kye

I just close my eyes and hope for the best. 

Datacolor Spyder 4, every couple of months.  Old but still gets me in the ballpark.

I watched unsane last night and didn’t think it looked that bad - at the beginning. I actually though that it gave a certain docu style to it, and some parts even looked awesome to my eyes. Of course it didn’t look like a normal Hollywood movie - A bit like an art film, a filmSchool project or like a lot of other indies which have gone on to great reviews. In the last part of the movie it was like the picturestyle fell apart and the limitations of the phone became an distractions to the story.
Tangerine was shot on a IPhone 5s and a Moondog adapter, and it looks great. 
 
To sum up: if you are planning on shooting weeding or the next charter in the Transformers saga then maybe your phone it not the camera you should choose. However, if you are working on an indie story-driven piece then I don’t think a phone is necesarraly the wrong choice. It gives the film a certain autentic look and then it all comes down to the storyline and style and working within it limitations.
In the end, it is all about the story - and if your story isn’t good enough to be told through a phone then maybe one should spend more time improving the story, than thinking about getting a better camera. And if one doesn’t already own a camera the maybe the money is better spend on other movie-related items than on an expensive camera. Better to get a great story told with a IPhone, than not to get it told at all. 

The GF1 had a real following.. I read a few reviews that loved the ergonomics when I was buying my GF3.  I think the GF1 had a button combination that worked well for some people, and they're seriously small and solidly built.  I'm not sure about the GF1, but my GF3 has a metal body, which was excellent considering I dropped it once and it slightly wrinkled the corner and that was it - a few more mm of damage would have damaged the LCD screen!

Here’s my video review on the speed booster I got from a previous thread. Just posting here so we don’t have multiple M50 threads. 
Speed booster really solves the issues with the 4K crop. I wish Metabones would make an “XL” version for EF-M so it takes the 4K crop to proper super35. But still, the .71x isn’t too bad.
 

I tend to agree that phones will eventually take over a segment of filmmaking. And if I remember correctly Soderberg said he would definitely consider shooting more films on an iPhone. I’ve been saying this for a while... future filmmakers do not care about the technical elements as much as we do. If you make your living working on films or videography, your world will change in a few years. 
Hell look that this forum alone... there are an increasing number of posts from newbies asking which camera they should get to start shooting weddings or corporate. People are jumping into this field without much prior knowledge and eventually phones will be more than capable enough to fill those technical roles. Right now I think the question is... which manufacturer will be the first to put a larger sensor into a phone? Apple? Samsung? Red? Hell I think Canon even has some new phone patents... get ready for the inevitable.
I, for one, am excited for this. I want to tell stories, so if that can be done on a phone with a small gimbal and a lens adapter... of some sort... Then why the hell not?

I mostly use the phone for cutaways and shots of my cameras while shooting. I like shots of cameras shooting, or someone shooting with a camera. Though its also great to grab a quick shot when you're walking around instead of taking the camera out of the bag. I also have a waterproof case, I've used the phone instead of a GoPro at times (wife and I snorkeled the Great Barrier Reef with just the iPhone). The stills below are similar to what I usually do with the phone.
Chris

Yeah I agree the that first video is too saturated for my tastes also. But that is a Apple thing apparently that most Normal" people really  like LoL. It states that there was No color correction done. I am sure a skilled colorist can make a iPhone look like a Arri if they want in this day and age. And I don't think you can really ignore, or dismiss them as a somewhat serious video and photo tool anymore. They can get the job done in a lot of situations. Low light, well not so much, but they do sell light you know. ?

I am never cutting edge with phones, but have just got a iPhone 7 plus and have a couple of observations. I have been using it to film barn owls in flight. OK that sounds a bit insane, but the direction of travel with this tech is clear. 1. Higher density sensor with improved digital zoom - at least for decent light conditions and HD resolution, and better processing for noise reduction. 2. Extra lenses - we already have 28mm, 56mm equiv. (I think) so why not 110? Blending the output of more than one camera opens up all sorts of possiblities. 3. Combined optical and digital stabilisation - filming at 6x zoom on my iPhone (is that around 180mm equiv?), one handed, and it is still remarkably smooth. 4. Usable, and suprisingly directional audio from a tiny microphone. 5. Very adequate, intelligent and responsive video AF. 
It isn't going to challenge the top of the range, but it will certainly push out a lot of the mid market competition.
 

And the large depth of field from the small sensor is an absolute boon when you need to keep the background magic trick in focus.
 

Maybe not for narrative film making but I see a lot of smartphones being used professionally by journalists in my work.
I remember being quite shocked when I first started seeing them being used a few years ago for reporter pieces to camera outside stadiums by "real" broadcast companies but its so commonplace now it doesn't even register.  I'm not talking just self shot pieces here either - though that happens as well - but a regular setup of a cameraman and a reporter, its just that the camera on the tripod is a smartphone instead of an ENG camera.
Typically, they'll be on a rig like this one 

What has really pushed it forward over recent years is the availability of good audio options and its even becoming more commonplace at press conferences I've been doing to see smartphones being connected directly to the audio split box to take the feed from the console. So standards don't have to drop just because the form factor and price of the gear you're using have.
Everything about them is becoming more sophisticated in terms of hardware and software (apps like LumaFusion are serious editing tools now and the Teradek Live:AIR products let you do multi cam broadcasts) and of course where they really win out is not just in the form factor but also in how fast they can get to air from anywhere.
So I can definitely say they have reached a point where you can do professional video work with them but the transition to "proper" film making (whatever that even means today) is always going to be hampered by the lens on the front of it.
If RED actually get it together in terms of a viable bolt on camera for the HYDROGEN then we might over time see it gain the same traction. I'm of a generation that sees a smartphone as a device whereas the people who will be making the films I watch in my retirement home see it as an extension of themselves. It is that ubiquity that will drive the change because to them, they do everything else on it so why wouldn't you make "real" films on it?
And to be honest, I have to say that dealing with a fixed device that limits your choices also limits the rabbit holes you can fall down so it can actually improve creativity and productivity. 

Lenses to go with the BMPCC4k needs a new thread. This is something I'd follow.

To add to Andrews comment about Resolve, if you're considering it there are a few articles about editing with Resolve that might be useful.  They're from editors, not all-in-one people who would colour grade as well, but they're still potentially useful.  My take on them was that Resolve is promising, if you configure it with the hotkeys the same as your current NLE then it's straight-forward to learn, but everyone says it's interesting but they're not going to use it solely for editing yet.  They don't normally give any reason, I suspect they're just being careful and not wanting to stand out as being too 'radical' as it may be too shocking for people.
I use Resolve as an all-in-one but I work on multiple projects that are tiny so my experiences with it really won't translate to your situation.

That makes total sense..  in a way the typical 24-70 can be thought of as a laymans scenery-to-portrait lens, so the only other shot left would be the telephoto, but thanks to the ~50mm equivalent second camera on many smartphones they're now covering off both scenery and portraits, so telephoto is the only one left.
Just wait until three or four lenses are common, the Light L16 has already solved the problem of how to get that variety of focal lengths into a thin body (the longer focal lengths go in sideways with a 90degree mirror):


 

that is not a 24-200 f2.8-f4.5
it's a 9-72mm f2.8-f4.5
or 24-200 f7.4-f12.4 (opening is 18mm high which would be f11 so there is likely some errors somewhere in there or it's not optimal in size)
At the wide end they could have made it a LOT faster than it is.
Front element would have to be 44.4mm which is as large as the entire lens assembly. Or 76% of the cameras height.
That would have been a 24-135mm f5.4-f7.5
or 8.9-50mm f2.0-2.8

I agree that a lot of stills lenses are rubbish to manual focus with.   When I first started in my role as an "Olympus Visionary" I told my friends at Olympus the same thing.  I actually have met with the optical and lens designers at their R&D facility in Japan and we talked very specifically about this as I mostly use manual focus when I shoot with these cameras.
The Olympus PRO lenses now have hard stops when in MF, and you seamlessly transition from focus by wire continuous and then into MF mid shot if you want via the way you pull the clutch back.  I love that Olympus have really tried to address this issue.  So far the 7-14, 12-40, 12-100 IS, the 40-150, the 17mm, 25mm and the 45mm 1.2 PRO primes all have this manual focus feature.  
The focus ring itself is all gigantic and actually feels great too, its a true mechanical feel.
JB
 

"sub optima" IS the reason I will use them. ? I don't want sharp as hell lenses like I said. And clumsy AF, hell the 4K BMPCC doesn't even Have AF in a sense. I am glad they don't resolve 4K LoL. I really doubt I will ever output in 4K. Maybe down sample at times to 1080p but I doubt even that often.
You are stating the complete Opposite of what I want in a lens. If I wanted sharp I would buy a Sony A7r mk III. I think the magic of a BMPCC is that they are not razor sharp. Not like ML 5D mk III. I don't want to really have to knock down sharpness on every shot I take. But sure nice if you want that option thought Like I guess you want. Now if you want a smooth look, which I like, I think those lenses can do that, buttery smooth, I doubt we can get that other than using real film with Cooke lenses, we will never be able to afford. Cut your face, well no either. But I don't like cut your face stuff. Seems you do. I like to get a lot of the look I like in camera, not spending 6 hours on a NLE doing it. So I think cheap lenses on it will do fine for me. Plenty of old Nikon, Canon MF stuff around for peanuts for my needs. Plus I am a cheap slate, eh poor, and don't have all that money to spend on 1000 + dollars lenses, when I can buy what I want on Amazon for 60 bucks each and get my result. But that is the beauty of video, photography, we all get to make it look like we want it to look like if we have the skill.
But yeah if you are going to try to make a living with the BM sure you will Need the lenses you are talking about and more of them. I am just in this as a hobby. At 71 I am too old to worry about deadlines, spending money left and right I don't have, on and on.
 
You guys are funny as hell.  I doubt ANYBODY has even made anything worth a shit with a 14.-140mm or the kit lens. Oh the vanity to throw tons of peoples stuff under the bus  LoL. I did BIF stuff for years photography wise and video wise, and gee, they seemed to work fairly well doing it. Super duper ideal, no, but crap lenses nah.

And the filter stack. 

In addition to the useful (and immature / tasteless) contributions above, another thing would be to shoot a huge amount.  Faster cuts means more shots.
Think about it like this, if shots are held for 1s instead of 4s each and every one of those 1s shots are the 'right' moment (framing smile etc) and are in a different location then that means you need 4 times as many shots.
TBH you're either a genius or you're crazy to try and apply this to a wedding scenario, and I really hope that the couple (and guests) really understand what it involves.  If you've got a couple who are having a simple outdoor ceremony and are willing to do lots of location changes and poses etc for an hour or two (or four!) then that's totally cool, but if you're going to try and apply this type of film-making to a traditional wedding then you're either going to get normal shots and not create something like this or you're going to interrupt their wedding day a huge amount, and potentially both.
Good luck - it's a beautiful style, although I would have thought that IS of some kind would have kept the hand-held look but cut out the sharper jitters making a nicer final product.

Thanks everyone, it's great to get such a helpful mixture of technical and more philosophical tips.
As @OliKMIA says, it's the creative process, and I am definitely still working it out for myself but I have got a lot of elements down.
I shoot a lot, and @mercer and @IronFilm are right that it shouldn't get in the way of the trip, but for me the logic is actually a bit different.  I like shooting, the challenge of it, the way that it forces you to actively look, rather than just passively drift through situations.  I also use photography if I'm a bit bored too as it's fun to try and challenge yourself about how to have as much variety in your B-roll for example, which is great if you're in-transit between locations.  Also, I think I shoot a lot of clips because I want to enjoy my holiday and so in a way I'm shooting while thinking about my holiday instead of shooting trying to think about the final edit.  I'm also shooting in-case something happens in much the same way as a street photographer would find a background and then frame and pre-focus and just wait for someone to walk through the scene, but in video you need to be rolling if you want the whole shot.  It makes me far less efficient, but in a sense I'm trading off enjoyment of the holiday vs work in the edit suite.  
Also, I like to be spontaneous and let the holiday dictate what I shoot, rather than pre-visualising or planning as @mercer and @Don Kotlos mentioned and then making the holiday fit more into the shooting.  I also don't like to direct, so these trips are mostly fly-on-the-wall (or massive-camera-on-the-wall as the case may be!)  On this whole trip I might have asked someone to stand somewhere or to look at the camera only a handful of times.  The last thing a family holiday needs is a bossy photographer ordering everyone about all the time
I think I've got the technical aspects of editing that @tellure mentioned mostly in place, I use markers, scrub through longer footage, use an editing codec (720p Prores Proxy proxy files are smooth as silk on my MBP), and removing useless clips.
I got this editing process from Kraig Adams at Wedding Film School who did a BTS of his whole editing process (10 x 1hr YT videos from nothing to finished films) and what I liked about it is that you don't spend time looking at 'bad' clips again and again, but @Don Kotlos is absolutely right about it being the "brute force" method, and that's definitely what it feels like!!
The other approach that @NX1user and @Mark Romero 2 mention is that instead of starting with everything and deliberately taking out the bad stuff to only pull in the good stuff.  This makes total sense considering that only a small percentage of the footage makes the final cut.  The challenge I have with this approach is that I think I will start off finding some good footage that suggests a particular style of edit but then later on I'll find more footage that suggests a different style of edit, and now I've reviewed a bunch of shots with one style in mind but am now going in a different direction and so many decisions were made incorrectly.  I think this would work well for videos that are pretty straight-forward, or for people who can hold a lot of information in their heads and can remember what footage there was and kind of hold multiple edits in their head as they're working.  This is absolutely not me!!
Breaking it down into bits as @Anaconda_ says is a good idea, and publishing them to keep up motivation is also a good idea - thanks @User.  I'm still not sure if I'll end up with just one final video or multiples.  In terms of the final output I'm also undecided.  I've previously condensed week trips into sub-5 minute videos, but this one had a lot more locations and activities.  I've thrashed this out with a couple of friends and we came to the conclusion that the length is irrelevant as long as it stays interesting - I've seen a 25 minute home movie from a 5 week trip through Europe that stayed interesting, so it can be done for home videos, plus there's the "super vlog" format that seems to work really well too.
Getting more understanding about what my audience wants would be good.  Unfortunately it's mostly relatives and friends that are in other cities / timezones and aren't up for critiquing my film skills so that is likely to be limited.
Music is important too, but I don't think that starting with it would work for me.  I think my editing process is more 'emergent' where my review of the footage (however tedious that is) gives me a sense of what happened and the vibe, then I can get a bit of a high-level view, which obviously you can't from 1100 clips, and then I bring the music in, and then the structure comes from that, and then the clips kind of conform to the music.  It's not a straight relationship between the clips and the music.
Perhaps the most crucial part of the whole picture is motivation and creative energy.  As @tellure and @jhnkng suggest, it's limited and needs to be managed.
I know that procrastinating is a sign to manage my energy - unfortunately I feel half-way to burn out just living normal life (full-on kids, full-on job, full-on family, etc etc) and I will look back on a month gone by and be annoyed that I didn't do any real video stuff (camera tests don't count!) but the truth is that I was just tired for the whole time.  I'm trying to improve other parts of my life but it's slow going and I want to still be able to share some of these moments.

An A7III type camera from Canon that had a good codecs, DPAF, canon colours and reliability, and had 1080 that was downscaled instead of upscaled would be a win for me!

Interesting articles @webrunner5.  It seems that in this market, if you want something in DSLR form-factor then there is nothing that has all the features you want - every camera has real weaknesses.  I'm guessing that Canon and Nikon will release things that are news-worthy, but I suspect the best we can hope for is another camera or two that have different weaknesses.
I'm hoping for one that has strengths and weaknesses that align with my style of shooting but I wouldn't bet on it!!

Thanks everyone, it's great to get such a helpful mixture of technical and more philosophical tips.
As @OliKMIA says, it's the creative process, and I am definitely still working it out for myself but I have got a lot of elements down.
I shoot a lot, and @mercer and @IronFilm are right that it shouldn't get in the way of the trip, but for me the logic is actually a bit different.  I like shooting, the challenge of it, the way that it forces you to actively look, rather than just passively drift through situations.  I also use photography if I'm a bit bored too as it's fun to try and challenge yourself about how to have as much variety in your B-roll for example, which is great if you're in-transit between locations.  Also, I think I shoot a lot of clips because I want to enjoy my holiday and so in a way I'm shooting while thinking about my holiday instead of shooting trying to think about the final edit.  I'm also shooting in-case something happens in much the same way as a street photographer would find a background and then frame and pre-focus and just wait for someone to walk through the scene, but in video you need to be rolling if you want the whole shot.  It makes me far less efficient, but in a sense I'm trading off enjoyment of the holiday vs work in the edit suite.  
Also, I like to be spontaneous and let the holiday dictate what I shoot, rather than pre-visualising or planning as @mercer and @Don Kotlos mentioned and then making the holiday fit more into the shooting.  I also don't like to direct, so these trips are mostly fly-on-the-wall (or massive-camera-on-the-wall as the case may be!)  On this whole trip I might have asked someone to stand somewhere or to look at the camera only a handful of times.  The last thing a family holiday needs is a bossy photographer ordering everyone about all the time
I think I've got the technical aspects of editing that @tellure mentioned mostly in place, I use markers, scrub through longer footage, use an editing codec (720p Prores Proxy proxy files are smooth as silk on my MBP), and removing useless clips.
I got this editing process from Kraig Adams at Wedding Film School who did a BTS of his whole editing process (10 x 1hr YT videos from nothing to finished films) and what I liked about it is that you don't spend time looking at 'bad' clips again and again, but @Don Kotlos is absolutely right about it being the "brute force" method, and that's definitely what it feels like!!
The other approach that @NX1user and @Mark Romero 2 mention is that instead of starting with everything and deliberately taking out the bad stuff to only pull in the good stuff.  This makes total sense considering that only a small percentage of the footage makes the final cut.  The challenge I have with this approach is that I think I will start off finding some good footage that suggests a particular style of edit but then later on I'll find more footage that suggests a different style of edit, and now I've reviewed a bunch of shots with one style in mind but am now going in a different direction and so many decisions were made incorrectly.  I think this would work well for videos that are pretty straight-forward, or for people who can hold a lot of information in their heads and can remember what footage there was and kind of hold multiple edits in their head as they're working.  This is absolutely not me!!
Breaking it down into bits as @Anaconda_ says is a good idea, and publishing them to keep up motivation is also a good idea - thanks @User.  I'm still not sure if I'll end up with just one final video or multiples.  In terms of the final output I'm also undecided.  I've previously condensed week trips into sub-5 minute videos, but this one had a lot more locations and activities.  I've thrashed this out with a couple of friends and we came to the conclusion that the length is irrelevant as long as it stays interesting - I've seen a 25 minute home movie from a 5 week trip through Europe that stayed interesting, so it can be done for home videos, plus there's the "super vlog" format that seems to work really well too.
Getting more understanding about what my audience wants would be good.  Unfortunately it's mostly relatives and friends that are in other cities / timezones and aren't up for critiquing my film skills so that is likely to be limited.
Music is important too, but I don't think that starting with it would work for me.  I think my editing process is more 'emergent' where my review of the footage (however tedious that is) gives me a sense of what happened and the vibe, then I can get a bit of a high-level view, which obviously you can't from 1100 clips, and then I bring the music in, and then the structure comes from that, and then the clips kind of conform to the music.  It's not a straight relationship between the clips and the music.
Perhaps the most crucial part of the whole picture is motivation and creative energy.  As @tellure and @jhnkng suggest, it's limited and needs to be managed.
I know that procrastinating is a sign to manage my energy - unfortunately I feel half-way to burn out just living normal life (full-on kids, full-on job, full-on family, etc etc) and I will look back on a month gone by and be annoyed that I didn't do any real video stuff (camera tests don't count!) but the truth is that I was just tired for the whole time.  I'm trying to improve other parts of my life but it's slow going and I want to still be able to share some of these moments.

I expect that it's a common problem, but how do you get over the 'hump' of starting editing a new project?
My most recent project is a family holiday during which I shot 1100+ clips over about a 10 day period, and I'm now procrastinating on editing it.
My process is normally:
review each clip and pull any good moments onto a timeline to create an assembly if the chronological order I pulled them in isn't quite right I'll group sections together and arrange them in chunks then I review the clips rating them into a few groups - normally "great people shots" "good people shots" "great non-people shots" "good misc" and "didn't make the cut" then cull all the "didn't make the cut" ones and start assembling little stories (sequences within locations) then I find music then I start to edit to the music and iteratively cut more and more out until I've got a tight end result The challenge I have is that step 1 takes forever and it's often quite demotivating finding that I missed shots, camera wouldn't focus, things I thought I had I don't, mistakes, etc.  Once I get the music in place it becomes enjoyable, but before that it's just a chore.
I've read that instead of the above where you touch every clip, some multiple times, that you just pull in the great clips and go from there, but I've found that often clips that aren't great are needed to complete sequences etc, and constantly playing "where was that clip I saw yesterday" doesn't sound like much fun either.
I don't know what the answer is, but maybe there's a way to think about it that helps?  I suspect my process is OK, I just need to change my perspective to make the process more enjoyable, such that I'll actually do it.  I love to shoot way more than editing, so I have dozens of projects sitting unedited on HDD..  
thanks

Hey everyone,

A music video I directed just released this week and I thought I'd share it! We shot in an old salon & a retro pinball collection and we used a bunch of aputure lights and rented a 'Letus Anamorphix' adapter which was quirky, but gave the look that I wanted in the end. We shot on an A7s (mark 1) into a blackmagic 4k recorder/monitor. I guess the main oddity of the adapter is that the aspect ration wasn't truly a 1.33x squeeze. It seemed to vary depending on where I had the 'focus ring'. So i ended up adjusting the clips scale by hand in the final grade.

The actors were the lead singer and his girlfriend (who is a non-actor), but I'm really proud of how they just went for it. 
YOUTHFOOL - Late Nights: 
https://youtu.be/PFc0JFBGJ8U
 
Any thoughts on the look of the adapter? Has anyone else used it before?

- Luke