jhnkng

Boy do people like to complain. A camera is announced two days ago with a feature and you expect every other camera to have it? We're also talking different recording media than the C200 and Blackmagic. Different ecosystems can support different things. It seems like they're trying to push as much into this ecosystem as possible, while keeping the "real" costs of a full kit as manageable as possible. And everyone's losing it over the internal raw of C200, yet the reality is that 98% of the time that raw is used will be in a controlled environment where external monitors are the norm and an external recorder isn't a big deal. And if you start factoring in the difference in SSD costs vs cfast... well, cost-wise the playing field starts to even. The weirder thing would be building a small camera that's perfect for doc and indy uses, shoving raw internal into it, an old ass 8 bit codec, and nothing in between... and no way to get non-raw 10bit... even from the output...

I was pretty excited that the C200 was offering compressed RAW, 15 stops of DR, and solid color science. buuuut there are a lot of compelling specs in the EVA -- 240fps in 2K, even in short bursts, would be fun to have. If they can truly attain Varicam color and 14+ stops of DR, i might be tempted. But I worry that 400mbps won't be enough. That's half what 10 bit ProRes 422 HQ would be at DCI 4K. 
Anyone know the crop factor for the Varicam line? I know, I know, screw crop factor. I only ask because I want to calculate the widest taking lens I can use with my anamorphic set. Canon Super35 is 1.6x. Not sure about Panny. 1.5x maybe?

Yeah I"m pretty sure it's intentional crippling. The processor is plenty powerful enough. There's a CFast 2.0 slot as well.

I don't think it's processing power -- the C300 Mk2 has Dual DIGIC 5s and can do 12bit internal recording, the C200 will have Dual DIGIC 6s (which I assume will be more powerful). It might be because there'd be no reason to by a C300, it might be because they're not 100% sure SD cards can't handle it (dunno why they wouldn't put in a UHS-II card slot in there), or maybe they'll release a firmware upgrade that allows for 10bit internal recording after they release the C300 Mk3 with RAW.

It currently supports 10bit 422 1080p through SDI, so I suspect we're going to see a lot of Ninja Stars appearing on production rigs. 

The DSLR filmmaker community is funny. It's like "Gimme 8bit proxy, 10bit, RAW, Canon colour science, Log, 4K, IBIS, DPAF and HFR in one package, in A7S form factor, max 2500 bux. I need a silver bullet that covers all cinematography and videography scenarios but make it cheap because I'm not a pro and want to shoot flowers/cat in my garden with it. Also has to shoot on SD cards because Cfast is too expensive". 
There's no silver bullet for everything in cinematography. Every camera body and ecosystem has its compromises. You can hold out for the perfect dreamworld unicorn camera, or you can pick up one that fits your shooting style and then actually shoot something.
Also, the C200 looks awesome and exciting - and daaaymn, official 4K RAW on an affordable Canon frame, without the unreliability of hacking stuff. Had I not sprung for an UM4,6K recently I'd be throwing my money at the Canon.

Man, I suffer in silence when I read some stuff here (I guess I'm masochist to keep reading it). But this one is too much for me... On what ground do you think it should cost 2,500$ ? Please tell me. Do you know a video camera costing that price and doing this ? And don't tell me blackmagic please (fan of the brand, but their cameras aren't in the same price range and they are way less reliable and easy to use, and no autofocus, no support) Do you know  a pro 1/3 sensor camcorder costs more than 2500$ (Sony, Canon) ?. It might not be the camera for you, that I totally understand but with all due respect, I think your comment is from a spoiled naive non pro shooter who doesn't know the requirements of pro work and on being on the field with reliable equipment.
People always complain, at some point it's just ridiculous. They want new technology right away, but when Sony releases a new camera too soon, they think theirs just became obsolete and hate Sony for it. In the mean time they blame Canon for holding off. And now they unleash something very unexpected from them, still complaints. Same goes for bitrates. Canon files take too much space, now they want that kind of bitrates in their gh5, and they're suddenly ok with the file size. And all that to end up posting videos on Youtube (which is not a bad thing but just all those concerns are irrelevant for that type of delivery).
Anyway, this camera seems to be freaking great. Canon used to deliver not on specs but on the field and with the image quality/mojo. Now this one also has the specs ! Granted an intermediate codec is more than necessary for a camera at this price point, but it will come down the line anyway.
Pffiou, sorry I had to get it out of my chest  Now I can burn in hell !

Nice work, John... I loved the second to last shot. I really enjoy the intimate stories you portray in your films. If not for you, I would never know of this couple in Hiroshima or the Harley subculture of Japan. 

This was shot in Hiroshima over a couple of days in 2016. I'd just gotten the BM Micro Cinema Camera and I wanted to give the camera a good shakedown, and I thought a personal project was a nice way to do that. I shot a lot on the Tokina 11-16 with the BMPCC speedbooster, and various Nikon primes. I tried to lock in down in sticks where I could, since I hadn't really worked out how to rig it for handheld at the time, and since I was travelling I didn't have all my parts with me to franken rig it as I was shooting, so the hand held stuff (particularly in the car) is pretty messy.

I struggled with moire like crazy, I only had a Tiffen IRND with me and it wasn't always enough ND so I was stopping down for some of those outdoor shots, which really amped up the moire. I managed to tone down the worse of it, but an AA filter is a must with this camera if you intend to take it outside. I shot it in Prores LT, edited in Premiere Pro and graded in Resolve. Some of the night shots needed noise reduction, but mostly to remove the colour noise -- I actually like the structure of the noise, just not that keen on red and blue ants crawling all over the screen. Neat Video does a good job of removing chrominance noise while leaving the luminance noise, and it blends nicely with a little bit of grain using Filmconvert.

Hope you enjoy the film, love to hear what you think!

--
Daisaku & Takae have run their local grocery store in the hills of Hiroshima together for the last 53 years. In that time they have seen huge changes in their neighbourhood, and profound changes in the way local people shop for essentials. From humble beginnings selling cigarettes from a window in their family home to a bustling grocery store that served their community, they have seen and felt the rise of supermarkets and convenience stores and the impact that has had on their livelihood. 
Here they tell their story of how it started, what keeps them working, and what they will do when they finally retire.
CREDITS
Direction/DOP/Sound/Edit/Grade by John Kung
Translation and Interview by Iku Motonaga
Very special thanks to Daisaku and Takae for their generous telling of their story.
 
 

I have 3 Lexar CF cards and 15 Sandisk SD and CF cards, and two of those Lexar cards have been replaced under warranty while I've not had a single issue with any of my Sandisk cards. It's circumstantial evidence at best, but I only buy Sandisk cards.

This was shot in Hiroshima over a couple of days in 2016. I'd just gotten the BM Micro Cinema Camera and I wanted to give the camera a good shakedown, and I thought a personal project was a nice way to do that. I shot a lot on the Tokina 11-16 with the BMPCC speedbooster, and various Nikon primes. I tried to lock in down in sticks where I could, since I hadn't really worked out how to rig it for handheld at the time, and since I was travelling I didn't have all my parts with me to franken rig it as I was shooting, so the hand held stuff (particularly in the car) is pretty messy.

I struggled with moire like crazy, I only had a Tiffen IRND with me and it wasn't always enough ND so I was stopping down for some of those outdoor shots, which really amped up the moire. I managed to tone down the worse of it, but an AA filter is a must with this camera if you intend to take it outside. I shot it in Prores LT, edited in Premiere Pro and graded in Resolve. Some of the night shots needed noise reduction, but mostly to remove the colour noise -- I actually like the structure of the noise, just not that keen on red and blue ants crawling all over the screen. Neat Video does a good job of removing chrominance noise while leaving the luminance noise, and it blends nicely with a little bit of grain using Filmconvert.

Hope you enjoy the film, love to hear what you think!

--
Daisaku & Takae have run their local grocery store in the hills of Hiroshima together for the last 53 years. In that time they have seen huge changes in their neighbourhood, and profound changes in the way local people shop for essentials. From humble beginnings selling cigarettes from a window in their family home to a bustling grocery store that served their community, they have seen and felt the rise of supermarkets and convenience stores and the impact that has had on their livelihood. 
Here they tell their story of how it started, what keeps them working, and what they will do when they finally retire.
CREDITS
Direction/DOP/Sound/Edit/Grade by John Kung
Translation and Interview by Iku Motonaga
Very special thanks to Daisaku and Takae for their generous telling of their story.
 
 

This was shot in Hiroshima over a couple of days in 2016. I'd just gotten the BM Micro Cinema Camera and I wanted to give the camera a good shakedown, and I thought a personal project was a nice way to do that. I shot a lot on the Tokina 11-16 with the BMPCC speedbooster, and various Nikon primes. I tried to lock in down in sticks where I could, since I hadn't really worked out how to rig it for handheld at the time, and since I was travelling I didn't have all my parts with me to franken rig it as I was shooting, so the hand held stuff (particularly in the car) is pretty messy.

I struggled with moire like crazy, I only had a Tiffen IRND with me and it wasn't always enough ND so I was stopping down for some of those outdoor shots, which really amped up the moire. I managed to tone down the worse of it, but an AA filter is a must with this camera if you intend to take it outside. I shot it in Prores LT, edited in Premiere Pro and graded in Resolve. Some of the night shots needed noise reduction, but mostly to remove the colour noise -- I actually like the structure of the noise, just not that keen on red and blue ants crawling all over the screen. Neat Video does a good job of removing chrominance noise while leaving the luminance noise, and it blends nicely with a little bit of grain using Filmconvert.

Hope you enjoy the film, love to hear what you think!

--
Daisaku & Takae have run their local grocery store in the hills of Hiroshima together for the last 53 years. In that time they have seen huge changes in their neighbourhood, and profound changes in the way local people shop for essentials. From humble beginnings selling cigarettes from a window in their family home to a bustling grocery store that served their community, they have seen and felt the rise of supermarkets and convenience stores and the impact that has had on their livelihood. 
Here they tell their story of how it started, what keeps them working, and what they will do when they finally retire.
CREDITS
Direction/DOP/Sound/Edit/Grade by John Kung
Translation and Interview by Iku Motonaga
Very special thanks to Daisaku and Takae for their generous telling of their story.
 
 

I think what Liam means is that the "Shooting" subforum is for people who have a creative work to show, not a place for gear. The subheading for the Shooting subforum is "Screening room and the creative side of filmmaking - share your ideas / stories".

Oh right, basically it takes a grid of 3 x 3 pixels and combines all that data and displays it as a single pixel. That way they can capture the full frame and reduce it to 1080p without line skipping. 

Haha, it's funny, when the Sony A9 was announced I spent the day tallying up how much I can sell everything for and how much a brand new Sony system will cost me (quick answer:  a lot). But then I told my wife what I was doing and she asked me why I wanted to switch -- and to be perfectly honest I couldn't come up with a solid answer. Sure there are features that I'd like, but nothing I have now gets in the way of shooting and I like the results I get. I'm currently working on a documentary project for a local non-profit and I'm shooting on my Micro in 3:1 RAW, and workflow issues aside, I'm finding it harder to nail a look with the Micro compared to how quickly I found the look with the D500. Having a semi-flat profile rather than a full on log profile makes a really big difference.

Oh right, basically it takes a grid of 3 x 3 pixels and combines all that data and displays it as a single pixel. That way they can capture the full frame and reduce it to 1080p without line skipping. 

A minor segway for people who wonder why the hell anyone would shoot on nikon still: I was editing stuff from my last shoot yesterday. Interior shot exposed for the exterior sky (so there was just a tiny bit of data in the blue channel).  Flat profile on nikon d5500, as flat as possible on the gx85.  Blue skies recoverable from both shots, interior on the gx85 absolutely unrecoverable, no problems on the d5500 (and if only they had a decent codec it could be pushed much further).  I dont know how the gh5 and log will compare, but the *usable* dynamic range on the nikons is still better than I've seen in this segment.  
I love my nikon gear, I also want them to be around in 10 years time :/

Latest figures Ive found says youtube gets 300, 000 new videos every day from its 1 billion users. 
They also say that they get 300h of video uploaded every hour. The average length of a youtube video is 30-120s. So if we use 1.5m for the example I get the number 17.28 million videos per day.
Instagram which is a much younger platform and only has 400 million users (grew from 90m in two years). They receive 80 000 000 photos every day.
Does this mean that video isn't the future? No. But these numbers alone tells me that a company that focuses on stills in their camera. And priorities for example wifi over log isnt dumb and going backwards at all. I would say that they are adapting to current times just fine.
Because from those uploaded youtube videos I would be very interested to see how many are log, graded, filtered, monitored through hdmi, etc. My guess is not many.

But Sigma + Tokina + others now means we have an excellent selection range of DX lenses! 
 
The D750 is right at the end of its life cycle.....  the D7500 only just got released! (and D750 can't do 4K)

The crop is the same as the GH4 with native lenses and less than the NX500. Most audiences rarely say after watching a movie... man I wish the crop factor was smaller. With faster lenses like the Tokina 14-20mm f2, you are basically at 28-40mm. 
The 1080p looks great...
I'd agree $1000 would be a better price point and when it gets below that, I'll probably buy it. 

All I know is... my D5500's video looks more cinematic at 1080p than the G7 looks at 4K. The LX100 and it's 12MP sensor has more mojo than the G7 at 16MP. Now I'm not picking on the G7 or Panasonic or anyone else, but when a conversation arises about good, clean 1080p, the D5500 and the D750 always gets mentioned. And who cares about MPs? 21 MPs are more than enough.
I am excited for the D7500. The 4K video I've seen from the D500 looks great. The 1080p I've seen from the D500 with it's IS looks great. 
@jhnkng recently posted a video from the D500... I thought it was shot in 4K but it was actually shot in 1080p.
Yeah the crop could be better, but it's basically the same as the GH4 and IMO, the D500 has better 4K than the GH4.
But I do wish it had peaking. 
In the end, the cream rises to the top. And any camera from Panasonic, Sony, Canon or Nikon, etc... can be used to make a fine film.
A couple months ago, I told a story about how I was at the movie theatre over the holidays and the projector went haywire and the menu showed on the screen during the trailers. All of the trailers were being projected at 720p. Last week I worked a trade show and on their theatre sized screen, the video was being displayed at 720p video and it looked amazing.
So we should probably stop worrying about this spec and that spec and instead work on making better films.

How to do qualify "a lot less"? Because I own a D500 and I don't see any major difference in dynamic range compared to my D800 or D750. The D500 is definitely not as good as the D750 for high ISO work, but I've not had any issues with dynamic range. 

I shot it on the Flat Profile as is with the Saturation bumped down to -2. I find that Nikons can go overboard on reds and yellows, pulling back on the overall saturation helps to keep it under control, and if the surrounding colours are looking flat I can boost that in the grade. I also shot with Active D-Lighting on High -- I like the extra shadow detail when I'm shooting so I don't raise my exposure too high looking at an overly contrasty image. I don't think it really gives me any extra dynamic range, but it's not hurting so I leave it there.

No sharpening in post, having a grain track overlaid gives the impression of sharpness -- if you look closely you'll probably notice that the only time I nailed focus was on the very last shot on his face, and all the GoPro shots where it was infinity :D

I haven't shot that much on the 4k, that additional crop means I don't have a lens that suits what I do. I only use the D500 when it's super run and gun; if I have more time or control (or if I'm not travelling) I shoot my BMMCC. Having that 4k crop means my 17-50 isn't wide enough when I'm indoors, and if I put the 11-16 on then it's not long enough for when I need to punch in. I don't love the image from the Sigma 17-50, but the IS really helps and the range is perfect for what I use that camera for. 

Oh I also shot the whole thing with Auto ISO on, it's so great! It does occasionally get confused, but it never goes more than 2/3 of a stop off and you can keyframe it back in the grade pretty easily. 
 
Hell yeah, I can't wait to get back there with a bit of a budget and do a proper deep dive into the scene! There are some proper outlaw clubs there as well, I dunno how they'd feel about a guy making a documentary but there's only one way to find out!

I shot it on the Flat Profile as is with the Saturation bumped down to -2. I find that Nikons can go overboard on reds and yellows, pulling back on the overall saturation helps to keep it under control, and if the surrounding colours are looking flat I can boost that in the grade. I also shot with Active D-Lighting on High -- I like the extra shadow detail when I'm shooting so I don't raise my exposure too high looking at an overly contrasty image. I don't think it really gives me any extra dynamic range, but it's not hurting so I leave it there.

No sharpening in post, having a grain track overlaid gives the impression of sharpness -- if you look closely you'll probably notice that the only time I nailed focus was on the very last shot on his face, and all the GoPro shots where it was infinity :D

I haven't shot that much on the 4k, that additional crop means I don't have a lens that suits what I do. I only use the D500 when it's super run and gun; if I have more time or control (or if I'm not travelling) I shoot my BMMCC. Having that 4k crop means my 17-50 isn't wide enough when I'm indoors, and if I put the 11-16 on then it's not long enough for when I need to punch in. I don't love the image from the Sigma 17-50, but the IS really helps and the range is perfect for what I use that camera for. 

Oh I also shot the whole thing with Auto ISO on, it's so great! It does occasionally get confused, but it never goes more than 2/3 of a stop off and you can keyframe it back in the grade pretty easily. 
 
Hell yeah, I can't wait to get back there with a bit of a budget and do a proper deep dive into the scene! There are some proper outlaw clubs there as well, I dunno how they'd feel about a guy making a documentary but there's only one way to find out!

Well I would ask before you shoot, because I bet they would shoot You without asking! 

I was in Tokyo earlier in the year and I shot this over an afternoon. Most of it was shot on a D500 with the Sigma 17-50 f2.8, the bike shots were on a GoPro Hero 3 Black, and I recorded the interview on a Rode Lav hooked up to a Zoom H1. Amazingly the bike audio was all off the GoPro -- I'd recorded some engine sounds on the H1 as well but the GoPro sounded great so I saved myself the hassle of synching audio.
Edited and Graded in Premiere Pro with the Impulz Kodak Ultramax LUT (which was great because they had a LUT made for Nikons AND GoPros) and I used their 2.5K Grain track as well.
Overall it turned out pretty well. If I had more time I might've found a better way to grip the GoPro to try and dial out the camera shake, but I wanted it to look rough anyway and I grew to like it. I'm constantly surprised by how well GoPro footage can look if you use it in the right way. Kinda wished I'd had the Hero 5 with the Karma grip, might've been able to do some faux drone shots by putting the whole gimbal on a stick and holding it from the back of the bike as we went along. 
Hope you enjoy the film, love to hear your thoughts!


----
What drives you to do what you do?
With 
SEVEN ESCOBAR
Direction/DOP/Sound/Edit/Grade 
JOHN KUNG