SD Cards in the Sony EX-1

This seems like some exciting bit of news. Apparently, folks have figured out how to shoot onto SanDisk SD cards with the Sony EX-1 and EX-3 cameras, instead of Sony's expensive SxS media.

The EX cameras are supposed to be great (see latest EX-3 review from Adam Wilt.). Excellent performance in terms of resolution and low-light sensitivity. Their 1/2" sensors work much better than the smaller 1/3" sensors in the Z1, Z5, Z7, HVX200, HPX170, and Canon cameras. The big problem for me with the EX cameras was shooting on the expensive SxS media. Like the Panasonic's P2 cards, these are much more expensive per GB than run-of-the-mill flash memory--e.g., $850 for 16GB of SxS Pro storage. It just wouldn't make sense when you are shooting a lot of stuff because the hassle of making sure all your footage was safe on hard drives all the time.

Well, this guy says you can use a 16GB SanDisk SD card for $60 that will do just about everything that Sony's $850 card will (the notable exception being over-cranking, used for slo-mo shots.) You just need a particular Kensington Expresscard adapter for $40 that you put in the camera.

It still doesn't make the the EX-1 ($6450 at B&H) a no-brainer for Link. That's still $60 to record about an hour at 35 Mb/s or 90 minutes at 25 Mb/s. The camera's more difficult to handle than the Z1 or Z5, or even Z7. Plus the Z5 has a 20x lens versus 14x lens for the EX cameras. And we are hardly ever delivering HD--so we usually downconvert in the deck, which is both a good and easy way to get SD footage from HD source material. If quality is what really counts, than the EX cameras are a real winner in the sub $10K range, but I think, but there are some significant drawbacks to the camera when compared to more practical, tape-based cameras like the Z5.

If you are seriously interested in this, then read the fine print here:
Overcoming the cost of SxS media: Introducing KxS.
Also, I don't know of anyone personally doing this. I would probably wait for some trustworthy sources to vouch for this before I committed to buying an EX camera.

UPDATE: Adam Wilt (a very trustworthy source) says that he's heard good things from Sony about working with off-the-shelf memory cards on the EX cameras in the comments section of this post on ProVideo Coalition.

I tried looking for the Kensington card reader, and it seems to be out-of-stock everywhere. Also read on a forum that it may have been discontinued. Not good news for this concept.

Link TV's Next Camera

"Review: Sony HVR-Z7 & HVR-S270 1/3” 3-CMOS HDV camcorders" by Adam Wilt

I don't make many predictions on my blogs, but if I had to guess I think the Sony HVR-Z7 will be Link TV's next camera. Why you ask? First, it's Sony, and folks at Link in SF seem to like Sony. Second the price is right for us--well below the $10,000 mark, now about $5700 street price. Second it's a significant improvement on the Z1 camera that we have now. The Z1 has been out for over 3 years and Sony has finally released a true successor to the Z1. It's supposed to be faster than the Z1. It's all supposed to have a good LCD and viewfinder (areas where the Z1 is seriously lacking)

I'm basing this on Adam Wilt's excellent review of the Z7 and its bigger sibling the S270. It seems like there are some other good cameras out there, namely the Sony EX1, which records only onto flash memory. But for Link the lack of tape recording is sort of a deal breaker. At least as a post guy I don't want to have to deal with the headache of worrying about all of that media on hard drives with no other backup. Plus the EX1' s SxS Pro recording cards are still pretty pricey. For big shoots, that leaves options like a hard drive recorder, lugging around a laptop to shoots, or renting more storage. So much easier to pack a bunch of cheap tapes for a shoot.

If you want tapeless storage, the Z7 can even record to Compact Flash using the included HVR-MRC1 unit, which attaches at the back of the camera. That's a nice feature if you want the quick turnaround of material, which is a big benefit with tapeless workflows. Compact Flash is much cheaper than Panasonic's P2 and Sony's SxS Pro too.

The EX1 has 1/2" chips--the only sub-$10K HD camera with that. And it's supposed to have the sharpest picture in this price range. Too bad they couldn't match 1/2" chips along with the HDV format. The S270, which is reviewed in the same article, has one big feature that I'd like to see on the Z7--it can take large cassettes. That means 4.5 hours of HDV on a tape. But that camera is over the 10K point. But all things considered, the Z7 looks like a good camera, and from what Adam Wilt says, the champ of the sub-$10K HDV cameras.

Here's Adam's summary of the pros and cons of both the Z7 and the S270:

Pros

• Interchangeable lenses with standard 1/3” mounts.
• ISO 400 sensitivity.
• 800+ TVl/ph resolution with smooth, natural detail.
• DV, DVCAM, and 1080-line HDV recording.
• Interlaced and true progressive modes.
• Killer EVF and very good LCD; good peaking control.
• Best-in-the-business viewfinder data displays.
• Unique in-viewfinder tilt indicator.
• Z7: well balanced and easy to handhold.
• S270: no-nonsense, full-sized shoulder-mount camcorder; 4 channels of audio; 4.5 hour record times.
• Sensible ergonomics on both cameras: controls are where they should be.
• Sony Steadyshot.
• HVR-MRC1 CF card recorder included.
• Comprehensive Picture Profile tweaks, most with 15 steps of adjustment.
• Very good shotgun mike included.

Cons

• Stock lenses have only average chromatic aberration performance.
• Resolution drops with increased gain.
• Smooth Slow Motion clips have low resolution, many compression artifacts.
• Lens iris ring isn’t labeled or calibrated.
• Fastest power zoom isn’t very fast.
• MRC1: buttons lack a “hold” switch and are subject to inadvertent activation.
• MRC1: no single-frame mode in interval recording.

Camera Blogwad

I seem to have a lot of posts about cameras even though this is supposed to be a blog about post-production. So I've been saving up some interesting links on cameras because I didn't think they warranted a post to themselves on my blog.

First Look: Sony HVR Series
Good info on the new Sony HVR-Z7 and HVR-S270 HDV cameras, as well as their companion deck, the HVR-M35. More detail on how Sony is doing progressive recording and playback with this gear.

CompactFlash Media Test Results
The HVR-Z7 and HVR-S270 will record HDV onto Compact Flash memory cards. But there are some performance issues, especially with cheaper cards. The test found delays in starting recording, dropouts, and even lockups.

Another review of the Sony PMW-EX1 at DV.com (registartion req'd.)

Three good posts from Adam Wilt at his new blog at the ProVideo Coalition:

Three three-letter cameras: EX1, F23, RED
The new Sony XDCAM EX1 and the $250,000 Sony HDCAM SR F23, versus the upstart Red.

Whither The HVX200?
Adam says: "Does the EX1 render the HVX200 obsolete? Don’t be too sure!"

2008 FAA rules on battery transport
Frankly, I don't understand all of this. But if you're a production person who travels on planes, then you should.