fuzzynormal

FWIW, I have one. Got it used for $1,250 a year ago. Great IQ, but I just don't like using it for video. That cam's ergos fight me.

Thank you for taking the time to actually give the film a shot and devoting some of your time to it. It's actually a big ask to request someone's attention --and then have them do it; much less write out a critique. Believe me, it's super appreciated!

It's a work in progress, yes, so the feedback is appreciated. Your suggestions align with our thoughts as well, so the affirmation is encouraging. There were a few different storytelling tacts we considered. We ultimately decided to not deviate from their reality much and stay true. Our usual tendencies would have been to play up some of the challenges to heighten stakes, but their thing is actually rather modest and somewhat mellow, so (this edit for our locals anyway) is character study and a slow unfolding of their situation. We expect to ultimately make a short "TV" version where the tighter and conventional storytelling stuff is in play. So many different cameras were used simply because that's what we had on hand. Also, there was a perverse pleasure in knowing we were using a ridiculous mix of cameras and then trying to unify IQ in post. So much of what my wife shot was on an old Fuji XPro2. Which is kind of a really dumb thing to do if you know that camera. But oh well! I often used a Olympus EM10iii --with a 1970's 50mm on it. That's the camera that caught alot of the people shots. For the hawks, my severely banged up GH5 had a super cheap vintage Toyo 500mm lens and a 2x extender on it. That was the rig that caught the most bird footage. Rented some things along the way, but the timing of the rentals and nature didn't yield much. Having that old lens was the silliest thing ever for capturing clean nature shots, but there was a lot of fun in the challenge of trying to make it work. Manually trying to focus while panning at an effective 2000mm fov? That was difficult. I should have bought a real tripod, like a Sachtler, for trying to get birds in flight. Not doing that was a mistake. The Oly cam was the most doc friendly. Small, unobtrusive. Easy to use handheld kuz of the decent IS. Looked good most of the time. Trying to film on my Xiomi 12s Ultra was...meh. Got a few pretty shots on it, but missed so much while fiddling with the touch screen. No thanks. Not doing that anymore. Also, the phone's IS induces unwanted image jitter. Bleh. The phone camera can look really great. On par with the other cams in a way. Not a practical tool though. As for audio we just put 3 lav recorders on the main characters and let it rip. Typically 2 hours in the morning, 2 hours at night. x3 x60 days x2 years. No monitoring of the audio. We got what we got. Keeping impressionistic field notes helped when trying to find good phrases later. The standard grind of doc editing there, mitigated with the novel AI assist of transcribing. Every once in awhile we'd pull out a blimp/deadcat/shotgun thing and get some quick interviews, but only a handful. Finally, the days in the field were not really working shoots, per se. More like us hanging out with friends, so those numerous hours were not a problem whatsoever. Still, our rate card plus those hours would have kept the wife and I flush, but this is doc film making so that ain't happening. If we ever see a return on this I'd be amazed. Cheers!

Here in my small town, during half the year, we're actually doing screenings at the local performing arts center and trying to curate an interesting mix of films. Without that option, I'm not really able to make time often for an authentic cinema experience. After all, a 3 hour round trip drive is a big commitment; especially to watch a movie that may or may not be good. My reality is kind of frustrating for spontaneously catching a random movie at the theater. I sure miss that experience that was a huge part of my younger days. And, sure, I like to watch films at home, but nothing beats the communal experience of an engaged audience while watching a movie. https://www.borregospringsfilminstitute.org/

Anyone here specialize or enjoy documentaries? My wife and I made a doc for our small community and were wondering if it had any viability beyond in-town screenings at the local film fest. https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/gorqbss1yxq6lufl81x44/HAWK_WATCH_SCREEN_DRAFT.mp4?rlkey=x5d8vcd4igr3bix0cdsgajq0b&st=mt1xzunz&dl=0 The 1st draft here is still loosey-goosey, but if you're so inclined, take a look and see if the story intrigues you enough to say, "Yeah, you might be able to get this out there other places." We feel it's such niche topic that distribution isn't much of a reality, but maybe being niche is a positive in a certain way --and with a significant cut down it could have opportunities? Not sure. As one work on these things one gets rather myopic. As you might imagine, feedback from folks in our local community is too biased. They're just happy to see themselves, colleagues, and friends in a film. Any advice is welcome if you have time to watch.

FWIW, our latest doc used: GH5, GH4, iPhone, Xiaomi ultra 12s, Fuji X-pro2, Fuji XT5, Oly EM1mII, Oly EM10iii, DJI Mavic, GoPro, 5DII. Wanna guess which one shot the most? Which lenses were used? I can tell you, but, "eh." The film got made and it looks nice enough to us. Still, docs like ours have no shot at Sundance. The reason why it can not be considered for something like Sundance has nothing to do with equipment. If our latest doc had a better story at its core, then maybe... but it doesn't. It's just not that interesting or entertaining enough. With docs, my opinion is that you can shoot with anything that makes an image. If the story is awesome and rousing it'll get seen and lauded even if the technical quality is mediocre. Nice to have both great story AND IQ -- but story telling...camera can't only help so much in that regard, and that sort of help is really, well, not all that much anyway.

Let's hope in a larger context than cameras, yeah? The USA is a business plan more than it's a nation --and business isn't much about community. After all, once we're doing things for each other we aren't doing it for shareholders. I'd certainly rather see people congregate on-line in smaller less invasive digital places.

I've written that having any camera is "good enough" and video creatives should just go to work and make stuff? That wasn't really possible with the D90. Lord knows I tried. Totally f'ed up a shoot with Stan Lee trying to make that thing work. Ooops.

There ya go.

Still kind of amazing that the notion of buying your way into image quality with a camera is a thing these days. What others have said. Don't ignore the craft. Swap out an ARRI with a GH1 in certain production environments and you'd be, like, "Holy shit! That looks awesome!" Three or four stops of DR does not a good image make. It helps, but it doesn't make it. A decade ago a bunch of cinematic heavyweights, Coppola and the like, did a popular test screening of hybrid camera tech at the time. They were more than pleased with what the products, like a 5dII, were delivering. If it was good enough for them in 2010's, what the heck are we worried about? Also, who remembers that one talented dude guy filming in 720p on a canon rebel? I think his name started with a "Z"? Beautiful stuff because he knew how to use it. Would it have been better if it was an ARRI? Of course, but would that really affect the narrative? Anyway... And then, yeah, add in a bunch of YT knobs playing with the gear without any deep wisdom about gaffing, camera moves, and storytelling --of course the video examples of hybrids'll end up looking like crap. Here's an anecdote: I'm currently editing a documentary with a decent budget. The cinematographer on the shoots sucked balls. He filmed with an ARRI and two different REDS along the way. The ARRI has a look. It comes out of the cam with a lot of "thickness" to use, you know? Regardless, we recently had to hire a different guy to do a half day of pick up shots and he used his lowly GH5. He knew how to find the right light, frame an interesting composition, and (thankfully) knew how to hold a mother-f'ing-shot longer than 2 seconds. Grrrr. Guess which footage looked better and was more useful? We can (and should!) chase the tech if that's what floats our boats, but real creatives don't really give too much of a rip about the tech. "Is it working? Good. Let's tell this story." They make it happen with what they got.

Ah. Yes. you're right. What was it then? There was some reason audio related, I think. It's been a few years. Maybe it was a videographer couldn't live monitor the audio recording? It was something "audio" that held me back. I also remember the EM5III didn't have 60p 4K, and that bummed me out. Trying to grade Oly is always a bit of a let down too. Doable, but you don't get much leeway with, say, a GH5.

We could only be so lucky. I was really rooting for Olympus/OM because I enjoyed the EM5II and EM10III, and always wanted a PenF when it was released, but could never spend the $$ knowing I'd never have a use for it when it came to video.

Yeah, but they also removed the ability to record audio directly into the EM5III cam. It's not like the EM5II was awesome for audio, but for recording voice it was fine and that worked for me. Just really bummed the EM5III was ham-strung for video folks like us. Ultimately, I just got the EM10III (refurbished for $300, so cheap) that had the same video capabilities as the EM5III. (but still no direct audio) And the weight of hybrids never mattered to me. I used to shoot 3/4" video tape. Everything is easy compared to that. On my EM5II I used the OEM battery grip and a tank of a 55mm FD lens as my main video rig. That mass helped. As it happens, I'm still using my modest EM10III a lot. It's just not my daily driver. For that I rely on the GH cameras. Once you have high speed frame rates at 4K, such as you get with the GH LUMIX'es, it's hard to not to have that production flexibility when shooting run 'n gun. The GH cameras deliver a purty picture and cool abilities, but using them leaves me a bit cold. For some reason I just like holding and using the Olys, even though they were, and are, subpar IQ-wise.

FWIW, the EM5ii was my favorite camera ever to hold and shoot with. Shame the IQ was poopy. If only they would've engineered it to do 4K I'd probably still be using it.

With 3rd party apps I can actually get some rather awesome IQ video outta my Xiaomi 12S Ultra. That's kind of neat, right? What I can't get is an app that let's me film motion pictures without a lot of unnecessary difficulty and fiddly nonsense. Thus, I do not use my Xiaomi 12S Ultra to shoot rather awesome IQ video. Imagine trying to use a hammer and the handle is a jug of milk. Pretty freaking hard to strike a nail. It can be done, but...annoying as hell.

Oly fans have been begging OM for an update of the PenF. Ain't gonna get it. Such is Japan management.

f me. I'm over here shooting a doc with an EM10iii I bought used for $300 and thinking, "Dang, this looks pretty good!" And yet now I want an SL2. Damn you all.

Well, look, always has been. Trains are cool.

You joke, but I spent this summer getting my old Amiga 2500 back up and running and playing around with the VT. As for FC7. The best looking movie I ever made was cut in FC7 and shot with a LUMIX gx7, so....

Or if you fart within arms length of the rig. Looks cool when it work though.

Yeah, if a move isn't motivated, then...why do it? On the other hand, it's a lot of fun to actually and effectively realize motivated movement; movement that helps tell the story. When that happens you're now not just getting coverage, but doing things that start to get cinematic, imo. Been working on two documentaries this year and I've literally wanted to shake the camera-people that shot the footage and ask them how they like it. Spaztic shooting, very amateur hour. For the most part I don't use tripods these days for my own stuff, but I try to stay as quiet with the lens as possible. Still, I would have loved a heavy duty smooth-as-silk-Sachtler for some recent wildlife work where I was over (ffeq) 1500mm a lot. Had creative solutions to get me through, but something with excessive MASS would have been the exception to my typical "stay-mobile" attitudes.

I only have to assume you're editing this stuff too. Once you're trying to edit footage from an inexperienced shooter using stabilization, it'll drive you mad. So many good shots wasted by the false stabilization shift. "Oh! This looks like it's going to be nice pan to the... [image does an ugly shift/hitch] ... ah fuck!"

"The media completely lied about the election forecast" Yet I was out here voting and worried about Harris winning. Why's that? All the reported polling forecasts I was reading about had it at a statistical tie. All polls were within the margin of error with many polls showing Donald trending to a slight lead. I was incredulous about it being so close going into election day because it's Donald, and, you know, all he does, how he behaves, and all the ridiculous authoritarianism he represents, but never thought for a minute the election wasn't a toss up. After all, eggs cost more now. All MSM I saw was reporting these fact. Lo and behold, look what happened. So, friend, where's the lie in that? What media do you consume that implies otherwise? And, bare with me here, could that particular narrative potentially be what is not true? The stories we tell ourselves. Ever curious. I suppose a good story always needs a bad guy?

There it is. As it was as it shall be. It's just fast as hell these days because of tech. I like to lean into Robert Persig's philosophy of "metaphysics of quality" outlined in Zen and The Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. If true, then there's always going to be a cultural inherent yearning for things that transcend the bullshit. Now, I lean into it because I WANT it to be possible... But, as you say, (and Persig does as well) there's also always going to be people that can't appreciate it. Who wins out in this modern world? Hell if I know, but I know what team I'm on.

Well, I'll tell you what, there ain't no way I'm laying the blame at the feet of labor in regards to the state of the biz here in SoCal. Any objective analysis of the industry over this past decade will reveal a much more complex narrative than the recent labor dispute. There's a bunch of chapters of that particular story that should focus on the board rooms foremost. Funny how that narrative has a hard time sticking in the popular media landscape, yeah?