B
I'd like to see a real video of a new product, shoot in real situation by someone
Fred,
This is difficult.
To begin with we're a sound-bite society. Most people want to hear a phrase. If it's one line and works on facebook it's ok, if it takes a paragraph then it probably gets passed by.
Super detail, new lenses, shoots fast, something that seems like an obvious plus. That's why they now sell a 80mpx back with no other improvements other than 80mpx. As crazy as it seems even though there are full page 12 mpx 6 figure images running on the cover of every major magazine and on building sized images in times square, all the makers including the 35mm genre still cling to more megapixels on each new release.
This thought is exasperated by the dozens of print and on line publications, and many more dozens of self appointed web experts, that either push for advertising dollars, or close associations with the makers/sellers of equipment. I mean which one of those sources is going to tell you not to buy something?
Michael Reichman probably is the best of the bunch as he tends to give a warts and all review of any camera that passes his way, but most, just push the kool-aid of their favorite brands and politely diss, or ignore the brands that they don't associate with.
But to show the process is basically showing that using any camera for heavy production is real work, sometimes hard work and that's not a message anyone wants to pay for.
Few makers ever want to spend the time and resource to show the complete professional process, that begins before you shoot and can finish weeks, even months after a project wraps on set.
Take pre production. Lenses and contacts have to be cleaned, sensors tested and cleaned (numerous times), drives and cf cards formatted, firewire cables and backups tested along with multiple computers. That doesn't even include the charging of 12 or so batteries.
That can easily take a day and who wants to see a first assistant sitting at a table with a white cloth diligently cleaning lens contacts and firing blank frames into a computer. (The camera/computer pre production really should be shown by all makers because it would cut down their complaint calls by 95%, but it's never really put out there). It's funny because losing this day can mean a disaster on set. I've heard a lot of photographers say my ______________ is crap because it crashed, but how many of them really went through a detailed process of preparing their equipment and testing everything before working?
The shoot day is really all anyone wants to see, since there are models on set and people are running around saying lovely, fabulous, etc. and from the outside it looks like fun. If a software glitches, an image moires, or focus is missed that stuff is never seen as everyone has a brand to protect.
Anyone that tells you they never have a camera problem is probably standing on a manufacturer or dealers stage at a trade show, because no professional camera is perfect or bulletproof . . . that's why everyone owns or rents multiple backups. This stuff is complicated and once again, either somebody is fibbing or doesn't work their equipment that hard.
The next process, intermediate post production where we process out jpegs and make web galleries, edits and contact sheets also falls into the boring category. Who wants to see two red eyed techs or assistants, drinking red bull, standing over an I-mac making adjustments and waiting for jpegs, or a tech trying to balance skin tones from an over sensitive digital camera. Nothing sexy in that.
Try to match skin tones of 14 subjects and still hold the integrity of the surrounding image and do this on 1,2000 images a night. I doubt if that will ever make a you tube video.
(Actually, give us a camera that shoots less sensitive skin tones that are easy to match and for my business, that's something to really talk about).
Then the final process of selecting images, making retouching markups, processing and retouching out to final is the one thing that every medium format maker should show and never does, because that is the only step in the process where medium format really excels over the 35mm competition.You can learn phocus, c-1, lightroom, sinar capture, dxo whatever, (and you should), but in reality at this stage of the process 95% of all images of importance are processed in photoshop. I know . . . horrors of horrors, but it's a fact. To add fuel to this thought 95% of all images of importance and manipulated heavily in post production and once again the sharpness and details of medium format make this easier for the retoucher when working a file close, deep and especially when multiple images are combined. Also one thing medium format fails to mention is that due to this sharpness, it's damn hard to tell a 21mpx image from a 40 mpx image if you uprezz in the raw convertor. I shoot a p21+ next to a p31+ and I can promise you we work an image deep and most of the time I either forget or can't tell which image is from which back.
This is a simple image (these are fast screen shots) shot with a Contax and I think with a p21+ and when it gets to final (we're not there yet), it will have more layers than a government bailout program. It's not that it wasn't good out of camera, or the model needed really any work, it's just in the world of digital capture and professional image making it takes a lot of post work to get to final, a lot of suggestions from clients, creatives and the whole post production team. If this part fails, all that effort went for nothing so post production is not something to be passed over lightly.
It also takes a view from multiple platforms. It needs to be printed large and viewed web small as both uses have equal importance and what looks great full page, can look kind of plastic on the web. Different mediums require a different look.
Regardless, Fred what you want, need, should see before plopping down even a buck fifty for a piece of equipment you probably never will see, or know of the issues until you write the check.
JR