Thursday, July 28, 2011

New Switronix Adapter for the GH2!

Good news for GH2 shooters. Switronix issued a press release yesterday announcing an adapter that connects their high capacity Pro X Li-ion battery to the Panasonic DCC-8. This should provide a real solution for folks who want to use the camera in remote locations.

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Tuesday, July 12, 2011

RED Delivers Epic Convergence

I don't usually repost interviews, but there are several profound insights on the imminent convergence of stills and video in this interview with DSLR pioneer Vincent Laforet at aphotoeditor.com.

Laforet is now shooting with a RED Epic-M, and is able to pull high quality stills from 5K 96fps or 200fps streams.  In the interview, he tells this awesome story:

"For example this morning I was about to leave my home to go to work. I had my Epic with me and my daughter got into her ballerina dress for the first time. And I had a choice between my Leica M9 or the Epic, two very different tools, to very different ways of shooting, and two very different results obviously. One’s noticeably heavier. But with the Epic, I get 5k resolution stills. I’m shooting it at 96 frames a second, at a 200th of a second. And I’m able to get incredibly sharp 14 MP stills from the camera.
I’m most likely not going to print poster images of my daughter- as much as I love her. But I will definitely print 8×10, 11x14s with a 14 megapixel camera, which is what the 5k can do. And it’s going to allow me to pick one of 96 frames every single second. And I also have the benefit of having a video clip to go along with it. Slow motion video that is @6 times the resolution of 1080p content as a result. So why would I choose the Leica other than the form factor, obviously? And the fact that it’s a still image and slightly higher resolution.
You’d choose it for price.
We’re talking about the future here. Not what things cost today. My iphone shoots better pictures than my $20,000 Canon D2000 shot 10 years ago."
In a decade or less, we will be in a world where a 5K camera costs $5K. In that world, there will be a lot more people creating big-screen quality motion pictures -- and pulling high quality still images out of them -- putting a lot of ACs, camera assistants and still-only photographers out of work.

People have been predicting this since Laforet shot Reverie a little less than two years ago -- but the 5DMkII (and even my beloved GH2) were just harbingers of this revolution.  The Epic represents the main force.

Take a look at what revolutionaries Laforet and Bloom are doing with the Epic and tiny crews:


EPIC #308 from Vincent Laforet on Vimeo



Great Wooden Boats: RED EPIC from Philip Bloom on Vimeo


Welcome to the next chapter of the hybrid camera revolution. More power to the people!

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