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Sony is known as one of the largest producers of motion picture cameras, supplying cameras to Hollywood, agencies and solo filmmakers. It’s already produced fan favorites, including the compact yet powerful Sony FX3 – and now it looks like a more affordable version of that camera could be on the way.
If you’re a filmmaker who has priced the Sony FX3 (which cost $3,899 / £4,200 at launch), this could be very good news indeed. The FX3 is a compact full-frame cinema camera that combines the build of Sony’s Alpha series with the advanced video features of its cinema series.
This compact solution provided a gateway to Sony’s produced cinema cameras, while remaining familiar to Alpha fans without mirrors. It’s based on the Sony A7S III, one of the best video cameras money can buy, but it’s even more of a pure video camera than that E-mount favorite.
Since the release of the Sony FX3, it has proved popular with solo filmmakers and seasoned industry professionals looking for a small yet powerful B-cam. Now, a year after its release, the rumor mills are spinning with Sony Alpha Rumors (opens in new tab) stating that a new APS-C version of the cinema camera is on the way in the form of the FX30. But what video treats will it bring? Here’s everything we know so far, plus a wish list of the kind of specs we’d like to see.
Sony FX30 release date and price
It looks like we now have an exact release date for the Sony FX30. The usually reliable Sony Alpha Rumors (opens in new tab) is pretty sure the camera will launch on September 28, though it may vary by time zone.
If so, the camera would land just over 18 months since the arrival of the Sony FX3, which arrived in February 2021. The FX30 would also be Sony’s first new mirrorless camera of the year, with the latest announcement being the Sony A7 IV back in October 2021.
There have been no major leaks or rumors about the potential price of the FX30 yet, but we can make informed guesses. The closest cameras to this new model are the Sony A7S III ($3,499 / £3,800 / AU$5,999 at launch) and the FX3, which cost $3,899 / £4,200 (about AU$7,485) when it last year landed.
Both cameras are full-frame models. If the FX30 has a smaller APS-C sensor, it seems more likely to cost in the neighborhood of $2,500, a figure that also appeared in an earlier leak of Sony Alpha Rumors (opens in new tab). That’s still pricey for an APS-C camera, but could be justified if the FX30 keeps most of the FX3’s features…
Sony FX30 rumors and what we want to see
Sony Alpha Rumors (opens in new tab) claimed on September 12 that it had seen the Sony FX30 and that it looks the same as the Sony FX3. However, the camera’s rumor list has already been changed twice, so we’re taking the leaked information so far with a pinch of salt.
It was originally assumed that the Sony FX30 would have a full-frame sensor. But it now looks like the FX30 will have an APS-C sensor instead, while keeping the same compact form factor as the FX3.
One of the most interesting rumors about the FX30’s specs is that it could have the same 26MP APS-C sensor as the Fujifilm X-H2S, a camera that packs in some very impressive video power, including ‘open gate’ 6.2K video (which comes from the sensor’s full 3:2 format) and the ability to record 4K/120p video, albeit with a 1.29x crop.
Sony Alpha Rumors claims the FX30 will be capable of shooting 4K/120p video, but offers no further details on whether or not to crop it. In fact, at this point that’s pretty much it for the rumored specs of Sony’s next cinema camera. But that doesn’t mean we can’t fill the significant gaps with our own wish list…
Sony FX30: what we would like to see
1. Open port recording
If we’re to believe the rumors and the Sony FX30 will share the same sensor as the Fujifilm X-H2S, we’d love to see 6.2K ‘open gate’ video footage, showing the whole sensor in a 3:2 ratio.
2. Dual Native ISO
Prosumer mirrorless cameras capable of shooting stills and videos often have a linear ISO range where the image quality introduces digital noise and color cast as the scale goes up.
Video cameras can feature dual ISO, which allows the cameraman to set a lower ISO when shooting outdoors and then switch to a different ISO range suitable for low-light conditions. This allows you to capture images with optimum performance whatever the conditions. We would like to see this Dual ISO on the FX30 set to ISO 800 and 4,000.
3. CFexpress Type B + SDXC Cards
The Sony FX3 offered CFexpress Type A cards, along with SDXC cards for fast transfer rates. But as the technology continues to evolve, it would be good to see CFexpress Type B introduced to provide great read and write speeds and enable higher resolution recordings such as 6.2K ‘open-gate’.
4. High frame rate slow-mo
While the FX3 was able to record in 4K at 120 frames per second, it would be a real bonus if the FX30 came with a lower-resolution 240fps (or even 480fps) mode, to give us even more slo-mo to give options and versatility.