Canon EOS 100D / SL1 review – Handheld Landscapes

The Canon EOS 100D is Canon’s newest entry level DSLR and once again: It also shoots video. I tested the camera and took it out for a walk in the highlands of Scotland.

It’s lightweight, it’s compact, it shoots video. A travel application is the logical conclusion to test this full fledged DSLR.

Beautiful landscapes are a nice thing to shoot. Unfortunately the aliasing the sensor produces makes it less ideal to shoot something that has a lot of detail, like landscapes.

In terms of video quality this camera is similar to the other affordable Canon DSLR’s out there.
So if you’re only looking for this kind of video performance and you don’t care about functionality you will not notice a difference between this one, the new 700D, the 4 year old 7D or anything in between. You can get the Canon EOS T3i for $549 right now (was $400) which offers a very similar look.

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‘Relentless’ – the ‘MoVi’ for the rest of us?, part 2

Everyone and their mum knows about Freefly’s MoVi now, the gimbal-stabilized handheld camera rig made famous by Vincent Laforet with his demo film right before NAB in April, where it was introduced.

At $15,000, the MoVi M10 isn’t exactly affordable for indie filmmakers.

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Snap Focus – a new handheld follow focus idea

Kickstarter, the crowd funding platform, has some interesting product concepts for HDSLR filmmakers every now and then.

Here’s an intriguing idea by a fellow film student from NYU who teamed up with his neighbor Harry to produce a follow focus that uses the technology of bike brake systems. Cool and it seems to be a possible alternative to Zacuto’s Tornado hand-focus.

The price of $799 seemed high at first, but on a second thought this is a full handheld rig. What we don’t know is how good it is, how well and accurate focus can be controlled. I’m sure a review will come out sooner or later if you’d rather not gamble on the quality.
Go to their page to order a Snap Focus: LINK

Testing affordable accessories for RED from AllStar Taiwan

It’s important to realize that you have to spend a lot of money on accessories if you want to make your precious RED camera work. A burden many are willing to take for amazing image quality below $20K.

Now would you spend that money on products by a Taiwanese company that has a rather dubious web presence (as seen on the left). Me neither.
Lucky for you they sent us some of their stuff for testing and in conclusion I must say the company with the interesting name AllStar and a strange web address (http://allstar-cine.myweb.hinet.net) sells some good and useful gear.

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