TomTheDP

8lbs isn't bad, when 8lbs is the starting point before rigging then you have a problem 🤣

Shooting at 100 iso I have found there to be an incredible amount of detail in the shadows. I did find banding and posterization to show up in 10 bit and 8 bit recordings. The shadow control in the RAW tab on davinci can bring up banding posterization sometimes so I found it's best to avoid that. I found using the exposure control in the raw tab to make major adjustments and then using curves to make minor adjustments works well. In terms of resolution and crop modes I found full frame 4k is noticeably cleaner than all the other modes. 4k crop mode, HD full frame and HD cropped all had more noise. HD is very noticeably softer. It isn't unusable but it's definitely not the golden standard for HD.

Sounds like a very competent kit. I am also cool doing away with gimbals for weddings. IBIS gives you enough creativity and you can actually get quicker more precise shots than on a gimbal. Of course you lose the ability to do those super smooth tracking shots but who really needs that. I definitely got some of my best wedding work shot on the S1 plus a 35mm or 50mm.

Yes I did go PL. Locking EF mounts are kind of weird. Surprisingly they are both priced the same so it was a no brainer for me. I think if I had a bit more cash lying around I would have went with the IRIX. But once the 18mm and 100mm come out it will be a really nice set and all with an F2 aperture. Do you like the longer focus throw?

It actually covers full frame as does the 75mm. There is a vignette on the 35mm but I feel its very usable even without cropping in. This is a shot with the Meike 25mm on full frame, definitely needs a crop to be usable, wouldn't use with a client.

Hmm all Z-cam besides the very first have prores internal.

I don't think he disliked the R5 but it had overheating issues and a weird lack of dynamic range considering both cameras have the same log profiles.

It is kind of up to you. Do you want to deal with ignorant clients that you have to put on a show for? You could also just educate the client and hope they are receptive. Honesty always depends on how much you need the money lol. Showbiz is inevitably a pretty showy industry although it's a little more justified on the higher end of things. One of the simplest ways to make more money is simply to own more elaborate and more expensive gear, but it's not always the way and capturing good content can make up for any lack of "professional" gear. I did a short about a month back and pulled out all the big stuff. I actually think we may have been able to do a better job with a small DLSR as we just didn't have the time do be using a lot of the heavy duty stuff we were using. It looked great on set though.

oops I am not sure why I thought you were in AU Yeah I am waiting on that new ARRI, should be very interesting.

Interesting. I was on a short and they opted to rent the Mini LF over the mini that the DP owned. I am guessing it was a good deal more expensive. Australia might be a bit different though. I would be content with the OG mini, but I feel like it doesn't carry the weight it used to anymore in the US.

Those are the standard these days IMO. If you look at films the old mini and older S35 alexas are barely used or mostly as B-Cam. The LF is the king these days and the Venice isn't far behind. People love full frame so much that they'd buy something as unpractical as the Sigma FP to get full frame and RAW. The URSA body size is great though. You can shoot much more stable handheld with something in the 5 pound body size. You lose that with the Komodo or FX6. XLR and ND's are also really nice, at least for the type of thing I do. The nice thing about the URSA is the crop is like 1.4x, so its actually not far off from full frame compared to like APSC 1.6 crop or micro 4/3 1.9 I am getting by with the 14 pound Classic, with an 80w power draw and no internal ND's though, definitely worth it. 🤣🤣

I have yet to test it out. I imagine the rolling shutter is less in crop mode, so that could actually be a good idea. I always shot in regular VLOG 422 H254, not HEVC. Maybe it would work better in Resolve though.

I've had the Emotive Color lut break the Panasonic s1 4k 10 bit files. What happens is you get like weird looking noise. Hard to explain I'd have to post some photos. I suppose neat video would probably fix the issue. I would also imagine if you shoot RAW this probably wouldn't happen but that is a guess.

I compared it with my Classic shooting prores 2k.

The rendering on newer Sony cameras is nice even just shooting 10 bit with their 709 luts. The problem I have encountered not particular to Sony is just more subtle or small color differences that are hard to correct for. Would definitely be interesting to see the Sony in mixed lighting against the Alexa. Maybe just shooting in RAW and going through ACES gives a good match.

Has he tested it directly against an Alexa? Cameras are definitely getting better and better.

Yeah I like the color coming out of the FP better and CDNG just looks more organic than anything I have seen from the S1. That said otherwise they are very similar cameras. Possibly the same sensor? You get more resolution and frame rate options on the S1. I agree the S1 is super convenient. pretty nice button layout, IBIS opens up a lot of new shooting styles, solid full hdmi, and small but pretty high quality codecs. The thing the S1 is still lacking like every other "cheap" camera is poor focus peaking and HDMI lag. It's hard to pull critical focus as the HDMI out introduces noticeable lag. Not a problem for the most part but if I am on set with an AC, its not a great situation. Plus these smaller cameras are often the "gimbal" or odd rig cam where you actually really need remote focus. I don't know if you've ever used ARRI focus peaking or RED but it's night and day better than on these cheap cameras. Another issue, though this is less critical I suppose, is proper REC709 monitoring. On Alexa or RED what you see on the LCD is what you are getting. Accurate color and noise. Monitoring on the S1 or any cheap camera I have seen is not accurate. In terms of usability the FP has to be rigged up for handheld shooting for sure. The micro HDMI is very concerning but I'll do my best to keep it intact. The Pocket 4k is hard to beat. It is so cheap to start with. Blackmagic menus are the best in the game. The non tilt screen is annoying as well as the relatively short battery life. Overall though I have never loved the BM image, which is why I've not bought any of their newer cameras. Overall though the P4K is a great value, 1k for something that is close to full frame with a speedbooster and has internal compressed "raw" up to 4k 60p. It does suffer from the same hdmi lag and shit focus peaking. It does have full hdmi which is a blessing. Yeah at the end of the day it's recording 12 bit linear RAW, when the sensor is capable of 14. So data is being thrown away. I am personally not big on the Sony look which is why I wouldn't go the A7S3 route. I honestly feel the FP image is better despite capturing less color information. The thing about the Alexa is even if you just record in 422 it looks fantastic. I feel the color you can quickly get off the Sigma is really really nice. It's almost making me want to sell my Alexa, but the FP is just not suited for A cam usage on a "real" set.

By the way I tested the ARRI against the Sigma in a mixed lighting condition. Lit myself with a blue light on one side and and orange light over head. I was really pleased how close it looked to the Alexa after adjusting WB, tint, and contrast. Its really too bad all the cheaper cameras have crap focus peaking and terrible laggy HDMI out. The image quality is there but the practical usability on set isn't. But hey still pretty cool to have something like this for a little over a thousand bucks. I am sure this was already posted but maybe worthy of posting again. Really nice imagery imo

Yeah shooting outside at least you can't go wrong protecting your highlights unless maybe you are shooting a subject with the sun behind them but no camera will really handle that perfectly.

Just trying to find the ideal color workflow. I am sure for the majority of people this is pointless discussion.

Yeah I suppose if it renders accurate color in lightroom it should in general. The ARRI Alexa has very accurate color, but I think having accurate color under all lighting conditions and mixed lighting conditions is what really makes for more pleasing rendering. Very few cameras can do that.

yeah but adobe color is not really an option in NLE's unless you want to process in lightroom first.

@Ryan Earl If you isolate the color chart and check the vectorscope which is more accurate?

So my first impressions were instant regret. I took some video to find terrible banding in the deep shadows. After updating to the current firmware and playing around a bit more I think I am satisfied. You definitely got to follow an image workflow. @Ryan Earl suggestion seems to work well. Set the RAW to the P3 D60 colorspace and gamma to linear than apply the color space transform and set the output to REC709 and gamma 2.4. Adjust the max input on tone mapping to 1000 and you are set. Setting it to the blackmagic colorspace is a bit quicker to do and looks pretty good. But the colors are vastly different and it doesn't retain information quite as well. Might be good for matching to other BM cameras though. What I have found is that the shadows fall apart way quicker in both 10 bit and 8 bit RAW. 12 bit seems the way to go. To be fair I was pushing the shadows really hard. Overall the image is nice and organic. I think I am sold. I really hope sigma can fix the monitoring for 3200 iso, would really make it quite the camera. Its no Arri Alexa but there is something nice about CDNG. I wish Premiere supported DNG better.

Do you use an external monitor on the GH5? I feel the GH5 ISO range is much more sensible for run and gun shooting. Though I guess the native 2000 would be nice for lowlight situations. I've felt the GH5 performed nicely up to 3200 iso. I suppose on the GH6 you can always drop to the standard single gain mode and get a native 400 iso. I think the GH6 may be the best run and gun camera now. I feel like a Sigma FP with BM video assist is too cumbersome. The video assist is also a power hungry bastard. The FP with a little SSD on top and the tilt screen mod seems really run and gun friendly. Not sure what good options there are for OIS lenses and L mount. A 2TB card gets you 2 hours in 4k, not bad at all. You can compress to 7/1 raw and get really small files with Slimraw. But you can only monitor accurately at iso 100, unless you have a ninja V. Overall I feel the Sigma FP isn't terribly run and gun friendly. Too many little quirks. I am planning on using the FP as a travel cam as well as an Alexa B cam. For travel I generally shoot wider so I don't have to worry about stabilization. I think on full frame I can get away with shooting up to 50mm handheld without much of an issue.