At this point in time no, however it would be nice. Renting MFD makes more sense at the moment. Due to time we shoot almost all our jobs on the Canon 1DsMKIII with the 5DMKII as backup. Post has always been a big part of what we do even when we were in the darkroom. Also I find the art directors are coming up with more complicated layouts because of photo shop & digital cameras. At least that is the way down here in Australia. We want to be shooting with the latest and the greatest so we don't buy - we rent. Also I think MFD has to do HDV.
Denis
Denis,
I understand your point and I'm not saying a new mfdb doesn't have a place, I just wonder how many people are going to actually buy a new back, new lenses and a new body all in one swoop compared to doing what you do, which is renting as required.
Maybe a lot of people will buy and if so that's good for the companies, obviously shows a healthy trend in our industry.
The rental thing seems to throw me as a business model though, because I don't know what's happening in your world, but in the States, I get a few e-mails a week from techs offering a RED, A 60mpx camera and back, a computer and their tech services for $1,100 per day. Maybe those aren't real prices but I get enough of them that I have to feel that's where some of the rental market is going.
I find all of this in a state of change right now, because in the same e-mail que I have about 10 offers of RED seminars and 3 offers of new 5d2 video accessories.
I look at this thread and see it's kind of mixed with cameras and high speed lighting and it's interesting because today I pulled out a little Casio camera I bought for an inset shot for a video we just finished.
It's small, looks kind of like a dslr but in video mode it shoots up to 3,000 frames a second or something absurd. I've only used it for this one gig, so know little about it but started playing with it and noticed it had a function to shoot still images at 60 fps with the onboard flash (or without) in still mode.
60 fps with flash. Really blew me away.
Now I know this is a toy, I think it cost $800, when compared to a new medium format back, but imagine if somebody made a true professional camera with these functions, 60 fps in still mode, 3,000 fps in video, wow, then I guess I would be answering the $64,000 question with a purchase.
Once again, this may just be a reflection of my market, but I know today, most of the people that work in still photography services, retouchers, stylists, crew are all having a challanged year. On the other hand the film editorial company I work with that has over 15,000 sq. ft. and 14 editing bays has been booked steady all year and today is booked solid for the next few months.
BC