Sony A1U/A1P/A1E

Hey all,

Have done a search on this camera, and found nothing.

I have a job early next year that is to be shot with one of these cameras. I have read up extensively on all the issues relating to Sony's hybrid HDV, so I'm well aware of what I may or may not be getting myself into when it comes to the edit.

What I am trying to establish is the quality of the 1/3 CMOS sensor, vs the 3CCD setups I'm more used to working with.

Does anyone have any experience with this camera? Should I up the ante and ask for an FX1/Z1U? Or just go back to my beloved Canon XL2?

I'm curious to try out on of these 'HDV' cams anyway I think.

Any opinions appreciated!

Justin.

jusrus Wrote:
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> Hey all,
>
> Have done a search on this camera, and found
> nothing.

> Justin.

I Googled "Sony A1u" and got 143,000 hits.

Sorry, I searched LAFCPUG. Have of course googled, and found a wealth of stuff. I'm interested in the opinions of those on this forum that might have encountered one of these cameras.

Thanks...Justin.

I haven't really used it yet (only a couple hours), but we picked up the A1-U earlier this year. My wife took it to China and shot some stuff. The footage looks pretty good - the biggest caveat is the low light performance is not very good. Also be careful with fast pans.

My wife loves the camera because it's small and easy to handle. A couple years back we were shooting a doc with a Sony PD-170 and she had trouble doing hand held stuff with it. The other nice thing about the A1-U is that it has both an onboard mic and a removable external mic with xlr jacks/phantom power. Also, it has a full 1920 x 1080 CMOS sensor. Overall, it's a cool little camera.

If you can, I would use the Z1 over the A1-U just because it has the 3-CCDs and I like the layout better. I don't know the difference in quality between the A1/Z1 over the XL 2, but I've seen a huge difference between the Z1 and the Panasonic DVX-100a. The Z1's much better. The A1 gives similar image quality. I know of a DP who did some tests with it and got it close in image quality to a Varicam (he was needing to intercut the footage on a doc he was shooting).

The best would be to do some tests with the different cameras and see which one suits your needs the best. OTOH, I do think we tend to over analyze our choices, and use our analysis to justify not moving out of our comfort zone - so, unless there's just some major shortcoming, and from my experience, I doubt it, the A1-U will do the job, do it well, and it will be good experience to actually use it.

just my $.02 cents.

exactly, it handles low light very poorly but can easily intercut with a z-1 in good conditions, the zoom and iris controls are straight out of the consumer world so they leave much to be desired but it's size and audio capabilitys make it worthwhile. I slap a nice fat wideangle lens on it and its a great small HD-capable camera...

DV dot com has a good review on this cam. Lots of good info and gotchas

[www.dv.com]

Michael Horton
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Thanks for your input guys. It is a day shoot, so low light won't be a problem, and from what I know, no fast motion, so that shouldn't be a problem either!

Any other opinions, feel free to shoot them through!

Cheers....Justin.