Anyone hearing anything about a C100 MKIII announcement yet?

[Steve Burkett]

Of course, it is somewhat heresy to say this on a Canon thread, but many C100 operators that I know have moved to the Sony FS5 or FS7. Again, colours are not great out of the box, but I've seen a fair few videos where grading has paid dividends. Canon are dragging their heels with 4K. The C100 Mark ii was a great time to implement it and would have had me snapping one up in a heart beat. I can't see how 4K at 100mbps would have cut into their C300 line. If the Canon Mark III offers some form of 4K recording, I'd certainly be interested. However unless they announce one this year, I'd be wondering if they even plan on having a replacement released.

[Pete Cofrancesco]

The GH4 /5 and similar dslrs have there place for live events. Their small footprint make them ideal for gimbal work and low cost ideal for multiple camera shoots. There are all levels of budgets and requirements so it's silly to look down at any camera , "Oh you're using..."

My view on 4k is beyond digital streaming there isn't currently or in the near future viable methods to deliver it. You need a 4k tv, a 4k player and some sort of 4k media and/or the bandwidth to stream 4k. What is the % of the public that meet that criteria?

Clients who ask for it might not understand this. Just saying 4k makes me feel good but at least in my line of work I'm still delivering SD and struggling to find ways to physically deliver HD let alone 4k. Of course we all live in different worlds.

[Gary Huff]

At this point, I have to have 4K. I would pick up a C100 that had 4K to use as a secondary camera to my C300 Mark II, but so far that's the XC10/15 and while that is a really nice camera in certain respects, I need an EF mount. So right now, that's the A7R Mark II for me.

[Pete Cofrancesco]

I believe the Canon 5D IV is also 4k

[Steve Burkett]

The codec isn't that good. Not that it doesn't deliver a nice image, but its akin to using a sledgehammer to bang in a nail. Now if it was 10 bit 4:2:2, I could excuse the large file size. Plus it lacks focus peaking and all the other useful video features that make our lives a bit easier. Pretty sure there's a time limit to recordings just to add insult to injury. It's designed perhaps understandably as a Photographic tool that does video, rather than one that gives equal measure to both. My personal opinion mind.

[Steve Burkett]

Originally Posted by Pete Cofrancesco

My view on 4k is beyond digital streaming there isn't currently or in the near future viable methods to deliver it. You need a 4k tv, a 4k player and some sort of 4k media and/or the bandwidth to stream 4k. What is the % of the public that meet that criteria?

I would say online delivery is becoming more common every year. Whilst DVD is still popular amongst my Wedding clients - maybe 50% of them requesting it, I'm finding more and more prefer USB and in that I deliver both HD and 4K files. I can play 4K files via USB plugged directly to my TV and on my Parents new 4K TV, without any need of a player.

Youtube and Vimeo offer 4K playback. There are 4K Blurays, though this hasn't extended to recordables, but how long before it does. I've had Wedding clients contacting me and asking if I did 4K. Netflix is now 4K; do you think they'd insist all their original shows adhere to that format if they didn't have customers making use of it. It's a small margin now, but a growing one that I can see taking off more paired with HDR.

[Dan Brockett]

Originally Posted by Steve Burkett

Dan, not all of us are anti micro 4/3's, and value the camera because of a sensor size that gives us a smaller camera and smaller lenses; ideal for solo work, especially when filming with multiple cameras.

That was exactly why I purchased it and all I can say is, generally, I rarely see video or still images from M43 imagers that impress me. I have had most other size imagers as well (1/3', 2/3", FF, S35) and I could say the same about 1/3" sensors, they are too noisy, grainy and the FOV and DOF is a handicap for most of my work, thank goodness Panasonic finally saw the light and make small fixed lens cameras with larger imagers. But even the DVX200, I have really wanted to like the images from it but I have only seen one or two examples, out of dozens or possibly even hundreds I have looked at that I would consider desirable for me, my work and my clients. It's not the lighting and compositional skills of the shooters using the DVX200, its the camera/imager. It looks okay but does not have the nice colors and skin tones of even my old HPX170. Someone at Panasonic lost "the touch" with their lower end cameras and I don't know why. I look at a lot of footage I even shot years ago in 720p with the HVX200 and the HPX170 and it objectively looked a lot better than the GH4. That's another reason I bought the GH4, I though it would be a small, changeable lens, 4K version of what I could get out of the HPX170 and it wasn't even close. Sure, higher resolution but everything else was not as good.

Originally Posted by Steve Burkett

Whilst lenses can look like toys, it is results that matter and those like the voigtlander are professionally made if one isn't too snobbist to look down on its smaller form factor.
Nor do we all share your video requirements and type of clients. Its clear the GH5 would be a poor choice for your line of work, but it is still a worthy contender for the C100 for some users, whatever your personal needs and feelings on the matter.

I don't judge anyone's skills or visual storytelling capability by the camera they shoot with. I just personally found that M43 and for that matter, 1/3" sensors don't work for our clients and my aesthetic preference. Doesn't mean I think they are bad, they are just not what I choose to use for work and our clients have responded in like. With the GH4, they actually would get irritated when shooting an interview and we couldn't really make the BG as shallow DOF as they were used to or liked and we were shooting these interviews in people's homes, not on a set so there was no way to move the camera and subject further apart to gain shallower DOF since the room the producer had chosen was for specific aesthetic reasons. They would take the correctly lit and exposed images into post and ask why there was so much graininess, even in the footage shot at ISO 400. Some of my GH4 footage was intercut with some C300 footage shot by another crew in Washington and the comparison was amazing, that was when I decided to buy a C100, then a C300. I had lit the interviews to look good and they looked decent, but compared to the C300 interviews the other crew shot, I was embarrassed at how much softer, grainier and less defined the interviews I shot looked. And the C300 was obviously in 1080 versus the 4K images we shot on the GH4.

Originally Posted by Steve Burkett

I disagree the GH4 is a hobbyist camera, as it is used by Professionals including myself and has been used in some TV shows, albeit as a B camera or for aerial footage. In fact I have seen the GH4 paired with a 12mm olympus, the very definition of a toy like lens, which was used on a TV show. So clearly it was Professional enough for them. As you say, it is a case of the right tool for the job, but not everyone has the same job and arguably the same requirements.

I have a fellow DP colleague I speak with who used a GH4 as a POV camera on a quad for a TV show and as a crash cam for some explosions next to Go Pros. A useful tool for many people, I don't dispute that, just not my choice as an A camera I am hanging my career on.

Anyway, this is supposed to be a thread about a possible upcoming C100 MKIII, not a GH4/GH5 thread so back to our original programming...

[Steve Burkett]

Originally Posted by Dan Brockett

Anyway, this is supposed to be a thread about a possible upcoming C100 MKIII, not a GH4/GH5 thread so back to our original programming...

To be honest, concerning the GH4/5, I really didn't need you to clarify your feelings and experiences any further. You had already made your position pretty clear to me in your earlier replies and are now guilty of somewhat milking the point here.

Personally regarding your situation, I would say the C100 in any form is not Professional enough for your needs. From the description of your work and clients, I'd stump up for the C300 Mark ii. No way will the C100 mark iii have 4K 60p. That just would be a leap too far. Plus the 4K at 30p would be a weaker codec than what the C300 would offer. Fine for event filming, but no way suitable for broadcast or the discerning client. The C300 is the Professional choice over the C100.

Of course there's another alternative, the Canon EOS-1D X Mark II, which does 4k at 60p, but suffers from the same terrible codec that blights the 5d Mark IV that gives enormous file sizes for no good reason. Plus it's a crop of the sensor as per the 5d. Still consistent with the C100 angle of view. It is a well regarded professional camera and has a smaller size. A slightly cheaper option when considering rigging and accessories, if 4k at 60p is really that important.

[Dan Brockett]

Originally Posted by Steve Burkett

To be honest, concerning the GH4/5, I really didn't need you to clarify your feelings and experiences any further. You had already made your position pretty clear to me in your earlier replies and are now guilty of somewhat milking the point here.

It sounds as if you have a personal attachment to and have wrapped up your identity in your choice of camera Steve. I didn't intend to hurt your feelings. I'm not emotionally intertwined with which camera I own or rent. I shot a decent budget project recently just using two Go Pros (in-car stuff). I use a "lowly" 1080 only Canon 80D on my Zhiyun Crane, even though everyone else looks down on it because it's not a mirrorless 4K camera like a GH4, or an A6300. I like small, cheap cameras for certain things. Good enough for the client and for CBS as B camera. My only real conviction about cameras is that we all should shoot with what makes sense financially, what makes our clients happy and whatever camera makes us money.

Originally Posted by Steve Burkett

Personally regarding your situation, I would say the C100 in any form is not Professional enough for your needs. From the description of your work and clients, I'd stump up for the C300 Mark ii.

We often do, depending on the client and project. Some of our corporate clients are very happy with the C100 when we team it with the Atomos Ninja Blade and we can hand them Prores HQ files at the end of the shoot. But Netflix, Hulu, PBS and several of the studios are now upping their origination requirements to 4K (UHD) 4:2:2. Have not seen anyone yet require DCI though, UHD seems to be the new standard. For those clients, renting the C300 MKII often works. Unless they want Sony, RED or Arri. I am always happy to rent whatever the client wants/needs. In some ways, it's better because we don't have to invest money in one system when clients want us to shoot with other cameras.

Originally Posted by Steve Burkett

No way will the C100 mark iii have 4K 60p. That just would be a leap too far.

Time will tell. Some think that Canon won't even introduce a C100 MKIII, at least at NAB. A few have posted that Canon may introduce something higher cost with more features, but it won't be until the Fall of this year. Who knows? Canon is rarely one to tip their hat about what they are coming out with.

Originally Posted by Steve Burkett

Plus the 4K at 30p would be a weaker codec than what the C300 would offer. Fine for event filming, but no way suitable for broadcast or the discerning client. The C300 is the Professional choice over the C100.

It should be for two to three times the price. But we have used the C100 for quite a few professional/broadcast projects as well, (almost always output to the Blade to overcome the weaker internal codec) just depends on the clients, their needs and of course, their budgets. Budgets are generally shrinking in our client base so if they cannot afford the day rate for an F55, C300 MKII or better, then they sometimes only have budget for the C100 or C300. That's why we keep it and keep using it, it's still making us profit.

Originally Posted by Steve Burkett

Of course there's another alternative, the Canon EOS-1D X Mark II, which does 4k at 60p, but suffers from the same terrible codec that blights the 5d Mark IV that gives enormous file sizes for no good reason. Plus it's a crop of the sensor as per the 5d. Still consistent with the C100 angle of view. It is a well regarded professional camera and has a smaller size. A slightly cheaper option when considering rigging and accessories, if 4k at 60p is really that important.

We've been tempted, the images from it looks good, but having shot collectively quite a lot of projects with the 5D MKII, MKIII, GH4 and a few others, the DSLR form factor doesn't work well. Lack of internal NDs, lack of time code, having to shoot dual system sound, it just doesn't work for how we shoot. We're the classic case of needing a video or digital cinema camera. Our clients don't have time to transcode formats to easily editable formats (they prefer Prores), they hated when we had to hand them separate audio files to sync with the camera scratch tracks, and they often want to go from tripod to shoulder mounted with fast zooms and the ability to provide smooth, steady footage for long periods of times. A video or digital cinema camera works better for all of these reasons.

[Steve Burkett]

Originally Posted by Dan Brockett

It sounds as if you have a personal attachment to and have wrapped up your identity in your choice of camera Steve. I didn't intend to hurt your feelings.

Nah, I just have a low boredom threshold for reading the same stuff over and over again.

[Steve Burkett]

Originally Posted by Dan Brockett

Our clients don't have time to transcode formats to easily editable formats (they prefer Prores), they hated when we had to hand them separate audio files to sync with the camera scratch tracks, and they often want to go from tripod to shoulder mounted with fast zooms and the ability to provide smooth, steady footage for long periods of times. A video or digital cinema camera works better for all of these reasons.

I agree on all of this. If I was in your shoes, I'd go for the C300. As for the C100, if Canon introduces a Mark III with 4K and as long as they don't cripple it too hard, it'll be a camera on my list to buy. I have some projects where it would be very useful.

As you say, time will tell if Canon releases such a thing.

[Pete Cofrancesco]

To be blunt Canon does make the camera with the specs you want, it's called the C300 mkII. You might not like the price well neither do I but in fairness that's not Canon's problem. I want a lot of things but if my clients or type of work doesn't warrant the price tag you just live with in your means.

Canon does offer 4k under the c300 but it comes with caveats. But why wouldn't it otherwise there would be no reason to buy the c300. That's why C100 mkIII can't have all the specs you want. We can dance round and round the issue. In a nutshell you want to pay c100 price with c300 features. Not going to happen.

[Dan Brockett]

Originally Posted by Steve Burkett

I agree on all of this. If I was in your shoes, I'd go for the C300. As for the C100, if Canon introduces a Mark III with 4K and as long as they don't cripple it too hard, it'll be a camera on my list to buy. I have some projects where it would be very useful.

As you say, time will tell if Canon releases such a thing.

On the fence now about buying the C300 MKII. Have a big documentary coming up where the client requested we shoot 2K and I would love to shoot the 2k 12 bit 4:4:4 for this, which looks amazing and makes the CFast cards last so much longer at 225 MBps versus 410 Mbps for 4K. But I know it will be a small shoot, with a small crew and we are trying to stay super low key. So the C100 might actually work better for this shoot in the sense of it's small and less conspicuous than a built up C300 MKII. We'll be all over Rio, trying to blend in as picture taking tourists, not as a film shoot. We will be trailing a celebrity musician so the C100 with just the handgrip and possibly the Blade can somewhat pass for a stills/consumer video camera in a lot of places. C300, not as much. Bringing the 80D as well in case we are getting too much hassle even with a C100. I used the 80D as a C camera on a recent shoot and it cuts pretty well with the C100/300 footage. Nice to have options for shooting low key.

Also, I can't pull the trigger until we see what happens at NAB. I bought my C100 MKI literally weeks before the C100 MKII was released because of the same situation. It killed me too because I knew the C100 MKII was coming but I needed the camera for a multi-week shoot in South Africa and it was either buy or rent one, it made more financial sense to buy it. So I did and the job almost paid for the C100 MKI package. But I really missed the 1080 60 FPS, face tracking and EVF from the MKII. So the lesson there was, if possible, try not to buy a month before the new model is introduced or Canon decides to reduce prices drastically.

[Gary Huff]

Originally Posted by Dan Brockett

I would love to shoot the 2k 12 bit 4:4:4 for this, which looks amazing and makes the CFast cards last so much longer at 225 MBps versus 410 Mbps for 4K.

I really love this mode coupled with Clog2.

the C100 might actually work better for this shoot in the sense of it's small and less conspicuous than a built up C300 MKII.

Take off the LCD unit and use the EVF. You can get the MA-400 if you need XLR, or use the 3.5mm input on the side if you can use that connection. Leave the handle off too. The C300 Mark II isn't much larger than the C100 when you do that.

We'll be all over Rio, trying to blend in as picture taking tourists, not as a film shoot. We will be trailing a celebrity musician so the C100 with just the handgrip and possibly the Blade can somewhat pass for a stills/consumer video camera in a lot of places.

But now you have 2 sets of different batteries, and there's no way the C100 + Blade will pass easier than a C300 Mark II stripped down. Plus you have a potential point of failure in the HDMI cable, so you'll need to bring spares for that as well. I would not trade my C300m2 for a C100 with an attached recorder.

[Steve Burkett]

Originally Posted by Dan Brockett

We will be trailing a celebrity musician so the C100 with just the handgrip and possibly the Blade can somewhat pass for a stills/consumer video camera in a lot of places. C300, not as much. Bringing the 80D as well in case we are getting too much hassle even with a C100. I used the 80D as a C camera on a recent shoot and it cuts pretty well with the C100/300 footage. Nice to have options for shooting low key.

Having seen a C100 with a Blade attached, no way does it pass as a stills/consumer camera. I'm not a fan of the 80d personally either; by my observations and the various reviews and tests, it's HD is quite soft compared to Mirrorless cameras HD output and not in the same league as the C100 in terms of quality. Still if you stick to shallow depth of field, it can work. Wide shots with greater depth, details just tend to look mushy.

Frankly if I owned a C300 and I'd love to, I wouldn't be messing with C100 and an external recorder for a shoot like this. The two aren't that different in size - what 15% larger - no way more obtrusive than a C100 with an external recorder.