Help whats the cheapest but best camera

[Matty2Phatty]

So were group of guys trying to to some braidcast level work mainly commericails etc. Recently we rn into trouble with gettting hold of a camera so we want to buy our own.

So our budget is about 1200 at most :shrug: yeah i know kinda low...But i figure other than ebay the are probably some good camera choices out there for us maybe some of the older models

So you want to do commercials but can't pay more than $1200 for your gear?

In my experience people have been known to pay in excess of $200k for a commercial, and i've been told of people who pay a great deal more than that.

Why do you need the camera before you ever get a contract to do anything? Why not get the contract and explain to them how much you need upfront to pay for the production, and how much they can pay apon completion?

You may be able to pull it off, but if i were looking for a production house to do my advertisements i certainly wouldn't go to one that works this unprofessionally.

[shadow]

$1200 will buy you nothing but junk. But with $1200 you could rent some good stuff. I recently edited a videoclip that was shot with that budget. Can't say it's the best clip ever created, but I have seen worse.

[crutch]

Just curious cause I have no experience in the field. But, how often is a commercial shot using something like a DVX100a and are they shooting commercials with below $10k HD cameras?

[Matty2Phatty]

That happens all the time at the bottom end of the business. Old Ma and Pa's corner store get their ads done for dirt cheap by shooting on a DV camera, maybe even getting their grandson to do it for them.

What kind of advertisements are you hoping to compete with?

[crutch]

I'm actually just a very late bloomer and have been taking an interest. Would you suggest to someone starting out to be a one man show or would it be more profitable to do freelance for others? By one-person show I mean handle all aspects of creation or by freelance I mean do compositing/effects only.

[Tagger]

S
Most of the work we are doing will have alot of post effects but still real life action in it.


If you want to be serious with post effects, get out of the DV pricerange and invest in decent equipment.
1200 is not "kind of low", for a professional camera it's just WAY under the budget

[Matty2Phatty]

Would you suggest to someone starting out to be a one man show or would it be more profitable to do freelance for others?

On short films that i have done, i have had a crew of 11 people. This is for 7 minute shorts on a 4 day shoot (over 1 month of pre and post production though). If you're doing a commercial properly you'll probably want about the same amount of people. I find that 11 people is enough to cover all jobs and still not get too crowded.

I would very highly recommend you find work at a place that already does commercials, because i'm guessing if you don't even know which camera to buy, then you don't have a reel.

One man just can't do professional advertisements. You'd be shooting for a month with 20 hour days.

[Abava Bava]

My friends have the Sony Z1U and that camera isnt much more than 1200 and it looks amazing. My other friend just shot 5 commercials for a tire place in maryland on his dv 3ccd came but still 29.97 it wasnt even hdv 24p and he is getting about 5 grand for the commercial spots.

[Matty2Phatty]

$5k sounds about what i would expect low-level DV advertisements would earn a guy, I think he's probably doing alright for himself at that level. I'm not sure what the original poster was planning to shoot, but like I said, if you're making ads for grandmas corner store (or tire place) then you'll do alright with DV.

[banzato]

Hi Matty, so what camera do you recomend for a good comercial? With this money I think he can rent a camera, instead of buy.

[Matty2Phatty]

The guy seems pretty sure that he doesn't want to rent. I'm not actually sure what he's trying to achieve.

[BuckBeaver]

I'd also suggest renting rather than buying, but if you really want to buy you might want to look at the Sony HDR-HC1 Mini DV / HDV camera. I've heard good things about it and I think they shoot Rocketboom (http://www.rocketboom.com) with it as well. I believe it sells for about $1,400 but you might find it for slightly less on ebay.

[Ed Bittner]

I would, if possible, go for a 3ccd chip camera. You'll get decent video. However, most importantly, lighting will "make or break" a project. We just picked up the Canon XL2, for about($3600.00). Not HD, but I didn't want a camera that compressed the video to MPEG2 before I had a chance to play with it, which ALL the consumer HD cameras do. The XL2 is designed for real camera operators, with a multitude of manual controls. I know it's way over your budget, but if that's all you can squezze for the camera, I'd go for some pro lighting gear.

E.

[CGTalk Moderation]

This thread has been automatically closed as it remained inactive for 12 months. If you wish to continue the discussion, please create a new thread in the appropriate forum.