The new movie Civil War is not just an adrenaline-fuelled blockbuster, but an ode to photojournalists who risk their lives to capture the truth.
Civil War is the newest film from studio A24 and British filmmaker Alex Garland (Ex Machina and Annihilation). Set in the not-too-distant future, it centers around a team of journalists traveling across the US during a rapidly advancing American Civil War. In tow is a veteran combat photographer, played by Kirsten Dunst, and a younger aspiring photographer, played by Cailee Spaeny, and of course their camera choices stood out to me.
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It's hard to imagine what the best camera for war photography might be, it may be one of the few camera buying guides we don't have on Digital Camera World! Many cameras have been used for photojournalism in combat, and I am sure, in a way, there is no wrong or right answer, but the choice by Dunst's character does seem to make a lot of sense.
It is difficult to make out from the trailer but it looks like she has opted for two of the best Sony cameras on the market, the Sony A7R V and the Sony A7 IV, although as it is set in the near future, they could also be Sony models we haven't seen before.
The A7R V is dubbed Sony's 'resolution specialist' capturing exceptional detail with its 61mp sensor. But it is not just a camera for the pixel peepers, the A7R V also offers a fast burst rate, buffer depth, and AI focusing making it ideal for fast-paced shooting.
Another interesting observation was the lenses she chose for her two camera bodies. The A7R V has what looks like the Sony FE 70-200mm f/4 G OSS attached, perfect for keeping distance to your subject, however, the more interesting seems to be an adapted manual focus lens on the A7 IV, and if my eyes don't deceive me, it looks like an adapted Leica 35mm Summilux. Perhaps not the first choice of lens for combat photography in the modern day, but it certainly has been used to capture some decisive moments in the past.
Much like the current camera market, the younger photojournalist in the movie opted for an analog camera. Taking a page from one of the great war photographers Don McCullin's playbook, the younger character chose to shoot with a Nikon FE2. The Nikon F series was a favorite amongst photojournalists, and the later models were a prominent tool to capture the war in Vietnam.
The movie looks storm the box office when it goes on general release from March 12, promising "a graph of ramping adrenaline and intensity leading to an invasion of Washington DC". But at its heart, Garland states that the movie is intended as "a love letter to journalism and how important it is. Newspaper people … I wanted to make them heroes.”
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