I have a commercial coming up and we’re gonna shoot with the Arri Alexa (at least that’s the decision as of this weekend). Curious to hear anyone’s thoughts, comments, concerns about the camera.
The commercial is for Blair Underwood who is introducing a new line of menswear suits.
Key Grip and friend Dwight Stone has made available an awesome piece of cinema tech. If you’ve ever had to mount a hi-hat to a ladder you know it can take some time, often need more than one person and a fair amount of gear. He designed a clamping system that does it all very easily and won’t stymie the operator with clamps, c-stand arms and the like. After several jobs using the prototype it’s great seeing the market version now ready for sale. Congrats Dwight!
Here’s a link to check it out in action as well as more detail.
http://www.gripnerd.com/1-step-Laddercam/
Who knew Dwight could be so good on camera!?
Just ordered the latest version of Magic Bullet Suite 11. Looking forward to using it as I update my demo reel this weekend, with hopes of having it done this week. In leu of recent developments with Final Cut Pro, I’m seriously considering editing my reel in Premiere 5.5. We shall see. Just finished selecting the music, tomorrow I’ll start editing and decide then. Can’t wait to see what’s new with Magic Bullet. More later…
2011-07-17 So far, so good. The first cut is done, now time to evaluate. I’m using Premiere as mostly a straight cuts system so, as can be expected, it’s working just fine. No crashing, it’s fairly easy to get around and, uh, yes, I chose to do it on Premiere. While I’m still tempted on using FCP7, I’m reminded of something I heard on a recent podcast by the RC’s Mike Seymour about why he switched from Aperture to Lightroom. He commented on the continuity of software made by a software company (Adobe) versus a hardware manufacturer (Apple). I love Apple and their products but long term consistency and stability are winning out.
Magic Bullet Suite 11 is also working out very well. Loving how fast things render. I’ve used almost everything in the suite except for Denoiser – it’s been doing unexpected things so I’m going to research that tonight. Cosmo, the plugin that softens faces, is fantastic. Not trying to make anyone look younger, just need to take the edge off of some wrinkles. Works great, easy and the results aren’t distracting. Colorista II is as good as ever. Looks has been well redesigned. The only, only, thing I feel it’s missing in Looks is that when you make an oval vignette, there isn’t any way of rotating the oval. It’s a little thing that makes a huge difference on vignettes.
Should be done tonight. More later…
UPDATE: It seems that with Cosmo, when you leave the “Show Skin Overlay” on, it renders it into the video. Opps. Still a great plugin though.
UPDATE 2: So my narrative demo reel is done. (click here to view) Next, update my commercial and music video reels. The whole thing was done with Adobe Creative Suite 5.5 Master Collection. In all, I used Premiere, After Effects and Photoshop. The verdict? Well, in oh so many ways I much prefer FCS – better the devil I know, perhaps. If Adobe continues, as they’ve said they would, to support and improve these video applications, then yes, I’ll likely stay here using Adobe products. I’m not an editor, I don’t need do to this everyday and so for what I do need, it’s more than enough. It’s fast, worked with all the wacky formats I needed to drop into the sequence and most of what I need above and beyond the Adobe suite I can find in Magic Bullet’s Suite 11. Speaking of MBS11, I love it, period. My only gripe and I’ve already voice this to Red Giant (the folks who sell Magic Bullet) is that I can’t rotate the vignette. I’m not the only person to complain about this so I hope our voices will be heard and the minor improvement will be done soon. Other than that, for the level of color grading I do this combo is perfect. I will miss many of the plugin I have in FCS but it not as if I can’t still use it and will likely when the need arises.
I’m not usually a fan of Microsoft but I can’t argue with something good. I did a location scout recently and needed photos of places we were considering for later evaluation and planning. Whipping out my trusty iPhone, I started up the Photosynth app. It generates a 360° panorama created from numerous stills. You aim, it shoots, you move the camera a little to the right, it shoots a little more and on and on till you’ve photographed the entire vista you need and then you can watch it back as if yo were still standing in that spot. Here are some photos that might better explain the process.
I was in a rush so it could have been better but good enough for my purposes. Still you can tell what a good job it’s done where one photo overlaps another. Mostly very clean. Useful when having crew members review a location they couldn’t visit. Very handy little free tool. Kudos to Microsoft. Now if you can do something about your Office suite…
…well it’s an accessory. I bought a Manfrotto Elbow Bracket for the times when I shoot on a Panasonic HVX200, Sony EX camera, Canon 5D or similar and need to mount the camera on its side. Why would one need mount the camera laterally? Most of the time, it’s for shooting a full body on a chroma key so that you can maximize the use of the sensor. It’ll be great being able to pan and tilt as well as not have to build rigs for this. Next step is to try to center the camera nodally – just for fun.
Just read a fantastic explanation of the IIF ACES system that is being developed by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences technology committee. As you’ll read in the article, the purpose of IIF ACES is to systematize a more accurate approach to how color images from various motion picture camera manufacturers are treated and to maintain that accuracy through the various vendors that might have access to those images and to keep that accuracy through distribution. The language is very straight forward but technical enough for some. Take notes, you will be tested in the future. With luck, I’ll have a chance to use the ACES approach in an upcoming project.
Click here to go to Mike Most’s blog.
2011-03_17: 02:59 hrs: Second week is done. We’ve gotten some amazing scenes that I can’t wait to see cut together. Performances have been spot on, the exterior shots of the town have been beautiful, and the weather, for whatever difficulties it’s played on the crew and production, have done so much to enhance the story I definitely feel that a little magic has happened. And speaking of the crew, a lot of heart and soul has gone into making this movie and I know that those efforts will be channeled on the screen. I can’t thank the many men and women on the crew who have done a fantastic job! Thank you.
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THE CAMERA, GRIP AND ELECTRIC TEAM:
(top) Dean F. (1st AC) and Ryan L. (2nd AC) hustling to get our next shot.
(middle) Daniel S. (Key Grip) and Gord H. (BB Grip) helping us get in as many great dolly shots as we can fit in.
(bottom) Rob T. (Chief Lighting Tech) with yet another bright idea.
(Missing photos of: John S. and Adrian H. – I’ll get shots of you two soon enough.)
(above) Hood mount.
(below) Our longest dolly shot yet.
During our previous day off, I had a chance to go to Edmonton and there I found a fantastic store called Mountain Equipment Coop (MEC). In the US, it’s like REI. It’s an outdoor activities stores that I could spend hours in and walk out spending too much money (it’s my Costco of sporting goods). I did manage to find a couple of gems to get. First and foremost, cold weather shoes. I got lucky to get some Sorel boots at end of the season discount. But the biggest find is a pouch to replace my long shredded sidekick. Those folks who’ve worked with me for many years, have know me to have a pouch by my side with my director’s finder, point-and-shoot, pens, compass, etc. Sadly, my trusty pouch with many years of faithful service gave up the ghost late last year. After searching far and wide, I couldn’t find a match much less a better match. Then about a week ago, I notice our gaffer wearing that familiar pouch I so longed for. That’s how I was introduced to MEC. It’s exactly like my old pouch only made of far better material. I was so glad with my find that I bought two. One for the day-to-day work and another for commercial jobs where dressing up is necessary. With membership in hand, I suspect I’ll be buying many more things from them.
With two weeks of shooting done, we’ve gone through most of the lens gamut of our package. The verdict… very happy with the performance of all the lenses. The workhorse is definitely the 18-80mm (4.4:1) Arri Fuji Alura. Sharp as a tack, fast at T2.6, manageably large in size and weight, and a useful range. The primes are a beautiful piece of glass but do miss the lens flare of older glass. There’s fast at T1.9 and light for handheld work. We’ve had a few opportunities to break out the torpedo 45-250mm (5.6:1, T2.6 and also an Alura lens). I love the characteristics of long lens photography and wish we could bring it out more often. But as limited as its use has been, the times it has come out have made all the difference photographically. It offers all the wonderful characteristics of the short zoom we have but with an amazing range.
(above) the Alura 45-250mm(below) the 35mm uniQoptics lens
(above) Dawn over Provost. I love Canadian skies on a clear dawn or dusk. While beautiful sunsets can be found in many places, there is something quite unique and special about the morning and night skies in the Canadian prairies. Something about low sun, clean air and atmospheric moisture content that causes the scattering of the sun’s rays in such a way that enhances the violets and enriches the pink, reds, oranges and pale yellows in a way like no other. The colors are rich and at times, offer tones of pastels and as the skies stretches across the flat landscape, somewhat solemn. This and the people are what I miss when I go back home.
With childlike awe, I’m always amazed by the speed with which the weather changes from blue skies to snow showers to fog with trees powered with horror frost. Each stage beautiful in its own way. Not so fun for a production that needs some consistency but a joy to see personally.
Big night at the Community Center set. My scribblings of camera placement, lenses, and screen direction.
One last thing of note, we had a chance to shot a scene at the Provost News building and there I had the good fortune to see up close a Mergenthaler Linotype Model 8. (Warning: geek moment coming.) This machines lineage made it possible for newspaper publishers to expand their coverage with more pages than were possible before when done by hand. The devices workings are amazing for its simplicity and yet also for its complexity. The name derives from the fact that it produces a “line-of-type” in what is termed “line casting”. Here’s Wikipedia’s simple description of what the machine works:
The Linotype machine operator enters text on a 90-character keyboard. The machine assembles matrices, which are molds for the letter forms, in a line. The assembled line is then cast as a single piece, called a slug, of type metal in a process known as “hot metal” typesetting. The matrices are then returned to the type magazine from which they came. This allows much faster typesetting and composition than original hand composition in which operators place down one pre-cast metal letter, punctuation mark or space at a time.
I believe the one we saw was acquired in 1929 and has survived two fires! I would have loved to have seen it working in its heyday.
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2011-03-06: Day Three is done. Damn groundhogs got it all wrong! Corbin shot scouting photos from last March with not even an ice cube on the ground. Instead we got…
Our Red One MX with full winter gear. Who are we wearing? Well, we have four tukes (or “beanie” for those of you south of the boarder – northern boarder that is). These lovely tukes are from Field’s Dollar Store. We have them wrapped on each battery and the onboard monitor with sporty black duct tape accented with chemical hand warmers to fend off that frigid prairie cold. To compliment this sporty look, the view finder is swaddled in fashion forward, hipster inspired terry cloth arm bands where conveniently stashed underneath are yet more hand warmers. Draped over her lovely Red One body is a custom made, safari inspired fleece one-piece with hideaway pockets for more chemical hand warmers. Designed and sewn by our fine co-producer, Kelleigh M. It’s sure to turn heads wherever it’s seen! Oh, and yes, it’s f-ing cold.
I love walking away with a great tip. Our 1st AC Dean F. brought this wonderfully useful kludge. It is as the name says, a shooter’s ridge. The dove plate fits very snuggly into the “v” and wait, there’s more. Under the ridge is business end of a Lazy Susan. We shot several shots off this rig, worked wonderfully! Kudos to Dean who in turn was inspired by the Camera SaddlS. Fantastic!
2011-03-04:
Day one is done. It was sketchy at first – sun, then clouds, then sun again. Got what we needed while the sun was out. Then, just to make things interesting, the prairie cold ripped its way in and just tore into everyone’s bones with temperature plummeting as night came. And finally, the calm. We reviewed some footage. Went over the next days shots. Called it a night.
We’re playing with some new toys this go around. The camera vendor is hooking us up with Arri Fujinon Alura zoom lenses - the 18-80 (4.4:1) T2.6 and the 45-250 (5.6:1) T2.6. Beautiful glass, lighter weight than the Angenieux glass we used last time and smaller to boot (well by a wee bit anyways). We’re also getting a reasonably new set of uniQoptics (T1.9) primes. I never hear of them but have heard of the lens designer Kenji Suematsu. On reduser.net, they’ve been compared with the Red Pro Primes and I’d have to agree. Sharp as a tack with very little flare. That last point is a bit of a disappointment to find true. I love, love, love flare (on the lens that is). We had a car driving at night coming straight toward lens and didn’t so much as give us the courtesy of buzzing the lens one iota. Do kinda wish we had gotten the old school Zeiss Super Speeds but with budgets and logistics and the chance to try some new equipment we are where we are. I suspect I won’t regret it. I’ll certainly have more to say on the matter tomorrow when I get my dailies.
Amazing crew, great performances and we actually ended the day ahead by knocking off a few additional shots. All-in-all, a good day.
I finally found the time to upgrade to the latest version of Gamma and Density software, 3cP/SL. I hope to put the software through its paces on a feature I’m scheduled to start in March. Till then, I’m gonna give it a go with the files I have on my computer and drive and will write my thoughts later. First impression are, I like it. The real benefit to the upgrade is what the software can do for dailies and post. Let the testing begin…
UPDATE: 2011 Jan 12: I was sent a survey by Gamma and Density about using 3cP and it gave me a chance to tool around the new version of the software. Thoughts so far are that it just keeps getting better. Backed up and verified Red MX, P2, and Canon 5D footage flawlessly and love having the ability to checksum in either MD5 or SHA1 with Red footage. Love the grading reports the software generates, producing dallies is easy and the optional ability to add slate information at the head of each dailies clip is well thought out. On the survey I add a about a half dozen idea for improvement but overall I think it does a great job. Look forward to using it on a regular basis for a feature film I’m shooting in March.
↑ Footage from a video I shot of my wife making her famous and award winning Truffle Bacon Popcorn. Mmmm… bacon!
CURIO:
I love pre-production. It’s where the first draft of the visual script is drafted, followed by the fine cut during production and the final cut made during the edit, effects and color grading. Over the years, to codify my thoughts I’ve used text documents, spreadsheets, and index cards. Back in May of 2010, I was looking for an inexpensive flow chart app to help design a Red One post-production workflow diagram when I stumbled upon a program called, “Curio” . I tried the demo and within a half hour purchased the Pro version. I always find the software a bit hard to describe. The maker describes it as a “digital notebook” and “an innovative and visual application for brainstorming, notetaking, and project management”. That’s a great, broad stroke description. With the software I’ve made lists and checklists, virtual index cards, mind maps, production workflow charts and org charts, sketched drawings, used it as a photo light box, organized my tear sheets, produced lighting plans, kept a production schedules, and mapped out story character relationships along with notes about each character’s personality and actions. You can even upload the project online and share your thoughts and notes with other crew members (see link below). It’s flexible enough that you can make it into a tool that you’re not likely to see mentioned anywhere in the literature. That’s it’s brilliance – that it’s more than the sum of it’s parts. I’m currently using it for prep on a feature in March and it’s good to be putting it through it’s paces again.
Here’s an example of Curio at work from a recent project: Epson
HotDoors CadTools:
When it comes to making lighting plans my first weapon of choice is Adobe Illustrator with the CadTools plugin . I start by using Illustrator to create all my stencils of lighting and grip instruments. Then I use CadTools within Illustrator to draw the set floor plan to scale, place the instruments in the space and add notes and dimension lines for where the light is aimed. It also serves as a useful thought experiment apparatus. Looking at the set on the screen, you can visualize in your head… should the light go here or here, how high, what will the quality of light be a particular time, etc. I also use sunPATH to get sun rise/set data of a location and then place that information on the lighting plan. See link above under the section “Notes” to see a lighting plan made with the above software. I also have to say that I’m a fan of CadTools because it’s an Orange County company (It’s true, the OC was my stomping grounds).
For on set and some pre-production work, these are my iPhone app. Enough has been written about them online so I won’t go into it. Just wanted to share.
Since I’ve seen this on other website, I’ll include this note here that none of these software manufacturers paid or gave me anything for these kind words of praise (I wish someone had though – insert “wink”). Still, I think these apps are great and I hope you find some utility in using them like I have.
Forgot about this one. A few weeks ago while shooting a commercial for Hotel Corque in Santa Ynez, we brought some China balls for lighting. To control the light we used duvatyne, wrapped around the ball and secured with clips so that an opening remains lighting our subject. That opening once is usually vertical or horizontal or simply exposes the bottom of the China ball. I don’t remember if it was me or someone else (let’s just say me since it’s my blog) declared that when the opening is vertical it’s a “nun” and when it’s horizontal it’s a “ninja” and when the bottom is exposed, it’s a “monk”. Funny right? It glows in the same epiphanic epithet as when make-up artist Nikki Smith (see earlier blog entry from this year) took to naming apple boxes pumps, wedges, or stilettos depending on how you orient the box.
left: ninja configuration | center: nun configuration | right: monk configuration
No one is likely to care about this but here it is… If you’ve worked with me in the past year, you probably can’t hear me on my walkie. My old earpiece got replaced with one that supposedly has noise canceling and a kevlar in the wires. Great but no one could still hear me. During “Zombie Roadkill” the gaffer’s father came by one day and brought some goodies he sells. What did I get? By far the best earpiece I’ve ever had. It’s a single cable instead of the usual two and best of all, everyone can hear me now. He also sells a version that lets you plug into your iPhone. Email me if you want his contact information.
I got to shoot some product shots for Merle Norman cosmetics and director Greg McDonald. We shot using the Red One, a Skater Mini dolly and the InnoVision lens system, Probe II Plus. The set for our products was a black laminated platform with one inch walls all around to keep a pool of water and a matte black cyc back wall. For only being 6′x4′, the pool took nearly 20 gallon’s of water which works out to be 166 lbs. of water! (8.35 lbs. per gallon). It looked beautiful when you can see the reflection in the pool or when the water is disturbed and seeing the ripple in the mirror image. We also took some shots without the water and placed a matte black floor. Great looking stuff.
↑ Our Red camera fully equipped. Here we’re shooting in “the pool”.
→ Reviewing the shot with Koji (1st AC).
↑ Andrew (Grip) awaits. I love the way the light hits his eyes. Happy accident.
→ Shooting the white bottles, jars and tubes.
Just before leaving Los Angeles, I took the dive and purchased the Gamma and Density 3cP software and color chart. I recently used it on a corporate spot with green screen work and now it’s with me here in Canada for the pre-production and production work on the feature “Rust”. (Could I have still call it a film if it’s shot on the Red One?)
While here I’ve used it for pre-visualization of some locations and day-for-night shots. I’ve been taking photographs of locations in a RAW format and experimenting with look I’m proposing for the project using the 3cP software. Also, we shot some footage this weekend in what we’re calling a “camera test”. I’ve had a go with some of that footage already and it’s great to see options I’ll have in the final grading suite. I’ll try to write more about the software and how it’s being used in this production during my day off. So far it’s been really great. I have a beta version of the upcoming release whose upgrade is focused on Red workflow implementation. I have to say that so far I’m very impressed.
Till then.
My wife knows how I do love gadgets, especially those having to do with photography. She found this bottlecap camera mount online. It’s a 1/4′-20 thread with an adjustable (15°) swivel head and a rubberized base that fits snugly on a plastic water bottle cap. I love this thing.
And yes, the bottled water I get comes shaped like a flask.
I can’t tell you how many times lately I’m asked if I have had any experience with the Red One camera. Well, I finally did it. I got a chance to play with one and do some very rough and tumble tests – one with my friend and producer Greg and another with jib op/owner and director, Shane. The verdict? In a nutshell, I really like it (but don’t love it, not yet).
What did I loved? I love the modular design. The menus are great – no more MS-DOS-like looking hierarchy tree. The onscreen information is wonderful and very useful. The onboard monitor produces a great image and it’s light as a feather. The Electric View Finder is one of the best I’ve used. Using it handheld is great – nicely balanced and easily adjustable. The controls are all easy to get to and easy to use. Building the camera is fast and easy.
One feature I really like is the exposure by colors. When activated, the exposure of the scene is represented in colors. So if a window is over 100 on a waveform monitor, the window would be colored yellow, red or even magenta to signify that it is over exposed. Or a chair in the shot that’s would be 45, might be colored green. Very visual and personally, much more useful than a waveform monitor for my needs.
↓↓ Here’s the color scale for reading exposures. Note the over/under stops indicated.
What I didn’t like so much. The Red lens (specifically the 18-50mm zoom) isn’t as good as most. It’s not sharp and it seems to flare quite a bit. Still for the money, it can be perfectly usable for smaller projects. I’m not so sure about the smaller BNC & audio connector. I’m sure I’ll change my mind about this after using the camera. One thing I noticed is that while the shots we got weren’t lit or graded or anything that might go into an actual shot for a scene, the images look and feel very “plastic”. Here too, I’m sure after shooting and finishing a project under proper conditions I’ll feel different about this.
I’m hoping to do some extensive tests before heading out to NAB. Till then, we did some very simple test:
↑↑ Director/producer Greg M. plays with the focus on the camera.
↑↑ This is a fast pan to the right. ↑→ This is a slightly slower pan back to the left.
I wanted to see what would happen with very fast panning shots. So here it is.
↑↑ Everyone who wants a shallow depth of field now has it. We shot this with the focus set to 12″
↑↑ This was to see fine detail. Next time we’ll use charts or a newspaper.
Both cameras were using Firmware Build 15.
What a glorious weekend – shooting a music video for singer/songwriter Sara Mann. It’s for a song from her upcoming album. You can listen to the song, “The End of You”, on her mySpace page: http://www.myspace.com/mannsara The video should be available for viewing by Valentines day. Keep a look out for it.
From a home in North Hollywood, the video includes both a performance and a narrative story element. The project is directed by Guy Julian – a name you’ll see often in the music video section of my resume. We shot the project using the Panasonic HVX200. As you may have read in a previous entry, I recently purchased a Lensbaby 3G and have been mostly using it for still photography. The Lensbaby is a selective focus lens. But after having seen it used on the feature film, “The Butterfly and the Diving Bell”, this seemed like a good device for what we were doing and a fine, real world test for an upcoming short film I’ll be shooting where the Lensbaby will get some use. To get the Lensbaby to work with the HVX, we used a Letus35 Extreme lens adaptor (↓ see photo). The Letus35 is an adaptor for using 35mm lenses on video cameras. Both worked extremely well in this application. The frame below was shot with the Lensbaby without any iris rings (ƒ/2.0). As expected from some testing my friend Clay and I did with the camera a few weeks back, the camera performed as expected. In this configurations, the camera is performing with an EI of 200.
↓ ↓ The following two photos are from shots that we did in hallway were we zoomed out on the camera enough to see the edges of the ground glass and partially see the mirrors on the Letus35. Personally, I love this stuff. It’s reminiscent of things I’ve gotten during telecine. Here we used a Nikkor 50mm (ƒ/1.8) lens.
↓ ↓ Below is the final lighting plan for the performance footage. In this room, hundreds of cards were hung buy fishing line – it’s an element of the song. The Lekos on the fireplace have Alice Blue (incidentally, the color is named after Alice Roosevelt Longworth – her favorite color and who happens to be Theodore Roosevelt’s eldest daughter). These lights flickered by using a Magic Gadget flicker box. They had been meant to wash the room with blue but they ended up being a blue wash for the background. Still good and perhaps better this way. The band is mostly backlit by Dedo lights and 420 Pepper lights which are also on the flicker box. They’re kept low to hit the lens from time to time as they pass through the hanging cards as we dolly back and forth. By and large, we shot wide open on the camera (ƒ/1.7) and with a 1/250 shutter (35°)
↑ ↑ From L > R: Phil Hurley (guitar) / Miles Crawford (drums) / Michael Eisenstein (bass) – Phil is in a band call “Stoneyhoney” -n- Miles has played in “Stomp” for years -n- Michael with his wife Kay Hanley were part of “Letters to Cleo” and is currently producing. If you look at the photo on the left toward the bottom right you see she show’s mascot, Maya.
↓ ↓ For the verses, we dolly in to one set of for two lines in the lyrics, then the set is changed and we then dolly out from the new set. We shot some balloons against a greenscreen and that’ll be composited between the shots. Many thanks to my wife for doing the set design and make-up.
↑ ↑ Guy directing Sara on our New Year’s set.
We had one set that needed to look like a dinner scene. Steaks for the shot where browned using a propane blow torch. Since my wife is a chef and she’s done food styling before, the trick not only worked it was fun too. I know because I got to brown one of the steaks – boys do love fire . The only thing that went on the steaks is a sprinkle of course salt. As I browned the one steak, I was struck by how like painting it was. I would darken an area and them move to the edges and fry the fat and blacken the bone and then darken another area until I felt it was done.
Vendors:
Camera : Indie Rentals
Grip & Electric : Wooden Nickel
Drum set sound dampeners : SIR
Ah yes… your moment of Zen. (Toby, our IT guy, our playback guy and all-round good guy.)
Recently my friend (and director) Clay purchased a Letus35 Extreme for his commercial and music video projects but also for a short film we’re shooting next month. The Letus is an adapter for using 35mm lenses on non-35mm cameras. He brought the adaptor up and a Panasonic HVX200 for a little test and fun. So what did we learn?
Well, for his camera at least, our settings were 73 on the zoom, 50 on the focus, and the iris on the camera is set to wide open, which is approximately ƒ/2. First we wanted to see what the Lensbaby would look like. The movie below is with the Lensbaby and no iris ring (ƒ/2). If you notice the vignette on the left side. That’s the adaptor’s ground glass. We know that we’re seeing it because we didn’t zoom in enough but what we don’t know is why it’s not centered. If we were to zoom in into the ground glass to clear the left edge of the ground glass, we end up with lots of room on the right that would go unused. Research time. The Lensbaby was manipulated by hand.
Here we shot with a Nikon 50mm prime lens. It was at end of the day with the clouds in the sky after a day of rain. We poured water on the ground and shot the falling water at 60 f.p.s., preset the white balance to 3200K, 12dB gain, shutter at 1/250 (35.6° 35mm equivalent*) and the taking lens set at ƒ/1.4.
Letus claims that their lens adapter has a 1/2-stop loss of light and by our estimation, based on how we set up the camera the camera, we rated his camera set-up at 200 E.I.
Conversion formula:
Shutter speed to shutter angle: 24 x 360 / inverse of the video shutter speed = shutter angle equivalent => For example, 1/250 would be: 24 x 360 / 250 = 34.56 shutter angle equivalent
Shutter angle to shutter speed: 24 x 360 / shutter angle = n where , 1/n is the shutter speed equivalent => For example 180° would be: 24 x 360 / 180 = 1/48
FYI, the 24 x 360 = 8640
New year, new toy. I first heard about the Lensbaby from my then 1st AC Koji about two years ago. After much longing for one, today I finally got my Lensbaby 3G. It’s a lens for shift/tilt “like” photography. It creates a “sweet spot” of focus whose size is determined by various shaped iris rings. Here’s an example from paying with it today.
click to see a larger version
Primarily, I got it for shooting food shots of my wife’s cooking. But then, “The Diving Bell and the Butterfly” used a Lensbaby 2 for the opening scenes that was modified by Arriflex – Lensbaby now offers a PL version. (My shows have to get bigger budgets.) A friend of mine has been hoping to shoot with one for at least a year. (His shows need bigger budgets.)
So now I’ve got one. We might have a music video shoot in the next couple of weeks. We’re gonna see if we can use it with a 35mm lens adaptor (like the Redrock Micro). Let’s hope it all works out. More to follow.
Here’s another pict from today’s play.
A few more from day to of learn by doing…
: : A butterfly at death’s door.
: : Portrait of my friend, Justin. A lucky grab during a production planning meeting.
(So far one of my favorite portraits.)
I’m getting more used to it – learn by doing. I’m finding, as other have, that ƒ/5.6 very nice working stop for the focal length of the lens. The last three photos are all using the ƒ/5.6 ring.
: : L>R – 1st AC Leigh V. and 2nd AC Vince S. as we shoot the emulsion test of the 5299
At long last, I got to shoot a film test again. Most of the work lately has been on some flavor of HD, but this feature film project that’s scheduled for later this year is just that, a film shoot. So thanks to a responsible producer and a curious director, we’re shooting tests. This batch focused on three things: frame rates, shutter angles, and grain structure of the 5279 and 5299 (Kodak Vision 500T and Kodak VisionHD Color Scan, respectively). Here’s what and how we tested:
Note: We’ve only projected the 5279 so far and next week we’ll be viewing the 5299 once we find a suitable post house with a Kodak Digital Processor . I’ll update this article then.
TEST SPECS:
Camera:
Panavision Panastar II – Primo Prime 50mm – Tiffen Filters
Lab:
Technicolor – processed normal
First Test:
Click on the image below to view a cheat sheet version of our testing notes.
[ click picture to enlarge ]
Frame rate
First we wanted to see what frame rates would look. Leigh rotated her arms like a propeller as close to the same speed for each test from 6 to 120 frames per second. Conclusion: 14, 24, 48, and 120-fps looked the best based on this test and the speed Leigh moved her arms. Things might look different when we view it on a monitor but as for projected, these are the speeds we liked.
Shutter
Again, having Leigh rotate her arms, we shot using a shutter angle of 40° to 180°. Conclusion: We definitely like the 40° shutter.
Combo Test
As the cheat sheet above shows, we did a few frame rate and shutter angle combinations. Conclusion: Here again, we love the 40° shutter at 24, 48 and 120 frames per second.
As mentioned, we have yet to view this material on a monitor. Next week, we’re going to telecine to HDCam. It’ll be interesting to see if we choose differently when viewing the material on a monitor.
Second Test:
Click on the image below to view a cheat sheet version of our testing notes.
[ click picture to enlarge ]
For the second part of our testing, we shot an emulsion test of two stocks, 5279 and 5299. I haven’t work with 5279 in a very long time and 5299 is one of Kodak’s newer stocks. Both stocks were rated at EI500. This was a very simple over and under test. Ultimately we were looking for grain (in this case a good thing) and that’s what we mostly looked for. The plan was to have the lab print a one light version based on the grey card and then a timed version that’s corrected in 1/2 stop increments. The one light didn’t get done and so we’ll be back next week to view this material again. But we did see the timed version. We’re also waiting to get the lab report to see where the printer lights came in at.
It was a four stop over and under test. The lens always stayed at T2.8. As for the lighting, here where things got a bit screwy. The test was to be done under two 1K lights and we were told that they would be provided but with as many shows that were there (Bourne Ultimatum was prepping next door), that didn’t fully happen. We got instead three 650w Fresnel’s – definitely not ideal especially with high speed and shutter tests). They had to be color corrected and I metered them by adding some 1/8 and 1/4 blue to the point where it ended up within ±50 kelvin. They also suffered from hot spots and so I’m not totally sold on what we got back as far as color is concerned. (Note to self, always bring your own lights to a camera house.)
Conclusions: From what we did get back, we liked the grain of the projected image when it was underexposed and timed back by 1/2 stop. Here again, what we like might all change when we view this on a monitor.
I start a feature in a week and I knew we’d be shooting HD, but I wasn’t sure which camera I’d want to use. To figure it out, I visited Alternative Rentals this morning to do a test on an Sony CineAlta F900 with a new software package they’re promoting and it’s called YedLog – named after the one of the inventors Steve Yedlin. The software essentially bypasses the preamp and sets all the menu setting to a zero state. What you end up with is a Log color space in 4:4:4 (F950) or 4:2:2 (F900).
It’s a fascinating possibility. I’ve included my camera log for what we captured. The test was a very simple over and under exposure test to see what what can be saved when conditions are really out of wack as well as what are the most pleasing settings. In the coming month, I’ll be back to do it again this time with a model and if time permits and Alternative Rentals is agreeable to it, I’ll take the camera out of the prep room and into real locations both day and night.
I’ll be looking at the footage next week on a Avid Nitris and report back on what I find.
: : click on image to see larger version
