Sony Fs7 Owners Manual

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D. Preparing the camera and shooting
  1. Preparing to shoot  12
  2. The shutter and shutter speed  17
 3. Setting the gain or ISO 20
  4. White Balance in Custom Mode  23
  5. White Balance in Cine EI mode  24
  6. Exposure, Waveform and Histogram  25
  7. Aperture/Iris control  30
  8. The ND filter System  31
  9. Focus and Focus Aids  33
Section Index 
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D. Preparing the camera and shooting
D1. Preparing to shoot
After switching the camera on you may see a message 
saying “Execute APR”. This is not an error or malfunction. 
The APR function minimizes the appearance of bright or 
dark sensor pixels and minimizes sensor noise. 
Cover/cap the lens and press SEL/SET to execute the  
APR function. 
If you do not perform APR you will be reminded to 
perform APR the next time the camera is turned on. 
You should perform APR regularly to maintain the best 
possible image quality.
Choose the appropriate frame rate, frame size and 
recording codec for your production. 
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D. Preparing the camera and shooting
D1.1 Start by setting the country area. The country area 
setting determines which frame rates are available. 
Choose PAL Area to enable 50i/50p/25p, choose NTSC 
Area for 60i/60p/30p//23.98p/24p.
D1.2 Next choose the recording codec.  
(MENU: System – Codec - Select).  
The options available will depend on the whether you 
have the extension unit installed on the camera or not.
Recommendation: Use the XAVC-I codec. This codec 
offers the greatest frame rate flexibility combined with 
excellent image quality for HD, UHD and 4K. XAVC-L may 
be considered for situations where you do not have 
enough media for XAVC-I. MPEG HD 422 may be needed 
when only legacy edit systems are available. 
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D. Preparing the camera and shooting
MPEG HD 422: HD only, the same as the XDCAM 422 
codec, 8 bit, 422 at 50Mb/s. Good for news, quick turn-
around, small file size. Not best for heavy post production 
work or grading, Not recommended for use with S-Log2/3.
XAVC-I: HD/UHD/4K DCI. XAVC-I is always 10 bit 422. 
XAVC-I is normally the easiest version of XAVC to edit, 
requiring the least processing power. XAVC-I is the best 
choice for working with S-Log2/3. 
XAVC-L: HD/UHD XAVC-L is a long GOP codec offering 
similar image quality to XAVC-I but with a smaller 
file size. In HD it is 10bit 422. In UHD it is 8bit 422 (not 
recommended for S-Log2/3). 
In HD there 3 bit rate choices of 50, 35 and 25Mbps. 
50Mbps offers image quality comparable to XAVC-I. 
35Mbps is comparable to MPEG2 HD 422 50Mbps.  
25Mbps is suitable for corporate or other professional non 
broadcast applications.
XAVC-L requires more processing power in post 
production than XAVC-I, so a high performance  
computer is recommended. 
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D. Preparing the camera and shooting
ProRes (with XDCA-FS7 only): HD only. ProRes is a widely 
adapted codec originally developed by Apple for use in 
post production but now finding use as an acquisition 
codec. ProRes 422 HQ offers slightly higher quality than 
ProRes 422.
Raw (with XDCA-FS7 only): High quality external 
recording option that allow the recording of raw sensor 
data on a compatible external recorder.  
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D. Preparing the camera and shooting
D1.3 Now select the frame size/recording format and 
frame rate. The (MENU: System – Rec Format – Video 
Format) page is where you set the frame size and frame 
rate that will be the cameras base rate. The options 
available will depend on the country area and codec 
choice. 
1920x1080 = HD, 3840x2160 = UHD (the standard frame 
size for consumer 4K television), 4096x2160 = 4K DCI (the 
standard for 4K digital cinema). 
If you have chosen XAVC-L as well as frame size and frame 
rate you will also have a choice of different data rates for 
the 1920x1080 modes. These are 25, 30 and 50 Mb/s. 
50Mb/s is the highest quality and recommended for 
broadcast productions. 
Choose the operating mode.
Recommendation: Use Custom mode unless you 
understand the Cine EI operating mode.
Choose between Custom Mode or Cine EI Mode: 
(MENU: System – Base Settings – Shooting Mode).
The camera should now be ready to start shooting.  
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D. Preparing the camera and shooting
D2. Shutter Speed or Shutter Angle 
It is recommended that to avoid issues with flicker from 
some types of light fixtures that the shutter speed is 
set to a multiple of the local mains electricity frequency. 
Please check the mains frequency of the country you are 
shooting in to determine the most appropriate shutter 
speed. In a 50Hz country 1/50 or 1/100 is recommended. 
In a 60Hz country 1/60 or 1/120 is recommended.
D2.1 The shutter speed or shutter angle effects how 
motion is portrayed in the recordings. A very fast shutter 
will freeze rapid movements in each frame of the 
recording making them crisper but possibly adding judder 
or jitter. Too slow a shutter speed will result in blurred 
motion and handheld camera wobble can result in soft 
looking pictures. In addition a fast shutter speed reduces 
the amount of captured by the sensor.
The camera can display the shutter time period as either 
fractions of a second (shutter speed) or in degrees. In 
either case the operation of the shutter is identical, there 
is no difference in the quality of the images captured. 
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D. Preparing the camera and shooting
Shutter speed is the easiest to understand and is similar 
to how the shutter period would be expressed in a stills 
camera. With Shutter Speed the shutter timing remains 
fixed at the speed set even if you change the recording 
frame rate (unless the shooting frame rate is increased 
beyond the set shutter speed, in which case the shutter 
speed will become set to the slowest possible speed for 
the shooting rate chosen). 
The Shutter Angle setting mimics the way the shutter 
period of a movie film camera would be expressed. The 
shutter in a film camera is a spinning circular disc, part 
of which is cut away to allow light to fall on the film. The 
most commonly used shutter angle is 180 degrees, which 
is half of the 360 degrees of a full circle. So a 180 degree 
shutter on a film camera would allow light to fall on the 
film for half of the shutters rotation period. In a video 
camera this means that the sensor will capture light for 
half of the recording frame rate. For example, if shooting 
at 24fps a 180 degree shutter will be open for half of 1/24 
which is 1/48th of a second. With shutter angle, if you 
change the recording frame rate the shutter speed will 
also change as it will always be the same fraction of the 
recording rate. 
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D. Preparing the camera and shooting
D2.2 To change the shutter period indication  
between Speed and Degrees go to  
(MENU: Camera – Shutter – Mode).
To change the shutter speed: Press the Shutter button 
on the side of the camera body and use the scroll wheel 
to choose your desired shutter speed or angle. Then press 
the sel/set button to set the shutter speed. Do not press 
the shutter button again you wish to set the shutter speed 
control to automatic.
Suggested settings are 180 degrees or for 50Hz countries 
1/50 and for 60Hz countries 1/60. 
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D. Preparing the camera and shooting
D3.  Setting the Gain or ISO (Custom Mode)
The signal that comes from the cameras sensor can be 
made brighter by adding additional amplification by 
increasing the gain of the cameras image processors. 
This may be useful when shooting in low light situations. 
However it should be noted that when you increase the 
camera’s gain, as well as making the desirable image 
brighter you will also increase the noise seen in the image. 
Because of this it is normally desirable to use the lowest 
possible amount of gain for the best results. 
The gain setting of the camera can be displayed as “gain” 
in dB or as the equivalent ISO rating of the camera.
D 3.1  dB gain is easy to understand. 0dB is no added gain 
and the optimum setting for the best possible image 
quality. Every time you increase the gain by 6dB you are 
making the picture twice as bright (equivalent of opening 
the lens aperture by 1 stop). But adding 6dB of gain also 
increases the noise in the image by a factor of 2. Adding 
+6dB gain makes the picture twice as bright but 2 time 
noisier, adding +12dB will mean a picture 4 times brighter 
than 0dB but also 4 times noisier and so on. 
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