I love and hate the Sony fx3 let me explain why
I'm Rafael and welcome to the channel where our goal is to always fix it in camera and
then finesse it in post and I appreciate the early thumbs up because just being able to use
cameras is awesome I flipped and flopped back and forth on which camera to get to extend my
camera kit but ultimately I chose the fx3 it produces great images that are in line with
its Big Brothers the fx6 and the fx9 and plays nicely with them and from a hardware perspective
it's nearly identical to the a7s III except for the body and as of this recording I've had the
camera for about eight months now and have really put it through its Paces learning how to get the
best images from it I have the Canon c200 which is still a very nice camera for me but I wanted
something that was fill out the kit and add functionality that I wasn't getting already
so it was a long road to decide to get the fx3 as a supplement camera as it could do things that the
c200 C70 and R5 just could not do let's go over the things I love first it's so tiny and yet so
powerful for what it can capture this is one of the main reasons I wanted the fx3 compared to the
other cameras that can be rigged out to capture at this quality which is 4K that can go up to
120 frames a second or HD at 240 frames another big thing that my other cameras couldn't do or
the R5 really it's low light capabilities this camera is able to produce usable footage in some
of the hardest laging conditions and when you only have one chance to capture something this
is my go-to camera the Dual base ISO at 800 and 12 800 really do set the line between one style
shooting and another when you do get to 12800 the image cleans up and it stays fairly clean
in those ultra low light scenarios this is the first camera that I've personally owned that has
10 bit 422 color which I'm very used to working in post-production because I do work with a lot
of footage from Alexa's Reds the higher end Sony's and the higher end Canon cameras and
I actually wish that the c200 had 10 bit as well because I do notice the drop in quality another
great thing is the autofocus there are so many choices with autofocus you can really dial into
your shooting style to best suit your needs and now that Sony has updated the firmware it adds
so many new features like loading Luts for both preview and to burn into your footage there's a
new menu which makes it so much easier because that was actually one of the things that was
frustrating initially another big thing is having dual xlrs on the top handle I'm not a huge fan of
this design but having this able to connect wire free just to the hot shoe makes it really really
handy to keep the whole camera system really Compact and speaking of audio the 24-bit audio is
really nice to have my c200 doesn't have that it doesn't have 24-bit audio so it's a lot harder to
pull back some things that have been blown out a little bit and you can really fine tune the audio
in post-production I love having the aperture ring right on the lens it's very reminiscent of
the manual cameras that I started out with I love that this is the control you can visually see and
quickly adjust in a moment's notice and and on the G Master lenses I love having the focus hold
button it feels very intuitive especially when you're holding the camera and just push it down
with your thumb it's a great feature I love that about the G Master lenses the Dual dual card slots
I love having the choice to shoot on which format which cards and I have been in a scenario where I
needed to quickly buy extra cards because we weren't able to offload the footage quickly
enough to continue shooting the tally lights are a really nice feature because then you at a quick
glance you know if you're recording or not and on camera Talent really likes it for the exact same
reason I love that there are two record buttons right on the top and one right in the front so
depending on how you rig out the camera or where you're positioned on it you can always have access
to a record button and I know it's been done to death talking about the multiple mounting points
it's such a great feature to have on this camera to keep it as small as possible you can mount
stuff to it without having to add an extra cage again keeping it tiny that's the whole point with
this camera is to keep it as small as possible I did get the small rig half cage it adds all the
little things to the camera that I feel I need to rig it out for the best handheld performance this
next one may not seem like a big deal but having a full HDMI too often I've been on set and need
to buy a longer HDMI or a new one and the full HDMI is super easy to find in most places so
good job Sony for that one and another one that doesn't seem like a big thing but is actually
quite awesome is the power over USBC or to be able to use the fx3 as a webcam over USBC while
still powering it with one cable and over the USBC you can transfer the footage off of the camera at
high speeds without having to have a dongle and a huge thing that I love about the camera is the
images that it produces the images that come out of this camera are fantastic and they can
be pushed and pulled to match nearly everything it did take me a little bit to get comfortable
with the footage coming out of it to match it to my other cameras but once I got that dialed
in this camera produces some of the best images that I've worked with with my personal cameras so
there are obviously things that I love about the camera and now these are some of the things that
drive me a bit batty with this camera and dare I say almost make me hate it I know I talked about
autofocus earlier and how it was great to have so many options but the autofocus and focus breathing
you really have to dial in the settings to get it where it doesn't feel like it's really noticeable
because I know it's there I feel like I noticed it so much more and I can't seem to find a way
to just get rid of it no matter how hard I adjust the settings I can always see the background doing
this pulsing action that focused breathing really drives me nuts and the a74 got an update where it
had Focus breathing compensation which I hope they would add in the firmware but they didn't
again something that is frustrating another thing that was frustrating was the fx3 wasn't supposed
to overheat but there is an overheating setting that you needed to set right from the bat but
with the latest firmware update it does ask you right from the onset if you want to turn it on so
good job on fixing that one because I was filming a project with it and the camera overheated and
I had to wait for it to to cool down before I could start again which really caught me off
guard and with the firmware update the menu has been improved but I still feel like I have to
search around to find what I'm looking for in the settings now this may be just user error and user
experience and I just need more time with it but it's still fairly annoying currently and because I
have both cameras it's hard not to compare colors with the Canon now I know that this is 100 a user
issue but it's a thing that I still find trying to match footage from One camera to the other
especially if I'm doing two separate angles in a lighting condition that I don't have control over
in a very controlled setting like this one it's easy to match when I get into larger spaces with
natural light or lighting conditions that I don't have control over I know that it's going to become
a little bit more work in post-production to match those two angles this one is just annoying
I would love to be able to mount the mics that I have into this but for some reason it seems that
Sony has only made it for Sony microphones the hole is too big for microphones that I have so
I have to either jail rig it or not use it at all I wish there was an easy way to take it off
without making it look janky but maybe that's for another video I have found that many of the
accessories are still hard to find especially the hot shoe mic it's back ordered for a while
with supply chain issues and all the such another frustration is not being able to switch over from
video to photo mode very quickly and easily and repeatedly it's one of the things I love about
the Canon EOS R is that with one button you can go from photo mode right into video mode I wish
there was the same functionality with the fx3 the next thing is the screen it is so bad in
bright environments it's nearly impossible to see and make out what you are actually capturing
with any kind of confidence you can get around this by using an external High bright monitor
but the flippy screen does feel flimsy and makes me nervous using it all the way open especially
seeing how many other people just had it snap off at the hinge and because the screen isn't
that great having no evf is a big frustration for me and I didn't think that it would be an issue at
all but in daylight an evf will be great to check Focus or framing especially for photos it's really
really hard to see what you're capturing and one of my personal biggest frustrations with it is
that as a Canon user I have many lenses that don't perform well on the fx3 and I don't want
to swap over my entire collection to Sony just yet so I'm mostly sticking true to my don't buy
a camera by a brand model which I explained fully in this video also I live stream on my
second Channel where I deep dive on the creative process as well as freelance financials so make
sure you check that out hit the like button subscribe and as always thanks for watching