SONY F65. A NON PLUS ULTRA CAMERA AT $65K

On Tuesday, September 6 at the DGA theater in Hollywood, California, Sony officially raised the curtain on its flagship  digital camera, the F65 CineAlta. The new revolutionary digital motion picture camera system was presented to a selected audience members of the American Society of Cinematographers (ASC), members of the press, local industry professionals and many cinematography products resellers and distributors.

Peter Crithary, Marketing Manager for Production
at Sony Electronics, shows a new F65 feature.
The Rotary Shutter 

Sony also screened a newly shot F65 footage lensed  by Curtis Clark ASC, Paul Babin, Brad Olhund and Kess Van Ostrum ASC, to demonstrate the attributes of the camera, its powerful resolution at 20M 8K sensor, dynamic range and latitude (14 stops) and color reproduction in a variety of extreme lighting conditions on different exterior and interior locations.

Jim Houston from Sony Pictures, Kees Van Ostrum ASC,
Brad Ollhund, Paul Babin

 
Sony's Toshi Kawamura rolling out the introductory price of the 
F65 system. Toshi brought the price down from $102+  
to a mere $65K!!! A figure easy to remember, he said.

To close the presentation, Sony's Toshi Kawamura, announced its roll-out marketing plan  lowering the purchase price to  a mere $65,000!! (offer good until next Christmas only) from an original component cost of $102+ and included  is the viewfinder, a dockable SRMemory recorder and a 1TB SRMemory card. From Los Angeles,  the Sony team  leaves to Amsterdam to show the F65 camera system  to a worldwide audience at the IBC 2011.conference. (follow the IBC 2011 here).

The F65 derives true 4K resolution - and beyond - at the point of image capture. "4K" resolution is 4096 x 2160, which is more than four times greater than the full HD (1920x1080) spec. Its unique 8K image sensor, with approximately 20 total megapixels, offers higher image fidelity than any other digital cinema production camera. With 16-bit Linear RAW File output capability, the F65 creates the gateway to an end-to-end 4K file-based mastering workflow.

  Sony revamped its CineAlta logo to indicate infinite quality.

 A chronological progression of  Sony's CineAlta technology

 Alec Shapiro, Senior V.P of Sony’s Professional Solutions 
of America Group
"This is the camera Hollywood has asked for, designed specifically for filmmakers," said Alec Shapiro, senior vice president of Sony's Professional Solutions of America group. "The ability to shoot content in true native 4K resolution lets filmmakers capture more of what they're seeing through the lens to fully realize their vision. The F65's incredible imager captures more data, which translates to more information that can be put up on the screen. And access to an open and inclusive platform enables the integration of an F65 file-based workflow into other systems, creating truly exciting, and limitless, production opportunities."


 The latest enhancements and features are: 14 stops High Dynamic Range with much wider color gamut, a rotary shutter model (F65RS) to remove motion artifacts; four ND Filter built-in with rotary shutter, Wi-fi operation for remote control operation from tablet devices (including the Android-based Sony Tablet S and Apple iPad), HD-SDI output with viewing LUT for on-set monitoring with focus assist zoom, 60 Minutes of 16 bit Linear RAW file recording onto a 1TB SRMemory card at 24FPS, a dockable SRMemory recorder - model SR-R4 - which attaches to the camera to record directly to an SRMemory card of 256 GB, 512 GB or 1TB capacity with data security and sustained throughput of 5.5 Gbps.

 Another  powerful new capability for the F65/SR-R4 combination is the ability to switch recording between 16-bit linear RAW File and MPEG-4 SStP File modes. Users can configure the camera on a project-by-project basis, selecting either 16-bit linear RAW File for ultimate quality acquisition or high speed operation at up to 120FPS, or MPEG-4 SStP File (HDCAM SR native) for exceptional quality HD recording. MPEG-4 SStP File also provides full compatibility for viewing, offline and post production using either the free Sony PC or MAC viewer or products using the new Sony Software Development Kit.

  David Grober, Motion Picture Marine, Chuck Lee, Fujinon Inc
Technology Manager, Mark Miller, SOC attendees to 
the F65 presentation

The F65  pre-orders are available in Hollywood at Otto Nemenz International and Band-Pro, Burbank. The camera starts shipping in January 2012.  Band-Pro's Sony F65 Introductory Pack  at $85,000  includes: A Sony F65 Camera Body with Mechanical Rotary Shutter,  HDVF-C35W Color Viewfinder,  SR-R4 Digital Recorder, 1x Sony 256MB SRMemory Card, Sony SR-PC4 Data Transfer Unit.