HN Theater @HNTheaterMonth

Get some talented people together, and you can do some pretty good looking movies. E.g., "Snowbrawl" [1]. Here's a "making of" for that [2] showing the equipment used.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cM8DcCoZulw

[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAJwbyu-2mE

Apple has a short 'making of' video here, too: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAJwbyu-2mE

I think it's interesting to note that for the majority of these 'shot on iPhone' videos, there are likely hundreds of thousands of dollars of production work and accessories provided, including:

  - Production staff and crew
  - Location scouts / grips / etc
  - Stabilization gear / gimbals
  - Video monitors and edit stations

It is nice to know that 'the camera you have with you' is of high enough quality to get decent 4K footage, but that has been the case (well, at least with 1080p) for the past few years. What makes videos like this watchable is the creative minds, the crew, and everything else you don't see in the final frame (well, besides the talented individuals doing the stunts and blasting each other with snow).

I don't want to be negative, but it's kind of like saying "you can build a competent Kubernetes cluster with Raspberry Pis". Sure, you can (and I maintain one—see www.pidramble.com). But the Pi is nowhere near a professional tool that makes it _easy_ and as painless as actual purpose-built tooling.

And if you're talking about having small cameras that can mount anywhere, something akin to a GoPro is even better suited for this purpose than your $1,000+ phone, which you also want to make sure is available for browsing HN later in the day (and wasn't crushed by a gnarly smash into a tree, then doused in melted snow).

⬐ aaron695

Swingers for instance had to be shot on short ends. http://grantland.com/features/an-oral-history-swingers.

A lot of other movies as well (It was mentioned in Dolemite Is My Name). Clerks was black and white because of cost.

Gimbals, scouts, dangerous stunts and everything else can be done cheap. You can pirate editing software if you have to. I've seen nothing to say Snowbrawl had CGI or expensive post production applied.

Cheap film has been the holey grail for a long time.

Now we get to see did the artificial barrier of filming cost improve film quality, or did we miss out on great directors, actors and films.

I see no proof either way yet.

⬐ aggie

I feel like you're missing what 'shot on iPhone' is trying to convey. The point of the campaign is that the iPhone camera is good enough to be used in a professional shoot, not that it automatically makes high production-value commercials on its own. A RED camera would be 'purpose-built tooling' but would still require all the same production as using the iPhone camera.

⬐ geerlingguy

My point is that almost all consumer cameras these days are good enough to be used in a professional shoot—GoPro, heck even cheap consumer point-and-shoot cameras from Nikon or Canon can produce the same (or usually better) images, and are much cheaper than an iPhone.