fuzzynormal

Well, good lighting is not incredibly difficult. I find its more about knowing what not to do than anything else. Theres lots of online tutorials to pick up the basics. Once you actually start to "see" light and get confident to manipulate it to your advantage, it gets pretty easy. You have the lens and camera right now to make images with impressive quality and resolution. I wouldn't worry about that.

​Ouch. It hurts just to read that.

Bought a $10 1970's Pentax lens. It created a pretty great motion picture image for my GM1; used it on a short film and had a lot of fun. (the film was kinda lame, but that happens) Also learned a few standard symbolism techniques for narrative cinematography and used them somewhat effectively in a production.

Good ambition. You're onto something, you just need to refine it. I also did sketches (a looong time ago) for fun. My ideas and my comedy were pathetic, but the process of making mistakes while filming was invaluable. My advice is this: you're trying to fix the wrong problem. If you want your work to look better you need to worry about a bunch of other things before lens selection. And, honestly, a slightly wide lens is ideal for comedy stuff. You're already set. I'd fret most about lighting and knowing how to create strong balanced exposures on subjects. Your lighting is uninspired and kind of distracting. If you can't learn to do it well, maybe hire someone that can...or is at least willing to try hard to figure it out. It's heavy lifting, so you need to love the challenge or find someone that does. I can't emphasize it enough. The thing that separates good shooting from bad shooting is not the gear, it's using whatever gear you got with the right light. Good shooters chase good light or make good light. They combine it with numerous others imaging skills to make something special. This is why, in filmmaking, you'll see a talented 17 year old kid with an old Canon Ti making films incredibly better than some camera-gear-head with a brand new [insert latest expensive and popular technical camera here] and every lens at his/her disposal. The deal is simple, if you want to get better than everyone else running around with a great camera these days (aka: everyone with a vague interest in DSLR/mirrorless video), then get better where it actually makes the most difference. No lens can salvage a poorly lit frame. And in case it needs saying: exposure is not about pumping enough light into a shot, it's knowing how to place or remove the right amount of light where it needs to go for pleasant shots to result. It's like music. You don't make nuanced music by playing a cacophony of relentless sound. Good music happens in the space between notes. Lenses? A very important tool, however they're only a part of everything --And this only addresses the simple technicalities of production! Governing the artistic performance side of it all is another consideration altogether...and your camera is one of the main characters! ...Of course, you could be like many and just buy camera gear as a catalyst to some creative motivation. I've done it...

​Actually, many would want it to say that no matter what crap they framed up. Or, even better, "Great Shot! That was so much better than what you'd get from [insert competing camera brand here]."

Ha! Funny responses. It's true. For some reason there's a weird psychology of some people that tend to believe expressing exaggerated criticism somehow makes them seem insightful. No, it just make them seem silly.

I still use FCP7 and just carry around my cameras as they are. That's all.

Opinions are like...

Yeah, they achieved it in the 1940's. How's that for antiquated?

Go download some recent Japanese NHK dramas. Maybe some if the cool Samurai ones, they're all 60p. Watch that Then let us know what you think about immersion. I personally like high resolution 24p motion images where subjects motion blur on the edges; reality but not reality. I think it aids in the suspension of disbelief. Anyway, the new video monitors with their default frame blending nonsense are simulating hfr. A lot of people are watching some variation of the thing simply because they're ignorant of the intended screening FR...so people are being conditioned off of 24p regardless. There's 2cents, rub them together.

There's a whole theory of philosophical thought that acknowledges people process "quality" regardless if they're illiterate with the medium. I tend to agree. There will always be anecdotal examples of people acting foolish and making bad choices, but overall folks appreciate something done well even if they can't articulate the how and why of it.

I shot with the em5 this past year for a paying gig. Nice camera that delivered on the stabilization. It's good for that, but yeah the sensor and codec don't match stuff that's out now. Keep shooting though. For what it's worth, I'm not suggesting you're asking stupid questions. My responses are just as much for random readers of the thread. Since you have decent gear now you can do things. Go do it! Have patience and buy a better can in 2015. Whatever you get will be fine. Just be prepared to accept that once you have it there will be something "better" about to hit the market next...

Just a general observation for others following these sort of "what's the best" tech threads: If you're a beginner on the piano --and you spend a week learning how to play "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star." It's not going to sound a whole lot different when you play it on a toy or on a Stienway Concert Grand. The thing that matters at first is learning. You can't buy technique or skill. You earn it through practice. A 200k camera in the hands of a novice will look worse than an expert shooting with an iPhone. With motion pictures in 2015, you can't buy your way into something extraordinary by purchasing a camera body. They're all awesome. What you do with it is the only thing that makes it extraordinary.

The thing is, (in my opinion) the difference in IQ is not that big of a deal these days. If you're spending about $2k, you're going to get some sort of camera that does a good job capturing clean nice motion pictures. Bmpcc. You like the image? Get it! Honestly, no one needs the "best" camera anyway. It's how you use it that matters. To wait in the meantime... and miss out on the time and opportunity to actually go out out, film stuff, and be creative seems like a strange idea to me. It's not that such a thing isn't good for you, it's just that I don't really understand it. If all you want is the best camera so you can carry it around knowing, "wow, I have the best camera," that's perfectly fine, but making stuff is the ultimate goal, right?

This'll sound snarky, but it's written with honest sincerity: Go ahead and place your order. What exactly are you waiting for? Are you scared to actually start making videos or something? Again, not trying to be rude, just curious why you seem to be here asking for affirmation to spend your own money? I'm always curious about that.

The Gx7. If you already have the M43 glass, why not? It's under $500 in the u.s..

I only shoot "manual." Being a good editor is what sets you apart. Knowing how to work with clients, solve their problems, and answer their questions gets you hired again and again. In my (admittedly low-end) world gear doesn't matter so much anymore. All IQ from modern cameras is good enough now. EDIT: It's just as important to know which clients you should stay away from. Hard to explain that one. You just kinda figure that out through wisdom.

Yeah, but it's just a PR thing/contest. No need to assume it's supposed to be an a-list caliber film.

The basic reason: Garbage in, garbage out. You can use search engines to quickly find out the why and how of low-bandwidth video compression. Understanding the technology you wish to use will ultimately make you better at it. Higher end studios actually hire professionals to deal with this specific issue, so it's well documented across the world wide web super information highway. Good luck!

It matters.

I think it's nice to have friends that are good actors and that can do earnests naturalistic reading of heavily metaphorical writing. Seriously. That is NOT easy to do. Without the allegorical VO the short would be rather typical of what we normally see on Vimeo, eh? To be honest, I'm not sure why the NX1 is mentioned specifically...images look decent; not bad, not great. I wonder if it must be some sort of PR thing going on with Samsung and Levitt? Anyway, short, punchy, held my interest.

Shoot motion pictures with manual camera control.

Any camera is perfect as long as you actually do something with it...besides just take test pictures of leaves and then compare DxO charts the rest of the time. Or, just wait for the next big/best thing. Have a lot of patience because it never comes.

I've always had problems with color clipping in nightclubs and weird stage lights. Maybe the A7s is more sensitive to this because of the way it's engineered for low light, but I've yet to use any camera that does not ultimately have issues with this. That's my experience anyway.