Sydney-based Director of Photography Tim Hawkins used a pre-production Sony FX5 over five weeks of production on Series 19 of Pat Callinan’s 4×4 Adventures, shot in remote Australian outback locations. Hawkins, who has more than 30 years of experience across broadcast television, documentary, and reality programming, says the FX5 replaced his FX6 as the primary camera for the series.

“I was genuinely blown away by what Sony achieved with the FX5,” says Hawkins. “They hit it completely out of the park. By integrating Open Gate, internal RAW recording, a fantastic EVF and highly flexible menu architecture, they created what is, in my opinion, the ultimate and best run-and-gun camera I’ve ever operated.”

The FX5 is a full-frame Cinema Line camera featuring open gate recording, internal 16-bit scene-linear X-OCN RAW, AI-enhanced autofocus, high-speed capture up to 5K at 120fps and 4K at 240fps, and an optional high-resolution OLED viewfinder.

Hawkins says the camera’s image stabilization was the standout feature. An editor who received footage from the shoot assumed handheld shots had been captured on a gimbal. “At that point in the shoot, I hadn’t even mounted the camera to a gimbal once,” Hawkins says. “He was looking entirely at handheld footage backed by the internal IBIS.”

He also cites the triple base ISO as a practical advantage in the high-contrast outback lighting conditions. “Having a middle base ISO fills that gap perfectly. Using the dual gain function gave me an extra stop of latitude, which was crucial while shooting in the Australian outback.”

For the series, Hawkins shot UHD in XAVC-I. He says upcoming firmware will unlock 4K at 240fps with full functionality.

“At the end of the day, the Sony FX5 completely earned my trust,” says Hawkins. “I threw five weeks of absolute punishment at it, rain, mud, sliding around the back seat of a car and it didn’t fail once. What really blows me away, though, is how harmoniously the features work together. On so many other cameras, turning on one setting arbitrarily locks you out of another. With the FX5, everything just works in tandem seamlessly. I’ve never owned a camera quite like it and as a result, I’ve put my order to buy two of them.”