Video DSLRs vs Camcorders

[johnastovall]

The Dirty Little Secrets


"Just as in the world of digital stills, there are categories and cameras, and then there are marketing words such as amateur, prosumer, and pro. Depending on who's saying them and the context, these can either be explanatory or pejorative.

Video capable DSLRs like the Canon 5D MKII have been rapidly embraced by professional and indie film makers for what it can do, but not because it is by any stretch of the imagination a professional video camera.

The magic that video DSLRs offer is their large sensors (at last when compared to video cameras). No, not for the purposes of increased resolution. 1080 and 720 are what they are, and a larger sensor doesn't provide any higher resolution. Rather, because these larger sensors allow for narrower depth of field. Of course it's not the sensor size so much as it is that for a given aperture and focal length one gets narrower DOF with a larger sensor as a consequence of their using longer focal length lenses for the same image magnification. This is the holy grail for many film makers: the narrow DOF that allows the videographer to isolate a subject and therefore give the scene a more "filmic" look.

Combined with shooting in 24P (another filmic conceit (Def 4.b)) these are the two characteristics that North American independent film makers (Indies) try for when shooting video. In the rest of the world most video producers just don't get it. That's fine. I'm fairly agnostic on the subject though trending more towards embracing shallow DOF and 24 FPS the more I shoot.

The reason for this preamble is to try and shed some light on why film makers are going a bit nutso over video DSLRs, even though these are, for the most part, not very good all-round video cameras.

They're not – you say? How so?..."

Full story at link above.