For those of you who know me, I've been shopping for a camera for some time now. I narrowed my search down to two cameras - the Panasonic HPX-300 and the Sony EX-3. Both are great cameras, and the decision was a tough one to make. But after spending time with both cameras, and thinking about what would be the smartest buy for me and 100 Acre Films, the Sony EX-3 was the winner.
Both cameras have some great features and some drawbacks. Both use CMOS sensors, which is a blessing and a curse, and both are tapeless (good) using expensive media to record on (bad). The HPX-300 has a 1/3" sensor, but the camera can record AVC-I which is a great codec. The Sony has a 1/2" sensor, but it records with an interframe MPEG codec - good, but not as good as AVC-I.
No camera is perfect. They all have things that can sometimes drive us nuts. I think that when you decide to buy a camera you really have to look at your needs, your workflow, and your budget. All of these should be primary factors in your purchase decision. For me, both cameras fit into my budget, both fit perfectly into my workflow, and for what I do - they are exactly what I need. But I felt that the Sony would serve me better then the Panasonic.
If you'd like to know more about the cameras, or you'd like to know more about how I made my decision, let me know and I'll share what I know and learned about both cameras.
Here's a short video I put together with footage shot with my new camera. There's some color-correction in a few shots (I didn't adjust the white balance on some shots), and but overall I left the footage as-is.
A Day at the Park from Eric Addison on Vimeo.
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