Hi Jay, I was given this camera as a surprise gift and what a wonderful surprise. The gift giver also got me the mini tripod/pistol grip which I love as I use an aftermarket one with my current small point-and-shoot Canon camera. Your skin tone from this SONY camera image is more natural than this RU-vid video recording, hence the color quality. Your explanation is excellent so much so that I don’t really have any pressing question and feel confident of using this camera. I will watch this video again, like reading a book; the more times you watch it the more you learn from it. I am just glad I came across this video of yours. Thank you very much.
What some people are forgetting, is the advantage of the remote on your wrist is if you have it helmet mounted, and you're not 100% sure on the angle you'll be shooting at, its easy to adjust when you can see through the lcd on your wrist, It goes without saying Sony's optical stablization is now only matched by the GoPro 7. but I still prefer the Sony.
You would need a device to read the memory card so you can view the photos. I use a Mac for that stuff... That sucks you can't get the live view remote anymore... These days I would go for the GoPro 9 or whatever it's up to, because it is better than this now much older design.
Stabilization and picture quality are great, but user interface sucks, big time. It feels like I´m programming my 15yo air-conditioning. I don´t want external, tiny screens on my wrist either, thankyouverymuch. By comparison, the Hero6 can have slightly worse stabilization (much improved from the Hero5, though) but it´s a pleasure to use, not requiring neither a tiny, dingy external LCD, nor the case, to make it waterproof and forget about it. It also makes it much easier to use as a photo camera, as well. IMO, Sony´s electronics with Hero6's design would be the way to go... Cheers!
Very good points and thank you for sharing your thoughts and experience ;) The Hero 6 is also a great action camera solution for sure. Can't go wrong!!
The built in colour screen on GoPro also uses more battery power. I simply cut a strip of wind muff fur put it across the front of the mic holes & around each side a bit & wrap a rubber band around the camera to hold it in place. Works like a dream.
great review. I have a mountain bike channel and I used to use the GoPro, I would get comments all the time from people about my footage being shaky, I didnt want to buy a gimbal because it would get in the way when riding. I ended up getting the Sony X3000 last year and I have no regrets. The BOSS image stabilizer is amazing. The Sony's picture quality, color, sound and image stabilization is so much better than GoPro. As far as fixing the wind noise all you need to do is tape a small dead cat over the mic (under the lens) and the wind noise is eliminated. Its called Rycote windjammer you can buy them online a pack of 6 is about $15. It has completely changed my channel, I mount the Sony on my helmet and it gives the viewer a more realistic view of what I see when riding.
FUll Review Here: www.sonyalphalab.com/my-sony-fdr-x3000-action-camera-review/ Gear and Support Links Below: Sony FDR-X3000 Action Camera Kit: bhpho.to/2EiZsPI GoPro: bhpho.to/2XMMxgR Sony VCT-STG1 Shooting Grip for Sony Action Cams: bhpho.to/2EizdIX Killer Extendable Selfie Stick: amzn.to/2CV3WcG Action Cam Suction Cup Mount: bhpho.to/2ByIgCE Sony Handlebar Mount for Action Cam: bhpho.to/2EitZwT Sony Motor Vibration Absorber Action Cameras: bhpho.to/2Bzj5A1 Sony MC Protector for Action Cameras: bhpho.to/2BB1ebU SeaLife AquaPod Mini Underwater Monopod: bhpho.to/2EfbKIF Revo Adjustable Selfie Stick: bhpho.to/2HYh0C1 Sony Anti-Fog Insert: bhpho.to/2CVqSbT Extra Battery: bhpho.to/2ByBcpK Skeleton Case w/ Lens Protection: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Xd59XDNYhQ0.html Recommended Memory Cards: bhpho.to/2Ehx2Wh Tip Jar: paypal.me/SonyAlphaLab Shopping @ Amazon? amzn.to/2ikI5DQ Patreon Fan Support Page: www.patreon.com/SonyAlphaLab Thanks again, Jay
Hi thanks for posting. I'm a big SONY fan too with one broadcast camera plus many other things from them. I'm at a cross roads between this and the GoPro Hero 7. I'm not a fan of GoPro's as I've had only trouble with them in the past. This SONY, the specs look pretty good, especially the bit rate up 100Mbs. My only gripe (and it could be a deciding factor is the lack of a monitor that can go under water, unlike the built in one in the Hero 7. I know the RX0 probably would be a better contender for my work (nothing to do with the YT channel (LOL) and add that chunky looking Aluminium UW housing, but at a bigger cost than the camera to get it down close to 100m. Mmmm and the Go Pro supposedly can handle down to 60m with optional (too) UW housing. The other thing going for me is the support from SONY and the fact that it actually has a brand name lens system in the camera. How do you find the low light situation with this SONY?
Hi Bush, for your situation I honestly don't know. 100M is really deep and the pressure is very high at that depth. The Sony is not good in low light, but neither is the Hero 7. The Sony has overheating issues with extended recording at 100MBS as well, so it's not the best option for critical must get footage recording. I did not have any issues with the overheating, but several people have reported problems to me since I published this review. Honestly I think the Hero 7 might actually be a better option over this currently. For your situation, the RX0 would be much better in the low light department, but it also suffers from heat issues. I don 't think it would underwater though consider how cold it is at those depths. At the end of the day, I really don't know and I would hate to recommend the X3000 or GoPro Hero 7 without some actual knowledge in this unique area. It really sounds like you will need a proper heavy duty housing, and for low light, the larger the sensor the better...
@@Jason_Hermann Hi, thanks for your great reply. Yeah I have just found some crazy depth rated housing for the FDR (rated to over 2km!!!!) big chunky aluminium construction, so it would be a good heat sink. Anyway, I really appreciate your views here with this regarding both of these cameras. Yes, maybe a specialist low light camera (I've worked with them for many years)- LOL but never hd to buy them personally now and now it's my own company money LOL, hence considering a cheapo camera. The heating issue I was not aware of, fair enough running at 100Mbs with aplastic body.
I own mini Sony action cam this is definitely one to buy but I highly suggest to avoid the RM-LV3!! It's trash, only get if you can the RM-LV2V. So much better and you don't need to that god awful cradle to charge it
ANYBODY HAVING PROBLEM WITH FOCUS? I was almost convinced to order one FDR-X3000 BUT. today I've read that whenever the camera heats up, it has some focus issues. and sometimes the focus issues will not be normalized even after the camera cooling down
I have another question. I was recording in Mpeg format at 1080 but when I uploaded it to RU-vid it looked horrible. Any suggestions ona better recording format? Will this happen if I record in 4K as well? Very disappointing
I would say it's the software, I never used Powerdirect so I can't say one way or another. Try to export the footage in the best quality option and see if it makes a difference I guess. I use Final Cut Pro and had no issue with quality.
@@Jason_Hermann Jay, I actually found on a my video edit software an upload setting dedicated to RU-vid uploads and it looked much better. Thank you for always answering questions. I appreciate it.
Hi, Is it passable to connect some monitor thru HDMI and see what the camera recording? Like here with GoPro - ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-o44ZaRt3-A4.html Thank you!
Hei! Nice video and camera. I have It myself and bouth It fore about 2 week ago. I want It fore long time but price was high and I have many camera from before. But Its a fantastic camera from Sony. And I have Sony RX100 from before and It use the same battery pack and Its super cool))) I also have Sony FDR-AX53 and Its a fantastic video camera. Sony Is super good. Them deliver sensor to all drone from DJI I fly Inspire 1 V2.0. and now I bouth Mavic Air Combo flame red. It was Intresting to se your video)) Very good work!
Hi Jay, thanks for your review. I've never owned an action cam and about to make the first purchase for our USA Vacation (Disney, Vegas, Sea World, Universal Studios, Fresno, Sacramento and San Francisco) in August. I have narrowed down my selection between GoPro 6 and Sony FDR-X3000. Overall, what is your expert opinion on what should I buy? Many thanks again.
I think your justifying on the the specs. Yes both 4k but the GoPro is at 60 not 30 like the Sony. Second the wrist strap is NOT a better idea over screen on camera. It's extra cost. Also in some aggressive sports (not doing a brake-stand on a quad)....if you keep looking at your wrist, you could get seriously hurt. *Maybe cost per value might be higher....that's only if you DON'T add the wrist band. Good review, but you sound a little like a Sony Fanboy....just my opinion.
Thanks for mentioning that you need to purchase BOTH the camera and the Love View remote at the same time. No one else has mentioned this. That is too, too bad for this new owner. Do you happen to know if there Is there any way the Live View Remote can be purchased separately directly from Sony, or does the camera and Live View Remote need to be somehow programmed at the factory? Doesn't make sense to me that you can not buy the LVR after the fact. Thanks.
Wow. I’ve watched many videos about this device and yours was easily the most thorough. Just put this camera on my list. Thanks. Timecode and 3.5mm stereo microphone jack!!!
I want one for my motorbike helmet and read that if put in the underwater case you cannot attach a mic. My question is how waterproof is it say on a helmet in the rain. Does it need the underwater housing?
It's a good camera but Sony just love to do something goofy which spoils the experience. Two things on this: 1) The wonderful external mic output. What a great feature, but try to use it with any normal mic and the gain is internally set up to go so high the audio is ruined. There is no simple fix for this, without spending on a much more expensive powered mic with it's own adjustment to turn levels way down so the X3000 can boost it up again. This simply must be a deliberate ploy from Sony. (so you buy their own recommended mic for 4x more?) 2) Live streaming. Not something you might use often but maybe you could stream to a computer and use like a webcam? Nope you can only do it via 'Ustream' (Who?) - oh, they have changed names now and you can't have a free account, and no one is going to view your stream on there anyway. How hard can it be to have this work with youtube or even Facebook. And a bonus one 3) Helmet mounting. This really should not be so hard, the camera is a similar size and shape to the Ghost HD? Sony sell a fairly simple mount, OK it costs about 4 times as much as it should - but hold on it's almost impossible to set it up in a suitable position with a lot of helmets? And don't forget if you want audio using that handy external mic socket it will be unusable due to unexplained extra audio gain you can't turn down. You couldn't make it up, why do this when the camera and inbuilt stabilisation is so good otherwise. It is still very competitive with Hero7 but the stupid intentional faults which could likely be fixed by firmware just make you sick.
This camera is in need of upgrading because the GoPro Hero 6 has it beat in so many ways. With camera you have to by a case to take it under water and you have to spend $150 for a monitor to see what you're recording and the Hero 6 records 1080p at 240. As to image stabilization, as long as the image is stable and of good quality it doesn't matter to me if it's optical, digital or by black magic. All care about is a good stable image. The Hero 6 does a very good job in this regard.
STARTED HEATING UP on day 31. I've only had mine for two months. barely missed the 30 days money back by one 1 day. HEATS UP after Recording on 1080p, Medium, 50mbs, 60fps after 52, a few minutes later I get the shutdown message, then it stops recording about 10 min. later, then finally it SHUTS DOWN by itself. This SUCKS. On 4K is even worst, I can smell the heat coming out of this camera. I haven't been able to record no more than 28 min 4K video clips. then wait for a while before I can record the next 4K I'm Now Stuck with this crappy Cam from Sony. I've tried to send it to Precision Camera (Sony's preferred Repair Shop) but are broken just like the camera. I have a small video about all these symptoms on youtube. let me know if you want to see it.. Ashame Shameful Sony Crap. I'm stuck with an almost $400 piece of crap.
There is a way. I was also having the same problem as you. If you install the app called Pinnacle Studio, and have it on your device, then you can use the ‘multi out’ on your camera to a USB cable adapter on your iPhone to copy the files. I’m not sure how it works but it does...lol You don’t even need to have Pinnacle Studio open for it to work. It’s a little over my head why it works, sorry I’m not very technically savvy.. If it doesn’t work, try different USB cables. Some of them won’t transfer the file for some reason.. Hope this helps!
@@Jason_Hermann I found one on eBay! It just seems to fulfill most my requirements since I don't enjoy vlogging with a massive camera. Keeping it low profile keeps it a lot more natural in my experience. Thank you for the answer!
It's a great camera and I really enjoyed using it when I had it. I have the goPro 10 now, and it's great, but I much preferred the shape of the Sony so I could snug it up to stuff easier. Not really the biggest deal, but it is what it is....
Great video, Thank You !!!! Debating between the FDRX300 and GoPro 7, will use it more for vlogging than action stuff. If anyone could give their opinion on which one I should get that would be appreciated CHEERS :)
I would go with the Hero 7. The new stabilization system works awesome and it's the latest and greatest. The usability is also way better on the Hero 7 as far as the menu system type stuff in my opinion. The only down side is the lack of wrist remote option, but you can use a smart phone for that...
Up date , in this video I see an option to flip the filming on and off, I’ll check my settings, I’ll update my comment if it doesn’t work. Help please nothing on youtube, my bran new FDR-x3000r only shoots footage upside down, how do I fix this? It’s driving me crazy. I can’t find anything on RU-vid to fix this, and I have fiddled around with the settings so much now, I have lost myself in grief. Can you give me a few tips about where to look in settings? Thank you. I’ve made one video on RU-vid and I had to flip the footage in post took forever, and I’m glad I had one program to find the flip footage option. Gee wiz! Thank you . Subbed!
Awesome review mate! I have one myself and I agree 100% with you - LOVE THIS LITTLE CAM! I'm yet to edit the snowboarding videos of my Japan trip, used a board mount on my snowboard and got some pretty cool footage, will let you know when I finally edit and publish it (I'm a lazy bastard lol, first ever camera I have and didn't do video editing before)
It would be great, but it also would increase the size and decrease the battery life. One huge advantage to the portable design is you can see the screen easily when it is mounted to a helmet for example. So the view the the camera see's you can see without looking at the camera itself. DOn't get me wrong, a screen on the camera would also be nice! Hopefully Sony will come out with a new model soon ;)
You create the slow motion footage in post processing software like in this tutorial here: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-x61INdvIJGI.html
You are very welcome and by all means ask away!! As far as micro SD cards go I purchased this Sandisk: amzn.to/3cw9nnC It's been working flawless for a very long time for me, so I highly recommend it ;) All the best, Jay
This is a awsome camera . But not sure why everyone seems to be doing reviews now about it. Only grip i have is the screen dosnt work under water. It does not have manual controls for photo like iso , shutter speed exposure for low light timlapses . Thats about it everything else is pretty good. Also the side screen needs to be back lit its really hard to see in low light.
Thanks for the comments ;) The screen does work underwater? It has physical buttons you need to press, the screen does not do anything when you touch it... It does not have manual controls for shutter speed and stuff, but does offer exposure comp and white balance at least ;) I hear ya man, a new model from Sony is over do for sure!! I reviewed this last winter and the camera was already pretty old, but I really wanted to see what it could do. Action cams are fun!
probably the best review I've seen so far.Bought yesterday this gear as my gopro hero5 black unfortunally fell down during hicking session last week.I've collected some video and photo basic samples and I'm really impressed with this unit even if I'm learning how to use it,obviously.I must say there's a big difference comparing it with gopro,this camera is just so good enough to set the bar even today july 2019 ! thanks for sharing
REALLY NICE VIDEO! thanks QUESTION: Can I buy this LIVE Monitor separately? and if YES. would the FDR-X3000 be compatible with it? (because there are actually at least two versions of this camera. I'm refering to the one which comes without this Live Monitor Bracelet Thingy)
Jay SonyAlphaLab are you going to buy it? I'm amazed it has the same senor as my AX53 but with it being smaller the X3000 would be perfect for vlogging, my sony ax53 is but this looks even better
Hello and thanks for great review. Is this camera suitable for filming nature , time-lapses etc..? I consider to either buy this camera or Lumix FZ 300 (much bigger though ). Thanks!
Great video. One question - While using the live remote, after hitting the record button, why does the screen on the remote go blank after 7-8 seconds? Is that normal? How do you know what you are filming? Please explain. Thanks
"Auto monitor off while shooting" is enabled by default. You need to turn that feature off in the menu on the monitor, and then it will stay on the whole time your recording. See here: helpguide.sony.net/cam/1650/v1/en/contents/TP0000960337.html *If the remote control has not been operated for more than 10 seconds while shooting movies, time-lapse capturing, or loop recording, the LCD screen display of the remote control is turned off automatically to reduce battery consumption. Operate the remote control to turn on the LCD screen display again. Press the MENU button. Press the UP button or DOWN button to select (Remote control settings) - (Auto monitor off while shooting) - setting value, then press the REC/ENTER button. (default) (The LCD screen display is turned off automatically, if the remote control has not been operated for more than 10 seconds while shooting) (The LCD screen display is turned on while shooting)
Hi Jay. Thanks for the great review. I see a few people saying their image is out of focus beyond 30 inches from the camera.... have you experienced this? .... should everything be in focus? I'm noticing everything is in focus near the camera but distant objects are not. Some people are saying there is some sensor glue expansion issue that results in far field objects being out of focus, when they should be in focus.... do you have any thoughts on this?
Hi, if you have the camera really close to something and it chooses to focus on that close-up subject, then stuff in the distance might be slightly out of focus. This is called depth of field though, and not a flaw with the lens or anything. You need to make sure the camera is focused on what you want in situations like this. It's not always easy, but you can try and make sure that whatever is close to the camera is away from the lens enough to not accidentally be chosen as the focus point by the camera. Does that make sense? I hope that helps!!
@@Jason_Hermann many thanks Jay. I agree with your points on depth of field, and generally when you get close to a subject the depth of field becomes more shallow ( for a fixed f number). But I finding many people saying " everything should be in focus , both near field and far field" . They were claiming the glue holding the sensor was expanding and resulting in the camera only focusing on near field , and far field going out of focus. Thanks again for taking time to reply. Great channel by the way!
I have one of these and I feel you should mention the battery life which is abysmal, also the buttons on the unit and the menu function it clumsy but apart from that it’s a good action cam
I own and l love this camera... the lens protector you mentioned fogging up is never off my camera, since my one complaint is the lens has no protection without it. the lens bulges out from the front with no protective bezel, which I think is sorta dumb. a strange design... otherwise I love the camera. I run around with my kids at the park with it or on hikes and I sometimes am sprinting after them holding the camera at arm's length, the footage is great, that stabilization system is a marvel on it
Great review and info. I've had the FDR for a while now but I didn't get the remote and am regretting it. Does using the remote affect the battery life? Both while recording and while off/standby? Can the remote wake the camera if the camera is powered off? With my old GoPro the remote was pointless but if the Sony remote works similar to the android app I'll upgrade to the remote kit. Thanks.
The wrist controller liveview wristlet, has his own battery inside and the other cool thing about the wristlet is that you can use it with any Sony alpha!