[Mike Drew]

Sorry, I made an assumption I shouldn’t have but I know a lot of folks want the look of DSLRs without realizing the amount of difficulty involved in making them do a job they’re not really designed for.
As far as video cameras go, the Sony you mentioned is about the only one I know of in your price range that comes close. Canon also makes a couple of models that shoot HD to cards that you may be able to find used that could fit your budget as well.
Do you have any lenses at all? The reason I ask is that any crop-frame Canon DSLR will give you similar video. They all use the same sensor with more or less the same processing all the way from the cheapest T3i to the 7D so you could get something in the middle like a 60D and get great video.
The problem is that you’ll need a suite of lenses – or at least something like a 17-70 and a 70-300 to get you started – as well as sound gear and rigging to allow you to shoot the moving subjects you will be concentrating on. Even if you have stuff left over from your earlier video forays, it is likely that none of it will work with the DSLRs. Your $4000 will disappear in a hurry.
You may find that the Sony with an 18-200 will do the job well enough to get you going. The used Canons will come with lenses as well. You’ll still need sound gear, of course, and some sort of support system but at least you can get shooting right away.
Hope all that helps and that I haven’t been too much of a downer!!

[Mike Drew]

You are going to need some serious glass to shoot golf. Figure on everything from a wide-angle to at least a 300mm. If you’re thinking of shooting for tv, you are going to need to shoot a variety of angles and for that you’ll need to cover everything from wide-angle to tight upper body stuff with a long lens.
Personally, if you only want to shoot video, I’d bypass the DSLRs entirely and spend the money on an actual video camera. If you want to shoot stills as well, that’s another story. I’m guessing by your question that you are just getting started in the video game and that you’ve heard DSLRs are the way to go. For many things, they are excellent tools. But they are compromise tools. Good as they are, they’re designed to be still cameras first. I think, for this particular use, you’d be better off with a dedicated video camera.

[Mike Drew]

Frank, I think all this advice is good but there are a couple of things you might want to consider. First off, your FCPX setup is a little weak. If you can swing it before you do this shoot, try to max out the ram on your machine. It will make a lot of difference when you’re trying to chug through all those long clips.
The second thing is, Google up a few tutorials on using multi-cam in FCPX. It is a miraculous bit of magic but it can be kind of a bear to work through. No need for PluralEyes as FCPX has excellent synching but you might want to consider doing a strictly audio, high quality recording of the concert as a reference track to sync all the video clips too. You’ll get different sound from each of the cameras and it’s unlikely any of it will be of the quality you’ll want.
I don’t envy the task you have ahead of you with this project but that which does not kill us only makes us stronger!!

[Mike Drew]

From the looks of your specs your machine should easily be able to handle 5D II files with no transcoding at all. I have no idea why it is so slow but maybe try just loading the h264 files and see if that helps. I use a mid-2012 15in Macbook Pro and I haven’t had to transcode a file in months. I regularly load over 100 clips at a time and I’m ready to rock in a matter of seconds.
Another thought – sounds like you’re daisy-chaining your drives. In my limited experience with doing that I’ve found that invisible bottlenecks can develop which slow transfers. Maybe copy your folder of .mov files to your desktop – blasphemy, I know – and try importing to FCPX from there. Might eliminate one variable, anyway.

[Mike Drew]

Hi Osmani.
I’ve been using FCPX with Canon DSLRs since Day One and the method I use has never given me a single problem. What I do is simply copy the .mov files to a folder on my desktop – or external drive – and then, if there’s jpegs in the same card folder, I copy those to a separate desktop folder.
In X I select import media, click on the .mov folder in the window that pops up, hit import and edit away. I think the secret is to just import the .mov files that you need and leave the rest of the stuff – jpegs, Magic Lantern, things like that – out of the system.
Hope that helps.

[Mike Drew]

The 60D is the best bang for the buck in my opinion. I’ve been using one for the last couple of years shooting newspaper video and I love it.
You won’t find any DSLR’s WITH XLR’S so forget that. Get a good small mic like the Rode Videomic Pro and an extension cable so you can take it off the shoe and stick it close to the interviewee’s face and you’ll be good for the vast majority of your stuff.
Make sure you get a Zacuto finder or some other loupe to put on the back of the camera. It’s essential for seeing the screen for proper focus in bright light and it also gives you a third point of contact to make things steadier when you’re hand-holding.
The kit lenses are adequate but that’s about the kindest thing you can say about them. Sigma and Tamron both make excellent small zooms in the 17-70 range that are very affordable. I use the Sigma 17-70 f2.8-4 on a daily basis and it’s fantastic. The image stabilization on it works amazingly well.
But be aware that shooting video with a DSLR is not like shooting with a dedicated video camera. There’s no autofocus so manual focus is the only way to go. And you never want to shoot with automatic exposure or auto white balance if you can possible avoid it. It can be a nightmare to edit video with the exposure and color jumping all over the place. Be sure to practice with the camera – any camera – a bunch before you try to shoot something important. NGO’s like nice looking video as much as anyone else.
Good luck!!

[Mike Drew]

I should have posted my solution earlier but your post reminded me. What I did was restart X, open the VO recording window and cycle through the options for stereo and mono and suddenly the levels popped on. I haven’t had a problem since. Not a very scientific or logical solution but it worked for me. Hope that helps.

[Mike Drew]

I’m sure the GH3 will be a great camera but as you said, changing workflows may not be worth the fight. And finding a suite of lenses that work for it may be a bit expensive, too. Look around for other reviews beyond DPReview, though. And for God’s sake, don’t read the DPR comments!!! Your head will explode. If it helps, I can send you a short clip of a crime scene I shot last night at ISO 12800 in just about the worst-case lighting you can imagine. All things considered, it looks pretty darn good.
Best of luck with your decision.

[Mike Drew]

This is an observation from just a couple of months of shooting with the 5D III. It is an absolutely spectacular camera and well worth the investment, especially now with the price dipping closer to the $3000 mark. I love it.
Having said that, though, for most of my video uses, unless you are shooting in very low light or find yourself shooting a lot of things that generate moire patterns – brick walls, ripples on sand dunes or lakes, things like that – you will see very little difference between the video from your 7D and that of the 5D III. The option to shoot all-I on the 5D will make a difference as the bit rate is much higher but if your primary vector for your videos is the internet, the difference will be virtually invisible.
As a news shooter – both stills and video – I have very little control over light and that simple fact alone makes the 5D III worth every penny. The low-light abilities of this camera are amazing. The shallow depth-of-focus thing is kinda cool, too. But again, it really depends on what your primary goal is. For me, working in unpredictable conditions, the 5D III is indispensable. For you, who knows.
But overall, I’d recommend that you just buy it. It’s an amazing camera and you’ll have no regrets. It’s a better camera in every way – except FPS – than the 7D. Too bad you can’t rent one just to try but I’m sure you’ll love it once you get it.

[Mike Drew]

I’ve found that I get the most consistent and realistic results using the Daylight color preset in the camera. It gets a little warm in the early morning and late evening hours outdoors and a little blue at dusk and dawn but the color is consistent. I only use Auto if the lighting is mixed or Tungsten – the little lightbulb logo – in extra warm lighting.
Kelvin will give the same effect as the presets but I find it easier just to go with the camera’s preset settings. Trying to figure out exact Kelvin settings will just frustrate you in the end. You can also shoot something white and use that as a custom white balance but I only do that in extremely strange lighting. Otherwise, I just let the camera do its thing.