Personal work plays a huge role in improving our skills so that the work we do for our clients continues to excel. Here is one of the latest personal projects I created as an anniversary and birthday gift for my wife. But this piece is also a lesson in how it’s not always about the equipment.
As a professional commercial director, I’ve shot with a wide variety of cameras, including Canon’s digital cinema cameras like the C300 and C100; 4k cameras like Black Magic’s 4k Cinema Production Camera and Panasonic’s GH4; and DSLRs like Canon’s 5D Mark III or Nikon’s D800. All of these are powerful cameras which, when in the right hands, can create stunning imagery.
But as I like to always say “If the story sucks, I don’t care what you shot it with.”
I shot Mar with two relatively inexpensive cameras: a Canon T2i and a Fuji XE2. For all intents and purposes, they are consumer cameras. But shooting with cameras like these often gives me a certain sense of freedom you don’t get from some of their “big brothers.” They’re smaller, so maneuverability is easier.
But beyond that, the features they lack force me to use more creativity and ingenuity in my shooting. So by the time I’m back to shooting with one of the “big boy” cameras, there’s an added level of creativity I’m able to bring to the table.