Leaderboard

FM lens + ES Cinelux + Olympus 85mm on Full Frame. Nothing exciting at all here, unedited and boring shots - but only had a spare 10mins to give the FM a quick spin. Tested everything wide open at f.2 on Olympus OM 85mm to see if wide aperture would introduce any fringe or edge nasties when the FM was attached, pleased to confirm that everything looks pretty clean and sharp. ( although .h264 compression for Vimeo has robbed it's true 'wow' sharpness)...so please download/ view 'original' file Very shallow depth of field when wide open at f.2 (perhaps too shallow for practical use most of the time) and the 2x bokeh when used with 85mm on full frame is pretty darn stretchy. Goes to show that sensible stopping down would make this setup even sharper whilst still maintaining plenty of attractive defocus. Footage was shot 1600x1200 ML raw on 5Dmk3 in 4:3 aspect, resulting in 3200x1200 8:3 (2.61) unsqueezed.This seems like an ideal aspect to shoot at - as it seems to bypass the edge 'warp' that people have noticed on the ES Cinelux when panning. Everything is handheld, racking focus by hand also...to prove it can be relatively 'run & gun'. The near focus abilities are very impressive, with practice it is pretty easy to do a full range rack focus by hand but a focus gear would be of great benefit when using in the real world for narrative work. So initial quick test is very promising indeed...noticed a very slight 'ghost' or 'glow' to extreme contrast edges, but almost definitely due to being wide open and the taking lens not being 100% light tight or aligned when shimmed against the FM rear. In general the FM lens seems to take the edge off the cinelux's clinical sharpness somehow, I suspect the fact that the light is now passing through extra glass means a subtle contrast lift and very slight softening to the image - resulting in a more filmic look, whilst still being plenty sharp. I did notice an unforeseen issue - it is pretty easy to knock the taking lens focus when adjusting aperture on taking lens. A tiny amount is enough to take the 'calibrated' focus from the FM lens - resulting in a non pin sharp result. Think the easiest way to remedy is to tape the taking lens focus in its fixed position with electrical tape when setting up for FM lens. More proper testing to come, just thought I'd throw this up in case someone was 'on the fence' about how usable the FM lens is when handheld and pushed to f2 on full frame.

Just received the lens but unfortunately I'm at work. I'll do some tests tonight/tomorrow and get something up! Packaged really well. Solid build, slightly metallic focus feel but very solid. All of the grub screws are snug and a hex key is included for the small screws on the barrel. Caps included as well as a silver collar which seems to be for smaller anamorphics. The small grub screws on the barrel itself could be replaced fairly easily with longer, stronger ones for smaller anamorphics. More later.

  Allow me to fill you in on that second one at C5D. It's a seriously biased piece of writing and testing. Johnnie and Seb at that site fell out with me a year ago after they made a deal at NAB with a Berlin cine shop to do an exclusive review of the KineRaw Mini, practically whipping the camera from under me in my own back yard, doing deals behind my back with my own contacts and friends. Regardless when the camera landed in Berlin the shop offered the demo unit to me first anyway and I emailed Johnnie to ask if it was ok to put my results out there. He said yes ok, as long as no video. I forgot about the video and as part of the page of images put a very short clip out there showing some bubbles in slow mo and he lost his rag saying I couldn't be trusted. That was over a year and a half ago.   Now we come to the present and the NX1 is a target because I have been advocating it as a decent camera. So the C5D test is basically there to discredit me. And this tweet just before it came out, is another passive aggressive swipe at EOSHD -    It's full of flaws anyway. They criticise the EVF at the same time as giving the 7D Mark II top marks for handling... well that doesn't even have one! The EVF on the NX1 is great anyway! They complain about usability when all their complaints are solved merely by setting up the camera properly.   Put stills to 16:9 so it matches video framing, use peaking and magnified focus assist, hit record. Not hard is it? The 7D mark II doesn't even have peaking and neither can magnify focus whilst recording yet the NX1 gets a kick in the knees for it and the 7D doesn't. They barely mentioned it.   Most critically the workflow they used was totally the wrong one. They had SmartRange turned on and Contrast -10. Double trouble. They say 18 hours to transcode 1 hour of footage, but that simply isn't the case. They didn't use Wondershare to transcode to ProRes and only used the supplied Samsung software to transcode to H.264.   On top of this their rolling shutter test has been flawed previously, rating the GH4 in 4K better than the 5D Mark III in 1080p and the A7S in APS-C crop mode. That's not borne out in reality. Likewise their dynamic range test has brought up weird results. They rated the A7S at 14 stops, same as an Arri Amira and the 5D Mark III with CineStyle ahead of the 1D C with Canon LOG!! I'm curious how they get 11.8 stops out of the 5D Mark III's stock video mode when the sensor is only rated for 11.5 stops in raw!!   It all just seemed overly critical, more critical than their other reviews for distinctly less impressive cameras. What a shame some personal bias has affected their impartiality as reporters. I hope nobody cancelled their NX1 order as a result.

A is video.   Some people got it perfectly. A bit more compression in the blacks on A and a bit more sharpening in-camera. The raw file had more C/A because Adobe Camera Raw didn't remove it by default and sharpness was left on default as well which is why it looked a little softer.   But the very fact that they look so similar to the general 'audience' with almost a 50-50 split between you on this forum over which was which, shows how good the video is on this camera.

Literally just bought this gem not more than a week ago. Much more simplistic and way easier to use than a Sankor I had before even though housing construction was nicer of course. Just chasing the kids around with the holiday lights keeping everything decently lit. Super exciting for me right now and brings joy again with single focus.

Yes, I think Anamorphicshop said there is a focus gear in the works next year. I believe the diameter is 88mm (away from FM lens to check at the moment). It will be a relatively wide gear so it it still meshes with a standard drive gear on a follow focus when it travels in and out on the FM. You could also make your own by using two wide focus ties placed side by side...but they won't be seamless and might not allow full range of focus. As mentioned above, RAF camera would make a nice metal gear as a custom job.

Focus throw test. Of course it's raining today in New Mexico (of all days) so tests will have to happen on the weekend. After cranking the lens down with a flat head, the swaying is gone. Focusing isn't bad at all. 58mm Helios barely vignettes full frame (cropped to 2.66). Cropping to 2.66 helps with the edge distortion as well. The flare in the first video might have come from the slightly dimmed overhead light or my iPhone. Regardless I don't know if it came from the front element or the small space between my anamorphic and prime. In shooting around the house, shooting into direct light seems to cause some softening and glow around light sources, due to the HUGE front element. As mentioned before, it seems this lens is sharp when it counts, but promotes the organic nature of anamorphic. Very satisfied.

Looks great. I just don't understand why the FM guys didn't do these kind of portrait tests in the first place. Would have been a no-brainer! (instead of their slow focus pulls through the barley field)

Initial mounting was really easy. Included was a small silver aluminum collar. The Hypergonar I own tapers towards the back so as a work around, I focused the anamorphic to infinity, gaffed the collar onto the anamorphic and slid it into the FM lens. Used the included hex key to clamp down on the collar and slid onto my crappy plastic cage. I'll need to figure out a more secure mount with the 1/4" threaded clamp. The weight of the focus module causes it to swing loose. Some pictures: https://www.dropbox.com/s/jlv1ubwd92kl8zw/Photo%20Dec%2004%2C%201%2057%2054%20AM.jpg?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/ox1t8vwdzqnnekz/Photo%20Dec%2004%2C%201%2057%2021%20AM.jpg?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/0lyh6dqswxqsfez/Photo%20Dec%2004%2C%201%2057%2009%20AM.jpg?dl=0 And a short clip before the batteries died. Jupiter 9 85mm f2 @ f2. Hypergonar Bernoist Berthoit Anamorphic. Full frame on the A7s. Quick Lut thrown on. Exported as 3840 x 1080 ProRes 444. Download the original for best quality. Screengrabs from ProRes Master https://www.dropbox.com/s/bwe5gpq0z115nmo/Screen%20Shot%202014-12-04%20at%202.45.36%20AM.png?dl=0 https://www.dropbox.com/s/zvp8rwnlge2x3wo/Screen%20Shot%202014-12-04%20at%202.45.50%20AM.png?dl=0 First impressions: SHARP! So glad it's so sharp Focus throw feels huge but it's only the size of the lens. Focusing is really a breeze. Mounting was easy, easy to adjust anamorphic leveling. The rear collar could be a bit wider (ie two 1/4" holes) to keep the heavy lens assembly from swaying. Nothing a little rubber can't fix. More shooting tomorrow!

I work in real time 3D graphics (read: games) and unfortunately people have a habit of dissecting the hell out of screenshots. I mean Halo was excoriated over rendering at 900p instead of 1080p and then doing an upscale. Can you imagine someone complaining that a movie, even a CGI movie, was only delivering 900 vertical lines of resolution when screenshotted? That would be insane. Unfortunately it has led to emphasis of technical parameters over aesthetic quality, and so a lot of these supposedly high quality games look awful. I don't feel that the art direction in many big name games is competent, as well. More relevant to here, though, is that working in imaging that way attunes you to every single fault - and feature - in an image. I need to be able to see everything, because my job is to get it right and make sure there are no mistakes in the underlying systems which might later crop up in surprising and unwelcome ways. My wife gets annoyed when I stop a game or movie in order to take a look at the technical aspects of how it's put together :D

Thats terrible, 40 minutes discussion and what !!!!!!!!! 1 minutes about 4k and high resolution............. all the rest of the 39 minutes about lighting, composition, framing, colours, styling.... Pffff bunch of amateurs, didn't they here about the latest Panasonic 4k wonders that you can put in your pocket or Sony cameras that don't any more lighting because you can shoot at 100 000 ISO.

I read the latest EMPIRE magazine today, it had an interview with James Cameron ( not available online ) and he was asked about whether he was still set to release Avatar sequels in 60 fps...guess what...he backtracked completely...saying that he will film 48fps, and not the whole film but only parts of it...in fact, he said he will only use HFR on horizontal panning shots! :D Victory for us and death to HFR! He must have gotten the message that audiences hate it after Jackson's massive mess with Hobbit in HFR and wisely decided to almost completely abandon the idea. I think we can all breathe a collective sigh of relief now, - 24fps is here to stay.

Anyone plan on using this with a B&H Kowa? If so, could you make a video on how to mount it well?

My iscorama just lost it's value... goes to show how powerful an 85mm + full frame + 2x ovals + 2.66 :1 is!

The NX1 is not a SLR because it has no mirror ;)

Don't get me wrong, I don't disagree with all that you're saying. And my post was not to single out yourself in particular, it was meant as a general statement. I've seen your recommendation for the Nikon 28-70 zoom on here in the past - and it is in fact a lens I've used on commercials! (So - good reccomendation ;)) I just see so many newbies these days rushing out to buy the latest and greatest camera body, and spend hours looking online to find the right profile, or the right settings that's going to make their picture look the most cinematic. I think it's just really important to look at what Cinematography really is, and what actually makes you a Cinematographer - and it's really not got much to do with what camera you use, and definitely has very little to do with what the in-camera sharpness or saturation setting is at. I've shot outdoors on sunny days at T11. The Australian sun is unforgiving. We had an incomplete ND set, so I had an ND1.5 in and still had to stop down to T11. It wasn't (just ;)) the fact that we were shooting on Alexa that made those couple of shots still look good, and indeed cinematic - it was more where I put the camera and how I shaped the light in that spot. My eye and my lighting is what gets me work, and is what people like about my work - It's not the cameras I shoot on, or the stop I shoot at. Perhaps evidenced by the fact that nearly every project I shoot is shot on a different camera. All cameras are tools. And all lenses have a different look, different stops have different looks and depth of field characteristics. I think most people would agree and say 'duh obviously.' But if you want to be a DP, your choices should all be driven by the story, not what looks the 'coolest' or the most 'cinematic.' I've shot things that don't look cool, don't look cinematic, and don't mimic what professionals are doing on their major features. But it's what the story called for and it worked with the story. The Director and I both loved the look. As I'm sure you're well aware, something looking cinematic has very little to do with shooting at f/16 outside. Now, I don't make a habit of shooting at that extreme a stop, but I do shoot there, and if the story called for a look that suggested shooting stopped down that much, I would go for it. All I'm trying to say is that a shooter will never understand the 'how' until they understand the 'why'. And blindly rushing out to buy or use gear simply because 'that's what x does and their stuff looks really good' is missing the point completely. I know that's not what you're going for, but it can be interpreted as such - and you will never succeed as a DP if all you do is copy those better than you. You're right - you can't buy experience you have to earn it. But how does a newbie even know they need more experience if they're told that all they need is x camera, y lens, and z settings and their image will be just as good as anything you see in a movie (again I know this isn't what you're saying, but as a more general comment). You could give a newbie an Alexa with Master Primes and a full set of NDs or a RED Dragon with Leicas and they still wouldn't shoot stuff that looks as good anything shot by Roger Deakins or Jeff Cronenweth. As evidenced by the fact that one of the most awful-looking films I've ever seen was shot by someone I know who was never really a DP, but thought they could be. Shot it on RED Epic in 5K, and it's the most awful thing I've ever seen - even worse than many home videos I've seen shot on DSLR. I think if you want to be a professional shooter, you should build up some experience on kit lenses, or whatever you have. Just get out and shoot and find what you like. Your style might not be shooting on Angie zooms and Cooke Primes wide open. That's cool. Your style might be. Maybe I'm being too pretentious with this whole give a man a fish/teach a man to fish thing... I would love to share my knowledge about how I work and my lighting choices etc. This seems to be mostly a gear forum, so perhaps I'm posting in the wrong place.

Here's a short vacation video I shot on my a6000. Lenses used were the Zeiss 24mm 1.8, Sony 50mm 1.8, and Sony 10-18mm F4. Coming from the NEX-6 I appreciated the a6000's autofocus speed and accuracy quite a bit. I also used the face detection focus tracking a couple times and it worked pretty well. Still wishing we could record in XAVC / slog2 though like the A7s.

So as long as we're on the subject - what IS the current feeling about the GH4 vs the NX1 as hybrid cameras? (So taking both stills and video into account.) Both are obviously excellent cameras, but are there any key points to tip one way or the other?

I talked to London Camera Exchange in Manchester and they said a lot of Sony bodies were selling now. Used to be mostly Canon and Nikon. Times are a changin. Don't say I didn't warn them...

Shoot a ruler and do the math.

I was in a big independent camera shop in North Wales at the weekend, chatting to a seriously knowledgeable photographer (i.e. nerd) behind the desk (who shoots stills with a 5D3). He got the 7D MkII out and said "I've been waiting impatiently for this camera for YEARS and it is a massive let down as stills camera because Canon have crippled it for you video guys". I looked bemused for a moment and said "but ... it's a crap video camera". He couldn't believe it. He was practically on the floor with laughter. Who knows what Canon are doing ...

I wasn't suggesting it be the only method you use, just that you try it. I think this whole 'test' proves that a trained technical eye can sometimes be as much a handicap as a professional necessity. Very few of us make images for other tech-geeks. We are the illusionists trying to wow the audience, not impress other magicians with our technical virtuosity. If we can't step outside ourselves and see our work without analytical eyes, we just get bogged-down in easily quantifiable stuff like resolution and compression artefacts. It can take away from the bigger picture. I wasn't boasting when I said I could see B was RAW clear as day, immediately. I really could. I honestly thought that everyone was going to follow me and say "easy, B is raw." I was genuinely amazed when people started saying A is raw. If you look at the two images and genuinely forget about the analytical stuff and just ask yourself one question: "which image feels most real", I believe that B is the only answer. Anyway, well done, you were right too! :) (thank god)

Yes I'd definitely go for A being video now too. Particularly after reading the other comments ...

as you say the Sony is alot better than a Canon in low light so its the exception to the rule , Its all about what ever you are used to working with I came from Super16 for along time, Super 35 then DigiBeta Cam and B4 lenses , then 5D , then Panasonic because of your work on the GH2 . So I'm used to small gate/ frame size . And this past year now there are so many good speedboosters for Panasonic cameras it has transformed Panasonics into very serious workable cameras that have a Super 35mm field of view - you can use all those focal lengths exactly as you can on Super 35. Also don't forget Directors like David Fincher de noise everything they shoot on Red Cameras in post, so its all cleaned up - Red Epic is noisy in the blacks too its not super clean.

I think it's hard to give a one answer suits all for this.   Devil is in the detail. If you're focused on infinity with a wide angle lens and there's nothing in the foreground within 5 meters, then A7S is clearly going to be better in low light even though the 'deep depth of field' is a little less deep on the A7S shot, that shot will look the same as the GH4 because nothing will be out of focus.   APS-C crop mode on the A7S still benefits from the massive 9 micron pixels so we should compare that 1.5x crop to GH4's 2.3 crop in the DOF calculations, not full frame. There A7S will be cleaner on all shots, just not by as much.   The GH4 gets a bad rap in low light, it's not so bad actually. The reference point should be Super 35m film which gets noisy at 800 ASA and $25,000 cinema cameras which get noisy at ISO 3200. By those standards the GH4 is perfectly fine. The A7S is an alien from another planet, an exception.

yes exactly if you read American Cinematographer each month you will see most features shoot in the f2- f2.8 for night stuff and f2.8 - f4 - f5.6 for day stuff....in general roughly speaking , every cinematographer has their own style , some set a stop and shoot the whole film to that stop ..like Darius Khondji shot Alien Resurestion at f2.8 for almost the entire film so it kept a uniform look . I can't to that kind of stuff on full frame so I stopped using my Canons...... When Shane Hurlbut shot Act Of Valor on Canon 5ds and Full Frame Zeiss primes he had to shoot at around or below f4 or f5.6 to get the look they wanted anything faster was just tooooo narrow dof on full frame . proper modern cinema lenses are designed to work sharp fully wide open.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xh_IGpE-JGA&list=UUBWpVAaEn9CvmidPcK_mFHw After work yesterday, drove past the Auckland Domain. Weather was too good to pass up the opportunity to shoot something. Although it got cold really fast again. Can't believe its supposed to be summer. Slowly getting used to the dual focusing. I found myself rushing a little bit in this kind of situation because I wanted to get shots while the sun was still up.

  And you are doing the reverse which is the same thing.

But colour distinctness is how I identified the raw image. I wasn't making a technical analysis - I can just see that there is more colour information in B. Regardless of white balance or tonality. It's just there, plain as day. Not just in the red swatches, but everywhere. It doesn't really matter if the WB was off a bit. The hues will still be more varied and distinct. I spent years in art school and grew up in a house full of painters so perhaps I'm more tuned in to colour than the average filmmaker, but I see it all the time in 8-bit video. The Canon C-line is the only 8-bit camera that I can't distinguish from 10 bit (they must do something very clever with compression). Put most 8-bit video next to Prores, RAW, etc, and you can see it straight away. It's not just about what can be done with the image in post, or dynamic range. You can see it as soon as you lift saturation. The colours look alive. This is why I hate that so many talented filmmakers are replacing their ML 5D's with the A7S (spreading 8bits of colour throughout so much DR is just silly). It's the No.1 reason I've bought a GH4, and the reason I don't understand why everybody who owns a GH4 doesn't also own a Ninja Star. It's why I am selling my D5300 and G6 even though they have lovely colours - particularly the Nikon - they just don't satisfy next to my BMPCC. Even downconverted 4K from the GH4 (supposedly 10bit 444) doesn't match the colour fidelity/separation of 10-bit (or the C100!). It looks much better than most 8-bit, and the Samsung does too (the NX1 video colours I've seen look very nice indeed actually, but I suspect that has at least a little to do with the high contrast/low DR). Sorry for the rant, but as you can see I feel very strongly about this. I'm a colour junkie ... :) I'm getting a Ninja Star for my GH4 as soon as I have a spare £300, and along with my BMPCC I'm never looking back - at least for personal work anyway. Bye bye 8-bit.

Please, everybody. Forget about detail, artefacts, etc, and just look at the colors. Narrow your eyes and let the image fall out of focus. Now compare the colors in the two images. In image A there is very little difference between the hues in each color group (e.g. the reds all look very similar). With image B they are all very distinctly different. I assume this points to greater bit depth...

Canon's made it clear that they don't consider DSLR video to be a serious thing. And for those who do consider it to be a serious thing, they can go buy or rent an EOS Cine series product. And by all accounts, they're quite happy with how this has worked out. Hoping for anything else from them is simply irrational given their statements to date.

Hm, substantially different color signatures between the two images. I'm not going to cheat by delving into any kind of technical analysis tools on the images. Some observations: A is warmer, higher contrast, with significantly deeper blue hues. At the same time, A seems to be crushing colors, visible in both the blue and red hues. A is noticeably sharper than B even viewed at 1080p; zoom in to see that color fringing in B is hurting sharpness quite a bit. Also take a look at the shadow tones - something is off in A, almost some kind of green veiling noisy thing. Zoom in and you'll discover macro blocking in the shadows. My guess? B is the raw image. Better gradation in the colors is my primary motivation for saying so, but the color fringing suggests uncorrected raw CA to me that the processor is dealing with in the graded video image. I also suspect that the green tinge in the shadows is being introduced by the video grading. My first instinct was to pick A for its visibly better sharpness, but that's a mistake as we don't know what the CA correction and sharpening settings are at, and video is more likely to be sharpened than a raw conversion. More subjectively, A just feels like an Andrew Reid color grade with the slight warmth and the shadow tone contrast. B feels like an ACR conversion, with the understated color tones, well preserved gradations, clean shadow tones, and clinically perfect white balance. Going to feel pretty silly if I'm wrong.

Look at colours 37 and 31 in image A (reds, 2nd line down). They look like almost the same colour, yes? Now compare them in image B. I think that is what you call bit depth, yes?

I bet everyone who picks A for raw also thinks the A7S has great colours. :P That's cheating Max!!!

Well, I don't mind the price. I captured a theater performance yesterday and the LX100 was my master shot. First gig with it. I was pretty blown away by it and preferred it to the Canon 5dIII, especially considering the ease of the workflow (realising ML Raw is not even an option here) and how easy it was to rig up (15mm tube clamp under the camera to mount it to rods and you have access to battery chamber). You do have the disadvantage of not having hdmi out and freedom of lenses, no headphone, no microphone in, etc. But I think it's a perfect companion to a GH4. What is there not to like? It pays itself back in a couple of jobs. And being able to shoot in a square format larger than hd is pretty wild for fx shots... The 15 min recording limit is a bit silly of course, but what a great low profile camera this is.

No, that wouldn't make any sense - they would then be cannibalising C100mkII sales. Most people who shoot on C-series cameras are people who have come from SLR shooting. They may have certain features about C-cameras that they like, but if someone's looking to make a camera purchase, and they can buy a 5DmkIV with the same image quality as the C100mkII for $2k less, they're going to go for the 5D. There's nowhere Canon can go in terms of major improvements for video in the sub $5k market that won't cannabalise their C-series lineup. I would expect incremental video updates, and much more substantial updates on the photography side, at least for the <$5k market.

Please have a look at the music promo I made using a kowa 8-Z anamorphic adaptor, mounted on a voigtlander Nokton 35mm F1.2, using a Lumix GH3. I also had a Tokina .4 achromat and a Cokin Diopter +2 for the Close ups. It was all shot at night which presented problems as the Lumix isn't very good in low light. I was shooting at 50fps which reduced the amount of light I had even further. I also found that if the lens was fully open it was difficult to get a focus. Not because it was too shallow, but because it wouldn't focus on anything! As you can see I over-cranked the ISO on occasion, but I couldn't set lights up on the banks of the Thames at 3am, as we didn't have permission to be there. I wish I'd got someone to stand close by reflecting a bright torch off a white shirt though. I can only hope that I get away with the graininess in the spirit of low/no budget film making, and it looks like 16mm! Staying close to the subject, using the diopters, gave me a picture I liked the most. The bokeh looks lovely and soft and cinematic. Shots where I had to focus to infinity were difficult - the bokeh is ugly in those shots (in my opinion), taking the shape of a kind of horizontal tear. But I couldn't film the whole video in close ups! It was difficult to shot this as a one-man-band. Having to screw two different diopters on or off every time I wanted to change my proximity to the actors made it quite fiddly. I was also moving lights (I had x3 LED panels). I had some other taking lenses, but it wasn't practical to change during the shoot. Lastly, I know its normal to crop the super-wide picture you get from shooting 2x anamorphic on a 16:9 sensor, but I decided to embrace it. It's fun, and a bit silly, but its a music promo, so why not. Hope you enjoy. The track by Durlston George, his debut single, is lovely.

I give you a ton of props for making this. As hard as it is (yeah I feel your pain on working with diopters) I think this is a good effort. Any type of filmmaking is very difficult. You got that vintage look and I think it works. Like the church interior scene, looks the best wide. The office scenes are all skewed, wish you got those right because the bokeh from the city lights is nice. Keep working at it! I think you have a good eye, just get a friend to carry stuff for you or help position lights.

If the T2i or T-rex from whatever era still floats your boat then fine. Nothing wrong with that. Some like the low-fi look! Sometimes so do I! But if the low-fi look was all we had... it would be very creatively limiting. No insane high ISO shoots like with the A7S which look so beautiful without requiring an Arri truck full of lights and a crew. No creative re-framing in post from 4K. No colour correction fun with raw (Canon still haven't officially ratified Magic Lantern's genius on that one). No stealth shooting bare bones with a built in EVF rather than a clunky loupe. No 120fps slow mo and no crisp details like we've enjoyed ever since the GH2 gave us proper 1080p and not line-skipped mush.   Creativity through technological innovation is a beautiful thing. DJI Inspire One - beautiful innovation. Blackmagic DaVinci Resolve - beautiful. Sony 12MP on a full frame sensor - incredible. Canon - just plain fucking boring. Good job there are some creative filmmakers around making so-so equipment look good purely through excellent story telling and lighting. But I want more than this. I want the technology to make new stuff possible that wasn't before. I want to tell a story with moon light or candle light. I want to tell a story with sequences at 120fps. I want to add drama and visual appeal. I just cannot do that with a Canon DSLR in the same way I can on other cameras for the same price.