EX Series Issue With Rolling Flutter

Jay Gladwell wrote on 10/7/2008, 8:38 AM

Last week, before I couldn't turn the camera off, my EX3 exhibited what I called a rolling or fluttering shadow across the image.

With the advent of Bob's and Serena's advice to use the All Reset button, the flutter has gone away (knocking on wood).

To see the effect go here: Rolling Shadow. This was posted by Ola Christoffersson. It's the exact same thing I was seeing in my footage.

Any ideas as to what causes this?

Thanks!

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Comments

Serena wrote on 10/8/2008, 3:00 PM

"The only problem is they are in New York and I'm in Miami."

Call your Sony broadcast service guys in Miami (I gave you their name in a previous thread).

farss wrote on 10/8/2008, 11:53 PM

Based on what Sony have said after looking at the sample it footage it's not a problem in general or in Jay's camera. All that has to be done is to switch the filter from Auto to Off.
This isn't the first such non problem I've come across. We had several palmcorders that had this wierd problem. Locked off on a tripod every so often the image would jump up and down. We thought it was a problem, our Sony dealer thought it was a problem when we showed him the footage. After some angst the way to fix the problem was to turn the EIS Off when the camera was on a tripod. Sony had implemented a more sensitive EIS that could go nuts for a few frames if it did get a tiny, tiny amount of movement.

Bob.

Jay Gladwell wrote on 10/9/2008, 3:13 AM

Again, just to show that Bob and Serena were correct, over in the DVi forum, under "Sony XDCAM EX CineAlta," Juan Martinez, Senior Manager for Sony Electronics in the Eastern US, wrote:

"EX1 & EX3 camcorders are shipped with the "Flicker Reduction" set to Auto. In some rare occasions, repetitive luminance changes when panning may falsly trigger the Flicker Reduction circuit ON. To eliminate the possibility of this phenomenom inadvertingly occurring: invoke the the camera menu and turn OFF the Flicker Reduce circuit."

At times like this, I do miss the old, reliable, mechanical cameras like the Arri and Aaton. Would I go back? When it's all said and done, probably not.