Any NX3D1 user reports?

[Jim Michael]

Would like to hear from anyone using this camera. How does the footage look? What are you using it for? Is it suitable to the task you purchased it for? Mainly interested for some unique news footage for a project I'm working on. I don't see many comments out there from users, just a couple of reviews when it first came out.

[Jim Michael]

Best hands-on report I was able to find Animal Kingdom: Shooting in 3D on SafariBuck McNeely, Buck McNeely, Buck McNeely

[David M. Cole]

I've been shooting quite a bit with the NX3D1, both terrestrially and underwater. These are the bullets of my experience:

1. Wide-angle is limiting underwater and top-side, too. 34mm is not wide enough for a lot of u/w composition. Water is a terrible filter and the further back you have to get to capture the scene, the more crud is between the camera and the scene. I have a bias towards shooting wide in 3D and 34mm isn't' ideal.

2. Low-light is BAD. This camera is light-hungry. Starve it and things get noisy very quickly. Mildly under light a scene and the footage starts to look like it was shot on a Flip cam. (On the other hand, there is no cure for over-exposing - and it's EASY to blow out the exposure too).

3. Need manual white balance. This is sorely missing for underwater.

4. Bitrate and color depth are limiting. 28Mbps MVC (3D) @ 4.2.0 is terribly lacking for professional acquisition. Can you get away with it? Sure, but you have to remember that motion fidelity (especially fast motion) will be BAD and there is very little latitude for post color correction. Low-fidility motion coding is a particular problem for objects in negative parallax - they can be difficult for viewers to fuse.

-- HOWEVER --

1 - I.A. is PERFECT for underwater. Most composition happens within 6 feet of the camera - and almost all within 10 feet. This is the first camcorder that has a narrow enough I.A. (31mm) to work well underwater.

2. Form-factor is awesome. This little guy can go anywhere.

3. Zoom and image stabilization rock. I'm not familiar with other integrated 3D lens systems on camcorders, but Sony nailed it on this camera. I didn't expect to be able to zoom while rolling, but it works like a charm.

So - the NX3D1 might be (to rip Churchill) the worst 3D camcorder on the market, except for every other 3D camcorder.

[Prech Marton]

The zoom lever is horrible.
No Auto parallax adjust, or just i don't found.
Low light is really terrible, is TD1 better?
No 50i and 60i on the same card.
Very few manual adjust when take 3D.

Display is great.
96GB internal mem is a lot :)
Professional look.

[Jim Michael]

Thank you both for your comments on the camera. It's good to have feedback from folks who have had a chance to really use it. David, I remember going on some dive trips down your way when I lived in North Palm. Mostly drift diving but I recall a reef in shallow water in front of the Palm Beach Hilton that had a lot of activity.

[David M. Cole]

>> some dive trips down your way when I lived in North Palm <<

We're VERY lucky in S. FL. LOTS of great recreational beach dives.... low stress, low cost. Don't you miss it??

I've spent the last 2 summers in the Caribbean, however, filming sharks and dolphins. Have used a Side-by-side rig, GoPros, the Sony TD-10 and now 3 of the NX3D1s. Nothing works great... but... the NX3D1 is as close as I've come. Maybe we'll get a Scarlet beamsplitter in a housing before the end of this season. The GoPros remain VERY handy for putting on a pole and sticking into situations that are a bit TOO sharky.

[Neil Richards]

Dave, have you looked at the Pannie Z10000 for underwater use? IA is a bit wider and about 30mm wide angle but has a 3D macro mode for use as close as a foot and a half and good low light performance too.

I'm not an underwater guy but I trialled it for 4 days (on land) recently and was very impressed, it might have a good combination of features for you.

Neil

[David M. Cole]

>> Dave, have you looked at the Pannie Z10000 for underwater use

Haven't tried. I've been hoping to get a sense of how it stacks up to the Sony. It seems as though it has better manual controls in 3D mode. I'd really like to try them both, side-by-side in low light. Perhaps I'll get a chance. Physically, it's not as easy to house as the Sony, with the handle on top.

Did you happen to shoot much in low light? Any observations?

[Neil Richards]

Yeah, the handle isn't detachable it's got the LCD in it. Don't know what options there are for underwater housings.

It's got a lot better low light performance than the 3DA1, I did some shots from afternoon through dusk into night time and went all the way up through the gain range (goes to +30dB...) and down to 1/25 shutter. It seemed to hold up well and although obviously it did get grainy higher up the blacks seemed to look pretty good for quite a long time. Right at the top end though it got muzzy as expected. I need to be a bit more scientific with my testing next time I get hold of one.

The lens is F1.5 to 2.7 in 3D, 32-320 equiv. which feels pretty good after the 5-6x on the 3DA1 :)

Sorry I can't post any footage yet, I've only watched straight out of the camera onto a big plasma so far as I don't have a flow yet to edit on a Mac but Sony Vegas and Edius 6 can handle it in Windows.

Neil

[Jim Michael]

I don't know who it was that mentioned that AVS forum, but there is a lot of activity there re 3-D technology, so thanks for mentioning it. I was starting to think it was kind of odd not much discussion of these cameras anywhere.

[David M. Cole]

Originally Posted by Neil Richards

...Sorry I can't post any footage yet,

Do you think you might be able to post some straight MVC footage out of the camera? A low-light sample would be GREAT! If you PM me, I'll provide an FTP site to post it to, if you don't have one at your disposal.