There is a really quick answer to this question which is because the price was too good to refuse. How we justified buying another camera to ourselves is that we sold our Sony ZV-1 to finance this purchase so gained more than we lost.
Whilst we loved the little Sony and its fully featured point and shoot characteristics (and that famous Sony autofocus), we didn't really use it as much once we upgraded to the iPhone 13, which is another post all unto itself around the best camera to have with you to capture family moments and other events.
We are really impressed with the camera and whilst it does have it's faults, we will outline below the aspects we have found the most appealing.
The Cinema Cube Form Factor
We know we shouldn't care about it as much as we do, but we are suckers for cube cameras and this one is actually cute (yeah, we called a camera cute). It's form factor works well for us in the following situations:
- The studio - We can put it on a tripod for talking heads, we can put it on a desk tripod for the most overkill webcam ever, a timelapse camera for any BTS work, and finally a live-stream camera.
- Gimbal work - It is a great little A/B/C camera for gimbal work, especially when you strip it right down to just the camera in a cage and MFT lenses (which are generally smaller than the full-frame equips to start with). Keep in mind though that the Z-Cam E2C rolling shutter is not great so you do need to be considerate with your movements otherwise you will see some jelly.
- Completely rigged out A-Cam - If you wanted to go all out, you definitely can rig it out to make it your only camera on shoots if needed. We have filmed social media content for clients using this as the only camera and it did the job perfectly.
The Bang for Buck Specs
Looking for a camera in the sub $1000 price point if a difficult ask. To find a cinema camera in the same price bracket is even harder. So when we saw this Z-Cam E2C second-hand online we just had to pounce.
The full specs of the e2c are on the Z-Cam website, but the key highlights are:
- 12-Bit ProRes RAW recording over HDMI to the Ninja V 5” HDR monitor-recorder
- 4K @ 30fps, 10-bit colour
- 11.5 stops dynamic range
- Prores internal (make sure you upgrade the firmware for this)
By itself, those specs look very tasty but there is always a catch. For this camera in particular it is that the sensor is micro-four-thirds which some people either love or hate. No matter what side of the argument you stand, the picture is of an extremely high standard and we have matched it with our full-frame Panasonic cameras without any major issues.
The price of cinema lenses is also appealing when you have MFT sensors. So you can take your savings that you have grabbed from getting this camera and invest it in some really nice cinema glass (even grab some cool anamorphic lenses) and give your footage a very stylised look that will work for any commercial or narrative work.
Even if after all of this you still can't get past the sensor size, you can always grab a few of the many MFT Speedboosters that are available and give yourself a look that is closer to a Super35 sensor and allow you to adapt other lenses to it - we are actually considering to do this later on as well. The only catch is that the lens mount on the Z-Cam E2C's are not interchangeable as they are on the Z-Cam E2M4 (or even the original E2).
The Quality of Picture
There is a general consensus that there are not really any bad cameras available anymore - a point we generally agree with. The same applies to this camera as well, the quality of the colours and picture when you nail your exposure looks just as good as anything else on the market right now. If you really mess up exposure it is hard to save the footage (especially in the shadows), so we tend to go just slightly over exposed (1 stop max) to give us just that little tiny bit more.
If you have a monitor that supports false colour, we would definitely recommend using that to ensure your levels are spot on.
Conclusion
If you are in the market for your first cinema camera and don't have a Hollywood budget, this is a great place to start. It appears Z-Cam has stopped manufacturing these cameras so they might be a bit tricky to find first-hand, so keep scouring the marketplaces to find those that are willing to depart from it.
The other option for the same money is to get one of the countless other hybrid cameras out in the market, but if you are after ProRES or RAW files, this is your best option.
Let us know if you want to know anything more about this camera and we can keep doing some follow up posts.