Ivar Kristjan Ivarsson

Who cares what kids think?  The illusion isn't broken for them because they barely grasp the concept of illusion.  If the sets don't look real it doesn't matter to a child because it doesn't even cross their minds that it isn't real.  
Once the curtain is pulled away and you lose your child like sense of wonderment, HFR narrative ceases to be convincing.  HFR action sports works because its actually real life and no illusion needs to be created. 
I don't think 24P is going anywhere until the film industry itself evolves into something other than watching moving pictures on a large screen. 

Plasma TVs rule. Bought the last model of Panasonics before the end.

Am i the only one who wishes they still made plasma?

Internal 4K is at the bottom of my A7S II wish list, under IBIS, SLog 3, SGamut3.cine, 10-bit HDMI out, professional Look Profiles (like Rec709 type A) as picture profile options, smoother AF, the elimination of lossy RAW compression for stills, and less rolling shutter.

Unfortunately, this will be big in the ENG world. I say unfortunately, because I'll have to shoot with it one day. I'm fine with the all in one design, built in ND's, etc. all the the things that make run / gun, doc, ENG style work easier. But I have one major beef  with this design - the EVF should be where the monitor is and side mounted. What Panasonic, Canon and Sony forget with their EX3's, C100/300 and HVX's is that in ENG, Reality, Event and doc world you're often doing takes up to half an hour or more. Holding the camera with two hands out front and your eye on a rear mounted EVF is OK for five minutes or so, but once it goes longer you'll be begging for a 20b proper news camera balanced on your shoulder. I'm sure every ENG cameraman will agree, it's better to be heavy and balanced then light and all on your arms. 

If they'd just put the EVF where it should be, then it wouldn't take much to rest it on my shoulder with nothing more than minimal rigging (shoulder pad and handles). As it is, to get it on my shoulder will now require mounting a 3rd party EVF or monitor out front on some frankenrigging or slinging it on an easy rig. This obsession Sony, Canon and Panasonic have with the rear mounted EVF is beyond comprehension and shows they beta test with soccer moms and tourists.

Yea, I'm just not sure I will take the FS700/OQ7 to Iceland as it is quite a beast to carry around, especially with 5 primes and a large tripod.
Iceland is so amazing though, not sure anything but 4K, raw, 1-120fps would do it justice. Decisions, decisions

So basically what you are saying is A7S = perfect camera to shoot The Simpsons with?

This is a rehersal of the norwegian entry in Europe's biggest song competition (ESC) where every country once a year submit a contestant to represent their country. Last years winner host the following year. The show is seen live on tv throughout europe by approx 600 million people and is one of the biggest tv-shows here. Audience watching the show live in the hall is about 20 000 people. After every country's had their go, each country vote and submit their countrys points and its all added up to decleare the winner. In 1974 Abba won with Waterloo so this contest have rocketed some carriers. My country Norway has won a couple of times and in putting the show on takes a lot of combined efforts. Your observations regarding tv vs audience is true btw. Its all done for tv, however, being there is quite fin and spectacular. Especially for us interested in the technique and such. Its a massive machinery. 

​Modern Televisions have such poor contrast ratios and such heightened highlights and milky blacks and weird motion cadence that I rather have my stuff seen on an ipad or iphone or the web than ever on TV.  I watched Better Call Saul on my macbook pro - first 3 episodes then ep 4 on a samsung 30' hdtv and man the little 15' display looks so much better.  I have lost my faith in most HDTV displays.  It's sad.  The contrast and motion  on tube tvs used to be quite wonderful and organic.  Thank goodness for Apple making good looking computer and phone displays the norm.    Kind of sad of all companies Sony that help pioneer digital cinema cameras makes such poor HDTV displays with soap opera frame doubling the norm setting.  How many TVs have I fixed?

​I do big commercials.  I'm on one right now.  I also have an Emmy and just was in American Cinematographer.  And brand loyalty is a big thing.  We mostly use Arri HMI lights.  Joker sometimes but Arri because we know Arri makes a damn fine light with the M90 or M18 - Joker 1600s never took off.  I use the best camera for the job - but I have to have long talks with the producer sometimes about that.  For instance, I just did a Lincoln commercial in Dubai and we shot on the Sony F55 - not the Arri Alexa or Red Epic Dragon.  Why?  - Got that question so many times.  Alexa was too heavy - it was 16 hr steadicam days in the 110 degree weather - and Red Dragon - not good in heat - but I got slack - because Alexa and Red have better names.
I also shoot dog videos on smaller cameras.  I own the NX1 and the Sony A7S - and I work with film and own 2 f35s and red one mx and use alexas and red dragons and arri 416 and 435 on jobs - and there is so much goodness to come from using a small lightweight camera.  So much wonder and beauty from using these little guys - it reopens wonder and ease and has improved my color grading knowledge so much.  It's such a pleasure to have a lightweight camera where it is fun again, where it's not physically exhausting to reframe.  
So there is a differing opinion from me.  
Traditional DPs are now dealing with the new era, where young upstarts like me can rise up without being a loader, 2nd, 1st, , cam op, then DP.  Or electric, best, gaffer then DP.   I became a DP in just about five years.  I was an assistant editor for 5 years going down the editing path and I switched because I was already shooting docs.  And there is nothing wrong with that.  My sense of lighting took longer to develop but my sense of the emotional space was more developed.  Getting smaller moments.  
There is no right way to be a DP.  Because I am so unconventional, I bring a childlike wonder to filmmaking.  I bring a different perspective and wonderment to how I work - more innocence, more in the moment.
There is no one right path.
Older established DPs I have nothing but respect.  Maryse Alberti, Gordon Willis, Raul Coutard, Jordan Cronenweth, Storro, Michael Chapman, Conrad Hall, Lance Accord, Nestor, Wexler - nothing but respect.
Also the DP of IDA - the most beautiful film I saw in the past 4 years, was a cam operator - first time DP.  The director said he was so good because he had no ego.
So next time you watch an unlit video of a dog - think about how much fun the DP was having.  How casual it was, and how beautiful that can be.  

​I agree completely John - I think following textbook examples of how to do things vs developing a style of doing things are different - it's dogmatic "filmmaking" vs "untraditional" and sometimes both ways can lead to a different product.  One can be more "factory-line" and the other more "artistic" - whether one is better is completely subjective.
But each director and crew work differently, and I am saddened by on-set behaviors thinking that there is only one way to make a movie.  There is not.  And many of the best doc filmmakers fell into it.  For instance, Errol Morris, started as a private investigator.
 
Creativity happens at all levels - and the give and take between an actor and director is highly important, as well as the collaboration between crew and director.  And yes a good script can get by with weak performances, and vice versa, but it's only when all the elements come together - story, acting, cinematography, sound, editing - that I feel one is watching a film of brilliance.
 
All art may or may not follow these principles.  But again there is no right way - it's art.  It's in the realm of the subjective.  I think that Lawerence of Arabia is one of the greatest films of all time, as well as the 400 Blows - but on several occasions I have had friends tell me how boring they think both films are.  And that's the point - that no one can say in art what is good art and bad art.  It's all a matter of opinion.

From http://eddavid.tumblr.com/post/111
I was told I had to redo my W9 income tax form, because the form I filled out was the Nov 2013 form, which was expired.  So I went and filled out the Dec 2014 form and noticed something new - a whole extra page of paperwork - It went from a three page document to a four page document - and that’s our government, the king of bureaucracy, in action.
Bureaucracy was the big theme in this month’s Harpers, currently my favorite magazine of all time, up there with the Atlantic and the Week and the New Yorker as what I read (sorry novels, I haven’t read you guys in a while and maybe that’s another essay to write about next).  
In this issue, they mentioned that bureaucracy also bleeds into the arts, which is my field of work as a cinematographer.  The use of credentials - like a police chief or military commander or certified doctor -  a practice that exists in places like Soviet Russia have fallen into our field.  The highest esteemed titles, like DGA or ASC even go after your name on a movie title (also the only art industry in the world where you put the credits on an advertisement for the product - does Colgate Toothpaste do that?)  Saying “Joe Schmoe, ASC” does that make Joe Schmoe more certified than his name without that title?  Does it make the film any less beautiful?
At what point in the arts are you certified as an artist?  At what point can you say, “yes I know what I am doing.”  Some great artists do their best work before they “become” recognized. A lot of famous artists reminisce about how much easier it is for them to create good art before they are lauded, such as Jackson Pollock.  Once he was called by Life Magazine, “is this the greatest artist of our generation?” his life suffered immensely.
My theory is, you are an artist when you create art.  So anyone is an artist, if they put pen to paper, dirty finger to keyboard.  But in our filmmaking industry my whole life I have felt guilty because I didn’t go to a film schoo, I didn’t get certifiedl - I went to a liberal arts college and was an anthropology major and almost a film studies minor, as well as one point a music major.  I didn’t have the training everyone seemed to be whispering that I needed.
I felt so guilty,  that I didn’t know how to load a film mag, that I didn’t ever sit down and learn lighting or even lenses.  I had no photography background - that was my sister. I didn’t know the difference between a wide angle lens and a telephoto lens, surrounded by many people who did. I didn’t know soft light vs hard light, or the angle of lighting and how it changes on a face in shadows.
I grew up shooting documentaries and prank videos on VHS-C cameras - made one in high school called “perspective” and interviews young people, older young people, and my parents about various historical issues like the Vietnam war, trying to show how our age affects how we interpret history, as well as education level, etc - bigger issues I didn’t address like race and class, because, well, I grew up in the wonderful safe bubble of Fairfield, CT.  I didn’t light it - I didn’t think about the aesthetics of it at all, just what I was trying to say.
But that guilt of me not having the credentials for filmmaking has haunted me for so long.  I would show up on set and be so nervous that I didn’t know anything about lighting - or 35mm film or real lenses - that I would call for the wrong lens - that I was being judged by everyone.  I remember about 7 years ago or so I was on a low budget tv spec spot and an electric asked me my age and I think I said I was older than I was so I could pretend that I knew what I was doing.
But the more I do cinematography, the more I know that whatever unique perspective I have is an advantage.  Not going to film school, coming from an anthropological and philosophical perspective gives me strength, a different way of seeing.  And it is skills that can actually be learned on the job, online on forums, by talking and observing and learning from others.  I  have learned so much about filmmaking from a vimeo series called “Every Painting a Frame” that is just some passionate film editor named Tony Zhou doing it on his own time as from a youtube series spoofing George Lucas, and of course on set mentors like the great DP David Tumblety I shot with a few times.
Everyone who brings a fresh perspective to filmmaking is so needed - we can not just have people do films all the same way.
 I think more and more there is a gluttony of film set behaviors that rewards the same and bureaucratic method of making “films” - traditional, boring, waiting - not just trying to find moments and capture little tiny ideas and bigger thoughts - but this route system of regimented military-like crew that does things traditional ways that people like Paul Thomas Anderson rally against - no marks - no lets go overt here instead - untraditional approaches that open up wonder again.
But also that wonder is not anything without intense concentration and commitment and hard work.  You can’t be lazy and successful.  It’s sweat.  My Puritanical work ethic was at one point rewarded vastly by my former boss and greatest mentor, Joe Baron.  He runs Attitude, Inc - a post house in New York City.  He taught me about perseverance  - about going for perfection - “crossing the finish line” - which would sometimes be at 3am to get a piece to a level of standard he believed in.  To not be mediocre, no matter what anyone else believes - to put one’s full heart into anything.  To not get upset and bogged down by bureaucratic methods - to just be a part of a small group of people and be passionate.  He found my strengths, and didn’t make me feel bad about my flaws, my quirks.  
I didn’t learn this in school, and this mentorship under him, as I assistant edited under him for two years.  And his voice has been guiding me ever since, as I navigate through my adulthood. And whoever I get down because maybe I switch a lens too late or change my mind too suddenly (all artists need to be open to changes that can occur at any moment - spontaneity) - I always think of him there, watching over, making sure I’m okay.  

​Interesting thought, but what makes the Voigt so perfect for me is - next to your mentioned things - also the ability of having a relatively short focus throw (for 0.3 - infinity), the added macro mode as well as the short focus distance. Given, short focus throw and close distance is nothing what everybody needs, but for me as a run&gun guy this is quite essential. Anyways, i will have a look into the canon 50 f1.4, thanks! 
Does the commlite adapter has any drawbacks when compared to the metabones adapter?

I have to opt-in for the Voigtländers. I worked a little bit over a year just with the 25mm and it is absolutely gorgeous - in fact, i am still busy finding an adequate counterpart now that i switched to the a7s...

I always copy the files into a folder with a descriptive name and date, then I wrote a simple python script that goes through all folders and renames the clips with the folder name + the original name of the clip. This has worked well enough for having unique names and takes very little time. As for deleting them all, just delete them all at once from the folder on a computer.

​
​I agree. I am also a rig user so the small size of the a7s is actually a plus for me. The menu system is not that horrible imho after you get the hang of it. When on the rig I find it not hard to hit the rec button but I have small slender fingers.
When photo shooting I use the battery grip. Yes I agree that the NX1 feels slightly better in hand and the battery grip for that is better build but the A7s is not bothering me at all.
I am getting lovely results with Slog and Filmconvert pro 2(love the new options).
Personally I am very happy with the images coming from the A7s.
Just my 2 cents. 
P.S. Off topic: I bought my A7s from the official Sony retailer here in Iceland. From what I have read, I thought the A7s was PAL/NTSC locked. But I can change to either without the warning message I have read about others getting. 

​Great, we will be in Reykjavik for a day before hitting the south coast. This is my 3rd visit now, I love the country like it is my home! We even spent a month there for our honeymoon, camping... (-2C in a tent was not very romantic, haha)

​If you are in Reykjavik send me a message. Happy to assist a fellow EOSHD forumist.

I could have made that box.
All I need is, erm... a box!
Buy the Ninja and the lenses, suddenly I am Nikon!
They must be so proud of themselves.
By the way the lenses are their cheapest primes in the whole Nikon line-up and they haven't got focus gears, but hey... filmmakers don't need more than that right!?

I really need to get my hands on one. 
I need a lightweight camera for my trip to Iceland in March and, on paper, this ticks some serious boxed. As you can imagine though, Iceland can be unforgiving in terms of lighting (sun on ice against lava black rock, for example)... Which is why I am obsessing over the DR.
I'll be taking the BMPCC too, so I guess DR is covered on some shots.
As it stands, the decision is between the NX1, 1DC, A7s or possibly a BMPC(4K) 
Decisions, decisions.

​Well put. I come to this site because I learn things about small and inexpensive cameras that we don't regularly test or use on set. Last week I shot an AMEX commercial with an F55 but we also used a BMCPC as well for a different look. Much of the info on that cam came from sites like this. For the past month, I'm on a TV show where we use Amira's all day but guess what, we also break out the A7s and Go Pros from time to time. Again this site and several others help pros get a handle on emerging tech. I'm actually considering shooting my next feature on A7s (even though we have the choice of Arri's). While I do think we sometimes over analyze  specs here and not just look at what great pics a camera makes, I find this site at the forefront of smaller, lighter and more versatile tech. Any pro who ignores these things will be left one day wondering why the phone stopped ringing.

​Yeah, the counter weight is nice. I have that one on the C300 rig back at work since I dont need it on mine cause I have the Shape shoulderpad/counterweight combo.

​hehe, I will

​Just buy and shoot...

​Not vist the internet anymore?.......that's....that's not possible.