One more day till the Glasgow Camera Day at BBC Scotland where you will entertained and educated all about Going HD-Going Tapeless.

There are two spots, Wednesday morning and afternoon, both consist of Phil Myers telling us all about Large Sensor Cameras and then onto ENG camcorders all tapeless !

HD Warrior has been invited to produce a web video, you will see the Sony FS100 being used in the field along with various lenses as a run and gun which may give you ideas for future productions you may have in mind. Remember CVP are here to help with any of your production needs big or small.

Details can be found here : http://www.creativevideo.co.uk/index.php?t=events/19/

I wrote an article during July last year called “Sionara DSLR, Time is running out” at the end of it I made a prediction …

“A prediction for the future…

My money is on Mr Bloom the GURU of the DSLR, he will have a passing look at the Sony VG10 but it’s domestic feel will not entice him…the Panasonic VF100 will ring a lot of bells being a more pro calibre, prime lenses etc but I think he will plum for the Pro Sony FilmLike camera. Philip Bloom is a film maker at heart and is looking for a camera that suits his style of filming, the DSLR in my opinion is not an ENG cameraman’s natural choice ergonomically, Philip has adapted to suit his needs.

Philip has been an ENG cameraman for many years and used 35mm adapters to give him that SDoF but his cameraman’s sore back I suspect gave him jip lugging around such heavy gear which is why he took to the DSLR…great low light pictures, SDoF and 100 times lighter.

Philip is too much the gentleman to drop the DSLR so he will run in tandem for a while but my bet is that he will be persuaded by the FilmLike Pro camcorder for it is closer to what a cameraman is naturally used to using.”

Philip Bloom “The image this camera is capable of as it is is superb. Seeing it in the Zacuto Shootout 2011 literally blew me away. It performed amazingly. But this takes it to a whole new level. So much so that I took the plunge. I went in with Eric Kessler of Kessler Crane and bought a Sony F3 from Rule Boston Camera and I also personally  treated myself to something I have been desiring for over a year now…a set of Zeiss Cp.2 s. I have the 35, 50 and 85mm…Don’t worry I am NOT abandoning DSLRs. Far from it. Cannot wait until the 5DmkIII or whatever it will be called and still will be shooting a huge amount on them. This is a different tool for different jobs and with the S-log bang for buck that is unheard of!!”

S-Log is a gamma function applied to Sony digital cameras, so that digitally originated images can be post-processed in a similar manner as film originated materials. Since S-Log can reproduce the entire tonal range of what the CCD imager can capture, S-Log image can be described as the “Digital Negative”. Shooting in S-Log will enable the cinematographer to decide the exposure value by using a light meter, and offer a smooth transition from film acquisition to digital acquisition.

There you have it, yes I know Philip has an AF101 but that was obviously a passing fancy, Philip at heart is a Sony man you can tell by his camera list, in the end he has bought a mean looking kit and his Zacuto EVF will come in very handy for critical focus, especially with those Zeiss prime lenses, as predicted he has not abandoned the DSLR but would you if it takes you round the world, teaching and earning enough to buy an F3 and three Zeiss Prime lenses…fantastic.

Who is going to be the king of the low light footage, I have one more day with both cameras then the F3 needs to go back down south. So far my conclusions are that the F3 glass helps keep flaring to a minimum but you would expect this as the lens is made specially for the camera.

This is where I take issue with Sony they have dedicated their prime lenses to fit on this camera only, so you can’t use them on any other camera, this may be for technical reasons but as we know Sony don’t make lenses, a third party has made these lenses but to Sony’s specifications.

I think it’s a poor decision by Sony not to make this a universal “PL” mount taking the edge off a rather nice set of prime lenses. The mount on the camera is identical to the EX mount but for one pin…why the exclusivity…only Sony can answer that.

The camera performed very well in Edinburgh city centre and as my good pal and fellow DP, John commented “it’s very filmic” “the pictures are unreal”. We watched the footage from both Edinburgh and Glasgow and John who is not easily impressed was stunned by the quality of the 12dB footage.

Although I have taken footage side by side with both cameras I have deliberately not seen the footage yet as I want to savour the moment that I put Sony’s Goliath against Panasonic’s David.

The one thing I can divulge is the difference between using £2.6K glass against £830 glass. The Sony 35mm was the closest in angle of view to my Voigtlander NOKTON 25mm lens, although the NOKTON has a very fast aperture of f0.95 I decided to keep it fair and stop down to f2 the same as the Sony lens. It was clear to me that the Sony had flare but not as noticeable as the NOKTON lens, as the Sony is three times dearer I would expect the optics to be superior to the Voigtlander lens, so no surprise there then.

I am about to hit a busy spell so you will have to wait for my final conclusions i’m afraid.

Tonight we were filming in a cold, Edinburgh city centre with the Sony F3 getting low light shots at 12dB and the camera excelled itself. I used all 3 lenses from the 35mm to the 85mm all T2 (f2). I could see from the LCD that we were getting amazing low light pictures but watching the footage back on a 55″ screen, the footage was just jaw dropping.

Question…Is it any better than the Panasonic AF101 in low light ? As yet I do not know but you can be assured I will know the answer by Wednesday evening.

No longer are you tied with a full lighting kit to produce a docudrama this camera excels in low light in fact once Sony give us their zoom lens you will have a fantastic ENG camera. I have never seen pictures shot at 12dB that are so grain free in my life and the quality of the Sony Prime lenses are exceptional.

You could produce a drama in street lighting and tell the Gaffer to take a night off, mark my words this will become the de-facto drama camcorder of 2011 and if the director of our local television drama Taggart reads this, start using a Sony F3 …YOU WONT BE DISAPPOINTED !

I have a lot on this week but I will have my video review of the Sony F3 in the can before Thursday, though it may not be edited before the end of the following week.

My Sony F3 arrived today from H Preston Media only for review may I add, not to keep and with it came Sony’s 3 prime lenses the 35mm T2, 50mm T2 and 85mm T2. It feels like a Desperate Dan oversized handheld camcorder.

Two things became apparent while looking over the camera today and by chance I had an expert on hand, Mike Lippmann from Miller Camera Support, I took the camera plate of the AF101 which has 2 tripod holes a 1/4″ and a 3/8″ which is industry standard in bigger professional shoulder mount camcorders.

We were very surprised to find the F3 a substantially bigger heavier camera did not have the statutory two different size tripod holes but the less sturdy 1/4″ screw holes ? Personally I am not a fan of mounting anything that can’t be held in place without two tripod screws.

Also it became apparent that Sony had left off a focus hook which is standard in their 700 series of camcorders, once again a second omission although won’t cause you to lose sleep over is surprising considering the camera is marketed as a film camera.

Apart from a review I am hoping to have a head to head with the Panasonic AF101 especially in the low light department and it will be interesting to see if the camera suffers the same 8bit banding problems that the Panasonic suffers from.

Just a note to let you all know that the Sony PMW-F3 web resource is now live, if any of you want to contribute to the site send me an email.

www.sonyf3.co.uk

Here is your first look at our new users web site for the Sony F3. I should be getting a Sony F3 in about three weeks time with three Sony Prime lenses and producing a user video review by the middle of March 2011. I hope to film a small drama with the camera as part of the review.

Spoke to Mike Tapa today and he has promised a Nikon to Sony F3 adapter while I am producing the F3 video review.

www.sonyf3.co.uk