^^This. The trick to photo and video is redundancy. If you have an A and B card slot, use them. I've seen it save someones ass on a shoot on more than one occasion.

I'm considering getting a new camera. I have a Sony handy cam 4k.it was brand new in 2019.
They continually upgrade camsI need one that will adjust with the lightingnot against it for my camera man. He's not a professional. He does a good job capturing what I wantbut? I want even MORE. I am never pleased. Lol! I AM. But I'm picky! I guess bc I used to shoot all videos with "we won't say her name" and I was VERY good at it.
If you ever saw any of her videos that looked better than her usual with amazing footage? That was probably me filming. I became a cam ninja!

But I'm also poor. Lol! Haha! Wam is not something that you make a ton of money on. It's a labor of love.
And this year? all the footage you are seeing were not customs. None of my mud stuff, pie stuff, new stuff I have comingwe're all my own deals.
So? When I don't make a lot back in sales? (Bc the market is saturated!)
I actually lose money. But damnit! I love it!
I'm gonna have to quit my healthy diet and eat ramen. Ahahahahahahahahah

Even if you weren't poor, I doubt it would help matters. I got approved for a B&H card and I literally locked it in my safe hoping I'll forget that I have it LOL. Shot you a PM. Check your inbox

I'm a desktop user and when I download vids I purchase, I copy them to a portable USB drive to watch them on my TV. What irks me is the number of videos shot on a phone in portrait format. So my TV or monitor has the video dead center, but the other 80% of the screen is blank. I refuse to purchase any video shot in portrait mode on a phone. It's not so much the phone aspect, but the fact that I have to strain to see the scene in such a small area of my screen. I do understand that phone users have a better experience viewing videos this way, but some of us are using big screens for our wam.

Just another reason to use an actual camera in my opinion.

I'm a professional photographer who mostly shoots models, wildlife, and soon, concerts and NHL. WAM and other adult content for my friends is too much fun to pass up, though my town doesn't seem to have very many WAM models and those it does have are largely private, so most of what I shoot in-genre is for peoples' OF pages.

I shoot with a pair of Sony Alpha 1 cameras running dual CF Express cards. SD cards are prone to failure and data loss over time while CFE seems to be a lot more robust. And I can shoot 8k30 on these systems.

Sony has a lot of solid camera options available, and most newer ones are offering CF Express as a standard. But if you're not looking to deal with cameras and mics and tripods and all, a pair of newer smartphones will meet most people's needs, especially where fetish request fulfillment is concerned. Just depends on whether you want all wide-ish angle video or if you would rather have a more compressed, pretty telephoto look to your stuff. Phones do not give the latter.

CFexpress and Cfast are my choices as well. I also record direct to SSD. I been really digging what Sony has been putting out lately and the A7 is still gives you a lot of camera for the money. Tried my friends rig out with a 50mm Prime and the shots came out delicious.

For the longest while, I was torn between Blackmagic and Sony FX3 (which is STILL an amazing cine camera), but went with Blackmagic only because the EF mount could accommodate my still lenses and 6K recording onto BRAW worked seamlessly with Resolve.

"amazing video of me getting encased by Taylor"
I need to get with you about a custom video!

Same. And for Adorama. Jesus that's a dangerous game to play...

Try taking it out of auto exposure mode and exposing for the light you have. Then, don't let your camera guy move in big arcs unless he can see the light is still good (as in avoid shadows.)

You might be surprised by the resulting consistency.

This!^^

Using Auto exposure and Auto white balance is the worst to deal with in post, especially if your lighting is inconsistent. I check my exposure against false color and use a gray card to tack in White Balance.

Even auto-focus can be a pain at times too, when it picks up on something other than what you're wanting and starts hunting focus.

The big difference between experienced professional camera operators and amateurs is that the professionals know and understand what all the settings are for and lock them off to the correct setting for the job in hand while the amateurs set them to auto.

You either take charge of the camera or the camera takes charge of you!

Of course, the difference is that on a pro camera, all the important settings are readily available as physical controls, not buried in obscure menus (or, worse still, not available at all). However, true pro cameras can be very expensive so there's always a compromise to be struck somewhere.

Yup! This is why I turned to using either a follow focus or focus motor for my rig. It's tougher to master, to be true but the results and options it opens up creatively is just better on all levels. I'd just rather have 100% control over my shot. A cine setup gives me that.

To be honest, because of the ever evolving landscape for the creative community and arts as a whole, it has become more affordable (not cheap, but affordable). Where once the entry point WAS 5-6K on up just for the camera body, now you can enter at about a little less than 1/2 that. Still not cheap but not as heartbreaking if anyone is serious about getting into it.

Dear lord, no. That is far from an absolute. It's all about using the tools for the job, and they're dependent on the job. What the pros know is that their's a reason for the variable modes on their cameras - even your basic $300 DSLRs have things like aperture priority and variable ISO. Any photographer or videographer that says "I only shoot in Manual" is either full of shit or not as good as they think.

The only reason I shot in manual mode professionally for a couple of years is because the knob fell off and I couldn't be bothered to order a new one. Now I'm in heaven with a new camera...

You can take advantage of an auto mode if your lighting is evenly set and spread and you know where things are going to change so you can anticipate if you're in HMBM (Human Moving Bipod Mode.)

It is to advantage, mostly, but not always, to lock off in a studio where the lighting isn't going to change and shadow is deliberate.

You'll also hear a lot of people talk about understanding light is the be-all and end-all of using a camera. This is incorrect. The difference between a good camera person and a great one is understanding shadow.

Yes - I was thinking, in particular, of live edited (i.e. vision mixed) multi-camera work (generally but not always in a studio, e.g. OBs), where the vision operator working in the studio or OB 'gallery' (or 'control room' for those not in the UK) controls the 'operator control panel' for all the camera settings available to the remotely mounted camera control unit in the apparatus room, while the camera operator deals purely with framing and focussing, and the vision mixing takes place under the supervision of the director - but it does depend, to some extent, on the application and the degree of control over other factors that might (or might not) be available. The point was that the best results come from a person controlling the camera settings, not the other way around.

Obviously, that type of set-up is unlikely to ever happen when shooting WAM content so, when you're on your own in a situation that's not under complete control, you have to make a judgement as to what's best to do. That does still, however, depend on understanding all of the technical factors in order to get the best out of the equipment - which is always true in any situation - and ensuring that the settings that are best left fixed are set accordingly.

Eh, I'm mixed. Totally see your point but I meet everyone who approaches the same obstacle differently. Every solution has a purpose and there is technically no absolute wrong or right answer so it all really boils down to preference and situation. When running through my first steps with my R6, I actually experimented with auto focus and a few other enhanced features and to be honest, they worked splendidly! Nothing wrong with it at all, especially in photo! Where things can get a bit tricky is with video and you don't have full control of your lighting situation (ie outdoors or using natural light). Nothing is more annoying than having a great natural lit shot and a slight shift in cloud cover makes your auto white balance move on you, but from what I gathered, this too also depends on a few factors.

Again though, It really depends on the camera you're working with, the limits of your abilities and situation you're facing. My cine rig and how it processes white balance is NOTHING like my R6. They're totally different. What I may trust my cine to do, I may never trust my Canon to handle and vice versa. For instance, forget Autofocus on Blackmagic. It's possibly the worst feature on that camera which BM planned on because they just assumed the cinematographer would use a follow focus or focus motor anyways, which is fine because that's how I shoot film.

My Canon? Autofocus is a beast (you know! You own one! LOL) on that camera because it needs to be. When trying to capture stills, a photographer can't be bothered with tuning in focus just right sometimes, especially in fast paced moments like dance or sports where your opportunities are brief.

On the other hand, my Canon can shoot film but I feel it is almost TOO perfect and too sharp so I had to use 1/4 diffusion to grade it down some to get that "look" that I wanted (anamorphics look SICK though!). The next R6 owner maybe completely happy with it without diffusion or they may just run a mist filter effect in post. Again, sometimes preference plays a hand in how we shoot. That's why I dig talks like this with other pros because there is always something for me to learn. For instance, One photographer who I met a year ago had a method that actually saved my ass at a wedding shoot I had this past summer. LOL

Ah, a live production guy! Now it makes sense! That's actually how I ended up being the resident of expert of sorts with Blackmagic Designs with our group here at the studio. I started out on sticks and eventually graduated to running the ATEM switcher here for a local production here in Boston. Nice to see another studio guy on here!

What BM have done with bringing the price of studio gear down is remarkable, though I do hear reports of people having to drill additional vent holes in their ATEM gear, even when operating under forced ventilation in racks! Certainly their earlier stuff had a bit of a reputation for running 'a bit warm', anyway. Not sure whether they've sorted that out now.

When I started doing that, we were still on the original incarnation of Grass Valley vision mixers ('switchers' over there) with Hitachi studio cameras and an ingenious UK company the name of which escapes me that made combined CCUs and coax backs for the cameras that eliminated the need for expensive triax links by replicating them with simple coax. We moved on to Panasonic HPX370 studio cameras later on. Can't remember the mixer we moved to.

Long before that, I remember having to demonstrate how to set-up Ikegami HK323 tube cameras. (2-man lift job!)

Happy days but all 'in a different lifetime' now!

Yup! That was a thing! Just the amount heat those things created was unreal. We needed an AC back there when we had everything running because between all the hands on deck and that gear running, you were about ready to scream 30 minutes in with the studio door closed. It got stuffy REAL quick. They since fixed that issue and it's mostly firmware and software hiccups that you have to keep a lookout for. For instance, we had to roll back firmware versions one year because the hyperdeck was periodically not reading media when it was mounted which slowed things down or the mysterious "missing SDI" hiccup which seemed to resolve itself with the following update .

They make great stuff for what they do, and there is certainly better out there but for overall workflow, I always appreciated their gear which is one of the reasons why I went that way for my cine camera. Now, if I ever get to the level of my mentor to have the excuse to buy a RED Komodo, well, That may all change LOL

Agreed. I learned the finer points of photography from pretentious youtubers who were great, but insisted you only shoot manual. So that's what I did, until I got tired of fiddling around with dials on photo walks around the city and realized that in aperture priority mode you only have to worry about one setting for every shot and can take more shots faster if you're not trying to manually compensate for every situation.

It's the same with those "Real filmmakers only use manual focus" people. That's all well and good until you're one-man-banding a corporate interview and need to monitor audio while reading questions to a subject who sways all over the frame. Then AF becomes your best friend. That's why I ultimately switched from Fuji to Sony.

To bring it back to WAM filmmaking, one of my all-time favorite shots was thanks to autofocus: girl 1 in the foreground ducks out of frame to put a dress she had just taken off away. For the brief second she was out of frame, girl 2 was standing about 5 feet behind holding a bucket of slime. The AF perfectly snaps to the background girl who said some kind of taunting line and when girl 1 comes back into frame, the focus returns to her. Couldn't rack focus better myself. Well...maybe I could, but I had enough going on at the time.

Sometimes real filmmakers don't have a focus puller available. Nobody cares how much work you put into getting the shot, only if you got the shot.

Interviews are a vastly different beast though. You're probably not going to be racking focus and typically both primarily and second camera are static unless you're doing a B roll. Any movement with the subject is slight and you are not trying to be Bruce Surtees here with an interview. Hell I even cheat and use autofocus on my second camera for this production primarily because my asst doesn't know how to run focus and to your point, if I am by myself, I can't because my hand's are already full. So I will set one as static and key frame dynamic zoom in post. Again, it always depends on the scenario and the type of shoot you're at.

There really is no "one size fits all" method in photo or video (which is partially the love) and sometimes video mirrors music in a lot of ways. As a session musician, most of what I play is basic, simple 4/4 rock patterns with the occasional leading, or simple fill for flare. If I came into a set with the idea of making someone else's song a 3 minute drum solo, I'd never get hired LOL.

Brings me back to a story my teacher told me. There was an interview for a cinematographer who was involved in shooting a film. I forgot the name but they were telling him how amazing cleverly raw and dynamic some of the shots in the film was and they wanted to know "what was his technique".

His answer: "We didn't have our tripod"

Sometimes things just work out for the better without us wanting them to. The beauty in it is we get to own it anyways

Man, I hate using a tripod (anyone that's seen my videos will know that, and why). However, some amazing shots have come because we left a camera on a tripod. The funniest being a model asking me "Shouldn't your camera have a red light as well?"


Boy, we're getting into the weeds here. Poor Jayce must be bored with this thread now.

Lol YUP! We honestly need to have a film makers part of this forum. Nothing like the store owners area but apart from it where peeps like us can talk shop

Isn't that partly what the "Wammaster's Group" is meant to be for?
https://umd.net/groups/group/wammasters

And no offence to anyone in this thread but I've noticed quite a few times, someone asks something like "I've been filming my videos on an iPhone, should I think about upgrading?" - and people start talking about things like Sony Alpha A1s that start at five grand just for the body, and probably the same again in lenses. It's amusing, but I do think an awareness of a more down-to-earth level is needed.

If someone's shooting on a phone, the two simplest upgrades are:
1. Learn to shoot in landscape mode (just say no to vertical video).
2. If working indoors, spend a couple of hundred dollars on studio lights, and if necessary, window blackout kit to avoid mixed light sources.
3. Don't shoot in wide angle, instead move the phone further back and shoot in standard.
4. When your contract comes up for a phone upgrade, chose your next one for its camera quality first and foremost.

The next upgrade from there is to use a proper camcorder, but it's not necessary to spend thousands, buy a consumer one, avoid the very bottom of the range, but spending $600 or up on Panasonic or Sony will get something very decent, and if budget allows, get two batteries esp if shooting a lot outdoors. The quality you'll get from the much bigger lens really will be a step-change.

Not in any way meant as a put-down to anyone, personally I find the camera tech talk fascinating, and if I'd the money I'd be leaping right in to buy fancier kit myself - but for the time being, I'm getting absolutely superb results from my £600 Panasonic 4K HC-VXF1, and a Nikon D300s for the stills. Am considering going mirrorless for the stills to get shot of shutter noise on the video soundtrack, but not got round to it yet.

Also for those of us who shoot outdoors - and some of my best sellers are our riverbank mud scenes - if you drop a camera in the river it's rather easier to replace if it cost less than a grand. Not happened to me yet, but I've come close to falling in a few times.

All excellent advice from DM1 there! The number of times I've heard of inexperienced camera operators not dealing with mixed colour temperature in light sources and saying "we'll fix it in post" (without understanding that you can't really do that) is astonishing.

Whatever you use, the important thing is to learn what all the controls do and why they're there, as well as the interactions between them, so that you can decide which ones need to be left on auto and which are best not, for the specific circumstances under which you're operating at each shoot.

No one once ever suggested that. Not one. The OG question was about using a phone over a camera which I think we all answered. Any discussion being had after the fact is about our own gear and experiences, hence Why I asked about a group for gear heads like us. I was aware of wammasters but at a glance it really doesn't look like anything different from a mix of the store owners group and here. What I am suggesting is more specific to film, video, photo and editing.



THIS is about half an answer though. With the new age of influencers and creators demanding more for less, there is a growing plethora of options under 1,000 for those looking to go a bit deeper and since mirrorless has come within the price range of many amateurs and novices, it definitely deserves a mention. Canon and Sony both come to mind and you can even find a Panasonic Lumix within that range as well that give you a kit lens that is practical for a wide variety of applications and camera body. You get even a larger sensor, more pixels (20mp and above compared to the under 10mp on most consumer grade camcorders), more dynamic range (typically) and more versatility if you factor in that you are not married to the lens and now open to the growing market for accessories.

It is like iPhone vs Samsung Galaxy. Sure, they might be very tight knit as far as options go but how you intend on using it and the 3rd party support will always dictate where you wind up.

Is it always that simple? No. Is it for everyone? Of Course not! I have said on a number of occasions that it takes a bit more to learn other options beyond a point and shoot camcorder. I think it is universal between all of us that it takes practice (shoot your shot), mastery/understanding and I will always suggest for those looking to do the deep dive into photo and video, to rent or try before they buy. Learn ISO, Shutter, Exposure, White Balance and various other features, what they do and how they can effect your shot. One camera's UI might be better and easier to understand than the next or you may get a few hours in and realize that it just isn't for you. In any event, with the abilities mirrorless offers and at the entry point they are at, it is haphazard to simply mention camcorders as the sole option especially now when the tide has turned incredibly well in our favor for alternatives.

Now this isn't damning camcorders. Camcorders certainly have a place in a creators toolbox. They are just not the "end all, be all" alternative anymore. I use one as my second camera because my second camera person isn't versed well enough to run focus on a cine camera. I use Canon XF605 preferably because of it's ability to record in RAW and Canon cinema color which gives me a bit more control to grade in post but I have also used their XA Series with plenty of success.


I would challenge you to try video on a mirrorless. You are not bound by video recording limitations as you would be on a DSLR and assuming you have a relatively quiet lens and run a shotgun mic, the quality is amazing. The Canon EOS kit with the 18-45mm f/4.5-6.3 is NOT bad at all and is pretty damn good out of the box at only 800.00 for the Camera and Lens.

I have to confess that for stills shooting, I prefer the optical viewfinder over having to peer at an LCD screen in sunlight! Apart from anything else, I don't have to swap my specs like I do to peer at an LCD screen, which becomes very limiting when you're having to put your distance ones on to look at the subject you're trying to capture, then swap to the close ones to peer at the screen that's barely visible in sunlight without a decent shade (which isn't always practical without some faffing) and especially so when you're just trying to do 'grab shots'. (One of the disadvantages of ageing eyes!)

It doesn't make any difference for video as you're stuck with the LCD viewfinder anyway of course.

One aspect that's worth thinking about, though, is the issue of sensor size vs apparent depth of field. That's where a genuine video camcorder can sometimes work to advantage. As it has a smaller sensor size, the subject will more likely stay within the DoF. The large sensors are favoured by those who like 'arty' images and insist on having lots of 'bokeh' on subjects that don't move about. (That really is a clichéd image - yet 'art school' types still think it desirable and churn it out regularly!)

When you're trying to capture something that's unrehearsed and fast moving, a larger sensor is more likely to result in the subject visibly drifting out of focus unintentionally, unless you're incredibly good at following focus ... and have sufficient hands free. Similarly, autofocus that's homed in on the wrong thing (but close) is more obvious on a large sensor camera whereas you'd be more likely to get away with it on a smaller sensor camera.

This is one of the reasons why people often get away with all sorts when using a phone, which has a very small sensor but the downsides are limited optics and lower signal to noise ratio. (Having said that, my own phone has an incredibly annoying habit of hunting in and out of focus dramatically, at random ... and usually at the most innopportune moment!)

Of course, the larger sensor provides a better SNR for shooting in lower light conditions as each pixel site has a larger area, so you do need to boost the lighting for the smaller sensor, to avoid noise - but that also allows for the preferred lower shutter speed at a still sensible aperture, which in turn helps with DoF. The dynamic range is also often better but we're not even talking about getting into HDR here. Even shooting to record in Rec2020 for non-HDR UHD can't capture more than 60dB in 10-bit or 72dB in 12-bit of course (10-12 f-stops in photo parlance), since bit-depth will always be the limiting factor of SNR there... but that's more than adequate for non-HDR viewing screens.

SNR can also be affected by having to de-mosiac from a Beyer sensor too. Again, this is why broadcasters still prefer full-spec. studio cameras to have a 3-chip sensor set on a trichroic splitter block, as there's no de-mosiac work to be done. The costs involved have pretty-much lost that battle for all other applications, though - and probably even for that one very soon.

Anyway ... we're off into the world of insanely-priced kit and esoterics again! All very interesting for those of us who like to consider such issues but completely irrelevant to an economic one-person shoot of WAM.

Like I said wasn't getting at anyone here, I've been seeing threads like this do the same thing for 20-odd years.

Fair point about a group, poss one to raise to MM?


Fair enough for someone that's info video work in general, possibly still overkill for someone who just wants simple and reliable WAM shooting though?

Back in the day I did a lot of railway video on sVHS. These days, for railway stuff I just use my (Samsung S20) phone. Yeah, it's not always perfect - shooting Flying Scotsman passing Kirkstall Locks in the dark the other week it had focus issues - but the convenience of not having to haul a camera bag everywhere outweighs that, enormousely, and esp for casual trips where filming wasn't considered and I'd not have taken a proper camera anyway.


Interesting, and presumably the future of DSLRs. Definitely something I'm thinking about, at least for stills, when finally upgrade, will have a play with video too, though see my comments below re form factors.


Sounds like it'd be very good for studio work, not sure something with that form factor would be practical oudoors though. When shooting mud scenes, I have the camcorder in my right hand, and am looking at the screen, I have my Nikon on its strap round my neck, sitting at stomach level, and am firing the shutter with my left hand while filming with my right. I've got reasonably good at pointing the DLSR blind, and any duff shots get deleted when I'm back at the Hall.

Might work for some wetlook scenes, where I have the video on a tripod deep in the river (usually the camera is about 6" above the water level, at a depth where the models will be chest-deep when they're standing directly in front of it, so we can watch the water rising up their clothes as they wade down towards it, and I shoot the stills hand-held from off to the side, I'm usually waist-deep.

I bought Rob Blaine's "Guide To Messy Photography" book back in the day, and one of the most important things he said was how it's impossible to shoot good mud scenes if you lurk about on the bank keeping your feet dry, you have to be willing to go right in with your models and shoot up close and personal, which is how I've always done both mud and outdoor wetlook. I shoot solo, as paying an assistant would take money that's needed for model fees and supplies, plus thanks to a recent tax law change, for business purposes a van can now only have 3 seats, which is me plus two models.

I prefer to use the fold out screen, though also having a viewfinder is one of the advantages of a higher-end consumer camcorder, the cheaper ones seem to be screen-only, or were last time I upgraded. I still remember the first camcorder I ever used - full-size shoulder-mount VHS, tiny black and white viewfinder, and a tube sensor. 1988 or thereabouts.


That's a very good point. If lighting permits (i.e. not so bright I'm shooting everything at f22) I'll sometimes go for bokeh in the pre-scene clean shots of the girls and their outfits up on the bank before we hit the mud, but once the scene is underway what matters is making sure everything is sharp and clear and that I can see and capture all the most important shots, which in my case means the moments of first contact between clean and the mud, and especially the models' legs, bums, and lower trunks, being engulfed. At the end of the day I'm shooting fetish fuel for people like me who like to watch fully clothed girls getting covered in mud, food, gunge, or water. Everything else is secondfary to capturing the full clear details of that to the absolute best of my ability.


I had that using my phone to film Flying Scotsman in the dark the other week. But then I knew I was pushing things somewhat past the extreme limits with that shot, and it did stabilise once the lights of the coaches were going past, just meant that the fire-lit cab of the locomotive wasn't in sharp focus as it passed me. Still looks OK though, and not many enthusiasts have the shot I got.


LOL! And indeed.

The whole reason I got into WAM filiming in the first place was frustration at how horribly badly mainstream scenes are filmed, which of course is because they aren't filmed for us, they're filmed for general entertainment. So for me, detail, method, clarity, and seeing both the event and the aftermath, are the prime directives. I guess every producer, even of similar scenes, will have their own take on exactly what matters, what they regard as the high-points of their own art.