Where are we at with film??

[Jon O'Brien]

Sure, whatever the customers want. That's the way to make an actual living from having your eye stuck to the back of a camera. My inner irk though is all the young dudes with DSLRs and mirrorless cameras, with the big huge monitor attached at the top. What's the go with that? Since when did a movie camera look like a stills camera? I don't get the DSLR thing. Other than that, yep I'm happy these days shooting digital. I do like a viewfinder though. I only use a screen on top or to the side if it's the logical way to shoot for a specific shot, like on a gimbal. To each their own of course. But I don't get it.

[Aapo Lettinen]

12 minutes ago, Jon O'Brien said:

Sure, whatever the customers want. That's the way to make an actual living from having your eye stuck to the back of a camera. My inner irk though is all the young dudes with DSLRs and mirrorless cameras, with the big huge monitor attached at the top. What's the go with that? Since when did a movie camera look like a stills camera? I don't get the DSLR thing. Other than that, yep I'm happy these days shooting digital. I do like a viewfinder though. I only use a screen on top or to the side if it's the logical way to shoot for a specific shot, like on a gimbal. To each their own of course. But I don't get it.

I shot the last project with the Panasonic S5 , recording prores422hq and proresraw with NinjaV recorder. Mainly I wanted to use it because of lens options ( I used a mix of old spherical Lomos and Nikon AI-S lenses plus some Tokinas for wide angles) but for light sensitivity too. With very small crew I need to light efficiently and needed quite sensitive camera for that reason.

Something like a Blackmagic could had been an option but there is no way in hell those things could be gained nearly as much as the S5 and most of it did not need to be raw so no practical reason why would had needed to take less sensitive camera. Another thing is that "dedicated cinema cameras" consume tons more power than stills cameras which have very efficient ASICs and with limited charging possibilities it was way easier to shoot with the S5 + NinjaV setup for needing less batteries and could use cheaper batteries too. The third reason is that a mirrorless + separate recorder kit can be made extremely short and compact which was very important when shooting in small ints and in a cavern needing to squeeze between rocks to get some shots. The fourth reason is that a mirrorless camera can have a built in image stabilizer which saved couple of the shots which would had been garbage with a "cinema camera" for being too unstable and having no room for any kind of tripod or stand to rest the camera on.

so when shooting on real locations with minimal crew and gear it can be very efficient to use a dslr if the recording format is just high enough quality. "Cinema Cameras" are good for situations where there is more room for the kit and enough crew and power to light everything to 800 ISO.  Like said previously I shot comfortably at 12800 ISO at times with the S5 + NinjaV which would be outrageous with a "cinema camera" and likely would mostly have noise instead of usable image

[Jon O'Brien]

Those are excellent reasons Aapo and you've obviously chosen exactly what was needed for the job. I was meaning more general use, as in, for all jobs and all types of shots and by preference. It was more a comment regarding camera makers and the designs they choose for their camera bodies. If I was stuck in a tight space yes I would grab a DSLR body if it was needed. Though with a big battery on the back even a DSLR is often only a few inches shorter than a 'cinema camera' (actually I wasn't specifically referring to 'cinema cameras' but was also thinking of the older 'camcorder' type camera body design that seems to have 'fallen out of fasion'). I've heard the DSLR models can be more prone to overheating, but big deal, if they work for the purpose then they are a fine choice. I was speaking more of general fashions, not so much about very practical and necessary choices for specific shoots or specific shots. Good on you for choosing the equipment that you chose. Clearly ... to quote the guy from the Indiana Jones movie ..... you "chose wisely". Jon

Edited June 22, 2023 by Jon O'Brien

[Tyler Purcell]

14 hours ago, Giray Izcan said:

Jon, from my experience,  nobody really cares whether you have film experience or not. People care about how the end result looks in terms of cinematography and not the format.

I have for sure gotten more film work because I know film. 

But I haven't lost digital jobs, because I'm a film guy. 

[Tyler Purcell]

13 hours ago, Jon O'Brien said:

Sure, whatever the customers want. That's the way to make an actual living from having your eye stuck to the back of a camera. My inner irk though is all the young dudes with DSLRs and mirrorless cameras, with the big huge monitor attached at the top. What's the go with that? Since when did a movie camera look like a stills camera? I don't get the DSLR thing. Other than that, yep I'm happy these days shooting digital. I do like a viewfinder though. I only use a screen on top or to the side if it's the logical way to shoot for a specific shot, like on a gimbal. To each their own of course. But I don't get it.

Don't worry, I doubt you'll ever see anything those people make. 

[Uli Meyer]

On 6/19/2023 at 2:33 AM, Brett Allbritton said:

I love your short, Uli! Very fun.

Thank you Brett!