@@calebgrahamfilms Yeah it was expensive. I wish we could have an adapter that would accept modern media. I worry about footage corruption with these older ssd's
@@GabrielScindian Yeah I hear you on that. And not being able to get your hands on Red Mags and readers as easily is definitely not ideal. Here's the thing but.. A lot of the media for DSMC3 made by angelbird has had a LOT of issues worldwide. I'd say they're much more unreliable than the older options. I've personally had a Cfast card fail and the data wasnt recoverable even by Angelbird..
Cheers Bruz! Used a bit of the Jan downtime to put a leftover paper roll up in the garage haha. Thats my camera cart - an Adicam.. Got it a few years back when the exchange rate was a bit better, such a game changer for loading in when Im lugging heaps of gear
This is one of the smallest cinema cameras you can buy in 2025 at 5lbs. The Alexa 35 weighs 6.6lbs, the Alexa Mini weighs 5lbs(more like 7 with needed accessories), Sony Venice is 10lbs. I think that factor alone is a huge plus. I have found the Epic has crazy highlight retention. When I tested it against the Classic at 800 iso it actually beat the ARRI. Now the shadows aren't as clean but still that is a great performance. Of course half of owning a camera is about if it can further your career in some way. That is very individualistic depending on a lot of factors. But in terms of tech to me the Epic still holds up in 2025 and beats a lot of competitors in overall usability without a large crew. Not having prores is a bummer but REDraw is the most friendly raw codec that works in all NLE's pretty flawlessly. I considered the Raptor as well but ended up going with an Amira. Though the Raptor is much much smaller.
Thats some interesting takes! Wouldnt have thought it would beat the Arri in highlight performance - that was always one of the areas the Alexa had a big edge in, thats cool to hear. I know shooting at ISO 1280 in bright environments on the Dragon.. I've always been super happy with the highlight details and roll off, especially compared to newer Reds like the Komodo. How are you finding the Amira, and what kinds of projects are you shooting with it? Not the first person I've heard of picking up one of those in recent years, pretty classic camera. Cheers for sharing your thoughts, thats one of the best reasons I put out these kinds of videos👊
@@calebgrahamfilms I may have made an error in my testing but I am pretty sure everything was set correctly. I did find the Alexa was about a stop brighter at the same ISO. So 800 ISO on the dragon looked like 400 on the Alexa Classic. I owned a Classic previously. The ARRI image regardless of model is really nice. The Amira is lighter and more power efficient against the classic. It also boots up faster. It's still a pretty beastly camera, but you can't really get away from that with ARRI cameras. I shoot almost entirely narrative. ARRI really seems to be preferred in this space. I really think RED cameras are better for more solo type shoots though. Overall quality isn't as good as ARRI but that is reflected in the price.
@ Yeah interesting! Even if its just anecdotal thats still a surprising takeway. Even if the Red highlight performance isnt as good.. just to at least compete with an Arri is a good thing - especially when you consider the price. How do you find the end output of something shot on a camera like the Amira - when you view for example a UHD final export in Prores or something like that on a 4k monitor - how does it look in terms of detail and resolution? Having limited experience with Arri's personally I've always been intrigued to know more about that kind of thing.
@@calebgrahamfilms I haven't seen any of my work from the Amira on the big screen yet though I have with the Classic and it looked fantastic. I currently use a 4k 27in monitor to edit and the footage looks great on there. I think of it this way. The Alexa LF shoots 3840 in its 16:9 FF mode. The Amira shoots 3200, that is only a .64k difference. Considering the LF is probably the most used digital camera in major motion picture and commercial work for the past 8 years, the Amira sits very close in terms of detail rendering. Regardless of that 6k definitely looks a lot better if you have to crop into it. There is just no avoiding that. I don't usually make it part of my workflow to do cropping in post, but I can admit it is occasionally a nice option. The OP on a film I did last year was very inexperienced and we ended up relying heavily on cropping. Fortunately the B-cam was a RED Komodo which was more forgiving in that area. I usually cam op on projects I DP so that usually isn't an issue. I do enjoy the workflow of 3.2k 444, it's just easy to work with and the files aren't massive. ARRI footage just looks great without the need for RAW. But higher resolution definitely can be nice to have.
@ Ahhh interesting I don't hear of many other people using the low light OLPF - I think they're really underrated. I wish mine was the DSMC2 version also.. when Im shooting projects where other people are doing the post, 4k prores is a super common request.
@ a Dragon guru friend suggested it for best DR. Apparently the introduction of ipp2 corrected color shifting or highlight rolloff issues from before. It’s really lovely in practice. Really cool to see you giving the sensor some love.
Thanks Caleb also got a Dragon x last year to my Komodo and love that camera
I got my Dragon back in 2015 and it still rocks
Yesss.. Ten years, thats epic! How many hours are on the brain?
@@calebgrahamfilms 4123 hours. I picked up the Motion Mount on Ebay for 600 bucks. Global shutter and ND in 1 package
@@GabrielScindian Solid choices all round! Exactly the kinds of stories I was hoping to hear. They used to be about $4k when they came out right?
@@calebgrahamfilms Yeah it was expensive. I wish we could have an adapter that would accept modern media. I worry about footage corruption with these older ssd's
@@GabrielScindian Yeah I hear you on that. And not being able to get your hands on Red Mags and readers as easily is definitely not ideal. Here's the thing but.. A lot of the media for DSMC3 made by angelbird has had a LOT of issues worldwide. I'd say they're much more unreliable than the older options. I've personally had a Cfast card fail and the data wasnt recoverable even by Angelbird..
Happy 2025 Caleb. Love your videos mate
Appreciate it!
Nice lighting setup bruv! what's the table/chest you're running to rest the gear on?
Cheers Bruz! Used a bit of the Jan downtime to put a leftover paper roll up in the garage haha. Thats my camera cart - an Adicam.. Got it a few years back when the exchange rate was a bit better, such a game changer for loading in when Im lugging heaps of gear
This is one of the smallest cinema cameras you can buy in 2025 at 5lbs. The Alexa 35 weighs 6.6lbs, the Alexa Mini weighs 5lbs(more like 7 with needed accessories), Sony Venice is 10lbs.
I think that factor alone is a huge plus. I have found the Epic has crazy highlight retention. When I tested it against the Classic at 800 iso it actually beat the ARRI. Now the shadows aren't as clean but still that is a great performance.
Of course half of owning a camera is about if it can further your career in some way. That is very individualistic depending on a lot of factors. But in terms of tech to me the Epic still holds up in 2025 and beats a lot of competitors in overall usability without a large crew.
Not having prores is a bummer but REDraw is the most friendly raw codec that works in all NLE's pretty flawlessly.
I considered the Raptor as well but ended up going with an Amira. Though the Raptor is much much smaller.
Thats some interesting takes! Wouldnt have thought it would beat the Arri in highlight performance - that was always one of the areas the Alexa had a big edge in, thats cool to hear. I know shooting at ISO 1280 in bright environments on the Dragon.. I've always been super happy with the highlight details and roll off, especially compared to newer Reds like the Komodo. How are you finding the Amira, and what kinds of projects are you shooting with it? Not the first person I've heard of picking up one of those in recent years, pretty classic camera. Cheers for sharing your thoughts, thats one of the best reasons I put out these kinds of videos👊
@@calebgrahamfilms I may have made an error in my testing but I am pretty sure everything was set correctly. I did find the Alexa was about a stop brighter at the same ISO. So 800 ISO on the dragon looked like 400 on the Alexa Classic.
I owned a Classic previously. The ARRI image regardless of model is really nice. The Amira is lighter and more power efficient against the classic. It also boots up faster. It's still a pretty beastly camera, but you can't really get away from that with ARRI cameras.
I shoot almost entirely narrative. ARRI really seems to be preferred in this space. I really think RED cameras are better for more solo type shoots though. Overall quality isn't as good as ARRI but that is reflected in the price.
@ Yeah interesting! Even if its just anecdotal thats still a surprising takeway. Even if the Red highlight performance isnt as good.. just to at least compete with an Arri is a good thing - especially when you consider the price.
How do you find the end output of something shot on a camera like the Amira - when you view for example a UHD final export in Prores or something like that on a 4k monitor - how does it look in terms of detail and resolution? Having limited experience with Arri's personally I've always been intrigued to know more about that kind of thing.
@@calebgrahamfilms I haven't seen any of my work from the Amira on the big screen yet though I have with the Classic and it looked fantastic.
I currently use a 4k 27in monitor to edit and the footage looks great on there.
I think of it this way. The Alexa LF shoots 3840 in its 16:9 FF mode. The Amira shoots 3200, that is only a .64k difference. Considering the LF is probably the most used digital camera in major motion picture and commercial work for the past 8 years, the Amira sits very close in terms of detail rendering.
Regardless of that 6k definitely looks a lot better if you have to crop into it. There is just no avoiding that. I don't usually make it part of my workflow to do cropping in post, but I can admit it is occasionally a nice option. The OP on a film I did last year was very inexperienced and we ended up relying heavily on cropping. Fortunately the B-cam was a RED Komodo which was more forgiving in that area. I usually cam op on projects I DP so that usually isn't an issue.
I do enjoy the workflow of 3.2k 444, it's just easy to work with and the files aren't massive. ARRI footage just looks great without the need for RAW.
But higher resolution definitely can be nice to have.
Is your camera an Epic X Dragon? The Dragon-X was a DSMC2 camera that came out in 2018 and yours looks like DSMC1.
Correct you are! I had in my head the names went from Epic-X to Dragon-X. Description updated.
@ love mine. There is something so special about the image. I use a LLOLPF. THE DSMC2 brain can also shoot prores, which is nice
@ Ahhh interesting I don't hear of many other people using the low light OLPF - I think they're really underrated. I wish mine was the DSMC2 version also.. when Im shooting projects where other people are doing the post, 4k prores is a super common request.
@ a Dragon guru friend suggested it for best DR. Apparently the introduction of ipp2 corrected color shifting or highlight rolloff issues from before. It’s really lovely in practice. Really cool to see you giving the sensor some love.
I was rocking the BMCC 2.5k in 2013, hotswapping SSDs like a maniac.
Haha classic! Was that the 2.5" SSD's?
@calebgrahamfilms yes it was. I had some 512gb SSDs. Pricey at the time.