Sony A7C vs GH5/6

Hi all,

does anyone have experience with the Sony A7C for underwater shooting, also compared to a Panasonic GH5/6? Do you recommend to buy such one?

Kind regards,

Christoph

27 minutes ago, Christoph said:

Hi all,

does anyone have experience with the Sony A7C for underwater shooting, also compared to a Panasonic GH5/6? Do you recommend to buy such one?

Kind regards,

Christoph

It would probably be helpful to detail what sort of shooting you might like to do - macro or wide angle?  What sort of video - 4k? frames/sec for slow motion etc. What sort of lenses are are you considering? - working back from the lens/dome combination may help with your decision. 

Primarily for shooting videos underwater and above water. Maybe with the Nauticam WWL1 lens or the macro CMC1-converter. Videos up to 60p in 4k. How is the white balance and colors compared to a Panasonic? The advantage is that this would be a rather compact system which also has IBIS.

In YouTube I cannot find many samples of underwater videography with the Sony a7c. If you have some links it would be helpful. In the internet I found this review: https://reefphoto.com/blogs/trending/the-sony-a7c-underwater-shooting-full-frame-in-a-half-size-housing

I don't have any links to UW video.  A few people here have shot stills with it but I haven't seen any video.

I would note that the A7C can only do 4K 30p, 30p results in a 1.2x crop while 24p uses the full sensor width.  It only does 8 bit output as well.

Also Sony recently announced it is suspending A7C production due to chip shortages.

Would you go for a full frame camera or stick to Micro FourThird for underwater like the GH series?

On 2/22/2022 at 9:46 AM, Christoph said:

Hi all,

does anyone have experience with the Sony A7C for underwater shooting, also compared to a Panasonic GH5/6? Do you recommend to buy such one?

Kind regards,

Christoph

When you read reviews of digital camera for video there are usually few key metrics

1. Useable dynamic range (SNR)
2. Rolling shutter

3. Latitude (over / under exposure resistance)

4. Codecs

Many cameras can cover 1 quite well but may fail miserably all the others. Point 2 rolling shutter is not that important in static scenes but if for example you have waves it shows

Latitude is always important for wide angle shots but the single most important feature are 10 bits codec. Camera that have 8 bits highly compressed codec need to have it totally right in camera or there is not much you can fix

If you want to look at a good Sony camera look no further than the A7S3 it has many interesting features. Skip the A6XXXX and A7XXX they lack the codecs and have terrible rolling shutter  and bad codecs. 

There are many good options to take photos but video is a totally different game and other consideration apply more than simple IQ of a static scene

Canon EOS R6 is another good option as well as Panasonic S1H

In the cinema segment there are also interesting options like BMPC4K and ZCAM. THe BMPCC4K needs a power and hard drive solution and is not stabilised but has nice IQ the zcam is very nice but needs a monitor and its housing

And of course the GH5 now at mark II which has the benefit of not requiring any extras and being able to run with a fairly simple set up this camera does well in all points 1-4 

Dear Interceptor121,

I rented the Sony a7c (will like to buy new GH6) and used the camera first dive with WWL1 wet lens and m8000 lights with blue/ambient filters. I also used Keldan S2 red filter on wet lens.

- do you recommend to use red filter for videos?

- when setting custom white balance using whibal grey card the videos get reddish, this is not the case when using existing white balance setting for underwater in the menu, especially when using the lights. The lights have ambient filter on them.

why does this happen? Do you have any tip?

i can post video. Please see images here:

View archived post in: Custom White Balance - too reddish

thanks a lot,

Christoph 

On 2/25/2022 at 11:47 PM, Interceptor121 said:

When you read reviews of digital camera for video there are usually few key metrics

1. Useable dynamic range (SNR)
2. Rolling shutter

3. Latitude (over / under exposure resistance)

4. Codecs

Many cameras can cover 1 quite well but may fail miserably all the others. Point 2 rolling shutter is not that important in static scenes but if for example you have waves it shows

Latitude is always important for wide angle shots but the single most important feature are 10 bits codec. Camera that have 8 bits highly compressed codec need to have it totally right in camera or there is not much you can fix

If you want to look at a good Sony camera look no further than the A7S3 it has many interesting features. Skip the A6XXXX and A7XXX they lack the codecs and have terrible rolling shutter  and bad codecs. 

There are many good options to take photos but video is a totally different game and other consideration apply more than simple IQ of a static scene

Canon EOS R6 is another good option as well as Panasonic S1H

In the cinema segment there are also interesting options like BMPC4K and ZCAM. THe BMPCC4K needs a power and hard drive solution and is not stabilised but has nice IQ the zcam is very nice but needs a monitor and its housing

And of course the GH5 now at mark II which has the benefit of not requiring any extras and being able to run with a fairly simple set up this camera does well in all points 1-4 

2 hours ago, Christoph said:

Dear Interceptor121,
I rented the Sony a7c (will like to buy new GH6) and used the camera first dive with WWL1 wet lens and m8000 lights with blue/ambient filters. I also used Keldan S2 red filter on wet lens.
- do you recommend to use red filter for videos?
- when setting custom white balance using whibal grey card the videos get reddish, this is not the case when using existing white balance setting for underwater in the menu, especially when using the lights. The lights have ambient filter on them.
why does this happen? Do you have any tip?
i can post video. Please see images here:
thanks a lot,
Christoph 
 

Sony has historically had issues with custom white balance underwater
I would hope the situation has improved but perhaps not
One of many reasons why I don’t particularly want to go back to sony for video
Just checked the a7C does not even have 10 bits video and considering it does not white balance well I would look at something else


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24 minutes ago, Interceptor121 said:

Sony has historically had issues with custom white balance underwater
I would hope the situation has improved but perhaps not
One of many reasons why I don’t particularly want to go back to sony for video
Just checked the a7C does not even have 10 bits video and considering it does not white balance well I would look at something else


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Thanks a lot for your answer, very much appreciated. With just ambient light it is ok, but with video light (ambient filters) the situation is worse as depicted. Should the video light also shine on the grey card? But that is not easy as video light do not have the angle to directly highlight grey card in 20cm distance.

Thanks!

3 minutes ago, Christoph said:

Thanks a lot for your answer, very much appreciated. With just ambient light it is ok, but with video light (ambient filters) the situation is worse as depicted. Should the video light also shine on the grey card? But that is not easy as video light do not have the angle to directly highlight grey card in 20cm distance.

Thanks!

 

Ambient light idea is to white balance that of course works if the camera white balances properly

It is also a very advanced topic you should start with something simpler where white balance works in ambient light and not white balance with the lights forget filters to start with

I am running a boat this summer if you want to learn there will be other videographers on it and one actually does have a sony camcorder (not camera)

3 minutes ago, Interceptor121 said:

Ambient light idea is to white balance that of course works if the camera white balances properly

It is also a very advanced topic you should start with something simpler where white balance works in ambient light and not white balance with the lights forget filters to start with

I am running a boat this summer if you want to learn there will be other videographers on it and one actually does have a sony camcorder (not camera)

Do you do white balance just with ambient light or also video light? Can you post a link tongue boat trip?

thanks 

3 hours ago, Christoph said:

Do you do white balance just with ambient light or also video light? Can you post a link tongue boat trip?

 

thanks 

With lights you have the color provided by the lights provided you are close enough

I think you are already subscribed to my blog the trip is on the top banner

http://interceptor121.com

There's been discussion on this topic in the past.  The general theme is the filters on your lens and on you lights need to "match"and they only do so in a fairly narrow depth range.  For it to work your camera needs to be able to ambient white balance at the depth your shooting if not it'll never work.  See this post:

View archived post in: Combining Custom Ambient light filters and Lens Red filters

Yes I think the blue filters on the lights are not strong enough and I have to exchange them.

@Interceptor121 would you recommend to buy a Sony a7 iii s or s gh6 for videos? On Land there is the trend towards full frame cameras. However I do not like to spend so much money on the camera so the gh6 would be in budget. Are there already any tests for the gh6 underwater regarding white balance, dynamic range etc? Will it be as good as gh5?

1 hour ago, Christoph said:

Yes I think the blue filters on the lights are not strong enough and I have to exchange them.

@Interceptor121 would you recommend to buy a Sony a7 iii s or s gh6 for videos? On Land there is the trend towards full frame cameras. However I do not like to spend so much money on the camera so the gh6 would be in budget. Are there already any tests for the gh6 underwater regarding white balance, dynamic range etc? Will it be as good as gh5?

The GH5M2 fits in the original GH5 housing of which there will be a second hand market

The GH6 housing is not released yet and will cost more than the A7S3 

Generally the A7S3 is a pure video option while the GH series are hybrid cameras so take photos too

On land there will be little use for the A7S3 at 12 megapixels as that is the resolution of your phone

You need to consider from your point of view what makes sense, how much money you want to spend and your overall use case

Thanks, is there any way to compare video of this Sony and gh6, are they comparable? 

There is some very nice video being posted from GH5 some of the best being Bugdreamer, I quite liked the couple of films on Halmahera diving.  I'm sure you'd find some A7SIII coverage somewhere, but his shooting really is first class and it's hard to see how you could better it.  You won't find much GH6 footage yet at least not underwater.

https://www.bugdreamer.com/4k-films

17 hours ago, Christoph said:

Thanks, is there any way to compare video of this Sony and gh6, are they comparable? 

There are some online comparisons in terms of latitude. 

I would say for what concerns performance Sony white balance and colors have been historically problematic so Panasonic has a better overall IQ

However if you depend on autofocus (underwater only required for certain close up work) Sony has a clear edge

I am not a fan of low resolution cameras they are a legacy of the past and provide negative benefits

If I had to really choose a full frame camera I would get a Canon R5 at least you have something that is more versatile

Well if Interceptor 121 is saying he would get an R5 (R5C?) then it seems an R5 is the machine to go for. I get the feeling Interceptor 121 knows his stuff in this area.