Awww. Why ruin a good story with the facts?
Folks would much prefer to think that a million dollar TV production can be shot with an $800 camera, just like the one that they own, and probably hand-held by one person as well.
Michael
True but some of the footage of expensive episodic broadcast is being shot with a under $3,000 camera which would have been unheard of a couple of years ago and though high budget broadcast advertising is still shot on film or with a RED/Arricam, there is more and more experimentation trying to use these dslrs.
Let's see what happens next, but the beauty of digital footage is it's opened up a whole new world for artists. Prior to even mini-dv, building a reel, or learning the editorial process was an incredibly expensive and time consuming ordeal.
A 7d a few lenses, some sticks and a copy of FCP studio tops out at about 4 grand. To do any of this a few years ago was in the hundreds of thousands.
Regardless, under certain situations the 5d2 footage has artifacts. No denying it, no talking around it.
Maybe outside with a lot of quick cuts, lens flare, very shallow dof, it doesn't show, but in real lit production a jacket zipper will christmas tree light, or a red top with have this moving moire.
As T-Mark said it can be fixed in post, usually massive, but it would be nice to see Canon address this at the front end.
Now as far as the 7d or a smaller frame, I dunno, I guess that's ok as long as you don't have noise. The real beauty of the 5d2 is that you can shoot video at almost any iso and not see noise when the image is moving.
http://ishotit.com/rundsmc.jpgWhat really would be nice is if there was a single codec that was the standard for video. It's almost mind numbing to go through the process of mixed codec, formats, frame sizes and try to cut and color a coherent piece, even for the web.
We just had a RED on set and the DP/video guy used it for about 2% of the footage. For locked down lit dialog it was fine,(Then again what he shot with it could have been done with about any high def eng) but moving, high iso, , even quick stationary images he was holding a 5d2, while the RED set in the corner.
Regardless of all of that, I would bet dollars to donuts the next 1ds4 is gonna be a killer. Canon had to learn a lesson about putting more stuff in a cheaper camera (5d2) than their flagship and though you never know what any of these companies are going to do, almost everyone believes the next 1ds will have raw footage, probably more than 2k and maybe even better live focus.
Will I buy it, yea maybe . . . well probably, cause when I tally up the numbers and the art, no camera has been as good for my business as Canon. It may sometimes seem soul less and everyone loves to kick sand on em, but everybody owns one and there is a reason why, mostly because it covers more territory than any camera.
BC