- So Sony has always been known
for checking off an
amazing amount of boxes
when it comes to the
specs on their cameras,
and the camera we have
today is no exception.
(upbeat funky music)
Today we have the Sony FX9.
(chill jazzy music)
Ooh, the layout's quite nice.
Okay, so what do we
have in here, let's see.
We have the grip,
which has been known on the
FS7 and the FS7 Mark II.
So it just goes on the side of the camera,
we'll see the camera in a second.
But they've also added
the additional extension feature here,
which is a little bit more robust
than the previous one.
Yeah, so they gave us a single
charger and a dual charger
for the single battery that they gave us.
This is Sony's standard BPU90 battery,
which is the battery that they use
across the FS5, the FS7, and the FX9,
so it's commonplace to use these.
If you own an FS7 or an FS5
and you're thinking about
having an FX9 as an upgrade
or maybe a new A cam
and then making your FS7 a B cam,
it's nice because it uses the same battery
so you don't have to buy a bunch of these,
'cause these are not cheap.
We have an AC adapter here,
and then here is the
monitor and the EVF loupe.
And this monitor is touchscreen.
Now I haven't used the FS7
extensively in my career,
but as far as I remember,
it's not touchscreen on that camera.
If I'm wrong about that,
correct me in the comments.
Now I remember using a similar
EVF loupe with the FS700
back in the day when we
still had that camera.
Comparing it to that in my head,
they seemed to have
improved this quite a bit,
but I will get the chance to test it
on my shoulder in a second.
Here is the standard monitor
that comes with the FX9.
It's on the tiny side,
but that is honestly fairly commonplace
for a camera that is both
a medium to large size
but also compact enough to still take
on a long trip.
So this is Sony's 28 to 135mm F4 lens,
which is a very good complement
to something like the FX9 or the FS7,
because it's got such a long range.
F4 is pretty standard
for a lens in this range
and still good enough for,
especially if you're
shooting primarily outdoors.
And the nice thing about this
is it has a built-in servo
so that you can control the lens's zoom
from this rocker right here
and not have to have that
standard ENG motor setup
where you'd have the zoom
rocker here on the lens,
which is pretty cool.
And then there's this push-pull,
very satisfying push-pull for focus.
So this will be AF and manual adjustment,
and then this is a full manual adjustment,
which feels quite a bit smoother,
and I like it.
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This also has image stabilization,
which is again why it's a great complement
for an all-around lens,
especially if you're
shooting sports or something.
Oh, look at that, they
did send more batteries.
This is the FX9 itself.
It's about 4.41 pounds,
based on what the specs
on Sony's website say.
Feels really good in the hand,
like, it doesn't too feel heavy,
feels like it might be
fairly well-balanced.
Because it would sit on your shoulder,
it's designed to sit on your shoulder
kind of on the front end,
it's not the best balance,
'cause ideally you want the
balance point to be level,
and you want equal amounts
distribution of weight
from the front to the back,
and that way you're
not fighting the camera
in any one direction.
Let's take a look.
(upbeat jazzy music)
Look at that.
Now it is unfortunate
that it's a 6K sensor
that you can't use at 6K,
but it's also a full-frame sensor,
so I'm not that surprised
that you can't use it at 6K,
and Sony's using the fact that it is 6K
to allow you to downsample
your footage down to 4K
and make it that much
more detailed and sharper
and have more color information
when you downsample.
That's their approach for now.
I don't know that there is going to be
an ability to shoot 6K
either externally or
internally on Sony's end,
but to be fair to Sony,
this camera is not meant
to be the highest-end
thing that they make.
On Sony's end, I sort of understand
why they justified not making it
so that you could record 6K internally.
It probably was, on an engineering level,
a difficult thing to do.
But they also have the Venice,
and the Venice is their
highest end flagship
that will shoot 6K internally
and is made for movies.
So that is the camera
and that is the answer
if you really need that resolution.
On this side, we have two audio inputs
which have phantom power, that's awesome.
You have on the back
the standard STI timecode, gen lock,
all that kinda stuff.
On the bottom, there's a very thin
silicone adjustable shoulder
pad, battery compartment,
and then we have our
dual media card slots.
(piece hits floor)
That came out too easily.
These are Sony's XQD cards.
This is the media that
they've chose to use
with the FX9 and the FS7.
Any FS7 owners will probably
have plenty of these.
They're not that cheap,
but, I mean, no media
is really that cheap,
because you wanna media that's reliable.
It's just kind of unfortunate to this day
to still see Sony going with
their own proprietary media
from the majority of
their higher-end cameras.
This records 10-bit, 4:2:2 internally,
and that's at 6K with
the full-frame sensors.
That honestly is pretty good.
This seems to be about the same
as Sony's ENG-style,
very similar to the FS7.
So anyone who's used those cameras
is gonna be very at home here.
So I have used E-mount plenty,
but this is just strange.
You have to undo the
lock so that these align,
and then you just line
up the lens with the pin,
hold it there
while you turn the lock.
I didn't find that to be super intuitive,
'cause it feels weird to
need to hold the lens there
to make sure that it doesn't fall off
until you've locked it.
I mean, and the nice thing
is when you unlock it,
there's this little catch here,
so that you can't just unlock it
and then your lens'll fall off.
But once you hit the
release and you unlock it,
the lens just comes off.
Don't like that.
This has gotten significantly heavier.
Let's see how it feels on the shoulder.
The cable tip for the handle is micro USB.
What?
Nice thing is that the grip
is the way it always has been.
It has this nice adjustable
little trigger here.
Wow, honestly,
the old focus hand here.
I definitely feel like,
even with the extension
and the right angle,
you could very easily have
this arm that holds the grip
get quite tired throughout the day,
but it is well-placed and
the design is pretty good.
But again, yeah, once you feel
all of the weight is on
the furthest part forward
and you're not quite balanced,
so you'd wanna be able
to find the solution
that allows you to get the camera
a little bit further
back on your shoulder,
and you'll have a happier
time for long shoots.
So now that we have it built up,
one of the features that I
wanna talk about really quickly,
and probably one of the
biggest features on this camera
besides the fact that it has
a full-frame, 35mm sensor,
is it's variable ND.
And it's not just the variable ND
that they put in the FS5.
It has another feature,
it has an auto feature.
So that allows you to go
from inside to outside
without needing to change
your aperture or your ISO,
so not compromising on
either of those things,
but then still getting
very seamless exposure
from very large differences
from inside to outside,
which again, for people
who shoot documentary
or anything run-and-gun,
and like the stuff that we would do,
where we have to sometimes
go from outside to inside,
that would be a very, very useful feature.
The other nice thing that they've added
is the S-Cinetone,
which is the same color profile
that is derived from the Venice.
So you'll get similar Venice
colors out of this camera,
which, for the price point,
this camera is $11,000 US.
Okay, now that that's over with,
let's show you guys some footage.
(upbeat chill music)
(water glunking)
(birds chirping)
(truck engine running)
(birds chirping)
So overall,
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Sony has a winner here.
They took everything that
was good about the FS7
and just made it into a full-frame camera
at a relatively affordable price.
Not cheap, but considering the performance
and the image that you
can get out of this thing
and how easy it is to use,
the dual native ISO, the auto ND,
the fact that it has audio,
the ergonomics of it, good job Sony.
I would, if I shot documentaries,
buy one of these.
Unfortunately, I don't,
but for all the people who do,
let me know in the comments
if this is the type of
camera that you'd wanna use.
Thanks for watching.
