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I have a new setup and pipeline and I'm really happy with it. GH7 shooting V-Log in C4K Prores 422 internally, at around 500Mbps 14-140mm F3.5-5.6 lens for daytime, 12-35mm F2.8 for night-time K&F True Colour 1-5 stop vND Pipeline in Resolve: CST to DWG as working colour space Plugin for basic shot adjustments Film Look Creator for overall look (and for taking the digititis out of the image) ARRI709 LUT to get to 709 output I went on a walk on Monday to test the full setup, and it was a crazy hot day (37C/99F) and direct midday sun, so seriously challenging conditions. Here are a few grabs (be sure to click-through rather than viewing the preview files embedded in the post). My notes and impressions - while shooting: Setup was GH7, 14-140mm lens, vND, and a wrist-strap and that's it I used the integrated screen, showing histogram, zebras, and focus-peaking to monitor I used back-button focus to AF before hitting record, so no AF-C going on while shooting (and randomly changing its mind about what to focus on) All shots were 14-140mm at F5.6 for constant exposure The K&F 1-5 stop vND had enough range, when combined with the DR of the GH7, so I never needed to change settings, despite going in and out of shadow (and even inside, which isn't included in the above images) The vND had a much more consistent sky and colour render than my old (crappy) vND, so I'm really happy with it I did ETTR and bring images down in post, but my tests indicated that V-LOG is very linear so there are a good few stops of latitude there The "tripod mode" of IBIS, which locks the frame completely, was very effective (despite me being hot and not having eaten for hours) and I could hand-hold past 70mm without it needing to drift, and even at 140mm (280mm FF equivalent) the shots will be fine with a bit of stabilisation in post (C4K on 1080p timeline) I shot about 18mins of footage in about 1.5 hours, camera was on most of the time with screen at full brightness, and didn't get any notifications about the battery, and didn't look to see how much was left since I have a spare My notes and impressions - in post: I chose a Film Look Creator preset and then just messed with it for maybe 10 mins, while scrolling back and forth through the footage, and I deliberately pushed the contrast to create a really strong sense of the contrast between the beating sun and the deep shadows Shots had exposure adjusted (obviously, due to ETTR) and some had contrast lowered and a few had slight WB tweaks, but that's it I never felt like I was fighting with the footage, and it didn't feel like work when creating the look.. I've shot with a lot of cheap cameras with tiny sensors and you always feel like you're trying to make gold out of lead, but playing in the FLC was more like choosing between a large range of high-quality options I used another copy of the FLC to adjust exposure etc per shot, with it set to not impart and 'look'. The advantage of that is that in Resolve there is a mode (Shift-F) that maximises the preview image and gets rid of the GUI except for the vertical toolbar on the right-hand-side where the DCTL and OFX plugins are, so it's a way of getting almost a full-screen view but keeping the controls visible.. very useful if you don't have a control surface or a second monitor handy. I'll talk more about my thought process and how I got to this setup in a later post, and also go into some of the technical stuff (DR, high-ISO, etc) but more importantly than that, I finally feel like the tech has come of age. What I mean by that is that I now have a setup where: I can shoot with a conveniently sized setup that doesn't need a rig and is ergonomic to use It has the right usability features, such as histograms, zebras, focus-peaking etc internally The monitor is bright enough The GH7 plus lenses (14-140mm F3.5-5.6 and 12-35mm F2.8) are long enough and fast enough to shoot what I see, without being too large, heavy, or prohibitively expensive It has enough spec that it can deal with almost all the situations that I actually shoot in, with enough DR for the sun, enough ISO for night-time, and fans so it doesn't overheat before I do, etc It shoots internally using a colour space and codec that don't look cheap/amateurish and make me think about upgrading It doesn't fight with me in the colour grade Resolve and the Film Look Creator are able to easily give me the flexibility in post to match images and correct any weaknesses from shooting (e.g. if there's a bit of movement when shooting hand-held at 140mm) Resolve and the Film Look Creator are able to remove the 'digital/video' look and instead give me a range of options that don't look artificial and most importantly, contribute a feeling to the footage without distracting from the content of the images (this is, after all, the entire purpose of what we're doing here.....) For the first time it feels like I'm getting the results I want because of the equipment I have, rather than in spite of it.

Autofocus!

I live on the Detroit River... still plenty of Prohibition-era smuggling relics in this area- secret canals and tunnels and such. Maybe I should get a little dinghy and start making midnight runs for barrels full of bodies and lenses 😄

Great value in every country in the world except the US where it will cost 17,000 US dollars.

Maybe they meant their OWN FX3 rather than Sony’s.

To save you bothering to watch that video (as pretty as the visuals are) here is what it ended up being about.

After being in a pretty heavy accident on Saturday that has written my car off, my new favourite art camera is the Ring Doorbell camera. My car was hit at a 90 degree angle from the side by some clown who sped out of their driveway and across an empty bus lane flipping my car round and causing the rear tyre to blow. The art that the Ring Doorbell camera produced was in two parts. The first being a beautiful record of my hitherto unknown stunt car driving prowess to correct the induced swerving to avoid the trees on the pavement side and then the oncoming traffic in the other lane and bring the wreck to a controlled stop. The second and best bit was when the homeowner of the Ring Doorbell came outside and showed the footage to myself and the other driver who had thus far ludicrously been somehow claiming it was my fault. Upon which the other driver, faced with the reality did their own rendition of the Larry David fake fainting. As the Ring Doorbell was still active, it caught that too 🙂

The main camera manufacturing countries just got slapped by Tango-man. China - 34% Vietnam - 46% Taiwan - 32% Japan - 24% Thailand - 36% Hope all the ones who voted for this enjoy their new electronics prices 👍

I opened my box. I'm keeping mine & here's why: perhaps 80% of my income comes from clients that want a mix of still (heavy on the stills) and short video content. In this use case, the camera excels. It is very fast to use. A Panasonic that finally tethers to Capture One. Gorgeous, robust stills. Very good AF (although I am awaiting that first dimly-lit event). Fantastic IBIS in cropless mode - no more need to bring a gimbal for 60-90 second clips and walking shots (this was a serious knock against the Z8 for me). Nicely implimented, mid-range codec and the CineA2 is my new Eterna (when I don't want a Vlog workflow). Slightly better ergos and good in its own right mechanical shutter. I do not think I would keep this as a video-first camera body, which I think will doom it to irrelevance in this forum. I've had no issues in my limited time but the overheating that I am also reading about leaves a bad taste - more so than the rollign shutter concerns. I will experiment but for now, I wouldn't trust it filming 10-25 minute takes continuously over 2+ hours in a warm environment. Maybe 4k/24p would be ok and maybe all would be ok recording to an external SSD? A lot of variables would need to align. I also note the "crunchiness" from the S5II/x in the video - slight and I need to spend more time with it. @ita149 Any further insights re reducing NR in Vlog? Regardless, for client work, it will NOT be an issue and for flimmaking primarily, I'm keeping my S1. Some bitchy posters in other places were droning on and on about how it should have been named the S5RII. Well, bitchers be right. It's a good-feeling camera but it takes more from the S5 line that the S1 series for sure. Rather than an S-Pro lens, it feels more like the 20-60. @MrSMW The shutter is not that wonderfully damped shutter of the S1 but it is a significant improvement over the horrid clatch of the S5. I don't love it, but I'm comfortable with it. I greatly disliked the S5's ergos and the S5II/x was better. This is better still. Other than the weight, I love the S1 and the best feeling small body to me is the X-H2s. But this new camera is good, and I may get the grip to help that pitiful battery and for better support with larger lenses. But again, once I started working with the stills from yesterday's product shoot, no looking back.

I think it's not clear whether the MAGA politicians are rational or not. Clearly, many of them know little about the government of states, which explains why there is so much fumbling about and obvious mistakes and unintended consequences. However, it's clear that Trump is a con artist. He is using the power of the presidency for personal gain. Just now there are videos showing how Trump is bragging about how he and his friends made a lot of money by taking advantage of the stock market fluctuations caused by Trump's tariffs (being turned on and off). This is entirely rational behavior from a con artist and a narcissist. He's got the all-clear from the Supreme Court that he can't be held responsible for his official actions as president in court. Congress could still hold him responsible (impeachment), and the people maybe can (if there are free elections in the future) but it could very well happen that he gets away with it, and he's old enough that even if he does go into prison, he wouldn't be there for a long time. Tariff wars tend to be followed by actual wars where people die. That's why the EU was founded, by removing tariffs between European states, it was thought that wars between the states can be avoided, which has been the case so far. However, for Trump, the tariffs are just a means towards personal enrichment (and his friends' enrichment), plus getting a lot of personal attention in the media that he craves.

And the centre-left parties are letting it spread and enabling it. A lot of people are stupid, but a lot of them just feel that the traditional career politicians don't speak for them. Then we have 4 or 5 years of this or that liberal party in power and nothing changes. Where is Kamala Harris now? How do you lose to a fucking convicted felon? How useless do you have to be? The democrats are now holding little signs up in congress! What is that achieving? You can't play diplomacy games with a fascist thug. It's one of the reasons Putin is so powerful, he had half of them round his little finger, whilst Russian influence & money was deeply embedded in western society. The only way you remove a fascist dictator or a mafia from power is violence. The US might be about to find that out at the next election. In the meantime, this China trade-war is really ramping up towards a possible armed conflict, and not a lot of Trump voters realise the seriousness of what he's started.

All I want to know is if the presentation has finished yet?

I have a friend who still shoots GH5 professionally and his clients are happy. Really the GH5 represents insane value these days.

Got my S1RII and like I thought, I'm a bit disappointed. Stills are great with very good resolution, the Dpreview studio test is odd because the camera is very sharp even when using not so sharp lenses like the 28-200mm. But there are better cameras for photography, AF implementation is weird, AF-S is only DFD and the buffer is a joke when shooting high fps pictures. Video quality is the same than S5II, a bit less sharpening but still the same video engine, it still looks worse than the old gen, the resolution just feels not as good, no matter the mode or resolution used the image doesn't look really sharp in a good way, lines are not straight, some details are missing like if a filter or blur in some part of the image was added. The image looks like there is a slight oil painting touch softening the image at the core. Like on the S5II the rec 709 profiles are worse than V-log. So it is a bit ironic from Lumix to say "discover unseen details" for their S1RII tagline. Because of this the moire is not too much prononced. Some will like this tradeoff. I tested Prores Raw 6K Pixel to Pixel and the image is much better, the weird processing is gone. But I can't get the image right when using Premiere Pro, colors are off, I don't think Prores Raw is really fully supported by Premiere. The crop and the data size also makes this mode hard to use and it is not supported at all by Resolve. Using the Canon R5 or Z6III for raw is much easier as the files are better supported and there is no crop. The rolling shutter is just bad when using the DR boost, I didn't think I could see it but I can see jello even with relatively slow movements. In addition 24fps is the max fps we can use with DR boost and Open Gate. I can't select 30fps, maybe a bug. I think the best modes are 6k or 4k 60fps, there is only a slight crop, worse DR because no DR boost and the image quality becomes even slighltly worse but there is not a big difference with the 30fps and the rolling shutter is better. I quickly tested the 4k 120fps and as if it isn't enough that the 4k30fps was not great, the 120fps is even worse : blurry, bad details, just unusable. When selecting Pixel to Pixel, the quality is better but again these crop make these Pixel to Pixel modes hard to use and feel like we are using a S35 camera. Stabilization is the best in the market and for me it's the main reason I still use Panasonic (with Open Gate too). But the S5II is as good ... The S1RII feels like it was created for people taking mostly photography of still subjects. And for this the camera is good, not the best DR performance but nice colors and impressive 177MP handheld mode (the image makes a very long time to create though, much longer than on the S5II). For video it comes with marketing bait as 8k and 4k 120fps. The 8k like every other modes except raw is too much processed, it has high rolling shutter when the DR boost is enabled and the 4k120fps is not good at all. Yes we can do a lot of things with this camera but with big penalties most of the time. The added Prores Raw is questionable too, the files are not supported in Resolve and the crop is really disappointing. The fact remains, however, than the S1RII is the only affordable high resolution camera with acceptable autofocus for L mount. However, I don't see anything which could attract new users to Lumix or L mount, the S5II is a much better value for Youtube and other social media creators. And the A7RIV is much cheaper and has better AF for stills. 3600€ is a lot of money but I would have happily spend a bit more to get better video engine, better rolling shutter and 8k raw. As things stand at the moment with the current firmware, I think the right price should be more about 3200€. About the reviews available online like the one from Northrup, I think the best is to always wait for some Chinese or Korean reviews, they provides much more informations and are much more unbiased than any Northrup or Undone reviews. Here is an exemple of a good and accurate review :

I’m going to go out on a limb and say that you definitely won’t get either in that Blackmagic presentation 😀

HAVE YOU GUISE SEEN THIS?!?! IT IS A WORK OF ART idk where the overwhelming amount of negative reviews are coming from -- bloggers, influencers, theater goers -- but what about disney themselves!?? THEY like it!! thats why they spent half a billion dollars making it and advertising it. the 'empty theaters' are clearly propaganda what i like to see in filmmaking is some low contrast shots that are poorly graded, with bad art direction, costume design, etc. i like a script that would be borderline unreadable on the page, one that has been brought to the big screen with some surprisingly terrible acting, insane casting, and a healthy dose of girlboss wokeness. and i HATE the old fashioned boomer 'rotoscoping' from 'beautiful footage' that looks 'naturalistic' -- so lame!!! who came up with that!?!?? i dont want any kind of visual unity in sfx, vfx, whatever -- i LOVE uncanny valley stuff. it speaks to my generations post modern malaise in a way that old ppl just cant understand ~ i mean this sucks (below). i especially hate how friendly and cool the animals seem despite being kinda anthropomorphic in the face and theyre not EVEN REAL!!! the ppl who made this were morons w no tech. if only theyd had more dr THIS, on the other hand, looks GREAT to me. it needs a few more stops of dr but it is highly naturalistic i thought these were all real ppl until...... someone told me that IT WAS CGI!! i also though these characters were deformed dwarves (and possible aliens) until i was told that they are 'magical creatures' !!! fooled again by those hollywood geniuses! most of all, i like that turquoise color of her dress. what a great design! classic what do you all think of this contemporary masterpiece? im sure it will recover its $500 million within minutes and go on to be a timeless masterpiece that we show to our children, and our childrens children nice hoodie

Am sure this is the first and last time I'll ever see rifles being used to construct a diff frame! As on the weekend I was working on a friend's little short film, he was the Director / DoP / Writer / Editor / Gaffer / DIT / 1st AC / "Everything" (even acting in some of it!), except for Sound (which I of course did. Although I helped out a little teeny bit sometimes in other areas too, such as lighting). Due to the nature of the shoot (almost no crew, basically no budget, and out in the middle of nowhere) we had very limited amounts of gear at our disposal. So while a couple of combo stands with a proper diff frame was constructed for the first scenes of this film we shot down at the beach (which even that took a fair bit of hiking through the bush to get to), later on when we went further up the hill/cliff, then the heavier stuff was ditched. As wasn't viable to keep on carrying everything with us (and even a little dangerous? A little further on up from here is where one of our actors ragdolled their way down when they slipped and fell. Luckily they're still ok! Pity that moment wasn't caught on camera). Thus you see the improvised situation here! Making the best out of what we had at hand in the moment.

There is nothing wrong with Braw, one bit! however EVERY single edit house we ship footage to only accepts Prores LT or ProRes, so it would have to be a transcode, which if you have time is not an issue (but then why shoot raw and not use any of it's advantages) but in very quick turn around situations when you have to hand off a drive, Braw is not possible! These are challenges where you are part of a much bigger production, but if you are a solo shooter and cut your own work, then it's absolutely not an issue!

"I'm getting too old for this shit. I'm only two weeks away from my retirement." I'm gonna be one of those craft people that refuses to use AI. Damn the consequences. This all sucks. As a documentarian, even something supposedly innocuous like audio transcribing is causing more inadvertent issues than it's solving. It's really getting in my way holistically -- although it "feels" like it's helping in the moment. It divorces me from the nuances and intimacy of the material. How can I be expected to make anything meaningful to the audience or to myself if I allow an algorithm to make crafting determinations, even the simplest ones? Tools are tools, but when the tools diminish rather than enhance? That's a recipe to being superficial. I don't think I want to be superficial. Unless I'm doing corporate bull shit for the pay day. But then, the corporations using AI can now (or soon) cut me out of that calculus anyway. Get off my lawn you damn machines.

It is the S5ii as far as I’m aware. I’ve pulled this from a demo of the new functionality and shows switchable contrast and phase detect in the UI. Full video is here Yeah I think it will become clearer what BM’s intentions actually are for the 12K when they are doing demos and interviews at the show itself.

It’s going to be like prohibition all over again. The new B&H Photo branch will be a speakeasy selling smuggled camera bodies from Canada.

Seems to be the pyxis 12k. (Doesnt seem to have internal ND, and only braw. No prores) just saw the banner on the NAB windows.

"The S1RII feels like it was created for people taking mostly photography of still subjects." I guess I don't understand how anyone thought it would be otherwise. I mean, that's what the R stands for. I continue to be amazed at how the online crowd managed to psyche themselves into thinking camera was going to be something it was never intended to be. It's a photo-centric camera with a massive video bonus. It's not an S1HII. It's not a Sony A1II. Especially considering only 6 weeks ago we all thought it was going to be just a cheaper Leica SL3 (cue the moaners saying 'I wish it was' as if there wouldn't be a horde of complaints). I just got mine and it's exactly what I wanted. Now I can get off the terminally negative online train and get snapping.

Just watched the first episode. Very good stuff. The single take is extraordinary but almost seamlessly unnoticed at same time.

These kind of posts are always my favorite. Thank you for sharing!

02:37:32 "We'll probably eventually charge some kind of upgrade for this." Looks like we can expect to pay for major version upgrades in the future. Still better than a subscription, thankfully.

Was catching up with my new favourite magazine The Atlantic today They have some neat AI articles https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2025/03/libgen-meta-openai/682093/ Like this one about the kind of scale of piracy the tech giants are doing in order to train some of their mainstream AI models. There's a link to a tool called LibGen, where you can put in an author name and see if his work has been harvested up by Meta and used to train their large language models. https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2025/03/search-libgen-data-set/682094/ Sure enough I put "Andrew Reid" into it and up comes the GH4 guide. So we can confidently say the Meta's Llama 3 knows all about shooting 4K with a certain 2014 Lumix camera. When do I get paid and how much?

If it's subscription, I think there will be rioting in the streets and a lot of users migrating to Final Cut... including me. On the other hand, given that I paid like $200 for my license like 5-8 years ago and have been receiving free upgrades ever since then - and now I have a second license that came with my camera, if they were to ask for $50/year for license upgrades, I wouldn't be upset. After all, if Resolve either makes no money or loses money, they have no incentive as a business to keep supporting it. I'm not upset about that. If, however, they want me to hand them $20/month to use it, I'm done.

I remember Grant saying the same thing in these presentations in years previous. And I remember looking for anything that explicitly stated "free upgrades for life included" and could never find it. People just assume this because that's how it's been so far. I would hate a subscription model. Paying per major version would be fine, I would most likely skip a generation or two before feeling a need to upgrade. Same as I did with Adobe before their switch to subscription. Assuming the AI stuff is the major cost driver that would cause a switch to a different model, it would seem fairer to attach the cost more to the AI stuff- you get basic models/capabilities with the regular Studio purchase, then can pay to add-on better models or faster processing etc.

If it doesn’t burst into flames or require a portable power station, that PYXIS 12K is going to be a huge winner for them. The fact that they will finally have AF is the icing on the cake.

Oh, cool! I'm super excited! One of my primary hesitations about the Pyxis was rolling shutter, but CineD tested the 12k sensor at just 5.5ms in 8k and 4k, more than fast enough. My writing partner and I are considering the UC 12k for our next project, but frankly, a Pyxis body fits a small crew better. If it's identical to the Pyxis with that sensor for $5k or less, it may be a winner for us! (Our other ideas at the moment are: used Red Komodo for ~$2.8k, or C500 Mk II for ~$5.2k, with the obvious benefit of the C500 being NDs + included EVF)

Oh! Sure enough, lookings like it's using the UC 12K sensor. UC 12K body is $7k, current Pyxis is $3k so... probably somewhere between those numbers. Lack of internal ND is a bummer, but I'm guessing that means it'll have a mirrorless mount available. If the weight is closer to existing Pyxis (1.5kg) vs UC 12K (4kg), it could be a real winner - especially if it's closer to $4k than to $5k.

The frustrating thing, as an American, is that lower income folks are among his most ardent supporters yet are the ones who will end up hurt the most by his heartless, cruel policies. I've said it on here before, I live in a mobile home. I made a choice to live as cheaply as I could, regardless of whether I could afford a nicer home or not, because I want to live a simple, affordable life. I own my mobile home outright, so I have no mortgage. I just pay a modest lot fee every month in the community I live in. My taxes property taxes are extremely low, and I live comfortably. A lot of folks here are lower income, though, and live here because it's what they could afford. They're decent, working class folks who struggle to make ends meet. A lot of them are on public assistance, like fuel assistance and food stamps. You want to know who most of them voted for, though? Based on the yard signs and flags, most folks here voted for Donald Trump. They voted for the man whose policies will hurt them the most. It'd be funny if it weren't so sad. It's a testament to the Democrats and their incompetence that twice they lost to a swindler and con man because they were unable to convince a majority of the electorate that the racist billionaire doesn't give a fuck about them.

I don't know it's educational system issue or purely political issue, but it should be clear for anyone with IQ above the "retarded" territory that the whole purpose of the trade, (even since thousands of years ago), is provide the best goods available in the world at cheapest possible price for "our" people. So even from a nationalist point of view, if my people get the best goods very cheap, my country wins. With tariffs, my fellow citizens get worse goods (because of less competition) at higher prices! Its completely opposite of the purpose of the trade. We're living in a timeline that Christians support billionaires who publicly despise the poor, and nationalists support the losing position for the nation.

It's actually worse. Over 50% on China in sum total of all Trump's tariffs. If you voted for this and think it's a good idea you need your head examined.

One that would be interesting is if they took the original UMP12K Super35 sensor and put it in the Pocket 6K Pro body. Though I suspect they would need to add too much power to make it viable. I’m hopeful that they have a firmware upgrade for the Micro Studio 4K G2 that allows the use of the USB-C monitor they make for the PYXIS. Or at least one that switches on the Bluetooth module we all know that’s in it but they inexplicably won’t let us use!

Flirted with the idea of selling my S1 and go for the S1RII but eventually decided to keep it for life. Parting with this kind of image quality in such a tank built body for 800€ is a crime 🙂

There is something to be said about how my S1 still comfortably covers all my needs 7 years later...

I pick mine up from the store on Monday, excited to check out my own files.

Impressive @kye no idea what this forum would be without you, really. Food for thought. You're such an asset and a few people here, if no more or/and elsewhere, miss you when you're absent : ) You've summed up the whole thing : ) it's all about that, no more no less, one of the reasons why people love (and use) anamorphics :- )

HA! I didn't notice that until you pointed it out, as I hadn't hit play on that shot yet. I guess nothing is immune to moire, although this was worse than I would have thought. The GH7 has no crop in its full resolution modes, and none in the 1080p modes, but the 4K modes do have slight crops - with the C4K having slightly less crop which is why I chose it, so I wonder why that is and what tom-foolery might be going on with that. The bitrates for the native resolutions are pretty brutal without Prores LT, so I'll likely stick to the C4K mode unless it starts being an issue. Thanks! I didn't get the LogC upgrade. I haven't seen any tests that were done properly so am assuming that it's not worth the cost unless proven otherwise. I also figure that even if there is some magic in there, I'm taking a hammer to the image with the FLC anyway, so it's not like I'm precious about it. The only thing I am precious about is getting images that have the right aesthetic to support the subject matter and get out of the way rather than being distracting. When I saw Goodfellas and a bunch of film trailers projected on 35mm film, the two most stunning things about the images were: 1) how fundamentally flawed they were from a technical perspective 2) how quickly and completely those incredible flaws evaporated and you saw effortlessly through and into the scene I'm still at the beginning of my FLC journey, but I'm convinced this pipeline is capable of removing the digital distractions from the image that bug me so much.

Part 2... how did I get here? I've written about this previously, but the summary is that I went through a sequence of trial and error, continually bumping up against the limits of the hardware, the software, my skill, and mindset. Setup: GH5, fast manual-focus primes I shot a bunch with the GH5 and a set of very fast MF primes. I chose this setup as it had 10-bit LOG, IBIS, and the fast primes gave good low-light and some background blur. I knowingly sacrificed AF, essentially swapping a fast / accurate / robotic AF for a slow / human / aesthetically-appropriate focusing mechanism. The MF worked, but not always (especially for my kids, who wait for no-one), and took time and effort to operate the camera away from the things that literally every other crew member does on set. The 10-bit LOG worked, but wasn't a properly supported LOG profile so didn't colour grade flawlessly in post. The primes provided the low-light and shallow-DoF but the shots I missed because I couldn't change lenses fast enough were more valuable in the edit than having shallow-DoF. The DR was lacking. Setup: GX85 with 12-35/2.8 I owned the GX85 and 12-35mm zoom, so I did some testing. I loved the speed of AF-S, and the deeper DoF meant that the number of shots unusable due to missed focus dropped to almost zero. I tested it with low-light and for well-lit night-time areas, like outdoor shopping malls, it was sufficient. The Dual IS (IBIS + lens OIS) was absolutely spectacular and a welcome addition, and having a zoom made me realise why doco and ENG shooters have them as standard issue. The DR and 709 profile was a real limitation though, and I really felt it in the grade. It was around this time I figured out proper colour management, and the Film Look Creator was released. These made a huge boost to grading the GX85, despite its 709 profile. The mindset shift The fundamental pivot was in mindset. As social media became faster and more showy, I noticed the gulf between it and 'real' film-making more and more. I went minimalist, thinking more and more about the days before digital where the process was to shoot as best you could, cut it, do sound-design, and that was it. The focus was on what was in-front of the camera, how the cuts made you feel, and sound design that supported that vision. Even those shooting docs on 16mm film could make magic. Without throwing away the baby with the bathwater, I decided to re-focus. To shoot what I could shoot, to learn to cut with feeling, and to simulate a film-like colour grading process where the look was applied and only very basic adjustments were made. Setup: OG BMMCC with 12-35/2.8 I owned these already, and on my last trip to South Korea I took these as well as the GX85. My shooting moved from shooting people I knew to shooting more general scenes, giving me more time and taking the time pressure off. The setup was large (comparatively!) and very slow to work with, but it validated my mindset shift. The images were organic and rich, but in a way that drew you into their contents, rather than towards the medium. The DR was finally sufficient, and the colours were delightful. But the monitor wasn't bright enough, the lack of IBIS meant that the OIS stabilised tilt and pan but not roll, so the images all needed to be stabilised in post, but had roll motion blur due to the 180 shutter. The low-light wasn't ideal either, even with fast lenses. The moire from the 1080p sensor was real and ruined shots. I also got a lot more comfortable shooting in public with a more visible camera setup. New Setup: GH7 with 14-140 and 12-35..... So what I wanted was the best of all worlds. Dynamic range. I knew the OG BMMCC and OG BMPCC were the same/similar sensor, and I knew the GH7 had more. What I didn't expect was how much more that would be in real life. Here's a high DR scene from Monday. Here it is without the FLC, which I set to add contrast. Now with the shot raised by 3 stops. Notice the detail in the railings and under the eves on the right. Now with the shot lowered by 3 stops. Notice that the roof, and even the body of the car are still not clipped, with the only clipping being the sun reflecting off the car window. In grading, there is more DR than you can fit in the DR of the final shot - assuming you haven't developed Stockholm Syndrome for your LOG footage that is. Low light. I had previously established that the GX85 and 12-35mm F2.8 were good enough for well-lit night locations. I also knew that the BMMCC at ISO800 and the 12-35mm F2.8 set to a 360 shutter was good enough for semi-well-lit night locations. I also knew that the BMMCC with my 50mm F1.2 lens was passable at the darkest scenes I shot in Korea - which were from the hotel window at night. I've compared the GH7 vs the GX85 and BMMCC and the noise profiles are all very different, but I concluded that the GH7 had probably 2-4 stops of advantage over those. This means that I might be able to shoot well-lit night locations with the 14-140mm lens, and might be able to shoot from the hotel window at night with the 12-35mm lens. I'm still contemplating if I should take my F1.2-1.4 primes on my up-coming trip, but if I don't I'll still be able to shoot 99% of what I want to with the zooms. Camera size. Perhaps the only drawback when compared to my previous setups. I'll be taking the GX85 and 14mm F2.5 pancake lens as the pocketable tiny camera. This combo is no slouch by itself, so although it lacks some of the specs from more serious cameras, it is easily in the capable category, especially when helped by Resolve+FLC and from a shoot-cut-sound-publish mindset. Absolute speed. When it comes to absolute speed, nothing beats a smartphone, which is always in your pocket, can be pulled out and rolling in seconds. This is also a serious tool when combined with Resolve+FLC and a shoot-cut-sound-publish mindset.

The EOS R50 V is a loss leader out to encourage lens sales with a huge army of social media influencers and Youtubers. On the face of it, it's definitely a step forward from Canon in the value for money stakes. Sure, they will want you to buy loads of expensive glass for it. Thankfully Sigma is doing some nifty APS-C lenses so we don't have to. I do like the built in LUTs, C-LOG3, AF should be decent although maybe perfect, but it does lack an EVF and IBIS.

It was missing a question mark as I was looking for confirmation if it was or wasn’t 😀 I don’t disagree but by the same token, the S5 has garnered the reputation as being a much nicer image than it’s successor the S5ii from people who own both bur I only have personal experience with the latter so I have no idea. Keeping the resolution of the camera in all names means It has a whiff of the file naming abyss you fall down with “FinalEditUltimateRevisionDeliveryVersion.mov” that quickly becomes “FinalEditUltimateRevisionDeliveryVersion_v2.mov”

Yeah its pretty exciting as a Canon shooter myself to see a new product line emerge, especially one dedicated to video. First flat top Canon design ever. I don't know about no overheating as this is an entry-level product aimed at social network content creators so usually very short form content but the video below states they worked hard to avoid it. In any case rest assured this is the first product of an entirely new V camera line dedicated to video so its pretty much a given pro FF version will come. Here is a rare glimpse into the R&D folks at Canon HQ talking about it: R50V also has filters, custom LUTs, false color, aspect markers & 2.35:1 cine mode. Pretty cool for a $695 camera!

How about a fat fucking cunt named Donald. Would make a great soviet villain.

Saw Soderbergh's Presence the other day. Immediately noticed it was shot on mirrorless with gimbal, and turns out its the A9iii with Sony FE 14mm F1.8 GM. Interesting choice for a full-feature, it makes sense since the POV is a floating ghost inside a house: "We shot this on the [Sony Alpha 9 III], which is, as you know, a digital [mirrorless] camera. Its primary mode is as a still camera, but it also shoots really good video. It’s small, and this new version has a sensor that was never used in [this kind of camera] before. I did experiments with all the digital cameras that I’d worked with before and ones I hadn’t. I stripped them down as much as I could, then put them on the smallest stabilization rig that would support them. What I discovered was that there was just a couple of pounds’ difference between the camera I could use and stabilize and be able to back into any space I wanted to, and the next step up made that impossible because of the weight. We did all these tests with the Sony and this one rig. And I’m like, 'This’ll work. It’s not heavy.'"

Everyone is talking about how they used the Ronin 4D on the "Adolescence" and how well it did. I bet they only used it in like 4 shots though.

Anyone geeking out over the gorgeous lens choices of Season 3 of White Lotus? Season 3 shot on Sony Venice with DP Ben Kutchins. From what I can find out they used a lot of custom vintage Leica M glass from Zero Optik this season with maybe a handful of OMs as well. Last couple of seasons featured Zeiss Superspeeds, Cooke S4s, Baltars, Angénieux, Panavision Primos and Canon EF Zooms. Quite the buffet... A lot of people complain about the overuse of shallow DOF but it's creatively used in my opinion and only extreme in a handful of shots. Plus those shots are justified as a narrative tool in those instances. Tons of other shots with deep focus and the series always does a great job of establishing the exotic locale. I'm actually working a press event with HBO and the cast of season 3 next week here in Los Angeles and really looking forward to it.