New Sony AX-53 Testing

[Paul Newman]

Hi Owners

Is anyone concerned about the optical block "looseness" when the camera is off - I'm sure it is supposed to be wobbly, but I wondered if rough treatment in handling, say in a bag or on a plane might be a problem?

There's nothing in the data/handbook about this, is it more prone to damage?


Paul :-)

[Noa Put]

As far as I know my cx730 has the same stabilization and it is not affected by rough handling during transport when not in use.

[Ron Evans]

Originally Posted by Paul Newman

Hey Ron,



In Edius, I find the HD XAVC-S sharper on an HD timeline than the down sampled 4K ( by Edius I mean) I must be missing something!

Paul :-)

What system settings do you have set up. Make sure Lanczos 3 is set in layouter. I use my AX1 60P UHD on a HD timelline but make sure Laczos 3 is set in the layouter. How are you viewing this ? On your monitor from a Spark ? If you output a HQX file does it look different now ? If I want to downscale a whole file I would use TMPGenc. I usually work in HD then export a HQX file and downscale in TMPGenc for DVD etc. Layouter works fine to rescale a UHD clip on a mixed timeline of HD clips but system export of a UHD timeline to HD does not work as well as exporting HQX and getting TMPGenc to rescale, with Lanczos 3 of course.

Ron Evans

[Dave Blackhurst]

@Paul --
I'm sure that for someone unfamiliar with the BOSS gimballed optical block, the knocking around internally is a bit freaky.... but it is a design Sony has been using for a number of years now, and I haven't heard or seen any indications of failed units out there (no "as-is" activity on ebay for instance). IOW, I don't think it's something you need to be worried about.

You can feel the active stabilization kick in as the camera fires up, mine "twitches" a bit on startup... What happens when the camera powers off is that there are no longer motors and gyros stabilizing the BOSS optical block, so it's then free to just free float on the bearings. I'd suspect that short of putting the camera in one of those paint shaker things, you'd be hard pressed to cause any damage in "normal" handling and transport.

[Paul Newman]

Hi Ron,

Still investigating this, output is via BM Extreme card, also tested with a Spark - I've not come to a conclusion yet about how the downscale compares with an HD in camera "downscale" I'm using Lanczos 3 - I'll test some HQX too.

Dave, OK on that, I'm not a BOSS experienced user - but glad of the assurance from someone with more hours under the belt, thanks

Does anyone have the XLR K2M and if so can you confirm that the AGC (audio) is absent ie. switched off when this adapter is used as the manual is slightly ambiguous about this.

Paul :-)

[Anthony McErlean]

I read this customers review on the AX-53 4K recording in Amazon UK.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/product-rev...&sortBy=recent

The buyer writes " But in 4K (3840x2160), it will only allow you to record movies in 24/25 Frames per sec. That means, there is horrible flickering and jerking even with the slightest camera move"

I was really interested in ordering the AX-53 but not so sure now.

[Noa Put]

That happens at high shutterspeeds and when there is very fine detail in the image, the ax100 has this too which is because the image is so detailed, probably also because of over-sharpening incamera to enhance the sense of (false) detail. If you shoot at a proper shutterspeed, 1/50th in this case when the framerate is 25p, you will not notice that flickering in fine detail. The "jerking" he is mentioning can also be caused by a too fast pan caused by shooting at 25 frames per second.

Also 25p at 4K is a standard with most camera's today, only a few and recently released higher end camera's can do 50p at 4K.

[Ron Evans]

Originally Posted by Anthony McErlean

I read this customers review on the AX-53 4K recording in Amazon UK.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/product-rev...&sortBy=recent

The buyer writes " But in 4K (3840x2160), it will only allow you to record movies in 24/25 Frames per sec. That means, there is horrible flickering and jerking even with the slightest camera move"

I was really interested in ordering the AX-53 but not so sure now.

That is true for all the lower cost cameras even the Sony FS5. The processing and recording for 50/60P requires more power and ends up needing a fan, like my FDR-AX1. As Noa has mentioned the shutter speed and shooting in a film style camera movement is needed for slow frame rates.

I have an AX53 and it is very nice but my purpose was to replace my CX700 and NX30U with a newer sensor. I do not like the slow frame rates for the things I shoot so will never use the UHD on the camera. Also have an AX1000 and will not use the UHD on that either. But they are both lovely HD cameras.

If you want smooth 50/60P motion in UHD your choices are limited at the moment. FDR-AX1, PXW-Z100, HCX1000, DVX200 and then to the more expensive models like the FS7. They start to double in price very rapidly !! I will look forward to the Panasonic AG-UX180 after IBC.

Ron Evans

[Anthony McErlean]

Thank you (again) Noa, well, that puts a different slant on it.

Thanks for your advice.

[Anthony McErlean]

Originally Posted by Ron Evans

That is true for all the lower cost cameras even the Sony FS5. ... If you want smooth 50/60P motion in UHD your choices are limited at the moment. FDR-AX1, PXW-Z100, HCX100, DVX200 and then to the more expensive models like the FS7. They start to double in price very rapidly !! I will look forward to the Panasonic AG-UX180 after IBC.

Ron Evans

Thank you Ron for your advice too. I was thinking of buying this camera for my weddings just to give me a few extra clips.
Although I have twoTM900s they are getting a bit dated and something like this would be a great addition.

[Dave Blackhurst]

Be careful reading random internet reviews... "bob" is clearly a soccer mom level shooter...

There are 24p and 30p modes(he also references 25p, I presume a UK/EU/PAL mode option, don't know if EU cams have 30p,, but I would think the option is there?) - either he had the wrong memory card (limiting the available modes), or didn't know how to set up the camera, or a bit of both... with extra helpings of the latter! User malfunctions are the frequent source of poor reviews.

Flickering and jerking as already noted are a result of letting the camera run auto in high shutter speeds, the effect can be pretty horrible, and bit many reviewers in the butt when the AX100 came out.. At first I thought my AX100 was defective, until I started to run manual shutter speeds, which brought the shimmer and judder under acceptable control... and made it a favorite cam, even if it doesn't shoot 60p (and yes, it would be NICE, but is a technical limit I don't find THAT insurmountable).

4K cameras require a little bit of actual knowledge of how cameras work to get the best results, and can go horribly wrong if you just go "auto"....


The other factor is that one needs a 4K capable processing and display chain... my primary laptop with a fairly up to date 5th gen i5 stumbles quite a bit on 4K, both online (YouTube) and local files, and it's fast with an SSD and decent overall specs.... 60p HD is no problem...

I have another 4th gen i7 gaming machine for serious 4K work... I'm still trying to figure out where the threshold is for "minimum" specs on a machine, but 4K requires a fairly beefy configuration, and if you don't have it, you'll be dealing with some "jerking" and stuttering.

I'm still experimenting with the AX53 a bit, and trying to figure out why it seems to go soft at wide, and then sharpen up as it zooms in. The BOSS stabilization is definitely solid, and is an advantage over the AX100 and RX10M2, but both those cams are producing a sharper image (as expected, sensor size matters...). The question I'm asking myself is how close is close enough - I'm getting some shots that are very decent 4K, others seem a bit soft, but not "bad". Way better than the AX33, but the AX100 set a pretty high bar.

[Noa Put]

Is it even possible to lock the shutter at 1/50 while assigning iris adjustment to the lensring? With my cx730 i can only control one setting trough that front dial, all the rest is handled automatically by the camera.

[Ron Evans]

Yes it is possible to fix shutter and control the effective exposure . However this is only true if you use AE shift. The camera will decide what values of iris and gain to use. These cameras always have control of gain but you can control depth of field with iris (pretty much everything is in focus with a small sensor anyway and loose control of gain and shutter speed ) or shutter speed (and loose control of iris and gain ). If you use the " exposure " control on the camera you loose control of all of them as the camera will decide what values to use, but you can fix what the image looks like at that time and the camera will not change. I personally always use shutter speed and use AE shift to control how bright or dark the image appears. The camera will then keep this relative image brightness by changing iris and gain ( in fact looking at the data code it changes gain most of the time). I also set AGC limit and it will work with this too in AE shift. All my stuff is indoors so I want all the light I can get so set shutter to 1/60 on all the cameras so that motion blur is the same on all of them.

In this regard the AX53 is just like my CX700, NX30U, XR500. The AX100 does have full manual control but will also work just like the other Sony's if set that way.

Ron Evans

[Pat Reddy]

Originally Posted by Noa Put

That happens at high shutterspeeds and when there is very fine detail in the image, the ax100 has this too which is because the image is so detailed, probably also because of over-sharpening incamera to enhance the sense of (false) detail. If you shoot at a proper shutterspeed, 1/50th in this case when the framerate is 25p, you will not notice that flickering in fine detail. The "jerking" he is mentioning can also be caused by a too fast pan caused by shooting at 25 frames per second.

Also 25p at 4K is a standard with most camera's today, only a few and recently released higher end camera's can do 50p at 4K.

Hi Noa and everyone,

It's been my experience that this flickering on the AX100, especially with high detail scenes, greatly diminishes if you use manual focus. This makes me wonder if the flickering is due, in part, to rapid pulsing of the autofocus.

Pat

[Noa Put]

Could be that more then one factor comes into play, like very small auto focus adjustments, not sure if it is the case but I feel there is also incamera sharpening going on that also contributes to the problem.