Who are you, and what do you do?
Hey, I'm Danny! I'm an Irish guy who used to be a web developer but now I make documentaries about video games and the people who make them. Around 5000 people pay me every month to do this. It's nuts.
What hardware do you use?
Oh boy, where to start. The nature of this work means you have to touch a lot of different types of hardware. In terms of cameras, I shoot on a Sony α7S II, though most of our stuff is filmed on my camera op's (Jeremy Jayne) Canon C100 with an Atamos Ninja attached. For audio recording, we use RodeLink wireless lavs. We use cheap ass Fovitech lights because we throw them under planes. I could get super granular but if you want more info we made an entire video about it.
In terms of PC hardware, I use an i9-7900X with 32 gigs of RAM and a GTX 1080 graphics card. I've also produced a video about building that machine. It turns out that when you make stuff that looks good with a really small team, people are always asking you what you use!
And what software?
I use Adobe Premiere to edit our documentaries. I've worked in both Adobe CC and Final Cut and Premiere is simply leaps and bounds ahead of the competition at the moment. I have a subscription with RED Universe for some additional tools and affects. I use Audition to edit our podcast and Lightroom for any photo post-production we need. The only other software I use is all the games we play and record using Game Capture HD.
What would be your dream setup?
I'm in the fortunate position of basically having everything I need to do our work. I think we could do with upgrading our main camera to a C300 but anything larger would create more problems than it would solve. There is a universe in which I love the idea of filming on RED Digital Cinema camera but the ingestion process is so hands-on, and the cameras so unwieldy that it would negatively impact our work. I edit off of a MacBook while on the road which I think I'll probably swap for a PC when it's time for an upgrade. Apart from that, I'm always on the lookout for new lenses. A good lens can make an average camera shine. They don't have to cost the world either. My favorite lens is a Helios 44-2 58mm which cost me under $100.