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Source: http://www.cinematography.com/index.php?showtopic=66581&p=425881 Irrefutable proof that the Cinema Camera and Pocket Cinema Camera produce the best picture under $2000. Lighting and composition are the cornerstones to producing filmic work. So is grading. 13 stops of RAW is an incredible canvas and medium to work with. The counter arguments to these cameras are so laughable. It all comes down to effort. These cameras are "hard" to work with because they take just a little more time to work with. What's ironic is that producing filmic works always takes a little more effort. If you're not constantly chasing for that extra little bit, you're producing schlock. If a camera makes X easy, then you should be tackling Y. No camera should let you settle. This work isn't easy.

Here’s my story - I promoted “Lessons for a Tailor” I film I shot for Galen Summer back when Vimeo first came out. I submitted it to tons of blogs. That then got buzz and that was the start of my career. Later, I helped my friend and former roommate Sean Dunne promote the film I shot for him, “The Archive” - that eventually got picked up by a hip hop blog then the big break - Gizmodo. That then led by his own submission to Sundance, then acceptance! Then it went on PBS POV and got a Doc and News Emmy nomination! Me and him were the perfect team of promotion! That was then, around 2008. The land of blogs. Now in 2015, we have facebook and twitter and instagram and I still promote films the old fashioned way - well not so much - but I still try to email people about the film. But I think more and more “Gatekeepers” of good online films are more immune to this than ever. Now you need to get creative. And of course it’s just persistence - knocking on doors, believing in your film, not caring about rejection. It always has been and always will be. Eventually someone will give it a chance and play the film. Recently a lot I have taken to twitter to promote my work - most recently -”the Quiet Escape” - and overall it’s been great. It got the film to be seen on Gothamist. But today I got called out by a blogger. I won’t name her name, because maybe she’s just having a bad morning but this is what she said: Fair enough, that’s par for the course. I did tweet to about 10 bloggers today, because I still haven’t beyond gothamist for non filmmakers to see the film, which is of course an important thing for me. I want my film to spark a conversation on whether living in NYC is worth it or not. That’s my goal. To start a dialogue. But the blogger on twitter’s reaction was so visceral it hurt me emotionally and made me stop trying to get my film out there. And I’m sure she didn’t mean anything personal, she probably doesn’t know I’m a real person and an artist to push myself, but jeeze, I feel so bad for everyone who is just trying to get their idea or book or blog post or film out into the world and can get that kind of response.. I remember years ago I got a direct message from someone on vimeo about their film and I was snappy about it because I thought it was just a long impersonal “hey look here” and he got upset, then I apologized, I watched it and enjoyed the film. I felt like a douche bag. And never again, after this one tweet from this blogger will I treat any email from a person just trying to get their 2 cents in, their viewpoint or their film, with anything but respect. At the end of the day there is a person on the other side of that keyboard or phone. The energy, negative or positive, must go somewhere. And maybe in the future I send out customized twitter messages only - tailored to that blogger so they don’t think I’m spamming them. Maybe that’s my take-away.

​ ‘Political correctness’ can be very bad especially if it flies in the face of common sense. To give you an example, I live in New Zealand which like many western nations is suffering from ‘nanny state’ malaise. I recently read an article about a Northland school that decided to ignore the ‘politically correct’ compliance laws regarding child playground safety because they simply couldn’t afford it anymore. This became an interesting social experiment. The children were allowed to play in the type of school playground that used to exist when I was at school, without extreme safety padding and measures, and without constant adult supervision. They were allowed to explore and make mistakes, challenge one another and sort out their own social hierarchy. Sure it produced a few more scraped knees and bruises but what was interesting was that bullying became almost nonexistent (before they had a very high incidence of bullying). What is more, vandalism at the school dramatically dropped, students became far more engaged and academic achievement skyrocketed! Having said all this, I’ve been amazed by many of the children in Indonesia while on film shoots there. They are like 'mini-me' adults. They do chores, wield knives, hunt, haggle, take responsibility and enter conversations with adults much like an equal (many of the things we wouldn’t allow our children to do in the west because we’d consider them incapable and some of the tasks too dangerous). They do all this because it’s expected of them since they could walk. No wrapping in cotton wool like many of our children, yet they grow up to be socially well adjusted adults. Also in the name of political correctness my country will be spending billions to change our flag (removing the Union Jack so as not to acknowledge our colonial past) and changing all the mapping so that the North and South Islands are named by both their English and their Maori names - the North Island being ‘Te Ika-a-Māui’ and the South Island being ‘Te Waipounamu’. This is at a time when the aforementioned school has between 60-70% of primary kids being sent to school without breakfast and the school having to provide food for hungry children. This is what I mean by political correctness flying in the face of common sense. In the case of the renaming, while they are lovely names, they are expected to be in common use and used interchangeably with the English. What a source of confusion! How many of you overseas people would understand if you asked me where I was from and I told you “I’m from Te Waipounamu, in Aoteoroa”? Imagine the potential confusion in the postal service, especially with letters or parcels from the US! We’ve already had Americans arrive in Auckland from LA thinking they were on a domestic flight to Oakland! “Goddamn, I never realised it was such a long flight to Oakland! And haven’t our domestic airlines really gone to the dogs, employing so many illegal immigrants with such goddamn strange accents!”

Go to View - show window frame - press the green mac + icon on top left corner.

Here is a music video shot entirely on the E-M5ii ​handheld and the BTS

​Me too! I'd be happy, and would promise not to contribute to wishlists ever again, okay, well at LEAST for 12 months. But seriously, I'm very tempted by the C100 Mark 2 as an all-in-one 1080p machine for the next 3 years, but I'm loath to buy into the Canon system due to their "just enough" approach. Come on Panasonic, you can do it. I'm hoping it's just slightly more compact than the AF100, and looks less like a shoebox with a toilet roll coming out the back. ​I agree, if they nail the ergonomics and it delivers beautiful images out of the box then they will have a winner on their hands. If designed right and priced right it could cover the C100 and C300 market segments like the FS7.

​No, on the contrary. I got no problem. The IQ of some cameras is far more advanced than others. I don't see this particular Oly debate happening here on EOSHD though. The consensus is pretty much, "Yeah, Oly's still not there yet. Too bad; wish they were." Which is kind of why I'm curious as to your earnestness. I'm not faulting you for your perceptions, nor would I discourage them. If you want to "rant," as you said you felt like you had to do, go for it. Don't let my comments dissuade. (after all, I do agree with everything you say regarding IQ) But, I am kind of surprised that you would want be so ardent about it here --as I think we're all kind of well aware of camera IQ and are more or less impartial about it. Ultimately, IQ does tend to be the dominant topic around these parts, for better or worse. If you're searching out some sort of debate as online recreation I think you'll probably get it here, but the rhetorical slant regarding cameras will come from a more specific perspective so try to keep that in mind.

I live in the Philippines and am working towards my Bachelor's Degree in Digital Filmmaking, and intend to graduate within the next two years. After I graduate, I plan on doing further studies at a one/two year filmmaking certificate/diploma course in the US. All the most popular schools are universities or colleges, especially the ones mentioned by The Hollywood Reporter in this article http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/top-25-film-schools-united-721649. Surely, there must be some great film academies/institutes out there. I'm not looking for a bachelors or masters degree but want to go to an institute because I am looking to hone my skills, and see no need to take a full on degree. As an international student, one of my biggest problems is getting a student visa, then converting it to a working visa, so it would be great if the school assisted with that as well. As for the ones I've found, it's pretty much the New York Film Academy (the reviews for which are 50/50) and the Digital Film Academy, both in New York. It would be really helpful if you could offer some insight as well as suggest other schools. THANK YOU!

the future of the world "political correctness" = end of free speech

You are a great cinematographer! Some people is just negative because they would be creative but they are lazy and they are not ready for the sacrifices that every creative work ask. It goes like that since Aesop's time: The Fox and the Grapes, you know what I mean I just retweet you Don't let them stop you!

Seriously this article is one of the worst I've seen posted on EOSHD. Its a gross mis-interpretation of events still unfolding and basically none to do with what the author argue upon ( notably artistic and creative freedom ) I do agree and abide with him upon the need to protect such rights. But seriously Mr. Clarkson's action past and well this one is not having anything to do with that. I suppose its just basic human decency that its yes, its OK to offend, so long you having a just reason for that That though does not include discrimination of sexual role, race, gender, or even simple thing like preference for mode of transportation ( if you might , check many previous episodes and you will note that ). Upon the incident, being a frequent business traveler myself too. I can relay with the frustration of the ill prepared dining arrangement ( if that being the truth ) but I guess that's no reason for any form of fracas. We all have such from time to time and we do not go out and well punch someone for that. To be very frank, I do not think the show would really suffer without him. For certain I do not watch the show because of his lively artistic show of what you call.

Is that a yes to your unconditional love for Jeremy Clarkson? He really shouldn't be let off because he makes a lot of money and is an 'artist'. I think transparency is good. The BBC should not shut up, and neither should the vocal critics. Also not a fan of the commercially driven cynical attitude as Philip Bloom pointed out. Surprised you are to be honest... I bet you if indeed Oisin was assaulted (verbal or physical) , and we polled the public, it wouldn't just be the 'minority' that would agree with the BBC's suspension of Clarkson! Or do you mean yes you do pay TV License? Because you should get a refund dude as you don't need to pay it. You still get to eat the cake and enjoy Jeremy Clarkson! Me, I'm a little bitter as only Netflix is worth my cash these days IMO. ​We can actually defend that. We can also defend Ricky Gervais' skits with yellowfacing on SNL's Office Japanese. And we can defend Sasha Baron Cohen's stuff too. Edgy humour but there's no hypocrisy going on here. They genuinely do have the moral high ground as artists because their humour is defensible. Jeremy Clarkson's level of artistry is closer to Katie Hopkins than the above mentioned!

I have to say, after picking up the Nikon D810 and D750 (I'm primarily a stills guy) I couldn't be happier with the video I'm getting out of them. Especially the D810. Sharp 1080p 60 FPS footage that grades surprisingly well. Haven't spent too much time with the D750 in comparison, but it seems to have a comparable image.

​I second this. I snagged mine used on amazon for about $300+ as well, and IQ wise, it's the best money on a camera body I have probably spend if thinking in practical terms. Great codec, great picture, workable low-light an dynamic range. Couple that with the speedbooster I placed on the mount, and you have a near-full-frame camera that's an excellent B-cam for the a7s (if not a worthy A-cam on it's own).

​It's a storm in a yorkshire teacup! It goes without saying bullying and fist fighting are unacceptable. You're absolutely right, if the producer had hit Clarkson he would be dead and buried. Career over. But if the Queen smacks Prince Philip in the mouth if he hasn't cooked he goose properly, you don't throw out the entire royal family. The producer and Clarkson until last week had had a happy working relationship for a decade. James May says he can't remember what happened because he was "blind drunk" as a result of that drink in the pub on an empty stomach. In the 70's and 80's we had professional snooker players swigging beer on TV during the world championship. In the modern professional climate, a hellraiser or firebrand is considered someone who pops outside for a cig break occasionally. The BBC needs its hellraisers like Clarkson. Otherwise blandness will ensue. I'm tempted to say it already has looking at 99% of their presenters. The BBC are indeed between a rock and a hard place politically on this one, they had to act. Agree 100% for them to turn a blind eye to bad behaviour now would be political suicide given the current climate. However you have to give creative license to your hellraisers and some leeway morally, as inevitably they occasionally throw a wobbly or cause a fracas. He's not the pope. He's not an Ambassador for Good Manners. Clarkson's responsibility to us is to entertain us, not morally reinforce our values. He should absolutely 100% apologise to his producer, take him out for a lunch and have a hug in front of the cameras on the next episode as well. It really should be that simple. Otherwise, he will be off to Sky like half the BBC F1 team. Jobs will go. Extreme Facilities supply Top Gear with GH2 / GH4 drones for example and their contract is with the BBC. Sad to kill such a consistently creative and popular show over a bit of bad behaviour. If Clarkson is not bigger than the show, as the BBC claim, then pulling the show because of Clarkson implies the opposite. Also I was really looking forward to the Ferrari vs McLaren vs Audi shootout I'm not even a petrol head. I like the humour. I like the bravado and the journeys. It's a travel adventure and spectacularly filmed in parts. Of course some of the blog post is speculation, none of us are truly a first party to what went on. We get our info through the papers and the internet. Therefore we have to remember that there's a whole section of the left wing political spectrum out to get Clarkson because he's a buddy of Cameron. Most of the earlier Top Gear controversies were hyped in just the same way, in order to damage Clarkson and Cameron's popularity with the public. In some ways, Clarkson actually doesn't deserve the reputation of oaf. In real life I expect he's a caring dad. He's playing it up for the cameras in the same way an actor would play a character. At this rate we'll be hanging Eastenders characters in the street when they murder someone! Occasionally a flippant remark will be attributed to him rather than to the script. Nobody is going to be pitch perfect over a thousand hours of scripted television especially when it's also improvised on top of that. You are going to have a joke go wrong or cross a line or go creatively wrong and it's simply unreasonable for the BBC to have no tolerance and to pander to every person who might be offended because they claim "Clarkson's a racist dickhead". That isn't a sustainable way to run a broadcaster. They had 150,000 complaints over the way a dog was handled on Crufts! A bloody dog show!! Looking at the numbers, you have to say Crufts is cruel and should be taken off the air. At this rate the BBC will have a lot of empty spaces in their schedules....

'Politically correct' is used in a pejorative sense here... it's simply a term used for caring about other people's feelings and minimising unnecessary offence." Manners and thoughtfulness are sufficient to avoid unnecessarily offending people. Political Correctness is a tool used in the West to control language, and once the language is controlled, so is the framework of discourse. It prevents the free expression of thoughts and ideas, the lifeblood of the artist and the distinguishing characteristic between a free man and a subject. The typical cost for politically incorrect speech in the US is the loss of gainful employment. Being politically incorrect in Bolshevik Russia sent you to the Gulag, or worse. Trotsky coined the term to help Russians avoid running afoul the authorities and ending up in the hoosegow, which also effectively kept them in line under decades of brutal totalitarianism.

Here is a quick test I did indoors today hopefully out doors tomorrow. Will give some insight to quality and focus performance will get outside to do more tomorrow. The Panasonic GH2 is hacked with the Sanity settings and the camera is set to Smooth contrast -2, saturation -2, sharpness -2, noise reduction -2. The settings for the Olympus were contrast -2, sharpness +1, saturation -2 noise reduction off. They need to let you turn them down more. The ISO was 800 on both cameras and exposure was set identically. For my hand held test I used the Panasonic 14-140 set to 40 on the panasonic for image stabilization. The olympus had the olympus 12-40 set to 40. Once I put it on the slider I used the Olympus 12-40 on both. If you like the slider check it out at salamanderslider.com ! My take aways so far I sucked at hand holding The focus tracking issue was a unhappy surprise moire shows up more than I like to cope with Olympus settings are so saturated they need more than -2 reduction I also discovered that you can use the front dial to adjust fstop after you pop out the touchscreen menu. That being said if you try to switch to viewfinder it turns off so it can do it but it is incredibly stupid. I thought Andrew was a bit harsh but maybe like me he had really high hopes and what they have presented is a huge disappointment so much so you want to go slap the guys at Olympus.

​I try every creative angle I can to get anything I work on - either as a DP or my own films out there. The right people. And at the end of it, it's just banging down on as many doors as you can. Finally someone will respond. How do you think Quentin Tarintino got Reservoir Dogs made? Did you ever hear that story? There are some amazing stories of persistence in many people trying to get their foot in the door. Even, unfortunately for a lot of male and especially female actors - having to hit the casting couch. And they do it. Ugggggg. What's also interesting is that once they are big, if they remember the struggle they went through when they were younger or if they blocked out the hard times.

This is the biggest challenge for me as a photographer and filmmaker today. You have to promote the crud out of yourself, because nobody is going to do it for you. I've made some connections with clients who i've made incredibly happy that promote me almost every time I shoot something for them, and I'm discovering clients/relationships like this are absolutely invaluable.

I'll make a specific post regarding the Top Gear incident. Like others I can understand the need to suspend Clarkson if he's actually punched a Producer. Having said this though I can find no news report stating a punch up, they state a fracas which may have been just verbal. What I do not understand though are the incidents leading up to this sad state of affairs - the bad comments, racial slurs etc. In these circumstances one must surely question the good taste and competency of the Producer and Director involved because these shows are highly scripted and set up with multiple takes. If Clarkson said something offensive why didn't the Producer or Director call him up on this in the field and do another take leaving out the offensive words. Even if this wasn't picked up in the field, why was it left in the edit that was broadcast - one can always cut around such things and as a last resort even completely remove the offending piece. Clarkson himself stated with the 'eeny meeny miny moe' piece there were other takes without the 'n' word and he emailed the Producer asking them to swap it out. This all sounds to me like a bit of a stitch up with a Producer trying to make an edgy controversial show. Perhaps some of the source of friction between Clarkson and him?

I mostly agree with you there. I don't think we could have a Klaus Kinski these days... However HSBC? There is nothing about that bank that needs to be saved. There were plenty of investigations into that bank that pretty much ended up with showing it was Satan itself, that it supports drug cartels, terrorist groups and other enemies of the US, and the only reason why it was allowed to go on was because it's too big to fail. It has a ton of blood on its hand. The bank needs to go away, and it's staff need to be investigated and put into prison.

The whole issue reminds me of when footballers act out. The club and/or establishment have to tread a fine line between looking like they have control, whilst making sure their prize asset will not just pack up and move away to a rival team/league.

​No worries! All I'm saying is that we don't know what he's done. We've had limited information released by the BBC and I'm afraid I smell a rat. Why release such a statement but not the full facts, if it was an unprovoked attack, then why did they not say it was an unprovoked attack. If there was a cause, why not tell us the cause. It stinks, and I can only think of one reason for releasing a sensationalist, incomplete version of events, they wanted to justify the suspension and didn't believe the full story would. But if it turns out he did assault the producer, I will about-face so quick, your head will spin. I've done it in the past and I'll do it again. I have no special attachment to him that I would not stick up for the rights of the non "starring" crew. After I heard the Christian Bale abuse to the guy who walked on set during a scene, I lost work I was so outspoken about what a moron he had been. EDIT: That guy turned out to be shane hurlbut, the things you learn!

​Because as I said in my first post, I have worked with him. When I worked with him, he was pleasant. He was hard working. These are things I know. I also know that the character he plays on top gear is fictional, he is not that person, he is acting, in the same way that Brad Pit is not Tyler Durden.

​Andrew, While I do understand where this post is coming from, I still applaud you for the sentiment and for having the guts to state how you feel. I understand your frustration having worked in TV for almost thirty years. I now call TV 'The Great Mediocrity Sieve', meaning it turns most things into porridge. It's almost impossible now to have strong authorship, strong ideas/views, be risqué, daring, confronting or even be too affecting because a committee of exec producers will step in to tone things down for fear the film may be 'too much' for their audience. I recently had this happen to a show I worked on in which the true events were deemed too 'dramatic'. Of course their ratings ended up being nowhere near as strong as they could have. But I fear TV is just a reflection of our wider modern western society in which an epidemic of 'political correctness' aimed at protecting ourselves from ourselves has raged rampant. One can hardly move these days without encountering some legal requirement or having to fill out paperwork, pay a tax or levy, or need permission from a government department. What we're witnessing is the rise of the bureaucratic class that generates laws that then require even more bureaucrats to administer (reminding me of Terry Gilliam's 'Brazil'). It's part of the reason most western nations are so hopelessly in debt. I don't live in Britain but I know over the last few years public sector economic activity there has been greater than private sector, the place from where the tax monies come to pay for public spending. This means that Britain's national debt has ballooned out to over 5 Trillion pounds and rising. This is the reason things we took for granted twenty to thirty years ago can now no longer be afforded, including decent budgets for investigative and educational documentary. The UK is one of the last places in the world to have government funded television - you're lucky.

​Well said. We are being molly coddled. I know it's a cliche, but it's true. Too many people are offended about offence. The US networks have their own version of Top Gear. It would be interesting to see the difference. I very much doubt it is edgier.

Hello, I am the President and founder of Digital Film Academy in NYC. We do things quite differently on many levels so please give DFA a serious look. ONE BIG DIFFERENCE is our LEAP Program (Lifetime Equipment Access Program). This means that all of our graduates have free access to all equipment, facilities, insurance policies ... everything that is needed so you can provide services to clients (Monetize your skills - TM) and create your own media (Monetize your media - TM). The LEAP program is no questions asked for a full year after graduation and then continues lifetime if you hire some fellow DFA grads or students on your gigs after the first year. It works really well. We have grads using RED cameras for free for years and therefore being able to under bid others and get the gigs. Give a look and see. I think we've got the formula that works because after graduation is when you have debt and need to monetize. Common sense really. Thank you. www.digitalfilmacademy.edu Patrick DiRenna

Do not go to Full Sail. I went there for Digital Art & Design, the film program does not have the best reputation. Worse though is that there is not enough jobs available in orlando for the volume of film students in the area (UCF & Valencia are both less than a mile away) and you will have to move to out of the area if you want to find work. Also the tuition is insane, I believe it's currently +$90,000 for 2 years. Those two New York ones are great, and there is a bigger film making community in the area. UCLA is also excellent, but hard to get into their film program.

I got mine today (I wanted to use it on a specific project very soon). First impressions are that Andrew is being a bit hard on the image quality but I am far from finishing my tests. That said, here are a few things that do bother me - - no way to adjust exposure or ISO when shooting video - no way to do custom white balance in movie mode ( you have to go to stills mode to do this) - no enlarged view when manually focusing in movie mode - apparently no way to refocus using auto focus while shooting movies - there is an INCREDIBLE crop when in movie mode. More than on the GH4 in 4K. I think this is what bothers me most of all. Totally unexpected. But... - build quality is beautiful - peaking seems to work better than on my GH4 - a quick test combining shutter priority exposure, stabilisation and continuous autofocus was really good (and will be good for quick, steady walk-through shots) My reasoning getting this was that it would (more or less) do the job of a gimbal. For what I do I just don't have time to mess around with rigging and it's not practical to have multiple cameras set up on different stabilisation devices. Despite all the drawbacks listed above, I think it might still serve the intended purpose.