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More people have Shotlists and Schedules than Scripts? Really? How does the logic of that work?

My understanding is that in terms of internal vs external they can be quite different. As an example the XH internal is 4K 8-bit 4:2:0 at up to 200Mbit, but the HDMI output sends out 4K 8-bit 4:2:2 which the recorder can then save in whatever format and bitrate it supports. Another example to prove the point is that the Sony RX0 can only record 1080 internally but outputs 4K so if you use an external recorder you can record in 4K with it, so they can be quite different.

Wouldn't that be for after the shoot? If you drink it before the shoot then you'd be far too relaxed, having too good a time, not be paying attention to annoying people....... hang on a minute - I think you might be onto something here!!

All companies must use the profit from their existing sales to invest in the next product or service that will take over from their existing offerings, otherwise they'll lose market share and eventually fail. This happens across all industries, but at different speeds. Slow change tends to make people say "when I got my first job it was different then", moderate change is "I worked as a X, but then there was less demand and so I re-trained as a Y", and fast change is when you are competing in an industry where multiple people have an annual product release cycle but products take longer than a year to design. This is the modern electronics market. Super fast change is in fashion or software where what is hot today is worth very little in months or weeks time. Product cycles are so short in fashion that it's now called Disposable Fashion. https://www.npr.org/2016/04/08/473513620/what-happens-when-fashion-becomes-fast-disposable-and-cheap ""It used to be four seasons in a year; now it may be up to 11 or 15 or more," says Tasha Lewis, a professor at Cornell University's Department of Fiber Science and Apparel Design." GoPro is a one-trick pony, as demonstrated by the relatively poor performance of their drone and 360 camera shows, their only non-action-camera products.

I think @Mokara was just pointing out that if you're shooting 60p then the camera only has 1000ms/60 = 16.7ms to capture a frame before the next frame needs to have started, otherwise the camera won't be keeping up with 60 fps. Your point about sensor temperature is well made though, as I would imagine it has to do with the clock speeds that the processors need to run at, and faster clock speeds often mean running chips at higher voltages, which means more heat, more overheating issues, reliability issues, and power consumption. Considering the battery requirements there's no wonder the RS on the Sony a6300 etc is so bad!

Thanks @Orangenz @Trek of Joy @graphicnatured That takes it down to the Yi 4k as the budget option, FDR-X3000 (what a name!), and the GoPro. The short version seems to be that the Yi 4K and GoPro do all the modes (4K60 and 2.7K120) but don't have IS and the X3000 has IS, higher bitrates but "only" does 4K30 and 1080p120. This would mean that I'd have to decide before hitting the record button what I want in slow-motion and what I don't, which I'm fine with. My iPhone 8 has OIS and 4K60 which I can use for dry shots I'm taking, with the GoPro being for wet shots or when I hand it over to others. Resolve has built-in Optical Flow frame retiming so I can fake slow-motion for short shots too. I think that the IS probably counts for more than getting extra resolution at a given frame rate, considering that I am ok with 1080 quality on some/all shots. IS is especially useful for low-light when the camera decides to use a 359 degree shutter and micro-vibrations blur each frame to hell. In that situation a 1080 capture with IS will have more resolution than 4K without it. Now the decision is really when to buy one. Come the September announcements we'll either get nothing, a new X3000 (yes please!!), or a new GoPro/Yi camera (or the BM action camera... hint hint). I'm not sure how much use an action camera will get between now and then considering it gets cold down under during this part of the year.

Yeah, I looked for an option to make the poll so you could complete it multiple times but no such option exists, thus why I said "typical". Many here are versatile

I'm sure you will get lots of advice / opinions from others on here, but here's a few thoughts: Before you choose technical aspects or equipment you should understand what your customers requirements are (eg, broadcast standards etc) and make sure you comply to those You mention getting an external recorder, but then ask about camera codecs - maybe try and get clear about if you're going to use an external recorder or not first as if you are then the internal recording formats on the camera won't matter but the HDMI/SDI? output will All cameras in this league (ILC, weatherproof) will deliver a good image, so perhaps there are other factors like ergonomics that are more important here? If you are carrying this stuff up and down mountains in the rain and then don't want to use it then that's a fundamental issue - the image quality of a shot you didn't take is zero, and if you're annoyed and fighting with the equipment all the time for an extra bit of data-rate then your quality of life will be much lower too. Often cameras have quirky little features that can really make them great to use in your particular situation - I'd try and read reviews of the cameras written by people who shoot where and how you are going to because they'll have worked out all the little things, and also will have tried to minimise the setup as much as possible with batteries and charging and media management etc. In terms of the technical aspects the 8-bit vs 10-bit debate is raging with knowledgeable and convincing arguments on all sides - this thread could go for hundreds of posts on this alone. Also, bitrate matters, but what matters more is how much motion there is for the bitrate to describe. Locked off tripod shots require much less bit depth than fast action shots. With todays cameras you're really choosing between options that are all at least 7 out of 10, so there are no bad choices, just some are slightly better than others.

I was going to make a joke about why the BMPCC4K isn't in there.... but it is! https://camerasize.com/compact/#698.613,698.366,782.5,ha,t just for fun I put the Panasonic 14mm f2.5 pancake lens on it :D

I've seen a few pocket cameras like you describe put microphones on the front of the camera to try and get a bit more directional audio and some footage taken in a public place seemed pretty good actually, so it's possible to make a camera that doesn't need external audio. A product like that would be very compact and well suited for vlogging as well as normal video

There is a deep divide in the vlogging community about where the flip screen should be.. those that use in-camera sound and prefer the screen flips over the top because it looks more natural if they look at the screen while shooting, and those that use an external microphone which is mounted in the hot-shoe of the camera and therefore they prefer a side-flipping screen like Canon. .....then there are the Sony shooters, who focus on their hand and then just stare into their 16-35 hoping they're in frame!!!

In a recent discussion people were surprised about what level of planning others did / didn't do before a shoot. I'm aware of forum members working on high-end commercial sets, those working with small teams, solo-shooters, and people using 'found footage' without even any actors. I though it might be fun to make a poll and we can see if it reveals anything interesting. I've probably missed some things, but ce la vie!

Thanks mate! Yes, still using the Hero 3 because it didn't get enough use to justify paying the entire purchase price again for a newer model that is, maybe, 3% better! To be honest it kind of sat without getting much usage until recently, when I shot two parties, and on my recent trip we went swimming a bunch of times and got used heavily there too, thus my renewed interest. Is your pole the GoPole? If not, it might be worth checking if there's a hidden 1/4-20 in there somewhere - the cheap GoPro accessories often have 1/4-20 with an adapter mounted on top that you can just remove. Considering the enormous market for tripods / monopods / etc there might be a nice $15 replacement available on amazon? Or, if you're a bit handy, there are millions of hugely functional accessories and mounts that can be made from practically any hardware store I made a modular rig for stabilising the GoPro underwater out of something like 20mm PVC piping with a handful of T-pieces that are just friction-fit. PVC is slightly denser than water so it sinks and I worked out that if I adjusted the angle on things properly I could drop the GoPro from snorkelling depth and it would slowly descend and then settle on the bottom, with beautiful framing of a piece of coral with fish coming and going! Then you just leave it there for a minute or two and then dive down and go get it, then in post you choose the best moments of fish action

That's an interesting point. Many of the reasons it's not suitable for me (as a specialist camera) make it more suitable for the average consumer. Phones still have huge screens and are already in your pocket, but the 19mm lens does help somewhat.

This thread suddenly got very useful!! and the BMPCC4K seems to just get better and better with more information released...!

As someone with a pretty average life (job, family, house, car, etc) who shoots with my GoPro a lot I actually disagree about them being good for family events. They're wide angle, which means that you have to either zoom in, which is pretty difficult to hold them remotely still (unless you rig them up, in which case just use a larger camera with IS) or film everything close up, which is kind of strange and the lens distortions are EXTREMELY UNFLATTERING to average people (who don't have the figures of models or people used to seeing themselves on TV). I actually agree with @Kisaha that the best cameras for recording normal life is the smartphone, as it has many of the advantages but also lots less disadvantages. Also, I think that action cameras are cameras that require huge amounts of editing to get good end results from. You film things close up, film things that are moving quickly (either in slow-mo or real-time), put them over fast music and do a fast edit with lots of cuts. That's the GoPro aesthetic. I think this video proves that: In researching a replacement for my GoPro I was reading forums about potential other cameras, and one person said their camera recorded nice quality at first but later on in the file the quality reduced. One of the replies was to only shoot short clips because "long clips are really boring" - obviously that person assumed the clips wouldn't be edited at all! Last month I shot a film at a club for a friends birthday (I posted it in the GoPro replacement thread) and I shot it with my GoPro precisely because I didn't want to pass my phone to drunken adults in a club. Plus I wouldn't have gotten my DJI Osmo Mobile 2 past security - they took a few long looks at my Bobber handle that I had on it. Completely agree. I did actually go swimming with my iPhone 8 deliberately at the beach when I first got it as I was wondering if I could replace my GoPro with it. I haven't edited the footage yet, but I can tell you the 1080p240 at 400% quality from MoviePro app looks absolutely spectacular in full-afternoon-sun, the screen only worked sometimes, and it took a few hours to dry out afterwards before it would charge properly again. I actually did what you're not meant to do and I plugged it in to charge, so it should have killed something but I was lucky. With your phone you don't have anything else to carry, you get a nice large screen (huge by camera standards), you can edit in-camera, and you can upload direct from the device. Action cameras require SD card adapters a full computer or hours of file transfer time, and all the stuffing around that keeps an army of post-production staff employed around the world. I have a big camera with zoom lens which is good for everything except being discrete (or wider than 24mm), my phone which is very discreet but no zoom, and my GoPro which is waterproof and very wide. In this sense it's a specialist camera used for very particular things.

The gyroscope stabilisation sounds interesting. I've done tests in the past and found that basically there are two levels of stabilisation required: stabilisation that limits small/fast movement while the shutter is open (creating blur - this can only be solved by OIS or IBIS), and stabilisation that keeps shot-to-shot movement at bay (where gyroscopes, warp stabiliser style stabilisation, gimbals, and to a certain extent OIS / IBIS can help). I noticed on the above video that there's a need for both levels of stabilisation. I use Resolve for the shot-to-shot stabilisation, but with these videos fast-paced edits are the norm and so movement isn't as detracting as other styles of films. Interesting, but I think the 1.4x zoom is too severe for me.. Pity! I didn't realise that this had a waterproof case - that makes a huge difference. I've just watched a bunch of review videos on this and I think this is the leading option for me at the moment. The fact that iPhonedo YT channel continually uses this as part of his run-and-gun setup for reviewing other cameras (including all the major action cameras) speaks volumes about the quality level. Also the higher bitrate would be excellent because with action cameras you're normally moving them around all the time so the bits aren't just dedicated to a few items in the frame moving, they're spread across the whole frame moving constantly. The lack of screen doesn't phase me (it's an action camera, so you point it vaguely in the right direction and you're good) but there's a remote screen for it which you can buy. Any idea if it's about to get an upgrade? I did some googling but couldn't find much about it, and it seems that sonyrumours has turned into some kind of news site ? In terms of GoPro Hero 6 I watched a few reviews where it was worse than the 5, so if I didn't end up with a Sony FDR-X3000 then I might consider waiting for the Hero 6+ which should be out Just In Time For Christmas, I'd imagine. Considering that the FDR-X3000 is approaching 1.5 years old (it was also out Just In Time For Christmas) it might be worth waiting in either case. If only the RX0 had a wider lens and 200Mbit codec.... (or if BM releases the Black Magic Matchbox Cinema Action Camera 4K.. hint hint... It would shoot in Prores and have BM colour science and be called the BMMCAC4K. With an acronym like that I bet they're making it already!)

Thanks mate! You're right that it was in the protective case - in a previous video I did someone kept kissing the lens so it was much easier to deal with. I tried to be really careful and clean the lens and both inside and outside of the case, but looks like I didn't succeed. It looked pretty clean though beforehand and during This was Protune with Cam RAW WB but I think that's the limit to optimising it. The Protune 2.0 settings seem useful and having the NR in camera turned off would be an improvement, although I'm not sure if having more noise or NR before the low bit-rate codec would be better. I may be the first person to suggest this (but maybe not) - but BM should make an action camera!!! Thanks! If I could use a larger non-waterproof camera then my GF3 m43 camera wouldn't be sitting in my drawer gathering dust The Sony seems excellent but it's just the lens isn't wide enough. Maybe I should see if there's a mod?

Despite having lots of nice cameras, I find that I've used my GoPro Hero 3 consistently over the last 5 years, but I'm frustrated with the quality and looking to replace it. My critical requirements are: Waterproof Very wide angle (~17mm or wider) Half-decent low-light performance Relatively small form factor (for hand-holding - doesn't have to be wearable) 4K or high bitrate 1080 (lots of movement causes compression artefacts galore) Doesn't have to have a screen I use it for shooting while swimming and for parties. The combination of waterproof, wide-angle and small means that people can pass it around and using it as a selfie-camera can still get themselves in shot, it doesn't freak out other people at the beach or whatever (it's still borderline though), and can be used in clubs or private venues without getting hassled by security (security had a couple of good looks at my gopro with "bobber" handle, but probably more concerned with its ability to be used as a weapon). Here are some issues I have with the Hero 3 - from a shoot about a month ago in a club: Overpowering flares (I wonder if this is my camera being old and having some coatings fail or something? if not then this may be common to other cameras though) High ISO and bad compression problems (these shots are already processed with with HEAVY NR in Resolve using masks and edge detection etc - original files are much worse!) I still got a good video out of it but it would be nice to have a bump in IQ.. It doesn't have to be a huge improvement but just something that doesn't make me disappointed every time I'm looking at the raw footage The wide-angle and ability to film lots of cool camera angles really suits the style of film. Final video: Candidates I've considered. GoPro Hero 6 - possible, but I'm not sure if the ISO performance will be much better? Expensive. GoPro Hero 5 Session - I like that it's tiny, but unsure about ISO performance? Can't exchange batteries, so battery life might be an issue? Reasonably priced. Yi 4k+ - unsure about ISO performance? RX0 - not wide angle enough, expensive. Any ideas or advice?

Wow, this thread is getting hard to keep up with.. is everyone hammering away on their phones or is everyone retired or between client jobs or something?? That's kind of like saying that Audi had too much of a hand in taming the latest Lamborghini and so you're going to be happy with your Ferrari and just pickup a second hand Lotus Elise to go to the shops and whatever...!!!! Agreed. As a Resolve user I would also say that the fact they're coming from the same manufacturer is also a significant plus for me. In terms of this camera being so flexible (and therefore requiring all the work to be done in post) the fact that Resolve will be optimised to handle the footage well in terms of the formats, colour science, etc takes a significant amount of the risk out of it for me. If instead we were talking about ML, then Resolve has no camera RAW, no support for the colour science, etc. (Sorry for the empty multi-quote Django - for some reason I can't remove the last quote from you.. )

I agree with your analysis, however don't mistake overall trends with niche markets or individuals. If there's a niche that is unfulfilled and the OP fills it, it could work well. In terms of how risky it is, that's something for the OP to assess.

Yeah, and I think I've said before that the more flexible something is the harder it is to get what you want. On a sliding scale between using Instagram (which 3-year olds can do) and shooting ARRIRAW (where professional colourists are required), this is at the difficult end and requiring the colourist skillset, however the killer aspect of this camera is that its price is at the Instagram end.

Yes - they could well be. On this note, it might be interesting to include a 360 camera in your setup (even just rent one perhaps) and take it to a few cool locations and put them up for sale and see how you go. Considering you're going to all the trouble of going places to film anyway it might not be a huge addition to your costs. 360 is another whole thing and requires different shooting techniques (from what I understand you need to set up the camera on a monopod hit record and then go hide for the time it's recording).

At the risk of getting flamed (yet again) for posting logic instead of camera specifications, here is my take on it. You are talking about starting a business - therefore this is a business question not just a technical question You should be choosing your equipment based upon two factors: what type of files will sell, and what it will cost you to get those files to market I have spoken to a few people who make money from stock footage (I'm not an expert by any means) but what I was told is that a few clips will sell like hot-cakes and the majority will hardly sell at all, and you can never predict which is which, so you basically try and output as many clips as possible to maximise your chances. They also said that things can sit and sell solidly for years, decades sometimes (I got told about real examples of stills imagery doing this). It's a long game that takes ages to build income but can have a return that also lasts a long time, your historical content also supports longevity of sales. So my recommendation about what will sell is to future proof yourself with formats. 4K was a dream only recently and now my phone does 4K60 - these things change quickly. More resolution might be useful for things other than broadcast standards (3d trackers for example love resolution). The cost of your camera is only a small part of the total time to identify locations, research best shooting times of day and seasons, arrange permission and releases, travel there, setup, shoot, as well as all the post-production, media management, and management of a sales pipeline. In terms of what it costs to get files to market you should consider what formats might be easier to handle in post. If you're shipping the files straight-out-of-camera then it's a question of what the sites you're selling on or end-customers will require, otherwise you should consider what transcoding or other conversions are required. Not all media standards are created equal. I hope this proves useful - and best of luck finding those winning clips that sell regularly and turning this into a profitable venture!

IIRC the fashion is to have shallow depth of field but the killer technique with Sony users (no front-facing screen there either!) is to extend your arm out with fingers pointed up and focus on them, as when holding the camera that's the same focus distance as hand to your face.. :D In reply to the above and also in general, we're in (yet another) situation where worlds collide. World #1 is people who shoot RAW and see the camera as a tiny cinema camera. In this sense SDI > HDMI and professional standards > consumer standards. World #2 is people who want the 'best' ILC camera for under $2000. In this sense, HDMI > SDI, consumer standards > professional standards, and front-facing buttons/screens/etc are nice features to have. Neither world is wrong, it's just that before the DSLR revolution and YouTube these two worlds had never touched before. Now they're in full collision mode. Camera companies are trying to make products that appeal to both worlds and failing to connect, and both worlds look each other up and down then go back to whispering in separate groups like 10-year-olds in the school-yard. In a decade we'll have worked out how big the market for online video is, how many people it can sustain at the various levels of quality, and what products make sense. At the moment it's a mess, where the 'best vlogging camera' debate includes your phone, the RX100, the Canon M50, the Sony A7III, and the Pocket 2. Any application that includes tools as varied as that lineup should indicate that we still haven't worked out what the hell is going on yet.