DSLR Video

charlieharper

charlieharper

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Anyone doing shooting video with DSLR's here?

Share your videos here and we can give tips, share ideas and ask questions.

I only recently got my first DSLR. It's a Canon 600D. Still learning how to use video on it, as I'm used to something like a handicam that does everything automatically. :p

Anyway, I got some footage, but as we all know, Canon DSLR's use H.264 video codec, which is highly compressed and therefore could make editing video a lot slower.
Any recommended formats that I should encode my footage to?
 
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I shot some video with my 60D last year, only did one complete video as editing took too much time as I had to teach myself how to edit first.

[video=youtube;oKRO1s2aD64]http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=oKRO1s2aD64[/video]
 
Must have swapped at some stage, but probably mostly with a 24-70 2.8 (Non-IS obviously, haha)
 
Want to get a Canon 50mm 1.8 . Would you recommend it?

At the moment I only have a 17-55mm f3.5-5.6 kit lens.
 
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ronald911 said:
Want to get a Canon 50mm 1.8 . Would you recommend it?

At the moment I only have a 17-55mm f3.5-5.6 kit lens.
Click to expand...

The 50mm for video? I wouldn't use a prime for video I reckon.

For stills the 50mm 1.8 is a fantastic starter lens.
 
MongooseMan said:
Why not?
Surely a prime is ideal for video, you get as much light as you want and can have a really shallow DOF if that's the look you're going for.
Click to expand...

For a planned shoot? Sure. But for someone learning how to use video, the flexibility of a zoom would be helpful I reckon. It's easy to be out of focus often when using a shallow DOF and you're new to the medium, especially if you aren't controlling what you're shooting.
 
Randhir said:
For a planned shoot? Sure. But for someone learning how to use video, the flexibility of a zoom would be helpful I reckon. It's easy to be out of focus often when using a shallow DOF and you're new to the medium, especially if you aren't controlling what you're shooting.
Click to expand...

Fair enough, but sometimes it's better to be constrained on one variable (zoom) so that you can learn the other one (focus) better.
It's hang of a hard to keep stuff in focus when zooming. (Let's be honest, you pretty much have to use Manual zoom when shooting video, Auto simply isn't going to cut it 99.99% of the time.)

Most resources online that I've looked at don't even consider zooms an option for DSLR video.
 
Thanks for all the answers / advice. The main reason for these low f/stop lenses certainly is for the depth of field in your videos. And lets face it, with most DSLR's, it is literally impossible to to shoot unplanned shots well unless you really are pro.

Zooming and and out just looks goofy, as the aperture values change when you zoom.
 
I encounter something strange - When I try to set the aperture at 3.5 (lowest value it can get), to get an increased depth of field, it always seem VERY over exposed when I'm shooting outdoors ( which is common sense as the lens is obviously now wide open).

I don't want to play too much with the shutter speed, as most tutorials / ebooks I have read recommends that you keep your shutter double your frame rate.

I always keep my ISO at 100 when shooting outdoors.

Any tips, how I can get a better image outdoors, while still be able to maintain a very shallow depth of field?

Thanks in advance.
 
ronald911 said:
I don't want to play too much with the shutter speed, as most tutorials / ebooks I have read recommends that you keep your shutter double your frame rate.
Click to expand...

Did they say why? If your aperture is wide open, and your ISO is already at its lowest, then the only choice you have is to increase shutter speed.

I might be wrong, but maybe the tutorials say to keep the shutter speed at a minimum of twice your framerate?
 
Randhir said:
I might be wrong, but maybe the tutorials say to keep the shutter speed at a minimum of twice your framerate?
Click to expand...

Yeah, I'd agree with that.

Also, just a technical note, decreasing aperture value decreases your depth of field (more is blurred, less is in focus).
 
Have you heard of Magic Lantern ... Pimp out yer 600d! HDR video! FPS control! Focus peaking in your EVF! And lots of other fancy-shmancy tweaks!
 
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In answer to your original question....

I would avoid any solution that requires you to re-encode your video into a lossy format before editing. You will be rendering lossy source footage out to a lossy target format so avoiding adding generations is important.

You should be able to edit with high speed scrubbing 1080p h264 video in real time on any modern intel Mac. Your video will be transcoded into a optimized 422 format for editing purposes but the source will be left untouched. You can further transcode your editing footage into a low quality proxy format. You will edit using the high speed low bit rate proxy media which is great if you have multiple camera angles to work with.

In either case when your project is rendered the original high quality source media is used.

On a PC it depends on your editing solution. Ive tried Sony Vegas and Avid Pinnacle both are super slow. I believe Adobe Premiere now has GPU acceleration but requires specific Nvida GPU's to enable this so didn't work for me. Avid media creator has a similar proxy meda system but is too expensive for me to justify.

Hope that helps?







ronald911 said:
Anyone doing shooting video with DSLR's here?
Anyway, I got some footage, but as we all know, Canon DSLR's use H.264 video codec, which is highly compressed and therefore could make editing video a lot slower.
Any recommended formats that I should encode my footage to?
Click to expand...
 
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