite a special camera for its purpose indeed, I don't think it's bad. Don't know why BMCC is lower. I was actually planning to get one instead of NX1.

The XC10 seems totally fine for it's intended use (news, drones). I'm very surprised to see the BMCC lower than the Sony A7SII, A7RII and 1DC for "character and rendering". In my opinion it blows the socks off the Sony's for this.

XC - 10 Limiting lens. The non-constant aperture can drive one crazy while shooting at multiple focal lengths…The maximum aperture difference between wide (F2.8) and tele (5.6) is too large.Not enough assignable buttons. There are only 3 of those and that’s very limiting. After assigning 1-Magnification, 2-Display and 3-Push auto focus, had to dig into “FUNCTION” in order to change ISO values, engage the internal ND filter, use the focus peeking or enable zebra.After changing a value in “FUNC”, when starting to record, the menu screen will still be present, preventing the possibility of quick recording. You are forced to close the menu in order to have a clean view of your recording.No viewfinder. The proposed original Canon solution (loupe over the LCD) is a good idea but badly implemented. The image is distorted and not evenly in focus when you enable the diopter, which can cause eye fatigue and headache at times.Cheap stiff rubber on the loupe is extremely uncomfortable to use.Not a worldwide camera. Region restricted.Magnification will punch in only once. Not enough to judge critical focus in some shooting situations.Build quality is questionable, especially the lens on the camera.If you intend to shoot in HD (1080) or slow motion 120 FPS in 720p, prepare to have an extra SD card as those formats will not record onto the CFast card.Canon is marketing this camcorder as professional. A better professional XLR audio solution from Canon is missing for that though.Minimum ISO in video mode is ISO 500.the CFast 2.0 media are still quite expensive for such an entry level camera.I just cant understand why a camera with such high specs, even got c-log, is, nd filter has such crappy lens. This camera is not suck, its ridiculous.

Award of the most useless post of the year !

Thanks so much, Andrew, for all the work you've done to provide all of us with a nice hub for information related to video production and photography. I check the forum of this site almost daily and am very appreciative of all who collaborate in a positive way here, but also love the product reviews you've done. Happy Holidays to you and all the other forum members who make this little place on the internet great.

These look fantastic. I'm going to be spending the next few weeks doing a crash course on color grading to improve my skills, I've never used a LUT before. Thanks for sharing.

Sorry for going off topic but what lens is in use during those shots?

Just finished a re-edit of my first wedding the NX1 (fortunately, wedding season is over !), I didnt re-grade, just made it smaller. Hope you guys like it : https://vimeo.com/148642940 C&C are always wellcome !

The spread of strengths across the camera industry is driving me a bit nuts. Only Blackmagic do cheap affordable int. 10bit ProRes. Only Olympus do effective stabilisation. Only Panasonic do cheap 4K in Micro Four Thirds cam Only Fuji do a film-inspired shooting experience (although Olympus run them close) Only Sony max out the specs and do a full frame mirrorless camera Only Samsung do a really responsive fast ergonomic DSLR-style mirrorless camera Only Canon... I mean only Magic Lantern do raw video. The A7S II is closest to the perfect camera but the handling is just...so soulless. Currently I am thinking of keeping hold of the E-M5 II as a stills camera, second to the NX1 and A7S II as my main video cameras.