Sony CX730/740/760 info centre

[MombasaFlash]

The CX730 has arrived - I cannot find the 740 - and, apart from the entertaining dancing lens I am still waiting to be impressed. Of course the Touch Screen is a blasphemy but worse is that the manual options are limited. It appears to have only priority modes, i.e. the shutter speed can be set OR the iris can be set but not both at the same time. As soon as the fiddly push button/ wheel at the front is moved to another parameter the previous one is returned to Auto. Same in the menus. If the Shutter Speed is set to 50, for example, and then the Iris value is changed, the Shutter Speed gets returned to Auto.

A question to those who have experience with any of these cameras. Is this the same with the CX740 and the CX760? Do they also have only Priority Shooting modes or do they have a full manual control option?

 

[ZAxis]

Hi there. The 740 & 760 are the same camera internally but they just have an added amount of built in memory 32Gb & 94Gb.
You are right about the controls though as you can only set either the shutter or iris on manual at any one point & the lack of F stop numbers leaves it as a bit of a guessing game. I usually run mine with the iris set on manual so the changes between sky & land can be be controlled a little better.
I think you'll find it's a great camera for AP & the composite out certainly makes things alot more simple as we have had the same games as yourself with a HDMI converted with an NEx5. For the money though I don't think it can be beaten!
Lec

 

[MombasaFlash]

Tests finished. The CX730 is going back.

It does not improve significantly on ANYTHING that the GH2 has to offer - apart from a more pleasing colour balance straight out of the camera in the 1080p25 mode. Otherwise, just like the Nex 5, the image is generally soft compared to the GH2 and the 1080p50 option drastically washes out the colour. It also actually loses fine definition. The BOSS stabilisation DOES soak up more Pan and Tilt movement than any other OIS that I have tried but the lack of Roll stabilisation cannot hide a wobbly horizon.

The painful Touch Screen menu access is ... painful ... and the ridiculously limited manual options are ... ridiculous. The availability of remote zoom is a plus point but if all the above boxes are not ticked, who needs a zoom? It also conforms to the current fashion of in-camera battery charging, rather than a separate charger - how stupid - and the lens hood cannot be used at the same time as filters. This means either expose the lens to the elements, and have the devil's own job of trying to clean it inside the automatic shutters which are only open when the camera is turned on, or use filters and protect the lens but be plagued by lens flare the whole time.

A typically lacking and frustrating consumer camera.

Overall score: 6/10

 

[Droider]

More info

 

[E-Copter]

Tests finished. The CX730 is going back.

It does not improve significantly on ANYTHING that the GH2 has to offer - apart from a more pleasing colour balance straight out of the camera in the 1080p25 mode. Otherwise, just like the Nex 5, the image is generally soft compared to the GH2 and the 1080p50 option drastically washes out the colour. It also actually loses fine definition. The BOSS stabilisation DOES soak up more Pan and Tilt movement than any other OIS that I have tried but the lack of Roll stabilisation cannot hide a wobbly horizon.

The painful Touch Screen menu access is ... painful ... and the ridiculously limited manual options are ... ridiculous. The availability of remote zoom is a plus point but if all the above boxes are not ticked, who needs a zoom? It also conforms to the current fashion of in-camera battery charging, rather than a separate charger - how stupid - and the lens hood cannot be used at the same time as filters. This means either expose the lens to the elements, and have the devil's own job of trying to clean it inside the automatic shutters which are only open when the camera is turned on, or use filters and protect the lens but be plagued by lens flare the whole time.

A typically lacking and frustrating consumer camera.

Overall score: 6/10

Hi,

i agree with some comments, but i have to say that i'm more comfortable with multirotors technology than camera settings and tech ology and so far, the 740 CX gave me out of the box in an easy way what i needed. I have no doubt the GH2 is better but only if operated ( on my opinion) by someone who knows really about how to fine tune things.

Now a small thing to note :

BOSS is very powerful and if you get some details missing in 50P, most of the time it's because you have small vibrations / wobbles on the gimbal. This causes a kind of mini motion blurr and you miss many details on trees and stuffs like that. But with a proper gimbal , without vibrations, you get really good results. I would not be able to tell about colors ( i don't know anything about these stuffs) but definitly details are really impressive when the camera is mounted on a solid gimbal. Roll and tilt stabilisation are the duty of the gimbal and it's stabilisation, and such camera will give it's best results only with a solid gimbal setup. BOSS will help to catch back small hick ups, especially in the wind and will smoothen panoramas at low and medium speed. No camera can corect mechanical vibrations or problems that are not cured at their sources.

My personal feeling after testing the CX 740 ( 32 GB memory) is that the camera forgives many small things that a reflex camera can't help with, but will be limited in it's quality by it's " consumer" settings when you can have access to a really different world with a Reflex camera like the GH2, even more with it's hacks, but the smallest trouble in flight will make you loose maybe the scene...

Anyway, i like the 740 CX a lot, i use also the 550D with the Magic lantern firmware but i had better results with the CX 740 because of my lack of camera settings knowledge.

Regarding filters and lenses, with a bit of carbon and imagination, all can be worked out

Best regards,

Fabien

 

[Macsgrafs]

MF, have you tried the Panasonic X900M? It has FULL manual settings, built in 32GB memory & roll,pan & tilt stabilisation? Colours not quite as rich as the Sony, but sharper & easily worked on in premiere etc.

Ross

 

[DucktileMedia]

Having played with the xm700 I think it wouldnt work well on a heli. I think they use digital stabilization which means it tracks points. This works amazingly well for a handheld shot. I zoomed that thing fully in to some windmills a mile out and handheld it, it looked like it was on a tripod. BUT! the problem is when you pan, it tries to keep the points of interest in frame, when they go out of frame it jumps. So for a heli shot that is constantly moving around it wouldn't be ideal. but maybe they have improved this on later models. I'm still torn between the cx760 and waiting for the GH3. I agree with what MF said but he also knows what the hell he is doing and probably has a well tuned gimbal. I dont think it's ever the right thing to "band-aid" your problems with a super stabilized camera but at the same time, if it yields great results, who cares how you do it. Personally I would rather have a well tuned gimbal with the GH3 as it will work very well for stills and will give you much less compressed, moire free, sharp imagery. It's gonna be time to clear out our dslrs pretty soon. I sure wish Canon could get on the 60p mirror-less bandwagon as I love canon glass.

 

[MombasaFlash]

MF, have you tried the Panasonic X900M?...

I did. I cannot remember all the reasons I did not want to keep it now. I remember appreciating the soft, filmic look of the image after the first test but I also remember how the inaccessibility of the a/v out annoyed me. I remember being prepared to be blown away by the 5-axis Hybrid OIS, but I wasn't. At the time I was looking for a lighter alternative to the 5D. The Sony Nex 5n is a cute little camera and lots of folks are more than happy with them but somehow it just didn't rock my boat so, as I am primarily interested in video, I decided to stop experimenting with video capable stills cameras and went back to trying camcorders.

Overall I think I would probably take the CX730 over the X900 because the BOSS stabilisation is more effective than the Hybrid OIS, even if it is only two axis, and the a/v output is not hidden behind the screen. It is on the other side of the camera, albeit via an awkward proprietary connector.

In the end I went back to ILC's and I am quite happy with the GH2 - for the time being, because it too has some infuriating shortcomings.

The Nex kit is available if anyone is interested. Both lenses with filters and spare batteries.

 

[E-Copter]

Hi MB,

i did not notice that you were like me from the Froggies country ))

Regarding the CX 740, i noted that most picture imprecision / blurr was generated by 2 main things :

- Center of gravity on the tilt support: had to work it out and remove all backslash to get a proper picture
- Roll servo quality / stabilisation : that one caused me lot of troubles and i had to test several silicone / neoprened / wire rope dampeners before i found the right one. PIcture is absolutly different since, much more " fine " i would say, especially in the tree panorama and stuffs. This is where came the limit of BOSS Stabilisation on the roll axis, for everything else it corrects almost everything
- Pan: this is the defect of the BOSS system : if you pan ( panorama) too fast, the lens will compensate and "pan" itself to counteract and will then bump at the mechanical limits of the lens, then come back to center and restart. By giving a bit of dual rate for the Yaw ( i use 2 axis gimbal) and reduce yaw speed, i finaly got good panoramas witout small hickups or blurring every 2 seconds

That said, i'm really very very impressed with the GH2 camera results i see on the internet, but i would not be able to set it up correctly i guess lol !

BEst regards and see you maybe on a multirotor meeting

Fabien

 

[nicwilke]

I have my eye on this 'googly' eyed little camera, but am yet to test my Canon Xf100 on my XM-6. They are completely different cameras, but I'm thinking since my gimbal is setting up quite nicely, I'll do some tests soon. I think for price, the CX730/40/60 are great. I wish there was a cheaper version as I dont need the fancy projector on the screen.... I'm still interested in this camera, I think I want to sell my NEX-5n with the twin lens kit and get a CX...

 

[E-Copter]

Hi,

The CX series do not have the " fancy" projector, these are the " PJ" series that have it

For example, i have the HDR-CX740VE, the version with projector is HDR-PJ740VE

The Small CX 250 and 350 are good little cameras also but sabilisation is not very good for multirotors, the 700 / 730 / 740 / 760 only have the Balanced OPtical steadyshot, with really moving lens, on the smaller versins like 250 / 350 it seems it's some kind of moving screen between the lens and the cmos thing or something like that ?

Best regards,

Fabien

 

[Macsgrafs]

Thanks for the replies gents, that answered me about the 900, yes it does seem to hold,then pan quick..then hold & so on & so on. soo the 900 hasnt changed from the 700 in that respect. Shame because as you said, hand held its one hell of a vid cam!
Maybe its GH2 time or the hack for the 7D will be out any day, its in trials now so hopefully 50/60FPS as well

Ross

 

[nicwilke]

Thanks for the replies gents, that answered me about the 900, yes it does seem to hold,then pan quick..then hold & so on & so on. soo the 900 hasnt changed from the 700 in that respect. Shame because as you said, hand held its one hell of a vid cam!
Maybe its GH2 time or the hack for the 7D will be out any day, its in trials now so hopefully 50/60FPS as well

Ross

What 7D hack? inerested.

 

[nicwilke]

Hi,

The CX series do not have the " fancy" projector, these are the " PJ" series that have it

For example, i have the HDR-CX740VE, the version with projector is HDR-PJ740VE

The Small CX 250 and 350 are good little cameras also but sabilisation is not very good for multirotors, the 700 / 730 / 740 / 760 only have the Balanced OPtical steadyshot, with really moving lens, on the smaller versins like 250 / 350 it seems it's some kind of moving screen between the lens and the cmos thing or something like that ?

Best regards,

Fabien

Fabien, Have you any sample video from your camera? I'm wanting to buy the CX740VE, and will most likely sell off the NEX-5n and a small panasonic handycam to assist in buying it.

 

[Macsgrafs]

What 7D hack? inerested.

http://www.magiclantern.fm/

 

[MombasaFlash]

Thanks for the replies gents, that answered me about the 900, yes it does seem to hold,then pan quick..then hold & so on & so on....

Whilst you are still in a quandary and before you splash out, I might add that the GH2 is the smoothest 'panner' I have yet come across. OIS systems in general do not handle pan movements well (other than small handheld shake stuff) because of their tendency to lock onto a POI and hold it until they are forced to let go and then jump to another one and hold it until it is forced to let go etc. etc. resulting in a very stroboscopic, stuttering image that is even worse than old westerns. The system that Panasonic calls 'mega OIS' is very forgiving and OIS enabled pans are the smoothest I have ever come across. There are three Levels of 'mega OIS' available but the camera restricts this to Level 1 when in Movie Mode.

Perhaps Panasonic have taken all the above into account and limited the OIS sensitivity in the pan axis for Level 1 and then restricted access to the other Levels in Movie Mode so that users don't get carried away with over sensitive settings and produce rubbish movies.

 

[MombasaFlash]

More info

Dave, your PM message box is full. I cannot reply.

 

[E-Copter]

Hi,

i have several videos, but they were for testing purpose on the beta navigation board i'm testing actually more than for recording movies )))

Here is one with a close view on structures when making smoothness control adjustment for flight:

The micro stepping effet is because of the H264 encoding, but i can take a raw sequence and upload it on my FTP for you in the afternoon,

BEst regards

Fabien

 

[snurre]

More info

Hi Droider,
Could you please write town the part number on that wide angle adapter and lens hood from Amazon?
Thanks / Tomas

 

[snurre]

Droider, one more question.
Do you often find it desireable to shoot using the wide angle adapter? And when you do, dont you get problems with motor arms coming into the camera view?

I have been producing some footage with the CX740 and despite the issues mentioned I find it easy and forgiving to use in AP. The BOSS certainly helps.