Why dont filmmakers use video cameras?

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nolankubrick

Member
Might be a dumb question but I've always felt more freedom while using something like a DVX100, where you don't have to set-up lenses and be controlled by what you have.

Why don't filmmakers use cameras like XDCAM?

If there was someone out there making cinematic quality digital video cameras, would there be a market for that in narrative filmmaking?
 
Tell me what advantages you think the small video cameras have that bigger digital cinema cameras don't.

I think there are many people making cinematic quality digital video cameras that are used for narrative filmmaking. Arri, Red, Sony, etc.

Please further explain your thinking.
 
by digital video cameras, I mean cameras that dont use interchangeable lenses, like DVX100, XDCAM, HMC150.

The only advantage I was talking about is the ability to shoot without needing different lenses to get what you want.

Lately, all the DSLR-killers are making the headlines and they are all still kind of the same thing to me, better specs of course but still DLSR's with a better form-factor.
 
nolankubrick said:
by digital video cameras, I mean cameras that dont use interchangeable lenses, like DVX100, XDCAM, HMC150.
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What makes a camera a digital camera is not whether or not it has interchangeable lenses, but rather the type of signal it uses to record the moving image. In the case of digital video cameras, it's a digital signal.

nolankubrick said:
The only advantage I was talking about is the ability to shoot without needing different lenses to get what you want.
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Interchangeable lenses may not be as convenient as a single fixed zoom lens, but they are absolutely offer more "freedom" when it comes to creative choices about your image. Case in point: let's say you wanted to get a close up of a beautiful girl as she lies in her bed reading a book, with a nice shallow depth of field. But, you're shooting in a tiny apartment where the maximum distance you can get the camera away from the girl is a couple of feet. With a DVX100B you're basically screwed. A small 1/3" sensor won't give you the shallow depth of field unless you're zoomed in and when you do that, your lens (generally) gets slower.

nolankubrick said:
Lately, all the DSLR-killers are making the headlines and they are all still kind of the same thing to me, better specs of course but still DLSR's with a better form-factor.
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Having said that, I'm geniunely interested in why you think that Scarlet, Alexa, FS700, and the C300 are "DSLRs with a better form factor". Not only do these cameras offer far greater control of the image in terms of depth of field, but they sport higher dynamic ranges, more accurate and deep color rendition, big data codecs so that motion graphics and animation is easier, and cinematic treatment of highlights and shadows.

nolankubrick said:
If there was someone out there making cinematic quality digital video cameras, would there be a market for that in narrative filmmaking?
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Those companies exist. They're called RED, Arri, Sony, and Canon. Avengers was shot on Alexa. A slew of big feature films have been shot on RED, including the recent best picture nominees The Social Network and The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. Digital video cameras are permeating every level of production in Hollywood nowadays, as well as independent filmmaking.
 
nolankubrick said:
by digital video cameras, I mean cameras that dont use interchangeable lenses, like DVX100, XDCAM, HMC150.

The only advantage I was talking about is the ability to shoot without needing different lenses to get what you want.

Lately, all the DSLR-killers are making the headlines and they are all still kind of the same thing to me, better specs of course but still DLSR's with a better form-factor.
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I think the reason you don't see professional cinema cameras using a fixed lens is the answer to your question. It is not an advantage in the context of professional narrative filmmaking. Narrative filmmaking is a slower and more deliberate process than say documentary, reality, wedding or other typical videography ventures. Thus, the narrative filmmaker has a more tolerable environment to carefully pick the best glass for the job. The best glass for the job is not always the same glass, so the narrative filmmaker should rejoice that he/she is not always stuck with the same lens and can choose glass based on the needs of individual circumstance.

Additionally, as camera sensors get larger, so becomes the demands/complications of a lens design. Sure the DVX100 and HMC150 have very nice ranged built in lenses, but can you name ONE camera that is over m4/3 that has a built in lens? The truth is, it becomes very difficult to make a one-solution, good performance lens that will suit everybody's needs when you reach sensors of that size.

Many lenses with a decent focal length range are HUGE in size and weight. Then the smaller zooms, which are light in weight, usually lack the focal length range desired. Some lenses are fast, some are slow. Primes hold advantages over zooms, zooms advantages over primes. New glass can be sharp and contrasty, old glass can be smooth and low-contrast. Some can auto focus, some have wonderful witness marks for focus pullers. Some can macro focus, some cannot. Some can tilt-shift. Some can be anamorphic. Some can be snorkel or probe lenses.

The needs of the professional are wide ranging and ever changing. The freedom to creatively select through which glass one shall capture a fictional world is a wonderful one. It is best to allow the lenses to be chosen for the task at hand.

Having cameras separate from lenses allow for custom combinations that would not otherwise be available if all lenses and cameras were built fused together.




Off topic but in the ballpark, I wonder why camera manufacturers continue to make fixed focal length photography cameras like the Leica X2 or the Fuji X100. I'm much rather have the M9 or the X-Pro. Fun for a 'let's see what I can do with one focal length' challenge, but annoying in every situation where another focal length would be more appropriate.
 
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Isn't the same argument used when consumers ask why they should buy one of these big cameras with sticky out lenses rather than a nice compact? I'd have thought the reasons for all the so called professional equipment being of so many different size and complexity formats is simply that it gives choice - choice of quality and choice of form factor. Nobody really can offer any workable definition as to what 'cinematic quality' even means. To some it's the 'special' look a big sensor produces, to others it's shallow DoF, to others it's fluidity of movement. You tend to only know it when you see it. You can buy almost anything and produce excellent work with the right techniques. You can also spend huge sums and produce rubbish. Cinematic to me is simply a combination of art and skill - not just what it was shot on!
 
nolankubrick said:
by digital video cameras, I mean cameras that dont use interchangeable lenses, like DVX100, XDCAM, HMC150.

The only advantage I was talking about is the ability to shoot without needing different lenses to get what you want.

Lately, all the DSLR-killers are making the headlines and they are all still kind of the same thing to me, better specs of course but still DLSR's with a better form-factor.
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As a non pro... the reason why I did not choose the HMC 150, with a fixed lens, and perhaps 'convenience' audio recording, etc... was the lens really distorted at short lengths... and it wasn't like 'oh, gosh, a little bowing'... it was really significant to me.

In addition, for the GH-1 I did buy, I can move up to a 400mm Nikon lens... when I need to... I've thought about doing some 'surf' ego clips for the local surfers... and that is not an option for the 'fixed' lens camera as far as I'm concerned.

I've not gotten into the the 'shallow' DoF... but if I do need a faster lens, I can rent/buy one... as needed... as it is I like to shoot about 2 stops down from wide open... so for me that's about 5.6/8 on the kit 14-140mm Lumix lens.

I use the 'zoom' more like a convenient set of 'primes'... that is rarely zoom while shooting... so if I did have prime lenses that had similar set of ranges, I'd be fine with that... ok, I may buy a couple more bodies...
 
Fixed lens video cameras are for doc/news work. That's what they have always been for. They are very poorly suited to film making. That's why (pre-DSLR) people were obsessed with finding ways to hang an interchangeable lens in front of them.
 
Even with 24p options, the look is still not quite there. As an example, compare 1080p24 on, say, the AG-AC160 (a great camera in its own right) to the GH2 or a C300 or F3. It's not quite the same, even if you can't put your finger as to exactly why.
 
Well, some famous filmmakers have made some movies using fixed lens handy-cam type camcorders. Danny Boyle shoot "28 Days Latter" on a Canon XL-1S; which was also used by Steven Soderbergh for the movie "Full Frontal". David Lynch used a DSR PD-150 to shoot "INLAND EMPIRE". There are other examples of the use of this type of camera, including the use of the HVX-200 on "Cloverfield" and different types of HDV cameras on "Crank: High Voltage". The thing is, there are cameras now available, with interchangeable lenses, that offer higher image quality. Filmmakers have gravitated to these types of cameras for the control and image quality.
 
28 Days Later was on a Canon XL-1 but that camera was interchangeable and they did use other lenses.

Inland Empire was something very different. Different in the sense that I'd hate life if everything looked like that. Wasn't a fan but appreciated the change of medium, because I can safely say there is nothing quite like that film. lol. Good or bad.

Your other points are good ones.
 
Marcel Zyskind has shot several films with Michael Winterbottom using a variety of 'prosumer/consumer' cameras, and a number have ended up winning awards in various fests...

On the other hand, looking at "Trishna"(2011), a Winterbottom directed, Zyskind shot film... the IMDB details list Arri Alexa, Canon 5D, and RED One.. so it would seem the boys have 'grown up'...
 
FYI: Anthony Dod Mantle used higher-resolving Canon EC (6-40mm) and Canon EJ (50-150mm) prime lenses to the XL-1 camera bodies using Optex adapters.

I'd love to be a focus puller on that production.... 1/3" CCD's. lol.

DP: "Is it is focus?"

Me (at crafty eating cookies and hitting on a pretty PA): "Yup!"


I looked it up in my American Cinematographer collection but here is a link to the American Cinematographer Article from July, 2003. LINK
 
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As we said, special use, sure, hanging a bunch of stuff off it to emulate a cinema camera (adapters), we all did it 2 years ago, but as the preferred tool for film making, no comparison with a system that uses interchangeable lenses.
 
Okay, let's try it a different way:

If you could have a large-sensor camera with a fixed lens, which was a zoom with a, say, in S35 terms, a 15-150 range at a constant f/2, at $7000...

Or the same camera, but with an interchangeable lens mount, at $6000...

Which would you go for?

I think there's a whole lot of reasons to consider the fixed-lens camera. Not the least of which is the thousands and thousands of dollars of lenses you'd have to buy to match the range of the built-in lens, plus the hassles involved in color-matching a lens set (unnecessary when it's all one lens!) plus the convenience factor plus the time savings of not having to change lenses and being able to quickly zoom to the appropriate focal length rather than having to pick up and reposition the camera...

I mean, there's lots of valid reasons why prime lenses are extinct on conventional small-chip video cameras...

Wouldn't anyone here be interested in having those same conveniences in a large-sensor camera? I know I'd be highly interested in it.
 
Barry_Green said:
If you could have a large-sensor camera with a fixed lens, which was a zoom with a, say, in S35 terms, a 15-150 range at a constant f/2, at $7000...

Or the same camera, but with an interchangeable lens mount, at $6000...

Which would you go for?
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Option 1, no question.
 
Barry, you forget about the sensor size and what it requires to build a lens to those specs. That is unbelievably unrealistic in my opinion.

Even if one could be made, a 'built-in' 15-150mm lens, constant f/2, S35 sized image circle wouldn't cost $1,000, like your scenario. And it certainly wouldn't be small or lightweight!

The only reason small HD cameras get these small and fast zoom ranges, is because the sensor is tiny and small.

The closest thing I can think of for S35mm sensor is the F3's 14x zoom, which is an 18-252mm . But you see even with that, it's $10,000 and not fast. At all. f/3.9 - f/6.8 wide open. Yuck!

The fact is.... the optical requirements and current limitations of the physics of light within our technology, simply cannot give big sensor cameras what we can give to small camera sensors like HVX200.


It's just not possible to get a 15-150 F/2 zoom for S35mm without being the size of a small rocket. And especially for just $1,000 extra. Right now, in 2012, that lens would likely add over 15k, maybe 20k, to the cost... and should i remind you, you'd be stuck with it.

I'd hate that when I would want to use other lenses for other reasons... such as a lens that wasn't as large or heavy... or one that had less optical element groupings for better sharpness or contrast. Vintage lenses for more flare, anamorphics for its' desired look, macro for close focus, probe for perspective work, etc etc.
 
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Very limited interest for me, but I'm sure there would be a lot of interest.
I pick lenses because of the qualities of that lens not just the focal length. Would that camera zoomed to a CU have the same dreamy qualities of my 135 I use for that purpose, probably not. Would it fall off at the edges the way one of my 28's does (that I like for certain shots), probably not. It would do even more to make everything look more generic, which is why I won't shoot on Canon L glass for example, because too many people already do.

Edit: In other words, you are taking a tool out of your hands for convenience. Which is trade off each person would have to decide on.
 
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Ryan Patrick O'Hara said:
Barry, you forget about the sensor size and what it requires to build a lens to those specs. That is unbelievably unrealistic in my opinion.
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I didn't forget about it, I know what it would take, I'm just throwing it out there for the purpose of discussion. Seems like some folks seem to think that it is the very interchangeability of lenses that is somehow making a camera more cinematic, and (despite owning tons of interchangeable lenses for stills and cine cameras) I just don't think that's a reasonable assumption.

Interchangeable lenses are, largely, a pain in the patoot. If it were possible (and it certainly isn't possible right now) but if it were possible to replace a whole lens kit of interchangeable glass, with a single do-all lens (a large-sensor equivalent to what we find on modern video cameras) then -- wouldn't that be appealing? Even at a price increase?

Seems obvious to me, but then again, it seemed obvious to me that nobody would actively want to shoot professional video on a stills camera, and as we found out there were plenty who had a differing opinion.

As it is, I'm looking quite forward to the supposed Lumix X 12-35 and 35-100. If I could replace all my lenses with just two, and have a reasonably fast, wide-ranging, auto-capable, high-quality set of glass that I only ever had to change once, instead of juggling a set of seven primes and four zooms... man, that'd be so much better...
 
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