Cell Phone Video: Threat to Real Camcorders/Cameras?

[Steven Digges]

Now that is funny stuff Andrew +1

I agree with Doug's posts.

I do not allow clients or technology to dictate how I choose to do business. If a "lowest price only" shopper calls me by accident it does not take me long to figure out they are looking for a Craigs List shooter. I politely let them know I probably charge more than they are interested in paying. It saves my time and theirs. If I loose a gig to a guy with a cell phone it is not a gig I would do in the first place.

Kind Regards,

Steve

[Josh Bass]

How do you suss them out? I have tried various flavors of "what's your budget?" And rarely am able to get an answer.

[Doug Jensen]

The solution is simple: Post your rates on your website so no negotiation is ever necessary.
Doug Jensen - Freelance director of photography and cameraman

Those people who do not want the gear I own or do not want to pay the rates I charge can move on without ever wasting a second of my time. I don't even want to talk to bottom feeders. And if someone does decide to call me, I assume they know what they are getting into and we can get down to discussing their specific needs. I don't know why more people don't post their rates? I hate it when I go into a store, a used car lot, or anyplace else that doesn't post their prices. I want to be as upfront as I can and save everyone a lot of wasted time.

Of course, if someone is hiring me as a "production company" to produce a finished production rather than a day-hire freelancer who hands over raw footage at the end of the day, then obviously a custom quote is necessary. But then I need a detailed description with a consultation on WHAT the project entails. Then I will give them my non-negotiable bid. If they accept it, great. If not, I go work on something else. I don't negotiate because if I do, I'll end up working for less than my time is worth and I will also give the client the appearance that I was attempting to overcharge them in the first place. That is the wrong message to send. So if they balk at the first price I may offer them an alternative plan for the production that may fit their budget better, but that is not the same as giving them a better price. If I quote them a price for a BMW production and they have a Chevy budget, then I'll offer to give them the Chevy production at a Chevy price. But they are never going to get the BMW production for the Chevy price no matter how much they cry about it. This weeds out the crappy clients pretty fast and builds a great relationship with the good guys. Success in the video industry is all about repeat business.

[Josh Bass]

I think I will try the price list thing for a while (though Lord know I don't have your client list/experience/gear list to brag about!)

[Bruce Dempsey]

Apart from technical differences the impact of phone/tablet video has had a profound effect on the viability of certain types of previously paid for gigs where the cameraman would arrange with the event organizers to provide video services, speculating that individuals featured in the recorded activity would buy a copy.
Used to be ten years ago I could count on 30 - 50% of the participants buying a dvd or blu-ray, Nowadays it's more like 2-5% Of course you already know this. Mom and pop's pnone/tablet video is nowhere near as good as mine but to them it's free and that makes it good enough to post a snippet somewhere.
A threat to Real camcorders/cameras? yep
A threat to Cameramen - oh yeah

[Noa Put]

I think that mainly applies to shows where children perform and where the parent is ok with their own cell phone video of their child taken from their seat; they don't care about the full performance, only the part that features their child.

For corporate videos or weddings that would never apply, companies want a professional result and for that reason they hire a professional and not shoot it themselves, same for weddings, no couple is going to collect hundreds of short clips taken by guests cell phones and then edit it themselves, there would also be a night and day difference between that result and something shot and edited by a professional videographer. I know there do exist companies that edit cell phone videos, just like they would edit your holiday films but this is mainly done by couples who have no budget for a videographer but who want something as a memory on film.

[Bruce Dempsey]

Don't kid yourself.
A tremendous amount of business has been lost by so called professionals with more and more lost every day and increasing faster and faster as the consumer gear gets better and better along with simple apps that allow for very professional looking results.
After all, a goodly portion of professionals are just regular folk who one day decided to buy a camera and see if the could get jobs with it because they liked photography and videography. Similar types of people are employed by those corporations and amoungst the guest lists of wedding parties.
Every business goes through this cycle: growth - peak - decline . What's at the end of decline (where we're at) nada

[Noa Put]

So you are saying weddingvideographers and corporate video shooters are loosing a tremendous amount of business by people who shoot with their iphones?

[Bruce Dempsey]

how could you not know this?

[Noa Put]

In weddingvideography at least I am not seeing any decline in requests I am getting, guess we have to wait untill the Iphone 9 comes out before I need to find another job :)

[Simon Denny]

I have to say, my recent trip to Japan I had issues with some gear A7s, RX10 and had to rely on my wife's iPhone 6 for some family video, wow beats the RX10 in the video side of things for my eyes. I think phones are perfect for a blogger or even pro use, I've never thought of using the video capabilities of a phone (iPhone) however this has me thinking.... if you could lock in focus, iso, shutter, f stop the normal things then count me in, the quality I think in good light is fantastic.

I still use an old iPhone 4 and its just about dead so have never shot video on this.
Phones I think might be a real threat for some camera companies, sure phones don't have some of the higher end specs of some DSLR, Mirrorless cameras.... time will tell, for basic blogging videos that iPhone 6 is great.

[Seth Bloombaum]

Originally Posted by Simon Denny

... if you could lock in focus, iso, shutter, f stop the normal things then count me in, the quality I think in good light is fantastic.

I still use an old iPhone 4 and its just about dead so have never shot video on this...

Filmic Pro is a great $15 app for iOS or Android that allows you to lock the focus, WB, and exposure settings. Not sure it will run on an iPhone 4 though.

The Sony BVP300 killed film. DV killed Beta. DSLR video killed DV. Nothing new going on here, just the normal run of winners and losers as new and revolutionary technology breaks.

Storytelling stays the same. Your iPhone may outshoot my... VX1000, but, I still know how to shoot and edit a story, that never goes out of style. The more things change the more they stay the same.

I had a colleague back in the 20th century who was a pro photographer and animation stand operator who trained at Brooks Institute. Really very good, he moved on to found his own stock agency representing his own and others' work. Digital killed the animation stand work. He didn't find the same type of clients as he used to shoot for. Re-established himself as a developer/publisher of online photography courses.

So, he came out OK, even though his market changed. And yet, there are still many, many working pro photographers.

It's a dynamic set of industries and markets for digital media production.

[Simon Denny]

To a certain degree it really doesn't matter which camera I reckon and as you mentioned seth, it's all about the story.

[Steven Digges]

I have been working in corporate video for a very long time. No one is shooting a real paid gig with a phone. We are still using broadcast cameras, switchers, and engineers to shade and call shots in many situations. The lowest level of camera I have ever seen on a ballroom conference gig for a straight record was an A7S (not my gig). If I showed up on my gigs with even a DSLR or a phone to shoot with, my clients would immediately fire me. No one in the real corporate market is using a phone. It is not happening.

Even for my corporate interviews on closed sets DSLRs are unacceptable. Phones are a joke. It is not happening.

Kind Regards,

Steve

[Noa Put]

Phones are a joke. It is not happening

Amen...

I think particularly videographers working in the lower end who shoot low budget theaterperformances, communions and weddings have to fear phones being a replacement for their line of work much more then videographers delivering a professional specialized service.

I first thought Bruce was joking but apparently not, I honestly cannot imagine corporate shooters, like Steve, showing up on a filmset with a few tripods and phones attached to it, seriously? :)

It's not just the ridiculous thought of doing a professional shoot on a phone but just the lack of functionality having to preset everything from a touchscreen and lack of lens choices or other options that a dedicated videocamera will give you.

For weddings I have a different opinion when it comes to camera's used where bigger is not necessarily better and where photocamera's with a videofunction have primarily taken over from dedicated videocamera's. Small size, low light performance and shallower dof are one of the biggest reasons why many made the switch. I still find dslr's a big compromise when it comes to shooting video and when it comes to functionality they still are a pain to use. It's so refreshing to use a camera more geared towards video only, like my jvc ls300 to get rid of all compromises I have to make with my dslr's.

I could not imagine trusting my phone to shoot run and gun style adjusting iris, whitebalance, focus on the fly, getting my creative shallow dof shots and having it reliably shoot continuously over an hour or trusting that it will capture decent audio, again, seriously? :)

A phone is a multi-media device that is like a jack of all trades, it's there to make and receive calls, watch films, play games, surf the internet and capture those family and holiday moments to share on facebook and so many more things but it is not going to replace a videocamera fro professional use anytime soon.