Video with L or EF mount

[KitW]

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I'd appreciate some advice as video isn't something I've dabbled with before. I currently have a wildlife photography project involving combining stills from 4K video, taken with my camera on a tripod. I'm currently using my Leica CL which I think would do a good job, except that as the twilight comes, the exposure drops to 1/30 of a second and as far as I can make out, there isn't a good way of altering this as I have no control over shutter speed or ISO. My stills become blurry. I've got some good proof-of-concept shots in the daytime, but the sunset shots don't work.

I'm thinking that I may need to invest in a new camera - hopefully without spending too much. All my L mount lenses are cropped, but I have a few full-frame Canon EF L series lenses. It seems to me that my three possibilities are to get an L mount body with good video support (cropped video might be an advantage with cropped lenses, assuming the crop factors match!), to get a canon SLR with good video support and use my EF lenses, or to get a dedicated video camera - perhaps with a Super-35 sized sensor. 4K video is probably adequate but 6k or 8k would be better, depending on the price. The lenses that I'm using are wide-angle so the video also crops them a more than I would like.

Thinking beyond this project, I used to control my Canon 5D with a microcontroller that I tapped into a remote release. This is one thing that I can't do with my CL as it doesn't have a port for a remote release. A camera that would let me hack into it - either via a simple remote release or ideally via something like a serial port - would be really interesting to me.

I'm off to London shortly. Does anybody have any suggestions for cameras that I should consider?

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[BernardC]

Have a look at the Lumix S5ii, or even the older S5, along with Sigma's EF-to-L mount adapter. You'll get a wired remote, 6K full frame or 4K APS-C, a great low-light sensitivity: EI 4000 in V-Log mode using the dual native ISO feature.

You might also want to wait for the upcoming S1Rii, which ups the resolution to 8K and provides a sturdier package (the S5 is an entry-level camera).

[LocalHero1953]

You don't say what sort of wildlife video you want to do: birds in flight or slow moving animals; handheld or static cameras? If you don't need an EVF, and your subjects don't move fast enough to worry about rolling shutter, it would be worth looking at the Panasonic S9, the Sigma fpL or the Blackmagic Pyxis, all in L mount (the Pyxis also comes in EF mount). 

[KitW]

Thanks to everybody for their thoughts so far.

The camera will be on a tripod and essentially I'm combining multiple stills of birds in flight. I'm aware that you can get cameras that will take stills at silly frame rates, but I'm currently taking several minutes of footage to process so I don't think that's practical for me. I don't need an EVF for this project, but if I do buy anything new then I'd prefer it to have an EVF.

The rolling shutter issue is a good point to bring up. All I can say is that it hasn't been a problem so far with the CL. I'll have to read up a bit more about it. I'm aware of how it works, but hadn't considered which cameras might exhibit it to a greater or lesser extent.

The Pyxis looks good but costs more than I am hoping to spend.

Edited March 19 by KitW

[Chris W]

The Sigma FP has great low light video (ISO 1250 native). It also shoots DNG Raw, which is effectively a stream of single frames. L mount too of course.

[jaapv]

On 3/19/2025 at 1:49 PM, BernardC said:

Have a look at the Lumix S5ii, or even the older S5, along with Sigma's EF-to-L mount adapter. You'll get a wired remote, 6K full frame or 4K APS-C, a great low-light sensitivity: EI 4000 in V-Log mode using the dual native ISO feature.

You might also want to wait for the upcoming S1Rii, which ups the resolution to 8K and provides a sturdier package (the S5 is an entry-level camera).

I found the S5 and S5Ii pretty robust for an entry-level camera. Weatherproofed and bump/slam resistant. For wildlife work the smaller weight and bulk make it handy in the field and the cooling fan makes it suitable for indefinite video in tropical conditions. 

[KitW]

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Thanks. I went to have a look around the camera shop and am pretty impressed with them but am currently tending towards a Canon because it seems you can sign up for a program that lets you program their more recent SLRs and RF cameras via an API. I still gave to do a bit more reading to see quite how much it lets you do and how hard it is to do it.