PRONEWS AWARD / Vol. 8: THE 2022 GRAND PRIZE WINNER! Who Takes the Crown?

The PRONEWS AWARD 2022 grand prize is…! ?

Finally, the PRONEWS AWARD 2022 grand prize has be announced. What kind of year was 2022? First, let’s take a look back at the film industry in 2022.

2022 was the year when digital transformation efforts were accelerated. At the Inter BEE 2022 exhibition hall, there were many booths that emphasized cloud-related solutions, and the Sony booth focused more on exhibiting production platforms that connect cameras, smartphones, and other devices to the cloud rather than exhibiting photography equipment. The video industry seems to be gradually shifting from hardware to software.

AI was a hot topic this year. Image-generating AI is getting closer to the level of viability we need and is evolving into a tool for everyday use. In the video industry, cloud-based automatic editing services, AI cameras, AI voice recognition transcription, AI image quality engine technology, and Sony’s new mirrorless camera products with AI processing units have become a hot topic. In the future, the era of fully automated shooting, camera angles, and editing will not be a distant future.

Vertical video content is also a new trend that cannot be overlooked. Various media have newly entered vertical content, and many of the short videos introduced by each SNS are being viewed on smartphones, making it a familiar experience.

This year’s PRONEWS AWARD 2022 grand prize has selected products that reflect such a year of change. This is the editorial department’s answer for 2022 for the PRONEWS AWARD Grand Prize.

PRONEWS AWARD 2022 Grand Prize

Sony FR7

Sony’s FR7 is a fixed PTZ camera, controlled by a web application or remote controller. Up until now, PTZ cameras had no interchangeable lenses, and generally had an image sensor of 1 inch or less. However, FR7 is about to rewrite that common sense.

The FR7 is compatible with Sony E-mount, and all Sony E-mount lenses can be attached. The image sensor is equipped with the same back-illuminated 35mm full-size CMOS sensor with about 10.3 million effective pixels as the cinema camera “FX6”. I would like to give the Grand Prize of PRONEWS AWARD to the FR7, which has a pan/tilt mechanism that can be described as unconventional.

Mr. Michihiro Takayanagi, Product Planning Division, IP & Business Headquarters, Sony Corporation, made a comment on receiving the award.

Thank you very much for choosing me for the grand prize.

We are very pleased that our challenge of “breaking new ground in remote shooting” has been highly evaluated.

The FR7 is the world’s first interchangeable lens swivel camera equipped with a full-frame sensor. We have developed We also had many discussions about the design and user interface that embody the concept of this camera. Development during the corona crisis was a series of hardships, but I think that we were able to finish it as a good product that condensed the commitment of each person who was involved in this camera.

As a member of the Cinema Line, the FR7 is an unprecedented camera that combines cinema-like image expression with remote shooting operability.

We would like to continue to evolve in the future, so we would appreciate it if you could use it in various shooting situations and support the realization of new video expressions for customers.

Outlook for 2023

The video industry in 2022 will also be a year in which keywords such as cloud, remote, network, and IP will be jumbled together. It can be said that the appearance of a new style cinema camera like the Sony FR7 symbolizes the new style of 2022. In 2023, multi-viewpoints, free-viewpoints, and other unprecedented images will become even more commonplace. What kind of year will the video industry be in 2023? I would like to bring down the curtain of the year while thinking about it.