I ended up purchasing the Canon 7D with a 50mm 1.8 lens along with an external mic and portable recorder, the Zoom H2N. I picked it up during a great sale at http://www.bhphotovideo.com and the fact that they are tax free saved me a couple hundred bucks. The external audio makes a big difference because the internal mic on the Canon 7D has auto gain control even with an external mic plugged into the camera. The auto gain control will force the mic to increase gain if nothing is to be heard, such as in the middle of a dialogue scene with no audio. When the gain is up, there will be a strong hissing sound that is pretty annoying, with the H2N I can completely avoid that problem.
Anyway, this is the first short film we made with the camera, mic, and lens. Enjoy.
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