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Looking for a Canon Lens for full frame video
Hello guys – I am a photographer who is dabbling in some video and two things are constantly plaguing me: Too shallow of a depth of field and shaky handheld video.
My wife is interested in starting some videos of her in the kitchen and on some of my initial tests, I am having a hard time with the two issues I mentioned above. I currently shoot with a 5d M3 and have a 24-70 (f2.8), 70-200 IS (f2.8), 50mm (f1.4), and 100mm (F2.8) MACRO IS.
I’ve figured out that I need IS if I want to do hand held. The 24-70 just didn’t do the trick. There are just some shots where I need to be holding the camera and can’t use a tripod. So for this I have tried my 100mm IS going up to F11 and while it takes steady shots, the depth of field is so shallow that I cannot keep her in focus. I am guessing that the lens is just made for a large depth of field.
So after a lot of digging and forum reading I am now looking at the Canon 16-35 F4 IS lens. With this I can shoot wider and have the IS for keeping things steady. The only problem is that I can’t find much info on videographers who have used this lens for video. Before I rent one, I wanted to see if anyone had any experience with this lens, OR is there a lens that you would recommend for indoor handheld shooting? The wider the depth of field the better.
I also have a simple shoulder mount and that has helped with the shaky video, but I find that with such a shallow depth of field I cant hold onto the rig and focus/zoom at the same time. This video stuff is challenging! 🙂
Thanks for any help!
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4 Replies
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The wider angle lens will certainly help with both shake and depth of field. There’s also some good post ‘filters’ that’ll help with camera shake – especially if you can crop in post. The 5DIII is a difficult camera for video: great in low light, but difficult to hold focus. This is where a second camera (for B roll) would be valuable.
bartone.com
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Hope you have better luck than I if you must go handheld.
At one shoot I had to leave the tripod but had some confidence in handheld. It was totally unusable. We are now used to such smooth video that a little shake is obvious. Not fixable in post to any satisfactory degree.
There is new gyro and gimbal hardware that may help. There are small pistol grip types now which are more appealing to some people than the larger two handed stabilized types. The small pistol grip types cannot accommodate larger rigs which may have separate viewfinders, batteries, etc.
The problem for some of us, of course, is that these devices are between $750 and $1,000 dollars.
Best wishes,
Mike -
Yeah it’s looking to be that handheld is just not a great option. This leads me to think that an actual video camera is better for handheld shooting compared to a DSLR. I have a video tripod and have been using that with a little handheld mixed in and that is looking a lot better. I already have a lot invested into a DSLR and lenses so a dedicated video camera is going to have to wait.
Thanks for everyones input!
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Right. There is a split between the goals — and the visual result–of those with a documentary camcorder approach and those who try to achieve a beautiful result, called cinematography.
The first I call the “6-o’clock News” approach and the other is the artful approach. Get ready for religious wars on this topic!
But the practical side is really the answer, IMHO. That is, if your job description calls for “bringing back the bacon” then a camcorder with a long zoom and using auto settings for everything is the only practical approach. For example, a wedding client may want end-to-end coverage, everything. After all, they want everyone to see everything!
Or, the client may realize that, in the end, it is really a few precious and beautiful shots that capture the day, to be seen by relatively few.
One the one hand, there is lots of footage, none of which is likely to be beautiful; and on the other hand there is relatively little footage but it might have nuggets of gold.
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You can guess which camp I usually find myself in! And I have found–knowing that I will have more gear and setup required than my friends on the same shoot–that I plan for it as much as possible, trying to guess the best place for the tripod, the best framing and light, etc. True, no way to get end-to-end coverage.
Once I asked an acquaintance who was editing such a shoot about including some of my shots, a couple of which were unexpectedly, even to me, gorgeous. He said he couldn’t. Why? Because they look so different.
That is, a video-y look from a camcorder set to auto everything versus a full-frame dslr image with tight framing, beautiful highlights and background out of focus, etc.
Ya choose your poison, as they say.
Best wishes!
Mike
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