DV Info Net - Short clip from tonight's MMA event...

Yes it was the stock lens. Wobbly... ok, I'm not going to try to make excuses, BUT there are several ;-) First, this is a different promotion was putting on than the one he normally does. It was also in a different venue (night club.) So there was a bunch of unknowns. To give an idea of what I dealt with, they wanted to utilize the venue's LCD screens to show the fights, so I had it setup to run a feed from the 1 camera to the DJ booth so he could send on through their distribution setup... I talked to the DJ beforehand and he said, "yeah dawg, its standard definition with composite input." ok... fine. Well I get there and its COAXIAL! There was a bunch of line noise on all but 1 TV and well, it wasn't my fault, but who will the crowd blame??? Me, but whatever. I had a DVD player playing the promotion's logo and used a remote controlled A/B switching device to switch from my camera to the player so they wouldn't see me running into the cage to get the introductions and winner announcements. SO, with that said, right before the first round, I had to quickly plug the BNC cable into the RCA adapter after filming the intros inside the cage. The referees did NOT wait a second hardly after the cage door was closed before starting the fight so what you saw was me fumbling in plugging in the cable.

What you also didn't see that was a result of constant wobble was where I was standing. Normally, I'm on a small plaftorm attached to the cage. A camera perch if you will. BUT the ceiling was about 20 inches from the top of the cage and if I used the perch, my shoulders would have been up past the ceiling. So, right beside the cage door and cage, there was a standing bar that surrounds the normally a dance floor. It was about 8" wide and had supports every 8 feet. It sagged and was not stable at all, but I hate filming through the fence so I had the guys that built the ramp from the floor to the cage for them to enter to brace it more. Well it didn't sag, but man was it still wobbly. So every drunk that felt the urge to do whatever they did on that standing bartop transferred energy though to me. OH! Did I mention to get over the cage I put my 2 pelican cases on there and used a ratchet strap to secure it and I stood on the pelicans and bartop? Yeah, I should have taken a picture of that setup.

Another nightmare issue was lighting. The promoter said, "Yeah man, they have bright club style lights, all will be good." When I asked him about lighting. I walked in and there was about 8x 50 watt can lights shining on one side of the cage. I walked in and freaked out. So I went back to the office and got the 2 softbox lights.. one had a 500 watt bulb and the other a 1000 watt bulb.Still wasn't ideal, BUT it was better than I walked into. I know the photographer so I messaged him while in transit and told him and he said he just got there and told me to bring a saw and we cut a hole in the roof for moon light... HA!

Anyways, at the first, fumbling with the cable hasty, the cage being naturally shaky, my "stand" was more shaky than the cage and given all of that, the wobble you saw was not as severe because I did infact use the Active Image Stabilization.

I will say that the next event I do for him will be at his regular venue and I'll be on a solid platform at the entrance again. I'm sure the footage will be rock solid compared to this. Now with that said, this clip looks like network compared to 90% of the amateur footage I get on a regular basis with the TV Show's submissions.......

I was happy with how the camera dealt with the lighting and such. I wish I lifted the black level a point or two in the PP, but looks good on the timeline and scopes. I'm going to check out that post you made talking about the FS100 PP to the EA50. That may help me get THE PP I'm looking for......... When playing around with some of those I've found, several I immediately scrapped saying "why did they want this look?" But its probably in fact having to do with the slight differences in the 2 cameras.

Sorry for the "book" but I wanted to explain the wobble. Oh, I will say that I've filmed SEVERAL MMA events with the A1 and I know without a doubt that the A1 would have puked itself shooting last night's event. EA50 did well.