Older camera comparisons and thoughts:

[TheRealOG]

16 hours ago, LloydPDX said:

yes, and you?

Yeah!! Haha. Weather has been nicer these days than snowmageddon.

[LloydPDX]

12 hours ago, EphraimP said:

Dang, that would make at least for of us on this board. I'm kinda shocked. It's a pretty small place, taken from a global perspective.

You can probably find/rent a Ninja V pretty easy up in PDX. I've got two down here in Eugene. If you were close enough to make it worth while, I'd let you play with one for a few hours to see if it is something you'd be interested in using and/or rent you one when you needed it. I use them with Fuji X-Ts and definitely appreciate all the pro features they add to the camera, plus the much bigger screen to monitor and capturing in ProRes.

Thanks for the offer/willingness, appreciate it. Yeah, renting here not likely a problem. The external recorder introduces the need for additional powering solutions, but it would be good to have some firsthand experience to understand its value.

[EphraimP]

2 hours ago, LloydPDX said:

Thanks for the offer/willingness, appreciate it. Yeah, renting here not likely a problem. The external recorder introduces the need for additional powering solutions, but it would be good to have some firsthand experience to understand its value.

You're right about the additional powering solution. Fixed on a tripod indoors for something like a livestream or studio shoot, it's no problem to run it off mains power with the included power adaptor. For mobile shoots, you can turn that particular lemon into lemonade by using a V-mount battery or an NP-F battery with USB and DC outlets to also power you camera (with a dummy battery or a USB-C cable) and even another accessory. I have one rig built up with mini-cine style with a V-mount and two of the super cheap Powerextra 48 Wh batteries for my more minimalistic setup and they work great. 

The balance can be an issue with a heavy battery up high if you go the NP-F route. I personally tend to mount the monitor off to the left on that rig either on top of a side handle or just using a magic arm as a field-expedient side handle off the nato rail built into the side of my cage. 

If you go with a side handle or just on top of the camera/cage/top handle, do yourself a favor and use a monitor mount like Smallrig's that you can tighten with an allen key. Regular ball heads will always come loose. I think I'm going to try one of the Nitzi mounts because they tighten with an allen key AND are the only monitor mounts I've found with Arri-style locating pins. I'm not sure why no one else has them. The monitor is built for them and why wouldn't you want to it in so it won't twist when you are trying to swivel it?! Even the ballhead I got from Atomos kit doesn't have them for crying out loud. 

Anyway, probably deeper into the weeds than you were interested in. But there you go.

[IronFilm]

On 2/25/2021 at 5:51 PM, LloydPDX said:

Thanks for the suggestions, and I do already enjoy a Mixpre-6. Trying to keep it simple and avoid external monitors/recorders if possible. The 2k image is not nearly as good as the 4k, but in 4k you lose peaking, stabilization and zebras. And in 2k, you can only have one at a time. No WFM or scopes either.

With almost any camera you have can benefit from an external monitor, even big cinema cameras have extra monitors being used for the operator / AC / director (or all of the above). 

Especially if you're just doing the bulk of your work as sit down interviews, I can't see why you wouldn't want to use an external monitor. 

[IronFilm]

On 2/26/2021 at 12:49 PM, kye said:

Please watch this video from the D850 and then explain, in great detail, how this image isn't sufficient for your needs....

 

Here's the blog post outlining a bit about how it was shot (handheld with a 50mm lens): https://news.coreyrich.com/2017/08/latest-work-home-shot-d850/

Spend the money on yourself, lighting, audio, or lenses, but why upgrade?

It is not a D850, but I found those videos comparing the Nikon D750 with the BMPCC to be enlightening:

 

If you're new to videography, than any of these good modern-ish Nikon DSLRs definitely won't be holding you back! You've got twenty other things to worry about first before even beginning to think about upgrading your camera body.