Sony SR11 With WA & Rode Mic
 

Here's a photo of my SR11 with a Canon wide angle lens and Rode stereo mic. I'll be testing this setup this weekend as an unmanned camera at a wedding.

Great!

i'm waiting for your test, since i'm interested to both optionals!

ciao!

Tony - What WA lens is that?

It's the Canon WD-H43. It's got a 43mm thread so I'm using a 37-43mm step-up ring so I can use it on the SR11.

I tested the camera as an unmanned camera at a wedding on Saturday and it worked really well. The bride was late so our other 2 unmanned cameras (Sony HC3s) ran out of tape towards the end of the ceremony but the SR11 still had 5 hours recording time to go! Ultimately we will be replacing the HC3s with a couple more SR11s.

Tony, I also use HC3's unmanned for weddings, and want to change them. How do you find the sr12 (well 11 but they are virtually identical) compared to the HC3?

Is the image quality any better?

What about low light comparisons?

Does it shoot progressive or is it interlaced only?

Thanks
Steve

Steve,

The SR11/12 is a HUGE leap over the HC3, I'd call it night and day. As much as I liked the little camera (its's still one of the cooler looking cameras IMO, and it wasn't BAD, unless you compare it to later cams), I abandoned the HC3 as I saw too much noise/macroblocking in low light and it just didn't have good enough picture quality for my tastes when compared to the HC1 and HC7. The HC3 sensor was a lower res sensor to start with, so it has a bit of a disadvantage.

My testing with the SR11 is showing it to be cleaner and less noisy in tough lighting conditions than the HDV cams. In good light the latitude is better as well, but you've got to be REALLY anal to see the differences. I tested CX7 and SR11 side by side - after blind A/B testing I always chose the SR11, and the CX7 beat the HC7 in low light performance...

I believe the cam is only shooting 1080i, no "p"... I just render 24P in post, looks fine so far, need to run some tests at rendering a file for BluRay with various settings, but I just finished a project and 24P 720x480 (SD) looks incredibly good with the SR11, no post corrections needed for color and contrast, which is amazing to me.

ONLY downside I'm seeing is that you should simply turn off the digital zoom on the SR11 (saturation goes "flat" when you hit the digital range in low light, 99% sure it has to do with the digital processing), but the 12x is probably adequate in most situations.

Short answer is, grab one, you'll like it!

Thanks Dave. Appreciated.

Tony,
What rode mic did you buy exactly? and its price?
what about its behaviour? is that good?

thanks ciao!

It's the Rode Stereo VideoMic, I'm still evaluating it's performance compared to the much smaller and cheaper Sony active interface stereo mic. I'm not sure the Rode mic is worth the extra expence and I keep forgetting to turn it on which wouldn't happen with the Sony mic.

Tony, it would be nice to hear your conclusion about "the Röde vs Sony mics", when your done evaluating.

Cheers

Hans

Gosh, that's a nice setup.

Which step up ring did you use?

I have both the Sony and Canon wide angle lenses, and I bet the Canon resolves a little more detail. The Canon lens just looks so crystal clear, so invisible. They really make some impressive glass, given the price.

[QUOTE=Robert Smith;896205]Which step up ring did you use?QUOTE]

I got it from a UK company called Keene Electronics...