While we wait for the new Sony FS100 to appear why not look at Doug Jensen’s footage, Doug produces tutorial DVDs for Vortex Media which teach you how to use various levels of Sony Camcorders, I bought one of his DVDs teaching me a lot more about my Sony EX3, well worth the money.

A week before the 2011 NAB Convention, Sony sent a pre-production NEX-FS100 for me to shoot some demo footage for use in my F3/FS100 workshops they asked me to teach at the show.

The camera arrived on a Saturday morning. I set it up on my DSC test chart and created a custom Picture Profile that looked good to me. Please keep in mind that you should never judge a Sony camera right out of the box. You MUST create (or get) a Picture Profile or Scene File with a Sony camera if you expect the camera to perform at its best. That’s the way Sony designs them, and it is the right way to do it.

All but 6-7 shots of this video were shot on that Saturday afternoon at various locations around Newport, Rhode Island.

I used a Novoflex E-Mount to Nikon adapter so that I could use my own Nikon lenses instead of the 18-200 f/3.5-6.3 lens that Sony sent with the camera. In my opinion, that lens is too slow for getting decent shallow depth-of-field . . . which is, after all, one of the main reasons for choosing a camera such as the NEX-FS100 that has a Super-35mm sensor.

The Nikon lenses I used were a 17-35mm f/2.8 and a 80-200mm f/2.8

Only the fishing boats and swan shots at 6:35 were taken with the stock 18-200mm lens.

All of the softball footage was shot through a chain-link fence in bright sun.

Because the camera does not have any built-in ND filters of it’s own, I used a $150 Genus Variable ND Polarizer filter to control the amount of light entering the lens. ALL shots, except for the indoor fruit basket were shot with the ND filter on the lens. I found that this filter actually allowed me much finer control over my exposure than of the camera had only a couple of built-in filters. What at first seemed like a big shortcoming of the camera, was quickly forgotten. I can use cheap step-down rings to use the same ND Polarizer on all of my lenses regardless of their native filter size.

No matte box was used.

All of the slow-motion shots were shot at 60fps at full 1920×1080 mode and recorded on the camera’s onboard SD card. Full 1920×1080 @ 60fps is a unique ability of this camera compared to other Sony camcorders.

All shots in the video were recorded to the onboard SD card at 24Mbps. I will post comparison footage that was recorded simultaneously with a NanoFlash at 100MBps when I have time.

Only three shots, which are identified with supers had any color grading or post-processing applied to them. Everything else is straight out of the camera.