What camera for our niche video market?

Hi,

This is not your normal "what camera should I buy" type question. I have a very specific niche video business and I'm hoping I can get some expert advice on what cameras I should be looking at.

My business is aerial video, we use a large radio controlled helicopter carrying a gyro stabilized 3 axis gimbal that houses a camera. We work very hard building and tuning the helicopters to fly as smooth as possible, we have the 3 axis gimbal mounted on wire rope isolators, and we have the camera soft mounted on a vibration reducing gel tape. Even after all this, we do have vibrations and movements that get to the camera and occasionally cause us problems.

For the last year we have been flying canon EOS DSLR cameras. We mainly chose these cameras because that is what most of our clients are shooting with and that is what they ask us to fly. We have had very mixed results. We get good shots when; our heli is flying perfectly smooth, there is very little or no wind, our shot requires little movement, and the subject we are filming doesn't have patterns or lines or other things that will cause aliasing. If anyone of these factors is off, we have problems.

Our problems have been lines in the image due to rolling shutter combined with high frequency vibration. We also have aliasing and moire problems when we have a lot of movement in the shot. Our clients often want to use our platform to it's limit and that often means fast moving shots, big movements across the subject, etc.

Now what we don't need is shallow DOF and high light sensitivity. We have a live TV downlink that my camera operator uses to aim the camera, but our controls are not good enough to pull focus or to fly with a very narrow DOF. That means we usually shoot in the f8 to f10 range to get a nice wide DOF. We also don't ever find ourselves shooting in low light, we are always waiting for the golden hour and getting the best light.

Considering all of these factors, I'm starting to think the DSLR is not the camera we should be flying. Of course our clients want it because that is what they know, but we have actually lost our last 2 clients because of the quality of the shots. Both of these shots were on high wind days when we had a lot of camera movement, and even after stabilization there were too many problems with the footage to be useable. The problems were horizontal lines, artifacts, moire, aliasing, etc. All the problems you see with lots of camera movement and vibrations.

So my question is, will another camera solve our issues? I'm looking at prosumer video cameras like the HS700 etc. Full hd 1080p at 60fps are really good things for our business, allowing us to slow down the shot in post to smooth it out. Our competitors are using the AF100 with success but it is a little out of our price range. What other cameras can you recommend, and will these cameras specifically solve our problems we have with movement on the DSLR we have now?

Last, here is our demo reel showing the useable work we have. As you can see we have an awesome platform to shoot from, we've just got to figure out how to get consistent results.

http://vimeo.com/23486​779

I would look at cameras that get strapped to cars, since they share the same issues. Unfortunately I don't know more about those particular models.

You might consider looking into getting more vibrational resistance into your gimbal, too, either at the point of the camera, or at the point of the gimbal to the heli. (Or both.)

Thanks, looking for cameras that are mounted on vehicles, that is very good advice.

So, lets talk about what cameras have a reputation for being well suited for that type of environment, and what specific properties make them work well?

I think you should be careful here. From your video its quite clear that you have a high standard of video performance and quality.

Not knowing what your camera is (5DMII?), but assuming your using a DSLR with wide lenses (aka no IS), I would recommend looking at either a lighter DSLR, or a semi-pro camcorder and up. What do you think about the Sony VG-10?

david, thanks for the comments and yes we probably have a high standard but it is required in our field.

We find that the Canon EOS DSLR's all take about the same quality video. For our application where weight is a concern we are mainly flying the T2i. Everything in the video you saw was filmed with a T2i, 720p at 60fps. Glass is just as critical as the camera, and we are getting good results with a Sigma 20mm f/1.8 as our primary glass. It is big and heavy and that reduces a lot of noticeable vibration. It does not have IS but we have found that IS in the canon lenses really doesn't help our type of shots.

The Sony VG-10 will only shoot interlaced, and we have not heard good things about interlaced footage working in the stabilization software that we often use.

onlocation wrote in post #12576223
Thanks, looking for cameras that are mounted on vehicles, that is very good advice.

So, lets talk about what cameras have a reputation for being well suited for that type of environment, and what specific properties make them work well?

they're built to handle the vibrations, mostly. For a camera that doesn't have rolling shutter you're looking at a 3-CCD body which is going to be some of the sony/canon camcorder-form bodies that start in the $4-5k range probably. TBH though I think your money would be better spent getting some damping on what you've already got rather than swapping bodies, as you'll still have vibrations to deal with.

One of the biggest problems for vibration is the front mount vs. underslung. A couple of people said front mount is better, started making the product and everyone believed them. The long arms actually amplify vibration. Helicam Solutions top mount produces great video with the 'old' bungee concept. New, better concepts will soon be revealed.

Envision at APL