David Peterson

Would it be totally crazy off the wall thinking of me to shoot this in front of a green screen? As then you'd only need a few meters deep of haze, then you could key out the background and replace it with even more haze to make it appear to be a very deep background of haze.

 

I was gaffer on this project:

Which you can tell was only very vaguely similar, as it is quite obvious there is a black backdrop not at all too far behind the dancers.

Pity that Sony doesn't still sell these for cheap! Heck, they should offer it out for free as a nice final gift to F3 users.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/131882733172

 

US$15K is a crazy low price it went for!! :-o

Is even less than what a new Varicam LT goes for.

It wouldn't be quite so bad if it was a mirrorless mount (like the GH4/BMPCC/A6300 has), as at least you could then speedbooster it!

I'd do it, but I'm probably about 5,000 miles too far east.

 

 

You are heaps closer than I am!

The reason is there are so so so many of these available to sell relative to the almost zilch interest in using them. Thus a person finds one camera price too high for their tastes, they can easily move on and find a cheaper offer. Which drives down the prices. Simple economics of supply and demand!!

Oh please may I win lotto next weekend.... :-P ;-)

On a closely related point, what is (roughly generally speaking) the prefered aspect ratio by distributors? 2.35:1 , 2.39:1 , 1.85:1 , or something else?

The crop factor defearts the entire purpose of the 5D series!

Might as well buy a GH4, or A6300, or heck even a D500

About to start shooting a vampire comedy feature film with both the F5 and a7S mk2 together in 4K, the a7S mk2 is for the purpose of a smaller gimbal camera.

Any particular tips/suggestions I should be aware of beforehand?

For instance I am thinking it is probably best they both use slog2 rather than slog3? As the slog3 could be too much of a stretch for the a7S's 8bit codec. So use slog2 with the a7S and thus do the same with the F5 as well to help match it better.

 

Also, when I think ahead to when we get distribution (well.... hopefully!!), would they prefer 23.976fps or 24fps?

My combos (chinese, too) don't look like there's anything atrociously wrong with them. The clamping mechanism on the baby pin is a bit primitive, but otherwise I've no complaints. They are nearly new, though.

 

Thanks, for some silly reason I'd purchased C stands from Aliexpress but never thought to look for combo stands on there. Well lo and behold, of course they're for sale there as well:

 

http://www.aliexpress.com/item/4m-studio-Combo-Stand-Tripod-Load-20kg-for-Light-2k-5k-HMI-Compact-Par-1-2k/32265490574.html

 

And a smaller one:

http://www.aliexpress.com/item/2m-Low-Boy-Mighty-Studio-Combo-Stand-Load-20kg-for-Light-HMI-Compact-Par-M18/32263201271.html

What they use for Google Maps and what they use for exploring in 360 degree videos is very different.

For the videos it is likely 6 or so GoPros in a custom rig arranged in a sphere, which then gets stitched together later on the PC (such as by using Kolor's software).

I do this myself, here is a pic for example of what I've been using:

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10154017798262909&set=a.10150525021567909.382065.503317908&type=3&theater

BMPCC can be found cheap secondhand, the BMMCC is too new to have much chance of finding it secondhand for cheap.

BMMCC has to have an additional screen, but... it has a bigger battery which means having an external battery pack like with the BMPCC is not so essential.

Biggest positive for the BMMCC is the 60fps slow motion! BMPCC maxes out at 30fps.

Otherwise the BMPCC's only advantages is being extra stealthy, and a lower price.

Why not run BOTH? ;-) Heck, bring along a DSLR and run a third camera as a time lapse with the DSLR! :-D

No harm in doing that, and that way you're covered if the RED One fails.

You can get gimbals for under a thousand bucks for the a7S and a small lens (even small single handed gimbals can cope with that load!). So that shouldn't hold you back from going with the F5 package if that is what you want.

a7S mk1, a7S mk2, & a7R mk2 are the only ones of real interest to filmmakers. Ignore completely the a7 mk1, a7 mk2, and a7R mk1

If you want S35 4K from Sony mirrorless, then a7R mk2 and a6300 are your only options.

A trick I learned from a wily old gaffer was to state on your invoice that the agreed rate for the job was heavily discounted (even if it wasn't), and that the discount would be removed if the invoice wasn't paid on time. Doesn't help with deadbeat producers, but it has made a few corporate accounts departments pay on time.

 

 

Interesting idea! Especially as I normally am discounting things anyway in a number of cases.

They have their XEEN series, which is their Rokinon Cine DS series with a few tweaks, different casing, and a PL mount.

But their price is so high (but low for PL lenses) that I think a much wiser step is to instead buy a set of Sony CineAlta PL primes, or wait for SLR Magic to fill out the rest of their PL range.

 

Where do you see the spectacular bargains for Digiprimes and Zooms? As I seem to be able to rarely find them for sale at all on ebay/dvxuser/reduser, and when they are for sale they're still thousands upon thousands of dollars to buy :-/

 

Very cheap right now at only $2000

 

I've been browsing some of those dirt cheap F900 listings just now too.

 

These are the big problems I see with the F900 in 2016:

 

a) the F900 lacks SDI out (I think?????) and for that you need to instead get the F900R to get SDI out, and the F900R go for a fair bit more than the original F900

 

b) the really cheap F900 listings on eBay lack a viewfinder, and to buy them separately is very expensive! (relative to the dirt cheap body price)

 

c) none of my S35/FF lenses would be suitable to work with an F900, and for the high cost of a quality lenses (such as Digiprimes) I could instead buy a good S35 camera.

 

I think if I randomly happen to both have the money ***AND*** see a set of Digiprimes for dirt cheap, then I'd buy those first, and only then afterwards buy a F900/F900R (or even F23). But I wouldn't first by one of these older 2/3" cinema cameras without first having the lenses for it, as finding quality ones of those at low low low prices seems much tougher to do than finding the cameras.

Film was delayed... but we will finally be shooting it in a couple of months. Probably with my Sony PMW-F3 + BMPCC

Plus even their older cameras had non-raw options.