What's in our bags? | Ethiopia

When it comes to run-n-gun filmmaking, you need to be flexible and able to quickly adapt to ever changing situations. Working with Yezalalem Minch in Ethiopia, we were trying to capture content for 7 videos and a small photo library in only 11 days. YZM supports orphans and at risk youth in/around Addis Ababa with everything from school sponsorship to distributing clothes/food/hygiene products to the 1,500+ kids in their programs. For us to accomplish this feat, we had to have gear which allowed us to create quality content but not slow us down as we covered a lot of ground. 

Cameras

PXW-Fs5- The Fs5 was our workhorse on the video side of things. It’s an incredibly powerful camera in a tiny package, and the built in variable ND is a game changer for run-n-gun filmmaking. Whenever we arrive to our destination, this camera gets built up and never goes back into a bag. There’s been many situations where we are interviewing someone on a moment’s notice, and having the camera ready for anything is a life saver. Our build involves QR plates for wireless audio, and the monitor along with a Rode NTG 4+ so we are ready for anything. 

a7riii (2)- This is our photo go-to camera (except for some low light situations). The dynamic range on these files gives us a ton of flexibility, and the color depth allows us to provide the vivid colors we so often see.  I was dominantly shooting stills & directing the video, so there was always one of these on my person. If we were capturing certain events, I would carry both with different lenses (usually 16-35 or 24-70 on one, and 70-200 on the other).

a7iii (3)- The most versatile camera out right now in my opinion. We carried 3 because we constantly used 2 of them, and needed a spare in case of unforeseen circumstances. For all of our BTS, we had an a7iii with 24-105 as it’s the perfect combo to capture both photo & video without changing lenses all the time. Our B/gimbal camera for video was an a7iii as well because the 4k files out of this camera are amazing, and fit well with the Fs5. Especially with the custom Cine4 picture profiles I’ve developed allowing all of our cameras to match almost perfectly out of camera.

a6600- This might be my new favorite camera because it’s so tiny and insanely powerful. We loaned this from Sony knowing there’d likely be a few situations we couldn’t bring bigger cameras along, due to multiple factors. The biggest factor for choosing this specific model is that it uses the same battery as the a7 series cameras, which allows us to only carry 1 battery type. Pairing this with the 20 f2.8 pancake lens is a crazy compact combo which literally fit into my pants pocket for ease of being low profile.

rx100v- Historically this has been my every day carry camera. Being able to shoot 4k with manual controls in a point-n-shoot is clutch. Also, the built in ND filter on the mkV is pretty awesome for trying to shoot vlog content in the sun. We didn’t use this one quite as much on this project, but it was great for in the airports & spots we needed a small low profile camera.

Lenses

70-200 (2), 24-70, & 16-35 (2)- The holy grail of G-master lenses were the core of our lens choices. We preferred zooms over primes for our ever changing situations, and they allowed us to quickly adapt to whatever was in front of us. We kept these on the a7riiis for stills as it gave us the most flexibility for separating subjects from backgrounds by trying to keep them at f3.2 or f3.5. We did go up to f5.6-7.1 for time-lapse, while keeping the sharpness from these lenses.  We also used the 16-35 on gimbal a bit to get nice wide video of situations like kids playing in the courtyard. 

24-105 f4 (2)- This is probably the most versatile lens in Sony’s line up right now. We kept this on the BTS camera at all times. We also frequently used this on our B camera for the ability to get a little tighter shots even on a gimbal. 

20 2.8, 24 1.4, 35 1.8, 50 1.8, 90 2.8 macro- We brought a set of primes for redundancy & low light situations. It’s impossible to know exactly what/where/when we will be filming, so having some lenses with the lower apertures allowed us to be prepared for any nighttime events we may have run into. This also gave us a layer of redundancy through our necessary focal ranges in case zoom lenses got broken or stolen.

Audio

ECM-B1M- This is the newest addition to my audio kit. After trying it at Sony Kando 3.0, and seeing the amazing results with this it was a necessity for our BTS camera on this project. It allowed us to get great clean audio while cutting unwanted noise and no cables around either.

Rode VideoMicro, VideoMic ProR, & NTG 4+ - I’ve been using Rode mics since 2013, and they give me a great sound while being able to survive the torture I put gear through. These mics have been everywhere from DR Congo to Thailand and just keep plugging away giving me great sound while being small and lightweight. 

We packed pretty heavily for this project ensuring we were able to get all the content necessary for our client in such a short timeline. If I had to pare the kit down to just the absolute essentials, the kit would be an a7iii, 24-105 f4, 35 f1.8, and ECM-B1M microphone. That would allow us to still get great content while being as minimal as possible.