Travis Gray

I would ask if any of that is currently holding you back in how you're working. I shoot with the FS100 now, it just was one of the better solutions for how I wanted to work, but obviously not the best solution... 4:4:4 would be great. RAW would be cool. HD-SDI would be awesome. etc etc. But from what I had heard and saw, some awesome stuff came out of it, and I knew it would work fine for me for the time being. I'm not losing clients because I'm shooting on it. I own a D7000 for still photo work and as a B camera when I need something quick, and I could shoot events with that without running into any issues as well. If you do what you can in camera, you shouldn't have to push a grade too hard, so 4:2:0 isn't as big of an issue. If you know how to combat rolling shutter, also not a big issue. External recorder? It records on to cards. See previous statement about 4:2:0. Maximum record time? Know your events to anticipate when to factor in a break. Overheating... yeah.. maybe an issue (never had an issue with the D7000. Shot a whole event with it a couple months ago.) If you get a client who requires something better, work a rental into the cost. Especially with the rate cameras are coming out now... save up until you really outgrow the 7D. I wanted to go back to XLR inputs and peaking, etc, so I outgrew my short period of shooting on DSLRs. I've seen some very good things coming out of the 7D, and I know I've seen some professional productions done with them as well (can't remember credits off hand, I think I read some stuff in AC mag... maybe that cancelled horse racing show in some shots?) I would really evaluate what you need a new camera for, and with a budget of 5K, I don't think you'll be getting much of a true upgrade.

Why do you need to replace the 7D? Gear lust?

I do. I love it. Let all the people with money and the ones who have been shooting for a while use it and work out the kinks haha Someone I was talking to who wanted to direct a couple of features was talking about shooting in 4K and I mentioned a couple movies that were done in 1080 and were perfectly fine. Especially since he was new and still building up a portfolio. 4K seemed like an unnecessary expense right now. I could see if you had a specific shot lined up where you wanted the space for reframing or a shot stabilizer, but I'm more interested in other features in cameras like color space, range, and frame rate, but even that one's not a big deal. I guess ease of use too. That SLR form factor is just not fun to shoot with unless you have a decent rig.

Yeah, curious if anyone is doing the film thing, that's a smaller organization... haha I was thinking about investing into an LTO system, but the film thing really makes sense... except for the fact that I've seen prices around $320-450 a minute. yowzas.

I thought that this would be a cool camera to check out, but yeah, the lack of PL mount is a little of a turn off. But then when I thought about it, and read (what I think Phil said) about it having a bad rolling shutter, probably not worth it. If I'm investing in PL glass, I'd rather be sticking it on a little bit better of a camera. I'll wait until the FS700 does the 4K at least. It probably makes sense for DSLR people to move into something a little higher end, without having to fork over their first born for a cinema EOS camera. But from what it sounds like, definitely not something I'd be interested in.

I would check reviews if you can find them. I know a lot of still photographers love the 1.4s over the 1.8 (except in the case of Nikon's 1.4 vs 1.8G lens, one guy I know says the 1.8 is better, and it's only $200) I have the $200 1.8 and am perfectly fine with it. Haven't used it on the FS100 yet, but you'll want to look at depth of field charts to see how much narrower things will be at 1.4 vs 1.8 (at 1.4 at 10' is giving you 8" DOF, and 1.8 will give you 2 more inches), but the 1.4 lens might be sharper at 1.8 than the straight 1.8 lens. So that may be something to consider. I haven't had anything to test sharpness on a Super35 sensor, but I've seen the tests on full frame DSLRs and you'll see some differences in lenses. Same with distortion around the edges. I'm not as knowledgeable in this area as to how it would be on a Super35 sensor at 1080p. Not sure how great the differences is on that vs an 18mp full frame still sensor. I'd say maybe go to a shop if they have the lenses in stock and see if you can play with them on the camera itself (although, not a fan of taking advantage of brick and motor stores and then ordering online from somewhere else), or look for reviews online from people who have the lenses and have compared. Another thing to consider is how the handling is on them. If you're using manual focus, the focus ring is important. Whether doing it by hand or where you're hooking gears up to it for a follow focus. You can also look into renting things to try out. borrowlenses.com at least has the 1.4, and you could even try renting the 28-75. That may suit your needs pretty well if you're looking for diversity and keeping budget down, at least while you build up funds.

This is just me, but I'd go with the 24 and 50. At least to start with. But that's me. I like those lengths. 50 for going for a little more of a potrait/talking head and isolating the background, and then in the 20s for wider stuff. You won't use the fisheye or lens baby except in specific situations. I just shot an event on Sunday and used just a 28mm. And that was PL with an additional 1.11 crop. (I did have an SLR set up as a B-camera with an 18 on it for some random stuff, and occasionally pulled out a cheap 70-300 zoom when I felt like getting further back and a shallower DOF, but only for a couple shots, and I hated it. Look into what creates a shallower depth of field and you'll see what to get. Increasing focal length and opening the aperture does it. But beware. If doing run and gun, you won't want a shallow depth of field, or if stuff is moving around a lot and you're not the greatest focus puller. I was shooting around f/8 and 11 on the 28mm.

Indeed. ..UNLESS... for the van, you get a battery conversion kit. When I worked at the stage lighting place, we were hired for a weird protest event where they wanted a searchlight effect. No power. No money for generator. We bought some thing that hooked up to the car battery (chevy cargo van) and we left it running and powered a 575w lamp. We thankfully bought two, the first one didn't work, so we had a backup. I forgot how it worked, but it did exist. So you could probably even go with that and run a couple LED lights off of it. But, then, back of a van, with it running... fumes...

It depends. I can't remember how many my last house had, but I know my first apartment had a grand total of 4 circuits. 3 15-amp, 1 20. They might have been 10-amp. It was an old apartment. Find the circuit breaker box and check. The switches will have a number on them as to how much they can handle. And more than likely they are 120v. There are testers you can buy for these things. (voltmeters, and breaker identifiers... you plug them into a socket and check the breakers to see where it corresponds) If you have a completely clear 15-amp circuit, you could get all 3 650w lights on there, but I would probably play it safe if I didn't know the location that well and spread it to 2 lights on one, and the last on it's own circuit. And then maybe the 1k on a third circuit.

A general rule of thumb I worked with when doing stage lighting was a quick calculation of 100 volts. So, 1000w going into 100v was 10amps. And we were working with mostly 20amp services. So, 2 1k lights. Obviously if you're working with 120v, you can push more, but we would stay under just to have the room. If it's a house, I would just double check to make sure the wiring is fairly sturdy, depending on the age of the house, and you should be able to get at least 1 1k light on a circuit, assuming it's a 15amp service. And make sure you know what else is going to be on that circuit. If someone's charging a cell phone, it would more than likely be fine, but if someone's using a blow-dryer, something's going to pop. As far as things blowing up and creating holes, I was never quite sure on how that happened, so I'd have to defer to someone else haha. I think it has to do with wire gauges and how sturdy the connections are. I have wired edison ends improperly before and wires have touched and melted the ends, so that's something to be aware of too.

In the US, I've done small to medium light setups (relative term I guess... a mixture between about 16 400w lights and a handful of 575w, all spread out among circuits in the building we were working in. Did our calculations just to make sure we knew where the circuits were and what service the breakers were. Then spread out from there. Have also done larger gigs where we tied into the building power with another breakout box. But these were all within limitations of the building's power. Outside gigs and ones so large that they exceeded the building's power we've pulled in generators, but I think with your package, with calculations and planning, you should be able to use the building no problem. As far as burning wires and such too, make sure you're using the right gauges for your lights too. Too thin and it won't be able to properly handle the power being drawn. http://www.electrical-online.com/common-cable-and-wire/ This will be a help too: http://www.supercircuits.com/resources/tools/Volts-Watts-Amps-Converter

omg she was dead the whole time? no wai! didn't see that coming! but, yeah, yawn. I've seen some great stuff coming out of the FS100 even, so this doesn't impress me. It looks on par with everything else that's coming out, especially at the price range they're giving it. And I'm still confused as to why it's an SLR form factor.

I use this guy, and very happy with it. But definitely invest in a shock mount and a good windscreen (blimp or dead cat) http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/97711-REG/Audio_Technica_AT8035_AT8035_Shotgun_Microphone.html

I'm confused. What are you asking then? You sound like you've done your research and should be able to anticipate what changes there will be in the future (assuming you've compared them against the MkIII, D800, Sony FS100/F3/FS700, C300, RED...) (and just to be picky... the 7D and D7000 were not made for video. They're not camcorders. They just happen to do video.)

With the way things are going, everything gets "outdated" quickly. Do you have any lenses right now? If not, at least you have a clean slate as far as brands. I picked up a D7000 for stills work and light video, plus the $200 50mm 1.8 lens and I've been happy with it. I paid about 1600 for that plus an extra battery and a SanDisk extreme pro 32gb card. I know the 7D has come down in price, but that same package ended up being more at the time. Despite the camera getting "outdated" as new stuff comes out, it'll still do 1080p, which won't necessarily be going away any time soon. And I know some people who still shoot on tape and can make it look just as good. And depending on what you're doing, maybe go with used (especially if only using it for video, don't necessarily have to worry about adding too many shutter clicks yourself on the total) and get a decent kit lens (although I'd recommend anything with a constant aperture, like one of the 50mm lenses), then spend the other money on some lights or audio.

Every time I took a class in college that had a lab or some other requirement that needed outside materials the school didn't cover, it was made note of in the class description or at the very least, the first day of class, so you could still drop if needed. Shame on the school if this wasn't mentioned, but I highly doubt that. And I'm guessing the project goal is to learn how to work with film, and not just do a project and they just randomly chose film as the medium. So, cheating at the assignment is really just cheating yourself.

Why... why... why?? I just got my FS100 a month ago and really try not to be one of those gear lust guys... just reading this so far is killing me inside haha Watching the clip later on my big screen to fully appreciate it. Any hints from Sony on if the coming 4K will only work with their future recorder or do you think other companies will be able to jump on with it (4K and external recorders are still a bit outside of my range of knowledge, so may be a dumb question)

You're probably looking for a parfocal lens (brought up in another thread about the Sigma still photography lens) If using a still photography lens, it's probably a varifocal which won't hold focus through all parts of the zoom.

Eh. Maybe rent and see what you like better. The only things I can point out are the things I already mentioned. More length but f/4, but that's not a bad thing either since you'd probably want a little more depth of field so you're not hunting on focus so much. But if you're in low light situations a lot, the f/2.8 will help. I've heard image quality from both is great, so, I think it'll just be personal preference.

I would probably vote for the 24-105, especially with the C300 since it can shoot at higher speeds, you're probably not going to really need that extra stop, but it would depend on what you're doing too. If you want more creative control over the depth of field, the 2.8 will give you that extra room to open up if needed. And if you have more creative control, then you can not have to worry about needing to get the extra length to get a shot. I've shot with the 24-70 before on a MkIV for ENG/run and gun sorta stuff. My real opinion is not to use still lenses, but, budgets, cameras, etc. come in to play. So the real questions I would say are what are you shooting and what are you hoping to do?

Are you actually shooting anamorphic or just doing a 2.35 crop? If just a crop, obviously your field of view is going to change a bit, height-wise, but it won't affect focal length. If I'm shooting something and I want to do a 2.35 crop, I might go wider though just to be able to fit in more of the background and then move closer to get a tighter shot on the subject. I think it would depend on what you're shooting too. If I want to hide locations, I'm going to probably shoot 16x9 and keep tighter to the subjects. A good tool to check, if you're on an iPhone, is CeneCalc. It has a field of view calculator that allows you to see different crops on different sensors and pick your focal length and distance and see how subjects fill the frame. If you are doing anamorphic though, I have no idea haha. I have yet to shoot true anamorphic.

True, but at least players/displays can be set up to not stretch 4:3 to 16:9 (assuming you have a competent operator). I would think a 1:1 file/media on anything would be more problematic since it's an unconventional format. So I would shoot 16:9 or 4:3 (depending on equipment, mask off a display during shooting to know what I'm doing and then mask in post. Probably easiest workflow.

Can you shoot in 4:3 and just add a mask?

After asking a similar thing the other day here, I've decided to make the investment into the Zeiss CP.2, or at least a few, and not a full set (Able Cine allows you to do a mixed set of four), and in PL mount. While I do some extra camera work with a D7000, I'm going to try and use it sparingly and for shots that won't have a focus pull to try and avoid breathing, and rent/use what I have for glass already. Then with the PLs, I can then rent other cameras and not have to worry about adapting things or anything, and it does make sense for slowly building up. And then another reason on the CP.2 just for ease of working with them because of the gears, the focus rotation, and not having to use an adapter to get my aperture dialed in, and without any markers. I shoot on an FS100 right now and have a Nikon to E-mount adapter and the range is so short on the aperture adapter ring it drives me nuts. And it's kinda guesswork to see what you're shooting at. I know wide open and closed, and even halfway is tough because the closed marker on the adapter isn't actually where the aperture is fully stopped down on the lens.

Curious now... how does everyone export out of FCP? My typical process is FCP, send to color, send back to FCP, then export movie and work in compressor from there. And my timeline/footage settings are regular ProRes, 1080p. I haven't noticed any issues yet, but then again, my eyes probably aren't that sharp for these things yet.