August Meeting Follow-Up

We had another great meeting last night with about 20 attendees and several new faces. Scott Robinson demo'd an unique new plug-in for Final Cut Pro called nVeil. When first seeing it, you'll wonder how you'd use it. Scott did a great job showing us some really creative and smart uses for it.

We had a great discussion on shooting video on DSLR cameras, in particular the Canon 5D Mark II. FCPUG member Roger Muller and I got together last week with his brand new camera and did some shooting. Roger was kind enough to bring the camera to the meeting and let anyone interested check it out. The projector didn't do a great job of showing off the footage, so I've uploaded it to Vimeo so you can watch it without the projector in the way. I've also made the Keynote slides available for downloading as a pdf document. Just find the Downloads link over there on the left in the Navigation menu, or click here. Due to lack of permission for some of the visuals I used last night, some of the slides are different. All of the links to websites are there though, and are enabled as links so you can click on them and go right to the page.

I was very impressed with the 5D Mark II. You can create some gorgeous visuals that just aren't possible on the popular video cameras from Canon, JVC, Panasonic, and Sony. There definitely are some shortcomings to be aware of though as well. For certain types of shoots it could be the only thing you need, but I personally wouldn't want it to be the only video camera I had available. It would excel as a second camera to get interesting shots that cater to it's strong suits and avoid it's liabilities. I think the important thing to remember is this is essentially version one of a new breed of camera. Over the next couple years we should see the DSLR and video converge even more, hopefully getting us closer to the "perfect" camera.