Justin Kosman Photography

The DSLR (R)Evolution

7D or HPX?

There is a really interesting article over on Sportsshooter.com about a broadcast producer who used the 5d and 7d over in China for some location projects.
Andrew Watson made some good points about each camera compared to shooting with a typical broadcast set-up and really summed it up well in his final evaluation. Since the DSLRs have a limited range of audio quality, AW had to record the audio separately, which lends itself to great audio, but adds another crew member and seems to cancel out the convenience of using a small, quick DSLR set-up in the first place.  I’ll let Andrew say it best: ”neither the 5D Mark II nor the 7D are ideal substitutes for a video camera, the amazing images they produced make up for it. If you need to shoot hours and hours of video with sync sound then the workflow to these DSLRs still might not be realistic, but if you have some patience or the extra resources Canon’s 1080p, DSLRs are a great option. The minute Canon comes out with a DSLR that has XLR inputs, manual audio controls, headphone jack and multi frame rates, I’ll sell off my broadcast camera package”

Check out the full version here: http://www.sportsshooter.com/news/2331

That being said, I bought a 5d earlier this year and sold it a few months later.  I will say it was great for some behind the scenes clips and is not as intimidating as having an HVX200 stuck in your face. Ergonomically speaking, the DLSR leaves a lot to be desired if you are shooting long lens action and even wide angle action.  Probably the best case scenario is that you would use the DLSR with dollies and jibs, situations where you will be running manual foucus and won’t be pull focusing.  The consumer look of the unit lets you get away with filming in some private locations, where even a hand held DV camera in your hand will get you kicked out of places asap.  So I did miss having the quick draw of a DSLR and ended up buying the 7D last night.