5D2, 7D, 60d or don't bother now

[DavidPartington]

Seriously - congrats on your purchase.  You are likely to have an awesome eye-opening time with VDSLR compared to video cameras!   

[osbornes5]

You are likely to have an awesome eye-opening time with VDSLR compared to video cameras! 

No doubt. The lack of auto focus will be a huge issue for me as I have never been much of a manual focuser. The 12 minute clip length will be problem #2. However, there will definately be uses for it. Plus I am just glad to finally break into the world of HD! Thanks by the way...

[BillGrant]

Hey Marty,
Congrats. You You have a helluva tool on its way. I would consider a 2.8 lens somewhere along the way and I have struggled with the same thing you have with the lenses. Nikon lenses make sense to me, but for some reason the Canon lenses are a mystery. I would also suggest the amazing 50mm 1.4. Great prime and definately something to have in your kit. I'm putting my 2 cheaper lenses up for sale and getting the 24-105 as well.
If you have any questions about workflow, stabilization, et.c Don't hesitate to give me a call...
Bill

[osbornes5]

Thanks Bill! I appreciate that. I must admit that I do have some questions about work flow. I know the avchd stuff is a little different animal and how to get it to work with CS3 Premiere Pro is not completely clear to me but I'll get it and do a little testing. If (when is probably more accurate) I run into trouble I may have to give you a shout.

I do figure to get the 24-70L at some point but my budget was stretched like a guitar string on this purchase. Adding another $1390 to it just wasn't in the budget. I will also add the 50mm prime to the list. There are a couple of other lenses that I like as well. I LOVE the 70-200 2.8 Image Stabilized lens. Course now they have the second version of that lens for several hundred more dollars but it is receiving awesome reviews. I am tempted by the 70-200 L Non IS. It is just so affordable and is probably the best value in the L series, available right now for $594. I would probably be using a monopod for soccer pics anyway. I also like the 100-400L for longer shots (soccer etc) However probably the 70-200 with a 1.4 or 2.0 magnifier would be OK. I also need something a little wider angle, especially considering the 1.6 crop factor of the APS-C sensor in the 7d, but I haven't decided on one yet. Any suggestions? Also are there any Sigma, Tamron, or Tokina lenses that you use/reccomend? This would probably be my lens "want list" in order as of now:

70-200L 2.8 IS II
24-70L 2.8
50mm 1.4
100-400L

Course there are some other things that I would like to have that are not lenses such as some of the Zacuto stuff for making video shooting easier, but I'll save that stuff for another time.

[BillGrant]

I would say on your shopping are these things in order.
Cineform Neoscene. Converts to a highly editable avi. The files are worthless without a conversion. from videoguys.com $100
Zacuto Z-Finder - Makes handheld shooting possible. $400
Some great audio recorder. I've gotten by with the Zoom H2. but look around.
Look for the Tamron 28-75 2.8 I've heard great things about it. I got rid of mine before I tried it really, and I regret it now. Check out the Tokina 11-16. Heard great things about it. You will probably need a low light lens before you need a long lens. Good luck.
Bill

[osbornes5]

Thanks Bill. Hope that isn't the end of the DSLR advice I get from you as I am brand new to the DSLR realm. the last SLR I had, had no "D" in front of it. It was an old Pentax fully automatic rig that was excellent and I took a bunch of pics with that thing. I left it on top of a rental car in CA and watched it spin its way down the Pacific Coast Highway on its bottom at about 60mph. The lens was a little goobered up and would occasionally get hung when zooming and the bottom was scratched but other than that I took many more pics with that thing even after its wild ride. Suffice to say that I haven't shot with a "real" camera in some time and even then I was mostly automatic so I have a long ways to go.

I will probably have to buy the Cineform if it is worthless without it. I would also like to have a Gary Fong. I couldn't find one for the Other than that I am probably done spending dough for awhile. Got some home improvement stuff that has to come next.

Well, Christmas morning has arrived. The package arrived in good shape. I have charged the battery and am in the playing around stage with it. Initially, I am very impressed with the build quality of the cam and the 24-105L lens. Man what a tank. Solid as a rock but not too heavy. It seems to be a true piece of professional equipment. Shot a little dab of video with it and while it is too early to tell for sure, I was very impressed with the cam's low light abiity. And that was with an F4 lens.

I think I will start a new thread about the 7d and what I can learn about it as I go.

[BillGrant]

No problem at all really. I has been revelatory for me, but I am just (a year later) really getting used to it. The camera MUST be stabilized somehow. The best handheld shooters in the world can't handhold it. Try your hand at a native edit before you buy neoscene, but it was necessary for me. I have a quad core 2.4 with 8 gigs of ram and once I drop the native files on the timeline, no only do they stutter but the motion in rendered files looks odd. Check out my latest trailer in the critiques forum, it was 90% 5D
Bill

[osbornes5]

I will check it out. Sorry about the last post. Didn't make much sense. I started to write something and then stopped. Anyway. What I was saying was I would like to have a Gary Fong Lightsphere...Ever used one of these?

My puter isn't that stout (3.0 dual core w/ 3 GB memory) so I would imagine I will have ot do something.

MO

[DavidPartington]

I've used several versions of the lighsphere.  It seemed to make a reasonable difference on Canon flashes (I used them on a 500EX and 580EX).  It does drain your battery faster through