Owner Operator or Renter or what?

[Robin R Probyn]

Yes for sure.. the old saying.. buy the camera you need,not the camera you want...

 

But the OP specifically said he/his company wanted to mover into higher level work.. so I doubt a pocket cam or a 5D/ Fs5 is going to help their cause .. I doubt they need an Alexa Studio either..

Edited March 10, 2017 by Robin R Probyn

[Mark Kenfield]

Yes for sure.. the old saying.. buy the camera you need,not the camera you want...

 

But the OP specifically said he/his company wanted to mover into higher level work.. so I doubt a pocket cam or a 5D/ Fs5 is going to help their cause .. I doubt they need an Alexa Studio either..

 

Don't be ridiculous... clearly everyone needs an Alexa Studio! :D

[Robin R Probyn]

Only at your level sir.. I was once asked to shoot a one man band ,no sound shoot.. with an Alexa.. forget it.. !! like lugging a small car around..

[Mark Kenfield]

Only at your level sir.. I was once asked to shoot a one man band ,no sound shoot.. with an Alexa.. forget it.. !! like lugging a small car around..

 

Ouch! Yeah, mine certainly doesn't come out to play without a 1st and 2nd AC in place. That's why I keep a body-armoured F3 for the smaller jobs.

[John E Clark]

Under 5K isnt going to get you much in the video world.. the OP is not a beginner and says he wants to move up to higher level work.. this isnt gong to be under 5K camera packages .. personally I think buying the gear pushes you to get that work..and makes eco sense.. tax deductible etc.. I could be wrong.. always a first time..

 

It does depend on the individual's assessment of their near term income... for an anticipated $100K USD income, I'd say go for $10K equipment... or about 10% of the anticipated income.

 

One can also go the 'rent/lease/own' analysis... and so if one is spending $20K USD/year on rental, again go for the $10K buy. Part of the issue with rent/lease/own is while the purchase may be 'cheaper', in general, one can rent the 'latest and greatest', and not be locked into last year's technology.

 

Also there's the idea that taking one choice in an investment, precludes using that money in a different, and perhaps more rewarding investment. Spending $10K on equipment, does satisfy one goal, but spending $10K a better store front address, could be more rewarding... but then could be a bust... that's the problem with investment and risk analysis.

 

So, that's my kind of reasoning for under $5K buy... at the very least one has a set of reasonable equipment while one is seeking employment in a paying field other than photography...

[Robin R Probyn]

But what kit ? ,for the op,s plan to move up to better paying shoots.. he's already working in this industry ..you just wont have the gear to get those better shoots.. at that price level..this might get you a decent stills package..I dont really know TBH..but video gear ..its a tiny budget.. a good Mattbox can cost close to half of that.. and thats just doc/corp style ... you,ll need a "real" camera.. S35mm sensor..it will have to do 4K these days .. pro audio inputs.. a 100mm bowl tripod .. LED lights.. some diff frames..

 

Im not saying this is a starters kit.. but the OP says he wants to move up to higher paid doc/corp shoots.. your not going to get any where near that for under 5K.. not sure your last comment.. I don't think the OP is in this situation .. possibly we are talking at cross purposes ..

[Brian Drysdale]

Much depends on the local market, but for what could be termed middle ground these days I would assume you're currently talking about FS7 or similar camera,

[Robin R Probyn]

Yes agreed... I cant speak for the OP.. but I shoot alot of mid level corps for US companies ..the type it seems he wants to do.. the Fs7 has taken over from the C300 in a big way.. alot is shot 4K for crop,stable, creepy zooms I hate :).. its been a boost for F5 /55 owners too..as far as XAVC being adopted by all Post Houses.. and known about... C300 Mk II is out there too.. a bit late to the game.. as most C300 owners have already jumped to Fs7 or second hand F5..for 4K.. I know many who have..

 

The Fs7 II with the much better mount.. and all the new "budget" real cine lenses that are coming out now are changing things a bit for the better I think.. interestingly the new hot item lenses out in that market .. the Fujinon MK Cine Zooms 18-55 and 50-135.. are only E mount.. so far.. basically being made only for Fs7 A7 series .. owners.. apparently they found over some period, that over 2/3 of all camera,s sold were E mount..!..

[Artyom Zakharenko]

im thinking buying an alexa mini, but only because i have 2 big projects coming up that will return the investment..

i dont have a camera yet, but i really wonder if owning one - actually will bring you more work

[Mark Kenfield]

im thinking buying an alexa mini, but only because i have 2 big projects coming up that will return the investment..

i dont have a camera yet, but i really wonder if owning one - actually will bring you more work

 

It certainly seems to be the most popular 'pro' level camera at the moment. And Arri have just released a new 'studio' cage for it which looks to solve a lot of the issues of using it in an A-camera configuration.

 

It does have some seriously frustrating aspects ergonomically (due to the fact it was designed to simply sit in gimbal rigs and on drones). But with workarounds, the light weight and the internal NDs do make it very appealing.

 

On my last two jobs, clients have specifically requested '4k' Alexa. Make of that what you will, but it's the first time I've encountered such requests, and it perhaps suggests a trend.

 

That said, we ended up shooting 2k Alexa on the first one (with stills instead of '4k' footage for their post stuff), and the second shoot has ended up moving over to the Red Weapon (to better tie in with some previous segments they've done).

[Robin R Probyn]

So the big question.. when is Arri going to make a 4K sensor camera..or do they not need to as so far they pretty much have the high end market.. movies for sure anyway.. or will the Netflick /Amazon and no doubt Google/FB /Alibaba et el all lining up to do the same .. force their hand..

 

Or will production people thinking Alexa is 4K swing if for a few years more .. :).. I was just shooting a corp in 4K (Sony F5) and somehow in conversation I told the Dir that the Alexa was no where near 4K and he almost fell off his chair .. he just presumed it was and had no idea it wasnt ..

[Mark Kenfield]

Well obviously they'll make a >4k sensor eventually (probably something around 5-6k so that they can downsample for for 'proper' 4:4:4 4k (just like the current sensor is 3k for a perfect 2k output).

But at the moment, I think it's highly unlikely we'll see one in the next 12 months **I'm going to jump into rampant speculation from this point forward** Unless they perhaps create a new class of Alexa altogether and put a Vistavision-sized version of the current Alev III sensor into the body). That'd give them a true 4k sensor, appeal to the large-format madness that seems to have gripped the world, and mostly avoid pissing off the huge number of people who have just recently laid down lots of cash on Minis.

The bigger issue is data.

Using Arri's current uncompressed raw workflow is tough, seriously tough. And that's just for the 2.8k sensor. On Alexa65 shoots it's a mammoth task, only made possible because the budgets required to rent gear as expensive as the Alexa65, allows for the sheer data-processing grunt to get it done. I doubt anyone's shooting ProRes on those shoots.

Moving that much data around on lowlier shoots than Alexa65 jobbies, is simply never going to happen. There's a reason the vast majority of Alexa-shot features and TV shows still shoot ProRes.

 

So what happens? Do Arri have to change up their codecs and reconsider adding compression to their raw recordings? In order to make the material processable for most shows out there, they'd kinda have to. And changing up the workflow is a big deal, as it's still to this day, one of the camera's strongest selling points.

Change is coming, that's indisputable, but exactly what form it'll take. I'll be very interested to see.

Also, although Netflix and Amazon are pushing 4k hard. I did hear that Amazon have recently relaxed their 4k requirement to allow their own original productions to shoot on Alexa.

[Robin R Probyn]

Yes I agree re the over sample ..I think the new F5/55 will have to have this too.. to get a "true"4K image.. or at least you can have the option if you need it.. then leaving the Fs7 as the doc/corp level camera..

I think Arri have to do something soon.. great camera and look no denying it.. but now an old sensor and prores also long in the tooth and data heavy/in efficient ... the newer Sony RAW files are not much bigger than Prores HQ..

 

Have mentioned it before.. but Hedge for Mac has really changed my evenings on 4K shoots without a DIT.. in that I can now eat with the rest of the crew and not stay up all night down loading footage..! recent shoot we shot alot of 4K and slo mo.. about 13 hours over 6 days.. with hedge its about 16 mins to down load 1hr i.e. 1 X 128GB SxS card .. its smoking hot fast compared to other software.. thats going to be important in the future as files get bigger and bigger even in the doc, corp world..

[Mark Kenfield]

Yeah, certainly all big considerations.

However, I don't think we're going to see ProRes going anywhere until there's a new drag-and-drop alternative.

 

I don't know why, but there still isn't a single mastering format out there that matches ProRes's ultimate trick of a drag-an-drop file structure.

No subfolder structures to worry about, instant playback right there in your browser, the ability to rename your files to whatever you want with zero consequences.

It remains, hands down, the simplest and most elegant workflow that we have. It's the only format that's managed to fulfill the dream of a proper file-based digital workflow. And that's the one lesson that literally every other codec designer has failed to learn. It's where every other camera manufacturer (bar Blackmagic) has gone wrong.

And I think that until someone comes up with something that's the same, but better, we won't see the industry switching over.

[Robin R Probyn]

Yeah, certainly all big considerations.

 

However, I don't think we're going to see ProRes going anywhere until there's a new drag-and-drop alternative.

 

I don't know why, but there still isn't a single mastering format out there that matches ProRes's ultimate trick of a drag-an-drop file structure.

 

No subfolder structures to worry about, instant playback right there in your browser, the ability to rename your files to whatever you want with zero consequences.

 

It remains, hands down, the simplest and most elegant workflow that we have. It's the only format that's managed to fulfill the dream of a proper file-based digital workflow. And that's the one lesson that literally every other codec designer has failed to learn. It's where every other camera manufacturer (bar Blackmagic) has gone wrong.

 

And I think that until someone comes up with something that's the same, but better, we won't see the industry switching over.

 

 

Yes I guess so.. thats why it was originally built as an edit/post only codec I believe..

[Phil Rhodes]

It's worth being clear that there's nothing technologically that clever about ProRes. It's very similar to basic motion-JPEG, which was used from the very dawn of computer editing. Many of the things which are attributed to it can be done with many other codecs.

 

This issue of files coming in complicated folder structures is and always was craziness. It's completely unnecessary, it's enormously unhelpful and it's arguably misuse of a computer filesystem. When Panasonic came out with P2 I was horrified at how badly it had been done. Even MXF itself is a disaster; massively overcomplicated and so desperate to be everything to everyone it ended up being nothing to anyone.

 

It should always just have been file per take, just like Broadcast Wave.

 

P

[Max Field]

somehow in conversation I told the Dir that the Alexa was no where near 4K and he almost fell off his chair ..

 

Whoever the hell owns the patent on "4k technology" has to be making a fortune. I meet kids who think any image with a shallow depth of field was shot on a 4K camera.

[Robin R Probyn]

 

Whoever the hell owns the patent on "4k technology" has to be making a fortune. I meet kids who think any image with a shallow depth of field was shot on a 4K camera.

 

 

Yes some irony that the camera held in the highest esteem ,that has produced fantastic images for large screen projection .. is what 2,800K in standard 16-9 format..(or something like that).. or lower.. 2500 in others.. that alot of "non gear" people just presume its 4K or more..begs the question doesnt it.. do we need 4K? do we need 8K.. Mmmm maybe not..

[Phil Rhodes]

About the only really worthwhile application of very high resolution video at present is in VR/360-degree video, call it what you will. In that situation, there's a need for lots of resolution because the (generally) 16:9 image will be expanded into a sphere, so the region of interest at any one time represents only a very small part of the signal you're actually sending.

 

Obviously all a bit nascent at the moment, though, and you'll be deriving it from a cluster of a dozen cameras, so...

[Matt Thomas]

Just to update...

 

Ended up buying a stellar FS5 rig, kit zoom lens (cuz just rent glass ya know?), and with RAW upgrade and external recorder. I think this will be a solid base to build on and grow with. Quality wise, I think I've placed myself nicely between the top level RED guys in town and the DSLR crowd, without breaking the bank or getting into unforeseeable debt.

 

Not sure if I'll end up renting it out yet or not. My insurance agent laughed at me when I brought it up in our meeting <_< but like, what does he know??

 

Thanks for the input everyone. This really is the best cinematography forum out there.

[Max Field]

Just to update...

 

(cuz just rent glass ya know?),

 

If anything it'd be better to throw all the money into your glass and rent the body. Takes a lot longer for a high quality lens to go obsolete than a digital camera body. Lomos still see use 40+ years later? I don't see very many people rocking video cameras released 20 years ago..

[Robin R Probyn]

Until all the cameras go FF sensor.. and my lovely CN7 becomes a paper weight :)

[Max Field]

At that point will there be a surge in EF still glass? Or would that still be too small?

[Robin R Probyn]

Well no I imagine it will be a boom for FF stills lenses.. except they are a pain to work with.. but alot more "affordable" cine FF lenses I would guess.. Sigma are already going full throttle in knocking out FF cine primes and a couple of zooms too.. but one has alot of breathing apparently..

Or like the Angenieux (spelling) zoom that has some sort of changeable back element design..

[Max Field]

Sounds like we should start stocking up on L series glass!