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Are you going to hire, or buy? For the cost of an A9 body you could have a Fuji X body with a lens or three. If you're hiring, the A9 is a pretty easy choice, I know a guy who shoots on TV sets and loves everything about his A9. 

On the other hand this guy shoots Fuji on set:
https://www.fujirumors.com/behind-the-x-gear-meet-barry-wetcher-the-x-shooter-who-brings-fujifilm-to-hollywood/

For the record I shoot Fuji, but I don't do on set stills work. I pair my X-Pro2 with an X100F and it's great. The X100F is basically silent by default, the leaf shutter is barely audible, which is perfect when I'm shooting weddings and speeches and the like.

The Sigma 17-50 f2.8 worked pretty well when I had a BMMCC. Not as nice optically as the 18-35 art, but that extra range came in handy.

Procrastination is your body telling you you need a break. Seriously, take the day off, force yourself to go enjoy something else guilt free. But when you come back to it you just need to force yourself to focus on the task. But break each task down to manageable chunks and give yourself small breaks in between. Your creative energy is finite and needs to be replenished, managing that is as important to your work as the work itself. 

I generally put everything on a timeline on track one and group everything by what it is. Then I quickly scrub through each group, roughly cut out the stuff that looks good, and move the good stuff to track two. Then I duplicate that timeline, ripple delete all the track one stuff, and again scrub through the selects to pull out the good clips. Once I do that I should have gone through all the footage twice, and I should have an idea of what I've shot and how it can go together. From there if I can see a clear path I'll put a very very very rough assembly together, right up until I run into an obstacle -- then I switch gears and go find music. At every turn when I hit a roadblock I change direction and do something else, because at least for me I find that if I hit too many roadblocks it completely drains my motivation and I fall into a rut. I make it a priority to manage my motivation, and in the long run it makes me more efficient.

Of course, ymmv, some might read this as silly touchy feely self help crap, but it works for me!

17 hours ago, User said:

Not to derail the thread... but the 18-135mm certainly sounds like a decent solution for run and gun. Face tracking would certainly be welcomed at times.

I'd be curious how the look and feel of the image it renders compares to the Sigma 18-35mm at equivalent fstops. Something tells me I'd be more comfortable using 18-135 on productions where critical focus trumps image aesthetics. Any thoughts?

We know that the Canon 24-105 isn't a constant f4 through its zoom range, more like a 5.6 on the long end... so that 18-135 should have it beat by a hair for low light. But I do like the image it gives on the long end.

The Sigma almost never leaves my C100Mk2... and they are heavy enough together that I don't need IS. But it sucks that I can't trust the combo to auto focus. The 16-35 f4 nails it every time... but it's no damn good in the dark. Alas.

I own both lenses, and I just shot a quick test at home. I won't post those (the wife would not be pleased) but there's not a lot in it between those lenses at the same aperture. The Sigma is sharper at 18mm 3.5 (not surprising given the Canon is wide open there) but at 5.6 there's no practical difference. My 18-135 is the Nano USM version and optically it's pretty good. A bit soulless maybe but once you accept the compromises it does a good job paired with the C100mk2. 

The way I use it from 18mm to 30-ish it's an f4 lens, and from 35-135 it's a 5.6 lens. It actually doesn't click over to 5.6 until 85mm, but it hurts my brain to keep all that in there when I'm shooting. Face tracking works great for solo interviews, though it's not as good as the C200, and the C100mk2 is so clean even up to 12800 that I'm ok cranking ISO and keeping that lens on indoors as well. I like the extra range for fast moving jobs, and I don't know if it's the lens that does it or its the DPAF that does it, when you zoom in it it automatically changes focus to keep the same plane of focus -- so it's kinda parfocal. You will see the focus change and snap back in, but it's quick and doesn't hunt so it works very well.

I find the AF on the Sigma 18-35 works pretty well, it's a little slower but accurate. I was surprised how well DPAF worked even at 1.8, I love being able to do a pan and slide shot and have the AF track focus on the subject, it's like magic. 

30 minutes ago, IronFilm said:

A Tascam DR10L (or even a Zoom F1) is a better set up now than an H1 with a lav. 

Totally, though my thought was that the H1 can go double duty since it also has a mic. But on lav duty the DR10L is definitely better.
 

32 minutes ago, IronFilm said:

100% agreed. I tend to feel that f4 on APS-C/S35 (or f2.8 on MFT) is the sweet spot for general purpose / run&gun shooting. Or a bit more or less is good too, such as even f5.6 on APS-C. (same as f4 on MFT)

Honestly the only reason I shoot at 5.6 is because that particular lens is 3.5-5.6, and it's just easier to set it at 5.6 and leave it there. I was going to get the 24-105 f4, but the AF motor was noisier and it didn't support Face Tracking on the C100mk2. Plus I have more range on the 18-135, and more importantly I got it on special for *half price* -- $400!! ?

6 hours ago, scotchtape said:

Not saying you can't get great footage, it's just the shallow DOF takes more effort to achieve for run and gun on m43.

I actually liked shooting m43 because I had more DoF -- even now with my C100mk2 my go to lens for completely uncontrolled run and gun is the 18-135, I'd set that thing to 5.6 and let the AF take care of the rest. Sometimes it's more important to get the subject in focus than to worry about separation. Plus I think it's weird to blur the background so much that you completely remove the subject from its context.

Dude, if your budget is that tight then I’d suggest not buying anything, because you already have the gear you need. With the Ex Tele mode you basically have a range between 24-160, which is about all you need. Since you’re travelling I’m assuming you’re looking for work when you get to wherever you’re going right? I’m guessing from the advice you’re after you don’t have a deep portfolio behind you to be able to pre-book work before you leave. So really, the work you should be looking for is as a second shooter for someone who is already established where you’re headed to, in which case what you want is to provide a specific utility. You have a gimbal and a lightweight and versatile camera/lens combo, so be a gimbal/second shooter for event and wedding videographers. That way you leverage the gear you have, and you get a foot in the door of that market, and you start building a network of other creatives who you can lean on for work. 

If you’re really itching to buy something get a decent lav mic (I have a cheap Rode one that sounds fine) and a Zoom H1, and a Rode VideoMicro for your camera. 

Oh, background separation is a function of camera / subject / background distance, don’t buy anything until you get a handle on that. Trust me, you can spend a lot of money and still be disappointed if you don’t know how to achieve what you want. And you can achieve separation through other means, like colour/costume, and composition, and lighting. And stop worrying about bokeh — concentrate on the parts of the frame you want people to pay attention to, not how pretty the blurry background is. 

On 5/26/2018 at 1:00 AM, Kubrickian said:

Is the WDR in the same LUT package as Eterna? Anyone got a link? 

http://www.fujifilm.com/support/digital_cameras/software/lut/

I just weighed my Crane 2 and it comes in at 1.6kg with the follow focus motor and mini tripod feet, and with my X-T2 + 16 f1.4 it comes in at 2.6kg. I find it quite manageable, but like all gimbals you have to manage operator fatigue. I've never used a gimbal that I haven't needed to put down every few minutes anyway. I'd only use it on one hand when I'm really running with it, otherwise I fold up the mini tripod legs and use that as an additional handle, like if you walk with a camera on a monopod. Sometimes I use a monopod on the bottom of the Crane 2 as well which can be useful in really fast paced environments. 

9 hours ago, Kisaha said:

What camera are you using it with?

So far I’ve only tried  follow focus with my X-T2, but I’ve previously mounted a C100mk2 (with a 24 pancake) and a D750 as well. The C100 is too tall to go into inverted mode, but it worked great otherwise. 

I have the Crane 2 (the bigger one) and I just got the new mechanical focus motor, and it’s a revelation. Being able to pull focus using the Crane 2 wheel without having rig and power a bunch of different stuff is amazing. And they’re selling the gimbal and follow focus together for like 1000 bucks AUD!  Seriously, if you’re in the market for a gimbal you really need to look at the Crane 2. 

I've used the 18-135 which also has OIS and I was pleasantly surprised by how well it stabilised my shots. I didn't use it for that long, but I generally don't like the weird movement that OIS generates especially at long focal lengths, but this seems to be a little bit better than some of the others I've seen. If the 18-55 is as good as the 18-135 then it should be more than workable. 

http://www.fujifilm.com/support/digital_cameras/software/firmware/x/xt2/index.html

Just upgrading now, looking forward to playing with 120fps!

10 hours ago, IronFilm said:

As for an ARRI being overkill for YouTube? Nah, tonnes and tonnes of content for the web gets shot on an ARRI. 

Hahaha totally -- I recently worked on a job where we had an Alexa Mini to shoot an Instagram Ad. Just. For. Instagram. It was truly the most ludicrous job I've ever worked on.

2 hours ago, Drew Allegre said:

Nikon/Canon going FF or pro level mirrorless means developing a new pro level lens mount, which is the first step to obsoleting the massive F and EF mount lens systems.  It's probably not something either company is thrilled about or in a huge hurry to do.  No one really want to use adapted lenses, even if they're OEM.  

No way, Nikon will absolutely have backwards compatibility with all existing F mount lenses. Nikon F mount has been around since the early 50s, and every F mount lens still mounts on modern day cameras (you might lose metering and stuff but the lens still works.) The only reason Nikon shooters (me included) haven't completely jumped ship is because of lenses -- if Nikon doesn't ship an F mount adaptor that works perfectly with their mirrorless system then they might as well give up now. Seriously, if you need/want FF mirrorless why wouldn't you go to Sony if you have to buy all your lenses again? 

I've already half moved to Fuji, so really if 2019 is how long I have to wait it makes the decision to sell all my Nikons and get a GFX that much easier...

All my personal stuff yeah, for sure! The three personal shorts I've made were all with small cameras and just by myself, everything from GH4s to the BMMCC to the D500 to GoPros, and the odd iPhone shot (in a hospital where I wasn't allowed to shoot at all. But it was my grandma who was in a coma so...)

And I've recorded more location audio with a cheap as Rode Videomicro than I care to admit! 

16 hours ago, Hans Punk said:

I remember thinking Christian Bale’s outburst sounded perfectly justified.

Oh, my comment was purely about the shouting and the "I'm not coming back on set until he's fired" thing, not the substance of his complaint. 

Again, if you want to have a long and fulfilling career in this industry you should damn well develop a sense for when it is inappropriate to have your face in your phone. I've seen all that stuff that you mentioned and I agree 100%, but the solution isn't to ban phones on set. Anyone who is so easily distracted from their job on set is going to be distracted by their phone, or by anything else, and they just shouldn't be on set at all. I've been on plenty of sets where someone who has their phone in their pockets but keeps talking during takes, until someone else cracks the shits.

15 hours ago, TwoScoops said:

I'm aware. 

 

I've seen people say Hurlbut treats those under him like shit, which is believable if you've seen any of his DVDs, so maybe it's a shame The Batman/The Bateman didn't beat his ass too. 

Duly noted

I've never seen any of Hurlbut's DVDs, but I think he talks a bigger game than his credits can back up.  Check out his blurb on IMDB!

On 25/04/2018 at 5:25 PM, Robert Collins said:

But really 'the problem' is much more complicated than this. For instance it may not 'aggregate' - while he may 'trust' you, can he trust everyone?

One of the most insightful non-technical things I've ever learnt is that you hire crew to make you look good. And if you're hired as crew, your job is to make the boss look good. That's it -- your technical specialty and how good you are at it is just the barrier to entry, your actual job is to make the producer/director/whoever-your-boss-is look like they know what they're doing by hiring you and not someone else. So as crew, if the client is around you should know better than to have your phone out on set. If it's urgent, let someone know and walk off set. I mean how does anyone make it as regular crew anywhere unless they have a sense for what's appropriate or not appropriate on set? And if you're a producer hiring people you can't trust to have that kind of sense, then you need to hire better people, full stop. The buck stops with the person holding the cash.

On 26/04/2018 at 3:06 PM, TwoScoops said:

 

Imagine what Bale would say to a phone going off. 

That's Shane Hurlbut, and Christian Bale spent quite a bit of time apologising for that outburst. Regardless of what crew did or didn't do, Bale's reaction was deeply unprofessional and has no place in any workplace.

**edit** Removed some unnecessary snark.

If you're hiring people who you can't trust to keep their phones from ruining takes, then you need to ask yourself why -- not to treat crew like school kids. If I've caught up on what I need to do and I'm ready to roll at a moments notice, but we're just waiting for one thing or another, I see no reason why I shouldn't check my email. Besides the fact that quick responses to emails gets you more work, I wouldn't work for a producer who can't trust me to know when I should look at my phone or not. 

Also, if you see the time you pay as "your time", then it's your responsibility to make sure that there is as little down time as possible. If you can't keep your crew occupied, then that's your fault, and it's frankly unreasonable to demand your crew not check in on the state of their own business when they have nothing else to do.

Not getting into the ins and outs of legal responsibilities, but this is such an edge case scenario -- he took it apart and broke it. If you knocked an iMac Pro off a table and took it back to Apple for paid repairs they wouldn't bat an eye (you might, once you see the parts bill!) If the roof of your office leaked water onto your iMac Pro you would be able to claim that on insurance (assuming you had the right insurance). There are just so few occasions where you would be refused insurance or repairs, I don't see how his specific circumstance can be translated across to anyone who doesn't take computers apart for a fun and profit.

As an aside, the SSD on my MacBook Pro failed after 2 years and 1 week, and Apple repaired it under warranty. I didn't have Apple Care on it, and I didn't have to fight for it -- the guy just ran diagnostics, saw the failure, booked in the service. So anecdotal evidence goes both ways.

46 minutes ago, sanveer said:

The first guys to point out the fundamental flaws with ProRes RAW

I missed that completely, what did Blackmagic say about Prores RAW?

10 hours ago, Kisaha said:

Honest question. Why took them a couple of years to do something that was doable since day 1? 

Does this have something to do with overheating, and didn't want to fry their electronics early in their warranty period, or didn't want to, just because?

Well, if you think of it like a smartphone, where the phone ships with one set of features and new features are added with new OS revisions, then you get a roughly comparable situation. When the X-T2 came out 120fps wasn't standard amongst cameras of its type, so they develop what they can in the time that they have and they put it on the market to make the profits to plow back into making it better. As the development process goes on for new models, new software/techniques/efficiencies are created, and the company is at a crossroads -- do you keep new features it for new models (as almost every other camera company does) or do you release it to existing devices (as a lot of smartphone companies do). Fuji is probably the most "honest" about what a camera is these days -- an imaging computer. Computers can be improved with software, and unlike Sony, they actually follow up with feature updates.  

I'm very much looking forward to better low light AF speed on my Fujis, that's really the only major issue that keeps me from selling my Nikons for stills. 120fps also fills a hole that I've wanted to fill but I could never justify buying yet another camera just for that capability. Even without F-Log I find that the Fuji cross cuts just fine with my C100mk2, I think my X-T2 is going to be the perfect on gimbal b-cam for me.

Meanwhile, Sony updates the FS5 firmware and calls is the FS5 mk2!

3 hours ago, kye said:

Is this what you want?

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00QGJ91A4/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o02_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

It seems that it takes the same batteries as the XC10, and I have bought and tested the above and it seems to work ok.

Pretty much, but I find those USB chargers are slow — takes a few hours to charge to capacity. USB-C PD runs at like 14v instead of 5v at I think 2A, so it puts out more juice meaning you can charge batteries faster (it’s how USB-C laptops accept charge through USB). A 1hr fast charger for a single battery would be ideal, so as one is depleted you should have a spare, and one mostly charged. If it can take power from a V-Lock battery that’ll be even better.

This isn’t an issue if you’re charging overnight, and charging slower is probably better for the battery anyway.