OK Decisions! 5D vs EX1R

[Clint Fleckenstein]

I love my 7D and it’s fun to take out and play around with for video but unless I had a specific situation for which a DSLR is the clear-cut best solution, I’d never trade a video camera for it. A camera such as an EX1R is a great video camera without having to make all sorts of time-consuming and work-intensive concessions and extra provisions in workflow. Sometimes a DSLR is the exact tool for the shot, but most of the time I dare say it isn’t. Yet.

If your question was between a 5D and a second EX1R, I’d say go for it and have a gear selection that allows you to choose when to use each. If you’re asking whether to ditch the Sony and get a DSLR, I think you’d find that a painful proposition in the long run.

Don’t compare list price of a 5D vs an EX1R, either. The EX doesn’t need all sorts of expensive rigging to get it to work, additional technicians to pull focus and that sort of thing, and it just simply does a lot of video-related things BETTER outside of image quality.

Look at some of the behind-the-scenes stories on a lot of the really stunning DSLR videos out there, and you’ll find that they’ve got a half dozen or more highly trained people working to make that 5D put out the kind of images you see.

C

[Micah Mcdowell]

Here’s a plan…

Keep the EX1 and buy a Canon T2i (they’re so cheap that it’s hard to justify NOT buying one). Use each camera when it’s appropriate. Since you have a Letus, I assume you own/have access to good lenses that might work with the T2i. Then, you’ve got the best of both worlds (to a degree) and very little cost involved.

[David C jones]

Something else to keep in mind: as I understand it, the 5D takes the 35mm full-frame and compresses it to 1080p @ 50mbps, meaning you don’t really get the resolution of an uncompressed full-frame camera like an ARRI, RED or Sony F-35.

Dave J

[Craig Seeman]

Remember how a few years ago Red promised Scarlet.

Let’s not forget that a $2-$3000 solution is not going to be a match for a $30,000+ solution. For many people, they’ll be quite happy to have DOF control at an affordable price for 1080p work. I really think we’ll see $6-$10,000 solutions that will be a lot more video friendly in both features and ergonomics than DSLR. The support gear and crew needed to really take advantage of DSLR for video use gets quite expensive. If you’re a one man band indy/doc producer who also needs to do corporate work and local cable spots, that camera is coming soon my guess.

On the other hand, if you MUST get going now and have the crew and can amass all the ancillary gear you can go DSLR. The problem though is how budget worthy is it to buy all that DSLR support gear only to find it’s all eclipsed in just a few months. I think the VG10 is the writing on the wall and now would be the time I’d be cautious in investing in DSLR for video work. I probably wouldn’t be saying that if the VG10 hadn’t been released.

And if you listen to all the 3D advocates now is a really crappy time to buy a camera. You’re going to have large sensor video competing with smaller sensor 3D.

[John Young]

The company I work for has a EX-1 that I shoot a lot on, and I really love it. That being said, I want to buy a camera for my personal/freelance work and I am pretty sure I’m going DSLR even though I plan on a lot of documentary/run and gun shooting.

Here is how I look at it: $8,000 for a great, easy to use camera setup (including memory, audio, etc). Or $4,000 for a 7D DSLR setup with better image quality (big sensor, shallow DOF, low light capabilities) that might be more cumbersome to use.

If you have a $30,000 budget, then maybe your thinking is different, but my thinking is: I can get a great image with $4,000, go out and start shooting (and start making money) NOW or I can save up for a 6 more months, then buy a camera and still not have the DOF and low light performance of a DSLR.
It might not be the most convenient shooting but for those reasons I think I am willing to deal with that.

http://www.johnathanyoung.com

[Craig Seeman]

[John Young] “Here is how I look at it: $8,000 for a great, easy to use camera setup (including memory, audio, etc). Or $4,000 for a 7D DSLR setup with better image quality (big sensor, shallow DOF, low light capabilities) that might be more cumbersome to use.”

You need to take a LONG hard look at “cumbersome” especially when you combine with doc and run and gun. There’s some serious disadvantages such as potentially really bad rolling shutter, having to deal with second sound, trying to focus, changing focus when following action, just off the top of my head. HDSLR may be great with very controlled shoots (think narrative film or music video with some crew support) but there’s a mess of situations where clients are going to be unhappy given the complexity and issue compared to a properly designed video camera.

Sony came out with the NEX-VG10 for a reason and I’d fully expect they’ll expand on that. Panasonic also has a large sensor camera coming out soon.