- Right now I'm recording this video on my
Canon EOS R with a Sigma 24 millimeter 1.4 lens,
this is pretty much my favorite set up,
as like a lot of you probably know at this point.
It's great the R costs usually about $2,000,
sometimes a little bit less, and the Sigma lens
usually about $800.
So it's definitely not super budget, but it's
not totally out of reach either.
However, today I wanna kind of like turn things in a
different direction and rather than talking about
expensive cameras and L series lenses and
things like that, I wanna talk about something that
you probably already have,
and that a lot of people already have.
Which is something like this, a Canon Rebel.
And there's different versions of the Canon Rebel,
even different manufacturers have like their
you know, lower end cameras.
But let's see what you can do with a camera like this.
(electronic music)
The reason I wanna highlight the Canon Rebel is
because I think for a lot of people, myself included,
sometimes when you wanna get started making something
you want everything to be perfect.
You know if you wanna make a YouTube channel
or start doing videos, you wanna wait until you have
the perfect equipment and everything looks super
professional otherwise it's not gonna be as good
and then there's honestly just never a perfect time.
Like, there's never going to be a perfect time
and the best thing that you or me or anyone can do is
to just get started as soon as you can.
And the thing with cameras like the Canon Rebel
is these are so commonly purchased and then just
collecting dust on shelves, in drawers, in closets.
Sometimes people will buy these you know to do
family photos or whatever but they end up kind of sitting
on the shelf just because it, it's often times just
easier to bring your phone or you know a
smaller camera around.
But here's the power of the Canon Rebel.
First of all, just like any camera, these aren't perfect.
The EOS R that I'm recording on right now is
objectively a better camera, it's got better body,
better build quality, better image quality, flip out LCD,
better auto focus. It's just a better camera.
It also costs 4 to 5 times the price that this camera does.
This is the Canon T6 also known as the 750 D in Europe.
Usually retails for about $400 with a kit lens,
sometimes even less than that.
So even though there are better cameras out there,
and this camera doesn't have a flip out screen it
doesn't have dual pixel auto focus.
So when you're using video you're pretty much just
stuck in manual focus.
It doesn't have a microphone input,
and it doesn't have 4k or anything like that.
So you know it is limited, it also takes a relatively
small battery so the battery life isn't
super amazing on it.
But getting all of that out of the way,
you can do incredible work with a camera like this.
And this isn't even the newest or the most advanced
Rebel, this is actually the least expensive one
that I could find.
And I use these at work, in my high school digital
media program, these are the cameras that
I pretty much start everybody out with.
So the 9th and 10th grade students all start out on these,
just because they are the least expensive.
And because they do only have manual focus in video,
I think that's a really important skill to learn.
Auto-focus is great, but having that foundation and
knowing how to manually focus and get the shots that
you want the way that you want, I think is crucial.
And so these are incredible cameras to learn on.
Plus when it comes to the Rebel series,
the sensor inside of these is pretty much the same
exact sensor in a lot of cases as like the 70D and 80D
higher end cameras.
So the image quality, for all intensive purposes
is the same as some of Canon's higher end cameras,
it's just the body is a little different.
It's you know, it's not weather sealed it's
a little more plastic-y.
And I kind of mentioned the negatives but lets jump
into the positives.
The first positive of this camera is the price,
like I said about $400. Usually with a kit lens,
something like this 18 to 55 EFS lens.
Which is, this is the lens I started out with
when I got into DSLRs.
It's an incredibly usable, incredibly versatile lens.
You can get great shots with this,
you can record great video with this lens.
It does have image stabilization, the fact that this is
an EFS mount means that you can use any of Canon's
EFS and EF lenses.
So there's a huge variety of lenses that can be
paired with these cameras.
And down the line if you wanna upgrade, being able
to throw on like a L series lens or even the lens
I'm using right now onto this camera can
yield some pretty incredible results.
There's no like 120 or 60 FPS but this does have
24 frames a second and
of course 30 frames a second for video.
And there is no mic jack for an external mic,
but you can use just a separate audio recorder,
or even your phone.
But again, the biggest strength to these cameras,
and why I wanted to make this video,
is because a lot of people already have these sitting
around your house right now.
Or you have a family member or a friend that has one.
And if you're saving up or you're trying to wait
till you can get that perfect high end camera,
that's a cool goal but grab what you've got and do the
best you can with it in the mean time.
So I'm gonna show you how I would use this camera
to create some really cool stuff.
Right off the bat image quality is obviously what
matters the most so I'm gonna swap out my EOS R
with this Canon T6.
And there we go, this is the Rebel T6.
I've still got my EOS R recording, so I can get audio,
because I didn't want the audio jump to be to jarring.
But since this camera doesn't have an audio input,
and if we're talking about doing things on a budget,
of course you could have an external audio recorder
or a microphone but you can also just have your smartphone.
So, I actually just have the voice memo app recording
on my phone, I'm gonna switch to that right now.
And this is all audio being done through my iPhone.
So it's different than the Road Video Mic Pro Plus
that I was using before, but it's still very usable.
And if I switch to that and compare it just to the
audio coming straight out of the Canon Rebel,
you can see that audio is even usable in situations
especially if you're really close to the camera.
But I'm about 3, 4 feet away from the camera
probably won't wanna use that audio.
Just using your phone is a really usable tool.
The other thing is right now I'm recording I can't see
myself because there's no flip out screen,
but if you've already got a camera like this,
rather than save up and spend more money on a new camera
right away, you could put that money towards a new lens.
Which will last longer and probably have a bigger
impact on your image quality,
so let's take the Sigma 24 millimeter that I was using
and put it on this camera right now.
And now we have the Sigma 24 1.4 which is a tighter
shot than it was on the EOS R because the EOS R
is a full frame camera, and the Rebel, all the Rebels
are crop sensor cameras.
The tricky part with this lens actually is that
I'm filming it at 1.4 because realistically that is
what I use on the EOS R.
So 1 thing you can do since there's no flip out
screen and there's no auto focus in video,
is you can just find an object.
And my bass guitar back there, back when I started
my channel and I had the original Canon 6D Mark 1 that
was this same system it didn't have auto-focus,
it didn't have a flip out screen,
I used that as my focus test so this is what I would do,
and this is basically what you can do.
Is find something and just place it where you're going
to be, so if I'm pretty much right about here,
all I need to do is place that bass guitar right there.
Now I've switched this lens to F 2.8 I did have to
bump up the ISO from 200 to 400 to adjust for the exposure,
but that's pretty much it.
And that's really one of the benefits of the Canon Rebels,
because despite their low cost they still have
full manual control if you want it.
You can do manual aperture, ISO, and shutter speed.
Both in photo and video so there's no difference
between a Rebel and a higher end professional camera
in that regard, it's all just how your using
the tool that you have.
And that's really the whole point of this video.
That's why I'm filming this on a Canon Rebel,
that's why I'm doing audio on my iPhone is because
the best thing you can do is to get started with
the tools that you have and the more time that you
spend into learning how to use those
tools to the best of their ability.
Not only are you gonna get better results,
but it's gonna make you a more talented you know
creator, film maker, video producer, whatever.
It's gonna make you more talented at your craft
much more quickly.
And like I said a lot of people have these cameras
sitting on a shelf, sitting in a closet.
You might have a friend or a family member that has one.
I'd really urge you to just go borrow it,
ask if you can borrow it and then start making stuff now.
Don't wait until you have the "perfect camera",
because it doesn't exist and there's never going
to be a perfect time.
The most perfect time is right now and the most perfect
camera is the one that you know how to use the best.
Knowledge dropped.
(techno music)