Benjamin Hilton

Yeah, test test test. I don't have a lot of experience with the original a7s, but I'd imagine nailing your white balance and exposure will help you out a lot. Seems to go a really long way with the older mirrorless cameras.

Yeah I had the same concern watching YT reviews before I bought an R7, I think it's mainly the users though, not the camera. I have both the R7 and the Lumix S1 plus som GH5s. Definitely a bit lower DR on the Canon compared to the S1, but not a big deal overall. Watching where you put your exposure and doing a good rolloff curve in post is much more important than actual numbers in my opinion when it comes to DR though. Seems pretty close to the GH5s IMO

I know the feeling...not a m4/3 fan myself, but the feeling of an era coming to an end with letting go of beloved camera systems. For me it was my FS100, I got so much out of that camera over hundreds of projects it still holds a special place of nostalgia in my heart, even though it was technically a terrible camera in many ways.

Honesty stuff like this makes me wish Apple would take their phone processing and put it into a super 35 sensor one of these days...Can you imagine if we had modern smart phone processing in a quality Sony chip?

Yeah totally. I would venture to guess though that they put in more effort trying to shoot on an iphone for Tangerine than they would have put in with literally any camera. Plus they couldn't have replicated the look with literally any other camera and a decent colorist. It was basically about the unique idea, which is fine, just not a good reason to shoot other projects on a phone, unless you are getting paid by Apple or something to do it

Kind of like Gerber dropping commercials "proving" they can build a house with a multi tool. You probably can, but if you are going to all the trouble of building, for goodness sake go out and buy yourself a real drill and tape measure. You'll thank yourself a thousand times over.

That's kind of the thing. Phones can look great, but overall are really tough to film anything serious with. For stuff like Kye is doing and with the right post processing, they can look great. But for more serious narrative or doc work, they are really the wrong tool for the job. Weird HDR, internal storage limitations, overheating, warpy stabilization, hard to manual focus, lens limitations, ND filter hangups, the list goes on and on. If it's all you have, use it. But I would never recommend buying a phone as a camera specifically. You can basically sink that $600-800 into any basic DSLR setup and not only get a better image, but also save yourself a world of headache with actual usability.

This is 100% spot on. I have a workflow I use for specific cameras. My standard color science is dropped onto my 5" monitor via LUT. In post I apply the same color science with minimal corrections. Sometimes I go on to do a specific grade, but 90% of the time I stick with that because it looks fantastic. This workflow is really awesome because I can really trust what I see on the monitor and fix problems in camera as I go.

IBIS is way too useful of a tool to give up. It's not a replacement for anything, all old school tools still have their place, it's just another really useful tool at times. For doc work I can't tell you how many times I would have killed to have some form of IBIS on a shot and didn't have it back in the day. I do steadicam and tripod work a lot, but I can't tell you how amazing it has been to be able to grab a shot at 200mm with the camera balanced on my knee or pressed up against a wall and it actually look rock solid with IBIS.

I shoot and edit professional content all day long. While I would love to upgrade to a Red Komodo, or Fx6 or something, I'm still using GH5s, G85s, an S1, etc because I can't really justify the costs of upgrading. It would be fun, but I know the films I'm working on would be much better off dropping that 10k into production instead of gear. I just shot an entire $50k doc on an S1 and Canon R6 and am totally happy with the final look. Realistically I think if I get a new camera in the next couple of years, it will be a FS7 or something. Solid image like the S1, just beautiful ergonomics for doc work. Every time I use one it just feels like driving a luxury car... Not necessarily a good business decision, but purely for the joy of use. Not so hard of on the wallet thankfully used these days too. While upgrading gear is really fun, I think at the end of the day sticking with the same stuff for years on end is the best thing you can do for your image quality, especially if you are working with something decent (like anything made in the last five years)

I think one side to this whole thing is the fact that for some of us we focus on the other aspects of the business all day long: business, pitching, writing, editing etc. Sometimes having a place to discuss cameras and lights and stuff is just plain fun and relaxing, somewhat pointless, but fun nonetheless.

I'd give up resolution, viewfinder, any type of raw, photo capabilities. In my book the perfect camera would 14+ stops of real dynamic range, solid 4k up to 120fps, good IBIS, autofocus, ND filters... The only things that hits really close to all of that is the Sony FX6, but it's a bit out of what I can afford. Thinking of picking up a used FS7 one of these days as the prices come down

Honestly something like this would probably do you fine: https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/842086-REG/Magnus_VT_4000_VT_4000_Tripod_System.html

Yeah this is really accurate. People use the term "filmic" to describe something wide in variance. Are we talking about 1950s film, 1970s, slide photography, modern 35mm stock etc etc. I'm actually not a huge fan of the crazy 16mm filmic look that's popular right now, nor the 1970s look. I don't mind most modern 35mm stocks (Kodak 8323 and such) a whole lot, but kind of prefer a more modern clean grade overall.

Here are just a few of the projects I've created recently