Best Documentary Film Gear: Everything you NEED to get started.

This video breaks down the best documentary film gear I have used over the course of my career. After I had all my gear stolen I had to think about all the most important filmmaking gear I would need to be able to produce my documentaries.

My sports Documentary Lut pack https://www.alexzarfati.com/luts

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases #commisionsearned

My Camera Bodies
Ursa 12K https://amzn.to/3AyXpnT
Bmpcc 6K Pro https://amzn.to/3TuW7Do

My Lenses
Sigma lens 24-70mm https://amzn.to/3RltOoK
Sigma lens 50mm https://amzn.to/3CCR7X1
Sigma lens 24mm https://amzn.to/3RmYl5R
Sigma lens 50-100mm https://amzn.to/3PTUpIF

My Drone
Mavic Pro 3 https://amzn.to/3AyXpnT

My Audio Gear
Rode NTG3 https://amzn.to/3wAZIWj
Cheaper Lav System https://amzn.to/3Q1eYD1
Better Lav System https://amzn.to/3e0bcwd
Zoom Recorder https://amzn.to/3CHmC2q
Patch Cable https://amzn.to/3R4a1uy
Get this for Rodelink lav set https://amzn.to/3pSyO8H
Boom Pole https://amzn.to/3wFwoy8

My Monitor
Feelworld Monitor https://amzn.to/3PZLa9C
SDI Cable https://amzn.to/3R16cWV
HDMI Cable https://amzn.to/3pVpzoo

My Lights
Aputure 120D II https://amzn.to/3q9ue60
Aputure 300D II https://amzn.to/3RfaXeY
Aputure Mini Lights https://amzn.to/3RlUDte
Aputure light dome https://amzn.to/3cxC3zs
Aputure light dome Mini https://amzn.to/3ATJIl1

Tripods and C-stands
Tripod https://amzn.to/3AtMRXn
Cheap C-stand https://amzn.to/3PYuYWq
Better C-stand https://amzn.to/3Rvw4d8

Accessories
Ursa sticky circles for lav https://amzn.to/3Ax6Iov
Sandbags https://amzn.to/3e6Fzky
Clamps https://amzn.to/3QYSZxS
Gaff Tape https://amzn.to/3wETbdo
Painters Tape https://amzn.to/3wHAQMN
Tool Set https://amzn.to/3AwYLQ9

Contents of this video:

00:00- Intro

00:17- What inspired this video

01:18- Audio

03:19- ND Filter

04:11- Lights

05:01- Very Important Tool

05:28- Tripod

06:20- Lenses


AUDIO
I want to start by talking about the audio. The first thing that you should purchase for audio is a good shotgun Microphone, this is almost as important as camera because capturing good sound is half the battle.
The reason why you want a shotgun mic is because its extremely directional and when your filming a Documentary a lot of the time your in an environment where you cant control that. So by using a directional mic like a shotgun mic your able to capture more of the sound that the mic is pointed at and filter out the noise around it.
The shotgun mic I went with was the Rode NTG 3
The next thing your going to want to do is get yourself at least one good lauv setup. If your in a situation where your subject is far away or there's a lot going on and your not sure if your going to be close to them, best thing you can do is throw a lauv mic on them and hook it up to an external recorder so you can capture that audio
And that brings me to the next piece of gear you need and thats an external audio recorder. I use the Zoom H6 recorder and theres a few reasons why this is an essential piece of gear.
#1 to record interviews you definitely want to use an external recorder with high quality preamps, and depending on your mic you'll need something called phantom power to power your microphone which a lot of these external recorders have. And a lot of lower end cameras don’t have.
The other benefit is that they allow you to monitor the audio levels and they have a limiter so if your subject talks too loud it could limit their audio so it doesn't peak in the recording.

ND Filter
Moving away from audio, a tool that every filmmaker should have in their kit is a good ND filter. The reason why you need an ND filter is to be able to control your exposure when your shooting outside or even if your inside and its way to bright.

So instead of increasing your f-stop and having an uninteresting shot without depth, get yourself a good ND filter.

LIGHTS
One thing that you will always need is a good light. I can't stress this enough. I have bought cheap lights in the past and they turned out to be a complete waste of money, but when I finally bought my Aperture 120D I noticed a significant change in production quality right away and I still have this light to this day so If there is any light that I would recommend to someone just starting it would be the aperture 120D for sure!


LENS
Now i'm going to go into lenses, this is such a tough one because every situation is different and theres definitely not one lens that will be perfect for everything.

The way I think about lenses is simple, I ask myself what do I need to use everyday and you need to ask yourself the same. The big question is Prime or Zoom lens?


Zoom lenses are great because if your in an uncontrollable situation which im in a lot of the time then you have the ability to adjust the focal length and zoom into a subject. There's been so many times where i've been stuck in an area and there's something happening 30 feet away or really close and I've missed shots because I was using a prime.