Gerald just spilled the beans about YT reviews, naming brand and giving examples, etc

[John Matthews]

3 hours ago, kye said:

Actually, I think he's one of the most authentic YT reviewers in that way - he isn't a film-maker and doesn't pretend to be one.  His reviews are technical and he doesn't pretend to know which little technical gotcha will be important to you and what won't be.  This makes sense to me because film-making is different for everyone and tiny little things can be deal-breakers for a few but meaningless to most.

Put 30 experienced artists in a room with 1 newly graduated art critic, it will be the art critic who will be considered the expert. I wonder how Gerald Undone figures in with that? I cannot help but hear a bit of hypocrisy in what he says. 

[eatstoomuchjam]

2 hours ago, BTM_Pix said:

With the amount of leaks coming out of there about the S9, it’s more likely the panic came from BM rather than the other way round.

You think BM panicked about the S9?  Did they have bad intel?  I really can't think of any potential customer for a full frame BMPCC who would be jumping ship for the S9 - though I'm sure there that once it starts shipping, there will be at least some YouTubers who will make videos about how they're dropping their current camera for the S9.

Similarly, there was at least one who made one about how he was selling his Komodo-X to buy a Pyxis.  I didn't watch the video, though - just saw the headline, shrugged, and thought "that seems like a weird choice, but you do you, buddy."  I probably blocked his channel from my recs too since that's my default behavior when YT suggests "Why I'm changing from ______ to ________" videos to me.

[kye]

1 hour ago, John Matthews said:

Put 30 experienced artists in a room with 1 newly graduated art critic, it will be the art critic who will be considered the expert. I wonder how Gerald Undone figures in with that? I cannot help but hear a bit of hypocrisy in what he says. 

I'm not really sure what criticisms you're making.

When I watch a Gerald video, the things I'm seeing are things like:

• What is the DR that he measured
• What features aren't available in which modes (ie, what the manufacturer won't tell you)
• What else did he notice about it, like if it overheated, or took 20s to turn on, or got corrupted clips, etc
• He's mentioned before that he has a standard checklist of things to test and does that for all his reviews, so assuming that's true then it's a semi-rounded take on the camera

Maybe I'm missing all the times when he made comments that were outside his knowledge and experience?  If he did then I don't remember him making them.

The territory that gets tricky is when a reviewer is commenting on how good a camera it is overall (because that's subjective and not objective), or when things are outside their experience.  I can read whatever I want about an Alexa 35 but I'd be talking out my backside if I told you that it was a good camera for a cinematographer to shoot a feature film on, because I have no experience of that.

Perhaps the biggest criticism of that Gerald that I am aware of is omission of relevant facts.  Is there some gotcha about the camera that wasn't in one of his reviews?  Probably in every one of them.  Are they deliberately withheld, and if so then why? or did he just not find them?  Who knows, but it's worth noting that Gerald takes the most time to menu dive out of all the YT reviewers, and is obviously much more systematic in his approach, so whatever extent he's guilty of it then everyone else is guilty of it 10X or 50X more.

Most YT 'reviewers' seem to just read out the marketing brochure, turn the camera on and wave it around enough to film a video long enough for a sponsor segment, and if they find a weakness then might mention it and might not...  then proceed to tell you that it's a good fit for doing a bunch of things that they have no experience with at all.

We can throw shade at Gerald, and no-one is perfect of course, but if we're going to get specific then perhaps we should refocus our attention to the worst offenders.  Lots of reviewers making only positive reviews about a brand and then a "why I'm switching to X" video which mentions a dozen or so criticisms of their previous brand that somehow never made it into the original videos but would have been obvious from day one.

Of course, if we're going to re-direct our attention, then maybe we should focus on those who actively oppose any genuine criticism of a brand, like the R5 incident which was easily verifiable by anyone who had one or had access to someone who did...  Not being a critical reviewer is one thing, but voluntarily participating in a cover up is something else entirely.

[BTM_Pix]

1 hour ago, eatstoomuchjam said:

You think BM panicked about the S9? 

No.

I said that based on the timeline that any panic that had been suggested to exist would have had to have been on BM’s side.

The suggestion wasn’t mine obviously.

[John Matthews]

47 minutes ago, kye said:

I'm not really sure what criticisms you're making.

When I watch a Gerald video, the things I'm seeing are things like:

• What is the DR that he measured
• What features aren't available in which modes (ie, what the manufacturer won't tell you)
• What else did he notice about it, like if it overheated, or took 20s to turn on, or got corrupted clips, etc
• He's mentioned before that he has a standard checklist of things to test and does that for all his reviews, so assuming that's true then it's a semi-rounded take on the camera

Maybe I'm missing all the times when he made comments that were outside his knowledge and experience?  If he did then I don't remember him making them.

The territory that gets tricky is when a reviewer is commenting on how good a camera it is overall (because that's subjective and not objective), or when things are outside their experience.  I can read whatever I want about an Alexa 35 but I'd be talking out my backside if I told you that it was a good camera for a cinematographer to shoot a feature film on, because I have no experience of that.

Perhaps the biggest criticism of that Gerald that I am aware of is omission of relevant facts.  Is there some gotcha about the camera that wasn't in one of his reviews?  Probably in every one of them.  Are they deliberately withheld, and if so then why? or did he just not find them?  Who knows, but it's worth noting that Gerald takes the most time to menu dive out of all the YT reviewers, and is obviously much more systematic in his approach, so whatever extent he's guilty of it then everyone else is guilty of it 10X or 50X more.

Most YT 'reviewers' seem to just read out the marketing brochure, turn the camera on and wave it around enough to film a video long enough for a sponsor segment, and if they find a weakness then might mention it and might not...  then proceed to tell you that it's a good fit for doing a bunch of things that they have no experience with at all.

We can throw shade at Gerald, and no-one is perfect of course, but if we're going to get specific then perhaps we should refocus our attention to the worst offenders.  Lots of reviewers making only positive reviews about a brand and then a "why I'm switching to X" video which mentions a dozen or so criticisms of their previous brand that somehow never made it into the original videos but would have been obvious from day one.

Of course, if we're going to re-direct our attention, then maybe we should focus on those who actively oppose any genuine criticism of a brand, like the R5 incident which was easily verifiable by anyone who had one or had access to someone who did...  Not being a critical reviewer is one thing, but voluntarily participating in a cover up is something else entirely.

First, I should say I like Gerald Undone's videos and I watch most of them. My criticism of him is that he portrays himself as an expert in 2 fields: 1) cameras; 2) YouTube setups (he walks around with a clipboard grading them). Now with this video, he is adding to his repertoire and he sounds like he portraying himself as a "moral expert" when it comes to the relationship with companies. Again, Gerald, the expert, and, as you know, "we should all listen to experts". I'm not a fan of "experts," maybe after watching F or Fake. 

It might sound like I'm being excessively harsh on him and I'm sure there are many who are much less of an "expert" than him, but I don't like that attitude. I think he's full of crap when it comes to him explaining how he takes the moral high road. I think he too, will take the cash when shown. That's just my opinion.

[eatstoomuchjam]

16 minutes ago, John Matthews said:

YouTube setups (he walks around with a clipboard grading them)

I always took that as tongue-in-cheek and as a device to add a bit of humor to what would otherwise be relatively dry videos of somebody showing him a bunch of lights on lightstands, etc.

[ac6000cw]

2 hours ago, John Matthews said:

Put 30 experienced artists in a room with 1 newly graduated art critic, it will be the art critic who will be considered the expert.

I agree.

My wife does artistic painting etc. as a fairly serious hobby (to the extent of exhibiting and selling it). At an exhibition it's usually the artists who are the most down-to-earth people in the room, as they know what's involved in creating, promoting and selling it - which is overall a lot of work (just like making decent video content is).

Art critics are essentially product reviewers - they look at an art product and tell you what they think about it, sometimes implying 'meaning' in the work that I strongly suspect the original artist never intended (and who is probably dead so can't challenge the opinion). That's no different really to many other sales and marketing activities.

16 minutes ago, John Matthews said:

First, I should say I like Gerald Undone's videos and I watch most of them. My criticism of him is that he portrays himself as an expert in 2 fields: 1) cameras; 2) YouTube setups (he walks around with a clipboard grading them). Now with this video, he is adding to his repertoire and he sounds like he portraying himself as a "moral expert" when it comes to the relationship with companies. Again, Gerald, the expert, and, as you know, "we should all listen to experts". I'm not a fan of "experts," maybe after watching F or Fake. 

It might sound like I'm being excessively harsh on him and I'm sure there are many who are much less of an "expert" than him, but I don't like that attitude. I think he's full of crap when it comes to him explaining how he takes the moral high road. I think he too, will take the cash when shown. That's just my opinion.

He's on my subscription list and I watch some of his content if I'm in the mood for his style and I might be interested in the product he's talking about. But I think he's sometimes got an exaggerated sense of his importance, which grates a bit sometimes.

[John Matthews]

1 minute ago, eatstoomuchjam said:

I always took that as tongue-in-cheek and as a device to add a bit of humor to what would otherwise be relatively dry videos of somebody showing him a bunch of lights on lightstands, etc.

So he's not saying he an expert, even on a subconscious, non-overt way? He's visiting many popular YouTubers and saying he's "grading" them, with a "promis" of some sort of evaluation at the end. I think there's something there.

[mercer]

I don't know... I think all of these YouTube personalities are full of shit, on some level. And that's fine. It's a niche market in and of itself and if they have found a way to feed their families, then it's no worse than many other professions. As long as you know where they're coming from, then I don't care one way or the other.

They all follow trends amongst themselves, chasing each other's angles. The new angle seems to be... why YouTube content creating is soul draining and why I am getting out.

A month or two ago, one of my favorite YT shillebrities posted a video with that topic and then he broke in the middle for a word from his sponsor...

HAHAHAHA!!!!

[kye]

One thing I think is useful to keep in mind is that anything published to YT is a part of the entertainment industry.  That's why everything is about views & subscribers (the ratings system for free online content) and ad breaks and sponsored videos etc.  The business model is the same - the owner pays to make content that will attract viewers and then sells that attention to advertisers.  YT didn't call them 'channels' and have a TV as its icon by accident - everyone is running a TV station now.  Some are trying to be community stations, attracting patrons of the arts rather than selling out, etc, but the game is the same.

If camera reviews were part of science then there would be peer-review and the general goal would be to be well-respected and get funding through that mechanism.  Sure, there are lots of corruptions to science with research funding politics and publishing etc but it's still a long way from being in the territory that the entertainment industry is.

Only you can decide if a TV show / YT video is an informercial, a talk show, a documentary, or a public broadcast, but you should be making that decision when you watch.

[mercer]

To add... anytime gear becomes the center of discussion, there always ends up being flame wars. This camera is better than that camera. The features on my camera beats the features on your camera. My dick is bigger than yours. Blah, blah, blah. And the videos from YT get celebrated for it. If GeraldUndone posts a video about whatever technical, resolution achievement it becomes a fact and a must have. If Zedlin, a working Hollywood cinematographer, posts a video about how and why filmmakers are chasing the wrong thing... he's considered a dipshit.

[KnightsFan]

I think Gerald does a good job. There isn't enough time for someone to both test every camera, and test any one camera thoroughly. If I'm thinking about buying or renting a piece of gear, I try to see reviews from both people who use that gear a lot, and from people who have used a lot of gear. It's impossible for that to be the same person.

For example, I've there are people who have never touched an expensive lens in their life heaping praise on the flood of budget cine-style lenses (Laowa, DZOFilm, Meike, SLR Magic, etc). And they might be a legit artist who makes really good videos with those lenses. However, it's not that useful for a purchasing decision for someone to say Meike lenses are good, when what I really want to know is how it compares to the competition. I've seen people say how great the optics are on the only lens they own, while taking great images of great looking scenes, but I see other tests showing all kinds of problems compared to other lenses for the price.

And then, by necessity, the person who has made the comparisons between 50 lenses spent all their time comparing lenses and not making art. So it takes both kinds of people to get a complete picture of anything. I would never take art advice from Gerald, but his reviews are great for that comparison overview. As long as you keep in mind what info you can and can't get from what he says.

[eatstoomuchjam]

2 hours ago, John Matthews said:

So he's not saying he an expert, even on a subconscious, non-overt way? He's visiting many popular YouTubers and saying he's "grading" them, with a "promis" of some sort of evaluation at the end. I think there's something there.

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?).  😃

1 hour ago, mercer said:

I don't know... I think all of these YouTube personalities are full of shit, on some level

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.

1 hour ago, mercer said:

To add... anytime gear becomes the center of discussion, there always ends up being flame wars. This camera is better than that camera. The features on my camera beats the features on your camera. My dick is bigger than yours. Blah, blah, blah. And the videos from YT get celebrated for it.

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.

[fuzzynormal]

TL/DR: Old man+lawn+upset.

Funny to me that this video is considered a "spill the beans" kind of deal.  The information super highway has become what it was always destined to become.

It's novelty gave it value.  It's coasted on the early-year-legacy when it was a bit of a legitimate gathering space and access was a bit difficult.  

Even then, late 80's early 90's, I was interviewing corporate folks that were manipulating content.  With the advent of Mozilla and Netscape they really began to realize the scale potential of things.  Data tracking was a goldrush and they knew they'd be in front of the zeitgeist of citizen's respect of privacy.  Yeah, privacy used to be a thing.  People valued it.

Anyway, as we all know, but seldom really grok the extent, we are the product.  If you can segregate from Web 2.0 or find safe spaces, like this one, then you can remain slightly objective.  But it's pretty hard.  In this world right now the 99% of us are just things to be exploited.  I mean, we were back in pre-80's as well, but there was a useful skepticism to marketing, it wasn't AS insidious, and it was a lot easier to avoid.

I keep expecting a backlash and a shift in culture to forgo this intrusion into life, but then I look around and just end up typing ellipses ...

 

 

[MrSMW]

There’s quite a few ‘R Us YT’ers Full of Shit’ videos already uploaded, I guess in response and there will be others.

Gate opened.

[John Matthews]

 

[newfoundmass]

It's all branding and marketing, including this video from Gerald. I'm surprised so many people buy into it. Look, the dude humble bragged about how he takes these trips and then just hangs out instead of filming anything, but he gets most passionate when he starts talking about how he wasn't invited on the last Japan trip for the Lumix S5II and now this trip, with Lumix directly telling him that they just didn't think he'd like the camera. Most of the rest of his video was just acknowledging what we've all been saying for years and what Gerald himself has benefited/profited from, he just thinks it's an ethical problem because he's no longer on the list of people Lumix wants to play nice with.

 

There's absolutely truth in what he is saying, but let's be clear: if Gerald cared about ethical camera reviews he'd still be getting cameras from a local camera shop to test instead of having relationships with these companies. If he'd still kept doing that he'd never had been able to make a living doing YouTube though. Did he really ever think these companies viewed him as anything other than a mark they could exploit to market their products to people or was he just happy to be part of the game until other companies not named Sony decided to allocate their marketing resources to other reviewers?

 

Today it's easy to put Panasonic on blast. He sees the writing on the wall. He really has nothing to lose, his channel has predominantly been Sony focused for the last several years anyway and, honestly, it wouldn't shock me if this marks a change in his channel in general as the YouTube camera reviewer bubble seems to have burst or bottomed out for a lot of people. Views are down even on his Sony videos.

 

If nothing else he has seemingly successfully branded himself as the lone moral voice in the camera/gear space, as far as YouTube is concerned.

 

[EduPortas]

16 hours ago, IronFilm said:

Maybe, maybe not. 

Gerald has positioned himself as going a different path, that's he is uniquely the 'honest/direct" reviewer. 

In a way, him putting out a video like this is very "on brand" for him, he's doing what he does ("calling it as it is").  

He's definitely branded himself as that. 

You're right friend, but if he intends to buy or rent gear by himself then he'll transform into a "retro gear reviewer" outside the consumerist agenda of big camera brands.

I've left him a message in his comments section saying he wants to be treated like a tech journalist when companies like Canon and Panasonic classify his and his collegues chanells in the Marketing department.

Those are two very different beasts.

Tech journos want to review the product ASAP. Marketing guys want you to be 100% positive with your piece to produce more sales.

It's that simple.

He didn't play nice with the Marketing guys and they cut him. By their logic that's valid. By youtuber logic it's a travesty.

 

 

[IronFilm]

17 hours ago, kye said:

So, I've been watching that podcast and got to the part where Dave implies incredibly strongly that the S9 wasn't the camera that was planned to be announced.  

It's at the 1h30m mark of the video, but he's saying it as strongly as he can without breaking an NDA or outing a source (or both).  

My theory is that almost a week ago BM dropped the price of the BMCC 6K by 40% to $1575, and then seemingly Panasonic swaps the camera released during a press event where they had invited a bunch of film-makers to...  

Was Panasonic releasing a high-end video camera and didn't want to compete with the BMCC 6K at the same price point? Did BM get wind what Panasonic was releasing and drop their price to screw up their launch?

I've seen documentaries about corporate espionage and that shit is real - companies spy on each other as much as you'd expect when there are millions of dollars at stake.

I like this conspiracy theory! Sounds fun.

Wasn't there a rumor recently about the Panasonic S1H mk2 being not too far away? 

https://www.4kshooters.net/2023/03/23/leak-suggests-panasonic-s1h-ii-may-have-8k-phase-detection-autofocus/ 

https://www.l-rumors.com/l2-first-rumored-panasonic-s1h-ii-specs-8k24p-and-built-in-nd/

 

17 hours ago, BTM_Pix said:

They’d already gathered in Osaka, shot with it and left by time BM announced the price cut.

Oh noes, don't kill the fun with facts before it has even started! 😞

In a hopeless attempt to keep the conspiracy alive.... maybe there was a leak from BMD themselves? Someone outside BMD knew they were planning a big price cut to move out old stock after the launch of the Blackmagic Design PYXIS 

  

17 hours ago, BTM_Pix said:

My theory is that the leaking about all this stuff comes from the manufacturers of the cages which are always coincidentally announced on the same day as the new cameras so they have the most prior knowledge.

Yeah, that's how we first saw for sure confirmation of the S9, because an Amazon listing for handgrip/cage was up for it. 

  

17 hours ago, kye said:

I think it's a straight up content creators camera.

Yes

17 hours ago, kye said:

Gerald said he thinks that it was Panasonic trying to get some of that Fuji money after the success of the X100 selling out, and that the inclusion of all the more advanced features was simply a case of taking the S5ii package and not paying engineers to disable features when they can just release the new camera with those features and not pay anyone to remove them.

I would have thought then it makes more sense to be doubling down on the Panasonic LX15 / LX100 series. Bring out their next generation of them. 

They're "large sensor" P&S cameras, but to be fair, still smaller than the X100 sensor. 

But if Panasonic brings out an APS-C sensor camera, that's very unusual, it would be a bit confusing for Panasonic branding? They've never had recently an APS-C camera (wellll... technically the Varicam LT I guess was the most recent one?? ha), as Panasonic has been all about MFT or "Full Frame". 

 

17 hours ago, kye said:

Millennials and GenZ are running around with vintage point-and-shoot cameras and want film presets now, despite their smartphone being technically better in practically every way.  The fact that us crotchety old camera nerds don't know what the hell they want isn't surprising, especially considering I'm pretty sure they don't know what they want either!

It's just a backlash against the slick looking perfect images, and looking backwards to go retro. That's why those old CCD P&S cameras are selling for sky high prices. 

 

[IronFilm]

14 hours ago, eatstoomuchjam said:

You think BM panicked about the S9?  Did they have bad intel?  I really can't think of any potential customer for a full frame BMPCC who would be jumping ship for the S9 - though I'm sure there that once it starts shipping, there will be at least some YouTubers who will make videos about how they're dropping their current camera for the S9.

Nah, they are quite different cameras the BMD CInema 6K vs Panasonic S9. 

It certainly has some overlap. (probably even more overlap than you'd think)

But they're definitely different niches. 

Slow paced vs fast paced.

14 hours ago, eatstoomuchjam said:

Similarly, there was at least one who made one about how he was selling his Komodo-X to buy a Pyxis.  I didn't watch the video, though - just saw the headline, shrugged, and thought "that seems like a weird choice, but you do you, buddy."  I probably blocked his channel from my recs too since that's my default behavior when YT suggests "Why I'm changing from ______ to ________" videos to me.

Haven't seen that video, so I don't know their reasons, but I'm not at all surprised to see such a switch. 

In a way both Komodo-X and Pyxis exists in a kinda similar space. 

They're not in the premium space of ARRI. 

They're not in the mid budget mainstream videography / camera op space, which is dominated by the Sony FX6. (well, depending on the part of the world you're in, some places have the FX9 being the more common default than the FX6) And the Canon C70 / C300mk3 / C500mk2 mops up everything that the Sony isn't selling to. 

Komodo-X and Pyxis both exist in that same space of "a good camera, but not one that a person specifically hires you for" (unlike a FX6/FX9 or an ARRI). 

DoP / Cam Ops usually get hired on a mix of: connections / camera they own / ability. 

ARRI and Sony FX6/FX9 (& to a lessor extent, C70/C300mk3/C500mk2) can get hired on the strength of the camera they own being a significant factor. (although networking and talent always are far more important factors to focus on!!)

RED or BMD owners? Nah, usually that's going to be a very small or non-existent factor. 

Usually people are buying those cameras (RED or BMD) for themselves. 

Because they need "a camera" to shoot with, and they've decided to not go down the bread and butter Sony/Canon jobs (usually because they're chasing the narrative filmmaking path, or shooting for the high end). But they can't afford the likes of an ARRI! 

But from a brutal financial analysis aspect, it probably wouldn't make much difference to their overall income for the year if they got a secondhand $1.5K RED Raven brain vs the latest brand new RED Komodo-X. 

Which is quite different to the Sony or ARRI shooter, as there will be for them be a massive difference if they pick up a $1.5K Sony FS5 secondhand vs a brand new Sony FX9 (or an old ARRI Alexa Classic vs an ARRI 35). 

So if this YouTuber was feeling the financial pressure, then it makes a lot of sense for them to sell the Komodo-X while it still is holding up in value on the secondhand market and instead get a cheap Blackmagic Pyxis. 

Or maybe they're not under intense financial pressure, but they simply feel their investments need to be shifted around and reprioritized. Maybe rather than a Komodo-X they'd benefit more from having a Dana Dolly and an Aputure 1200D? So they sell the RED and swap it out for a cheaper BMD, then overall they've got themselves a better camera / lighting / grip package than before. 

I've seen both types of scenarios happen.