Canon 7d Versus RED ONE
 

Parameters:
Talking head scene. Interior
Shallow DOF.
Delivery: Web and mobile device ONLY.

Would a Red One offer any significant advantage in a shoot that adheres strictly to the above parameters?

As long as the talent doesn't wear clothes with fine patterns that alias, the 7D should do fine. Camera movement will be limited, so rolling shutter won't be a problem. You can have controlled lighting, so noise won't be an issue. For this type of shot you don't typically need to do extreme grading, so RAW doesn't really provide an advantage. Dial in the look with the picture styles and you'll be good to go.

You also don't need to have awesome resolution, since you'll go to the web. The 7D has no problem producing high quality 720p web content. RED One's 4K would be wasted.

Can the RED One provide a better image in this case? Probably yes. But you'd need to do A/B comparisons under lab conditions to see it. Light things well and use good makeup, and the audience will not question the video quality for a second - as long as the talent doesn't wear aliasing clothes.

Just don't shoot it in 720p mode -- shoot in 1080p and use a high quality downsampling algorithm in post. The aliasing is much, much worse in the 7D's 720p mode than 1080p.

You'll need to be more careful with white balance on the 7D. Also the recording time issue.

Red's pretty late in the product cycle to buy now. And you would need to learn a bit of software. But with raw white balance can be set in post.

Of course the RED is far superior than the 7D, don't get me wrong, I love both cameras and use them both. If talking heads is ALL your going to do then a RED would be a HUGE overkill. You are MUCH better off buying two or maybe even three 7D bodies and some nice lenses and some good sticks and getting more out of them then you would a single Red One.

However, if you think there is a chance you are going to do something other than talking heads, such as corporate, industrial, feature work, or anything of that nature you might would consider the RED. The RED has FAR greater latitude among many other benefits. It's also important to remember that it's not what you have (equipment-wise), it's how you use it. I have seen some AMAZING images from consumer grade cameras. A good example is the video that was floating around a while back that was shot on a consumer grade HV20 (granted with an AJA IO HD and a Brevis)...

Perhaps not if you have productions about to be shot and the RED One can be upgraded with the new sensor in the pipeline. The camera itself will be capable of shooting feature films etc for quite a few years yet. Although, perhaps not the greatest from an ergonomic point of view, but it can do the business and I suspect many of the more standard RED One accessories will work on the 35mm Scarlet/Epic anyway, as will the lenses. If you can pay off the investment in a reasonable time frame it'll be fine, although best to remember there are quite a few RED Ones out there.

The group concerned wouldn't *buy* a RED One, they'd rent. LA rental houses are full of them.

Thanks for the info.

I had assumed that with "Talking head scene. Interior" and "Web and mobile device ONLY" that this would be some sort of an ongoing video blog. If so, RAW post processing would have little value. You'd want to get everything baked in so you can simply cut it, add titles and music, encode, and upload. The last thing you'd want to do is to spend time tweaking in post.

On the other hand, if this is a one time shoot, having the flexibility to adjust things in post could be worthwhile. With the RED you wouldn't need to worry about clothes that might alias. You'll want a powerful computer though.

The 7D puts the workload on the front end - once. The RED puts it on the back end. I think the decision has more to do with workflow than image quality.

Twenty-five years in this business and I'm yet to do one job that wasn't tweaked in post.

That said, good advice from everyone. I'd add, do you know how to work either camera or post-produce the images they create?

Then again, somebody could work in live TV (sports, news) and never tweak anything in post. :)

It's actually not a blog but a webisode with a 100k USD budget. I'm looking to cut costs. Reds take a lot of people to operate and are cumbersome. Was thinking the 7D might be an alternative. The parameters are exactly as stated. A and B cameras.

I thought you were asking advice re a "talking head", ie an interview? There's huge differences between camera systems if you are using it for a drama shoot.

Talking head does not necessarily mean interview. Many of the scenes from "Twelve Angry Men", as an example, are considered talking head scenes because there is not much going in the way of visual storytelling.

The parameters are exactly as I described in the initial post. A "Talking head SCENE".

There's plenty going on in Twelve Angry Men in terms of visual story telling. Indeed, the use of lenses was paramount in creating tension and a sense of claustrophobia. Particularly clever in that movie was the way the focal length slowly lengthened as the drama unfolded, not easy to mimic without a proper cine set-up. It was subtle but intelligent, masterful filmmaking. If you want to use that movie as a blueprint for your show, I'd definitely go with RED and a big box of Cooke prime lenses.

If money is no object, then go with the absolute best quality you can. If you need to stretch the dollars, go with the 7D. I seriously doubt any viewers would be able to tell the difference in the end product if it's done well. The camera is only one tool in any production; make sure you have money for professional crew, lights, sound, dolly, etc. In most cases I'd trade the better camera for better lighting and better people who know how to use it.