dafreaking

Watermark. Watermark Watermark. Occasionally have a watermark run across the screen in an establishing shot or something that doesn't have actors. See at the end of the day, if someone want to leak it there is nothing you can do. So the watermark at least helps you identify who did it. 
 
On a film I worked, we would invite all these guys to our office and show them a copy. Sadly, the film was so bad no one bought it. So as a filmmaker it's also a catch 22 situation. 

Anyone who spends their hard-earned based on a rumour is truly a twit.

Andrew,
 
I love your site, but I have to disagree.  You *are* speculating with the facts, we all are.  No one is arguing that sales are down, we're arguing about why sales are down.
 
On Oct 26, 2013, you wrote:
 
"Consumer digital camera sales are down 36% this year. Why? I think there are four reasons.
Smartphones Satisfaction with current DSLRs Lack of innovate products Global economic downturn" Today you wrote:
 
"Now in an era of falling shipments both companies have blamed smartphones and the world economy. This is completely unacceptable."
 
Just a year ago, you agreed in large portion with Nikon and Canon, but now you find those conclusions unacceptable.  Yet I contend that the points you now reject *are* the core reasons why the market has collapsed.  Nikon and Canon spent the last 10 years feeding the market with successively-lower cost product that improved substantially annually.  Unfortunately for them, technology and economics has caught up with them and now everyone has a smartphone that does probably 90% of everything the average buyer will ever do with a camera, and they likely aren't willing to pay $600 to get that extra 10%.  Do you disagree with last statement (of opinion)?
 
It's not too different from the computer market.  After years and years of increasingly powerful and more capable desktop computers with increasingly productive features, most people now have more computing power than they'll ever use, and they've stopped buying computers.  Instead, they're buying smaller and smaller devices, because even those devices are powerful enough to meet most of their computing needs.  The smartphone has done that to the digital camera business (and the computer business!).  What possible innovations could be performed on the desktop computer that would bring sales back to the good old days when most people are already happy with their tablet?  The same question could be asked of the digital camera market:
 
What innovations do you have in mind that *would* cause the average camera buyer to plunk down $1000 (or $700) on a new camera?  Do you really think that if Canon and Nikon both released killer mirrorless full-frame 4:2:2 4K 240fps@1080p 14-stop DR with ND for $999 that sales would suddenly go back up to the good old days of 2012?  Do you know how many people actually care about those specs?  Pretty much everyone who routinely goes to this awesome website of yours, and almost no one else.
 
Yes, there was a compliment buried in there, we all love your site and your opinions, even if we disagree.

The funny thing is...if everyone was still shooting film, this blog wouldn't exist.

The funny thing is...if everyone was still shooting film, this blog wouldn't exist.

Let's keep this discussion in one topic :) To post go here to the original - '?do=embed' frameborder='0' data-embedContent>>

Digestion issues....
 
...kidding Gear Acquisition Syndrome 

Surprisingly good! And only 'surprisingly' because shorts are so hard to do, especially watchable zombie ones. But this was really well shot.
 
I thought the colour palette you used was appropriate, nothing was out of place or looked off from one scene to another. Stylistically, I wouldnt have done the warm and fuzzy cut away to 'better times' because it seems a little cheesy. A brief cutaway to another photo may have been better. Your main non zombie actress was also pretty good, but the zombie didn't feel particularly dangerous.

But great work.

it was good! i was interested with the plot most of the time. i felt that it was a little too dark in some places; even if it was meant to be dark to convey the mood of the film, i couldn't really tell what was going on for a small portion of it. good job though!

Hi everyone,
I've decided to make all of the music on my site free for commercial use as well as noncommercial. Just please credit me properly as detailed on my homepage.
If you decide to use one or more of my pieces, a donation would be greatly appreciated...any amount you can swing would be helpful.
As always, thanks for your feedback and I hope you find something you can use.
Eric

Hey guys,

I've got a bunch of new tracks for you. The newest of the new are on the following pages:

Introspective/Emotions
Urban
Nature Science
Fantasy/Game Music

As always, your feedback is really helpful and greatly appreciated. Thanks!

Eric

Well, looks like you got what you bargained for, the lot of you. For some reason people's egos and their cameras seem to be linked somehow.
 
But I'd like to offer another Pythonesque suggestion. You see, in case you do indeed feel necessary to let yourself slide down to exchanging personal insults, why not doing it with style? 
 
Something like this, for example;
 
"Go and boil your bottom, you son of a silly person! I'll fart in your general direction! Your mother was a hamster, and your father smelled of elderberries!" 
 
After all, you have to admit, that would be much more entertaining for the onlookers trying to read these topics, wouldn't it.  ;)
 
Now, go away or I shall taunt you a second time-mah.

the c100 is purely video, so you lose the photography feature correct?also i have used the 1dc and i know the camera
i think in reviews its better than the c100 so i would say 1DC. 

Lazy retort.
 
You can't expect to come on to this forum, which is largely populated with Panny-loving camera nerds, and say "I don't know shit but I think my shiny new 5D, which is the camera everybody said was great 2 years ago, is better than a GH4" and not expect to get pulled up on it.
 
You evaded my point. You said you bought the 5D for low light. Why didn't you buy a D5300? Because loads of people buy the 5D! Great reason to waste $2000 ...

Have you heard of lens adapters? E mount is one of the most versatile available ...
 
Oh no!!! 4K only with external recorder! How will we cope!!! Why would ANYONE buy a camera without 4K internal in this day and age! 
 
Wait a minute ....

I have seen some externally recorded A7S footage which is secret for now. The friend can't publish yet.
 
I have to say I am absolutely blown away by it.
 
The low light performance and dynamic range transformed the image... the shadows when graded were silky smooth with a fine noise grain, but it had latitude to catch the illumination realistically... and when the light source bounced against the shadows it looked like film... very nice. I believe it was shot externally to an Atomos Ninja... no signs of moire or aliasing and detail was good...a little soft and filmic but not exactly lacking in fine details and would sharpen nicely.

I think the big secret is a Metabones Speed Booster that gives the GH4 hybrid tea/coffee making features.

I know Andrew. But that is not an excuse for copyright infringement. Make another edit with another score for your promo work, if you must... If a person is unable to do their business without copyright infringement, there is something terribly wrong with that business imo.

Btw, you mentioned I should research fair use, maybe, I'm not an expert. But I think you should do the same.. the Wiki you link to is exactly where I got that quote from, I'm pretty sure the way you use (copyrighted) music on your video's would not classify as fair use.
 
Also see Pablo's reply.
 
And: http://www.copyright.gov/fls/fl102.html
 
Anyway, I don't like copyright laws either, but I respect them when creating my own stuff and uploading it to the public. And even though I agree with a lot of the arguments, I don't think justifies to just do as you like.

So deliver it to your clients with the music of choice for private use, and upload a version with music licensed under Creative Commons for your promotional purposes. Problem solved.

I make 3-4 wedding videos each year.  The couples I shoot choose their own music for very particular reasons, mostly some kind of emotional connection to a song.   It might be the first song they danced to, or a song that was popular when they first met, ...
What matters to them is that it's THAT song.  NOT a song that sounds a bit like it, or has a similar vibe, or a cover version ...
 
What I have been doing until now, is use that music in the wedding videos (including the online streaming versions), AND include proper credits and a direct iTunes link to the song(s). 
This is the best I can do right now, since publishers simply don't care about clearing songs for this kind of use.  Believe me, I have tried, and have never ever received a reply, let alone a quote.

I would be very happy with an easy, accessible online system where you can pay for sync for popular songs.

For all my other work, I find plenty of material at themusicbed or even the Vimeo music store. 

 

Thanks Andy, but what about lenses us mere mortals can buy? 

When you attach a lens to a crop sensor, the lens remains identical. The image is identical, but for the crop into the image circle.
 
He says the whole photographic system of aperture, ISO, focal length makes no sense. SAY WHAT!?
 
Aperture and focal length relate to the lens only. Why should they apply to a combo of sensor size and lens, as the video suggests it should?
 
A 2x crop factor helps when it comes to figuring out the angle of view. 12 x 2 = 24mm. That's about it.
 
The aperture doesn't change. The exposure doesn't change.
 
Applying crop factor to ISO is a huge mistake. That a larger sensor captures 'more light' ignores the fact that large sensors can still have small pixels due to very high megapixel counts or large gaps in-between pixels.
 
The ISO does not crank up on a smaller sensor because it isn't receiving as much light as a larger sensor.
 
You have to look at the sensor on a per pixel basis. The size of the pixels.
 
Take a 24MP full frame sensor and cut out 16MP from the middle to give you a crop sensor.
 
Look at both images at 1:1...
 
See a difference? No. So why does this guy suggest otherwise?
 
Because what he is neglecting to mention is he's not looking at the images 1:1, but downsampling the 24MP to 16MP, then comparing to a 16MP crop sensor. The downsampling of course makes for a cleaner image.
 
This is also where DXOMark goes wrong very often. They include the downsampling in their calculations too.
 
So a 36MP sensor would do very well in low light even if it was noisier on a per pixel basis. Look at their low light results for the 5D Mark III vs D800. We know the 5D Mark III has better high ISO than the D800 yet DXOMark somehow haven't managed to show this in their scores.
 
What matters is pixel size, pixel architecture and readout noise... Not sensor size.
 
The Blackmagic Production Camera is absolute proof that this guy's theory fails the reality test.

I am shocked and appalled at how terrible the information in that video is (and I want my 37 min of my life back). 
 
What makes it worse is that he is actually presenting it with such arrogance and conviction, that people are buying into it!
 
Karrim, let me take a moment to explain:
 
If you take a picture on a 7D (APS-C crop) vs a 5D (Full Frame) with the same 50mm lens, the 7D only sees the center part of that lens. If you were to take that picture from the 5D and crop it inward 1.6x in post, it should look pretty much identical to the 7D's picture. Same bokeh, same DOF, same amount of light exposure. The difference is only that you are cropped inward so much that you might not be able to get your entire subject in the frame anymore.
 
The aperture does not change on a crop sensor camera. PERIOD. However, you have to stand farther away from your subject to get what you want to fit inside the crop. Since DOF is a combination of aperture and distance, the DOF will change and become deeper as you step back more. But again, the aperture does not change! Only your distance has. A picture taken at the same distance will have the same DOF, and most importantly the same amount of light!
 
The reason the manufacturers list "35mm equivalents" on their lenses is not at all misleading. Many photographers think in full frame FOVs, so they need to know that a 28mm is no longer a wide angle, but rather a medium one. The amount of light gathered does not change, the aperture is very much the same. But your composition is different, as you are standing farther away. F/2.8 at a particular distance to your subject will yield the same DOF no matter what size the sensor is. What Northup is saying is PATENTLY FALSE.
 
As far as light gathering with a speed booster- imagine you have a flashlight, and shine it at a wall. As you get closer to the wall, the photons are less scattered, closer together, smaller and brighter. If you've ever tried to fry ants on a sidewalk with a magnifying glass, you know how a focal reducer can condense the light from the sun into a single spot intense enough to start a fire. So when using a speedbooster, you are actually gaining more light, technically more than a full frame camera with the same lens would as it is more condensed now. This is science, this is physics of light, and has been totally explained to death before. 
 
As an aside- his whole thing about smaller sensors having poor low light performance because they see less light overall. I'm with Andrew- total and complete bullocks. The size of the sensor overall has NOTHING to do with it, but rather the size of the photosites. The photosites are what make up the individual pixels for your image. The higher the megapixels, the more densely populated the sensor is and therefore the smaller each photosite. Smaller photosites gather less photons per exposure and therefore get noisier at similar ISO values to larger ones. But technically, you can have a small sensor with larger photosites than a larger one. The Sony A7S how shown what a difference smaller megapixel counts can do for a sensor in low light. Technically Panasonic can make a MFT sensor especially designed for low light by only making it 10 megapixels. Then we'd get stellar ISO performance compared to any 5D, despite sensor size. 
 
He keeps going on about how because the sensor is smaller than a full frame one, it can't see as much light and therefore the ISO needs to pump up the gain higher to reach the same exposure. Everytime he says that I want to shove my fist through the computer screen for being so arrogantly ignorant. 

Andrew, i just sometime feel like youre selling your opinions as facts, which i dont agree with nor like. your tests are perfectly objective and i love your page for that. but saying that its "madness" not to use the gh4 in 4k or declining that it doesnt come "at many costs", is not true. whats true is, that these draw backs are so little to YOU, you dont mind them, and that is absolutely fine. but its just not true for everybody, like it sounds like in your answer to my post.
 
obviously the 4k image of the GH4 is absolutely lovely and i can understand everybody using it exclusively for everything they do. but i for example shoot weddings and like to record everything with at least 50frames to have a dreamy slowmo when i need it. my G6s 50fps is soft, i hate it. having a crisp 62fps on the new gh4 is a real advantage for me. next, i shoot on cruise ships that often vibrate due to the engine. with even worse rolling shutter in 4k the footage will look terrible, having 50% less rolling shutter in 1080p is another huge advantage for me. that also applies when i have to stabilize shots in post. these things sum up in my personal use cases, which is why id rather use this camera in 1080p 62fps than in 4k. this goes against anything you believe in, but only because you re putting your focus on different features than i am :)
 
what im saying is: the way it works right now the 4k is not a selling point for ME. the gh4 comes with other great features that are good to have, but especially on the auto focus (in video), i expected some better. i understand your opinion thinking "pietz, its the first camera that shoots seriously impressive 4k material and it even costs below $2k. how can you complain about this camera?" but if 4k isnt a selling point for me, im not left with so many other improvements in the gh4. and not having auto focus in VFM at all is just rediculous in my oppinion.

Happy to have two threads actually...
 
One for problems.
 
And one for design aspects.
 
Slow-mo softness at 96fps and 2.2x crop in 4K is an aspect of the design.
 
A problem for me would be a bug or usability quirk.
 
Let's continue on the thread but be clear on what we mean...