NX5U and matching B roll cam - ideas

[Kevin Miller]

This is a little early as they have just been released, but I think many of us would be interested what smaller B roll camera best matches the NX5U? Like the HV40 size but probably tapeless. Just thinking ahead guys ;)

[Ron Evans]

One of the Sony AVCHD cams. My XR500 has exactly the same auto WB colour as the NX5U and is very sharp and if anything a little cleaner than my NX5U. As with all the consumer cams the colour is boosted a little more than the Pro models but is something I can fix in post. I already had preset in Edius to boost the FX1 to match and I expect a very similar preset for the NX5U.
I think the CX550 would be a really nice match
HDR-CX550V | 64GB HD Handycam® Camcorder | Sony | Sony Style USA.

Ron Evans

[Ben Moore]

Hey Ron

Does the RX500/CX550 have Zerba's for exposure?. Also is the exposure/iris manaually adjustable? if so is it adjusted through the touch screen?

Thanks
Ben

[Ron Evans]

Unfortunately no, the XR500 does not have zebra which was a disappointment for me as the SR11 did have zebra !!! The control wheel does control exposure, focus, AE shift and white balance shift. The LCD is the same as on the NX5U though in fact looks bigger until one sets them side by side and looks at the specs. Yes you can adjust using the LCD but the control wheel is a lot more convenient. You can use the touch LCD to spot set focus, exposure or both together. Face recognition does a good job in exposing and focusing on faces in the scene and the Motion Browser software can then index and search by face!!! It is interesting to select a clip and have all the faces displayed along the bottom of the frame.
As with most consumer cameras iris and gain are not independantly adjustable. Gain starts when the iris is full open in manual control. Leaving camera in some form of auto will allow the camera to increase gain before opening up the iris fully and retain more depth of field. The auto exposure tries to keep the iris at between F3.4 and F5.6 and will vary gain and shutter speed to do this as this is clearly the sweet spot for the lens. This is why I tend to use AE shift more with the XR500.
I would like a camera with similar features, little bigger lens and full manual control. But I don't think this makes much sense to Sony though I am sure there would be lots of people like me who would jump at such a camera.

Ron Evans

[Dave Blackhurst]

The new CX550V and XR550V "may" well give the desired control. Should know within a few days, as those cams should be in the retail chain shortly. The XR500V is a pretty sweet camera overall, I'm hoping the 550's turn out to be the best of the 500 with manual controls. My concerns are the noise that seems to have popped up with the CX500V (and doesn't seem to be there in the XR500... but the CX is a bit better in some low light, so perhaps too much gain) and whether the new lens ratio will prove to be better or worse...

At the moment the CX550V looks like a good camera overall. I'll be fine with 64G of internal flash (and MS Duo or SDHC cards), and rather not have the HDD, glad to finally see the VF option on the CX series!

[Richard Lacey]

Originally Posted by Ron Evans

Face recognition does a good job in exposing and focusing on faces in the scene and the Motion Browser software can then index and search by face!!

Stupid question, but do cameras such as the NX5 include the face recognition feature?

[Ron Evans]

No NX5U doesn't have face recognition or spot focus. It doesn't have the camera time set by the GPS either as far as I can work out. GPS time can set time code user bits but not the camera clock !!!!

Ron Evans