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1st feature film, low budget HD, mostly exteriors: which camera set up?


Jamesy

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We want to shoot on HD, outside (think adventure in the mountains), onto a hard drive, with a powerful G5 back at HQ for dailies/rough edit etc, with the image as 'beautiful' as possible, lots of wide angle lenses, DOF. Maneuverabilty and flexibilty essential, really experimenting with angles and loads of takes.

 

I'd love to hear any opinion on which cameras might be best suited to the task.

 

Many thanks

 

james

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I have not shot with a F900 or any high end HD gear but it is large and heavy. I am looking seriously at the Canon XL-h1. You have lens options and you can get 4:2:2 out of SDI record through a capture card or HD deck and have the color info. If you use the Canon or Sony and shoot on mini-dv, the hd is compressed but tapes are cheap. I would do all experimenting with angles and loads of takes, on a mini dv or consumer camcorder. That way you can test shoots and get a detailed shoot list before you bring in the expensive gear.

I have assisted on Film shoots and there is not much trial and error, the DP has a plan and sticks to it

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I have not shot with a F900 or any high end HD gear but it is large and heavy. I am looking seriously at the Canon XL-h1. You have lens options and you can get 4:2:2 out of SDI record through a capture card or HD deck and have the color info. If you use the Canon or Sony and shoot on mini-dv, the hd is compressed but tapes are cheap. I would do all experimenting with angles and loads of takes, on a mini dv or consumer camcorder. That way you can test shoots and get a detailed shoot list before you bring in the expensive gear.

I have assisted on Film shoots and there is not much trial and error, the DP has a plan and sticks to it

 

Hi,

Depends what you mean by heavy! I would consider an Arri BL heavy, an F900 is very light compared to any film camera even the lighter ones used for handheld a lot. I did a whole short handheld with the F900 and it was not a problem at all (I even had a pro-35 on it w/Primes so it was heavier than usual).

The XLH1 is not all it's cracked up to be by certain people on this forum! I used one recently and thought that 24F mode is definately inferior in look to true 24p (XL2 for example). The XLH1 does have quite extensive image manipulation menus in-camera which is always a big plus for me, it's just a shame it isn't 24p because to me I could tell the difference and didn't like it.

If your budget is around $500k shoot 35mm, the extra lattitude will be a blessing with lots of exteriors.

Just my opinion.

Cheers.

Edited by Tomas Haas
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