Shooting a promo with the A99ii and the RX10IV

A recurring client asked me if I had access to a camera that does 240fps. He had this idea of doing an Avengers inspired promo for a Municipal Broadband campaign that required some major slow mo running.
The A99ii only does 120fps and I was tempted to a moment to just shoot 120fps and extend it to 240fps in Adobe Premiere Pro or After Effects. There are also some specialized and pretty expensive pro slow motion cameras out there that I could rent. However, since the Sony Pro service allows me to get some loaner equipment to test (that they send through LensRentals) I decided to go with the RX10IV, one of the better point and shoots that Sony has made, kind of a go to camera if you need 600mm or 240fps in a small affordable camera.
Because I didn't how how the RX10IV would work, just to be on the safe side, I also got a 70-400mm lens for my A99ii. Generally I don't use zoom lenses, but I wanted to try perhaps doing some zooms. That was a mistake as I soon realized that hand held  zooming and focusing at the same proved impossible. Next time I will probably get an FS5 some other "true" video camera for this.
That said, both cameras worked well. The RX10IV is really light and the 70-400mm lens is surprisingly easy to use on the A99ii and not heavy at all. All the shots were handheld to convey a sense of urgency and action so it was great to have something light but not too light to work with.
I used the A99ii on 400mm for most of the non slow-mo shots of the people hanging in the park, switching to my 20mm prime lens to shoot the greedy corporation owners. I did use my 85mm lens for a few of the shots when necessary, like the chess game, because it had an Over the Shoulder aspect that I didn't want to lose.
I used the RX10IV exclusively for slow motion shots, as Sony calls them, HFR (High Frame Rate) mode. It only shoots 4 seconds of quality 1080p/24fps that makes it 40 second shot for use in editing. Once you're finished with shot, it renders it out to file in front of your eyes. So you need to be well planned to shoot in this mode and wait a little between takes.  A few good youtube videos about this helped be to be somewhat prepared for that. The footage though looks really really good, I guess that's the important part.
Since it's summer here and the shoot was to be held between 11am and 4pm, we had to deal with some really bright sun and/or strong contrast. I decided to shoot in S-Log 3, also after watching a few videos about this. Both cameras have the same menus to activate this. These menus are poorly designed and difficult to figure out. MENU → (Camera Settings1) → [Picture Profile] → PP8 should get you there though.  You should also set MENU → (Setup) → [Gamma Disp. Assist] to S-Log3, so you could properly see what the end result could look like.

That said, S-Log3 works really well in contrasty shots. It forces you to shoot in ISO 800, but it looks good. That said, in situations where there is less contrast I would not advise you to shoot in that mode as it hinders the ability to focus, either manually o with Auto focus.
Editing was kind of easy, I found a free preset to use. That said, color correction proved challenging at times as the bright colors provided by S-Log were sometimes really different from one another, depending on where we shot and what colors were in the scene.
Would I but the RX10IV? Probably not. I hope usable 240fps come to the Alpha family soon, perhaps on the A7iii that is out soon? I also hope for better control of the camera while shooting slow motion, as the current RX10IV option is to be stuck on auto throughout the shot. I would also hope for something longer than 4 seconds, just in case it is needed.
That said, the tools I were using were sufficient to make the promo. We complemented them with some drone footage to provide even more drama. I think at this point I still would rather hire a drone operator for these shots rather than buy one myself. I guess I am still in fear of crashing a drone :)