Which cam for outdoor beauty shots

G

George Loch

Well-known member
I am going to be shooting a promo for a landscape architecture firm. The concept of the piece calls for mostly beauty shots of the details and elements of their work in residential landscape design. I have assumed the 5D MKIII would work the best as most of it will be medium to close ups with a lot of dolly and tracking shots. However, I am a little concerned that the lack of good resolution in the Canon DLSRs is going to take away from the beauty. Since most of this will be shallow DOF, should I be concerned? There isn't a budget to rent a Red so, I am planning on the Canon with some good lenses. Any thoughts?

-gl
 
We are talking about focusing on the elements in the designs ie. water features, firepits, planting beds, etc. A lot of detail in their work. Not landscapes per say.

-gl
 
Ah, personally I wouldn't shoot on a Canon. I'm a GH2 guy and resolution and detail is more of what you're after than a soft look I'd imagine.
 
Snazzy Flapper said:
Landscape shots with lots of shallow DOF? Really?
Click to expand...
Its just as great as fisheye wide angle 300mm lens :smile:
Its not the camera, its your knowledge and experience that makes a difference BUT camera with higher dynamic range have more to showoff.
 
Can you rent the C300 or F3? Either of those cameras with S-Log would be a good choice for exteriors.
 
Perhaps. I will have to see what the budget will allow. I also have no experience shooting with either of those.
 
George Loch said:
I am going to be shooting a promo for a landscape architecture firm. The concept of the piece calls for mostly beauty shots of the details and elements of their work in residential landscape design. I have assumed the 5D MKIII would work the best as most of it will be medium to close ups with a lot of dolly and tracking shots. However, I am a little concerned that the lack of good resolution in the Canon DLSRs is going to take away from the beauty. Since most of this will be shallow DOF, should I be concerned? There isn't a budget to rent a Red so, I am planning on the Canon with some good lenses. Any thoughts?

-gl
Click to expand...

Perhaps things have changed about aesthetics of architectural shots... but I just checked my 'reference', Architectural Digest, and most of the shots, whether broad exteriors, exterior detail, or interiors, were 'deep focus'.

Now of course they are probably shooting 4x5 stills (if not 8x10 stills...), but it looks like Deep Focus has not gone out of style for architectural shots.

What I'd recommend is getting a shift and tilt for architectural shots, so you can have such 'angled' shots as looking up, that is the film plan non-parallel with walls or other 'straight up structural elements', and via the shift and tiled, 'correct' for the
usual distortion that occurs with such angled up (or angled down for that matter...) shots.

I personally would not use anything that distorted in a 'fish eye' or similar manner. When I did 4x5 architectural shots back in the olden days, I did spend the 'big bux' at the time for a 90mm (wide angle on a 4x5) that had rectilinear correction... (that is 'no bulging of parallel lines due to wide angle).

There may be a very few stylized shots that get away with such a distortion, but for me, for architecture, typically not.
 
Fluoro said:
You do realise that Zeiss ZE/ZFs have pretty much the same image quality?
Click to expand...

ZE / ZFs are at the same quality league as CP.2s? I didn't know that... but useful. So the extra money spent on CPs are paid for the uniform build and smooth focus / iris system?
 
legrevedotcom said:
ZE / ZFs are at the same quality league as CP.2s? I didn't know that... but useful. So the extra money spent on CPs are paid for the uniform build and smooth focus / iris system?
Click to expand...

yup same glass...same image quality. You are paying for the cinema lens mechanics
 
legrevedotcom said:
ZE / ZFs are at the same quality league as CP.2s? I didn't know that... but useful. So the extra money spent on CPs are paid for the uniform build and smooth focus / iris system?
Click to expand...

Well... Sort of. The CP.2s use the same glass as the ZE/ZFs, but there are some differences:
1. No focus breathing: This is a big one. The photo lenses breath, so when focusing the focal length changes. This is not at all nice in footage.
2. Mechanics: All lenses have the same front size, which is nice. They have a lot longer throw, all the markings on the side of the lens to help with focus pulling, which for me is the second biggest. They also have proper rotation (while the ZEs have that, they have no manual aperture) and 14 bladed iris (without click stops) that gives circular bokeh at every stop. All the distance markings are correct, plus the aperture is marked in T-stops.
3. Mounts: You can get it in different mount, but especially PL, which I consider to be the best mount out there. Sturdy and very future proof, as you can use it on larger cameras.

Of course, it all depends on how you shoot. I always have an AC with me, who does focus pulling, so of course I want cine lenses (having worked a lot as an AC helps too, since I miss a lot of it otherwise) but still lenses are OK for some, which I understand.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top