So if you were looking to pick up a minimal, cheap functioning package, would something like this work?
1. F35 on eBay (8k)
2. Sony ac-550 adapter on eBay (150)
3. PL Cp.2 lens on eBay (around 2k) (dont have any pl lens unfortunately, just canon and nikon)
4. Hyperdeck shuttle 2 (about 450 with ssd new)
Am I missing anything
Yes, I think you are indeed missing something. The big picture. Actually the big picture seems to be massively ignored through this whole thread. I've been mentioning it but, I guess it's all in the name of the dream.
Seems not to bad at about $10,600 for the camera used to film Real Steel.
See. This is what you (and many others probably) are missing. The F35 didn't shoot Real Steel.
Mauro Fiore did! As well as Avatar, The Island, Smokin' Aces, Training Day, Tears of the Sun, The A-Team and a whole bunch of other Hollywood big budget films. He's an experienced high-end DP!
On top of that, they used a F35, yes. But with Cooke S4 lenses recording 4:4:4 uncompressed to a Codex recorder! See the difference?
Then they took it through a very high-end post-production pipeline, had it color graded by a very high-end colorist and all worked and finished using the best professionals and workflow. Not to mention the multimillion dollar lights and equipment package at his disposal to get any look he wanted.
But nevermind. Yes, it was the camera head which is responsible for what you see on Real Steel. (sarcasm of course).
People keep saying the camera that shot Real Steel is selling for $8k and that you can get it "up and running" for just a couple more thousand. But they didn't shoot Real Steel with "messy" low end stills lenses and the F35 attached to a low end 4:2:2 Prores recorder on a shoe string budget. Can you get a F35 "up and running" with a couple thousand dollars? Well, I would say more like "kneeling and crawling".
You would be buying a single piece of a whole system that shot Real Steel. Which probably represents like 1% of the equation. Put a F3 in there with that whole system and under that DP and it would most likely has done just as well. Get it?
It just hurts any sense of reasoning to think about buying a high-end camera just to dumb it down with the cheapest accessories and lenses and think it's still the same camera that shot Real Steel. I guess it does feel good to be able to run around screaming "I shoot with the same camera they shot Real Steel". But it's not really true in it's core.
Just the Cooke S4s are already a whole different ball park. I have a set of Zeiss CP.2s and I tell you they are s*%t next to the Cookes, Ultra Primes, Master Primes etc. They are PL, yes, but they are just re-housed still lenses and the 50mm is a stinker! I often will just skip it and go either slightly wider or tighter. And this is the top end of still glass we are talking about.
This thread has constructed a hype around the F35 for independent people that is just illusive. It's a great camera indeed, specially if you can package it with great quality lenses, recorder etc. But by then it wont be such a cheap system anymore. And to buy a F35 just to ghetto the heck out of it, well, you might as well be shooting with a FS100/FS700/F3. So why bother? To say your camera shot Real Steel? Well, sorry it's technically a lie.
Sorry for the rant and I don't mean to be condescending or rude. But the hype has gone so high in this thread that delusion is kind of taking over. This is not a dig at anybody in particular or anybody who bought the camera or wants to buy one. If you have already a F3, Epic etc like some here and just wanted to add the F35 to your arsenal, awesome! One more tool and why not if you can afford it? This was just a reality check for anybody scrapping coins who can barely afford a F3 but is thinking of getting a F35 because it's the camera that Hollywood uses and thinks that's all there is to it.
But I digress. Rant mode out.