Andrew Reid

The A7R II review will start with boxing footage... a good test for rolling shutter, motion cadence and whether the colour comes out as nice as the 1D C which I will bring with me as well!! Then A7R II versus A7S in low light... this is one thing giving me pause for thought "shall I wait 6 months for the A7S II?" Then versus 1D C shot A-B comparison, especially with regards to colour and what it is like to grade! I think the 120fps mode should be interesting vs NX1 and GH4. RX10 II will probably beat it there. Let's see if moire is a problem vs 1D C which is very clean. And I also have the Convergent Design Odyssey 7Q to test the HDMI output. Wonder if it is better than the one on the A7S which had issues especially with S-LOG and the smudgy APS-C upscaling to 4K.

What's so god damned hard about a dedicated ISO button though?????

Yep, Vimeo downsampling 4K to 720p will do that!! Until he shares the original footage that test is completely bunk.

It's an interesting strategy to say the least because it means video shooters end up buying two bodies. Like I said in the article, you can't put them in the function menu or on a custom button... so you would have to assign them to one of the mode dial "memory modes" instead, but problem I find using those is that it also saves preset shutter speed, aperture, white balance, etc. so you could have exposed one way in Movie mode then gone to memory mode and have it all nicely fucked up for you.

There was a 6 month gap between the original A7R (Oct 2013) and A7S (Apr 2014) announcements.

Seems like the ergonomics of the XC10 were done by Canon's new junior team or something. The grip isn't the only problem. It has no ISO button!

Thanks for the video Davide, great stuff. I'll feature it on the blog later!

This first hands on is with a pre-production model, so no footage for now. Instead on Wednesday August 5th I will shoot for the first time with the final retail boxed Sony A7R II in Berlin at a boxing academy. Be sure to check out EOSHD for that and the full review next week. The Sony A7R II represents a significant escalation in specs for both stills and video, a truly next generation camera. To kick off my coverage of Sony's 1st 4K internally recording full frame mirrorless model I bring you this exclusive hands-on. Read the full article

Congrats on the NX1. Great camera. That F2 zoom is good too. Get EditReady for $50 and it is pretty painless. RX100 IV overheating mainly in 4K on long shoots, not a problem in the 1080/120fps/240fps modes so far for me. I have used the RX100 IV as a 1080p camera more than a 4K one. It has the best 1080p of anything I've ever used. Like an FS7 but smaller sensor and 1/8th the price. Yes that 1" sensor does give you a bit of a flat image at times but S-LOG helps make it look cinematic if you're good at grading. Really helps get rid of the 'video' look to highlights, better dynamic range, smoother roll off, etc. Digital Bolex also has a Super 16mm sensor but it looks cinematic as hell because of the colour, grain, texture, so it is not all about shallow DOF and you have your 1D C for that anyway My footage from the RX10 II and RX100 IV is coming soon... it doesn't look like camcorder footage! I'll be interested to see how you get on with AF on the NX1. It is occasionally magic but mostly unreliable and doesn't do what you expect given the specs. Same with the RX10 II and RX100 IV though, continuous AF is really quite terrible in movie mode and HFR, but not as disastrous as it would be on a larger sensor like Super 35mm.... so approach with caution I'd say.

My PC goes into a 4K display. Found scaling better on the Mac. Will try it in Windows 10 and hope for the best. Does look slicker and better designed than previous Windows versions, so credit to Microsoft for that. As I don't use Windows Media Player or Internet Explorer is it safe to go for the Windows 10 "N" version? Or does losing those take out important functionality / codecs? Well the rationale is that Media Center was designed for media PCs and not as your main PC audio player or whatever. So I can see why they have dumped it. I can recommend an Apple Music subscription and iTunes 12.1 as a replacement. It's superb. It's the future. You don't need to own your own media files any more when it comes to music and most films. All in the cloud and superb audio quality. Doesn't the XBOX ONE supersede any WMC PC? Surely that is the Microsoft strategy in a nutshell. Cheaper for the user too.

12 stops isn't lame dude. It is only 1 or 2 stops off film!

TONS more coming from RX10 II in the review. RX100 IV is a separate piece but I have had to work on that for past week, time which could have been spent finishing off my RX10 II review!

Final part of the review is coming soon. Delay due to accommodating RX100 IV as well. Spoiler: I ended up preferring the small one!!

The power banks are cool. Just found a 13,200mha one in Berlin for 38 euros that charges my RX100 IV approximately 10x over. Charges it quick too... from nothing to 100% in about an hour and a half.

RX100 MK IV / RX10 II are best for this, hands down. Forget the interchangeable lens mount options if you need a sharp image & moire free. That's a good budget choice. Way off the RX100 IV for quality but not so far off NX1's 1080/120fps, which looks like upscaled 720p anyway.

Note also the very nice positive locking EF mount - why isn't that on the C300 Mk II?

LOL. Pretty good considering it is 2MP on a full frame sensor and 19 micron. There are some sample videos already from the sensor before they commercialised it. Here was the prototype - http://www.eoshd.com/2013/03/breaking-news-canon-announce-new-full-frame-sensor-for-video/ And the videos I'll try and find (only low resolution stuff on Canon website I seem to remember) They also have another specialist chip... a massive 200mm CMOS 40x larger than full frame, that one is in a Japanese telescope - http://www.eoshd.com/2011/09/200mm-canon-cmos-sensor-records-video-in-japanese-telescope/

This camera highlights why Canon have been successful and profitable. Wish I could sell a 2MP sensor for $30,000 and have it all makes sense in eyes of the customer!! There is demand for this camera and it will be lapped up by broadcast and industry. No more infrared B/W shots on Big Brother! Yes they could have sold it to consumers and enthusiasts for $2000... it's only a new sensor, with massive 19 micron pixels (A7S is around 8 micron) but most would have looked at the crappy megapixel count and then struggle to get any use out of the 4 million ISO - even the creative filmmakers we are would have only a very limited use for that! 1 scene out of every 100 kind of thing. So they have done the right thing for business and dollars...this is a specialist use camera for the industry. Is it valid to say "no internal recording and only 1080p for $30,000 - that sucks?" well the customers who will buy this camera for the set of Big Brother or an astrophysicist up in his telescope will say that isn't a valid criticism at all - they will want a live feed off the back of the camera, no need for internal recording, no need for 4K either as delivery will be in 720p or even SD...but it is valid in the sense that there must be quite a bit of margin in this camera!! And it is a shame that Canon are not so innovative in their DSLR imaging at the moment by comparison.

It fits over anything provided you have the means to attach it. No idea what the thread is on those. You will probably have to clamp it like I did with the Kowa. It's no fuss.

Thank you sir! Berlin is a tricky place to live in at times but it's worth it. You think living here is exhausting, try living here and having two jobs, one running EOSHD and one being a filmmaker

This is disgraceful! Keep up the good work Ebrahim. It isn't easy doing anything worthwhile, people will always be jealous.

Yep not out long and £12,000 in April 2013.... £4500 in December 2015

1D C / 1D X body quite a bit bigger than a mirrorless camera so they got away with sticking a big heat sink in it. I think Canon need to wait for their new sensor manufacturing capabilities to come online before they will do it... as they are taking so long over doing that, chances are it might be pretty special and worth the wait. How much longer can one company - Sony - get away without being unchallenged? Yes good point... But then Canon likely believes that their average Rebel customer filming birthday parties and baseball games isn't ready for 4K yet anyway. Nikon certainly said as much on record.

$350? Wow. That is stunning for what you get. Don't forget that sensor is the best APS-C CMOS on the market at the moment, so very good stills camera as well even if the crop in 4K mode bothers you.

Vs the NX1, no mic socket, no headphone jack, crop in 4K, no 1080/120fps (only at 720p), time limit 15min in 4K, no gamma DR, no luma range setting or black level, but yes it is cheap though for such an amazing image and crop you can get used to. Stills quality also unbeatable for the price. I've shot a shootout between the two and it is coming soon in final part of my NX500 review which I decided to resurrect because I rather like the cam for the price. Decided to keep it even though I had the NX1 as it goes in a jacket pocket with a pancake 30mm F2.