Best camera to recreate this video

[Alan Lloyd]

Worry less about the camera and more about preparation and lighting.

[Mark Suszko]

The looks you see are not something that comes out of ANY camera as a default. These looks are created by how the shots are lit on the set and also some things are added in post. You’re already in trouble if your bosses have limited you to $700-$800 or whatever, because unless you already own lights, it takes between $500 and a thousand dollars’ worth of pro lighting, applied with skill, to create these looks. You can’t just expect to unbox a camera, point it at a scene, and expect a perfect shot. Doesn’t work that way. The lighting in these cases is more important than the camera choice. I could make the pool table video using a new iPhone as the camera, but I’d still need to light it. And budget for dollies,jibs, and/or sliders, to move the camera smoothly in some scenes. You would be paying from a thousand to three thousand to shoot the pool table demo, not counting the editing, and two thousand to shoot the fire pit, assuming you had all the gear already.

When people tell me it’s “Just for YouTube”, what I hear is: “It’s just to put on the largest video platform in the world, with several billion users and viewers – it’s not like we’re showing it anywhere important that needs tech standards and some sense of aesthetic quality”.

I’m not in love with the fire table demo: they’ve added a gradient vignette effect to make the white background look deeper and more visually interesting, but it’s obscuring the face of the presenter. This effect should have been applied on the background itself, a layer between the background and the presenter, not plastered over the top like this. The audio is also weak, as is the script.

[Oracio Rosas]

Thanks for the information. We already have three huge soft box lights and a white background room.

[Daniel Trout]

Quoth Mark:

When people tell me it’s “Just for YouTube”, what I hear is: “It’s just to put on the largest video platform in the world, with several billion users and viewers – it’s not like we’re showing it anywhere important that needs tech standards and some sense of aesthetic quality”.

>SLOW CLAP<

Thank you, Sir….

Daniel G. Trout
Video Production Specialist
The Roger Bacon Academy
Leland, NC

\”For truly cinematic expression, the camera and the microphone must be able to cross both fire and water.\”
-Sensei Akira Kurosawa