You might still be celebrating the new year where you live (or recovering from the effects), but right now we'd like to take this opportunity and look back at some of the most popular posts from 2012. It was the best year No Film School has ever had traffic-wise, and it included a few new writers to assist Mr. Ryan Koo, the man responsible for making this site what it is today. Even though they still continue to perform well, the DSLR Cinematography and Hackintosh guides were not written in 2012, and will not be counted in the totals. Click through to see which posts made it into the top 10.
Here is the list in order, from most views all the way down:
1. BlackMagic Design's Cinema Camera is a 2.5K RAW Shooter with Built-in Monitor and Recorder for $3K -- This was really the biggest announcement of the year as far as cameras were concerned. 2.5K RAW with ProRes/DNxHD onto off-the-shelf SSDs for $3,000 -- where do I sign up? Many did, and unfortunately while we've seen the incredible performance, and some are in the wild, they still aren't quite shipping just yet.
2. 5D Mark III/D800 Hands-On Part 4: Mark II vs. Mark III vs. D800 - Candlelight -- Take your pick: the inexpensive Mark II, low-light performance and no moire with the Mark III, or resolution and dynamic range with the D800. I re-edited this test to compensate for the slightly different ways in which Nikon and Canon produce their ISO numbers.
3. 5 Reasons Why the Canon 5D Mark III is $3500 and Why It's Worth It -- Do I regret this one? Maybe slightly, but I was also not operating off the full information available, as it seemed like Canon had improved the resolution (when in reality they had not). The other additions certainly made it a far more usable camera than the Mark II, like the headphone jack and the higher resolution HDMI output. With a price drop to $3,000, and clean HDMI coming in April, I think this camera now looks like a much better value if you want full-frame and great low-light performance.
4. Blackmagic Cinema Camera Shows the Canon 5D Mark III Who's Boss -- The test performed by Marco Solorio generated a lot of heat, but the images speak for themselves. The Blackmagic Cinema Camera gave a nice roundhouse kick to the Canon 5D Mark III, and I can attest to the power of the awkwardly shaped BMCC after having now used it. Blackmagic isn't kidding about the dynamic range, either -- there's a lot of it.
5. RED Cuts EPIC Price in Half: EPIC-X Now $19,000, SCARLET Under $8K, RED ONE Goes 4.5K for $4K -- RED may have wanted to ship a 3K camera for $3,000, but they did one better by shipping a 4.5K camera for $4,000 late in 2012. At a little over $20K for a brand new 120fps 5K-shooting EPIC camera, unheard of camera power is now within reach for a much wider audience than ever before.
6. Audio Recorder Roundup: Zoom H4n vs. Tascam DR-100mkII vs Tascam DR-40 -- Audio should probably get more attention than it does, but if you're in the market for a budget audio recorder, there are more options than there have ever been. The Zoom H4n is probably the most well-known budget recorder at this point for DSLR filmmakers, but in the test the Tascam DR-100mkII and Tascam DR-40 certainly give it a run for its money in quality or in price.
7. Canon 5D Mark III/X Confirmed at 22MP and $3500, Announcement February 28th -- We now know the camera as the Canon 5D Mark III, and it was indeed 22MP, but the date was a little off, as the official announcement wouldn't come until March 1st. This was the one many of you were waiting for, and while some are disappointed, there is no question plenty are satisfied by the photo and video quality in this camera -- with more features than ever before thanks to Magic Lantern -- and more coming soon from Canon themselves.
8. Blackmagic Design's Cinema Camera Now Available for Pre-order - What Will the Barebones Cost You? -- The camera will of course be more expensive than just the sticker price, but it will all depend on your gear. We took a look at the options out there for lenses and rigging, and figured that you should be able to put together a base shooting package around $4,500 - $5,000. I still think this is accurate, and the price may certainly be lower depending on what you already own.
9. Charlie Kaufman Gives 70-Minute Screenwriting Lecture -- The films that Charlie Kaufman writes are often a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma, but he's also got some very practical thoughts on screenwriting: you shouldn't let anyone tell you what a story can or should be, he can't tell anyone how to write a screenplay, and failure is a badge of honor.
10. Magic Lantern Unified: Clean, Uncompressed HDMI May be Coming to Most Canon DSLRs -- This was referring to the full 1080p output instead of the slightly cropped output currently available. This may very well happen sometime in the future, but for now, at least, you can either crop into the image a bit on most Canon DSLRs, or wait for April when Canon finally makes the clean HDMI available for the Mark III.
11. Peter Jackson Shows Off 10 Minutes of 'The Hobbit,' 48FPS Isn't Looking Good -- Yes, it goes to eleven...No Film School had the best year yet, so why not give 10 + 1? Since this film is now out, many more of you have your own opinions about 48fps, and I have noticed that some of your comments recently have echoed those from the folks who got a chance to see early footage of the film. We don't know if 48fps will become a standard, but we do know that there are those out there who will try to make it one. I don't think we'll be able to make a final verdict right now, but it's very possible 50 years from now that 24fps will look to people a bit like silent films from the early 20th century currently look to most of us.
So there you have it, the posts with the most traffic from 2012. As the most successful year in the history of No Film School has come and gone, we look forward to making 2013 bigger and better than ever, with more varied coverage from more writers than ever before. We've got a new site design on the way that will make all of the latest and greatest news and tutorials even easier to find, and hopefully make this a more inclusive community of filmmakers and video amateurs and professionals alike.
Thanks to all of you, the No Film School readers, for making 2012 such a success!
What were your favorite posts from 2012? What were some of the biggest announcements that affected you the most? How have you grown in 2012 as a creative individual, and where do you hope to be in 2013? Feel free to share whatever you'd like in the comments below -- especially those of you who have resisted commenting in the past. Let's make this a constructive and supportive conversation to help ring in the new year.
