Cliff Totten

If these A7S-III specs are right. Sony seems to be targeting the Lumix S1 but maybe NOT the S1H. I suspect that the S1H is WAY over spec'd for Sony to match in any "consumer" Alpha. XDCAM managers will demand that the future A7S-III will need to be crippled in very distinct ways. Alpha will want it to have everything and XDCAM would rather it not even exist at all. At some point they will agree and compromise with each other. The S1H is overloaded with an extremely high feature set that rivals an FX9 or even possibly Venice. Lumix is using Sony's own EXMOR image sensors against them! 10bit color is a must but what about Alpha's 29 minute time limit? Will Sony allow it to properly overheat to keep the high dollar pro's away from it? Rumors also say an FX6 is on the way...the cheaper, SD card long-GOP version of the FX9. I suspect that the A7S-III is THE most hotly debated camera in Sony headquater meeting rooms in the companies history. The A7S-III's biggest enemy wont be Lumix, Cannon, Nikon or BlackMagic. Its biggest enemy will be Sony's own internal politics!

So we know the Z6 uses the Sony IMX410 sensor. (same as Sony A7-III) So, Nikon will be implementing the many readout modes it has, including the famous Sony 6k to 4k full pixel readout options. Now the Sony FX9 (possibly IMX310 sensor) will also have a 6k to 4k full pixel readout mode that delivers 4k "raw". Its unclear how "raw" this 6k to 4k scaling tecnique actually is. 1) The 6k RGGB scaled "separately" and saved in raw Bayered form? 2.) Is the RGGB readout combined (deBayered) and then scaled to 4k and saved that way? Where is the scaling process happening? And is it "really" raw is a scaling process is applied and its it similar to BlackMagic "raw".....that isn't truly "raw" after all?

Are you asking why Sony Alpha is happy that Panasonic has tons focus complaints from its customers?

There wont be a GH6 until Sony is ready to make a new, upgraded IMX270 or IMX272 sensor. Panasonic and Olympus will just need to wait for Sony to make a fully stacked BSI MFT for replace the current FSI ones. Otberwize, why remake a GH5 or G9 using the same IMX272?

Guys,..quit asking for Panasonic to buy phase detect AF sensors. They are tired of customers screaming at them for it. Let's face it...Sony liscenses PDAF sensors to Nikon, Olympus and Fuji....but they will probably NEVER liscence PDAF sensors to Panasonic. Believe me....Sony is VERY happy to see Panasonic customers scream at Panasonic for not having PDAF. Every time a Panny customer says on social media; "Panasonic AF sucks"..a Sony Alpha camera manager says "whew!!...thank you Sony SemiConductor!" CT

The 29 minute recording limit has always been blamed on the Euro VAT tax. Camera companies have never wanted a 29 minute cripple but they were always forced against their will to do it because of Euro laws. Im told that Panasonic agrees with it's customers and would LOVE to remove the cripple but is affraid to. Even though the law is gone today, camera companies fear that it might suddenly return so they feel its best to just keep the 29 minute cripple limit so they wont be cought off gurad. Panasonic, Sony and Cannon DO agree with us about wantimg to remove the limit, its just those pesky taxes could return and they have no choice but to be ready, just in case. There wont be a GH6 until Sony is ready to make a new, upgraded IMX270 or IMX272 sensor. Panasonic and Olympus will just need to wait for Sony to make a fully stacked BSI MFT for replace the current FSI ones. Otberwize, why remake a GH5 or G9 using the same IMX272?

I'm sorry but I never really could understand the "Oh wow,...is that a LEICA?" thing. To me Leica is a "fashion" camera brand. I think the real brains behind Leica is really Panasonic. I dont know this for sure but I have to believe these cameras are 90% engineered by Panasonic in Japan with Leica people telling them how to style the ourside of it. I would not be supprised if these are reshaped S1 motherboards that share 100% of every chip and capacitor on them. It would not shock me if Panasonic software programmers made the menus for Leica. So what. Who cares if its an overpriced S1. As long as it has a red "Leica" logo in it, that's all that matters. Right? I dont get tbe whole "Leica" thing just like I dont get the "Hasselblad/Sony" thing either. CT

Gotcha,...thats what I get for skim reading this on my phone waiting for a train to go by.

Couple of things....wasn't BlackMagic forced tp drop in-camera CinemaDNG because of the violation of RED's pattent? Did Sigma work out a deal with RED? 8bit raw? I dont think any modern sensor today samples that low. So, my guess is...if this is a Sony sensor with on-board A/D converters...is that they are taking in 12bit readout and dropping out 4 bits to produce 8bit values? Something is fishy here.....has the L Mount Alience forced Sigma to stay at 8bit raw to not compete with Panasonic? Weird....what about 10bit or 12bit raw over HDMI to an Atomos recorder? Really strange.,,,,,

I have neen told that the hardest problem for them to solve with these organic sensors is that the use a massive amount of power and they get extremely hot. So, good like trying to get them into a small battery operated camera body. I asked a Sony technical manager that I know abour this technogy. He literally laughed at me and said "Cliff....it's one thing to BUILD the "Spruce Goose"....but actually FLYING it is a whole 'nuther story". Yeah...huge power and huge heat are the reason why its been in stuck developement like it has.

Yeah,...for me the Lumix S1H, a 10bit camera with great internal CODECs, no overheating and no recording limits and almost 6k raw? For $4,000,....is the most exciting camera I have seen in years. They just need to fix that one glaring problem with their color science and nasty blue channel clipping problem. I already have an S1 and now the S1H is on my radar as a replacement.

The dynamic range is no different. It's just in how the sensor samples and maps it's voltage readings to digital. The Atomos Shogun will take in Sony FS 12bit linear raw and can re-map it to a log curve like SLog-3 for video recording. It's no big deal to map linear to any log curve. Both linear and log mappings will capture the entire image sensor dynamic range. CT Remember, the S1H doesn't output "ProResRAW" itself,...it's just a plain Panasonic raw data stream. It's the Atomos NinjaV that takes that generic raw stream and converts it to compressed ProResRAW specifications and saves it to a file. CT

Here is an interesting question that nobody has ever asked anywhere yet: What "raw" output type will the S1H have? The Sony FS700, F7 and FS5 do 12bit LINEAR raw using floating point math. However, the Panasonic EVA-1 does it's raw using 10bit LOGARITHMIC (log) mapping using integer math. Many people don't know the EVA1 is 10bit raw,.,..which is totally fine. So what about the S1H? Will that raw be the same as EVA1? Complicated question: If (big "if") the S1H is using a Sony IMX410 variant, then that sensor will have it's own A/D converters that encode whatever Sony made them to do. Sony commonly does 12bit sampling and offloads those raw values. Is it possible that it will be 12bit raw? Is it possible that it will be a higher bit depth than the EVA-1's 10bit raw? I have to believe that Lumix would want to access 10bit sampling off those ADC's if they could, if that sensor would give that to them. OR,...maybe they would take in the 12bit raw and drop the extra two bits before that raw goes out to HDMI. I have a hard time believing that Panasonic would want the S1H to be 12bit raw and the EVA-1 to be 10bit raw. I hope somebody asks Jeremy Young of Atomos at IBC today. CT

I dont understand this blue clipping problem at all. On the S1 and S1H, while in VLog, the green and red channel have the very mild, saturation they are supposed to have. Those two have a perfectly normal response. However, blue is completely different than red and green, it just floods in with this crazy saturation that is 10 times more than red and green have. I dont get it...blue, why does THAT color respond soooo much more differently then red and green? I did some more blue light tests last night: S1 - Vlog = Blue 100% destroyed S1 - HLG = Blue 100% destroyed GH5 - VLog-l = Blue = Excellent! GH5- HLG = Blue = Excellent! Sony Z150 - HLG = Blue is very bad but not completely destroyed Sony NX80 - SLOG-2 = Blue is somewhat "OK" but responds weird. Sony NX80 - HLG = Blue is excellent! Sony RX10-III - SLOG-2 = Blue is 100% destroyed. Sony RX100 VII SLOG-2 (uses new Sony "Venice" color science) = Blue is excellent!! Sony RX100 VII HLG (uses new Sony "Venice" color science) = Blue is excellent!! All these cameras got the EXACT same blue light scene test. I dont know what to think but the GH5 is great and Sony's new color science seems to beat the problem too. This really blows my mind. CT

Excellent news! I was contacted by a Panasonic operations manager about this S1 and S1H blue channel clipping problem! He wanted me to be very aware that Panasonic has seen my video and they are very interested in this issue! I wont post my emails here but I will take one quote for you guys to see: "Rest assured that this issue has a lot of attention right now"....[from Panasonic] engineers. During this time, be very carefull about shooting in VLog. Outdoors should be fine. Indoors and night shooting are very prone to deep blue channel saturation, even on blue light that is not very strong. HLG will be the much safer bet for the moment. Lets cross our fingers that Panny will figure this out with a firmware fix.

The big question is: What other camera is out there that is like the S1H? I own the S1 myself and it's dynamic range, sharpness and cleanliness is better than any other Sony camera I have ever used. VLog in daylight is stunning. HLG is fantastic in day and night. VLog in low light with blue lights involved?....Uggg!!!....OK, you got me on that one. I can always switch to HLG and get mostly around that problem. But, overall, in my opinion, they only things that compete with these cameras are MUCH more expensive models. For video, no Sony Alpha camera can touch the S1 and S1H. If Panasonic could just nail down this smashed VLog blue channel issue with a firmware fix, then BANG!...they have a giant home run on their hands.

Fascinating! In my tests, the exact LED and test scene would NOT clip in HLG. Not even a little bit. In fact, I was at Disneyland two weeks ago. I shot a water, laser and LED light show called "World of Color". This show is LOADED with INTENSE multicolor LED lights and projections 100 yards wide. On my S1 in HLG, not one single clipped blue!!!. I got plenty of white clipping as normal for all cameras but blue looked perfect. None of that blue "smothering" effect that VLog is doing. HLG is the safest gamma the S1 and S1H has.

I'd almost bet my life that Sony will NOT try and challenge the S1H. It's simply WAY over spec'd for Sony to ever want in an Alpha camera. Instead, I think they will attack the S1 and "try" to match 10bit 4k and 60p and "maybe" unlimited record times in a smaller body with the new A7S-III. (I think XDCAM will give in and allow Alpha to match the S1) Sony will say; "We can match the S1 future for feature but we give you Sony phase detect AF for the same S1 price" Lumix S1H? Yeah,....right...XDCAM will NEVER,.....EVER,....allow ANY Alpha model to be THAT extreme!!! I suspect that Sony's XDCAM division has more to lose than Panasonic's Varircam division. CT

Exactly,...so for the blue channel clipping, yes we have seen this for decades on many camera models. Some camera's are more resistant that others. However, with the S1 and S1H, we are seeing these cameras having an EXTREME sensitivity to blue lights. More than any camera I have ever seen. Oddly enough, the same blue light test scene is 100% FINE when switching to HLG. And, going further, the exact same blue light does NOT hurt the GH5 VLog-L or HLG. Even B&H's S1H promo sales video is riddled with severe blu channel clipping. That was a terrible way to highlight the S1H. Those guys spread blu light all over their shots! If I was Panasonic, I would BEG B&H to take their promo video down! I "think" Panny can fix this, but of they can't, people MUST know that if you have blue light in your shot, like a stage show or wedding reception...DO NOT USE VLOG....you need to switch to HLG. Once that blu channel gets smashed, it cannot be repaired in post. We need to raise public awareness about this. If you are doing a paid project, VLog could totally ruin you footage before you are able to switch to HLG. BE CAREFUL NOT TO GET BURNED BY VLOG!

Seriously,....how profitable is Canon's cine camcorder division? How many C200's do they sell in a month? 20?....50 at very most? (I doubt its that high) THIS is what they are trying to protect? If Canon made a 5D V camera (or mirrorless) with CLog, 4k full pixel readout, no recording limit, clean 4k HDMI, 200mbp/s long GOP to SD cards, mic and headphone jacks, raw over HDMI and a few more small things from a great BSI sensor....people would go CRAZY for it! This "dream" camera would make up for any C200 lost sales TEN TIMES OVER!...and would get Cannon back into the game. This would put an end to all the YouTube joke videos about Cannon! Would this not be great for Cannon profits??

This really makes you wonder.....just how profitable IS Canon C series cine cameras? I mean, Canon is going to extreme legenths and dragging their name through the mud to protect their pro division? Are they making THAT much money off the C100 and C200? How many C200's do they sell in a month?....20? Maybe 50? A Canon 5D V (or mirrorless version) with full pixel readout, unlimited recording in 4k, 60p with 10bit color to a 200mbps long GOP codec and CLog..would sell several hundred a month...easy. Wouldn"t this EASILY recover and "lost" C200 sales 10 times over and put Canon back on the map again and stop all the Canon joke videos out there? I just seems like a slam dunk EASY business model. Unless Canon truely doesnt have the technology to do it.,.....???

Non of our complaints matter to Canon one tiny bit. They have a strong history in the camera industry. Their fans are incredibly loyal and pretty much dont care how Canon cripples their cameras. Canon fans dont care about BSI or stacked image sensors. They dont care how their sensors are read out or if they are video cropped or not. Canon fans are just as happy with MJPEG as they are with H.264. Why is all this true? Because a Canon rep told them not to worry about this stuff. Canon will make money no matter what cameras they release...because they understand how Cannon fans think. Canon can doesnt worry about keeping up with Sony, or Panasonic, or Ricoh, or Kodak or Poleroid technology.....because Canon fans dont buy Canon cameras for technology reasons. They buy Canon to be part of a historic "club"....to associate themselves with a good name. And this is all Cannon needs from them.

It is my understanding that Sony's 5k and 6k full pixel readout and scaling to 4k video...is dont at the A/D conversion level. The sensor does that proprietary scaling right on the sensor and feeds that final 4k image to whatever video processor your camera has. Why does this matter? Because all of the readout and scaling engine is on the chip itself. Your image processor doesnt have to do that work! Anybody who buys a Sony sensor has access to the scaling readout modes. So when Canon buys 1 inch Sony sensors,...bang!...they got Sony-style full pixel readout. Since Canon makes their own FF and APSC sensors,...they dont have that scaling engine onboard! Their DIGIC processor has to collect and scale that readout by itself! CLEARLY.....Canon has NOT figured out how to do 4k with anything more than a 1:1 deBayer or a 1:1 assembly using binning or line skipping!! Canon is literly 10 years behind Sony in sensor readout and image assembly mathematics! My God....wow.

This all hinges on weather Apple can shoot down RED's internal raw patent. Even Sony had to surrender on the F5, F55 and FS7 as they legally HAD to make an "external" Sony box to do their compressed raw format. I mean, Sony has already explored this RED patent from a legal perspective. BlackMagic's "raw" is actually deBayered and compressed. So is it "really" raw? Seemingly not enough for RED to legally trap BlackMagic.?? Unless Nikon, Sony and Panasonic want to go the "deBayered raw" road and compress the sensor data and record it in-camera that way??? I dunno,...I'm sure camera companies just want to output plain raw and not worry about ANY law suits from RED as I have to think that RED will "try" to go after BlackMagic in court. I'm sure Atomos' pitch to Panny, Nikon and Sony is; "Don't risk compressed raw internally, it's not worth the legal danger,...just let Atomos do that for you and you will be perfectly safe" I'm certain that Atomos is rooting AGAINST their buddies at Apple and hope they FAIL at shooting down RED's pattent. Atomos is RELYING on RED's patent to hold up in court. CT