So? I'm seeing loads of content that is really high quality and noticing it is done on a phone.
I am still old school, 4K camera
I HAVE filmed some wetlook and messy stuff with my phone and the quality is just INSANE!
I try to think of the pros and cons of filming with a phone (or two) and honestly? I can't think of hardly any "cons"
Especially after I filmed this very expensive, amazing video of me getting encased by Taylor with everything under the sunit was incredible.
Guess what? The sd card didn't read correctly and so? Half the video is watchable..but corrupted.so maybe not so watchable for some. The other half is fine.
Man. I was so upset.
I have paid THOUSANDS of dollars in sd card failures.
So? What do you all think? Throw out my cam and do two phones? One landscape and one portrait?
Or upgrade my camera?
The only "con" I notice is that when you go to look at a scene filmed by a phone? You have to click on each picture to really see what's going on.
What is your take on it?
Should I sell my cameras and just get one bad ass, expensive as fuck camera? Or start filming with two phones?
Idk! It's a pickle! Bc I want to have the best quality I can and I try to make sure you all see any and everything!
Phones will adjust to lighting on their own, whereas cams you have to adjust the lighting yourself. With me hiring out camera men who have no prior camera experience?
It's a matter of me having to sit and have them adjust lights and if I move around? Sometimes things don't look how I want. I do this for myself but I also? Do this for you all!
What's your take on it?

Also: I said yesterday I was putting up another vid "today" I meant to say "Sunday" sorry. I was typing fast. Lol. I'm a nimby.

This photo is from a live stream with one lighta tiny oneand a dark bathroom.

Camera quality on phones give me no reason to buy an expensive camera. Just mount your phone on a stand or tripod Tik Tokers use and you're good.

There is just no comparison of what a tried and true camera can bring over a phone camera. None. Is this to say you can't do amazing things with them? Absolutely not but unless they miraculously manage to shove a full frame or APC sensor with a zoom lens into a phone, light science will always work against them.

That being said, Phone cameras can be used to compliment your footage or as a great springboard into getting into creating. The IPhone 14 Pro Max is surprisingly good as you can record RAW Apple ProRes, which leads to another issue: Memory. Sure you can run it to your Google Drive or ICloud, but files of those sizes will nuke your data preferences quickly as well take time. They are also not immune to their own downsides if your upload is corrupted.

What brand and spec SD cards are you using? Also, what camera? I only had a handful of instances where I had corrupted SDs which required me manually retrieving/recovering the files and most instances were caused by Windows being, well, Windows.

https://youtu.be/pvngr0rSc6g?feature=shared

https://youtu.be/azahDAcshCo?feature=shared

https://youtu.be/EqkOY6okj_o?feature=shared

This is a snippet of Lexi's Strip scene prior to her oil wrestling match with Mandii.

It is also worth adding that I don't use Sd Cards for recording as much since my latest upgrade. I record to either SSD or Cfast. Never had an issue ever with either

Negatives wise if you were to use your daily driver phone as one of them there is a potential for other people (kids for instance) to see your content and also you would want to make sure the phones used didn't sync to your personal accounts for Google/apple so your stuff didn't end up in your personal iCloud/Google photos for the same reason. I've always been reluctant to use my phone for "home movies" because of the internet connectivity and once it's in the cloud it's potentially hackable

As Nostalgic Erotic Prod says, no phone is going to compete with the image quality of a proper camcorder, just because of the different sizes (and hence light-gathering capabilities) of the much larger lens and sensor. You don't have to spend a fortune on uber-bucks pro kit but the way I've always done it:

Get the best consumer-grade camcorder you can find. I tend to spend £600 (about $1000) on whatever is the top of the line Panasonic camcorder when I want to buy, and only have to upgrade occasionally. In the time Saturation Hall's been running we've gone from DV tape to Full-HD to 4k.

Get a really high quality memory card, and never take it out of the camera. Download your footage using a USB cable to your PC. With my current viseo camera, you can't actually "move" (as in copy and erase) from the camera, only copy, so when I copy the footage down, the version on the camera's memory card acts as my initial backup. Once everything is copied down, I can check that it's viewable and undamaged. Normally I wait until BackBlaze has backed it up to the cloud before I delete it from the camera, which I usually do at the start of the next filming day, rather than when the footage is copied. My current card allows 3 hours at 4k, which is plenty for a day's filming here. If the card seems to become "slow" (camera takes a while to start writting to it when you start a scene), take that as a sign to reformat it, still in the camera. before next use.

The reason for never taking the card out of the camera is partly to protect from physical wear and tear on the contacts (both the card and the camera) and partly to protect from different devices using slightly different voltages on the card, which could potentially cause issues.

I've filmed my personal stuff on my phone but thats because I have no intention on anyone else seeing it. Only problem I really have with phones is when I'm watching it on my computer but it's framed for a phone, so only about 40% of the screen is what I want to see and the other 60% is those big black bars on the side.

What phone? If it is relatively new, there are a few apps out there where you can modify the aspect ratio of your recording so you're not running into any crop factor

I would add Panasonic Mirrorless cameras to the list. Their new gen lineup is allegedly going to allow USB C recording to SSD. If that's the case, a Samsung T7 Shield runs about 130 bucks for 2 TB and mounts to an assortment of accessories on the market. Larger sensor, a vast assortment of lenses, multiple recording formats (including ProRes on some).

Agreed, phone video is crap compared to even 2K video out of a proper video camera, the optics are far superior. I have not had a single SD card fail in 2 years on my new 4K camera! Are you sure your buying the right ones?

Phil

P.S. Examples, not put in photoshop, just raw, these are only 1280 x 1080 and still far better than out of my new iPhone.

SD cards do have a fail rate (eventually) but it takes a bit of doing. Typically reformatting will hasten the lifespan of an SD but I have yet to encounter this and in cases where I have witnessed it, the camera will usually tell you that it's shot when you can't initialize your card. Prograde V90 hasn't failed me yet

I have an IPhone 13 and a similar cam as you have and while I don't record WAM on my cam I record a lot of other things on my cam I just find the cam still better for a lot of reasons. Just seems easier to edit as well. Just my 2.

You Can Call Me,

Al

Just keep it landscape and don't ever for any reason use portrait.

To be honest 4K (or, more accurately UHD, since 4K is 17:9 Digital Cinema Initiative) is largely pointless, other than a method for manufacturers to cajole people into buying new kit by bamboozling them with a load of marketing bollocks. (The very act of calling it 4K, which relates to the number of pixels per picture *width* (for DCI - actually only 3840 for UHD) demonstrates the cynical nature of the marketing when all previous values have been based on lines per picture *height*. It's actually only 2160 lines high, not 4K.)

Various research papers (e.g. BBC WHP092) have demonstrated that the visual acuity of the eye is insufficient to resolve the difference between even 1080 lines and 720 lines on an average sized TV viewed at an average distance available in a typical UK home. (Houses in the US are bigger so can accommodate larger displays, on average, however.)

Therefore going to 2160 lines (i.e. 4K/UHD) provides 4x the number of pixels that you're still unlikely to be able to see *unless* you're sitting closer than the intended minimum distance! (SD: 5H, HD:3H, UHD:1.5H. where H is the image height)

UHD currently only comes into its own for fully immersive gaming / training simulators etc. or for being able to extract a subset as an HD image from the UHD original. (e.g. useful in fast moving sports to enable a digital 'zoom in'.)

It does, however, provide the basis for progressive (i.e. non-interlaced) images, high frame rate, high dynamic range, wide colour gamut and next gen audio. These are the factors that really increase quality. Just increasing the number of pixels is the con that's pushed by the manufacturers to make you buy the new kit. It also means you fill your disk at 4x the rate of HD and need higher bandwidth transmissions (and/or greater compression again, which can introduce unwanted artefacts, countering the supposed increase in quality).

Until all those other factors are available (which mostly aren't yet), I have no desire to fill up my disk at 4x the rate of HD for no significant benefit in most cases, unless I'm peering closely at the screen which for most of the time, I'm not. As David Wood (former director of technology for the EBU) once said "We don't need *more* pixels, we need *better* pixels"!

My recommendation would be to shoot at a higher non-interlaced frame rate in HD rather than moving to UHD. Remember that image quality is based on *dynamic* resolution, which is a function of both the static resolution (number of pixels) AND the refresh rate (frames/sec). Shooting progressive (i.e. non-interlaced) HD at 50 frames/sec (most of the world) or 60 (59.94) frames/sec (USA/Japan) will thus provide a significant improvement in perceived quality compared with 25 or 30 (29.97 fps) without the massive increase in cost and overheads that moving to UHD requires.

It also provides a perfect down-conversion to lower standards when required, since halving the frame rate again (or converting alternate frames into odd/even fields for interlacing) merely gets you back to conventional HD without introducing visible artefacts. Set your camera frame rate to match the mains frequency in your area to avoid strobing and aim for 1080p/50 or 1080p/60(59.94) accordingly.

As has been stated above, there is no substitute for decent sized image sensors (better signal:noise ratio) and high quality glass (higher modulation transfer function). What phones can do is miraculous for their size and cost (and is often adequate for amateur use) but it's still not as good as proper sensors and good glass even when used at a lower resolution and it never will be, for those reasons.

Incidentally, there are still reasons to use a true video camera rather than a DSLR that can also shoot video. A camera sensor capable of resolving for a still image (very high resolution) means that its lenses are capable of passing spatial frequencies in excess of what the video definition's sampling can resolve. This results in a phenomenon known as 'spatio-temporal aliasing', the effects of which become very visible when there is any movement involving fine patterns, which appear to move in the opposite direction to the main movement.

A true video camera (e.g. a 3-chip broadcast camera with a trichroic splitter block) has its optical path frequency response tailored to the video resolution in use to avoid this problem but it means that it can't be used to capture high-resolution stills. Having one type of camera to do one type of job provides the peak of quality. Having one type of camera to do all types of job always results in compromises. When the camera is merely a bolt-on to a multifunctional device (a phone) even more so!

It all depends on what you shoot, how you shoot and what you ultimately plan on doing with it. For "run and gun" style shooting, 4K and 6K resolutions give us extra crop pixels for stabilizing footage. For fast moving subjects such as sports and motorsports shooting, it helps just as much. It really boils down to what you intend on the factors above.

Interestingly enough, my sales are nearly split down the middle between 4K and 1080p resolutions *shrug*

You're shooting it in vertical. This is fine if you're shooting something for instagram or twitter but if you want the full screen, your phone needs to be horizontal.

Jayce,

I shoot with an IPhone 13 Pro and Lumecube ring light. The ring light quality makes a huge difference. I'd recommend one.

Personally, I don't feel the need to upgrade to a "proper" camera at this time either.

That may be true in terms of final release file quality, but given 4K video cameras are commonly available, it make sense to shoot in 4K, even if you then release in Full-HD to save the customers' storage space.

We shoot in 4K, edit down to Full-HD at 20kbps average (28k peak), then use Handbrake to bring the final release files down to sensible sizes and bitrates.

Right now people don't want to be wasting 5 gig of phone storage space on every wam video they download. But in the future when everyone has a quantum smartwatch with a holographic projector display and multiple petabytes of on-board storage, it'll be good to be able to remaster Full-HD scenes to 4K.

Always shoot in the highest resolution you can possibly afford. For any serious WAM producer that now has to be 4K at least.

^^^^ This.

Just say no to vertical video, always turn your phone landscape when using it to film. There's a good reason TV, computer, and cinema screens are wider than they are tall.

Especially when you consider that some studios are shooting in 12k. It's just going to grow on from there

From someone who is just an amateur, I have found that the phone film is okay, but I do want to up my game with a camera. Currently, I don't really have the time right now to learn what I feel like I would need to make a camera worthy video, but will have some more free time soon and will be able to provide a better comparison then! The phone does provide some freedom if you need it (small, mobile) but you have such great shots, don't change a thing!!!

The con I can see about an expensive camera is if it gets ruined on accident. That would be a lot of money down the drain. I feel bad that you have so many SD card issues. I have friends that use still cameras that have issues with them as well. I use SD cards for various raspberry pi projects and things and never had an issue. Pull them in out etc. Part of me wonders if it is something where the camera is still reading the card even though it is off and that is what is corrupting things. If it makes you feel any better the expensive SD cards last them just as long as the cheap ones. I use micro SD cards with a converter as needed and that might be part of it too. I also only use SanDisk cards.

With the question about quality and stuff. For me, having a 4K 20 gig file for a 40 minute video is a little excessive. I am good with 1080p. But that is just me. I think the two camera angle would be a great idea, I would do both angles but the same orientation. Landscape is far better in my opinion to portrait. The extra borders on the side are a little annoying to me. The landscape mode is perfect. But to each their own. With the quality of phone cameras these days there is really no reason not to use them. There have already been a few feature length movies filmed on phones. Saving money for supplies and outfits and things makes more sense to me than buying an expensive camera. Whatever you are currently using looks great to me.

It would be interesting to see a side-by-side comparison of a 60 second simultaneous sample of your current camera and your phone. It would be interesting to see a white substance, dark substance, and colorful substance. It could even make a good vote. Don't tell your fans which is which to see if they can spot the difference.

... even though the eye cannot resolve such levels of detail (as proved by the research papers - visual acuity 1 minute of arc)? That's my point. Even if we ever manage to get to holographic projection, your original was still shot in 2D so will only ever be viewable in 2D, whether that's in HD or 4K.

We're now reaching the stage with video where manufacturers are doing what audio manufacturers have done for about 50 years (i.e. selling stuff to people that they can't actually detect while insisting that it's better). Hi-Fi nutters have long argued that they can hear nuances at 35-40KHz but double blind controlled trials have proved that they can't. Nonetheless, they continue to believe it, so manufacturers continue to sell them more and more expensive kit that they lap up. "Emperor's New Clothes syndrome."

There are circumstances where 4K does make sense, as outlined above - but they're generally few & far between - and taking resolution above that is even more ridiculous and requires far better optics (at insane cost), otherwise the MTF of the lenses acts as a low pass filter on the input path to the sensor anyway, making the increased sensor resolution completely pointless (again)!

The engineers, meanwhile, know that the other factors that are harder to explain and sell to the public (HDR, HFR, progressive scanning only, NGA, WCG) are the things that will really improve the perceived quality over the simplistic 'numbers game' of pixels... but the latter point is the one that's easy to market so that's what the marketing people keep on doing.


I would agree with this but with the caveat "up to the point where it becomes silly!" Let's not forget that we're talking about largely transient fetish videos, not historical records of detailed scientific discoveries where even the tiniest detail might be important.

Phone cameras are more than capable these days but I still prefer a GoPro, simply because I'm not afraid to get it dirty.

More thoughtful response coming soon.. however... for now I will share this gem of wisdom, as I do at every opportunity I get, about the evils of vertical video. It's not that hard to turn your phone sideways before hitting record. Most phones nowadays have orientation sensors and will make your video look correct when you export them to a computer. Also don't forget, the back camera is always better quality than the front facing "selfie camera." You won't be able to preview yourself, but there are workarounds to that issue.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dechvhb0Meo

I use my iPhone 12 to shoot stuff but we had an issue with the auto white balance in the normal camera app so I bought a separate camera app with controllable settings for shutter, ISO, white balance, and focus which helps soooo much. I do run into issues with memory on the phone though. It's a 64gb but generally I have to make sure I keep it pretty clean. I also have Dropbox on my phone so I just upload right after shooting and free up space. I've thought about getting a camera just to have a dedicated piece of equipment, but it's not in the budget now. As for the settings, allegedly my phone can shoot in 4k 60fps but idk too much about that stuff. I try to shoot in 1440p 60fps and bounce my final video at 1080p.

FPS standard is 30fps for broadcast. There has been attempts to run at 60fps however problem when you get to those frame rates is sometimes it will actually make the footage look worse. I usually will run 60fps if I intend on slowing down the footage which gives me the room to drop it to 50% speed at 30fps or a lil less than 40% at 23.976 fps for cine but typically I will use off speed recording for this approach so I am not horsing around with frame rates in post.

In your circumstance, I'd say 30fps is best for overall appearances. 23.976 or 24fps for cinema/film look. 60fps if you want to play with dropping speeds in post. Note: Dropping speeds in post will also effect audio so unless you have offspeed recording as an option, are really clever at editing or plan on putting your footage to a backing track, best to not do it.

Only for the Americas and Pacific rim countries!
[I think you guys are also now stuck with 29.97fps equivalent if you want to maintain backward compatibility with broadcast standards and having to work with drop frame timecode, originally resulting from the need to adjust the frame rate when NTSC was introduced because of interference with the colour subcarrier.]

The rest of the world runs at 25 & 50Hz and doesn't need to deal with any drop frame timecode. (You have to shoot to match the mains frequency (60Hz or 50Hz) in whatever part of the world you're in, to avoid a very obvious 10Hz strobing from mains lighting, so 59.94 or 29.97 for the Americas and 50 or 25 for the rest of us.)


There's no real reason why that should be the case so long as the frame rate is an exact multiple and the sensor's integration time (a.k.a. 'shutter speed') has been adjusted accordingly. For years, the EBU's recommendation was to *shoot* at 1080p/50, which allows exact downconversion for *emission* to 1080i/25 (interlaced video look) or 1080p/25 (cinema look). These days, that can now be raised to 2160p/50 or 2160p/100 if you have the gear that can do it and don't mind the storage requirements and bitrates resulting from it. The important point is that both the resolution and the frame rate are exact multiples.

Since the fields for i/25 are merely throwing away the odd or even lines of alternate frames in the p/50 originals to make the alternate fields for the i/25 frames, it provides a perfect reconstruction (not that you'd *want* to introduce the hideous artefacts of interlacing that become visible when viewed on moderen progressive scan screens (e.g. LCD) when you don't need to!) Similarly, if you go to p/25, you merely throw away every alternate complete frame. You can even make p/25 behave for interlaced emission by treating it like telecine through creation of PsF where the signal behaves as two interlaced fields derived from the same original frame, so there's lots of flexibility available.

If the 'shutter speed' is fixed to 1/50th or fractionally faster, it's very close to what would have been used in cine cameras anyway, so allows for both the video look and film look by merely converting the scanning standards downwards. (It is essential to understand in detail what the scanning standards are doing, however, in order to get the best out of it ... as is always the case with any technology!)

Obviously all these figures would be replaced with 59.94 and 29.97 for you guys over there and the 'shutter speed' would then need to be fixed to 1/60th. Creating the cine look that way might result in fractionally more judder for you because you'd be needing the slightly faster 'shutter speed' to cope with your faster frame rate, so as not smear across frames, which conversely means that you can't take advantage of using the slower shutter at 1/50th to reuce 'film judder', in exactly the same way that cine cameras do. (The use of stupidly short shutter speeds results in masses of flicker and judder that are often seen, instead of performing what is, in effect, a low-pass temporal filter through the longer integration time.)

Good to know, I never slow stuff down but I come from the audio world and shit like higher IPS = better, so I assumed the same for video.

You can do amazing stuff with a phone camera but you can't change the lens and the majority of its usability is software based. There's also a reason your favorite TV shows, movies, and even most big YouTubers and so on don't use their phone cameras - image quality and adaptability.

SD card failures shouldn't be a problem if you have a high end camera as it will have two SD card slots and one should be set as a backup.