ABSTRACT
What’s the Best Camera to Use? The vague question “What’s the best camera?” is one constantly asked by students. The answer is never simple. The response must be yet another question, “What are you going to use it for?” I can’t say that I blame students for wanting an easy answer when they are deluged with data and advertising. In my experience, fi nding the best camera often, embarrassingly, boils down to fi nding out what other teams have used. The production pipeline has gotten extremely complex, and now many people are involved in the process of choosing equipment to buy or rent. A large corporation may have an entire technical staff spend months doing research before acquiring equipment. For a small shop or an individual, fi nding the right equipment becomes a very daunting proposition. At the National Association of Broadcasting (NAB) convention, which is a showcase for media technology, it seems that the sales force for every single product on the fl oor will tell you that their product will turn lead
into gold and prove it by blinding you with science. For someone who has the responsibility for making a substantial fi nancial commitment and who isn’t a rocket scientist, choosing equipment can seem like the seventh circle of hell. Many motion picture personnel, myself included, have a diffi cult time absorbing this constantly changing stream of data, especially if they are fortunate enough to be working constantly.
