So You Want to Buy A Film or Video Camera, But Don’t Know What to Get

Not sure whether to get a film or video camera? Are the choices straining your brain and making you look at your wallet with disdain? Has the term “24p” been written on various walls in your sleep? Have you daydreamed about locking in your PL mounted lens?

I’ve been there too. Choosing a new camera is tough. I mean really tough. And if you’re here, contemplating a new camera, you’re probably looking at cameras priced under $10,000. Don’t fret though, below I’ve designed a way to ease the burden and help you make a decent, yet quick, decision (we won’t be discussing 35mm DOF adapters here, since we’ve already discussed that topic recently). So, let’s do a quick Q&A to figure out what your needs are:

1. Is this your first film?
2. Are you a technical type of person that likes gadgets?
3. Are you the impatient type?
4. Are you shooting a horror film or documentary?
5. Did you just love the look of the last two Star Wars films?

6. Do you plan on shooting several films this year (be honest)?
7. Is your yearly budget for film making over $8000?
8. Did you invest in a decent sound kit first?
9. Do you have an editor with access to a decent editing machine (one with a program like Final Cut Pro, Avid, or Adobe Premiere?
10. Do you have a few terabytes of fast Raid5 storage for editing?

11. Do you know what latitude is?
12. Do you have a Director of Photography who knows and understands the concept of lighting?
13. Do you know what an f-stop is? How about a T-stop?
14. Do you plan on having a 35mm print made for projection?
15. Have you worked on at least five different film sets before?

If you answered YES to questions 1 thru 5 above, then go straight to the VIDEO section below.
If you answered NO to 1 thru 5, and YES to 6 thru 10 above, then go straight to the HIGH DEFINITION section below.
If you answered No to 1 thru 5, YES to 6 thru 10 and YES to 11 thru 15 above, then go straight to the FILM section below.

VIDEO
Okay, you were sent to the video section. It’s not a bad thing, really; lots of great stuff is shot with video.

There are different levels of video, including Standard and High Definition, small chip and large chip, tape and other storage, etc. But we’ll discuss the differences between Standard and High Definition, and hopefully get you pointed in the right direction for you.

Standard Definition Television (SDTV) is the television standard, which is being taken over by HDTV. There are many different formats, and each format has its pros and cons. I’d frown upon using anything other than digital acquisition, unless it’s Beta SP – and even then I’d probably have a hard time talking myself into it unless it was practically free. The pro Standard Definition formats worth mentioning are Sony’s Digibeta (The British show Dr Who is currently shot on Digibeta) and the slightly lower quality Panasonic DVCPRO® (notice that I said “slightly” – it’s still a very good, professional format). The consumer oriented digital format is MiniDV. There are other formats, but let’s just focus on MiniDV, since if you are using DigiBeta, you probably already know enough to skip this section, since those cameras usually run in the higher price range….

MiniDV is a decent format. Any prosumer or better MiniDV camera in the hands of a professional who knows what he/she is doing is going to look good. At first, MiniDV was laughed at as a professional format, but it quickly made its way into the mainstream. I know I’ll get flamed for saying this, so before I do, let me just say that I have judged film contests, was on the board for a film festival, have shot a 35mm feature film, and have done my fare share of Cinematography. I have seen plenty of films made with the many different cameras, and I can say that there isn’t much of a difference between the look of the many different MiniDV cameras. I know there are people out there swearing by their DVX100b, but compared side-by-side with other camera footage, the difference is quite minimal (If you’re lucky, only 1 out of every 100 non-film people might notice a difference, if they are lucky). The limitation is in the format itself, which is why it’s not called a “professional” format.

24p – it’s the new buzz word, but it’s really not that big of a deal, unless you’re doing chroma key work. Even then, it’s not the best idea to shoot green/blue screen work with a MiniDV camera – the 5:1 compression and the 4:1:1 color sampling will make for a horrible time for any keyer. But people like to add the term “24p” to their movie so that their film sounds like it was shot with something Hollywood brought in. In other words, it’s a marketing gimmick. The 24p look is noticeable only if you are looking for it – and even then, it’s hard to spot. Other than that, it doesn’t lend a whole lot to the film. Some people like to think that they’re going to shoot 24p for easy transfer to film. For that I have to ask: “Do you have a REALLY big budget?” At $350 a minute, it’s not cost effective, so get that out of your head.

Good MiniDV cameras to get are pretty much anything with a 1/3″ CCD or larger. You can get them used or new on ebay and elsewhere, but here’s a few of the 1/3″ CCD MiniDV cameras: Sony PD150 (60i/15p), Sony PD170 (60i/15p), Panasonic DVX100b (60i/30p/24p), Canon XL1s (60i), Canon XL2 (60i/30p/24p). Try to avoid consumer oriented MiniDV cameras, stick with “prosumer” and above, if at all possible.

High Definition
Sent to the High Definition section? Interested in what High Definition can offer?

High Definition is still video. It’s the new television standard, which is replacing SDTV, but it’s much higher resolution (5 times higher) and allows film makers to use High Definition for things other than television if they would like, for instance: the cinema.

Like SD, there are many different HD formats and cameras (and the list seems to grow every month), and each format and camera also has its pros and cons. The consumer/prosumer oriented recording format shared by JVC, Sony, and Canon is called HDV. Panasonic makes its own format called DVCPRO HD which it can record to a special non-consumer oriented tape, or to the fairly expensive P2 cards. Then there are the other formats available from Sony: XDCAM HD and HDCAM.

HDV records MPEG-2 in a Group of Pictures (GOP), the same as a DVD, except in High Definition. HDV cameras pop up all over the Film and Television industry. Mike Rowe’s show Dirty Jobs uses a Sony Z1U as camera “B”. Another Discovery show, The Deadliest Catch, is also shot in HDV with the Sony Z1U. Clint Eastwood used several Sony Z1U’s on his two films, Flags of Our Fathers and Letters from Iwo Jima for cut-away shots. I could keep going, but I won’t. Many filmmakers like the Sony Z1U because it can be switched from the North American 1080i60 HDTV standard to the European 1080i50 HDTV standard.

There are plenty of good prosumer HDV cameras other than the Z1U. There’s the new Sony V1U (which does 24p) and the slightly older FX1 (the FX1 is a less costly, but more consumer oriented version, of the Z1U). There’s the JVC GY-HD110U (which replaced the original HD100), GY-HD200U, GY-HD250U and the Canon XLH1, XHG1, and XHA1 cameras. All are being used in plenty of places and getting great shots as well. HDV is daily proving itself as a real HD format and is being used in professional places, by major networks, studios, and other production companies around the world.

In 2007, Frito Lay did a “Crash the Super Bowl” challenge and invited film makers to create their own 30-second commercial which showcased their chips. Check out Girl was one of the five finalists of the challenge, and was shot with the Panasonic AG-HVX200, which uses P2 cards and DVCPro HD.

The larger 2/3″ CCD chipped cameras are expensive – usually starting in the $15,000 range. Do you need an expensive larger chipped camera? Possibly, but if that’s the case – you may want to rent it. All prosumer oriented HD cameras are good cameras. Adam Wilt and friends did a comparison last year between several of the HD cameras and came to the conclusion that the 1/3″ CCD cameras were fairly on par with each other – no one camera really stood out. Each camera had good qualities and bad qualities…

You can get the prosumer HD cameras used or new, on ebay or elsewhere.

FILM
Wow! You were sent to the film section of this article, which must mean you know a thing or two about filmmaking, right?

First, I gotta get this outta the way: Shooting on Film is NOT always expensive!!! I know, it goes against everything you’ve ever heard, right? Everyone tells you to buy a video camera, since it’s cheaper than film, but what do they know? Have they shot film before?

I managed to produce a feature film on 35mm film for the lowly sum of $10,000. At the same time, there were two other feature film productions going on locally that were being shot on the Panasonic DVX100. I don’t believe I’m at liberty to discuss the individual budgets, but both productions spent more than we did and the finished product didn’t look nearly as good as film. I’m not knocking either production though, they did their best with what they had, but both sets of producers told me that they shot on video because film was expensive – and yet both features still looked like they were shot on video…

You want film? Let’s do the math real quick: We’ve talked about the differences between 35mm, 16mm, and Super8 before, so let’s just say you’ll shoot on 35mm, since it is the largest and most expensive of the different standard film formats (excluding 65/70mm).

Let’s say you’re shooting a 3 minute short film. You budget a 3:1 shooting ratio (for every 3 minutes of footage you shoot, you use 1 minute in your film). A 3 minute film at a 3:1 shooting ratio needs 900 foot of film, heck with it – let’s round up to an even 1000 foot of film, just to be safe. Rolls usually come in 400ft loads, but you can buy recans or shortends if you’d like, which will help on the costs as well. So, let’s go with a few cans of fairly fresh shortends for $0.20 a foot. $0.20 x 1000ft = $200.00

You can buy older 35mm film cameras on ebay. I use a Konvas, but it’s loud. It sounds like a sewing machine while running, so you’ll have to figure out how to get decent sound in your short film – either by ADR or some other intelligent way.

Let’s say you drop $1200 on your 35mm Camera with 3 lenses, which is not an unreasonable price. My suggestion is not to buy a camera without lenses, unless you have bought film cameras before. Try to get a camera that runs smoothly and has been serviced recently. Get lenses that are scratch free. The Konvas cameras usually come with Lomo lenses. Lomos are really good lenses and can be bought for an excellent price. You can do the camera servicing yourself, if you are a brave soul, but if not, there are techs who can service your camera for $500 or more. Do not try to work on the lenses yourself!

Other 35mm and 16mm cameras are the Mitchell, Arri (aka Arriflex), Aaton, Kinor, and Eclair, to name a few. If you’re going to go with Super 8mm, look at any model Braun or Nizo, the Canon 514, 814, or 1014, any model Beaulieu, or the Nikon R8 or R10. When buying a Super 8mm camera, you MUST make sure it will work with the current stocks offered from Kodak. If not, don’t buy it.

So, at this point you have $1200 wrapped up in your 35mm film camera and $200 wrapped up in raw film. That’s only $1400 so far. You shoot your film and take it to the lab, who clean and process it for you. They charge about $.15 per foot for processing. Add prep and clean for an additional $.05 per foot. You want it transferred to DigiBeta or HD? High Definition will be much more expensive in every way around, so let’s go with DigiBeta this time. You’ll want to spend the extra money for a SUPERVISED video transfer if you can. Now we’re talking about $400 an hour for the supervised telecine. So, let’s add all that up real quick:

$0.15 x 1000ft = $150.00
$0.05 x 1000ft = $50.00
$400 per hour = roughly one hour for 10 minutes of film transfer.

That brings the overall total to:
$1400 + $575 = $2000.00

A new Panasonic DVX100b costs over $2100. So, a 3 minute short film is cheaper in 35mm. You’ll also get to keep the 35mm film camera for your next project. The costs of shooting Super8 and 16mm films is less expensive (and not to mention the cameras are often less expensive as well), so shooting on film is a very good way of doing things.

So why doesn’t everyone shoot on film? It’s time consuming! It takes a lot of technical expertise and know-how. A fully loaded 35mm camera is extremely heavy and bulky. There’s no instant gratification – if you shoot a scene, you can’t immediately watch it to see how it looked. Labs are hard to deal with and often frustrating. etc., etc… The cool thing is you have shot on 35mm film, which can easily and cheaply be transferred to a 35mm positive print, if you want to go back out to film (instead of straight to DVD).

The end result of shooting film is usually worth it if you have the guts and the know-how, but if not, it’s probably safer to stay in the realm of High Definition or Standard Definition video…

Before you leave, here’s some food for thought: A good cinematographer can still get great shots with a crappy VHS camcorder! Now go and chew on that!

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