Tulpa

Hello dear friends,
I've been running like a motherlicker, but I just wanted to take a moment that personally thank everyone who jumped into this thread to offer their support!
Right now I'm caught in all the extras in and around bicycle and support equipment etc. I'll update towards camera here when I get a little further along...
Until then... I'm wishing you all well in your life and cinematic adventures! 🙂

15 hours ago, eatstoomuchjam said:

The reason that I've been avoiding (and maybe others have to) mentioning the GH7 has nothing to do with low light and everything to do with it being as large and heavy as a lot of FF bodies.  If you're willing to go that big, you could also get an EOS R5 or a Z6 III.

 

Good point.

It’s been 10 years since I had a GH4 in my hands… and although not small, it was certainly smaller than the C100MkII that I went with. With that in mind, I remember that most folks loved Canon for their colour.

I don’t have any experience with the R5, but a friend is running one in India across that past 3 years with zero issues.

20 hours ago, John Matthews said:

I never used the GH7, only the GH6, but I found it to be great in low light; just not "no light" situations. Both of those cameras are mostly about 4k 120fps. The GH7 is about that and the AF in video and Hybrid Zoom. If the cost and size aren't the determining factors, the GH7 is the most fully-featured M43 camera for video today. Want the same features as the GH7? Go for the G9ii something smaller and cheaper, just no insanely long clips. In fact, the G9ii might be my last M43 camera as I don't see a point in anything more.

Thanks John.

The last camera I used at length was a C100MkII and it really had everything I needed short of a fatter codec. However I would never want to bring something this big with me cycling. Oh sure, stripped with a pancake it definitely shrank, but to the point that ‘control’ became challenging… though the NDs sure were helpful.

That S9 you recommended, would you still be happy after a few wireless receivers were attached? Those would certainly raise the footprint on this small powerhouse.

As an aside, does anyone make a wireless package with something like a small bolt on receiver that can handle multiple streams with minimal cable to the body?

Come to think of it, it would be a bit of a godsend if camera bodies had the option to included built in wireless receivers. I guess we can always dream.

15 hours ago, kye said:

I can vouch for the GH7 as a workhorse.

In terms of low light, I'd say it's fine.  Here are a couple of stills from the GH7 with the Voigt 17.5mm F0.95 lens.  I can't remember if the lens was fully wide-open or not, but I think the GH7 was at ISO 1600?

These have a film grain applied, so the grain is deliberate.  GH7 ISO tests are available online if you want to see the grain at various settings.  Also remember that NR exists in post, and compression does a pretty good job of NR as well.

The first shot is lit from the candle and the light of the fridge:

and this is just the candle:

Here's are some shots from the OG BMMCC from 2014 at its base ISO of 800, the 12-35mm F2.8 lens and shot at a 360 shutter to cheat an extra stop.  These locations looked about this bright with the naked eye, and I have excellent night vision.

You actually need far less low-light performance than most people think.

Thanks!

The issue is that you're either showing a very wide FOV, which will have significant distortions, or you're cropped in to the point where the quality is low because you're cropping out most of the data.

IIRC, If you have a 100Mbps 360 image then by the time you crop to the FOV of a 24mm lens you're down to something like only a few Mbps.  This is why I said the bitrates are what matters most.

Great frames that really highlight your point on the GH7 and Voigt's lowlight performance.

And yes, 3 cheers for noise reduction software… and high bitrates!

With some reasoning that sound is 70% of a film, how were you handling sound input into your GH7? Did you use the audio module? If so, any interesting insights worth mentioning?

11 hours ago, ade towell said:

I would check out Martijn Doolaard on Youtube, he filmed this on his own with drone and mirrorless camera and phone camera and it is seriously beautiful and high quality visually, and he has a very engaging way. He obviously has a good eye but it's amazing what can be done as a single person. He used a GH5 for this, it was a few years ago, the last 3 years he has been filming himself doing up a cabin in the Italian Alps, I think using a version of Sony A7 and drone. He releases a film each week and again it is beautiful to watch, is both mesmerising, educational, inspiring and medative, good for the soul.Highly recommend

Hi Ade, thank you for stepping in with this and yes I've seen it - and his other work.
I'd say that Martijn really nails it here in a way that would be challenging to top. Stepping in a bit more, and towards the narrative, most of these types of projects follow a similar story with the cyclist(s) as the main protagonist in their journey which can certainly make for a compelling story if these folks have what it takes to actually carry the story. And based on the numbers, I'd say that Martijn seem to be able to handle this rather well.
In considering the approach to story, I think we'd all agree that it requires a certain amount of reckoning with oneself (and certainly one's ego) to want to attempt something similar. And in doing so, and at this point, I've reasoned that I'd probably be more comfortable putting the focus more on others I meet along the way rather than myself, but with an understanding that it would be my hand guiding the story and experience. Some have suggested that I'd be just as good in front of the lens as behind it though it's hard not to be quite so self conscious when left to one's own scrutiny. Solving this, it would probably be easier to relax and let go of the self consciousness if someone else were to take on the role of filmmaker and follow me, but these shoestring budgets just don't allow for it. I guess I'll see where things go.

Does anyone else have anything to say about making the decision to step out from behind the camera? There have been several cases in documentary film history where directors had to do this to carry a story that was stuck... Nick Broomfield for one. Mads Brugger is my personal favourite in this.

With his current project - building his home in the Italian Alps, I'd reason that Martijn's current Youtube success stems from the fact that so many people long for what appears to an immersive and authentic experience that harken's back to a quieter time while more connected to nature. And his sparse filmmaking approach certainly compliments this. Well done I'd have to say.

It's good to hear of your Enfield adventures, it could easily be that we've passed one another on those dusty trails.

Does anyone have anything to say about the Fuji XT cameras?

On 8/8/2025 at 11:28 PM, kye said:

It even goes beyond that because you are essentially recording every camera angle at all times, so if there was something that happened around you, you could cut between multiple angles of the same event.  Even if you were psychic and were always pointing your normal camera in the best direction at all times, you couldn't record multiple angles at the same time with one camera, so it goes even beyond the mythical psychic camera person.

I just saw my first 360 material from a bike last night and although it was interesting to be able to cut back and forth from multiple angles, I just couldn't get past how distorted everything was on the wides... and it seems to me that this doesn't go away when cropping in. Maybe I need to check out some other material to get a better sense of things... but I like it that you've thrown this option into the mix. Thanks!

On 8/8/2025 at 11:53 AM, Snowfun said:

Isn’t the question “what camera should I take in addition to the Insta360?”

Thats the starting point. Size wise FX2/3/30 might be worth looking at?

I suppose it all depends, too, on the intended audience - family & friends, film festival submission, BBC documentary etc. I think if I was undertaking such a mammoth project I’d want a decent cloud account to offload files as I go. The Blackmagic offering might be worth investigating? 

Sounds fun. And hard work!

Thank you for the FX suggestions... I'd overlooked these units.
And yes, the decision on how to store and backup files certainly comes into the picture. I guess it's a matter of price and connection speed which are the variables. I'll keep your Blackmagic suggestion in mind.

Hard work... yes! It's one thing to show up somewhere, rent a flat, and then plug into a city for material. Quite another to do it from a moving bicycle. The good news is that others have done it with impressive results.

On 8/8/2025 at 7:57 AM, eatstoomuchjam said:

Just pointing out that "weather sealing" is useful for more than just filming in the rain.

It's also protection against dust (which is a very common problem in arid areas).  It's protection against something in your bag breaking open and leaking on the camera.  Or your tent leaks in the rain at night and you had your camera sitting out.  Or you just drop it in a puddle/fountain/shallow water for a second.

And yes, it is good to understand how weatherproof something really is, but simply having gaskets around a lot of the buttons and on the lens mount is a big deal.  And sealing on a zoom lens can be even more important in a dusty area so that zooming the lens doesn't suck in a ton of dust.

Thank you for pointing this out eatstoomuchjam. Entirely true on the dust factor... I'd say that this can actually be more important than rain.

On 8/8/2025 at 12:23 AM, kye said:

I also doubt that "weather resistant" is sufficient for the random deluges that are likely to happen over that duration of trip, although it's absolutely worth reading the manufacturers description of what "weather resistant" means, just so you know what they are thinking of when they use the phrase.  It might be a lot more (or less) than what you might be thinking.  This is something I have pondered for some time but haven't gotten around to.
Better to just get something completely waterproof and be done with it.  Then you can record in monsoon rains and get good footage of waist-deep water, which would be a highlight of the doco in itself.

I would also suggest that the "bad weather low-light" situation isn't really that important.  Realistically, if it's bad weather due to rain or due to dust at night then you can't see that much anyway.  Just turn on your bike lights or headlamps and film the chaos.
My setup doesn't cover the "long-zoom low-light" combination because it's not a thing that you need to shoot normally, and while it would be great to have, I have only ever wanted this combination for taking shots out of the hotel window at night in Seoul, and that's hardly a situation to design my whole setup around.

I'm also surprised at how compact the 28-200mm lens is on the S9, it seems quite manageable.

Well said Kye, thank you.
I've seen your work over the years, it's impressive just how much you are able to ring out of your bodies and lenses. Seriously.
And yes, the S9 and 28-200 seems like it can deliver as a smaller unit. I wonder how much larger things get when professional audio comes into play.

On 8/7/2025 at 11:50 PM, John Matthews said:

I'm going to revise my choice for this type of use. Camping and biking mean to me that one camera might not suffice if going Panasonic. I do not think that the OM-3 will give acceptable levels of noise inside a tent at night unless with a small light; nor do I believe the S9 by itself will give acceptable levels of weather resistance (by the way, I doubt the Panasonic 14-140 does either even though it's rated weather resistant).

Therefore, I would still go for the S9 with a 18mm f/1.8 lens for dark, inside a tent scenes and the 28-200. For bad weather, I'd get an action cam. This will eliminate bad-weather low light; maybe pick up a camera cover for the S9. At MPB, that setup will set you back 2500 euros.

The other option is the "do everything" set-up with the OM-3 with the Olympus 14-150 ii and the Panasonic 9mm for about the same amount of money, but you'll be spending more on the camera (double!) for less quality output (but still great).

If you are a disciplined shooter that usually uses a tripod and manual focus, there are options that will cost way less.

That OM-3 setup is about 950g and the S9 + action cam setup is 1300g. Note: Camera size doesn't have the Panasonic 18mm list, but it's the same size as the 24mm.

Again, this is for 10-bit with great IBIS and AF being the priority. I'd go with a much cheaper setup if it were me. I wouldn't want to take that expensive of gear out into the unknown. It's a close call though. There are so many good choices. It almost makes you say "screw it" and just use whatever you have with its limitations. If you're a creative, this is usually better.

Good to have your extra and revised insights here John. Thank you.

Yes, a combination of an action camera and a decent smaller unit seems the way to go. However, I think we'd agree that it would be great to have just one robust unit that we know and trust. But, of course, everything is a compromise.

With so many variables, I never put much faith into 'weather' sealed ratings. Sometimes one just has to spend and put these things through their paces until they just no longer work. Then grab a new one, and keep going.

"There are so many good choices. It almost makes you say "screw it" and just use whatever you have with its limitations. If you're a creative, this is usually better."
- This!

Finally, at the end of the day, we know a camera should be mostly intuitive to use... and get the hell out of the way.

I know that @Kye like the GH bodies... but notice no one here has said much about the GH7 as a work horse. It would be such a solid contender if they could get that low light up a bit. Correct?

On 8/7/2025 at 11:39 PM, MrSMW said:

Indeed. These kind of productions seem to be as much about the presenter as they do the subject/location with every scene being, “here’s me on my epic adventure and here’s me talking to an impoverished local and here’s me deeply respectful at the local temple”.

Ie, if it isn’t about you, you can skip all that shit.

Some folks are famous because they are in front of the camera and others from being behind.

 

Well said. And truth be told, I've never felt exactly comfortable in front of the camera... but I do like to be taken by the hand by other filmmakers as they lead me through unconventional stories that move the heart and imagination.
 

On 8/6/2025 at 4:54 AM, kye said:

 If you're a masochist then you can even go ahead, setup the mirrorless and hit record, go back again and ride through the frame, then go back and retrieve the camera.  It seems like a great way to shoot a film and a spectacular way to remove as much pleasure from the experience as possible.

This is hilarious… and exactly true! 😂

The other option is to just put this upcoming project aside and join a Buddhist monastery… but I’m going to try to take one last run at this type of thing and see what kind of ‘happiness’ it leads to.

Lets see…

Wow folks, this is exactly the kind of extra insights and support I was hoping for here. Thank you so much and hats off to all of you! Really 🙂

It's clear that some of you @kyereally understand the actual logistics of trying to pull something like this off while maintaining focus on the basics. @John Matthews Big thank you for getting right to the heart of which bodies and lens choices you would employ, this says a lot! @MrSMW for questioning those choices. And of course eatstoomuchjam for helping to get this party started. Clark, Tbonne and IIka for your insights as well.

I need a little time to go through the various camera bodies and lens combinations now and respond further, but please feel free to add anything extra if you feel that it will benefit. I'm super grateful for anything you guys can add beyond what has already been started.

With the logistics of the bicycle, bicycle equipment, route and camera/ laptop and actual story, you can see that this is a lot of balls in the air... so another huge thanks for your wise insights here folks! 🙏

5 hours ago, eatstoomuchjam said:

If it's being mounted to the bike, then yes, any of the current crop of decent action cameras would be a good choice, especially assuming that some parts of the tour would be in the rain or dusty areas, etc.  Even better yet if they can pair directly with the manufacturer's wireless microphone system (DJI and Insta360 both do this).  This can also be augmented with any halfway decent modern phone.

Otherwise, if you wouldn't want to go the action camera+phone route, I'd find the smallest and lightest camera on the market with decent weatherproofing and go with that, making sure that all of the lenses are similarly weather-sealed.  There are lots of used options, especially that are M43 mount, that would be good fits for small and light and can give better results than an action camera.  Better than 1080p is nice, but as far as I know, any festival will still accept it as a resolution.  More than 4K is realistically unnecessary unless you plan to crop/reframe in post.

Thank you for this eatstoomuchjam.
And if you you could have your pick of camera and lens, do you know what that would be? 10bit and 4k as a minimum with good low light capabilities?
I'm not only considering shooting from the bicycle, but collecting stories from the situations with people along the way.
Any thoughts?

Dear Eoshd members,

I've been a long time lurker and it's clear that there are some with an exceptional wealth of experience here.

I used to be quite up to speed with the latest camera tech but completely fell off a cliff about 3 years ago. I'm not so sure a lot has happened since then, but I would be curious to have your insights on what would make a solid camera choice for an upcoming project that I'm moving towards.

The project involves cycling around the world for several years under all kinds of conditions and producing a cinematic documentary about it.

I know that many use things like GoPro, Insta 360 etc with decent results. But I'm wondering what you folks would use to obtain your results if you were to embark on such an adventure and why?

I'd be grateful for any insights or observations any of you may have!

Hello everyone,

I'm a long time lurker here and I have some fairly big questions that I'm hoping some here can help with.

I've been working on a documentary series 8 parts (all between 30-60 min) that is getting closer to being finished and am trying to understand how to get it seen.
I doubt that it will have an easy path towards broadcast or getting picked up by a streaming service due to the (unpolitically correct) nature of the content. It's nothing too crazy but lots of swearing and ethical issues around the nature of the rough characters.
I'm also flat broke now, so I can't get it to one of these agent types who can get it in front of a streaming service.
I also don't know how festivals would be able to show something like this.

Currently, the project includes short clips of unlicensed material taken from other films in China. These clips serve as a reference to songs that my characters just happened launch into while we were shooting that fir with the situation they were in. The (15) clips are no more than about 30 secs. I cut them into the project to see if they would work. At the time, I imagined that if I could find further funding, I'd be able to license the clips. But I've come to understand that it is a huge undertaking to get clearance on this kind of material. And having contacted one of the distributors, he told me that they don't license their material 'in perpetuity.'

Towards distribution - and as it seems like there are few other options - Naturally I've been thinking about both Vimeo and Youtube. I'd rather the project live on Vimeo as it seems like a better fit. But towards the 'unlicensed material'...  and from what I understand, Youtube will sometimes(?) allow us to use unlicensed material in our projects if we provide some kind of acknowledgement to the copyright holder. Correct? Any thoughts here? On the other hand, and as I understand, Vimeo doesn't allow for this. Correct?

On the Vimeo side, I currently have a Plus account but that (as we know) only allows for 5gb uploads and I doubt that will support the (30-60min) file sizes I'd want to upload. To get a Pro account seems like a significant expense over the years for what will be probably little return.
I've considered having to break the 8 parts into smaller parts so that my Vimeo Plus account can handle the 5gb uploads. Is this what some of you do?

The project was shot in 1080 and I'm on an old Macbook Pro that would probably take forever to export h.265 - given that that is a way to reduce file sizes. Is this what some of you would suggest as a way to get the file sizes down?

I'd greatly appreciate ANY and ALL insights.
Thanks!

Very well said. Thank you.

What is interesting is the journey. And how it informs and expresses itself as we develop.  A healthy moral compass in parallel.

It's clear that it takes a lot of ambition to put oneself out there like our man Christian... let's wish him well in using his work as a vehicle for introspection and process.  That seems decent enough.

1 hour ago, kye said:

I've had a lot of success creatively in many different creative fields (music, drawing, photography, and more) by deliberately taking something you always do and just doing the opposite to see what would happen.  It kind of instantly makes something new and fresh, and you won't have any expectation that it will work (many times it really won't!) which means you will also take risks and will be more in the moment.  

Oscar Wild has a quote I quite like... 'consistency is the refuge of the unimaginative.'

C - roll? I wonder if he is down at the patent office as I write this.

Nice post Kai.

Of course I also love to roll through old material of the way things were.  Often it does have value. But (as we know) there is a profound sickness (narcissism?) unfolding in and around the need to capture (archive) our lives. I guess it comes down to intention. If it's mindless vacant crap done to stroke the ego via social media, then I balk. But this is larger than just me, so who am I to say... and I do understand the underlying need to connect which is human enough. But then, it becomes about 'what' is being shared. And then of course, there is the 'profitibility' side of things which is a huge loaded gun... as our biosphere heaves and groans.

I actually feel sorry for the guy in the clip. There literally tens of thousands of these guys who all look the same, sound the same though they see themselves as unique and special. If it were up to me, I would send him to live with the Papuans for a decade to unlearn what he has. And of course... no camera allowed.

But that's no answer either 😉

Thanks again @independent

I'll take a look at the 15-35.

1 hour ago, independent said:

They work well (AF and IS), except they aren’t corrected for distortion in-camera and are noisy (USM). If you’re looking to use an on-camera mic, go with RF Nano USM lenses. 

Thanks!

Can I ask what lenses you are using and how do you like them?

Hello EOS forum members. I haven't been able to find much online info on how well the adapted EF lenses work on the R5. Does anyone here have any first hand experience?