Thanks for you comments. Fiddling around with the camera last night brought up a slight problem. It looks like I was handed an AX33 instead of an AX53. Need to go back to the shop today and have the matter cleared out.

Anyway, I guess the first question to settle is in what kind of File Format I should record with. XAVC S HD or AVCHD? Before with the Panasonic I was taping with Full HD 1080 50p and rendering to MainConcept AVC/AAC Internet HD 1080p/25,000 PAL. Now with the new Sony I have the options of recording using either AVCHD or XAVC S HD (not considering the 4K option at this time). I see that my Movie Studio Platinum 13.0 software also lets me render in the XAVC S format. So should I go for the XAVC S HD format or stick with the AVCHD? And if I use the XAVC S HD format for rendering which option should I use: 23.976p, 25p, 29.97p, 50p or 59.94? I guess it has to do with the Frame Rate I chose when recording. That brings up another question. There are other settings as well and they are interactive. By choosing something, something else is not an option.

MENU / Image Quality & size

REC Mode - 100Mbps, 60Mbps

Frame Rate - 50i, 50p, 25p

File Format -  XAVC S 4K, XAVC S HD, AVCHD

Since I did everything before with AVCHD and maybe would like to mix in old clips with my new videos, will using the XAVC S HD create a future problem?

Cornico, Im using a HP ProBook 450 with a SSD HD. Before you slam it note that it has worked like a dream so far. Great ediging in Movie Studio. Only limit is that I cannot use it for anything when rendering.

Musicvid, my YouTube channel is Triggerboy62. Check out the videos for reference. All videos made after October 2012 are taped by using the Panasonic and I have so far done everything for YouTube. 95% of the time I shoot skiing in various light conditions. Since its dark in the evenings I shoot a lot in poor artificial lighting. I also shoot tennis, indoor so far, and would like to be able to get clearer slow downs of when the racket head whips at the ball. Now I just get a blurry mess at the most important moment.

One more thing I have been wondering about is PAL vs NTSC. That is the different television formats used in the world. Since I live in a country using PAL I'm choosing that format but does it really matter? I never watch my videos on a TV. Maybe I will.

Thanks in advance :)

Cornico - HP ProBook 450 G1, i5-4200M CPU 2,50GHz, RAM16GB, 64-bit OP, Win7 Pro Service Pack 1, SSD465GB

Cornico, I will make a video recording test today when I go and play tennis. I haven't really grasped the format issue. I guess I have to use the XAVC S HD to get the HighSpeed REC 120 fps recording option that I need in order to slow those tennis strokes down properly in slow motion without blur.

BTW, I got the AX53 today. They made a mistake at the shop and packed the AX33 by mistake into the AX53 box. You can never bee too careful. Luckily I bought it from a very reliable shop so everything turned out for the better with some nice extra customer benefits.

From the Sony website, I see:

"VIDEO RECORDING RATE (ABR / VBR)

XAVC S 4K: approx. 100 Mbps, XAVC S 4K: approx. 60 Mbps, XAVC S HD: approx. 50 Mbps. AVCHD PS: approx. 28 Mbps/FX: approx. 24 Mbps/FH: approx. 17 Mbps/HQ: approx. 9 Mbps/LP: approx. 5 Mbps, MP4: approx. 3 Mbps"

So, assuming you stick with HD (1920x1080), you are really comparing:

• XAVC S HD: (1920x1080/50p @ 50 Mbps) and
• AVCHS PS HD: (1920 x 1080/50p @ 28 Mbps)

You may wish to compare this to the Youtube recommendations of 12-15 Mbps ((SDR-HDR) for 1080p) or 53-85 Mbps (for 4k).

I have similar options on a Sony mirrorless camera for video and typically use XAVC S (not 4k) - although I don't typically upload to Youtube. I hope that helps.

Anyway, I guess the first question to settle is in what kind of File Format I should record with. XAVC S HD or AVCHD?

I don't have a Sony (I use Panasonic G5, G6 and GH4) , but from what I understand both XAVC S and AVCHD use H.264, so assuming that you can use the same codec capabilities, it makes no difference from the video point of view. From an audio perspective, XAVC should be uncompressed PCM (vs. AC3 audio in AVCHD) so quality is in principle superior in XAVC. Whether or not it is in practice depends on your source and type of audio. If you record sport events or other material which is not a symphonic orchestra in full splendor (and captured in detail with properly setup hi-end microphone configuration, by a brilliant recording engineer) I doubt you need PCM, which occupies a lot more space.

There's however a few caveats. First, it all depends on the H.264 capabilities which are made available to you by the camera in both formats - they both use the codec but no necessarily in the same way - the codec allows for different levels of implementation. Secondly, XAVC S is one of the various versions of XAVC: for example, while it allows the highest frame and bit rate of the familiy (up to 120p and 100mbps) it has 4:2.0 color sampling and 8bit per sample. Thirdly, it seems to use some of the less explored parts of H.264 so applicative support may be lacking (no idea with MS13/14). Already while MS handles the M2TS wrapper (which is common for AVCHD) very well, some players don't or require additional libraries.. so not sure about an even less common file (as opposite, everybody handles MP4 pretty well, to say).

All this technical bits, to me, is in the end of very little importance. The easiest way for you to find out the best format (or if there's a best format) is to figure out what you commonly shoot, go out and use half an hour to take similar samples in all the formats you may want to use. Use the same lens, sun/lighting position, scene dynamic range etc and as similar settings for the codec as you are allowed to. Then go home and use a good monitor to watch.

I suspect you won't see all that much difference on the video. If you don't choose the most convenient format for you in size, handling, compatibility etc - I suspect that would mean sticking with AVCHD and using your known workflow. But only you can say.. :)

Thank you Chris. You have been much helpful. The problem with testing is that since there are so many variables its likely something will be set up the wrong way. It took me several years to get a great end result from my old setup.

My primary use will be shooting skiing and tennis and posting it to YouTube. Here is a test I did today using XAVC S HD 50p and rendering to XAVC S HD 1080 Long-GOP 50p. I only used a bit of sharpening in VMS.

Here is a slow motion version:

Here is similar video with the old Panasonic:

Any thoughts?

Do your videos look better at 4k on YouTube?

Don't cheap out and have YouTube do the 1080p processing -- upload both yourself to compare. When doing so, be sure to note the upload/processing times because those may be a factor in your decision.

Thank you Chris. You have been much helpful. The problem with testing is that since there are so many variables its likely something will be set up the wrong way. It took me several years to get a great end result from my old setup.

My primary use will be shooting skiing and tennis and posting it to YouTube. Here is a test I did today using XAVC S HD 50p and rendering to XAVC S HD 1080 Long-GOP 50p. I only used a bit of sharpening in VMS.

 

What I was talking about, was to compare the result using exactly the same angle/camera position/lens/aperture etc.

Basically the very same shot, only taken with the two different format settings (or the various settings you want to compare). If you really want to go the full monthy, you could use a dolly with controlled movement and escursion to have really identical scenes.

In pratice there's no need: obviously if there's people involved you won't have the exact same scene but your tennis players bouncing a ball would do just fine. simply place the camera, shoot with XAVC, then only change the format and shot a similar scene again with AVCHD instead. That way you'd have two "player bouncing ball" scenes which are extremely comparable: you'll see the color effects, the noise effects, evaluate the ability to run slow motion and so forth, and watch on your monitor to see if you can pereceive any difference and decide which format you like best.

Since YouTube re-encodes streams, it's hard to make any judgement looking at footage there - what we see is not your footage, but your footage re-encoded by YT which may be a very different thing.

Thanks for your input here above. The ide with bouncing the tennis ball is good. I will try that.

Now to a new problem. Recording tennis gave a very sharp render as did skiing last week. However, this weekends XAVC S HD footage comes out very badly. I don't understand because I used the same AX53 and even if the light was not very good it was still daylight. Earlier I got these knife sharp images. Now they are not. The original footage is ferly ok even if its not knife sharp but the rendered version is bad as is the YT upload. Check here:

That was recorded in HighSpeed mode 100FPS. Any thoughts?

Anyway, I guess the first question to settle is in what kind of File Format I should record with. XAVC S HD or AVCHD?

I don't have a Sony (I use Panasonic G5, G6 and GH4) , but from what I understand both XAVC S and AVCHD use H.264, so assuming that you can use the same codec capabilities, it makes no difference from the video point of view. From an audio perspective, XAVC should be uncompressed PCM (vs. AC3 audio in AVCHD) so quality is in principle superior in XAVC. Whether or not it is in practice depends on your source and type of audio. If you record sport events or other material which is not a symphonic orchestra in full splendor (and captured in detail with properly setup hi-end microphone configuration, by a brilliant recording engineer) I doubt you need PCM, which occupies a lot more space.

There's however a few caveats. First, it all depends on the H.264 capabilities which are made available to you by the camera in both formats - they both use the codec but no necessarily in the same way - the codec allows for different levels of implementation. Secondly, XAVC S is one of the various versions of XAVC: for example, while it allows the highest frame and bit rate of the familiy (up to 120p and 100mbps) it has 4:2.0 color sampling and 8bit per sample. Thirdly, it seems to use some of the less explored parts of H.264 so applicative support may be lacking (no idea with MS13/14). Already while MS handles the M2TS wrapper (which is common for AVCHD) very well, some players don't or require additional libraries.. so not sure about an even less common file (as opposite, everybody handles MP4 pretty well, to say).

All this technical bits, to me, is in the end of very little importance. The easiest way for you to find out the best format (or if there's a best format) is to figure out what you commonly shoot, go out and use half an hour to take similar samples in all the formats you may want to use. Use the same lens, sun/lighting position, scene dynamic range etc and as similar settings for the codec as you are allowed to. Then go home and use a good monitor to watch.

I suspect you won't see all that much difference on the video. If you don't choose the most convenient format for you in size, handling, compatibility etc - I suspect that would mean sticking with AVCHD and using your known workflow. But only you can say.. :)

After some testing I came to the conclusion that the XAVC S in High Speed Rec with 100FPS worked best for my sports recording. Check this out: