Canon 5D Mark II used to film season finale of House

While some have question just how good of video a DSLR can shoot, when an entire episode of a prime time television series is filmed with an off-the-shelf camera, you have to think it’s a pretty good unit.

The medical drama House is one of the most popular television series in the world, and in an unprecedented move, the series decided to shoot the finale of its current season with Canon 5D Mark II cameras.  While there have been reports of the cameras being used to shoot commercials, this is the first known attempt to shoot an hour-long drama with such a unit.

The show’s director, Greg Yaitanes, decided to take to his Twitter account to answer questions about the experience, and PetaPixel compiled the most interesting ones together for an easy read:

@MVRamunno: What is the difference in how it looks on a TV screen compared to a regular camera?

Greg Yaitanes: richer. shallow focus pulls the actors faces to forground [sic]

@oamad0101: How many frames per second and why a Canon 5D Mark II?

GY: 24p and wanted it for ease of use in tight spaces.

@unikissa: Ok, seriously. Can you tell us something about the lenses you used?

GY: all the canon primes and the 24-70 and the 70-200 zoom

@sarabury: Did you have to change any of your working practices to fit in with differences between the 5D and a typical setup?

GY: some. focus was hard with these lenses but more “cine-style” lenses are being made as we speak.

@marykir: were you using CF cards for storage or some sort of mass storage mod? seems like you would need a lot of cards

GY: some 18gb or something like that card. gave us 22 min of footage.

@Drdiagnostic: How was the quality as compared 2 the traditional camera used in shooting?

GY: i loved it and feel it’s the future. cameras that can give you these looks

@klizma: How did you manage to stabilize the camera in tight spaces? Any special kind of brackets?

GY: no. mostly gave it a hand held feel. or on a small tripod

Considering how important this show is to its producers, this is a heck of a gamble they are taking trusting it to such an unknown factor.  It’ll be interesting to see if any other major production attempts such an event.

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