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Mah HD-DSLR Rig
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subego
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Aug 4, 2014, 06:40 PM
 
Send the kids out of the room. This is some full-frontal camera porn.

     
boy8cookie
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Aug 4, 2014, 06:51 PM
 
Total cost?
     
subego  (op)
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Aug 4, 2014, 07:35 PM
 
Originally Posted by boy8cookie View Post
Total cost?
The "body" cost about $7K.
The matte box and follow focus cost about $5K.
The full set of lenses cost... about as much as a luxury car.

To start.
     
Face Ache
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Aug 4, 2014, 07:41 PM
 
Is there a camera in there?
     
subego  (op)
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Aug 4, 2014, 08:13 PM
 
Originally Posted by Face Ache View Post
Is there a camera in there?
Ideally, no. Pretty much everything is engineered to compensate for the fact one has to be there.
     
subego  (op)
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Aug 4, 2014, 11:20 PM
 
Annnnnd... shoot I was prepping for was canceled. I hate that.
     
BadKosh
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Aug 5, 2014, 09:11 AM
 
AAhhhh, The "Entertainment Business"........
     
subego  (op)
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Aug 5, 2014, 09:37 AM
 
You know, this rig isn't exactly cheap, and lenses still cost what lenses cost, but I'm pretty amazed it's in the range of a tricked-out Mac Pro rather than a new house, which is what this type of thing cost for most of my life.
     
residentEvil
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Aug 5, 2014, 03:12 PM
 
If you remove "new" and take liberties with what you mean by "house", for the cost of a tricked out Mac Pro or your rig body and box/focus, could buy you an entire block of homes in Detroit right now. And still have money left over to turn the water on and pay all the property back taxes.
     
mattyb
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Aug 5, 2014, 05:11 PM
 
Can we get pictures of it from other angles?
     
boy8cookie
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Aug 5, 2014, 10:30 PM
 
Originally Posted by subego View Post
The "body" cost about $7K.
The matte box and follow focus cost about $5K.
The full set of lenses cost... about as much as a luxury car.

To start.
Tripod not included? That's the bit I'm most interested in. I'm in the market for a new one. Currently I have a sachtler.
     
subego  (op)
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Aug 6, 2014, 09:13 AM
 
Tripod was $2,500. The head is almost 20 years old, I've forgotten what I paid, and it was back from when a dollar was worth something, anyway

Sachtler (or sac hitler, according to autocorrect) dominates here in Chicago, and I have no idea why. Every AC I know complains about them. OTOH, I hear minimal complaints about O'Connor gear. I've always liked it.

Their stuff served me so well in the past, I decided to take the risk on the matte box and follow focus. The matte box is great. On par with a Chroziel. I like the follow focus a lot, but my film experience is as a gaffer, not as an AC. Most of my DP experience is with video video, so I'm used to an autofocus. The follow focus is relatively new to me.

That said, the O'Connor with a proper, geared lens feels really nice to me, while the Red Rock follow focus with a retrofitted gear is a hot mess.
( Last edited by subego; Aug 6, 2014 at 12:19 PM. )
     
subego  (op)
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Aug 6, 2014, 09:22 AM
 
Originally Posted by mattyb View Post
Can we get pictures of it from other angles?
That's definitely the best angle without me lighting it, or finding a place with a less cluttered background. I'll give you some closeups while I look for a better place to take pics.

Here's proof there's an actual camera in there:

     
subego  (op)
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Aug 6, 2014, 09:30 AM
 
You would think this is what makes the cage cool:



Power in, which sends 6V to the camera, and 12V out to accessories.

That does make it cool, but what makes it really cool is it's manufactured well enough the iris rods match up with the lens. Yes folks... that basic piece of functionality is beyond every other cage I've tried. It really pisses me off, because this cage only fits a 5D Mark II body (and is no longer made). I have to say "**** it" to the 14-bit RAW video I can get out of a Mark III, along with better low light, less overheating, and uncompressed HDMI out.


Edit: one thing which is irritating about the cage is it doesn't have a voltage regulator on the input. It needs at least 14V in, and most big, honkin' batteries are only 12V. On my first shoot with the cage, my only choice was to gang two 12V together. I drained them both, so I was working with 22V total, but it still almost fried the thing. Monitor kept up with the auto-shutoff because of overheating.

My remedy was to get a voltage regulator. Ordered one custom with an XLR out. The one they sent me had pigtails. I call the place and tell the guy... he screams "ASSHOLE" at the top of his lungs.

Needless to say, I was a little taken aback.

Turns out it was said to the guy who was supposed to have put on the XLR.
( Last edited by subego; Aug 6, 2014 at 12:06 PM. )
     
subego  (op)
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Aug 6, 2014, 09:36 AM
 
I put some trick-line through the belt loops of a Porta-Brace AC pouch and hung it on the tripod carrying handle to make a quick and dirty "front box".



The Pelican cases this all breaks down to are in the background.
     
subego  (op)
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Aug 6, 2014, 09:44 AM
 
Here's a closer shot from the same angle as the wide.

     
subego  (op)
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Aug 6, 2014, 09:50 AM
 
Here's the flipside, with me trying to get the white ceiling as a background.



I'm bulding this in the "open" room of my loft because my "studio room" has so much shit on the floor you can't walk, and the lamp which is supposed to be there is in my friend's basement.

Note MacOS screensaver on the TV.
     
subego  (op)
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Aug 6, 2014, 09:57 AM
 
Mah studio... with a touch of natural light since there's no ceiling.

     
subego  (op)
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Aug 6, 2014, 11:40 AM
 
Originally Posted by residentEvil View Post
If you remove "new" and take liberties with what you mean by "house", for the cost of a tricked out Mac Pro or your rig body and box/focus, could buy you an entire block of homes in Detroit right now. And still have money left over to turn the water on and pay all the property back taxes.
What I was thinking of were ads I used to see in American Cinematographer for Movicams.

They got Haskell ****ing Wexler (One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest) to brag about how the only thing he owned more expensive than his Movicam was his Ranch in Santa Barbara.

Yes. This was the selling point of the ad.
     
mattyb
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Aug 7, 2014, 04:21 PM
 
Looks like a hefty tripod, what does your beast weigh?

As an aside, are we know at the point where DSLRs are that much better than pro movie cams? Where's the dividing line/price?
     
subego  (op)
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Aug 8, 2014, 07:17 PM
 
That's a good question.

In an important sense, one should consider film and DSLR video as different mediums, and should be treated as such.

Film goes at 24 frames-per-second because you buy it by the foot. More frames-per-second = more feet = more moolah. The absolute minimum framerate you can use before sound synchronization starts to seem off is 24 fps. That's why they picked that number. Before sound, it was closer to 18 fps. That's why some silent movies have that "sped-up" thing going on. They weren't shot that way. It's what happens when you run film shot at 18 fps in a 24 fps projector.

Video doesn't have that limitation. There's no reason to use 24 fps except because we're used to it. Peter Jackson shot The Hobbit at 60 fps, and people lost their shit over it. People are going to start getting old and dying before we start pushing the boundaries of this new medium, rather than just trying to copy the old medium.

That said, simulating film with video is one of my specialties. I offer in my defense most of my work is influenced by the era of film. What we think of the 20's through the 40's is defined by images from film cameras. If that's the string you're trying to pull, film (or "filmlike") is the proper medium for that. If it's a movie about blowing shit up, and it's shot on digital, there's no thematic reason to make it look like film. It's done that way because that's how new mediums always start out.

Let's face it. Most stuff is shit, and most "artists" are hacks. It takes a real artist to push the boundaries, and they don't grow on trees. How long have video games been around and we're still crowing about how "cinematic" they're getting. Do you look at sculpture and talk-up how "painterly" it is? Of course not. The problem is the medium is still in its infancy. Most people don't know what to do with it, and they're not capable of seeing it as something other than an extension of the old. Digital video is an even younger medium.

So, to actually answer your question, they're getting close.

A really decent digital simulation of 35mm film should have about 4K of resolution across, and 16-bits of color (281 trillion colors, give or take). Uncompressed, natch.

If you hack a 5D Mark III ($3,300), you can get 2K at 14-bit (4.3 trillion colors).

A BlackMagic camera ($3,000) does 4K at 12-bit (68 billion colors), but gets crappy low-light images.

So, we're close. I'm not sure what you have to spend to actually get there. I have so much Canon glass, I tend to only keep up with their offerings.
     
subego  (op)
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Aug 8, 2014, 07:22 PM
 
Oh... camera was 12 pounds at last weigh-in. It feels way heavier. I may need to pull out my real scale. I used the bathroom one last time.
     
subego  (op)
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Aug 21, 2014, 03:53 AM
 
I'm trying out a Red Rock Micro cage on my Mark III. Seems like it may be useable. At least it clamps down solidly. Now to see if the rods align.

It's not powered, like most cages, but that's worth dealing with to get the Mark III upgrades.
     
subego  (op)
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Aug 21, 2014, 05:33 AM
 
Originally Posted by subego View Post
Now to see if the rods align.
Nope.

****.
     
subego  (op)
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Feb 2, 2015, 04:55 PM
 
I've been climbing this uphill battle with building a rig for the Mark III, and yesterday I notice for the first time the HDMI output has a ****ing quarter-second lag. A Google reveals this is really common, and sending it in to Canon may or may not fix it.

That's it. I quit. I'll stick with the Mark II rig, which actually works, and am seriously considering a Red Epic.
     
mattyb
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Feb 2, 2015, 06:23 PM
 
Originally Posted by subego View Post
That's it. I quit. I'll stick with the Mark II rig, which actually works, and am seriously considering a Red Epic.
And thats going to cost you how much?
     
subego  (op)
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Feb 3, 2015, 08:09 AM
 
A veritable bargain at $30K...

For just the body.

Tough to argue with 6K resolution and 16 stops of dynamic range, though.


Edit: or... you could say there are thirty thousand little arguments.
( Last edited by subego; Feb 3, 2015 at 08:31 AM. )
     
subego  (op)
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Feb 3, 2015, 12:27 PM
 
Now I'm waffling.

Yeah, there are a bajillion better things about a Red: 6K, enormous dynamic range, minimal compression, it's actually meant to be used as a video camera.

The 5D has this monster, full-frame sensor. I'm never going to get the same shallow depth-of-field from a Red, even though what I would get would be sharper, and 16-bit. That part of the "look" is important for what I do.
     
boy8cookie
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Feb 3, 2015, 04:16 PM
 
What is your output resolution? Sony VG900 has full frame censor, made to record video, built-in audio recording, working HDMI output for uncompressed recording. 1/10th the price of the RED. Lenses are cheap too.
     
subego  (op)
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Feb 3, 2015, 04:28 PM
 
I wanted to amend my last post, and say it's possible I don't know what the **** I'm talking about.

As to your suggestion, I'll definitely look into it, but I've got lots of good Canon glass.
     
subego  (op)
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Feb 3, 2015, 04:43 PM
 
It may actually make the most sense to get a 1DC.


I forgot about your output question. Right now, it's mostly 1080p because that's what I have. Even if I keep it there, the image will benefit from the upstream bump.

I'll take bits over pixels, but I'll take pixels over less pixels.
     
subego  (op)
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Feb 3, 2015, 07:14 PM
 
The 1DC just dropped $4,000(!), which on one hand almost seals it, OTOH it makes me think new models in the pipe...
( Last edited by subego; Feb 3, 2015 at 09:21 PM. )
     
subego  (op)
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Feb 3, 2015, 09:21 PM
 
Aaaaand... the 1DC at 4K doesn't use the entire width of the sensor.
     
subego  (op)
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Feb 3, 2015, 10:11 PM
 
Checked out a different MkIII. Same problem. This one had the January firmware update too.

Quarter-second was overstating it a bit, but it's five iPhone video frames. That's over 160ms of lag. ****ing worthless.



In the midst of all my bitching, I should say the MkIII is a fantastic still camera. No complaints from me there.
     
subego  (op)
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Feb 4, 2015, 11:25 AM
 
On the blower with Canon. Guy I'm talking to hasn't heard of the problem.

He (weakly) tried to convince me it was normal, but seemed to see the error of that tack when I pointed out it doesn't happen on a MkII.

He's trying to replicate the problem on his end.
     
subego  (op)
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Feb 4, 2015, 11:43 AM
 
Happens on the official Canon test MkIII at the official Canon service center.

There you go. Nice job breaking it, Canon.
     
subego  (op)
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Feb 4, 2015, 12:30 PM
 
A question for the panel...

HOW THE **** DOES NO ONE NOTICE THIS?
     
pooka
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Feb 4, 2015, 01:11 PM
 
And here I was thinking my A7s was cool.

New, Improved and Legal in 50 States
     
mattyb
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Feb 4, 2015, 01:18 PM
 
Originally Posted by subego View Post
A question for the panel...

HOW THE **** DOES NO ONE NOTICE THIS?
They do, but they just don't give a ****.

I blame outsourcing. Any outsourcing.
     
subego  (op)
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Feb 4, 2015, 01:39 PM
 
Originally Posted by mattyb View Post
They do, but they just don't give a ****.

I blame outsourcing. Any outsourcing.
It goes beyond Canon... aren't the people using them noticing?
     
subego  (op)
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Feb 4, 2015, 01:54 PM
 
Originally Posted by pooka View Post
And here I was thinking my A7s was cool.
No mirror, full frame sensor, only a 1.1x crop with 4K, and still usable at 10,000+ ISO.

That actually sounds pretty cool to me.
     
pooka
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Feb 4, 2015, 06:47 PM
 
Originally Posted by subego View Post
No mirror, full frame sensor, only a 1.1x crop with 4K, and still usable at 10,000+ ISO.

That actually sounds pretty cool to me.
I have a ton of canon glass and a mark ii. The a7s is the closest thing to magic I've experienced since Epcot as a kid.

New, Improved and Legal in 50 States
     
subego  (op)
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Feb 5, 2015, 02:10 AM
 
I'm going to have to try one out. The low light deal is mighty appealing.
     
   
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