Short answer: shoot 1080p.
Here's why, and then the two situations where I'd tell you the opposite.
For most people watching, on most screens, the gap between 1080p and 4K isn't visible. A lot of screens don't even output 4K, so those extra pixels get thrown away before they reach anyone's eyes.
You're paying a real cost for something your congregation cannot see.
4K is roughly four times the pixels of 1080p, and the file sizes follow.
Four times the storage, forever, on every project. There's nothing fun about running out of space and buying drives you didn't plan for.
Big files are harder on your computer. 4K playback stutters and drops frames unless you're on a strong machine.
That's not a small thing when the person editing is a volunteer working on whatever computer the church already owns. Shooting 1080p means the edit is smooth on hardware you actually have.
Some cameras produce noticeably worse 1080p than their 4K. Certain Sony bodies like the a6300 are known for this. The camera downsamples poorly, so 1080p out of it looks softer than it should.
If that's your camera, shoot 4K and deliver 1080p. You'll get a better image out the other end.
4K gives you room to punch in without losing quality.
This matters if you're pulling vertical clips out of a horizontal shot, or if you've got one locked camera and want two apparent angles out of it. Shoot 4K, deliver 1080p, and the crop is free.
1080p as the default for anything going straight to a screen.
4K when you know you're cropping, or when your specific camera has bad 1080p. Not as a general upgrade because it sounds better.
This one came out of Church Video Made Simple, which walks your team through camera settings, the exposure triangle, white balance, composition and audio. It's built for people starting from zero.
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