News for you gearheads who had idle dreams of taking home an affordable version of the Red One or Epic cinematic cameras someday: the long-awaited Scarlet has finally arrived. Unfortunately, the announced price for a working package is about $14k which is nearly 3 times the original ballpark figure of $5k that was bandied about by RedCinema for so many years.

http://www.gizmag.com/red-scarlet-x-digital-camera/20390/



The announcement comes on the heels of Canon's new C300, which is even farther out of reach at $20k

http://www.gizmag.com/the-new-canon-c300-video-camera/20383/



Looks like it's consumer models all around for people like me, at least for the foreseeable future

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Must admit, I do love oggling fancy kit, and those are beautiful!

But in all seriousness, how much of an improvement in WAM video quality does kit like that actually make over what you can get with top end ($1000-ish) prosumer gear? Is there a difference the audience can "feel"?

 

The difference between a consumer camera and an SLR, assuming the user is competent with lighting and handling the camera itself.



I'm pretty disappointed by this. The video revolution seems to be rolling nicely without it though.

60fps should do us better than 5k. I doubt any of my films will be showing on a cinema screen anytime soon.

 

Nobody is going to want to spend days downloading 4k resolution videos, so most footage would probably be downsampled to 720 or 1080 for distribution anyway. The biggest difference would be in the huge film-like dynamic range of these top end video chips and the superb 4 and 5-figure lenses these rigs use. Imagine shooting perfect noiseless cinematic video with a 50 watt light source or outside at twilight.

It would only be worth it for bragging rights I guess. Most customers seem to be unconcerned with video quality and I doubt it would do much for a producer's sales if he wasn't already producing material that people were buying regularly because of the style or content.

Sure would be nice to work with though...

 

I really don't see how they're worth it. I mean you can grab an EOS 5d MkII or something, with a nice lens, and for about $3,000 you're making movies that I personally wouldn't even be able to tell the difference between that and if you used a Red, a Blue, a Green, or whatever movie camera is out right now. I know those cameras support all the formats and have all the professional connections and what not, while the SLR's barely even have dedicated record/stop buttons. But for what WE do, why would you ever need more? If you didn't need the $1300 lens or full-frame, you could just rock like a Digital Rebel or Nikon D for less than $1000! Trust me. With good lighting and stuff, none of your consumers would know or even care if they could tell.

 

I might not need you to upgrade the RED, but I definitely take image quality into account. After downloading large libraries of pin-sharp HD vids from Muddypinays and Allwam, I'm definitely a lot less enthusiastic about buying vids from other producers (no names mentioned) whose equipment isn't up to the same standard, even if the content looks promising. Particularly with wam, being able to see the texture of the mud (or whatever) on a model's skin can make all the difference.

I value lighting over camera gear. There are a few producers out there that would be wasting less money on high end cameras.

I have been looking at the pros and cons of DSLR. Both Soundguy and Messmaster have given good advice. When my budget next extends to cameras I think i might give it a try.

 

This probably illustrates how different people will seek different things. I've looked at lots of Muddypinays sets previews, but the girls always seem to be wearing low-rise jeans, something I can't stand. Doesn't matter how high the image quality, if the models are in hipsters, I'm never going to buy that scene.

Now I've also seen stuff with models in clothes I did like where the video quality was so awful as to render it unwatchable, but that was down to "st vitus dance" camerawork, rather than actual image quality.

So in my case, as long as the video is of reasonable quality (SD DV or better), it's content, not image quality, that determines what I buy.

 

That's because the 80's were over 30 years ago, and Mom jeans are ugly!

 

The 80s was when I was a teenager, but I find low-rise jeans hideous, they totally distort a woman's figure, shortening the legs and lengthening the body. Plus the impracticality of having to be hitched up every five steps if the wearer doesn't want them to end up round her ankles.

Aside: A mate told me a story of the singer of an indie-rock band at a certain festival in Germany who wore low-rise jeans, and decided to run full-pelt from one side of the fairly large stage to the other in the middle of their band's set. They got half way across when their jeans dropped, cue instant faceplant to the deck, with the mic slamming into the boards so hard the ensuing bang deafened half the audience and did serious damage to the PA.

But high-waist jeans weren't just an 80s thing - look at Marylin Monroe in "The River Of No Return" (see uploaded image) - she's wearing guys jeans, high-waisted, traditional western style. That was shot in the 50s or 60s. Low-rise results in "muffin-tops", even on skinny models. High-waist (or natural waist, to be more accurate) fits the figure better, no unnecessary bulges, and a much better defined shape.

Here's a couple of collected images that illustrate the point:


Pockets on the bum, not half on the legs, no muffin top, and look at the figure definition!


Now *that* is how to wear wet jeans!

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I think we may be wandering well off topic... but hey!

High rise jeans make the body look shorter, which means the longer the legs the weirder the person looks (I say person, I live in Levi 527's and I am 6"1) (Aside - I have a pair of 70's Orange Tab 527's that are too cool even for me to wear too often) (Didn't we meet in London? I was wearing 527's. My butt got groped...)

If a model wears low rise jeans and has muffin tops, she is doing clothes shopping wrong.


A good pair of low rise jeans accent the body. Thing is... like any clothing you wear clothes to suit the body. Short legs and low rise with midriff showing is a no-no.








But if you really want to see a woman rock a pair of jeans, Gabrielle Anwar in burn Notice has some serious chops!

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This how you do it...






Of course, both styles can go horribly, horribly wrong...

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I'm fine with those jeans, but I certainly don't remember them dominating Muddypinays' videos.

I mean, it's a balance: I'm going to buy mudwrestling vids no matter how sucky the production value is. But if it's one girl rolling around in a mud puddle, that's common enough that I'm going to prioritize according to image quality (and also model hotness, but that might actually come in second).