Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

Believe it or not the I-Link firewire is still significant to me. I have a lot of corporate conferences we shoot in HD but still deliver standard DVDs too. I have a Sony Anycast I have used since they were first released. They are being phased out now. Mine has paid for itself countless times. I am hoping the I-link is hot while all the other formats are in use? I would love that! The Anycast is a multi source switcher and HDD recorder (among other things). The firewire inputs are my first choice even though it has others.

Also, don’t throw away your Adobe On-Location disk. A great program for field shooting. My main use for it was not even the HDD recording it will do. I used it for all of its useful tools like waveform monitor, vector scope, and others. Then set the zebras where you want (shadow and highlight), put the monitor in full screen and away you go with a half way decent firewire field monitor.

One word of caution. I have absolutely no faith in Sony when it comes to “future upgrades, to be released”. If the camera works for you out of the box then buy it. If your betting on the come you could end up waiting much much longer than you think. I have been burned by Sony rushing broadcast line products to market to generate this kind of excitement, when the product was far from ready for release.

Steve

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

I want more pictures geeezzz

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

I'm trying to find out about XAVC 50/60p support.

Hypergammas instead of Cinegammas. WiFi is not built in but via the CBK-WA01 adapter, Magnesium alloy body not plastic like the PMW-200.

So far only 3 pictures have been released, all show the camera from the same angle, just with different microphones.

I suspect the street price will be about 10-20% higher than the EX3 with the 14x zoom and quite a bit more with the 16x.

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

What's the difference between hypergammas and cinegammas? Which is preferable?

A 10-20% price increase is still very reasonable, for what you're getting. This is a workhorse camera.

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

Not a lot of difference, in fact Hypergamma 4 is the same as Cinegamma 1 and HG2 is the same as CG 2.

It's just good that Sony are standardising on HG across almost all of the range now which makes setting up cameras to match much simpler.

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

Here's an article that says the 14x lens version will be under $10K:

Sony’s Sub-$10,000 PMW-300 Is the EX3′s Successor | Studio Daily

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

Some PMW-300 specification information now on this Sony UK site:

PMW-300K1 (PMW300K1) : Features : Sony Professional

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

The XAVC codec and recording details for both the PMW-300 and PMW-400 will be announced at IBC in September, so we'll have to wait till then to hear about 50/60p.

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

Thanks Alister. I have to say that if no 1080p/50, then what's the point of the XAVC option now it's got a fully approved codec with XDCAM 50Mbs anyway?

AFAIK, what XAVC brings to the table that XDCAM can't is the ability to do higher resolutions (ie 4k), higher framerates (like 50p) and 10 bit. OK, nobody's expecting 4k here, but if the only benefit is 10bit acquisition, is the XAVC upgrade really going to be worth it?

Combine it with 1080p/50 and there's a lot more point.

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

David is spot on. Sony better make sure 1080p50/60 is part of the 2014 XAVC update for the PMW-300. And I'm sure they will.

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

Completely agree here. If a lower tier camera by that point has it and the 300 doesn't, it'd defeat the purpose of the XAVC upgrade.

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

How about a silent 2x or 3x zoom with a constant f/2 aperture? Sigma just put out a wide angle f/1.8 zoom for APC sensors. My Sigmas are kinda chatty on my Nikon D3, thought they all focus much faster than most of Nikons recent AF-S "G" offerings. The Sigmas are less chatty than Nikon AF-S "D" offerings.

Why should we stand for a Sony megazoom lens that only gets sharp at f/4 while losing sharpness around f/5.6 due to diffraction? While I understand the need for a 14x or 16x zoom, I don't want one. Why doesn't Sony offer other options that allow constant ape

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

I too agree that the key thing with XAVC would be 50/60p capability, although I do also like the idea of 10 bit 422 at 35Mb/s.

There will be a PMW-300 on the Sony Booth for the Broadcast Asia show next week.

Guess where I am right now... Singapore, shooting 4K demo footage for Broadcast Asia, so hopefully I'll be able to get you lots of pictures and more info. Don't know yet whether it will be a fully functioning camera or a mock-up.

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

Great! Look forward to reading/seeing what you find out Alister!

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

Availability is slated for Oct. this year, 4/5 months to go, imo it's probably a close mockup.

Still time for Canon and Pana et al to wind Sony up with some lower priced competition.

Cheers.

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

But will your computer like it......? ;-) Compared to XDCAM422, all it really offers is 10 bit, and a somewhat lower bitrate. But likely at the price of being far more difficult to natively edit?

Personally, it's the 50Mbs XDCAM aspect to the news that I think will be most relevant in the real world. I'm in little doubt that for the last couple of years the EX1/3 have had by far the better front end than their competitors such as the XF305 and HPX250 due to the 1/2" v 1/3" chips - but "it's not a full broadcast codec....." has been the sticking point.

As with the PMW200, with this announcement all that changes. The 1/2" front end of the Sonys is still superior to the 1/3" of the competition, and there is now parity with acceptability of recording format.

The XAVC, 50p, 10 bit aspects are all very nice and it's always good to know that what you buy has an element of future proofing as far as is possible - but my bet is that it's the XDCAM 422 aspect that will really sell this camera in the next year or two. And unless Canon and Panasonic can rival the 1/2" aspects, they stand to lose sales very quickly.

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

Investing in a new 16X lens for this camera seems to indicate Sony expects some years of profitability ahead.

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

Comparing XDCAM and XAVC bitrates is a bit like apples and oranges. XDCAM is MPEG-2, XAVC is H.264, so when it comes to compression efficiency, it's two different things...

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

Got some more info today, based on studying the pre-production mock-up here at Broadcast Asia. The VF is removable and the VF bracket can also be removed, the VF uses the same connector as the F5/F55. The extending shoulder pad extends far enough to actually sit on your shoulder, not just against your shoulder. There is a 1/4" thread on the rear of the shoulder pad so you can add a rear mounted accessory, maybe a V-Lock battery mount to help with balance. It has dual HDSDI outputs - reason - one to be used with the new Sony WiFi/Proxy device that can stream video over wifi for remote monitoring or live feeds as well as generating proxy files. This device can also control the camera remotely. 3G/4G capability will be added to the optional WiFi box later for remote live streaming and ftp uploads.
It has the same sensors as the EX1/EX3/PMW-200 but according to Sony the new 3D Noise reduction (also coming to PMW-400) uses inter-frame comparison and results in much lower noise and "better" image quality levels than current PMW-200.

All in all it's looking like a really nice upgrade to the EX3. Target price is the same as the EX3 for the 14x version, but that may mean that the street price may be a little higher than the EX3 at launch as dealers may not discount this new camera as they do an older model. No body only option at the moment.

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

Wonder if they talked with Teradek's OEM to make this new "Proxy/Wi-Fi" box.

The critical thing it has to support for livestreaming is bonded 3G/4G connections. A single antenna is not reliable enough for a consistent connection.

I'd be interested to see the OLED EVFs work with the 300 and how it would work ergonomics-wise.

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

Thanks for the info Alister

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

@Alister Chapman - Any hints or guesses as to how it compares to the XF300/305? I'd love a better low light capable camera that retains the same basic function as the XF.

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

It will almost certainly be better than the XF305 in low light. Like the PMW-200 it has larger 1/2" sensors and size matters when it comes to true sensitivity and low light performance. I suspect it will be quite a bit better than most 1/3" camcorders in low light, but we will have to wait and see. I'll try to get a 305 for some side by side tests when I get the 300.

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

Allister please more hi res pictures out of the box.

Thanks

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

If you could get any side by side tests that would be very appreciated. My dilemma is whether to get a C300 and keep my XF300, or to get a PMW-300 and trade in my XF300. The XF300 is almost the perfect camera for my uses but I'm just not that happy with it's low light performance on some projects I have done.

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

The trouble is, do they say more about the cameras intrinsically, or just how they're lined up? It's also possible to set up a camera to look good superficially, on one particular example, but it may be very different given different material. That's why I take most straightforward camera comparisons posted on websites with a pinch of salt, unless they are done very scientifically.

I note Sony are now saying they are using "3D noise reduction" which I understand to mean comparing over a number of frames, and using software to look for differences and give a cleaner effect. It can make results look better - but it can bring problems as well as solve them. It's what caused the "noise ghosts" with Panasonics HPX371 - in the original form it was unable to completely distinguish between (unwanted) differences caused by noise and (wanted) differences caused by moving objects. The result was moving objects leaving behind "noisy trails". What will Sony's implementation be like? Good question.

One thing that can be said is that no form of electronic noise reduction can ever be truly equal to achieving a really less noisy image in the first place. In that respect, the 1/2" chips of the PMW300 can only be a huge advantage compared to the 1/3" chips of it's competitors. There really shouldn't be any doubt about that - it's what Alister means by "true sensitivity". Additionally, the larger chip size means better dof control, and less problems with diffraction limiting as you stop the iris down. In the case of all of these factors, the advantage should be just over one f stop.

This is also assuming that we're talking about a lens with the same f stop in each case. Low light ability is a function not just of camera sensitivity, but max lens aperture as well.

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

things i would like to see changed with pmw-300

1. front 1/4x20 thread mount instead of hot shoe
2. a d-tap in front
3. get rid of composite video and audio outs
4. a sdi record in
5. 1080p 240 high speed

Thanks

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

It may be that the hot shoe can be removed and there might be a 1/4" thread underneath. The hotshoe plate fitted to the prototype looks like one of the removable ones, but I don't know for sure.

You do have firewire in for DV and HDV.

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

Setiawan,

Thank you for your post!!!

Steve

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

So the BBC claims, or at least JVC claims the BBC has purchased 500 GY-HM650U camcorders, probably because you can FTP video right from the camera.

How does that cam compare to the PMW-300?

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

HM650 - 3x1/3" CMOS
PMW300 - 3x1/2" CMOS

HM650 - SDHC cards
PMW300 - SxS cards

HM650 - 35mbps, 4:2:0 codec
PMW300 - 50mbps, 4:2:2 codec

The PMW300 should also get a Wifi transmitter. It can also upgrade to XVAC codec.

The 300 is more of a shoulder mount camera design.

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

The BBC purchase of HM650's is not to replace existing XF-305's or EX1's. The HM-650's are replacing older Sony Z1's that are still in use by journalists.

The HM650 is a fine camcorder, but it's not as sensitive as an EX1/EX3 and relies heavily on noise reduction to get a clean image. The 650's wifi and 3G/4G capabilities are it's big selling point and for the BBC this brings the possibility of live streaming of breaking news stories with no extra equipment, all be it at sub broadcast quality. In addition the use of SD cards and a small codec means that it works well for fast turnaround news.

The PMW-300 is very different. Assuming the new noise reduction process results in an image similar to that from the PMW-200 (which uses the same sensors) but with a little less noise it should be a good performer in low light. For image quality the 300 will be better than the HM650, but using the add on streaming adapter will most likely be more complex than the built-in streaming from the HM650.

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

The camera is strangely reminiscent of the ill fated and horribly expensive PMW TD-300 which was Sony's answer to stereographic 3D acquisition. I tested the camera and found the 2D and 3D imagery to be superb so I'm wondering if its the same chip array.

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

Probably the same sensor chips (there the same ones as used in the EX1/EX3), but all new processing so if anything it might be better than the TD300.

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

I'm amazed that anything other than press releases come out of Basingstoke having lived in Reading for a while(G). But honestly, owning both an xf305 and a C100 I can't see why I would be interested in this. (I bought the xf305 instead of an EX3 like 2 years ago). It seems like years late to the party. I've been shooting 50Mbps 4:2:2 Long GOP for over two years now with great results. My lower light shots with the xf305 have been pretty good. Having interchangeable lenses would be nice, but I already have that with the C100 and frankly, rarely take my 24-105 lens off it. I appreciate that if you have an EX3 that this is a replacement for that, but frankly, I'm not waiting on a replacement for the xf300. I've already got it in the C100, and the C300 if I want to break the bank and go to 4:2:2. But frankly I can mount a Atomos and still be less than the PMW-300. I have to tell you, I rarely shoot with the xf305 as the C100 is really a spectacular camera compared to a small sensor model. I didn't believe I could get as good a picture out of the 4:2:0 as the XF305 4:2:2 but I have to say it's damn close.

This isn't meant to be a slam of the PMW300, I'm sure that it will suit the folks doing broadcast just fine. Maybe it is really meant to compete against the Canon C300, since it's 4:2:2 but frankly, I like the layout of the C300 better, and I can use all my Canon glass that I have bought over the years for the 5D, C100 and on up.It just seems like this announcement is, "meh" meaning "really, you are getting worked up over this?" No harm meant, I love Sony too, she cares about professionals, but being independent she seems like a high maintenance date! Help me understand what I am missing. I frankly might have gotten more worked up over a real successor to the Panasonic AF100/100A. That was a great first effort a leader in the field and Panny just never really followed up on it. Finances likely. Or the Lumix division won out politically inside the company. I'm not really interested in going back to a DSLR now that there are real large format sensor options in a camcorder. This PMW300 doesn't seem like one.

Just sayin'.

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

No one is suggesting that this is designed to compete against the many large sensor cameras on the market. This is aimed at those that don't want shallow DoF. Those that need a camera that is easy to work with in run and gun as well as small multi camera shoots such as conferences or low cost studios. The EX3 was an incredibly successful camera, especially in emerging markets as it is a great all round camera. It's been used for everything from low budget corporate to high end BBC natural history. The PMW-300 will bring the EX3 up to date adding improved image quality including real 10 bit recording and output (something many of the large sensor cameras don't offer), better ergonomics and wifi streaming options. At the same time it retains the ability to use 1/2" and 2/3" Parfocal servo zoom lenses for normal applications or DSLR lenses for telephoto work such as natural history.
Much as I love using my F3 with it's interchangeable lens mount that allows me to use a B4 zoom, DSLR lenses or PL glass, there are still times where a 1/2" or 2/3" camera would be more appropriate and the PMW-300 is very attractive as it looks to offer good image quality and flexibility at a great price.

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

At the risk of repeating what Alister says, the PMW300 is aimed at a completely different market to the C100/AF100 et al. What may be seen as advantages of a camera like the C100 to one person may be seen as it's disadvantages to someone else - and vice versa.

For some types of work, shallow depth of field may be seen as desirable - for other types of work, it's a pain. For some types of work a long servo zoom is essential - try getting one that's affordable for such as a C100. And so on.

Obviously you're in the group who finds a large sensor format best suits your needs. Fine. The PMW300 isn't targeted at you. But there's another group who have very different needs, and that's who this camera is targeted at.

Whether it would be worth exchanging an XF305 that you've already got is up for debate. But if you need a new camera, and it's a choice of an XF305 or a PMW300, I'd go for the PMW300 any day due to the 1/2" chips, codec upgradability, form factor etc etc.

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

Yes, I'm really only posting because I am the type of customer I'm sure that Sony would love to have, as a small independent who does own a professional level camcorder like the PMW-300. I would agree that if I were going to consider replacing the xf305 today, and wanted the form factor of a camcorder I would be seriously considering the PMW-300 because of the larger sensor. But I guess my point was that I can shoot both an xf305 or a C100 any day that I shoot, and I find that I can get a pretty good DOF (shallow that is) with the C100 by using my NDs properly along with the choice of lenses. I'll not belabour the point further, I agree with the thread that it's a great update from Sony, especially for those who work with camcorders all the time. I do use my 305 when shooting performances and lectures style shooting, where a true zoom is useful. Don't you find it wild to hear people say that using a true parfocal zoom is so "70s" in it's look?

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

But Sony's offering to try to appeal to such as yourself is the FS700, isn't it? Or go a bit more upmarket to the F5?

I don't dispute that you may have valid reasons for deciding a larger format camera is better for your particular needs, but in that case why even post about the PMW300? It's intended for people with different requirements and needs to you, and it's them who find it of interest.

Up to now it's been a choice of 1/2" chips OR a fully approved codec in this class of camera. With the PMW200 and PMW300 you can have your cake and eat it.

Re: Sony unveils the EX3 successor: PMW-300
 

Reading these comments i'm reminded of a situation i found myself in 2 years ago. I was helping out a guy editing a doco he'd made about rappers in London. Most of the rushes were shot on the EX3, but some bits had a Canon 550d capturing the footage alongside the main camera.

The difference between the two cameras was night and day. Frankly, the EX3 looked like a 50p camcorder out of a box of Cornflakes next to the Canon. I got some colleagues to come and have a look too. All marvelled at the images the 550d produced, and commented how 3rd rate the Sony camera (costing vastly more) looked alongside it.

Don't get me wrong, i'm sure Sony have produced another superb piece of kit, but i will be astonished if this camera can match a 2 year old 550d.

Having said that, i've no doubt the Sony is a more useful all round tool, which of course is what it's intended to do.