Sony RX10 II review final conclusion and introduction to its smaller brother, RX100 IV

[Brian Williams]

The RX100 IV does have an internal optical 2x zoom that keeps the 4K quality and brings the camera to app. 140mm - but only in film mode, not in other modes like M that maybe most like Andrew are using.

I didn't realize this until you mentioned it- sure enough its there. But it seems that it doesn't have to only be in Movie mode to work, the photo settings just have to be set to JPG vs raw. So for me, I use the 3 memory modes as my movie modes- one for 4k, one for 120fps, and one for 24p HD- each is based off of manual mode, and for any one of those I can change my settings to JPG instead of raw (if I don't plan on shooting stills while filming, which I don't). And then I have the option of the 2x zoom.

It really is the same as just shooting 4k and cropping in in post, but still a nice option to have.

[Videogreg]

I've found several nice PP settings for grade. But I generally work in news/doc with zero turn around time. Trying to match to Sony EX 350. Anyone have a good setting? I ve tried movie with rec 709 gamma with a -5 black level and a gentle push in color/ saturation. Thanks.

Andrew, Really nice review. Love the writing and presentation.

[dafreaking]

Sorry, I'm still a bit of a noob, but I'm intrigued by this statement, even though I don't totally understand it; what do you mean by this quote?

I know what fly-by-the-wire focus is, but how does rangefinder fit in here?

Brian, you set the camera to focus at infinity and use the range-finder attached in front of the lens to focus.

[Cinegain]

Ah, ok, I was kinda lost on that too, 'rangefinder' sounded pretty generic... but once you add 'The SLR Magic' to it, I instantly get it.

[Brian Williams]

Brian, you set the camera to focus at infinity and use the range-finder attached in front of the lens to focus.

Got it- didn't realize such an adaptor existed; yeah, when you said rangefinder, I'm thinking you are talking about an optical viewfinder add-on.

[M Carter]

RX10-II users - can anyone give me a rundown of codecs? Are these common formats that can be dragged from the card clip-by-clip (like H264, etc)? Or more like the AVCHD style, where the entire card has to be read and translated vs. a folder full of accessible shots?

Any issues along the lines of Samsung/H265 encoding, or is this footage easier to access?

(I shoot a lot of Nikon DSLR and I can open clips right from the card to preview in QT player, and drag my favorites to an MPEG Streamclip batch, very easy. My "event" cameras are Panasonics, where I have to go through log & transfer in FCP to get prores clips, similar to C300 footage, etc. Those are my two transcoding paths I use daily).

[agolex]

Premiere handles it nicely, Resolve (at least 12 and for me) is a PITA. No audio unless you rewrap into .mov and after that I'm having major issues as well (might be Windows 10 or the beta release, though). Sony uses some non-standard audio encoding and XML metadata files. Nothing major, though.

RX10-II users - can anyone give me a rundown of codecs?

 

[kaylee]

(I shoot a lot of Nikon DSLR and I can open clips right from the card to preview in QT player, and drag my favorites to an MPEG Streamclip batch, very easy. My "event" cameras are Panasonics, where I have to go through log & transfer in FCP to get prores clips, similar to C300 footage, etc. Those are my two transcoding paths I use daily).

yeah youll have no problem doing that on a mac. none of that avchd bs. ive dealt w that in the past and i made sure to avoid it like the plague w this camera. files pop open w quicklook in your finder or in qt, audio and video work fine in fcpx. although.......

Resolve (at least 12 and for me) is a PITA. No audio unless you rewrap into .mov and after that I'm having major issues as well (might be Windows 10 or the beta release, though). Sony uses some non-standard audio encoding and XML metadata files. Nothing major, though.

i havent been saving those xml files are they something i need??   i was hoping that maybe if i ignored them theyd go away 

[agolex]

i havent been saving those xml files are they something i need??   i was hoping that maybe if i ignored them theyd go away 

I have no idea.  Couple of entries about the audio, video and stuff. Possibly time code related, too?

[mpies]

About the problem with AF in HFR: On 27.Oct.2015 a firmware update (V1.20) was released which should solve the problem. "This utility updates the camera firmware to version 1.20 to improve a focus shift condition with HFR (High Frame Rate) recording." it says on the Sony website.

Could you check up on this?

[kidzrevil]

On August 28, 2015 at 10:23 PM, Cinegain said:

Well, not for your enthusiast soccor mom/dad, the traveller and the streetphotog that want a somewhat compact all-in-one solution.

Besides, they make for great secondary cams as well?

Im extremely interested in picking this up as a second cam. Interchangeable lenses are cool but gets annoying for run n gun stuff where you have no shot list. I missed hella shots swapping lenses at events and concerts before, need something like this that can alleviate that issue for me