Shooting 1DC Shutter at 4000, no ND, thoughts....

[Nautical]

After three years of hoping to get one, I finally purchased a used 1DC.  I have been through many of the cameras that seem popular on this forum (5d raw, NX1, a7s, C300, C100, XC10) but there is something about the image of the 1DC that I find unsurpassed in the under $15k+ category.  I did consider the 1DX II, and I think it looks great, but the used 1DC was cheaper and a little more to my taste "film stock" wise (although DPAF is something I really wish I had). 

In particular when I think of the 1DC image I think of the work of Camille Marotte on Vimeo.  It has that unique mix of vibrant yet mature color, layered with the gentle roll off of C Log on top of 4k resolution that just looks so organic and cinematic to me (obviously we all have our opinions about these things). What I find interesting is that if you read through Marotte's comments below his videos (some of it is in French) he says that to capture the brighter high contrast scenes he will take his shutter up to 4,000 (he is often shooting wide open at 1.2 or 1.4 handheld) and that he never uses NDs because they distort the colors and image too much.  This breaking of the shutter "rule" seems so contrary to everything I have heard I wanted to get your thoughts on the technique.   Does anyone else do this? Thanks.

 

[Luke Mason]

There is nothing right or wrong about it, it's all down to personal preference. For shots with little motion 1/4000 shutter is totally fine, also if it looks too jarring you can add motion blur in post.

[mercer]

3 hours ago, Nautical said:

After three years of hoping to get one, I finally purchased a used 1DC.  I have been through many of the cameras that seem popular on this forum (5d raw, NX1, a7s, C300, C100, XC10) but there is something about the image of the 1DC that I find unsurpassed in the under $15k+ category.  I did consider the 1DX II, and I think it looks great, but the used 1DC was cheaper and a little more to my taste "film stock" wise (although DPAF is something I really wish I had). 

In particular when I think of the 1DC image I think of the work of Camille Marotte on Vimeo.  It has that unique mix of vibrant yet mature color, layered with the gentle roll off of C Log on top of 4k resolution that just looks so organic and cinematic to me (obviously we all have our opinions about these things). What I find interesting is that if you read through Marotte's comments below his videos (some of it is in French) he says that to capture the brighter high contrast scenes he will take his shutter up to 4,000 (he is often shooting wide open at 1.2 or 1.4 handheld) and that he never uses NDs because they distort the colors and image too much.  This breaking of the shutter "rule" seems so contrary to everything I have heard I wanted to get your thoughts on the technique.   Does anyone else do this? Thanks.

 

Thank you for sharing Marotte's work, I wasn't familiar with him at all. And yeah, clog from the 1dC is simply gorgeous, and to be honest I'm not sure I would trade anything the 1Dc offers for DPAF... That image is so organic, so cinematic that you almost need to physically and personally pull the focus to be a part of the process. 

As far as breaking the 180 rule, hey whatever suits you. I'm pretty sure @kidzrevil and @jase expose that way, and I really enjoy their work too. 

[tellure]

I'm a huge Camille Marotte fan too.  Interesting note about the shutter speed, I don't think I ever consciously realized he was shooting at such high shutter speeds.  It is interesting that there isn't that there isn't a lot of motion in his shots.  I like the idea of not having to depend on ND's at all but I'm not sure a shot of someone walking through a busy market at 1/4000 would have the cinematic quality he usually delivers.

I agree it is personal preference, it's just going to be much more of an obviously newer / digital / video look when you can very clearly tell you're shooting at super high shutters. 

[ricardo_sousa11]

I dont use ND filters, dont really care much for the shutter speed. For some specific shots we do need to be carefull, but I very very rarely use an ND filter.

[TSV]

I, unfortunately, rely a lot on ND Filters as I do not know how to do otherwise. If anyone got an Idea or know a place when I can see and learn how to do that (getting ride of ND filters) then please by all means let me know!

[Asmundma]

Actually with low shutter speeds, capturing mpegs from video on 1dx2 can give to much motion blur. I use ND filter it sometimes, but only expensive Tiffen filters do not colour in my experience. its also a problem if you take still and video with the same camera, so I also ignore it quite some times.

[Matthew19]

man, what stands out to me is to look at his newer red dragon work compared to his 4k 1dc. Though technically not as good, I like the magic of the 1dc image better. =)

Lots of folks break the shutter speed rule, especially in the live event world. 

[Luke Mason]

2 hours ago, Asmundma said:

Actually with low shutter speeds, capturing mpegs from video on 1dx2 can give to much motion blur. I use ND filter it sometimes, but only expensive Tiffen filters do not colour in my experience. its also a problem if you take still and video with the same camera, so I also ignore it quite some times.

shutter speed too low results in too much motion blur on any camera, not just 1DX2.

Also expensive Tiffen/Schneider all have visible colour tint, the best one is ND made by Breakthrough Photography, or True ND from Mitomo Japan.

[BrorSvensson]

I did this for a long time but then i got the Slr magic variable nd that you can change the polarization effect with and has close to zero colour distortion, i'm a big fan of 90 degree shutter with the more action related stuff i film.

[Nautical]

2 hours ago, Matthew19 said:

man, what stands out to me is to look at his newer red dragon work compared to his 4k 1dc. Though technically not as good, I like the magic of the 1dc image better. =)

Lots of folks break the shutter speed rule, especially in the live event world. 

Thanks everyone for your thoughts.  It seems like a lot of people are comfortable breaking the 180 degree convention (at least for low motion images), more than I thought.  

Marotte's Red Dragon work definitely is painting from a cooler palette than the 1DC.  It is a matter of taste, but I agree in finding the 1DC image more inviting.  I think also the size of the rig changes his proximity and engagement with the subject.   I am not sure, but I think he still has his 1DC for personal work according to his comments below the videos.   

[ND64]

Having a virtual 6 stop ND without paying a dime and with absolutely no colorshift is so a big benefit shouldn't be ignored, by anyone. Just because it was near impossible in 1920 to make a rotary shutter fast enough to achieve 1/4000 exposure doesn't mean we shouldn't use it today. But, with such high shutter speed you lose lots of event-data that could be used by your brian to understand the movements in the image. At 1/4000 and 24fps, you capture only %0.06 of every second, while at 1/48 you get half of every second. This is huge difference. Of course that lost %49.94 may only contains blurry pixels of displaced objects, but those pixels help our brain to think "this thing is moving". If you give it a flashing sequence of appearance and disappearance of objects, that will be harder processing task to render it as normal action. I get headache after watching a video with bad motion cadence for longer than five minutes, especially when I'm close to screen. Maybe the combo of myopia and astigmatism I have exacerbate the problem though.