Sony Alpha 7S for video - ???

G’day!

What do you think about SONY α7S for underwater video? Had anybody a chance to test it for this purpose? I'm especially interested in its low light performance: I'm filming a lot at 70+ MSW in Baltic sea with poor visibility, low light. Technical wreck diving and filming is my speciality. This is also why SONY α7S attracted my atention due to its compact design.

Compared with Canon 5D Mark III, how would you rank SONY α7S ? - again, I'm interested in video performance primarily, not in stills.

If you're shooting video, then you should wait until the review of 4K external recording with the A7S comes out. For 1080p, you can check it out here:

http://www.eoshd.com/content/13158/evolving-sony-a7s-review

But the day of 1080p will be over soon, so don't make your decision just base on quality 1080p, for such amount of investment, it should be future proof for the next 5 years, unless you make tons of money

I heard on one review that manual white balance was not possible while doing video with the A7S - if that's true I think it would be a deal breaker..

I heard on one review that manual white balance was not possible while doing video with the A7S - if that's true I think it would be a deal breaker..

My hand-on experience: In the Movie mode, A7S can perform all of the White Balance functions except Set CWB. The easy workaround is to set up to three CWB settings in P, S, A, or M and all three CWB settings will be accessible in the Movie mode. Hopefully, this little inconvenience will be corrected in the next firmware update. BTW, A7S also has an Auto Underwater WB function, but I don't know how well it works.

A7S Clarification:
Movie settings, including Set Custom White Balance, should be done in P, A, S, or M mode.
Turn the Mode Dial to Movie to choose whether to use P, A, S, or M settings for video.
With the Mode Dial left at the Movie position, Set CWB is grayed out, however, 3 CWB done in P, A, S, or M will still be selectable.

From my observation, the Sony A7S with its amazing low-light capabilities, FF IQ and DOF is becoming the preferred mirrorless 4K camera amongst professional filmmakers and the saving on lighting (purchasing, renting, transporting) can easily offset the cost of the external recorder. For now GH4 with internal 4K recording will be the preferred 4K camera amongst divers until Sony delivers internal 4K recording for A7S Mark 2 (??).

Since switching system is expensive, looking long term, the Sony mirrorless system has the most potential and more future proof, IMO.

When shooting with the A7S, for the S-log2 profile (similar to GH4's Cine-D I think), the minimal ISO that's allow is 3200. Go figure.

When shooting with the A7S, for the S-log2 profile (similar to GH4's Cine-D I think), the minimal ISO that's allow is 3200. Go figure.

According to Sony, S-Log2 ISO3200 is the optimal setting to deliver the widest (14+ stops) dynamic range. FWIW, EOSHD comparison stated that A7S ISO3200 looks like 5D3 ISO200 (near the middle of the review).

"ISO 12,800 on this camera looks like ISO 800 on the GH4. ISO 3200 looks like ISO 200 on the 5D Mark III"

If ISO 12,800 looks like ISO 800 on the GH4, does that mean a lower ISO on the GH4 yield a comparable noise quality compare to ISO 3200 on the A7S? 5DM3 is quite behind now so there is not point to compare to it when come to Video feature (Photo wise, 5DM3 still holds up well).

Also, rumor had it that an upcoming GH4 firmware update might allow it to have RAW recording on an external device. If it's true, which one is better? A7S Low light 4K recording on a Atomos Shogun, or GH4 RAW video on the Atomos Shogun. I think GH4 has 10-bit 4:2:2 output over the HDMI, better than the A7S...... all these spec started to become blur to me as I haven't look at their spec for a while.

I too am into deep wrecks. In my case in the Med and I am interested in both stills and video and I like ambient light whenever possible so the A7s looks very interesting. But I think 2k RAW video would be a lot more interesting than the 4k and I am wondering if the compressed Sony RAW stills would be a problem underwater. Apparently it's no problem on land but shooting underwater might reach its limits. Has anyone tried?