Sony CX700

The Sony CX700 has arrived as an upgrade from the CX550. In my experience, the CX550 has been an excellent underwater camcorder, with a good balance of size and quality.

http://www.sonystyle.com/webapp/wcs/stores...552921666294237

As far as I can see from the specs, the main improvements in the CX700 over the 550 are:

• 50% more internal memory
  
• Ability to record in 1080p60 (progressive, not interlaced)
  

The main negatives, as I understand from reading a couple of reviews, are:

• Slightly smaller viewer
  
• No "my menu" function
  
• Some reduction in steady-shot performance (from early review)
  

Apart from these, the CX550 and CX700 are almost identical.

L&M (and others) are working on a housing, probably an upgrade from their CX550 housing. I am guessing that L&M might make an upgrade kit for people who own 550 housings, given that they promoted this possibility when the 550 was released.

The no "my menu" change will be a hassle because, underwater, that was a quick way to get to some useful functions. The L&M arms use the "my menu" feature to do one-press manual white balance. They'll need to find an alternative.

However, my basic question is whether the one key feature of the CX700, 1080p60, is a big enough benefit to go to the cost and effort of upgrading camera and housing. Deinterlacing is a pain. It takes hours and hours of Compressor time to get it right. It'd be great not to have to do that anymore. I assume the resulting work would be better quality. But, better enough to justify the switchover of camera?

Thoughts?

Regards

Peter

hours and hours will supposedly become seconds and seconds with the new FCP X, so why bother?

At least I would wait until June...

It's quite a nice camcorder, but as I mentioned in another thread, the av-r protocol seems to have changed a bit compared to the CX550, so that apparently you can't input lanc and output av simultaneously. Could be a problem with some electronic housings. I had a pair but had to exchange them for cx550s as they would work in the bskinetics 3d housing.

my main reason for getting them was the 60p. From the camcorderinfo review it seems like most of the image quality improvements over the cx550 are quite marginal.

hours and hours will supposedly become seconds and seconds with the new FCP X, so why bother?

At least I would wait until June...

Joking right?

I don't that anything that is done to FCP would bring de-interlacing down to much less than today. De-interlacing is done in Compressor and is already using all the CPU power it can grab. It just takes time to run backwards and forwards to calculate the best de-interlacing compromise. A new 12 core MacPro would help but it'll still be hours...

Best way is to start with progressive footage right from capture.

Regards

Peter

It's quite a nice camcorder, but as I mentioned in another thread, the av-r protocol seems to have changed a bit compared to the CX550, so that apparently you can't input lanc and output av simultaneously. Could be a problem with some electronic housings. I had a pair but had to exchange them for cx550s as they would work in the bskinetics 3d housing.

my main reason for getting them was the 60p. From the camcorderinfo review it seems like most of the image quality improvements over the cx550 are quite marginal.

The guys at L&M are working on it.

I wouldn't know... I use FCE and JES deinterlacer... And it also takes hours and hours! After hours and hours of exporting... and after 1 min of rendering per second of video while editing!

Regarding the CX700, it is interesting that its 60p progressive mode uses "only" 28 Mbps versus 24 Mbps formally for the CX550's 60i interlaced mode. There is about twice the information (in theory), so either they drop some of it (compressing harder) or there is some very clever compression going on! The CX700 does not seem to have the high resolution 60i/24 Mbps interlaced mode anymore: I can only find a 24p/24Mbps (FX) and a 60i/17Mbps (FH). The CX550's FX mode (24 Mbps) seems to have be dropped in favor of the 24p mode...

Which one were you planning to use? 60p or 24p? The 60p seems to be a waste of bandwidth if you are outputting 30p, so why do they offer that in the first place (instead of 30p)? I suppose to answer the Panasonic challenge? So pointless...

I don't that anything that is done to FCP would bring de-interlacing down to much less than today. De-interlacing is done in Compressor and is already using all the CPU power it can grab. It just takes time to run backwards and forwards to calculate the best de-interlacing compromise. A new 12 core MacPro would help but it'll still be hours...

You should consider using JES deinterlacer, Graeme Nattress's deinterlace plugin or REvision Fieldskit. All do it faster than compressor at BETTER setting and as good if not better with more variables to tweak.

so why do they offer that in the first place (instead of 30p)? I suppose to answer the Panasonic challenge? So pointless...

If you have to ask that question then you don't need 60p for the smoother motion.

Not sure whether this will be an issue for other housings.

I've heard about the same problem with this camcorder with other housings. No solution for now

If you have to ask that question then you don't need 60p for the smoother motion.

I am not arguing with that. But you still have to drop half of the frames for playback unless the idea is to have a slomo effect.

Since (at least I was under this impression) most underwater action (and shooting style) is slow paced and light starved, I would personally trade high frame rate for better exposure (i.e. better sensitivity).

My 1 ct.