New lens
 

Has anyone tried the new 20x lens that comes with the JVC 890 camera on a JVC 790 camera I have the opportunity to purchase one but don't know if it will work properly. any help would be greatly appreciated

Re: New lens
 

Can't speak directly for the HM700, but I shouldn't think you'd have a problem. I've just recieved an HM850 and swapped the lens with the stock lens from an HD200.
Both lenses seem to work ok on either camera. (There may well be specific functions new to the 850 that don't translate, but I haven't found any so far.) So very unlikely the 700 series would be any different.
(Not loving the fujinon 20x so far though. Servo hum when you zoom fast; *everything* servo controlled; no macro and the *stupid* (grumble grumble) servo-driven "endless" focus of auto-focus cameras. (Not to mention the *odd* process for setting back-focus.)
OTOH the picture does feel cleaner!)

Re: New lens
 

John, my station uses HM790's, and we have several HM890's hidden somewhere in the building with the 20x lenses. If I can locate one, I will pop the 20x on the HM790 to confirm what functions work on it, and what functions do not.

Paul

Re: New lens
 

Thank you Paul and Rob for your responses was just wondering what the differences were sense the two lens are about the same price. the person trying to sell it preferred the fuginion 18 x

Re: New lens
 

John,

The new Fujinon 20x lens that come with the GY-HM850 and GY-HM890 have specific communications between the two enabling such features as Auto Focus and CAC (chromatic aberration compensation). These features are not available when the lens is used with the GY-HM700 Series camcorders.

Regarding the Fujinon HTs18x4.2BRM and HTs18x4.2BERM (the "E" is for Extender) lenses, these are the best 1/3" mount HD ENG lenses available in the marketplace today. They are not inexpensive, and the majority are being used by our broadcast news customers.

Finally, we just announced the next generation of the Fujinon 17x ENG Zoom lens, XT17SX45BRMK3, which now is capable of incorporating the CAC feature with the GY-HM850 and GY-HM890 camcorders.

Cordially,

Re: New lens
 

Sorry John, the 850's are in a studio for a production show called The List, and they are locked up overnight.

Craig, could you possibly provide a link where I could find some good compatible 5GHz US wi-fi adapters and LTE modems for a 650? Impossible to locate that info!

Paul

Re: New lens
 

I'm still not loving the stock (autofocus) 20x ... set the back-focus up three times, but still getting some soft shots. If I had the chance to swap it for an 18x I'd be in like Flynn!

Re: New lens
 

what about manual focus then? If you use peaking you'll never use autofocus again with these camera's

Re: New lens
 

My apologies for the delay in response. The listing of tested WiFi modems are slightly buried on our web site:

Supported broadband adapters
Carrier Model
Verizon UML290
Verizon UML295
AT&T 313U

In addition, we have been providing Buffalo WiFi adapters in the past, and have worked quite well with our camcorders.

I hope this information is helpful. For more information, you can contact our customer support team at 800.252.5722.

- Craig

Re: New lens
 

Thanks Craig. The need for 5GHz WiFi adaptors becomes more pronounced when you consider ENG microwave trucks, Bluetooth, and other 2.4GHz sources such as corporate WiFi and even TVU type backpacks all spit out 2.4GHz radiation. In testing at my station, we could not even establish reliable connectivity with the Buffalo WiFi if the HotSpot device was further than a few inches from the back of the HM650 itself. When we took the HM650's into the field to test the Zixi server, we tried to run our TVU simultaneously as a backup, but the WiFi HotSpot emitting from the TVU proved too much for the Buffalo adaptor to deal with, and even with the HotSpot phone touching the adapter, connection was not possible.

Paul

Re: New lens
 

If you look at the bottom part of the GY-HM650U specifications web page, there is a listing of 5 GHz adapters to take into consideration:

- ASUS USB-N53
- TRENDnet TEW-664UB

I've also been informed by our engineering team that the Panda Wireless PWIUSBA203 Mid-Range and PWIUSBA204 Long Range 2.4 GHz adapters perform quite well.

Here is the direct link to the specifications web page:

JVC Pro Specifications

I hope this information is helpful to you and your team.

- Craig

Re: New lens
 

I am about to buy the 20x lens for my 700. My old lens had an accident and is not able to be repaired. I am not to worried about the auto focus not working since I have never used auto focus. I am not sure how big of a deal the optical stabilization is though. I guess I don't have it now so I don't really need it.

Re: New lens
 

I've ditched the 20x on a new HM850 and am using the old std fujinon 16x that shipped with the HD100s.
The 20x has continual focus issues and (partly relatedly) is difficult for me to find the right exposure. I'm just not having those problems with the old lens.
This is definitely confirming all my prejudices :)

Re: New lens
 

Can you expand on the focus issues. Is it because you are using the auto focus?

Re: New lens
 

It wasn't a focus issue, though it looked like one. It was diffraction, caused by stopping the iris down too far when using the camera in bright sunlight, instead of whipping in the ND. More here: Understanding Lens Diffraction - Luminous Landscape
Kind've my bad, I suppose ... cos it's in the manual, page 59 :) But it hasn't helped me to love this lens.
The 16x I've been using gets this 'small aperture diffraction' - but only when you go past f16, and at that point the iris reading turns to 'close'. On this lens, the 'indication' (which I managed to miss) is the iris read-out in the viewfinder turns from white to grey. Since I find the viewfinder harder to read in general, and especially in bright sun, this didn't leap out at me.
The lens lets you manually stop down to f22 before the 'close' indicator comes up - and I've worked with plenty of lenses that shoot clean pics at f22. But this lens 'greys out' - indicating diffraction problems- as soon as I close down past f8. Since on the long end of the lens it's only an f3, that means less than 3 stops to work with (more on wide.)
Reading up on it, the canon xha1 has similar issues, and the same 'greyed-out' indicator.
l feel this compromises the HM850 20x combo for the sort of run'n'gun shooting I often do - in and out of bright sunlight, heavy shade, in and outdoors. The addition of a 1/64th ND is good, but having to watch the iris indicator like a hawk, and flick ND in and out all the time is not ideal.
I can't work out why they've left all those unusable f-stops there at all (the agent says it may be for shooting in certain conditions- eg shooting SD. I tried changing the camera to 720 and SD - it might make a difference to the pics, but the iris indicator is still greyed out at f9.)
So it confirms my prejudices- it's a lens that's designed to be used largely on auto. When you do that, the camera compensates - using, eg, shutter speed and/or negative gain to keep the iris in the sweet range.
Sorry for the long ramble - but maybe it will save someone else trouble.
I'd love to hear if anyone else has a problem with or thoughts on this - and esp if f8 is the limit on this camera/lens combination - or do I have an odd set-up/unusual problem?
Cheers-
Rob

Re: New lens
 

I was having some of the same issues with the two 850's we have. It first appeared to us as a back focus issue, but oddly seemed to show soft areas, on the same plane as in focused areas.

JVC assured me that it was a back focus issue and to do the back focus with the iris all the way open. So far so good. I haven't seen the "soft' stuff but believe me, I'm still not sold--sad because i do like the new camera as compared to the 750's we have--but the 750's were always true.

Re: New lens
 

When you go into the weird electronic backfocus process, I think the iris says wide open all the time regardless. I've done it often enough now :)
The one-push auto focus is quite good, but shooting in bright sun (and shade) today, it's not an easy combination lens and camera - unless you prefer auto settings. Not enough f-stops in the iris for me; and I find the veiwfinder and LCD both harder to read than the HD200 (the info font on the HD cams was blockier and the constrast seemed better.)
Disappointing.
The pics are pretty good though :)

Re: New lens
 

UPDATE: I've been trying the 20x lens on my 700 and couldn't get a sharp picture. The detail seemed to drop of no matter how many times we went through the back focus. I even had engineers from CBC look at it and hook it up to some very expensive monitors and they had no answers for me. I sent the lens back to JVC and am waiting for the 17x fuji lens with the actual back focus and macro control.

Re: New lens
 

I can tel you these cameras have very large variations in back-focus from unit to unit. I am on a spare camera since my stations 790 had an SDI failure. When the lens was swapped, it required about 2,mm of rotation to bring the back-focus into correct position!

Paul

Re: New lens
 

If I had the budget I'd get another lens. I find the stock 20x pretty useless.
Actually if I had the choice again I'd get another camera. Still love the form factor but not much else :(
Maybe I'll learn to like it ...

Re: New lens
 

Been using an expensive HTs18x4.2BERM Fujinon for over month now on my new issue HM890, and the performance is terrible. The entire left 1/4-1/5th of the screen seemed to focus much closer than the other side of the shot, creating a very blurred left edge. It is very ugly, and ver apparent. I only know it is imaging closer because when something CLOSER is on that left edge, it is in sharp focus. This problem was also exactly the same on a JVC loaner HM890 that we put a similar HTs18x4.2BERM onto. Worth mentioning that i saw this EXACT left blur issue on a Panasonic HPX600, and it was only correctable by putting a CAC capable lens onto it, and activating CAC.

Also worth mentioning, irising down to f2.0-f2.8 reduces and eliminates the slight vertical smear apparent on the HM890 sensors when shooting at night.

Craig, please urge your tech guys to allow CAC on existing $13,000 Fujinon 1/3" ENG lenses......pretty please. :-)

Paul

Re: New lens
 

I have the Fujinon HTs18x4.2BERM on my 700, and I've noticed the edge softness as well. With my lens it seems to be on both sides of the frame, and it varies with focal length and focus distance. It seems to be really bad around the 20-40mm range, with focus distances over 30ft. Hardly noticeable zoom out or at shorter focus distances.

I can only guess that this issue is caused by lens field curvature. If I set the focus to infinity, it tends to sharpen the edges up. The trick is to keep the centre of the frame in focus:(

I was very disappointed when I first noticed this issue, a $12,000 lens should not perform this way. So now I just have to be very mindful of limitations...using the focus assist really helps.

I hope the 20x works better, at least when it comes to edge to edge sharpness.

Scott

Re: New lens
 

The HTs18 is just a $10,000 HAs18 2/3" with a 1/3" compatible rear element, but it performs so poorly on these cameras.

Paul

Re: New lens
 

The 2.0 firmware upgrade will enable the GY-HM850 and GY-HM890 to engage the CAC function in the latest versions of the following Fujinon ENG lenses: HTs18X4.2BERM, HTs18X4.2BRM, XT17sx45BRMK3, XT20sx47BRM. The firmware can be downloaded free of charge at the following JVC web site: JVC Pro Software/Firmware Downloads

Please note that in order for the CAC to engage the lens must have the capability to do so, used in combination with the 2.0 firmware in the GY-HM850 and GY-HM890. CAC is also enabled for the 20x AF lens which ships with the camcorders.

I hope this is of help to you all.

- Craig