camera envy

i've been drewling over this camera for the last month, ever since having used one to shoot documentary footage for a friend in new orleans. i'm promising myself i will not even think about buying one until i have a project worthy of the price. it's not a super expensive camera, as they go, but more than pocket change. you could buy a decent used car for the price.

the picture quality is stunning. having worked with standard video for years now, my first shoot with this camera knocked my socks off. i'm used to what is now called standard video, in which approximately 480 horizontal lines of picture make up each frame. by comparison, 35mm film, which is what is used to shoot most motion pictures today, can resolve in the range of 2000 to 3000 lines (however, according to a paper i just read, by the time it's printed and projected in a theater the resolution drops to somewhere in the 700-800 line range). this camera, the sony pmw-ex1, resolves about 1000 lines, which by comparison is apparently better than what you'll see at most movie theaters. hot damn! the color quality is half that of more expensive broadcast cameras and a quarter that of the most expensive (as in $200,000!), but if you're in a situation where you need higher color fidelity, the camera can output it via cable to a recorder or computer, a really nice feature.

i'm also used to video looking, in my opinion, like hell, especially when outdoors in high contrast situations. back when i shot film in my still camera, super-8 and 16mm cameras, i could usually manage to keep the sky, faces, even shadows, within the range of the film, meaning each of those areas would have some tone. with video, i've always grimaced at having to choose what to let go, shadows or highlights. this is mainly because i use cheap video cameras, and don't spend much time with lighting, but it's also partly the result of the narrow range of electronic image gathering. this new camera, to my delight, had adjustable response curves and several presets that allow you to set up the camera to respond much more like film so that the sunny side of a face, for instance, doesn't bleach out but maintains tone at the same time the bicycle in the shadows of a tree is still visible. hot damn, again.

okay, one more thing: this camera seems to have a real lens. what i mean is that the usual three controls, focus, iris and zoom, each have physical rings that you can turn to adjust manually, which makes shooting, for me anyway, so much more enjoyable. i'm not a fan of automatic.

there are a number of other manufacturers making similar cameras today. i can't vouch for any of them, but from what i've read and seen on sites comparing them, this camera has lots to offer for very low budget independent filmmakers. now, if i can crank out a script that i feel is worth shooting, maybe i'll get one.