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My experience with Panasonic USA hasn't been the same as his experience. I have been told explicitly that they want our honest feedback and opinions and they have never had any say or sway in the content. The only "fear" certain creators have is not getting invited to the next event, which is all in their mind. If you make a positive or negative video... just simply honest, I don't think that will ruin your chance at "going to the next event". IDK. I'm moving on from this. Taking a step away from the industry in general. Already have almost both my feet out the door.

Let's take a moment to appreciate the old treasure that is the Nikon Z6 OG, which couldn't have aged better even if it were deposited in an oak barrel in Scotland for the past 6 years. First of all it is £650 now. Secondly of course it is full frame whereas a lot of the other options for this price are crop sensor. Many of the other mirrorless full frame cameras have aged quite badly. The Panasonic S1 is superseded by a smaller cheaper camera with better AF. The Canon EOS R classic has been superseded twice by the R6 and R6 II. The formula of Z6 on the other hand has only merely been tweaked with the Z6 II that doesn't add a huge amount extra, because it just doesn't need to. And the Z8 / Z9 are insanely more money than £650. I like that it has such nice colour science out the box. It also has better custom picture profile management than Canon. The IBIS is superior to the Canon EOS R3 in every way, let alone the EOS R5 or R6 II. The 4K video and 6K sensor is superb in low light, better than the 8K+ stuff. And despite now being very cheap the top LCD and enormous, detailed EVF hold up very favourably today, in fact the EVF competes with some of the best even in 2024. The ergonomics are excellent, it doesn't put a foot wrong in terms of what it tries to do. And what it doesn't do, you probably don't need. OK, so there's no 4K/60p, or faster stacked sensor, and 120fps is limited to 1080p, but everything feels fast and responsive, including the on-sensor phase-detect AF. It is much smaller and lighter than the Panasonic S1 or S1H, yet with phase-detect AF and a very similar sensor under the hood. Z mount has also ripened well... It has a really good line up of lenses and adapters now, including the nifty Leica M mount autofocus adapter which will turn every manual focus lens into a fast and snappy autofocus optic. Plus it's the only mirrorless mount that adapts to Sony E! So you can put your native Sony mirrorless lenses on there and everything works. I can't think of a better deal for £650 at the moment on the used market for cameras. Curious to hear other opinions and what's changed in Nikon land since it came out those long 6 years ago in 2018. I can't for the life of me think of another 6 year old camera that has aged this well.

No reason to play the Devil's Advocate, the 5Diii/ML Raw is one of the best images I have seen for the money... especially if you aren't too concerned with playing the resolution game. Is it perfect? No. Is the workflow a little tedious? Sure. But man those files!

I didn't post my camera choice just to be forced to defend it. With that said... please tell me another camera that has 14bit full frame, uncompressed raw video for less than $1000? Please I'd love to see that camera? As far as the Sigma FP being a better camera... I've had the 5D for about 7 years and the FP for about 1.5 and I'm sorry to tell you... the FP is not a better image... unless all you care about is getting sharpness via resolution. And this is coming from someone that truly likes the Sigma FP. I will say that I do agree that the FP is a weird successor of the 5Diii/ML Raw, in fact, I wouldn't be surprised to learn that Sigma got inspiration from that camera and firmware. As is, the similarities make the cameras a bit too redundant for me, so after a lot of testing and consideration, I am keeping the 5Diii and selling the FP. I don't really need 4K and I have access to an S5iiX if I do... weirdly I find the ProResHQ out of the S5iiX to be damn near close in quality to the FP.

🙂

I think the OG S5 and the S1 still have the best video quality with very similar image than a raw picture file, as opposed to the recent cameras like the S5II. Even if the S5II has better IBIS in 4K, and much better AF, these S5 and S1 are a steal for people who don't need very fast AF.

Well I'll know by around the end of July because with my workload, travel and production time etc, that's going to be about the soonest I'll find out how successful or not this project is. I am hoping the 6k 30p will be 'enough' and if so, will ditch my 2x stills cameras and 3x lenses in favour of another Lumix plus an appropriate lens. I'll still shoot stills, but limit that to; details, landscapes/architecture and family groups, none of which I currently shoot with video other than some drone stuff. If it's 'borderline' and 'needs' 8k, then I think I'll need to get hold of an XH2 and give that a whirl. If that in turn is not going to work, then I will most like trade my 2x stills + 1 lens for a single stills camera because I feel I have one too many cameras to juggle right now as in I can manage 4, but 3 would be my preferred max. And I can't see less than 3 because for ceremonies, I like to shoot 2x static angles and roam with my third video unit plus shoot stills. As I said above, limited info out there, no handbook and a lot of hands on trial & error required because it's more than about just on paper specs and opinions, but getting your hands dirty. Without cocking up a job you are being paid to do.

I think if camera makers were to take simultaneous capture seriously, then maybe they could record a 4k/6k/8k video stream at a normal video frame rate to one card slot, plus simultaneously a stream of reduced rate stills - e.g. 1/2 or 1/4 of video fps - at full (or near full) sensor resolution as compressed raw or high quality JPEG/HEIC images to the other card slot. That might get close to the best of both worlds. We've already got cameras like the S5ii that can record a 4k video stream plus simultaneously a reduced resolution 'proxy' video stream, so it I suspect some cameras already have enough processing power to do something like that.

There is really only one lens that I would call a ‘super zoom’ and that is the Tamron 35-150. In my ideal scenario, I would glue on one lens and be done. Canon come close with their 24-105mm f2.8 and the R3 is for me, the best lens platform other than in one area and that is mp. I need to shoot up to 150-200mm with my ‘one and done’ lens and cropping 24mp is a bit too much of a stretch. Now if the R3 had even 45mp or better still 60mp, we would not be having this convo as with that f2.8 24-105 it would be that and a 35-150+ at the press of an assigned crop button. But it doesn’t and any new R1 might, but it will be stupid money for sure. Keep a 70-200 for those times I need something longer? Nope. The times I need something longer are when I also need something wide. The bottom line is I am not so much camera bound but focal length bound and governed by approx 35-150 in a single lens. So Sony or Nikon is the reality. Either/both need a battery grip and the Sony is the smaller and lighter option with the Tamron 35-150 and the Z9 the most ergonomic and balanced, but heaviest and the Z8 with a battery grip does not get a look on because it’s bigger still with the battery grip and why would you on that case when the Z9 exists? Summary = Z9 or A7RV with Tamron 35-150mm are currently the best options. Nikon Z6iii and any S2R might change that equation and in the case of the Nikon, will require a battery grip. The Lumix question though always comes back to lenses and requires the pairing of a 24-70 and a 70-200 to get in the ball park but with that MASSIVE compromise of 2x bulky lenses and lens swaps I can’t do. Unless Samyang pop out their 35-150 and then we have a chance. Which brings me back to MF and the GFX series. Cropping in camera or post is my other solution to having a ‘one and done’ lens but that shorter zoom is too short and the 45-100 even, in FF equivalent, a bit short and requires a significant crop to get up to around 150mm. And so whilst I could just about swing that, GFX 100S + 45-100, does it make more sense than the Z9 or gripped A7RV with 35-150? I would like to get on with things but at the same time am not in any particular rush as my current set up does work, it’s just not (still) ideal. Quite possibly/probably Kye and this is where the issue lies in that this is a pretty obscure topic and surprisingly so. Around 12+ years ago, I attended a 3 day international photo event in the US where the big topic was ‘fusion’. Today we call it hybrid capture. I think as already dabbling and I thought it would explode and become the norm and yet it has not. With the cameras it has, massively so, but out in the real world beyond the chat, very few are really actually doing full hybrid capture, especially as one man bands. Over a decade and the industry is still pretty much photo or video, with an extremely small number of equal amount hybrid shooters. I am not complaining as it means my pool of competitors is tiny to non-existent but I still find that baffling almost every day. My main point being to quoting you though that because it’s still barely out of it’s infancy, there is so little info, limited testing, no ‘handbook’ so a lot of trial and error needed. In my ideal world, I’d have a well stocked camera shop on my doorstep that allowed loaners or at least rentals and I could play. The reality is I have to rely mostly on on-line research, instinct, best guesses, testing what I have, gradual evolution etc… By the time I have it properly cracked, I’m going to be out of the game 🤪

I reckon the only camera that aged better is the OG BMPCC! (although a very different camera, and also a fair bit older too)

Hope you're not feeling ill?! I know how that feels, they have a classic car show about two blocks away from me once a year... why couldn't it be one block? Probably the truest statement I read all week.

Just be careful to avoid stopping down too much, because diffraction softening sets in pretty quickly on this tiny sensor. In general I try not to go above f5.6; with some lenses I can go to 8 but the image starts getting soft in an ugly way. I used my OG Pocket earlier this year to film some music performance in a very dark club, and it worked! I used my Micro Cinema Camera last week to film a 2-hour evening concert and that worked out well too. I'll be using my two Micros and the OG Pocket later this summer for an all-weekend filming and photography gig. They're still great tools. I think stabilization is really the biggest challenge...for handheld I'm using a Zacuto Marauder Mini, which is no longer made, but it works pretty well for stabilizing while giving a handheld look. I also have a glidecam and might ultimately get a gimbal but I'd rather not have yet another thing that requires batteries and charging.

To play devil's advocate (because that's what we do around here!), it's never been easier or more economical to plug a camera into a v-mount battery, which can also power a monitor. If you are using manual lenses, your shooting experience will probably not be that different regardless of the camera body that you use... so you might as well use one that captures an interesting image, right? Also, my M2 Mac really takes the sting out of MLV app. Sure, it adds 20-30 mins of export time, but it also means that I can dial in the color balance and exposure of each shot before I even start editing. Not saying that this is the right way to go for everyone. For me, I like the idea of a camera that has a slight IQ pitfall to take away the pressure of capturing a perfect image, and to add a little gentle pressure to tell a compelling story so that the audience doesn't study your image too much. This is debatable. Many people do love the D200. I haven't shot with one myself, but I've used the Olympus e500 and Sony a390. I prefer the e500, but the a390 has better and more affordable lens options. Many swear by the earlier Pentax cameras, Fujifilm's S series, or Canon's 1D classic. I think that half of the point of an old CCD DSLR in 2024 is not to spend too much.

And there is my other option… I wish to reduce the sheer amount of kit I have, use and need and am alternative solution is to trade 2 existing 24mp stills cameras and 3 lenses, for one single high MP stills camera and just two, or even one lens. The Hassie R2D2 or whatever it’s called is my ‘dream’ but way above my pay grade, the 45mp Nikon’s not much point, the Sony A7RV a good ‘budget’ option used (and I have the lenses) but after the Hassie, I’d most like the GFX 100S. The issue with medium format is there are no decent zoom lenses. Yes, there’s the 45-100mm f4 but it’s a bit slow in low light and is big, heavy and extends. I’m going down a rabbit hole now I know, but keeping my options open as follows: A. Exploring frame grabs from 6k 30p video. B. Waiting to see what the Nikon Z6iii turns out to be. C. Waiting to see what any S2H or S2R might be for either the frame grab approach, or the high MP stills. D. If none of the above have worked out, maybe just trade my 2 Nikons (using with) adapted E Mount Tamron glass) and just do the Sony A7RV ‘budget’ route, shut up and get on with my life…

Perhaps it's just me but the search function didn't throw up any topic that I could find so starting this one. The XH2. Not the S, model, but the 40mp 8k capable one. Anyone have one and been using it in this mode, ie, 8k? And specifically, in one of the film profiles such as Eterna? I am back to musing over pulling stills from video at either 6k 30p full frame (which I currently have) with Lumix and potential other options... Not interested in BM Cameras, - too many compromises for my needs. Canon has options as does Nikon, but at 8k only. I came from Fuji X cameras (2011-2020) and the XH1 was one of my favourites of all time for both video and stills, but things have moved on quite a bit since then... The XH2 intrigues me with specifically 8k 30p Eterna, the profile I used to shoot with the XH1 and then the XT3 as a 'one and done', minimal grading required, wedding video option and 8k would allow me to pull stills. As above, any experience appreciated! And nope, not bothered about anything external or rolling shutter, just the quality of the output 🙂

Not that bothered with the former but I’ll give you the latter, - internal ND would indeed earn that title of ‘game changer’ for hybrid shooters who want to quickly and easily flip back and forth between stills and video with a single unit and minimum faffing around.

I am sorry if my tone was too strong. I did not intend to offend you.

Not affiliated at all for sure but found this one a no-brainer, as usual BTW coming from that usual suspect, kudos to him actually:

Would you buy this instead of a Pyxis? Hmmm... maybe not, I guess that's why Blackmagic has had the price reduction! https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1464917-REG/blackmagic_design_ursa_mini_pro_4_6k.html

Interesting. When I felt it was time for me to go to a better camera I was seriously looking at the Ursa Mini Pro but the fixed pattern noise thing was a turn off. I also was looking at the BM Production Camera 4K, Digital Bolex, the Ursa non-mini even (which were like a full size VHS camcorder). I see the BM 4K Production Cameras now on Craigslist for only CAN$1100 which is pretty amazing for their image quality. I wasn't liking the poor audio quality part though. There are always trade offs with cameras. I ended up getting a deal on a Digital Bolex and loving it. It's not easy to shoot with but the results are worth it for certain types of shooting. I had a small group over for supper and a screening (projected) of my latest film shot with it and one of them, who's a layperson and not involved in film at all, said something like the image had a certain quality to it and wondered if I had a special camera or something. In the end I paid a lot but I'm super happy with what I ended up with. No FPN, good audio, amazing image quality, etc. It's also become a bit of a conversation piece when I've been out shooting. I've met a few interesting camera buffs that way. I think to compliment this would be something like a 4K camcorder with built in gimbal type stabilization. Sony, Canon and Panasonic all make similar models. I have an HD Sony (PJ650) that I love for its ease of use, stabilization and all that. We live in a golden age of so many camera choices and most of them are very good and much better than the few choices we had in the past. In fact we can even get super picky about minor details. It reminds me of coffee and craft beer. Thirty or more years ago it was all crap and now so much amazing beer and coffee is available we can look down upon very good coffee because we can choose super good coffee.

As someone who has owned the OG S5 and uses an S5ii and an S1H, I can confirm. The S5ii has the best stabilisation (by far) and the best AF, (S5ii, then S1H, then OG S5) but actual picture quality, I'd rank them: S1H, OG S5 and last S5ii. But for anyone that doesn't need the stab or the absolute best AF, the OG S5 I think is a steal. In fact, the S5, S5ii, Z6, Z6ii and maybe some others, all share the same sensor, but perhaps with some individual brand tweaks. The S1H has an OLPF so is a slightly different beast but I prefer the still image results I get out of the Z6ii over the S5ii. There is not that much in it, but there's a subtle difference I cannot put my finger on except there is 'something'...

My specialty. Apologies to those who hate topic drift. I missed it completely, but it sounds like something I'd like a lot! Thanks for the suggestion! I'll probably start it today. That makes total sense. It's a super easy camera to use and the majority the ergonomics are really well thought-out. It just kind of gets the job done without any fuss and gives you a really nice image. About the only things I'd change would be to add an EVF and some built-in wireless image transmission. Oh, and if I'm wishing out loud, make it 4.6k to allow some reframing in post with no quality loss when delivering 4k. Along the same lines as the above, I'm shooting a 48 hour film thing here in late June and the producer got me a first AC. Since I have no use for an actual AC, I'll just be promoting them to second shooter and handing them the C70. I just need to make sure it's straightforward to match it to the K-X which I'll be using (should be, the sensors are really similar sizes and Canon and Red both skew a bit magenta).

Yep, how I started out 24 years ago. If I only shot video or stills, it’s probably how I’d still go today. Or maybe a pair of wider primes such as a 24 + 50 indoor and a 35 + 90 outdoors, with a 70-200 in the bag for anything else such as ceremonies & speeches. Yep. I can get away with an f4 outdoors and decent light but beyond that… F2.8 in FF is my slowest I will own and use. Even f2.8 is pushing it in my lower light environments. Compared to the US or UK, France is a second world country when it comes to anything like this. Or delivery. Or customer service. Or…many things 😏 I would settle for an internal ND. Using VND’s is a pain in the ass if switching between stills and video rapidly with the same unit. I do have some screw in flip up, flip down filter holders however and they do work, but I went back to dedicated units for stills and video. I might look at that again though… Otherwise, I have 4 weddings next month and I’m going to shoot all 4 at 6k 30p instead of my usual mix of 4k 25 and 50p and then pull frame grabs from each and do a direct comparison with my stills shot at the same time. The only real way to find out if I can make this work with 6k, or if I need 8k, or I just stick to video and stills.

Since the thread is somewhat pleasantly derailed.... I don't know if you have seen the series “Chimp Empire” on Netflix. Great cinematography made in many places of close-ups in the darkness and shadows of the forest but also of very dynamic scenes in which the two chimpanzee families give each other a hard time running through the trees. On YT there are several behind-the-scenes shots in which the video operators are seen running like crazy through the jungle. Situations you have to catch on the fly i.e. the classic “run & gun” applied to a very cinematic documentary. C300s and C70s are seen. It's been a long time since I've seen a documentary filmed with these machines. There is this very nice article about the choices the director made about the crew and equipment: https://www.televisual.com/news/how-we-made-it-james-reed-on-chimp-empire/ In another article that I cannot find now, the director related that the most beautiful scenes were shot by the guide alone (a local girl who had taken a filmmaking course) to whom the crew in the off periods had left the C70.

From my experience, ease of use in reaching that best potential image quality goes to the Bmpcc and Bmmcc, among DSLMs and sub 5000 USD class of cameras. @ita149 The og S1, S5 and the S1H provide fantastic potential in post with a modern flawless image, up there with a FX6, dethrowning a r5 in regards of dynamic range and latitude f.i. S1 would be my steal of the current moment, regarding bang for the buck for a cinema dslm. The og Bmpcc and Bmmcc are my image magic recording devices though.:)

The 14mm needed post stab even more than the 25 due to the kind of framing and nature of the mise èn scene going along with the fov, framing and most of all nature and design of the shot. A slightly shaky 14 looked more stupid than a more shaky 25 due to that, from my still little experience with my og pocket. I have shot with my og pocket about seven or eight times over the course of one year so far, each worth about 4 batteries per session and 30 to 40min of footage. So take it with a bit of grain of salt.:) @kye

Well, it definately is a raw look one can achieve doing that, filming handheld with a portrait lens on a tiny shaky camera.😊 Panning with a moving object yields great results though. Shooting with 180 shutter angle allows great stab in post. It stabilizes better than any of my other cameras in post. On my first day I shot my 25mm on 360 degree shutter and beyond diffraction limit. It was fun. Watching the footage was not.😂

@bjohn Awesome! Cannot wait to see some of that footage if you come around to post some. I also have two micros and one pocket. On one of the micros I got a Rawlite filter, unfortunately not on the other two cameras. Diffraction limit kicks in mercilessly, of course. I enjoy the look of F2.8 on my Lumix LX15 which in 4K mode is a 2/3" camera. It is an honest deep focus look without any nasties. On S16 it translates to a F4, S35 to a F8 and FF to F11. Yesterday the 12-32 went up to F19.😂 Stabilization in post would be rather needed for barebones handheld og pocket footage and it works pretty well. A bmmcc with a pistol grip can do without post stabilization imho, going for the raw classic handheld look. The Ois of the 12 32 on the pocket comes really handy in that regard. AF only on this lens. Quirky has been my middle name the last four days. Fun was my first name.😊

Thanks, that all makes sense, but man do I miss those Vimeo days... I can tell more from an image of a duck in a pond way more than this sanitized, raised midtones, carbon copy footage that circulates through YouTube.

What a great way of putting it. When the image is lesser, it's like a switch flips in my head and I'm able to move on to more important aspects. Shooting becomes so much more fun too.

Have been using mine the fourth day in the row now. Having a blast. It's a very pure experience, having to be set with four puny batteries, which last for about 30 to 35min of footage. Today I was using the 12-32 zoom, on the first three days a 25mm C-mount lens, the latter with a 360 shutter unfortunately! Not using Nds at all is a pretty big confession to choosing a desired depth of field. It provides me with some challenges I have to master and which make me reflect a good deal about my framing and sujet. Handheld panning and tilting with the 25mm is quiete an exercise as well.

This is interesting… So right now, I only shoot raw stills and log video. Based on multiple tests, I can always get a quantifiably better image out of the raw file… as I’d expect to! But having said that, always liked playing with Fujis film profiles (or whatever they call them), especially Classic Chrome. For video, I moved over to log just as I did from Jpeg to raw for stills though that happened with video last year and Jpeg to raw about 12 years back. Raw video looks interesting, but the absolutely humungous file sizes and storage does not! And that might be a sticking point for me as in if the best I am going to get out of 6k or 8k log is something akin to a decent 24mp equivalent camera Jpeg, when I am used to raw quality, might not be enough…and would I really want to go the raw video route? For the sake of raw video alone, god no. For the sake of a more streamlined workflow of only shooting video and pulling stills, maybe… For now, I am going to have to content myself with trying out the 6k 30p mode in my S1H and S5ii and to see if I can ‘get away’ with shooting all footage at 1/250th of a second which is borderline freezing action in say a confetti walk for frame grabs and if the footage for video purposes looks ok at 80% speed ie, very mild slow mo and on a 25p timeline… If that works out OK…and it’s a big if as I don’t really know, then I can maybe consider whether: A. It’s good enough or, B. Almost but 8k would be better or, C. Only 8k raw is really going to cut it, or, D. Junk the whole thing and just stick to shooting stills and video at the same time as I already do and have done for the last 14 or so years… The Fuji XH2 does seem to be the cheapest way into this if it works…and requires 8k. Canon have 6k raw in the R3 and prices have dropped back again to nearer 4k euros when they could not be had for less than 5k from MPB just a few month back. It would be a BIG investment though to switch to Canon and roughly double that of Fuji. Nikon Z8 and Z9 also have 8k raw and I am already in that system for stills and have 3 lenses… I could buy a used Z8 or Z9 and then return it within 30 days. A bit cheeky but it’s near impossible to rent camera gear in rural France. Or stoopidly expensive…

But no for goodness sake! Don't misunderstand me. The idea is also cute, since I fell for it. It's just that watching dozens of videos and hundreds of comments posted after GU's video I see that everyone tries to disguise the problem. then I don't know that youtuber so I couldn't appreciate his ironic streak.

I thought it was funny.... If this whole YT thing has managed to remove peoples sense of humour then I think some lightening up needs to be done 🙂 I mean, if you want to be pissed at someone, I'd be starting with billionaires getting rich off slave labour in third-world countries, but you know, you do you!

Edit: I realize it was a joke (sort of). So now all these YTs are trying to reposition themselves from the GU video. I personally believe that this business model is rotten to the core, and these witty videos are not going to change the substance. I don't think it will change anything. In some time the dust will settle and the circus will resume as usual. GU only spit in the pot it was eating in because it had long since repositioned itself from pure reviews. Time will tell

It helps standardise and unify the content, so for example Tokyo is one of the most photogenic places on the planet... That breathtaking beauty is going to be plastered all over the launch footage and test shots on the day the embargo lifts. It's why Canon took their bros to Hawaii, and not a carpark in Slough. Couple of days on a trip you can tell a lot about a camera, but it usually isn't final firmware and you can't compare very much to rival models. Although I did once bring my Leica SL to the Panasonic S1 launch 🙂 So you're right that you need longer to really get a long term insight into whether it's worth a serious investment and how it compares to a myriad of other options. So what usually comes out on YouTube is a range of quite glossy stuff that shows off the camera in the best light possible, in some of the most aesthetic situations. This has replaced the Vimeo tests of old where you had a filmmaker and model, or perhaps a videographer and a duck in the pond. And herein lies the marketing.

I remember our time at Photokina, Dave, some of the trips are really fun, really productive. And we've both been invited by various camera companies at times to a launch or two. It's all part of the industry, but where it goes wrong is when they start barring outspoken voices and strong personalities, because to be honest free speech is what it should be all about, not marketing. The best marketing is always truthful. If they are going to start telling Gerald what his YouTube titles should be, that crosses a line for me. I like to poke fun at it, but on the other hand sometimes have to throw my hands up and say I am unhappy with some of our colleagues and the hypocrisy. If Gerald was truly transparent about why deep down he truly no longer likes Panasonic, it would not have much to do with cameras let me tell you that. The brand in his eyes is tarnished now, and that is partly the fault of Panasonic Canada or whatever PR company handled him. But I don't buy the video he put out. It's weird. It isn't fully honest. In my opinion Panasonic will now be all over it trying to patch things up and bringing him back into the inner circle which is exactly what he wants! There can't be a situation where the press and journalists are turned into a bunch of crybabies who change their opinions on a whim depending on how their VIP status is going. I have been let down and insulted by camera companies before, most notably Blackmagic and have had the odd incidence of throwing my own toys out the pram! In some ways a normal reaction because you want the access and your survival depends quite a bit on the attention of the big players in the market. So at end of the day I don't blame Gerald as much as I blame the world of corporate marketing. It is the marketing people who are playing an unethical game, slicing and dicing, horse trading and using people like pawns in a broader war.

This is hilarious. Some Moral High Ground Fable was Woven by some guy named Gerald, whose sulking cause he didn't get invited to a launch party, and people have started bashing the whole world. This is ludicrous. If he doesn't get invited to the Academy Awards next year, he'll probably have an absolute meltdown.

Man - I recently watched my BMMCC footage I shot with the 14mm handheld and it was too shaky so well done on hand-holding a 25mm lens! The images certainly grade like refined butter.... just incredible compared to any h26x footage.

I'm no psychologist and I don't know the guy personally so I am no more qualified than anybody else to talk to motivations, but I took it as fully tongue-in-cheek, but if you take something else away from it, you're at least equally right (and maybe more right, who knows?). 😃 Sure, but so am I - and so are you, and so is every other person. The most important thing is to understand how people are full of shit. This is a huge problem. Factor into it that for a lot of people, especially if they could only afford one camera, they might have done research for months before they finally got it. For a lot of those people, a suggestion that they didn't make the right decision can instantly put them on the defensive and cause them to lash out. I'd guess that a huge majority of online dick waving contests about cameras stem from this sort of sensitivity. To follow on that, at least for me, any time anybody refers to their camera as a "beast," whether it be YouTuber or commenter or whatever, I instantly devalue most of what they said before/after. Cameras aren't beasts. They are tools. One should understand the positives and negatives of the tool and base purchase and usage decisions on those things.

Discussing them is all I’ll be doing as, unfortunately, I’m just too washed up to be using them anymore. Oddly enough, there is exactly the same type of WW2 re-enactment event taking place on Monday (which is a Bank Holiday so guaranteed flat lighting ) at a heritage railway 20 mins from where I’ll be. I can’t even be arsed going to watch it let alone taking a camera and filming it. On the topic of your endearing love for the 5D3, I think it’s quite common for people to still have the strongest affiliation to the first camera that offered the “great leap forward” for them in terms of their image making. That’s why there is still so much love for cameras such as the BMPCC and the GH2. Possibly also because they all represent peak enthusiasm before the gear ridden descent into being so jaded 😂

Keep in mind that in 2009 (when the 7d was released), the number of consumer lenses designed for APS-C was even less than now - and there weren't a ton of people adapting vintage Cooke lenses to the 7d. Plus, 15 years ago, sensor technology was not what it is now. Personally, I don't care a lot for Sigma lenses. Every time I put one on my camera, I feel like I'm putting on something designed by a robot - all technical perfection, no soul. But yes, the 18-35 is quite popular. The EF-S 17-55/2.8 is one of the standout lenses for Canon APS-C, but it's one of only a small number. Fast primes? Not many. I HAVE considered picking up the 18-135 USM for a walkaround lens for C70 + Komodo-X since it's decent enough quality and a big zoom range, but while I'd use that for personal stuff, I'd be really unlikely to take it out of the bag when on set. Who is making CCD in the still world nowadays? The sensor options in the still world are about the same as in the video world at this point. Still world has Foveon, but video world has the 17:9 sensors included in many cinema cameras - and most mirrorless cameras (excepting GR1 and Hasselblad medium format) support a video mode which effectively means that most modern still camera sensors are also video sensors... but most dedicated cinema cameras don't feature a still photo mode. The main thing to differentiate a pro DP from an amateur, IMO, is knowing how to light. Choice of cameras like the Alexa tends to be due to a feature set designed for a large crew, reliability, and having the most flexible image to hand off to professional colorists who also spend 80%+ of their time working on footage from the Alexa. This is one of the reasons that a lot of stuff was still being shot on 2.8k Alexa when RED had 4, 5, 6, and 8k sensors available in their cameras. As people here have repeatedly pointed out, a lot of the best DP's aren't making choices for the sharpest possible image - if you want the image to look a little soft, using a Speed Panchro on a 2.8k sensor to upsize to 4k is going to get you there. Will any Internet camera/lens reviewer give a glowing review to that combo? Doubtful. Will an audience watching the film walk out talking about how beautiful the film was? Yup. As a perfect example, I just watched Dune 2 last night since it's finally free on Max. Lots of people have been talking about how beautiful it was. As I watched, some of the scenes were really pretty sharp-looking and they were the ones that seemed mostly CG. When humans were on screen, I repeatedly noticed how unsharp the images were. Googled a bit and found this bit from the DP > "Texturizing the image was the name of the game. The larger ALEXA sensors are so extraordinary that I felt we needed to dirty the image up a bit." Shot on large format sensors, but too much perfection/sharpness felt soulless. Also: > We had a 57 mm LOOK lens with Petzval glass where you can dial in your effect with a third lens ring Dude shot parts of Dune 2 with a $400 Lomography lens. https://shop.lomography.com/us/new-petzval-55-f-1-7-mkii-art-lens And: > Ultimately Fraser and his team decided to use spherical optics and he worked with a diverse range from ARRI Rental including re-housed 1980s Moviecams and re-housed Soviet-era glass provided by IronGlass, along with some lenses from his collection. Dude shot parts of Dune 2 with Helios 44-2 and Jupiter-9 and lenses like that. Can't afford the IronGlass rehoused versions? Go buy 'em for like $200-300 on ebay.

I suspect it differs by what you're trying to achieve. To me, the images have an effortless organic and analog quality to them, very much like the early Alexa models, without doing much grading - it's how the image is to begin with. You can get into that ballpark with the modern mirrorless cameras, but it takes a lot of work in post, and I'm not sure you'd get there completely. When I look at the test images from CineD and Slashcam all these modern cameras all look pretty similar, and even the ones that don't match the rest seem to be different in ways that are relatively easy to overcome in post. However, I've graded images from quite a few of these modern cameras and they all start out looking modern but regardless of what I tried (and I'm a better colourist than most folks around here) I couldn't get them to have any of that early organic magic that the OG BMPCC, Digital Bolex, 5D+ML, and the high-end 2K-3K cinema cameras all had. Maybe if you have FilmConvert or Dehancer and you really know what you're doing you can get them there, but I don't think people want that anymore. The look of high-end 2K workflows and of S35mm just isn't desirable to people anymore. I've said this before, but whenever I go to the cinema I get a massive confirmation that almost all the online camera discussions are about video and not cinema. Certainly almost all the images I see from 'camera people' look like they were shot with the worlds best interchangeable lens high-bitrate video camera, and look almost nothing like cinema. Even when people don't want something that looks super-digital, they apply a heavy film-look that makes things vintage. There was a high-end look that existed between 1985 and 2019, but I seem to be one of the last few outside the industry who want this look.

The image from the 5D3 and ML is simply incredible. @mercer swears by it and the images speak for themselves, there is an organic magic to them that is seldom seen regardless of price or form-factor. Apparently it's pretty stable too, no crashes etc. The 5D camera body is excellent but is ageing, and the sensor isn't the best in terms of modern specs, but prices are also very reasonable due to these things. EF glass is also plentiful, cheap, and optically excellent. The lack of stabilisation and the lower DR really suggest that it's a good camera for controlled conditions where DR and lighting ratios are within a manageable range. If you shoot controlled scenes then the 5D with ML certainly would be a good choice for having one camera.

what is he missing in his tests? Out differently, how would one rationalize $5-6k more for the leica ?