Can’t decide, really need your help! Canon 5D/7D buying question

I own a 7D and a number of very prime lenses, some pretty sharp ones. I still find the 7D footage not sharp enough and suffering from weird artifacts (actors having blue streaks in their hair, pattern noise, et cetera), i get some very plastic/fake looking pictures from time to time.  Nevertheless i have found a workflow that suits me at the moment.

Last week i have decided to buy a second camera for budget music video production. My first idea was to buy a second 7D, but i still wonder why it is that some prominent DSLR filmers, like Philip Bloom and others, still use the 5D MKII for recent assignments.

So, i wonder if there are readers here that have used both cameras and can comment on this, or at least answer the poll below.

REMARK: consider picture quality – price/budget, available framerates and other options not taken into account.

I am looking for sharper images in the sense of better/more detail. Even better resolution (7D is barely HD when it comes to acutal recorded lines).

New Martin Beek / Marvels website

My new website has been launched this weekend. I’m still busy removing/replacing demo content and migrating content from the old website, but all is up and running and looking well…  http://www.martinbeek.net or http://www.marvelsfilm.com – use Member Login to register free (and secure, no spam) ’cause i’ll pony up the member section and user/comment links with this weblog. Also nice to see your names in the userlist in the right column, instead of “guest”. Thanks to Barry for his help!

It’s polls time!! Come on, speak up!

 

Red: how many more Scarlet pictures are we going to get shown?

- by Liza Witz and Martin Beek -

Currently it is hip to be Red. It’s perfect marketing. They didn’t design those cams like this by accident. I think they learned everything about that by Apple. Put good technology into a very cool case, deliver everything from support to software yourself and you can put a higher pricetag on it. Yes, you maybe can get the same technology for a lower price, but it wouldn’t be Red.

But like it goes with guys like Red and Ikonoskop; we haven’t seen a camera yet, we haven’t seen one second of footage yet, we are asked to wait another year. And another year.

Personally, I was interested in RED and when they first announced Scarlet it sounded intriguing, but its changed so much now it looks like they will never deliver the scarlet they promised.

To my mind, the company is all hype and no products… sure they eventually delivered the RED One. But by the time they did, technology had caught up to the point that it was not that revolutionary.

The 2/3 fixed lens version is probably not what you want. You need to spent another 5K$ on stuff for your Scarlet 35. Right now, the Brain with (a fixed lens) is $3,000. Add another $1,000 to put a CF slot on it and a single 16GB CF card (going by current prices on the RED store). Add $3,000 for the RED EVF, and add $600 for a battery, and assuming you don’t want to capture sound I think you’ve got a complete camera for…. what, $7,600?

I think RED is going to stay out of my price range for quite awhile. Call me cheap, but although i like Modular, i don’t like modular pricing.

Like Phil Bloom writes:  Don’t wait for something that isn’t out yet that only has an estimated release date. If you need something, can use something, can make money from something that actually exists then get that now. This applies not just to cameras…. (www.philipbloom.net)

Be aware of the fact, that other sexy 4K cameras will flood the market in 2010, for Scarlet’s price and less – i promise – let’s all wait a bit, try not to be too eager,  try not to be an early adopter -> it will save you money and a lot of stress…

Waiting for my little sweet ride: the DollyTrax

I was looking for a small dolly and/or tracks system recently and finally bought this one: the DollyTrax. 
It’s a very affordable solution, with even an operator stool and push bar. 

From the DollyTrax website (by Paul Lyke):  ”I needed a solution that solved two main issues 1) Something I could own and always bring to a shoot with me, as opposed to the usual hassle of reserving/pickup/dropoff/paying rentals, and 2) something I could operate myself, as I was NOT going to eat the cost of a $500/day dolly operator or track assistant. I started researching some of the new innovative dolly systems out there, but each one had an annoyance that would be a deal breaker.”

So Paul came up with a product design himself, with great specifications, with a track-less approach, with special 10″ pneumatic slicks that’ll roll smoothly on almost every surface, AND the ability to carry an operator with the godlike physique  that i’m blessed with (200lbs).

I hope it’ll arrive one of these days and i’ll keep you posted on this baby.

Martin

LCDVF great viewfinder alternative for half the Z-Finder’s price

LCDVF has launched it’s new LCD viewfinder for just 159 bucks. The already famous Z-Finder by Zacuto has proofed that a tool like this an absolute nescessity when filming with a DSLR camera.

The difference in price is huge, but according to Philip Bloom – who was one of the first to make a comparison –  the quality comes close to  that of the Z-Finder.

Have a look at the LCDVF website at http://lcdvf.bigcartel.com/product/lcdvf

Check out Phil’s shootout HERE.

GearNex brings back old-school filmgear

I am the proud owner of a geared head (Worrall) for many many years, but it is old and in very bad shape. Since i am on a life-time low budget, buying another one is not an option.
The sole manufacturer of geared heads was Arri ($25,000+ for the arrihead 2).  Was… because here comes the GearNex geared head..!
It’s around 5000 bucks (oy!), but that’s still cheaper than a used Worrall or Mitchell on eBay. See http://www.gearnex.com

Very sexy, very smooth!

So, all i want for christmas is just that…

Martin

Have been looking for a mini Worrall head, a Moy head or other geared head – found the new old-school Gearnex gear head at http://www.gearnex.com. Like to try one; hope i can get hold of one.

Found very cool Japanese Canon 7D Flash site

http://bit.ly/zowsC

Things to do today: learn Japanese…

Canon 7D, The camera we want to love

Darwin Wiggett has posted a 7D review on his website with the title “The camera we want to love”.

This is very bad for Canon and made hundreds of people decide NOT to buy the 7D for photographic use: http://darwinwiggett.wordpress.com/2009/11/11/the-canon-7d/

I don’t know if any of this is affecting the way the 7D shoots video.

You all know that i’m still not confident about the 7D’s professional performance and am seriously considering to buy another or extra DSLR video camera, such as the 5DmkII – but first want to make a comparision; AND i need 25fps.

Red could make everything to much simpler… Give us the Scarlet NOW!!! 

 

My Canon 7D workflow

People have been asking for my 7D workflow – i even seem to refer to it myself in one article; while being non existant at the moment… So here it is!  Not much of a spectacular thing, but this is the route i usually follow.

•  Shoot on 7D 1080, shutter 1/50th on 25 fps
• Read movies from camera and store on backup HD
• Use MPEG StreamClip (freeware) and it’s batch functionality to add all 7D clips to it’s batchlist and convert all these babies to Quicktime Movie : Apple ProRes codec -> convert all and save to project folder or “converted” folder on backup HD. Do NOT enable any scaling or deinterlacing options in this program, just set the Quality slider to 100% if it’s not already at that.
• Use FCP to edit as usual, set project/renderer to ProRes or ProRes-HQ (bit over the top maybe…)

To convert to SD (PAL):

• Export to self contained Quicktime movie in FCP, just same codec: ProRes or ProResHQ, save to HD
• Drag the resulting file onto the MPEG StreamClip surface
• Convert to Quicktime movie: Apple Prores. Set quality to 100%, check all the scaling checkboxes (“better scaling algorithm” stuff) un-check the deinterlacing checkbox(es)
• Set movie size to custom: 1024×576 (this is 16:9 PAL SD)
• Convert / save
• Optional beauty pass: reload into FCP and apply the Regrain filter (freeware plugin) with settings Amount:50 Treshold: 50. This sharpens the overall picture with a fine and sophisticated “unsharp mask” method. Re render, re export or send to compressor for DVD use. 

An example of a clip that has been sharpened using the Regrain technique can be found here: http://youtube.com/marvelsfilm - the first clip; press the HD button for best Q if your PC/connection can handle it. You’ll see that also the non-HD clip already looks pretty good. Clip is postprocessed using the workflow above, with the slight difference that the resolution used is 1280×720.

Cheers!
Martin