Sony FDR-AX100

[Cliff Totten]

Steve, if you don't like the AX100, that's perfectly cool with me. (it's no skin off my nose)

But seriously, if you are looking for problems with the AX100, you will certainly find them,..LOTS of them, no doubt.

And,...by the same token, if you are looking for problems with ANY camera on planet Earth, you will of course find as many as you want to find. Put any camera in front of me, Panny, Canon, Sony, BlackMagic, RED or AJA and tell me to identify 100 "problems"....BELIEVE me!...I WILL find 101 problems or reasons why I don't like each and every one.

For my purposes, the AX100 is a small, handheld run and gun camera with FULL manual control that has an absolutely crazy, eye popping, wicked UHD resolution. It has a sharp power zoom lens, great sensor and fantastic processor. I can throw 3+ hour batteries on there and shoot all day long too. Even the audio pre-amps are PRISTINE and VERY "beachtech XLR friendly"

What other small handheld 4K camera is in this class for $2000? Answer = "zero", non,...nothing.

The AX100 is even a supurb HD camera with 4:2:2 XAVC onboard. Adjustable peaking and Zebras adjustable in 5 IRE increments? Seriously? That's killer! How about the 720p high speed shooting? Damn!

The GH4?, sure its a cool camera too. It's softer and (supposedly) only scans a 1:1 pixel crop from the center of it's sensor. Let's see, that's around 2 million red, 2 million blue and 4 million green pixels in Bayer pattern...the AX100 (supposedly) over samples its UHD with far more pixels to start with....prolly the actual reason why it's so ridiculously sharp too.

Y'know how we say that an image "pops" out the screen when it's sharp? Well,..the AX100 doesn't "pop",..it "explodes" out of the screen. Every single person that has seen my footage says the exact same things..."WOW!,..holy crap...woah" These are all common reactions...lol.

No 60p? who cares? I don't even watch true 60p in 1080 today!...let alone watch 60p in 4k!! The very best I can hand over to a client is 29.97 PSF inside 60i on Blu-ray today! YouTube 4K @ 60p?...forget about it, not for a LONG time.

Bottom line? The GH4 will do things the AX100 cant do,...the AX100 will do things the GH4 cant do.

So?...buy what is best for you and be happy with it!

It's funny to read camera geeks bicker back and forth.

CT ;-)

[Ken Ross]

Originally Posted by Cliff Totten

So?...buy what is best for you and be happy with it!

It's funny to read camera geeks bicker back and forth.

CT ;-)

Cliff, speaking for myself, I'll only 'bicker' when I know certain aspects of a camera's picture have been clearly mischaracterized due to sloppiness on the part of the 'reviewer' or just plain bias and hidden agendas.

I totally agree, the AX100 is not a perfect camera, far from it, but damn man, show me another camera anywhere near its price that can produce a picture anything like this. The answer, none.

[Ken Ross]

Originally Posted by Steve Mullen

Fanboys will always defend what they just bought to the bitter end. They are so motivated they will simply not see anything that might cause them to re-think their purchase. And, they will setup straw-men by claiming falsely someone has said X and Y -- which they will then argue against. They will call anybody who doesn't agree with them every name in the book. Google Cognitive Dissonance.

But, outside a forum they have no voice. And, they never will precisely because no one will hire a fanboy as they can't be trusted to be objective.

No matter how loud they scream -- in the world outside of where they post -- no one will ever hear them.

Can't say it has been fun, but it has been useful to read what folks have posted. So here is an image and if you don't see the moiré pattern on the brick -- what can I say. Time to start writing so "over and out."

And you sir are living in la la land. OBJECTIVE testing has proven you wrong every step of the way. I have no idea what your true agenda is Steve, but frankly I find it reprehensible that you try so very hard to talk people out of a camera that simply does NOT possess the failings you continue to claim it does. I have a very critical eye for video, but it's an eye that sees things that are there and doesn't see things that aren't there. Therein lies the difference.

You were so sure of yourself when you presented "evidence" of artifacts early on, only to find out later it was YOUR editing mistakes that were introducing artifacts. Please don't come here to slam equipment for which you have not properly and certainly not objectively tested. A sloppy review is no review at all.

Once again, independent testing from Slashcam puts your 'claims' in the proper light they should be put in, baseless.

I would never take your assessment on a camera at face value ever again. This is certainly not a case of owners 'defending their turf'. The feedback this camera's video has produced has been met with rave reviews by those that have no axe to grind.

Is the camera perfect? Of course not, but NOT in the ways you point out. One final word to you Steve, the picture you posted of the brick wall from my video is a FRAUD. You know it, I know it and anyone knowledgeable about video knows it. The actual video has NOTHING like that, NOTHING. A frame grab from your computer downscaled to a lower resolution? Talk about intellectual dishonesty! Enough.

[Ugo Merlini]

Originally Posted by Cliff Totten

The AX100 is even a supurb HD camera with 4:2:2 XAVC onboard. Adjustable peaking and Zebras adjustable in 5 IRE increments? Seriously? That's killer! How about the 720p high speed shooting? Damn!

Where are the 422 is the downsample from 4k to hd?

Ugo

[Darren Levine]

I'm going to request that all parties please start from zero here, Let's try and get back on to the ax100, kisses, hugs, and cookies all around.

Because i'm still trying to nail down a few consensuses on this cam, my return policy looms, and it's a particularly puzzling camera stuck between two worlds. The BMC4k was fairly easy to diagnose and determine not to keep, but this camera has so many things to like.

So let me see if i can organize some thoughts on this:

1: Articating: zero issue, whatever is there is still in league with some of the best cameras.

2: CIZ/Active zoom/stabilizer: There is a loss in FOV and a small but present loss in resolution. (and for some reason on my camera i can't even get the 18x CIZ) and while the separate digital zoom looks okish at some zoom, you can't limit it, so it goes to an absurd looking 160x. why didn't they give options?

3:It's sharp, 4k, no kidding

4: Image control: is there really only cinematone? I've likened cinematone to canon WDR, and standard to.... well i guess about as flat as you can get with this camera. Remarkable that there's no sharpness/contrast/saturation?

5:like the rx10, the fly by wire controls for focus make it unreliable for repeatable focus pulling

6: the lcd/evf are quite lovely, not top notch but very nice to work with.

7: the focus assist button should get the darwin award of placement


But seriously, i have pressed about every button to try and get the CIZ 18x to work, and yes, read the manual which says almost nothing on the matter. removed the battery several times, reset the camera back to stock, and it just won't give me that CIZ 18x.

Oh and has anyone noticed that the the loss to f4 while zooming is remarkably small? either it's a really long and smooth graduation to it, or it's not quite 2.8 or 4. it seems like less than a stop difference from full wide to tele.

[Mark Rosenzweig]

Can you clarify what you mean you cannot get CIZ 18X to work? If you invoke Active mode stabilization, you get CIZ 18X. That's it. See my baseball video posted here; clearly (as it were) I was getting 18X zoom.

Your other points seem spot on (but don't forget focus peaking and zebras and built-in ND as real plusses).

[Ken Ross]

Darren, the following would be my observations in response to your points:

1. After seeing my recent posts, you know I agree, especially when viewed on a 4K monitor!

2. This one is perplexing. I have digital zoom turned off in the menu and when Active Stabilization is turned on, I get the relatively lossless 18x zoom. It does not zoom beyond 18x as one should expect, since digital zoom is turned off. I've never turned on digital zoom, ever.

3. It's sharp on an HD monitor and nuts on a true 4K monitor. The Dell 24" 4K monitor I'm using presents a 100% color gamut and the colors are just wonderful. I'm seeing subtle hues I never saw on my HD monitor.

4. Yes, you could say that's where Sony fell down a bit on the AX100. There are no color level, contrast & sharpness controls. Of course these have always been rather crude controls to being with. Generally 3 steps up and 3 down.

However there is one, often overlooked control. When you choose WB, you are presented with an "Option" control. This allows you to shift the color in a standard yellow, green, amber or blue direction via a familiar color grid. This option is available for any of the WB presets and actually gives you greater color image control than just a color level control that some Sonys have. With that said, it would have been nice to have the standard adjustments too.

Tempering that though is what I think is one of the best AWB systems I've ever used on a video camera. The AWB seems to adjust accurately in a wider variety of settings than I've seen with almost any camera I can remember. Obviously there's always MWB should it be needed.

5. Agreed. However you can use the touch focus control on the LCD panel quite effectively to achieve similar results.

6. Agreed. I would have liked a brightness control for the VF too and not just the LCD panel.

7. Yup. Could it be that Sony engineer have 3 hands? ;)

Again Darren, just make sure Digital Zoom is turned OFF in the menu and Active Stabilization is turned ON. That 'should' give you the 18x CIZ. If not, there's some kind of weird glitch in your camera.

[Darren Levine]

Originally Posted by Ken Ross

Again Darren, just make sure Digital Zoom is turned OFF in the menu and Active Stabilization is turned ON. That 'should' give you the 18x CIZ. If not, there's some kind of weird glitch in your camera.

Believe me, i've searching for the obvious, but as you can see, it just isn't working. I recall it working once when i first tried it, then never again

[Mark Rosenzweig]

Originally Posted by Darren Levine

Believe me, i've searching for the obvious, but as you can see, it just isn't working. I recall it working once when i first tried it, then never again

No, I do not see. What are we supposed to see in that video of your lcd screen that makes you think it is not working? It zooms (Might be useful to do this when there is light and an object to focus on). Are you complaining about focus? what?
What do you mean by "not working"?

[Darren Levine]

Did you not read the prior posts? Look at the zoom bar in the video, there is no CIZ available after the optical zoom range. nothing to do with focus

[Eric Lagerlof]

Ken, you mentioned, (20 pages back or so), that you re-formatted your SDHC card to exFat. With what utility/software did you do that? Everything I've found online seems to be about formatting FROM exFat to Fat32 not the other way around. I want to do a test using a SDHC card I already own before investing in new ones for a camera I'm still trying to arrange to finance.

[Mark Rosenzweig]

Originally Posted by Darren Levine

Did you not read the prior posts? Look at the zoom bar in the video, there is no CIZ available after the optical zoom range. nothing to do with focus

There is no indicator of CIZ I get either. That does not mean you are not getting CIZ with Active mode. Instead of looking for an indicator, why don't you test how far the lens zooms when Active mode is on compared to it off? If you had complained you did not get an indicator, maybe I would have understood your problem. You video demonstrates nothing but you get no indicator ("it isn't working" is not obvious). It does not show you get no CIZ since you focused on exactly nothing.

Repeat: I do not see any indicator bar or otherwise either with Active mode engaged on myAX100, but for sure I get a longer zoom when Active is on. I shot video with it, and it made a big difference in zooming.

[Mark Rosenzweig]

Originally Posted by Eric Lagerlof

Ken, you mentioned, (20 pages back or so), that you re-formatted your SDHC card to exFat. With what utility/software did you do that? Everything I've found online seems to be about formatting FROM exFat to Fat32 not the other way around. I want to do a test using a SDHC card I already own before investing in new ones for a camera I'm still trying to arrange to finance.

Any Windows computer running 7 or 8 will format an sd card exFat. It's an option in the format command. I bet you have an Apple computer.

[Darren Levine]

Originally Posted by Mark Rosenzweig

If you had complained you did not get an indicator, maybe I would have understood your problem. You video demonstrates nothing but you get no indicator ("it isn't working" is not obvious). It does not show you get no CIZ since you focused on exactly nothing.

No need to get snooty,

yes, i've been wondering about the absence of an indicator of when it reaches the optical end, and starts the 'CIZ', being that one of this camera's closest relatives is the RX10 which does just that. after re-reading Wacharapong's last post, i see now it's entirely different.

'The CIZ is integrated throughout the entire range of the optical zoom as opposed to engaging after reaching the optical end. Thus giving a full smooth 18x equivalent zoom range without the 'speed bump' you get with a typical, separate optical/CIZ function'

That's whats missing from any documentation and hence my confusion on the matter.

Originally Posted by Wacharapong Chiowanich

- The numbers aside, what I've seen from the max zooming and engaging the Active OIS is that the sharpness DISTINCTLY deteriorates on my calibrated monitors. There was no doubt by anyone who saw the image. It was plainly softer at the tele end apart from the very noticeable CAs in contrasty scenes but that's another issue.

Wacharapong,

where you referring to the other cameras you were talking about, or the ax100 specifically?

[Troy Lamont]

Someone posted this a few pages back, but this should have it's own thread now in the Sony sub-forums. It's been out for a while now.

Chris?