Canon 7D for short films. Trying to decide.

[Michael Olsen]

I don't think there's any argument. Certainly the sound is often neglected. It requires good equipment, but mostly, like many other things, it requires attention and time.

We'd all love to have an audio dept with a mixer and crew, but that's not always possible. I just used the Zoom H4N on my shoot and couldn't be happier. Obviously the caveat is that you have to put it in the right hands, but if we had to wait until we could get a fully equipped sound dept, we couldn't shoot.

Sadly, this is my situation at the moment. Zoom, for the price, definitely does nice work. Really enjoyed your short!

 

[WonJohnSoup]

I respectfully disagree on your percentage. A camera-mounted mic is good for about 5% of what you might want to shoot - B-roll most specifically. The audio section and control of the HVX is better than the 7D. There is a reason productions have production mixers.

A.

I think you misread it. I said a "boom mic" as in getting the audio in close on a boom. And yes, a separate mixer would be great. But I personally do NOT believe it is a requisite that say, having a recorder without auto-gain control is. AGC can blow out certain parts of the dialogue that you want to keep and can't get back. The built-in recorder on the HVX can be adjusted in regards to levels and you have the option of mixing a bit in post, however undesirable that would be. I do this about 90% of the time, since most of the projects I've worked on do not have a knowledgeable mixer on board. 100% of the projects where I've seen others working with an HVX had the boom mic running straight into the HVX. They knew exactly what they were doing. Logistics and budget dictated that to be the best decision and watching the movies that came out of this setup was perfectly fine. The audio did not have any problems where I was taken out of my suspension of disbelief.

And as a previous poster said, there are realities and ideals and the HVX having a decent built-in recorder is an enormous boon if you're working on non-Hollywood budget gigs. I've even done one man interviews with an HVX in which the camera was tri-pod mounted and I held the boom mic to the interviewer. So yes, I still stand by my statement that an HVX with a boom mic is about all a crew would need to shoot a movie (assuming ofcourse, they know what they're doing).

 

[RyanT]

Advantages of the HVX include more framerates, built in ND filters (can cost quiet a penny to add to the 7D if you are using seveal lenses), form factor more conducive to planned out narrative shoots, better LCD, better lens control (both the manual zoom rocker and electronic ring right in front of it), much easier to control focus with the ring, built-in audio that works and sounds perfectly fine for 95% of the work out there AND you don't have to spend a lot of time re-syncing things in post, ability to shoot to tape if desired, more monitoring options (zebra readings, audio monitoring, etc), built-in image stabilization, no aliasing, no rolling shutter...

The HVX was great at a time, but now after having one for two years and shooting countless shorts and music videos with it and an adapter, I never want to see one again. All those times when I'd have a bunch of 2k's and still not have enough light just haunt me in my sleep.

I just finished shooting a short that we had been planning for the past month. All the shots had been very planned out, we had a 1 ton grip truck, and we shot on the 7d. There were some things that were silly with the 7d, such as having to take pictures to check exposure, or just the fact that...you know, I've been sitting here for five minutes and I can't really think of anything else. Honestly, I loved that we had to take pictures to check exposure, because now I have all these very high resolution stills that we might actually be able to use for later on down the line.

Granted everytime I shoot something, we always do a dual system production, so sound is barely a consideration.

Really, all I care about is that at the end of the day, after talking with the director he just couldn't stop telling me about how happy he was with how things turned out. He told me that he was really hesitant at first, but now after watching the footage he really feels like we're making movies. Not like we're just some kids with an expensive camera. None of this other stuff really matters except for that.

 

[WonJohnSoup]

The HVX was great at a time, but now after having one for two years and shooting countless shorts and music videos with it and an adapter, I never want to see one again. All those times when I'd have a bunch of 2k's and still not have enough light just haunt me in my sleep.

I just finished shooting a short that we had been planning for the past month. All the shots had been very planned out, we had a 1 ton grip truck, and we shot on the 7d. There were some things that were silly with the 7d, such as having to take pictures to check exposure, or just the fact that...you know, I've been sitting here for five minutes and I can't really think of anything else. Honestly, I loved that we had to take pictures to check exposure, because now I have all these very high resolution stills that we might actually be able to use for later on down the line.

Granted everytime I shoot something, we always do a dual system production, so sound is barely a consideration.

Really, all I care about is that at the end of the day, after talking with the director he just couldn't stop telling me about how happy he was with how things turned out. He told me that he was really hesitant at first, but now after watching the footage he really feels like we're making movies. Not like we're just some kids with an expensive camera. None of this other stuff really matters except for that.

I don't think you have to take a still photo to check exposure? I just half-press the shutter button while still in video mode to meter, unless you're checking specifically for clipped highlights.

And yes, with a lot of supplemental equipment, the 7D is just fine for most studio style shooting. A lot of the drawbacks come up more in situations where the crew is smaller, you do not have the extra equipment to make up for the shortcomings AND you want to shoot in a very controlled manner. You take out that last part and the problems of the other two are lessened by a lot.

Great to hear you were able to overcome the "big camera envy" syndrome a lot of clients are prone to. I always thought it was silly how a lot of pros have to slap on matteboxes for the sake of making the camera look more professional.

 

[meauounji]

RyanT, I also find it interesting that you have to take a still to expose. If you're trying to activate the light meter, all you have to do is half-press the shutter release. You don't even have to wait for it to auto-focus. Just a little prod will activate the meter just like when you're trying to take a still, giving you plenty of time to make adjustments. If you're taking the still to record your desired exposure levels or for continuity records, then I can understand why you would want the still, but not really to check exposure.