The ease or difficulty of using a DvSLR depends on the subject and your style.

If you want a "straight" documentary where you cover events linearly and all in focus, a single DvSLR is not the right tool. On the other hand, if you are more creative with your story telling, are willing to use out of focus shots as an effect, and are willing to have the video give an impression of a person, place or thing, a DvSLR is perfect.

Jon:

Agreed, but not in the time-frame originally stated, and with the apparent experience (with DSLR's) level.

This is crazy on several fronts.

This is going to be a graffiti documentary. I plan on shooting it in a style similar to Doug Prays "Scratch" He used a lot of out of focus and non-traditional doc style shots. I am hoping the 7D will be a good option for this. I am also in the process of building a glidecam for some stable moving shots possibly. Since I was given such a short notice on this I plan on doing my best. I'll let you guys know how it comes out.

A DvSLR is a great choice for a graffiti doc. It's more about style than linear documentation. And graffiti is timeless. It's not like filming a wedding where "you may now kiss the bride" only happens once.

Some ideas:
* A super-wide lens or fisheye will provide attitude. The 5D is the better choice, but the 7D can work.
* A slider, dolly, or jib will give you camera motion. They take much less skill than a Steadicam. Even an old wheelchair can help provide smooth camera motion. Don't just pan with a tripod. You can get that look by panning and scanning a photo.
* If you can get an Intervalometer, you can do timelapses of people tagging by shooting photos, rather than video. The image quality can't be beat.
* Make it about the people, not just the art.

Best of luck!

just found out today that the shoot has been pushed back to the 14-19. luckily i will have a little more time to plan things out and get used to the camera.

A few tips on shooting a documentary with the 7D
 

I didn't read the all the posts so sorry if I'm mentioning the same stuff but here are some of my suggestions.

For lenses fixed aperture Zooms is a must since your gonna need to be wide open most of the time. Something like a Canon EF-S 17-55mm f/2.8 IS USM Zoom Lens or Canon Zoom Wide Angle-Telephoto EF 24-70mm f/2.8L Zoom would be good. Of course any prime Lens will be faster, sharper, easier to pull focus, and have less breathing.

For ISO I wouldn't go past 800 with daylight balanced light. Heavy tungsten light, I don't like going past 640.

For sound, thats not my department but I used the ZOOM H4n as the onboard mic. Much cleaner, as has 3 imputs, 2 XLRs, 1 1/8th inch. Not bad for 300 bucks.

Watch out for fast camera moves, stripes or anything that can cause moire etc...

Cheers
Jon

Doc shoot is tomorrow. I think I have developed a pretty good "look" for shooting it. I have been experimenting with picture profiles and I have settled with a super flat look like the one on the link posted earlier. I have tested it with Magic Bullet and have gotten some beautiful results.

As far as focus the zoom function will help immensely with interviews since I can pull my focus and zoom to check it and then record. I have also been using this to practice focusing manually and I have become pretty confident with it over the past week or so.

Also I built a hand held rig for it. Links bellow. It infinitely improves the steadiness of the handheld shots. (Rig cost about $50 bucks and parts were purchased mostly from Lowes and Walmart.)

http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-..._6829558_n.jpg

http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-..._7078196_n.jpg

Don't let this sway anyone, it's a tool, and if your bright you'll figure out what will and wont work!. The only difference is you have to use restraint, don't just go hand held. I jumped from an HVX200 to using 7d's in my series, and they have worked great. I use a tripod 90% of the time, and my shows actually look better. The auto gain is NOT a no go, it just means at times you MAY run into audio clipping issues and if you working loud areas the results are less then desirable audio. Some recoverable and some not. Only .01% of my audio has been bad. It does add time for the audio guy to adjust the effects of the auto gain. My sound guy is top knotch, and say the quality is certainly passable. Just put a good mic on there. I use RODE NTG2. Stay away from crap video mics. USE A WIND sock if it is outdoors... actually always use one!

For hand held stuff I use the stedicam merlin.