Sony NEX-VG10 AVCHD E-Mount Lens Camcorder

[Dave Blackhurst]

and there are already adapters popping up for other lenses to be hooked onto that E mounting - should be interesting

[Joel Peregrine]

Hi Ethan,

Originally Posted by Ethan Cooper

11 lux?? Surely that can't be right.

The lux and the frame rate were the first things I looked at too. Then I went to see if there were e-mount to eos adapters and there are, so fast lenses would lower the lux rating by 2.5 stops, but its still 60i. (You'd need two adapters to use manual focus lens unless its a third party lens with a eos mount like a Samyang, Tokina or Tamron.) I tend to think their marketing strategy is to get first adopters on the consumer version, then those same first adopters will trade up to the prosumer version that will surely come out within the next 3-4 months.

[Dave Blackhurst]

Since I haven't seen this link posted so far, thought I'd direct ya'll to the Vimeo HD promo piece for this camera

Beautiful Bali captured with the Sony NEX-VG10 Handycam camcorder on Vimeo

Looks pretty nice, even in what appears to be less than idea light, and I don't know why you wouldn't be able to convert to 24p or 30p in post, in fact I'm seeing some indication that the 60i is a wrapper and you really have "doubled" 30p... not sure exactly what that's all about.

The one question I'm curious about is whether this thing can do "dual shot" like the other Sony consumer cams, where they can sneak off stills while shooting uninteruppted video... I think it's safe to say the NEX sensor is getting good results for stills, and so this camera definitely should be able to do double duty better than any previous video camera.

[Monday Isa]

Originally Posted by Dave Blackhurst

The one question I'm curious about is whether this thing can do "dual shot" like the other Sony consumer cams, where they can sneak off stills while shooting uninteruppted video... I think it's safe to say the NEX sensor is getting good results for stills, and so this camera definitely should be able to do double duty better than any previous video camera.

This question is the same one I've been wondering about all day. Hope we can get a answer soon. I would imagine that it wouldn't interrupt it as the canon dslr mirrors have to flip to take the picture and since this cam has no mirror no interruption is needed. I hope we get a answer prior to release.

[Shaun Roemich]

Originally Posted by Evan C. King

So we only get ISO in Still mode and we have to go back to using arbitrary gain numbers to change sensitivity in video mode? No thanks.

A niggle but there is nothing arbitrary about gain as pertains to video. A sensor has an inherent sensitivity (regardless of whether you adjust gain using ISO or decibels) and anything higher than it's native sensitivity adds gain.

[Shaun Roemich]

Another niggle: the Minimum Illumination spec, in my humble opinion, needs to go away. It references NOTHING. Old school sensitivity ratings, like those found on broadcast cameras that state f-stop at a given luminance are FAR more accurate and useful for comparing cameras.

f13 @ 2000lux for example.

The minimum illumination spec "references" the least amount of light that produces a "useable" image. VERY open to interpretation.

Interesting development on the camera though. Once they start shipping it will be interesting to see how people use it, to it's strengths AND against it's weaknesses.

[Bill Koehler]

Well, that lasted a day.

A not so random thought: There have been a number of discussions about "who will build the Pentax K1000 or Digital Bolex of video cameras". Something well built, relatively inexpensive, manual operation with few frills type camera.

I've even participated in a discussion here: http://www.dvinfo.net/forum/area-51/...o-cameras.html

It occurred to me that we're looking at that camera. Thoughts?

[Tony Tibbetts]

No 24p? Who do they think they are making this for? What Market? Maybe I'm wrong, maybe I'm missing something. I'm sure somebody will point out some sort of niche market for this, but seriously, does this appeal to anybody here?

[Dave Blackhurst]

Could be... I myself suspect we are looking at a fundamental change in the market - the consumer is probably more and more served by what their cell phone can do, or maybe the cheap Flip type cams...

For a more "serious" shooter, I think we may see a collection of lenses, bodies for various purposes, adapters and related accessories for various tasks. Sort of a modular camera system, if you will.

Minimum illumination may be way off with this camera, as the lens will make a huge difference, and depending on the gain in video mode (which you won't see in still mode), there may be a lot of variability.

On the dual mode, I think that since there's only one media slot, and no internal recording media, it may be too much to hope for being able to shoot a still while shooting video - at the very least the resolution would have to come down some on one or the other - on the CX550V when recording 24mbps, you can't shoot stills at all, it's locked out unless you drop to 17mbps.

I really wish there were a way to get hands on one of these and see what it really does and doesn't have, the suspense is killin' me! And there are other announcements coming from the still camera side of the equation still to come before too long... Sony lab rats have apparently been very busy with new video toys.

[Shaun Roemich]

Niche market??? Broadcast. As a B-cam. Or A-cam on lesser channels/programs.

[Dave Blackhurst]

Maybe I'm missing something, but I render out to 24p in post... I really would rather have more data at the intake side of the equation, more to work with downstream. Now 60p WOULD be rather nice...

I think the more interesting question is why a modern camera would need a format dictated by technology choices nearly a century old... I no longer have a floppy on my computer after all, and all my data isn't crammed onto a 30Mb hard disk...

I understand there's a "cachet" to trying to mimic "film", but there's a lot more to it than one simple camera spec! In case no one noticed, DoF on this camera looks pretty good, and IMO THAT probably speaks "film" to the average viewer more than 24p...

Oh, and if the low light is acceptable, at this price, I'll be on it for an SLR replacement that does good video without artifacts (presuming it's as clean as it looks image wise), and good stills (or one could always pick up a NEX5 or NEX7 or whatever for dedicated still work).

[Wacharapong Chiowanich]

Now, I think we have to wait for the raw .mts footage coming out of the production camera and put it through some NLEs to see if it's truly interlaced or progressive segmented frames. If it's actually PsFs in either 60i or 50i wrap, this will be the "in" camera for the cinema look crowd. Unfortunately for some casual users, this also means the videos played back on their large screen LCDs or plasmas will be compromised by the halving of the input's temporal resolution. Either way, you win some, you lose some.

[John Wiley]

I'd like to know more about the audio capabilites. I read elsewhere that it only has AGC with no manual levels. I don't know the source of this information but if correct, it will be a serious disadvantage - because it means that other than the form factor it is actually a step backwards from the GH1/7d which offer 24p & 60p as well as having more lenses and adaptors available.

The other important thing I can't wait to see a review of is the aliasing/moire - it was reported to be very bad on the NEX3/5 which have the same sensor, so lets hope they've improved it for this camera.

[Daniel Browning]

Originally Posted by Dave Blackhurst

On that "lux" issue, reviewing the specs page on sonystyle I noticed that the rating is with the stock 18-200 lens, which is pretty slow by any measure (f3.5-6.3, I've got the "A" version of this lens, and yep, it's not great in low light).

I'm not sure if I agree with the emphasis here. It's true that f/3.5-6.3 seems like it would be very slow and not great in low light if you look only at the f-number in isolation. But that would be a mistake because low light performance does not depend on the intensity of light, but on the total amount of light falling on the sensor. The total is a combination of intensity and area. A high intensity over a small area is the same amount of light as a low intensity over a large area.

For example, 1/4" and 1/3" video cameras are often 2-3 stops faster than this one, let's say f/1.6-2.8. Going from f/2 to f/5.6 is three stops, which means the intensity of light is *eight* times lower. That's a huge difference. But the sensor is *twenty* times larger. So there is actually more than twice as much light falling on it. We should also consider that a typical 1/3" in this price range will have *three* sensors, which means that a single-sensor camera would have to get over a stop more light just to break even.

Originally Posted by Shaun Roemich

...there is nothing arbitrary about gain as pertains to video.

Agreed. It is ISO, not gain, that is arbitrary. The official ISO sensitivity spec is so loose that manufacturers can do anything they want with the gain, image processing, etc. and then call it whatever ISO they feel like and still be fully within spec. That's why ISO 80 on one camera gives you the exact same highlight headroom as ISO 250 on another. The spec is not very useful, and in fact I think it misleads operators into thinking there is going to be some sort of consistency from camera to camera (there isn't).

Personally, I think it would be a lot more clear if still camera manufacturers stopped calling it "ISO" (which implies that there is some sort of standardization when there in fact is not) and just call it "gain" like the video manufacturers (they are the exact same thing in reality anyway). At least until such time as they do start using some sort of useful standard, such as raw saturation based ISO rating (itself a small subset of the possible methods of ISO sensitivity standardization).

[Brian Drysdale]

Perhaps gain could be considered as an amplification of the sensor signal before recording, whereas an increasing the ISO could be some thing that is applied in post to the recorded RAW as per the RED.

I suppose calling it a higher ISO, rather than gain is less confusing to stills photographers and it looks more impressive for marketing..