Nex-7 pdf -- wow!

[Steve Mullen]

Note from Admin: attached here directly as a downloadable PDF.

[John Vincent]

Steve - you're not actually going to believe a Sony generated description of one of their NEX cameras, are you?

;)

[John Jay]

does it overheat after page 30?

[David Heath]

Originally Posted by John Vincent

Steve - you're not actually going to believe a Sony generated description of one of their NEX cameras, are you?

;)

Good to see somebody else doesn't take manufacturers claims too lierally..... :)

I especially noticed the following:

Moreover, image quality is outstanding even at this accelerated speed: the beautiful 1920 x 1080 pixel movie footage is the same resolution as HDTV broadcasts.

Now whilst many, many claims are made of cameras making "1920x1080 RECORDINGS", you don't often see 1920x1080 RESOLUTION claimed. Basically, because for practical reasons it's very difficult to do, and most video from still chips is much lower than 1920x1080 - even if a 1920x1080 recording.

I was all set to think that Sony were guilty of taking marketing hype too far .... then had a closer look at the specs. Most interesting is that the sensor specs for stills mode are 6000x4000 in 3:2 aspect, and 6000x3376 in 16:9 aspect.

I strongly suspect that in video mode, the 16:9 image will be slightly cropped compared to 16:9 in stills mode by about 4%, and that's one of the first tests I'd like to do if I got my hands on the camera. What I'm suspecting is that in video mode the used area of the sensor is actually 5760x3240 - which is 3x1920 horizontally and 3x1080 vertically. If this is true, it makes for a very straightforward readout directly to 1920x1080, and will indeed give true 1920x1080 resolution. And quite likely inherently better aliasing than most stills sensors used for video.

It would effectively be a very similar mechanism that Canon are describing using with the C300 - only here with 3x3 photosite blocks instead of 2x2 as with the C300. (It's more difficult with 3x3 than 2x2, but....)

Anybody care to compare still v video angles of view in 16:9 mode?

[Bill Koehler]

Originally Posted by John Jay

does it overheat after page 30?

It would appear his hands are smoking...


To be fair though, it is more fun to be enthusiastic than pessimistic.
In many ways it appears to have more features/flexibility than the VG20.
The VG20 wins only on audio and form factor.

The review of it on dpreview.com is very positive.

But at this point in time, for me at least, any possibility of me actually buying something will wait until after CES in January, maybe even NAB in April. But it certainly does look like the Panasonic DMC-GH2 just got some real competition.

[Dave Blackhurst]

Looks pretty nice, as long as it doesn't overheat badly, which supposedly Sony has gotten under better control with this generation. Level of control is impressive, though somehow I'd like a touch screen as I've grown used to having one <wink>.

And I'd jump on a NEX6 (16Mpixel sensor in the 7 body), theres some noise in the stills from the 7, where the 5n looks nearly pristine). Although I'd still buy the 7 for the stills alone, the video samples looked solid, and now I'm thinking on what lenses I'd need to add to fill out the package...

I suspect as the E mount catches on, there are going to be a LOT more lenses available "native", and between those and adapted lenses, with the peaking and focus assist abilities, there will be a lot of people buying into these cameras/system.

It's really too bad that they stripped out the "still" side in the VG20, one can only hope they put it back in in a firmware revision, otherwise the NEX5n and NEX7 are far more versatile imaging devices and at far more tempting price points...

[Chris Barcellos]

Well, I believe it when I see it. Sony advertized a lot of similar features in the VG20, thinks like contrast, saturation and sharpness controls, without actully including in the machine..

And with a larger pixel count in the chip, are you increasing the potential for aliasing again.

[Bill Bruner]

Originally Posted by Dave Blackhurst

...too bad that they stripped out the "still" side in the VG20...

Dave - I'm confused. What do you mean by "stripped out"? I took a few 16MP JPEG stills with the VG20 at the beach last week and they were pretty darned good (see my blog post here).

The VG20 is certainly not the best still camera in the world (no flash, and the viewfinder sucks compared to Sony's new OLED viewfinders) - but it's light years ahead of any other interchangeable lens camcorder - and it's a good enough video/still camera for people who want full manual control of in-camera audio, no time limit on their clips, and don't want to drag two cameras around.

Cheers,

Bill
Hybrid Camera Revolution

[David Heath]

Originally Posted by Chris Barcellos

And with a larger pixel count in the chip, are you increasing the potential for aliasing again.

Not neccessarily - see the points I made above. Key is if the chip dimensions are an exact multiple of 1920x1080 it can lead to simple readout WITHOUT the compromises that simple readout normally brings on most stills chips.

There are fundamentally two ways to readout. One is to read every pixel, deBayer to a very high resolution image, then downconvert to 1080. Starting from a 20megapixel chip this is basically not realistic and would require large power anyway.

Secondly is to read out R,G,B values directly, and frequently ignore (pixel-skip) many of them. How this is done will affect aliasing. If the chip geometry is suitable, the process works better, and the C300 is especially suited - dimensions are exactly twice 1920x1080. Not so good for the stills aspect - it's "only" an 8 megapixel camera - but the next best is to go to the next multiple, or three times 1920x1080. And my hunch is that this is exactly what the Nex-7 is doing in video mode.

It's when we get in the zone halfway between 8 and 20 megapixel that compromises most have to be made - exactly the case with most stills sensors.

[Steve Mullen]

Originally Posted by Bill Koehler

The VG20 wins only on audio ...

They have the same 3.5mm stereo audio input.

Don't know about a headphone jack.

[Dave Blackhurst]

Originally Posted by Bill Bruner

Dave - I'm confused. What do you mean by "stripped out"? I took a few 16MP JPEG stills with the VG20 at the beach last week and they were pretty darned good (see my blog post here).

The VG20 is certainly not the best still camera in the world (no flash, and the viewfinder sucks compared to Sony's new OLED viewfinders) - but it's light years ahead of any other interchangeable lens camcorder - and it's a good enough video/still camera for people who want full manual control of in-camera audio, no time limit on their clips, and don't want to drag two cameras around.

Cheers,

Bill
Hybrid Camera Revolution

IIRC, the VG20 has very few of the advanced photograpic oriented features of the NEX5n/7... yes it takes stills, and I'd expect rather good ones, you CAN mount an HVL-F series flash on the Sony shoe I believe... but it's primarily a VIDEO camera, with advantages to the built in audio and unlimited clips.

Otherwise, the NEX7, and to a lesser degree the NEX5n provide some very compelling bang/$ ratios. For many purposes, they are a superior "single camera" to "drag... around". Smaller, lighter, less attention draw, and pretty capable of shooting video up to 29 minutes in length (I'm on tripod if shooting that long, and a second camera in tow is the least of my concerns...).

Since I've been fiddling with "dual use" cameras for a while now, I'm used to the compromises for the secondary function - the NEX5n and NEX7 aren't "perfect", but are pretty close given the relatively complete feature set available when you hit the red button,

Perhaps stripped down would have been better phrasing... but where I see the NEX5n/7 as pretty fully featured STILL cameras that allow access to almost the same feature set when in video mode... the ORIGINAL specs for the VG20 indicated that it would be similar, with video the primary emphasis... then somewhere along the way all the advanced stuff of the still side seems to have been replaced with a simplified, dumbed down interface, as though "video dudes" wouldn't be able to deal with all those extra features/settings.

[Bill Koehler]

Originally Posted by Steve Mullen

They have the same 3.5mm stereo audio input.

Don't know about a headphone jack.

All reports I've seen so far indicate the NEX-VG10/20 has a very good built-in mic.
I'm betting it's a lot better than any of the others in the NEX 3/5/7 line.

And there is the issue of the headphone jack.

[Robert Young]

Noticed that SonyStyle is now taking orders for the NEX 7, but estimated ship date is not until April 2012.