Talk me out of buying the C300

I'd love to go with the C100 becase of the price. But I know I would kick myself everytime I show up on a professional set and didn't have HDSDI & 4:2:2 on board. If I had to rig up a C100 to do that I'd have extra junk on my rig. I think it's worth paying a little extra for convenience sake. If I could afford a RED package I would be getting a C500.
 
Yes, but then you have to mount it, power it, feed it a signal, then keep track of storage and media. I just want to "KISS"
 
mraaron895 said:
I'd love to go with the C100 becase of the price. But I know I would kick myself everytime I show up on a professional set and didn't have HDSDI & 4:2:2 on board. If I had to rig up a C100 to do that I'd have extra junk on my rig. I think it's worth paying a little extra for convenience sake. If I could afford a RED package I would be getting a C500.
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That's kind of contradicting itself, as to use the C500 to its full potential, you'll need to rig that up as well with an external recorder (which is what you keep saying you don't want to do). Otherwise you just have a C300.

If low light is not that huge of a deal, I'd say get the BMCC, as it records directly to ProRes for your weeding shoots, and raw 2.5k for your commercial shoots. It also has HD-SDI. And before you mention the battery "issue" I have already seen several compact battery solutions, which allow you to use cheap Sony or Canon batteries. Of course, it's not available yet, and no one really knows when it will be available in mass quantity. So if you need it now, your kind of out of luck.

It seems like you're pretty set on the C300. All the alternatives, you have a reason for not getting. So I'd say go for the C300.
 
If you get as much work as you sound like you do, the C300 should be paid off fairly quickly. Not sure why price would be a huge issue unless you don't get enough work to justify it.
 
Ok let me try: Dont buy the C300! Its going to be outdated within the next 12 months. If you need something for the big clients, rent!

did it work?
 
I'm having a really hard time seeing how the C300 will be outdated in the next 12 months. They've put so many industry standard features on the camera. Especially when you couple that with the amazing dynamic range that is only bettered by the F3. And I only mentioned the F3 because they are in the same price category.
 
I agree. I don't think it will be obsolete in a year. But with every passing year we'll see ever better cameras. Though I still think the C300 will remain a workhorse for quite a while. Nevertheless I would love to see 1080p60 added in a future C300 firmware upgrade. Panasonic offers this on the AF100 (just sold mine on Ebay) as an upgrade option for an extra $250:

http://www.panasonic.com/business/provideo/ag-af100.asp
 
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If your main source of income is weddings, a C300 is overkill. If the C300 is overkill, the Scarlet is even more so. The C100 seems like a very good option.

If you need HD/DSI, 4:2:2, minimum 50mbps, there are several, cheaper options than the C300: the Canon XF305, the Panny HPX250 and 370, the Sony PMW150/200. They may not have a large sensor, but they take very nice pictures.

Personally, I think the PMW200 will be a hit. The EX1/3 is very popular in the production world, and the 200 is a very good, broadcast quality upgrade.

Why did you sell your FS100, if I may ask?
 
The BMC has a very poor form factor for my type of shooting. Which is also why I sold my FS100. But another reason I sold my FS100 was because it of it's poor shadow detail and color reproduction. It made hot pink look like hot orange. And believe me, I tried every picture profile.

I love working with the smaller chip cameras, but for my style I need a large sensor.
 
The C100+Hyperdeck seems the most reasonable alternative.
Even without recorder it will yield better images than a DSLR.
Most clients in your business wouldn't even know the difference between a C300 and a C100.
Looks like the same chocolate bar to them, except ones got peanuts and the other doesn't.

The BMC would not be a good alternative, too much rolling shutter and aliasing to be used as a walk around camera.
The C series in particular has very little rolling shutter. This is the no. 1 reason docu's use it after the optimized sensor and codec.
 
$10,000 is a whole lot of cash to have HDSDI and 4:2:2 "just in case" it's needed on a bigger set. You could rent a C300 a good 25 times for that. A C100 will be more than enough camera for everything short of features or network broadcast. I say pocket the extra money and use (some of) it to enjoy being 23. You'll still have a kickass camera, plus you'll be $10k richer.

I don't know what market you're in or what pricing is like, but I know that out here it would take a dozen or so higher-end weddings to sock enough profit away for a C300. Is it worth not profiting on 12 weddings to have a couple of features that are irrelevant to your primary business?
 
While a lot of my calls are still for weddings, I'm wanting to expand my market and provide a one stop shop for my higher end commercial clients. I'm finding that clients now are quite aware of cameras and their capabilities. Which is why on my last job for Nike when they didnt have a budget for the Alexa the C300 was the next choice. And while the C100 may have the same "look" the client is going to wonder why it has 200 less numbers in the name than the C300.
 
If you're getting the work now that'll pay for the camera quickly, then jump in. If not, then rent until you can be assured a fast ROI. You can get a C300 for roughly $500 for a weekend. If the jobs don't pay enough to eat that cost a couple of times until you know that the work is there, then they probably don't pay enough to justify a $15-20k camera package. This is a terrible time to own an expensive camera that isn't fully paid off, and it's possible the least expensive rental market in history. Just be absolutely sure that this won't become a long-term investment that you're still paying for in a year when there might be better, more affordable cameras on the market that are more highly sought after by your clients.
 
Just put a lot of lightweight fancy looking stuff around a "Stupeflex" camera and most clients will probably be happy.
 
I just talked myself out of buying a C300 because I don't think the image quality and features are worth the high $. I'm looking into the C100 instead with a Hyperdeck (already have one) if needed. Much better value in this camera despite the lack of some features. If the C100 is used with the Hyperdeck you get SDI out of the Hyperdeck and better quality than 50mb/s MPEG2 4:2:2 as in the C300.
 
Editman Sweden said:
I just talked myself out of buying a C300 because I don't think the image quality and features are worth the high $. I'm looking into the C100 instead with a Hyperdeck (already have one) if needed. Much better value in this camera despite the lack of some features. If the C100 is used with the Hyperdeck you get SDI out of the Hyperdeck and better quality than 50mb/s MPEG2 4:2:2 as in the C300.
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It appears so, but no one has actually confirmed that the C100 HDMI is the same signal as the C300. The FS100 out is different from the F3 out even though they share the same sensor.

In his last video Jim, who is trying to do his best but is limited by what Canon tells him, mentioned the C100 as sharing C300 lowlight but unlike his previous statements didn't say the C100 out is identical to the C300, something he said before. Have things changed or was this a simple omission without significance? This is the critical issue with the C100's usability for higher level work.
 
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Editman Sweden said:
I just talked myself out of buying a C300 because I don't think the image quality and features are worth the high $. I'm looking into the C100 instead with a Hyperdeck (already have one) if needed. Much better value in this camera despite the lack of some features. If the C100 is used with the Hyperdeck you get SDI out of the Hyperdeck and better quality than 50mb/s MPEG2 4:2:2 as in the C300.
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hm does the c100 shares same dr , and has clog?
 
anatusa said:
hm does the c100 shares same dr , and has clog?
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C100 has C Log and a version of 709 that electronically tries to cram the full DR into an AVCHD 709 like signal. On the sample video there were highlight blowouts using this compression, but that could be due the filmaker's stated intent to grade the sample so that it looks like a DSLR. On the main C100 thread I posted images showing that the DR seen on the LCD was had much greater DR than the graded final product.
 
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