fuzzynormal

We did our little schlock horror romp in 2009 with the XH-A1. No complaints. Stills here if you're curious. I duno. Seems to hold up fine for what it is. Certainly was good enough. It's just a damn camera after all. As a person on a film festival selection committee all I can say is that I share such a sentiment. Man, I have to watch a lot of movies. These days most stuff looks technically decent IQ-wise. It's rare to see a filmmaker with a unique storytelling or visual "voice" however. There's a lot of film festival movies that are adequate. Not many that are awesome...or that even have some sort of juice to them. For example, I liked this particular film, and my colleagues on the selection committee hated it. But, it's got a little something going by perverting the horror tropes and is pretty creative, I think, in how it tells its story. Finding something like that is so much more important than how the image holds up.

The notion of this thread is wonderful. Exploitation B-movies are something to love if you have the sensibility to tolerate it. Failed earnestness is compelling. Some filmmakers (like me and my friends around a decade ago) have employed "ironic" mimicry for affect... barely making a comptent movies ourselves! But, when it's just a legitimately incompetence fueled dumpster file, man, that's awesome. I'm a member of a film festival and this year we're screening an utterly crap-tacular film by one of the most inept filmmakers I've ever seen. Ed Wood stuff. He's one of those guys where he's so bad it's good. He's actually legendary among cinifiles that follow horrible exploitation b-movies. His sensibilities are so un-pc it's embarrassing. The reason it's in our festival is 'kuz he's local and shot some scenes in our community and he knows the committee chairman. Be that as it may, it's still such a piece of nonsense that it's going to reflect poorly on our festival and we'll take an embarrassing hit for screening it. Filmfests are always political. Regardless, no one goes into a "legit" filmfest expecting to see such blatant inadequacy on screen. To give you an idea how shitty this movie is, he wrote a third of the film specifically to revolve around bad 16mm stock footage. He shot that footage for one of his movies in 1979. He's literally been making this movie for the better part of 4 decades. On the other hand, there's a film in our fest made by a 17 year old that would make y'all poop your pants in shame it's so visually miraculous.

Having a really good prime lens probably matters more than the camera, TBH. Especially for portraits. Being a good portrait photographer is mostly about the relationship of shooter and subject --and the photographer's ability at the craft. Anyone that thinks the camera is the most important piece of the portrait puzzle, well... I'd just have to up and disagree with 'em, that's all.

Any FF camera with a fast 85mm lens would be the best option. However, FWIW, my nephew shot my wedding with a GM1 and the Oly 45mm f1.8; pix turned out better than the "pro" we hired.

Sometimes I wonder if certain folks (maybe not the OP) buy these cameras, shoot the kit lens @ f5.6, and then are concerned why their fancy new "lowlight" kit is not all that great.

I always had a lot of fun with my GM1 and GX7. Shot a ton of video with both. Also took a crazy amount of RAW photos with the GM1. Had tiny Pentax a110 prime lenses on it. Mostly used the 25mm lens. Just a great travel cam. Not saying that sort of thing is for everybody, but I sure enjoyed it.

Used LUMIX

So, video on the G9 comes up a tad short compared to the GH5. The video specs ain't as elaborate. However, as far as I'm concerned, the claimed improvement of G9's IS to 6.5 stops might mitigate those perceived shortcomings. If the G9 could perform closer to what Olympus offers in IS, then that alone makes it slightly superior for actually acquiring footage than a GH5. Of course, that's my perception/preference based on how and what I typically shoot. Personally, I'd take better IS over anything else. Intense pixel peeping is for folks that want to do that. So LOG and high bitrates for them is great. I do think that with dslr shooters there's just way too much over-emphasis on the IQ minutia, and not enough practice of just plain old good shooting/composition. I really doubt that I'll ever have a client in my world that complains about 12 stop vs. 13 stop dynamic range. And, as long as it's the ballpark, they sure don't give a crap about skin tone either. That sort of discrimination among low-budget productions is just unrealistic. They will, however, recognize that a poorly shot video with crappy b-roll is a poorly shot video with crappy b-roll. Bad shooting aesthetics is what it is. If you can't manage to get the footage, and tell a good story with it, then what's the point if it's technically pristine? The G9's auto focus is supposedly improved too, but that doesn't matter to me. I shoot manual glass. I'm more interested in what a camera is going to be able to do for me and my way of shooting while I'm in the field. This is why I've always had a soft spot for my old Olympus EM5II. Not great on specs, but just a good field camera that allowed me to do some insane stuff completely handheld. While I appreciate Panasonic's attempt at IS and OIS, it's not near as good as what Olympus offers. And, to be clear, IS isn't the end-all-be-all for shooting. It's a tool and a preference. Sometimes I like shooting handheld without IS; just depends on the project. These tools are cheap, so it comes down to "what can you offer me right now?" I'm not really projecting using any camera beyond a year. Why would I worry about some HDR tool if that's not even something I need to consider? Now, as a current GH5 owner, I'm only using the GH5 within the same specs range as a G9. No GH5 LOG modes or insanely high bitrates for me. Thus, a G9 looks like a rather decent camera IMHO. I'm not in the market for a camera right now, but if I was I'd give the G9 serious consideration...along with whatever Olympus can put up against it.

I've experienced the opposite with my G85 clips. Weird weird weird.

I've thought about buying. Even a few years ago when 30k used seemed viable. I'm old enough to consider an Alexa a small camera compared to what I used to shoot, so that's not a big worry. But finacially it's silly. My productions don't justify it. Its just that I'm doing docs. And small cinema verite docs don't need a big camera. A big Arri cam would also just get in the way "emotionally" by demanding attention. IQ to make you weep with joy, but I'll take the hit to use a mirror less cam...and shoot breezily all day long. For commercials or up market corporate I'd rent.

I attempted Optimized Media (aka: proxies) last year with Resolve and it bombed spectacularly. Missing clips, failed encoding, crashes, etc. This was with the freebie version on a decently beefy PC system. I was trying to make a 1080p edit from .mp4 4K footage. Anyone got testimony regarding Resolve's "optomized" transcoding reliability these days? Eventually, I'd love to get onto Resolve to edit, but can't do it without practical proxy editing. In the meantime, Premiere is my desk. Which is pretty "meh." Works, but not in love with it.

360. I used to assume it was 0 too. Got "gently" told online that was untrue. ;-) Still, makes chronological sense that it kinda should be 0, doesn't it? Anyway, don't use 360 'less you really like it. The look is very distinct.

Well, that's perfectly fine, but distribution consideration are hardly the best reasons to make a decision about one's story. My critique (granted, very much in-articulated) was that the material felt like it would only need half the time to be productive. The story is redundant in places.

Make it 4 minutes and you'll be good.

I ended up with BOAN after buying an extensive Criterion Collection 20 years ago. I didn't even watch it all the way through, but did check out the scenes noted for inventive craft. I watched it simply for the academic acknowledgment of "oh yeah, I can see where that technique came from." During the viewing, for whatever it's worth, the sentiment of "Jesus, these guys were racist ass holes," was also part of the mix.

I'd politely suggest that some reflection is in order as well as a reconsideration of racist allegations. My thoughts about BOAN have been qualified. Stating a reality of nascent film making should not lead to being accused of racism. That's an unfair conflating of two very disparate things. It's not cool and it's not intellectually honest. I mean, hate the film as much as you want and refuse to watch it. Tell others it's your personal belief that it deserves to be ignored. But also be fair and nice to people trying to have a good-faith conversation. Being fair and nice to people is a considerate thing to do, and making charges of racism at people without a legit reason ain't exactly nice. Beyond that, if you're only willing to look at films made by saints then you're going to be waiting awhile. Ironic case in point, check out the director's back story on "Birth of a Nation" --not the 1913 film, the 2016 film.

For me, it's not a debate about what sort of lens offers better IQ. Rather, it's that 1 or 2 focal lengths for an entire production offers a sense of visual cohesiveness. The limitation of focal length, and shooting a manual lens, is ultimately an asset. It's just a notion I currently have and it's where I'm at personally with how I shoot my stuff.

GH5 with Voigtlander 25mm and 42.5mm primes. For this job: f-stop almost always @f1.4. The fps is 23.98. The shutter speed is 25. CinelikeD 0,-5,-5,0,0 is the profile. And don't forget there's a low-quality variable ND filter in the mix too. --Afterwards color is tweaked in post with Magic Bullet Looks. It's their Kodak 520-7 filmstock setting with some of their B&W film grain added. And then, with Premiere, Lumetri is then used so the colors in the blacks and whites are desaturated with a roll off. So, yeah, it's a certain sort of weird recipe for the end result.

Of course not. You're completely right. My comment is my opinion. As mentioned, there's probably not much chance that those chasing great IQ and the most flexible shooting possibilities would look at my work and style as an example of "the best" in any way, shape or form. I'm not that sort of filmmaker and that's okay. Point is, all this stuff is wildly subjective. No one knows if the OP is going to develop their own visual style or not --of if they're going to embrace a certain lens or camera. Personally, my bag(s) used to be overloaded with lenses and various cameras and, weirdly, it all just got in the way of shooting for me. Kinda decided not to care a ton about that eventually. These days a more organic "sloppy" style is my preference, for better or worse. Does my stuff have manual focusing going on and a human twisting the lens hunting for sharpness? Oh yeah...like that too. https://www.dropbox.com/s/6pu9i85hbszuhrb/NISA-INSTAGRAM.mp4?dl=0 That's an example of a test promo done yesterday for quick hit social media; shot on the GH5 with Voigtlander 25mm and 42.5mm primes. Check out what a 360 degree shutter does to mush up the image. There was also variable ND filters on the glass which adds all sorts of welcomed, IMHO, issues to the image. Is what's going on there appropriate for the OP needs? Probably not, but sharing my process offers context. It shows what some other random guy in the community is doing. OP can take it or leave it. BTW, the color for that vid above is done with Magic Bullet Looks. Does anyone here still use MB Looks?

Yeah. It's easy to zoom in, set focus, then pull back to your shot. Takes less than a second.

If photos are a big chunk of the job, I say yes to that. I made a living for a while with the trusty Canon 24-70 f2.8 and a 5D. Flexible and easy. For my video productions, I prefer to stick to 1 prime as much as possible. I do like my stuff to look different. I also employ 360 shutter. Not many shooters do that. I'm sure a lot of pixel peeping folks would check out my work and find unforgivable issues with it. That's okay. Anyway, as such, take any of my advice with a grain of salt. What I like to do is probably a bit atypical.

I'm of the opinion that 1 focal length is not only perfectly adequate for certain docs, it can be preferred. It really creates a cohesive aesthetic. FF eq. of 50mm is my particular sweet spot. Thats me. I shoot for simplicity. OP is asking about making it small and light...well...

I luuuuv primes. Ain't gonna apologize for it. Dudes running around with zooms end up with stuff that look like it was shot by dudes running around with zooms. Too many focal lengths in a production; don't find that at all flattering. Fine for some fast-work stuff, but my personal efforts are always done on primes.

FWIW, I do all those types of videos too and I've been content minimizing my gear. It's now basically a GH5 and three prime lenses combined with Sennhieser's ew100 wireless audio system. I also have a DJI mavic, but don't use it too much. When I want to move the camera, I just walk. It all fits in one bag. Works for me.

For sure, consideration of BOAN as a vanguard film could be US-centric. Which is poetic. The US often is simultaneously spectacular and horrible. Still, what other films were happening in 1914 that were significantly defining the future of the genre? I don't really know very early Euro films. When did the Passion of Joan of Arc come out? It was much later, I think- a late 20's film? Same with Battleship Potemkin? And, yes, Citizen Kane is masterful, but it also had, what, three more decades of tech advancement and craft honing before it was made? To give an idea how BOAN is riviled and revered here in the States, look to 2016's "The Birth of a Nation" and how/why that film deliberately appropriated the title.