a7r ii nothing but headaches.

[cantsin]

15 hours ago, richg101 said:

  lots of colours, no colour issues.

Sorry, but right the first pictures - the forest looked like it was a SciFi set, completely artificial, unnatural and un-nuanced colors...

[Roman]

On 3/2/2016 at 8:16 AM, amsh89es335 said:

I just sold my A7rii today. After having it for a few months I had nothing but huge headaches. I did many test with a 4k video devices recorder. Besides the worst rolling shutter I've ever seen no one seems to be talking about the horrible judder when panning. At first I thought it was just I'm shooting in 24p and viewing on a computer monitor at 60hrz. But further test in every setting, shutter speed and frame rate seem to have far more than every other camera I've shot with. Another problem is in 60p and 24p 1080 the noise level is bad. I also kept getting bad moire and aliasing in full frame 4k and 1080p especially in the highlights.

Granted as a small compact photo camera it's frickin pretty awesome. But for video the image only looks good in crop mode 4k and as soon as it moves or things in it moves it falls apart. I barely took it on a shoot because of how much testing I had to figure out before I felt comfortable with all its down sides. And is not worth it.

I went back to my Nikon D750 with a external recorder for now until I decided what to get next, but even though the 1080p image is softer everything else is far better. Rolling shutter very little. Noise level very clean upto 6400. Slow motion just as good as the 24p and very smooth. Color science far better. Dynamic range little less. Post with it is super easy. It's a shame this camera has gotten no attention, but it such a reliable camera its what we wanted out of the 5D Mk iii but quickly forgot about with all the 4k cameras that just keep adding more new problems, headaches, time and money all for the sake to say its 4k.

I also own this camera and have used it in a couple of video shoots and haven't experienced the issues you're having. I have also shot a lot of handheld stuff with the camera and haven't found the rolling shutter to be THAT bad. One issue i have experienced though is getting dust on the sensor which ended up ruining some shots and i had to use a blower to clean the sensor. 

I found the full frame 4k and slow motion to be really good but i would never go past ISO 1600. I was coming from mostly shooting with the 5D mark 3 and the difference in quality is night and day. But i guess everyone's experience is subjective so whatever works for you. 

[Inazuma]

It could be the stabilisation causing the bad movement?

[amsh89es335]

22 minutes ago, Roman said:

I also own this camera and have used it in a couple of video shoots and haven't experienced the issues you're having. I have also shot a lot of handheld stuff with the camera and haven't found the rolling shutter to be THAT bad. One issue i have experienced though is getting dust on the sensor which ended up ruining some shots and i had to use a blower to clean the sensor. 

I found the full frame 4k and slow motion to be really good but i would never go past ISO 1600. I was coming from mostly shooting with the 5D mark 3 and the difference in quality is night and day. But i guess everyone's experience is subjective so whatever works for you. 

Did you try exposing the slow motion with a light meter at the right exposure in lower light. Because if you go upto 1600 and over expose stop and half in sun light it looks better. But a proper exposure where 800 or 1600 where middle grey is at its extra nosiy in slog and and the cine modes compared to everyone else on the market. So what this means its ISO are all off to get a decent exposure. Which then if you shoot at 1600 but have to over expose then your really not getting 1600 iso but 800 or 400. The rolling shutter is really bad in the 4k crop mode even the image is cleanest. Coming from a 5d mkiii yes anything sharper seems like night and day. But look at you 5d panning and movement shots and the noise level and look the A7rii and look at things beyond sharpness. Also did you do the 5d mkiii magic lantern RAW? 

26 minutes ago, Inazuma said:

It could be the stabilisation causing the bad movement?

Tried it both on and off. Didn't see a difference on a trided panning slow. 

Also one thing I did learn from all this testing was how to get really good results out of slog 2. Use a color chart that resolves auto color chart reader can read and set the setting to the slog gamma. It really did a good job but I was also shooting 4:2:2 8bit uncompressed not sure about the compressed 4:2:0 8bit. 4:2:2 and 4:2:0 make a big differnce in coloring. But when not using a color chart with slog 2, shoot me.

[richg101]

1 hour ago, cantsin said:

Sorry, but right the first pictures - the forest looked like it was a SciFi set, completely artificial, unnatural and un-nuanced colors...

Very rarely do the colours in hollywood films represent exactly how the scene looked.  Unless you have been to that exact forest, at the exact time he shot the film you can't make judgement on the accuracy of the colour.  I simply posted that sample to show that both pleasing colours and motion can be achieved by a skilled camera person and careful grading.  Most dslrs would fall apart if you tried to pull images around as much as he has done to get this look.

 

  

[Nikkor]

9 minutes ago, richg101 said:

Very rarely do the colours in hollywood films represent exactly how the scene looked.  Unless you have been to that exact forest, at the exact time he shot the film you can't make judgement on the accuracy of the colour.  I simply posted that sample to show that both pleasing colours and motion can be achieved by a skilled camera person and careful grading.  Most dslrs would fall apart if you tried to pull images around as much as he has done to get this look.  

I remember when I was a child in the 90s when seeing rehersals or takes on a movie set in a making off I always asked myself why everything looked so crap compared to how it looks later in the movie.

[BenEricson]

6 hours ago, araucaria said:

I remember when I was a child in the 90s when seeing rehersals or takes on a movie set in a making off I always asked myself why everything looked so crap compared to how it looks later in the movie.

Nope. The guy can't take criticism. His image is all based on his reputation online, so he holds his opinion on everything.

[BenEricson]

6 hours ago, richg101 said:

Very rarely do the colours in hollywood films represent exactly how the scene looked.  Unless you have been to that exact forest, at the exact time he shot the film you can't make judgement on the accuracy of the colour.  I simply posted that sample to show that both pleasing colours and motion can be achieved by a skilled camera person and careful grading.  Most dslrs would fall apart if you tried to pull images around as much as he has done to get this look.

This is all subjective, but I live in the Northwest, and forests don't look like that... The issue isn't getting some Osiris LUT look, the issue is getting a nice professional looking image, with no weird skin tints or off looking color. You shouldn't have to use curves and HLS tools to achieve this. 

I have access to the FS700/7Q and the 5D3/Raw. I'll do some side by sides this weekend and post the flat Pro Res files. The FS700 is a hell of a deal, but I am working on a project right now and I am having difficulty with the Sony footage. The other project I am editing is C300mkii looks pretty great with only minimal adjustments to the C-LOG files. I used 5D3 for the pick up shots in public areas and it cut very well. The canon is punchy and saturated, the Sony feels life less, even when grading 10bit/422/4K files.

I'm wondering if the Sony suffers from IR contamination like the Black Magic Pocket... 

[TheRenaissanceMan]

The issue isn't that the colors are wrong. It's that they feel wrong. 

[hmcindie]

On 3/2/2016 at 0:43 AM, richg101 said:

 ...no motion issues.  lots of colours, no colour issues.

No motion issues when nothing is moving teehee.

Granted I don't believe in any "motion cadence" issues anyways. Except for rolling shutter. That's actually measurable. Usually people just react to well shot material and say "no motion issues" and when someone is flailing with the camera with a shutter speed of 1/1000 it suddenly looks like "horrible motion cadence on the cam".

[Axel]

37 minutes ago, hmcindie said:

Granted I don't believe in any "motion cadence" issues anyways.

I do, although it doesn't bother me much. amsh already stated that he was up to every trick, knew about shutter speeds, pan speeds, the effect of OIS lenses on tripods (and the like), and that he just compared the A7r to other cameras in this regard.

There is another factor to be considered here: in-camera sharpening. If you pan i.e. over a bookshelf, it sometimes contradicts the appropriate motion blur needed to soften the thin vertical lines. A friend with his 5DMiii complained about this one day, and I saw the judder then too. We changed a lot of parameters to get rid of it, and it disappeared once he dialed down sharpness. You know, with all those compression algorithms applied to the consumer codecs to make the image look acceptable, there are more hidden hazards than advantages. Just remember that skin-softening issue with Sony cams.

[amsh89es335]

19 hours ago, Axel said:

I do, although it doesn't bother me much. amsh already stated that he was up to every trick, knew about shutter speeds, pan speeds, the effect of OIS lenses on tripods (and the like), and that he just compared the A7r to other cameras in this regard.

There is another factor to be considered here: in-camera sharpening. If you pan i.e. over a bookshelf, it sometimes contradicts the appropriate motion blur needed to soften the thin vertical lines. A friend with his 5DMiii complained about this one day, and I saw the judder then too. We changed a lot of parameters to get rid of it, and it disappeared once he dialed down sharpness. You know, with all those compression algorithms applied to the consumer codecs to make the image look acceptable, there are more hidden hazards than advantages. Just remember that skin-softening issue with Sony cams.

Yes I also turned down the sharpness all the way.

Just got today another Nikon D750 (sold mine last fall to put toward the a7rii) and though not as sharp compared to the cropped 4k, the 1080 60p is much better. Playing around with some shots tonight and right away bam the Color science is better, motion cadence is nice and so much less rolling shutter. The rolling shutter has to best on a full frame out there. To bad I sold my A7r II 24 hours after putting it on craigslist or I would do some comparison. Though I am not saying the D750 is the best cinema camera I just using it as example, but I really do think its the best well rounded for its type of work and price range especially when used with a external recorder. Its just everything the 5D mkiii should of been. I mostly wanted it back for photography and run n gun video while I once again wait for NAB and to get back on the band wagon about another camera that will be out of date in 2 months of getting it and have a lot of problems to chase down 4k for cheap. 

[Don Kotlos]

1 hour ago, amsh89es335 said:

Just got today another Nikon D750 (sold mine last fall to put toward the a7rii) and though not as sharp compared to the cropped 4k, the 1080 60p is much better. Playing around with some shots tonight and right away bam the Color science is better, motion cadence is nice and so much less rolling shutter. The rolling shutter has to best on a full frame out there. 

I understand people have preferences but there are some things that should be stated correctly. 

1. HD FF resolution is better on the A7rII than the D750

2. Rolling shutter is also faster on the A7rII with FF HD than the D750.

A7rII HD ~ 13ms

D750 HD ~ 20ms (similar to the 5DMIII as shown here)

3. As others have mentioned, while motion cadence can be influenced by the codec and the camera most of the cases it is other things such as shutter angle that cause problems. Personally I have not experienced the issues that you mentioned and in a comparisson here with the A7s and GH4 I cannot see a difference:

 4. Color science just  means correct white balance + some custom color profile. I am going to agree with the point that some cameras such as D750 or the Canons have better color out of the box. But that is very different from saying the Sony cannot produce nice colors. Anyone that is serious about video should calibrate the camera colors to their preferences (Sony allows you to)  and do a proper white balance before each shot. For example using S-log3/S-gammut for everything with some random LUTs and AWB, will most definitely lead to bad colors. 

Again it is fine not to like a camera but we should separate personal preferences from the usefulness of the camera. At the end, cameras are just tools and we should find ways to make the best out of them. 

 

[Mattias Burling]

Everyone says the Sony can produce just as nice colors. But no one seems to be doing it. 

[TheRenaissanceMan]

10 minutes ago, Mattias Burling said:

Everyone says the Sony can produce just as nice colors. But no one seems to be doing it. 

Brandon Li can do it, but it does seem awfully rare.

[amsh89es335]

18 minutes ago, Don Kotlos said:

I understand people have preferences but there are some things that should be stated correctly. 

1. HD FF resolution is better on the A7rII than the D750

2. Rolling shutter is also faster on the A7rII with FF HD than the D750.

A7rII HD ~ 13ms

D750 HD ~ 20ms (similar to the 5DMIII as shown here)

3. As others have mentioned, while motion cadence can be influenced by the codec and the camera most of the cases it is other things such as shutter angle that cause problems. Personally I have not experienced the issues that you mentioned and in a comparisson here with the A7s and GH4 I cannot see a difference:

 4. Color science just  means correct white balance + some custom color profile. I am going to agree with the point that some cameras such as D750 or the Canons have better color out of the box. But that is very different from saying the Sony cannot produce nice colors. Anyone that is serious about video should calibrate the camera colors to their preferences (Sony allows you to)  and do a proper white balance before each shot. For example using S-log3/S-gammut for everything with some random LUTs and AWB, will most definitely lead to bad colors. 

Again it is fine not to like a camera but we should separate personal preferences from the usefulness of the camera. At the end, cameras are just tools and we should find ways to make the best out of them. 

 

I don't see on that page the rolling shutter for the D750, also who tested these or are these numbers just pulled off forums? And I used to own a 5Dmk iii rolling shutter is defiantly better on the D750. Also that video didn't test the rolling shutter right. He didn't do them side by side and his panning speeds are clearly different. Also yes the FF on the A7r ii is good, but look at the noise level and moire and aliasing. I didn't feel comfortable past 800 iso on any setting unless its was the apc 4k mode.   

[Axel]

4 minutes ago, Mattias Burling said:

Everyone says the Sony can produce just as nice colors. But no one seems to be doing it. 

I agree with Don Kotloss and at the same time with you. One can indeed change the 'color science' in detail, but obviously that can only be done by a somewhat scientific approach with color charts, scopes and what have you - and still implies personal taste. If you happen to know of anyone who made a decent custom profile, please link to it. What I found so far makes the colors only worse. I am particularly pissed if people tell me why, I like the colors as they are (like my friend does, who actually owns all 'my' cameras now).

2 minutes ago, TheRenaissanceMan said:

Brandon Li can do it, but it does seem awfully rare.

You don't have to use a creative style like Autumn Leaves (good compromise, at least for A7s), you can also find the right colors with SLog2 + 3, with Luts and grading skills, see this:

Now you may think, what are these idiots talking about? This is perfectly fine video. Where are the allegedly bad skintones, where are the RS artifacts or poor cadence?

The guy has managed to work around these things. And given all the effort put into this grading (who said raw was a hassle?), the skin tones, though looking appropriate at first glance, aren't good at all. There are very few nuances captured here. All people have the same SD-like color. User cantsin has pointed this out, comparing this clip with another one from the same filmmaker, but shot wit BMPCC.

 

[DayRaven]

Just now, Axel said:

IIf you happen to know of anyone who made a decent custom profile, please link to it. What I found so far makes the colors only worse

I think that this is a huge part of the problem - you can't just download a drag and drop solution to colour science

[Liam]

well... I do sort of understand the issue, but if budget is an important variable, you have to make compromises, and you have quite a few things on your list. slim pickings for low end price, professionally featured, good motion cadence, good rolling shutter, clean, 4k, small, lowlight crazy cameras, with 60p and amazing colors.. did you say full frame is important to you too? wasn't the a7rii the first camera like this with full frame 4k? that would all be great, but.. you know

[Axel]

12 minutes ago, Axel said:

If you happen to know of anyone who made a decent custom profile, please link to it.

 

3 minutes ago, DayRaven said:

I think that this is a huge part of the problem - you can't just download a drag and drop solution to colour science

Why not? We did this for XH-A1 and for EX-3, the latter having been found by a BBC engineer. Compared to which every Sony profile was really ugly. You don't need to download anything, it's just a short list of values.