Saturday, January 19, 2013

What I Want Update

Because everyone wants desperately to know what I want in the way of a camera, it's this:

  • Sensor size no bigger than APS-C, no smaller than 4/3rds sensor
  • 3200 ISO without unreasonable noise -- then we can shoot outside at night with reasonable f-stops
  • I want to be able to take production stills with this camera
  • No rolling shutter. Enough with the rolling shutter already
  • 1920p. Because now that's our delivery format
  • The ability to control the take number. In fact, I'd love to be able to put the project number and then the take number (or the roll and then the take number) into the camera. 
  • Marks in the eyepiece to indicate the 2.35:1 frame
Things that would be groovy, but I can understand if I don't get them right away
  • Wi-Fi tap. Just transmit picture over wi-fi. I don't even care if it's real-time or not, just let the art department see the frame on their iPads
  • I would prefer it if the camera would purr while it's shooting -- it helps to feel confident that we're actually in record
  • I'm becoming weary of the .mts format. Or any of these other weird formats. Can't we just shoot in .tga sequences or something? How about OpenEXR?


Things I don't really care that much about (in no particular order)

  • Through-the-lens viewing. Honestly, I shoot a lot of laser beams. And the sun. And between the two I'd rather not be looking directly through the lens. A little TV screen is good enough for me.
  • No compression. Meh. Go ahead and compress the signal. No, I don't want banding once we're out of color-correction in post. But RAW files? Not helping me make movies. ProRes normal resolution is good enough for me.
  • 4K. I just don't care. Yeah, we could re-frame in post if we shot 4K. But I don't want to deal with it. I don't want the data bothering me. Tell it to go away (see "compression," above.)

6 comments:

Lindsay Stewart said...

i've been looking at the bolex as an option, i'm just really taken by the assignable hand crank, kind of like an expression pedal. being able to manually ramp speeds on the fly would be kinda groovy. doesn't give you anywhere near the iso you want but you get your 2K. the super 16 sensor is smaller but is also a ccd rather than cmos chip. that may or may not clear up some of the rolling shutter issues. and then there's the price, being under 3 grand is a nice thing. too many options make it a matter of choosing your compromise.

Andrew Bellware said...

I haven't been paying attention to the Bolex. A hand-crank? That's awesome!
CCD doesn't have the rolling shutter issue as far as I know. So that might be a very good thing.
I'll have to look into it.

Lindsay Stewart said...

Here's their Kickstarter. They've done a lot of smart things including designing a functional RAW workflow for CinemaDNG or you can opt for TIFF or JPEG image sequences, not unlike After Effects output. Plus the look of the camera is retro sweet. My old man had the Nizo-Braun S800 but I always had a soft spot in my heart for the look of the Bolex and Beaulieu cameras.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/joedp/the-digital-bolex-the-1st-affordable-digital-cinem

Andrew Bellware said...

I'm not seeing the .tif workflow on their site. The RAW workflow looks like a nightmare. 18TB for storage? Ha!
No open EXR? Sigh...

Kangas said...

Have you ever shot 4K? Once you do, you might change your mind. Reframing and digital zoom is an INCREDIBLE time saver. Also, it's beautiful. Beautiful I tell you.

Andrew Bellware said...

I haven't shot 4K. I'm afraid to. It's like crack isn't it? Once you've tasted it you gotta have more.