Liang Minghao's Cinematographer's Notes

"Stories and You" is a student graduation feature film directed by Mo Yifeng, produced by Yizhen Studio, with Liang Minghao serving as director of photography. Written by DP Liang Minghao, this article covers pre-production planning, equipment selection, and camera performance — sharing why he chose the MAVO LF to shoot his first feature film. We hope it offers something useful to fellow creators.

Stories and You

Pre-Production

The feature film "Stories and You" is my graduation project. The story is inspired by the director's own father — a tale of leaving Wuhan for Hainan to seek his fortune in the 1990s. Because the film involves period-accurate set design and production, the prep period was relatively long, and the technical demands on the camera were correspondingly high.

My initial camera shortlist for the director included: RED Gemini, Alexa Mini, MAVO LF, and Canon C300 Mark II. The plan was to finalize the camera choice after completing our location scouts.

To bring the imagery closer to that era, we converted an abandoned old factory building into the dormitory shared by the film's two male leads, "Yuanlai" and "Qiwen" — one of the most important locations in the entire film. However, because the dormitory was long and narrow with very little space on either side, capturing a wide two-shot of both characters in the same frame was extremely limiting on an S35 camera. We needed a full-frame camera. Additionally, the film's opening sequence had to be shot aboard a cargo ship, where space was equally tight. Since the ship restricted how much equipment we could bring on board, high-powered lighting rigs were out of the question — which made the camera's high-ISO performance in low light another key consideration.

After the location scouts, the camera team and I conducted a side-by-side evaluation of all the shortlisted cameras. The full-frame MAVO LF performed excellently across every dimension. Its larger sensor gave us a wider field of view at the same focal lengths, opening up more visual and narrative possibilities for the entire film. Kinefinity's Wuhan partner, "Purple Night Sky Image Creation," also provided extensive technical support, which gave us complete confidence in the MAVO LF going into the feature.

For lenses, we chose two Angenieux full-frame zoom lenses: the EZ-1 45-135mm T3 and the EZ-2 22-60mm T3. We also added a set of UP prime lenses to give the director more flexibility in recreating the specific "atmosphere" he had in mind for certain scenes.

On-Set Performance

Throughout the shoot, the MAVO LF performed brilliantly. Because I didn't want too much ambient light disrupting the director's vision of that 1990s atmosphere — and with a tight budget — I kept the lighting rig lean. Yet the MAVO LF's shadow rendering was remarkably clean. On the ship scenes in particular, the camera's sensitivity to low light was exceptional, faithfully capturing the look and feel of the actual location. The full-frame CMOS also allowed more visual information to fill each frame, making every shot more information-rich, which elevated the viewing experience and made the storytelling feel more grounded and specific.

For the majority of scenes we shot in 5K ProRes 422HQ, while a small number of shots intended for VFX compositing were captured in ProRes 4444. The MAVO LF proved extremely reliable throughout — on-set temperatures consistently hovered around 40°C, and the production involved a large number of location moves, yet the MAVO LF never had a single issue. The 1TB official media card also performed flawlessly and consistently through more than a month of intensive shooting.

Overall Impressions

"Stories and You" was a graduation project completed entirely by our student crew. Because it was a period film, the bulk of the budget went to art department and set dressing, leaving very little for equipment. And yet the MAVO LF proved to be an outstanding choice for a low-budget student production that still demands high-quality images.

In my view, the MAVO LF is an exceptionally capable, all-around cinema camera with outstanding value for money. Its rock-solid reliability, stunning color science, and Kinefinity's continuously evolving accessories and camera ecosystem helped our student crew bring so many creative ideas to life. After more than a month of shooting, the MAVO LF has undoubtedly become one of our most trusted companions.