Canon 5D mark iii just arrived! Input on the rest of the cinema rig?

eastAR5

eastAR5

Active member
The mark iii body arrived the other day, along with a new editing laptop. Stoked on that.

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I don't buy those wack lens kits, since I am not a still photographer - just the body. This is my first jump into HDSLR filming, so any input would be appreciated before I go ahead and order the (first) lens and the rest of the cine rig by the end of the day.

Laptop: brand new 2012 Macbook Pro 17", 2.5 ghz i7 quad core processor, 12 gb ddr3 ram, 512gb SSD harddrive, anti-glare screen, et. cetra. Rendering/doing anything = ridiculously fast.

The full HDSLR rig:

1. canon 5D mark iii body

2. Lens= Zeiss CP.2 50mm OR 35mm T2.1 cine lens compact prime (first lens to support shooting 35mm FULL FRAME [w/ the 5D mark iii])

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/687428-REG/Zeiss_1834_818_Compact_Prime_CP_2_35mm_T2_1.html

3. Rig body = Redrockmicro Cinema bundle (mattebox, blue followfocus, etc) & Redrockmicro Deluxe shoulder mount attachment kit (easy swapping between tripod/crane/dolly/slider shooting + shoulder mount/glidecam/lower-gripped handheld shooting)

http://store.redrockmicro.com/Catalog/DSLR-Cinema-Studio-Rigs/DSLR-Cinema-Bundle

http://store.redrockmicro.com/Catalog/microShoulderMount/microshoulderMountDeluxe

4. shooting/field monitor = SmallHD DP6 true HD 5.6 (one of the most amazing and thoughtfully designed products that I have EVER seen & as well as the best monitor to buy hands down. )

http://www.smallhd.com/Products/DP6.html

5. Rode VideoMic pro directional mounted mic (The 5D has direct audio inputs compared to the mark II!)

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/744768-REG/Rode_VIDEOMIC_PRO_VideoMic_Pro_Compact_Shotgun.html

6. Accessories: lens gears, redrock micro mount w/ micro spud, . For now.

That just is absolutely the end of my budget right there. Can't spend a penny more for now.

Anyone who owns a professional HDSLR cinema rig setup - again, any input before I purchase the rig and components this evening would be appreciated. I have done a lot of research, reading, watching video comparisons, and talking to people - and while pricey, I have my specific reasons for choosing RedrockMicro for the full rig itself, and the Zeiss CP.2 - so please don't tell me any of this is 'overkill' - this is actually a barebones rig, just a top-shelf one.

* - My main question lies with the size of my lens choice:

- IF you could only afford to buy 1 Zeiss CP.2 cine compact primes (which is my case at $3900 each, im poor), would you get the 35mm or the 50mm? They both have the same T2.1 and are the same price. They both shoot full frame 35mm and attach to the 5D mark iii naively with no adaptation. In a sense, the CP.2 seems to be almost built for the Mark 3... At first I was set on the 35mm... but now I am thinking about the 50mm because of the DOF and since it will be the only lens I have with my 5D rig for at least a week or two.

- I would be adding a cheaper solid general zoom lens, a wide-angle and then eventually perhaps another Zeiss CP.2 prime when I can afford it after I start working with this rig & my studio. I would love to own the entire CP.2 set of cine lenses... soo dope.. but one step at a time.

I will post a review with full pictures and everything when the rest of the rig arrives!

 
I'm sure you've done a bunch of research already, but keep in mind that you can get the same zeiss glass inside a more photo oriented housing for a MUCH lower price.
 
Where the fuck did you get all this money?

Don't get cp2. Really. If you want zeiss glass, go with the ZE series. Same glass as cp2s, more of a still body but do you REALLY need a cinema oriented lens?

Also, wtf are you going to do with ONE LENS? break it down, what exactly are you filming? you do concerts and shit right? i could do better with like 3 really good lenses for $4k vs just one really overpriced lens.

That being said, pretty much everything you listed (including the 5dm3) are overprices items. You seem to have some flowing budget (guessing from your job) so yeah ball out, but you could pick up alot more shit if you saved some money on the overprices shit.
 
I appreciate the advice and I am NOT knocking it... however you guys really simply do not seem to have looked into what makes the CP.2 different than the ZE series.... There is a SIGNIFICANT difference between cinema lenses and regular photography primes that are used for video.

Again, I believe that splurging on a lens is NEVER excessive... Lenses are the best thing you can spend money on IMO
 
And heath I'm surprised you would say that about the CP.2... I mean I suppose if anything I would expect a response about the redrock rig itself (although I believe it is worth the money, overpriced.. yes. But nonetheless worth the money if you have it).

I mean to start, the CP.2 has more iris blades (15?) , double the amount regular primes have... and a whole list of other features that make cinema leses SIGNIFICANTLY different than using a regular photo prime for video.
 
Man, i've done extensive research on lenses. I wouldn't discourage you from buying a lens unless i was 100% behind it.

There are a few (not so significant IMO) features of a cp2 vs a ZE and that is:

1. Build Quality

-Geared focus ring

-no breathing

-very long focus throw

-very precise aperture control

2. You look cool cause you have a cp2.

Honestly dude, put a 50mm cp2 on a 5d and then put a 50mm ZE lens at the same settings, etc. you wont be able to tell the difference, especially just at 1080p.

You seem to be hell bent on wasting your money on one lens, but heed my advice before you do so. I'm not doubting your knowledge on the topic, but I think you're getting slightly carried away with "splurging on a lens is never excessive".

Here are the options I see.

A. buy a cp2 35mm or 50mm..... $4000

B. buy a number of other lenses (70-200, 24-70, 16-35, all L glass, all VERY GOOD) for $4000.

C. buy a number of prime lenses (zeiss, nikon, canon, 18, 24, 35, 50, 85,105) for about $4000 for a nikon prime set (not sure about canon but the zeiss ZE set will be more like $8k for a set, but you could get 35, 50, 85)

If you pick A, you'll have one cool, overpriced lens and you'll have to be a certain distance from your subject at all times... not sure how that works with your line of work but I would never want to be limited by one lens.

If you pick B, you'll have 16-200 covered and you could even get the 2xL converter and be covered to 400. To me, this sounds like the best option and like i said, i dont know exactly what you want for a lens, but having a range is always nice, even if you use one of your 3 lenses the most, having the option to go super wide or super tight is good.

If you pick C it will be more of a cinematic approach, all primes, covering a good range, but more time consuming than zoom. Again, i don't know how you feel about that, but its better than have one lens, but not as good as having zoom lenses.

You can listen to what I have to say or not, you can spend $4k on one lens if you want, but im just giving you some input. I think spending $4k on a lens is fucking stupid, but spend $1k isn't. I agree that money should be invested into glass, but $4k into one lens is stupid.
 
why hasnt this been answered yet... what do you film?

I could see this being worth getting cinema lenses if you plan on upgrading later on to a RED with EF mount but even then why fork out all of the money.

If your concentrating on creative short films or something like that I would say dont worry about gear, focus on the art of filmmaking. I would much rather have a full set of primes than one crazy prime lens.
 
Im still not sure if your a extreme organized troll, or a super rich kid... Thats like a $10,000 setup...WITH ONLY ONE LENS!
 
* much thanks again to Heath. Making me reconsider all my lens options, helped a lot. As I said, the HDSLR game is new to me.

I'm not "a kid" and I have been involved with filming/post production since I was younger than 10. I had a VX1000 + MK1 when most of you were barely able to walk...

I will be filming mostly for commercial, promotional and music videos - at least for a little while. I'll have to be vague for now.

And a little over $10,000 for a setup that is capable of producing images that not many years ago would require a $500,000+ budget is not bad at all..... In the entertainment/media industry 10k is far from being a ridiculous sum of money for anything.

I was given a grant from a generous benefactor to purchase this equipment, and I will put it all to use fully.

Skiing is only something I will be filming for fun. I like skiing too much to film it full time, even if I was presented with that opportunity.

I may very well move to a RED setup or more likely a C300 in the future.... so the EF mount and all the capabilities that the CP.2 offers is quite tempting. Although, I have checked up on the upcoming month of work for me, and it seems that it might be a better option to hold off on the CP.2 , get a cheaper set of primes for now. And then rent some CP.2s in the near future, see how I like them and then if I can afford it by then, and I deem it worth my money - buy the entire set of CP.2 cine primes. But one step at a time..

The BlackMagic cam makes me curious, although there are a lot of things I don't like about it from my first looks.

Regardless - once again, I will post a full review and w/ pictures of the final rig/setup I end up with once I finish ordering tonight and it all arrives and sample footy, just incase anyone is curious.

gracias

 
I'm slowly starting my set of ZF lenses for my 5D, instead of ZE. I would NOT recommend the ZE series because of the electronic aperture. The ZF are made for Nikon, but have a manual aperture.

There is a company called "Duclos" that will cine-mod lenses. They will de-click the aperture, put a focus ring on them, and give it a 80mm front mount. Thats what I did to my ZF.1 50mm F1.4. They can also change lens mounts from Nikon to EF to PL, etc.
 
I'm slowly starting my set of ZF lenses for my 5D, instead of ZE. I would NOT recommend the ZE series because of the electronic aperture. The ZF are made for Nikon, but have a manual aperture.

There is a company called "Duclos" that will cine-mod lenses. They will de-click the aperture, put a focus ring on them, and give it a 80mm front mount. Thats what I did to my ZF.1 50mm F1.4. They can also change lens mounts from Nikon to EF to PL, etc.
 
I'm slowly starting my set of ZF lenses for my 5D, instead of ZE. I would NOT recommend the ZE series because of the electronic aperture. The ZF are made for Nikon, but have a manual aperture.

There is a company called "Duclos" that will cine-mod lenses. They will de-click the aperture, put a focus ring on them, and give it a 80mm front mount. Thats what I did to my ZF.1 50mm F1.4. They can also change lens mounts from Nikon to EF to PL, etc.
 
I've used the 11-16 Duclos (the Tokina 11-16) and it is a gorgeous lens. Granted they only make it in a PL mount, but speaking to the quality of their craftsmanship and customer service, Duclos - if you can afford it - is really top notch.

It looks like they have cine-moded ZF primes as well. For a touch more than the standard ZF glass, you get the cinema-style focus ring as well as a de-clicked aperture. This will definitely feel very close to the CP.2's while costing less than half the price.
 
Yea, they are amazing. Luckily I live about a 30 minute drive from them, but you can always ship them your lens too. As much as I would love to have a CP.2 set, I'll sick to the ZF series.
 
Obviously I would of purchased a C300 if I had a larger budget. But I am not the least bit disappointed with my decision. There are some inconveniences and annoyances of shooting with a HDSLR setup - but IMO the positives hugely outweigh the negatives - especially in the case of the mark III.

If you take the time to look into the changes from the mark II to mark III... you'll see the upgrades are pretty hugely significant for anyone shooting video. I'll leave it at that for now. Go watch comparison footage or a full list of specs/upgrades from the Mark II... and tell me you wouldn't be stoked on having one.

Also - not really a considering factor for me when I made the executive order to have the mark III body purchased... but the fact it is inherently an extremely high quality, professional still-photography camera, which is easy for me to forget about sometimes... is a pretty awesome little perk. It's almost like getting 2 for 1.

So when I need professional, super high quality/incredible contrast/res photos for a website, look-book, product promotions, or just for anything... take it off my redrockmicro, throw on a 50mm prime or whatever, and bam, I have the ability to have magazine quality shots at up to 6 frames per second.

I took care of the redrockmicro cinema deluxe rig + the shoulder mount attachment , smallHD DP6 true HD 5.6 inch shooting monitor... about to finalize the lens situation by tomorrow.

I am still debating. Talking to an extremely respected DSLR photographer / cinematographer @ the harvard media department yesterday and he surprisingly said if he were in my shoes, he would get the 35mm Zeiss CP.2 cine prime over getting a set of ZEs or anything else. Since when shooting full frame with a 35mm on a 35mm full frame setup - it technically is 3 lenses in one. Step forward from your naitive shooting point at 35mm, to "point +1" and you are shooting your subject with a 50mm prime. Step backwards to "point -1" and you are shooting with a 28mm.

Still not sure yet. Probably end up getting a complete set of lesser but still great zeiss ZE glass, but then again I was offered a 20-100mm zoom that is a really nice expensive piece of glass, from the late 1980s - so that would give me a super nice versatile 35mm CP.2 prime + a zoom that would cover most things I need to shoot, at least till I could afford to expand my CP.2 collection. Only shitty thing is I would need to find a way to adapt the zoom to the canon EF mount. Sure it wouldn't be hard.

 
All you had to say is that you need a camera that can shoot great photos too. That justifies it much more.

Honestly there is no way that you could argue your point from a video only perspective imo. First off, I would NEVER buy the C300. Huge fucking waste of money if you ask me. Great camera, yes, but seriously overpriced.

There's no doubt that the mk III has some upgrades. That said, I would never buy a mk II for video, and I would never buy a mk III for video. It simply seems stupid to buy them for video when the reason why they're so expensive is because of features that are geared toward photography. Would I be stoked to have a mk III? you bet. Would I buy one? nope.

But as I said, the photography factor is huge. If you need a camera that can do both, then I can see why the mk III is right for you. I know you do a lot of video stuff so I assumed this was for video only (you made it sound that way too), in which case I would buy an FS700 over a mk III setup (and a Scarlet over a C300).
 
I agree with what you are saying to some degree, for sure.

However, the most professional/experienced full res test footage I have seen with the Mark III , shot with CP.2 lenses with perfect settings and focus, when anti-aliasing is turned off but sharping is added via editing software , and then color graded properly/magic bullet.... idk I would the photography bonus perk aside - it is capable of producing footage I think that rivals anything I have seen from the fs700, especially in extreme settings of Low light.

But of course, to cover the whole spectrum of shooting subjects/styles - of course the fs700 or any non-HDSLR camera will always be more practical. But I'm willing to deal with those aspects of impracticability with filming with a DSLR, converted into a full cinema rig - to achieve a certain look that until not that many years ago - required a budget (at least) 100x the amount I had to spend. regardless of what you would of gone with, it's all pretty amazing.

And yes, the more I think about it, the more having a baller still photography camera in addition to a top-shelf cinema camera (rig), is going to be something I end up using much more than I had thought about originally.

It will allow me to skip having to seek out a friend/colleague or worst case scenario - pay someone, for the times I need those cover shot style photos. Do it myself.

*and don't tell me to be concise when posting on intranet forums. what if i don't want to be concise.

SmallHD hooked me up with a 10% 'student' discount - kinda bullshit cause im technically not a student, but works for me. Brings the monitor cost down from $906 to close to $800.

And RedrockMicro hooked me up with a full set of lens gears ($178 value) that I would of otherwise had to purchase - just for promising to provide them with 'behind the scenes' pics of me shooting with their rig for promotional reasons.

always worth tryin to hustle everything
 
the only thing canon did right with the c300 that other havent done was a high quality internal codec. but for 16k for the body? are you kidding me? fs100/700 imo are the best bang for buck right now, the fs100 still blows away the 5dm3 the only advantage the 5d has is photo ability but shit man a decent dslr photo body is 1k, worth buying a video camera thats actually worth something.
 
If you do "Step down" to the ZE series, PLEASE do yourself a favor and get the ZF series instead. Its a Nikon mount, so you need a F -> EF adaptor (no big deal). Since the ZF series has manual aperture, A. They will basically work on any camera B. If you need to do an aperture rack, you can get it "de-clicked" and to it flawlessly.
 
Why anyone would buy a 5DmkIII for video is beyond me, nevermind the fact that the Zeiss' optical advantages aren't even noticeable with that shoddy anti-aliasing filter implemented.

Just out of curiosity- what are you using to support your camera and $4k lens?
 
Jesus... the money splurge... I'm Jelly...

You're new to HDSLR stuff, right? Get the aforementioned set of L glass, or a set of good vintage primes like eheath said - it will keep it's value very well, if not appreciate, and you can resell all of it later if you want to upgrade to a RED, or any other camera you're thinking about. You'll have a better idea of what you want to film (unless you REALLY know what you're filming now as it is) and some capital built, and THEN be able to throw down on more than just 1 massively overpriced lens.
 
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