Z7 Bad Autofocus
 

While most of my shooting is in manual focus, I did like the ability to switch to auto if I was changing distance from my subjects while gliding. The Z1's AF was pretty good.

However, my Z7 has a real problem with its autofocus as shown in this raw footage.

http://dvideography.com/client/Z7/

F 2.6, 30th shutter, 12 db gain

What bothers me most is that it's not even HUNTING. It's just ALL out of focus - background as well as my subjects.

Wow, that's beyond horrendous. I was looking through some footage of our filmfest and what I filmed looked fine (manual) but when I handed the camera to someone else to film, which was then in auto, it loved to hunt all over the place.

I hope all of these issues are synonomous whereby the lens will be fixed and all of these issues will be corrected.

We'll see.

I was so jacked about this camera when I saw it at a tradeshow being demoed by the project manager who also invented the Z1U. I was almost kissing the guy because the Z1 was and still is such a great camera that was a large part of my initial success. I was like an Apple fanboy just selling the hell out of this new Z7, which really is an event videographer's dream cam.

But after practical use on several major jobs this Zeiss lens, which I was very excited about using since I love the true manual features, is really falling down. I love shooting handheld with a real manual lens, but I also do a LOT of Steadicam work with Lanc control and the focus/zoom servo is TERRIBLE the speed is incredibly slow. I rarely use autofocus, but when I have it was HORRIBLE as well and Dave's clip is a prime example of what to expect if you depend on auto focus.

on behalf of bruceo....
 

on behalf of bruceo since he's been banned for whatever reason....
---
"I was so jacked about this camera when I saw it at a tradeshow being demoed by the project manager who also invented the Z1U. I was almost kissing the guy because the Z1 was ands till is such a great camera that was a large part of my initial success. I was like an Apple fanboy just selling the hell out of this new Z7, which really is an event videographer's dream cam.

But after practical use on several major jobs this Zeiss lens, which I was very excited about using since I love the true manual features, is really falling down. I love shooting handheld with a real manual lens, but I also do a LOT of steadicam work with lanc control and the focus/zoom servo is TERRIBLE the speed is incredibly slow. I rarely use autofocus, but when I have it was HORRIBLE as well and Dave's clip is a prime example of what to expect if you depend on auto focus.
---end per bruceo

Try turning off 'Focus Macro' in the 'Camera Set' menu. It appears the camera has a bad time trying to maintain focus when moved, panned etc especially if you are carrying a bit of zoom with it. The camera hunts from macro through to the long end... not a good look! With the 'Focus Macro' set to 'Off' the problem is nowhere near as bad. Not brilliant but not as bad for sure.

If you wish to have the macro function quickly available you can under the 'Others' menu assign 'Focus Macro' to one of the camera body 'Assign' buttons. Buttons #1,2,3 don't have any 'default' setting assigned to them so maybe one of those.

Chris Young
CYV Productions
Sydney, Aust

Dave that almost looks like a spoof of the problem. I can't believe unless something is set up terribly wrong that the auto focus could be that bad.

Bruce Cleveland

Bruce,

What would you suggest as "terribly wrong" with the camera setup? I've had some reception footage that looks like that. Its seems like the camera has ADD and is constantly looking for something to focus on.

-Chad

I am not sure what could be wrong. Maybe the auto macro is turned on. I have seen focus problems like that as well, but in much lower lighting. I am going to be putting mine through the tests tomorrow night at a social benefit, so I sure hope I get better results. I will post what I get.

Bruce Cleveland

Bruce ... I'll be interested to see how your unit does in low light. I won't really get the opportunity to check mine out till Monday night.

Have you considered the EX1 ? I just got it, so I can't comment on general autofocus. With the smaller battery, it's very similar in feel to the Z1. You get WAY better video quality although you do give up tape and the interchangeable lens.

Some of the early EX1s were plagued with a backfocus issue when using the built-in ND filters. A firmware upgrade is purported to fix this.

Just for the record, 'cause this comes up a lot, when you compare apples to apples, the EX 1 and the Z7 are NOT even remotely comparable in price.

You can get the Z7 and 32gb of compact flash media for about $US 5,900.

The EX1 and 32gb of SxS media costs around $US 11,000.

(And that's not even counting the time and cost of archiving.)

Sony's SxS media is dreadfully overpriced.

The EX1 package price seems a bit high. Check the prices at BH Photo, and you'll find that you're about $4k too high. A 16 GB SxS is less than $1k. I agree that the SxS prices are very high. Also, if you don't have a laptop with an ExpressCard slot, you have to drop $250 on the SxS card reader.

Don't you have to archive for Z7U flash media as well? Are you talking about using HDV tape for archiving ? The cost of a 1TByte drive is now about $200. Even archiving on two drives is cheaper than on $10 HDV tapes.

Bruce - How many jobs have you had your Z7 on?

We have our first one tomorrow night, so I will post everything I experience.

Bruce Cleveland

I believe the camera is too sensitive to hot spots like the lights on the wall in the background. Adding movement is the final blow to this camera.

Sad, very sad.

Paul

You're right. My mistake: I should have said 64gb of media, rather than 32gb. That's the minimum needed to shoot for 4 hours uninterrupted, which as a documentary filmmaker would be essential for me. That makes the EX1 around US$ 10,000.

And yes, I am assuming that the HDV tape will serve as the archive for the Z7's compact flash. As for hard drive storage, I don't consider that to be a long-term archival solution because of the failure rate. So, for the EX1 add a $1,000 (or so) for a good tape backup system or for an XDCAM disk deck.

EX1 Costs
 

Brian,

With the new PHU-60K hard disk recorder $800(www.dvuser.co.uk/content.php?CID=174) that will give you over 200 minutes of record time, the card costs will be negated. Add 2 8G cards (Free), EX-1 (wNAB Sony $500 discount:)) $6000, 1TB archive HD - $200, 1TB Backup archive HD - $200, Card Reader - $250, better picture- $priceless! Total Cost = $7450.

Mike Jensen
Jensen Wedding Films
www.jensenvideo.com

At NAB, JVC claimed that SD card cost is reaching the cost of BetaSP tape. Thus, after shooting, you'll file cards just like tapes. I'm not saying this is true, but it sounds interesting. And, considering one is recording HD -- how do cards compare to Sony Blue-laser discs and Pana DVCPRO (HD) tape?

In other words, if you think of SD cards as "pro" HD media -- how does it compare to the costs of other "pro" HD media?

$800 for the hard drive unit? The article you linked to says 750 British Pounds, which is roughly US$1500. At US$25 a gigabyte, that's still a darn site better than the US$55 a gigabyte that SxS media costs. So, figure $7500-8000 for camera plus HD....
O.K., getting closer....

How do I qualify for the NAB discount if I didn't go to NAB? Reading the promo, I thought it said something about getting a discount if I attended a NAB presentation. Did I misread it?

The media situation is complicated. The basic 8GByte SxS included with the unit and the free 8GB rebate allows you to copy one to a laptop hard drive while you use the other. The money could also be put into an HD-SDI capture device such as the upcoming Matrox field converter that will feed 4:2:2 to a an ExpressCard in a MacPro or MacbookPro.

The Ex1 offers video quality way beyond HDV on a Z1. I haven't used a Z7, but the EX1 video is clearly a class above my Z1. Hard drives are offered with a five year warranty, indicating that they last at least that long. Tapes may last 10? years? Although, you're right, the entire tape won't be lost. I agree with your skepticism about hard drive failure, but in recent years, this is exceedingly rare unless you play football with your hard drives. Also, data recovery tools are easy to use provided the disk still spins. In a pinch, you can pay a data recovery specialist to get it back.

Two years ago, I moved my most of my VX2000 and all of Z1/FX1 footage to a hard drives, now single 1 TByte hard drive. It's easy to keep your projects backed up on other hard drives. As larger drives emerge, just keep your old drive as a backup and copy all of your projects to the new, larger drive. This is a major convenience in that you have a flat access time to all of your data. When you do a bit-for-bit copy with your hard drives including a verify, you can be assured that your data matches. Tapes are still subject to dropouts. I haven't had many dropouts, but my biggest dropout was on my first HDV tape. Many tapes aren't filled completely, so you're looking at an average of 10 GBytes / tape. I realize it's hard to shed the tape habit. I'm just learning that.

I worry more about the optical disk recording than magnetic hard drives given my experience with the variability in disc media as well as DVD recorders on the PC. Dual layer recording is nuts on all but a couple of drives, which is noticed on systems with a full verify process. Optical disks don't last that long either.

Z7U Focus Hunting ETc
 

Just Curious

did you perform the backfocus adjustment "Flange Focal Length"

for the C Zeiss lens --- and are you using peaking to help you focus?

When I used the "FFL" adjustment -- the auto focus wasn't as much of an issue

I noticed your tagline on your videography website "You're the focus"
Oh, the irony!