I’m a big fan of TV Logics monitors. I’ve been using a TV Logic 056W as my primary on camera monitor for some time and it’s been a good solid and reliable workhorse. One of the great things about it is it’s weight, it’s extremely light, which makes it very simple to mount on the camera.

TV Logic have now released a new monitor, very similar to the 056W. The new monitor is just a shade smaller at 5.5″ but now features a full 8 bit 1920 x 1080 resolution panel.  At first I was sceptical that I would see any benefit from this high resolution on such a small screen, but I have been pleasantly surprised, I can see noticeably more detail in my images thanks to the screens higher resolution. This makes focus checking easier, especially when shooting in 4K.

The 058W’s feature set is very similar to the 056W. Inputs are 3G HDSDI and HDMI. There is also an HDMI out, very handy for feeding another monitor if you only have a single HDMI or SDI out on the camera. There are the usual Waveform and Vectorscope displays for exposure control along side luma zone (a kind of false colour) and over range error checking . There is coloured peaking (focus assist) to help with critical focus as well as an always handy zoom mode that allows you to zoom in to the picture for focus checking. There are various underscan/overscan viewing modes along with all the usual aspect ratio markers and safe area overlays.

DSLR shooters are also taken care of thanks to the monitors ability to take  the output from a DSLR and scale the image so that it fills the screen.

One feature I really like is the way the monitors 3 assignable function buttons work. Instead of having to go into the menus to assign your desired functions to the buttons, all you have to do is press and hold the button. After a couple of seconds a drop down menu appears with all the available options, then you simply scroll to the function you want with the scroll wheel and press the wheel to select. It’s fast and simple to change the assigned function as your needs change.

As well as providing a sharp and clear image, the monitors colours are also nice and accurate. You can even use TV-Logics calibration utility and a measuring probe to full calibrate the display and save the calibration settings as a LUT in the monitor. I’d really like to investigate the monitors LUT capabilities as this could prove very useful when shooting with Log.

There is a built in speaker for audio monitoring as well as a 3.5mm headphone jack. If you want you can monitor your audio levels via on screen audio meters.

The 058W is not quite as light as the 056W as it has a tough looking magnesium alloy housing, but it’s still nice and lightweight. It also lacks the analog input that the 056W has, although to be honest I’ve never used that feature on my 056W. The higher resolution screen is very nice, the new button layout (all along the top of the monitor) is a big improvement over the 056W and overall this monitor feels a little more robust (although my 056W has been all over the world with anything breaking). With 14″ threads on all 4 sides, mounting is easy, so the VFM-058W will now replace my 056W as my on camera monitor.

Well done TV-Logic. Another really good monitor.