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If you're trying to market yourself in 2026 and beyond you need to create content for social media otherwise you're nowhere near maximizing your potential, both in promoting yourself AND generating revenue. Here's an example that's very specific to me: I run a professional wrestling company. We release video of full matches and generate revenue from that. Individual matches can range anywhere from 5 minutes to over 30. These videos might get a couple thousand views in the first two weeks and generate $2-5 in revenue. However, in those same two weeks, we can release a 15 second vertical clip from the same match and get 50,000-200,000 views and generate $20-100 dollars for that short/reel. So we're generating substantially more from those shorts than we are for the full matches. Aside from the direct monetary benefits, every clip we post promotes the company and our upcoming events, which also drives ticket sales. It has also gotten the attention of local sponsors who help pay our expenses in running events and event planners and organizers who hire us to run events at breweries, festivals, fairs, and other community events. We were hired by almost a dozen people this year to run matches at events, generating tens of thousands in revenue for us. Social media and vertical video made that possible. We're a pretty hot local brand because of it. It's a totally different game when you leverage social media. Vertical video, and having a camera that can film in a way that allows you to re-frame your footage for whatever destination you're creating content for, is a huge deal and a game changer. If you're producing long form content and shorts/reels and aren't using a camera with open gate, you're making your life harder than it needs to be AND putting out content that is visually less pleasing for the people watching it vertically.

OK, we open a DJI drone shop in one of the Canadian border towns and Americans come across, buy one but only take the controller back with them. As soon as they are over the border they message us and we switch their drone on, put it on the roof of the shop and then they fly the fucker over the border themselves.

Do you agree with my choices... And did I miss anything? https://www.eoshd.com/news/the-2025-hybrid-mirrorless-camera-rankings/ The 2025 camera rankings for video quality and value for money are in!

I'm a little surprised that the S5 or S5D didn't make a mention. Pick it up for about 550 euros new and get one of those nice Konica lenses- you're ready to go for under 600. Get BlackMagic recorder and you'll even get B-RAW.

An increasing trend in marketing today, is not necessarily being the best or the most reliable or the most anything except being the most popular. The cult of ‘vote for me’ is taking over. The ‘game’ is knowing that but whether any of us choose to play, is up to us, but without question, we are missing out on a share of the pie if we don’t make an attempt to at least sit at the table. This more a situation for the small to medium sized business. Larger corps operate under different rules and for the private individual, it is irrelevant if you use social media or not. Social Media, visually anyway, is vertical. Personally, I despise social media whether it be Facebook or Twitter or TikTok or Whatever, but if as a small business operator, I actively chose to not participate, it would be completely fair for anyone to point their finger at me and state, “your business skills are lacking”. Current status = working on it. Can we get back to talking about cameras again now?

Then I'd also like to ask, what exactly is the "have to" part of it. Like, y'all can't get paid and/or make a living without vertical videos? I'm not trying to be obtuse in my responses. I don't do things for social media because I really don't want to. Dabbled for a month back during the pandemic and just decided, "Nah, not for me." My career is winding down so I'm not chasing that shit. So ... I legit don't know what's going on for a "have to" to be part of the career calculus.

Programmer and creator of the application is different person not the one behind MotionCam. However he used the same msraw format/container as motioncam. As result workflow is exactly the same and motioncam MacOS or Windows application is needed to extract the DNG files. Yes agree image quality is indeed lovely. Limitations however lead to some frustration for me. I may reconsider and use it from time to time, we'll see.

A timely piece as I’m looking to upgrade from my Fuji x-s20 in terms of bigger body, and I need better IBIS. Love the image but again hate the form factor and IBIS. Also have a 2019 6-core intel MBP so don’t need huge files or raw at the moment. Would the OG S5 offer me better ibis than my current kit? The thought of trying a GH5 is tempting as well as I would then probably have 500 I could spend on a couple nice primes, maybe more vintage glass.

Open gate for professional work is a real time saver. I had to film a series of interviews with football players for a bank here in Spain with was released in vertical and horizontal formats. 6K open gate gives so much flexibility. I vote for my Lumix S1ii as new camera of the year, for me at least. I think the Lumix S5 and S5ii are incredible bargains on the secondhand market.

@stephen Thanks for the heads-up on the iPhone raw Cinema DNG app. Is it by the same people (or associated) with Motion Cam? Phones are not meant to replace mirrorless cams for video, and the file sizes in the raw video apps are of course enormous. But you have to admit the image is rather lovely and it's fun to play with. I like that it is open gate with optional 18fps mode, you can get very close to a vintage super 8 look with that. Interested to compare it to Blackmagic Video app LOG in terms of the unprocessed look though.

Fair point.

I, for one, would like to welcome Zhiyun's marketing team and/or their spam bot to this forum. As to that specific light, if it doesn't come in an ugly leather case and have Cam Mackey's signature all over the light and all of its accessories, is it even worth considering?