Last night kicked off the start of the Bococa Arts Festival. I was there, camera clad, to start shooting some footage a proposed documentary following the festival. After the experience, a few things came to mind.
Unconventional performance locations are difficult to film in. The lighting sucks, it's crowded, loud, and hard to move around in.
My shoulder mount was a little too big, bulky and heavy last night, a disappointing realization, I must say. Today I'm removing the shoulder pad and fore grip, so I'm going to stick the basic rail system on my monopod and run around like that.
I would love to have a bunch of lenses that were 1.8 or faster. The sigma lens I got performed well, but as the sun went down, it really became too dark in the bar, so I had to bump up to higher ISO speeds, making for a noisy picture. At one point, I swapped lenses for my Canon EF 50mm with the f/1.8, and man it was super sweet. I shot at slower ISOs, got some great shallow depth of field, did some rack focusing, it was a blast. The only down side, is that in a small bar, you'll only get two members of the band in a shot at that focal length. I'll figure it out.
Saturday, June 19, 2010
Friday, June 18, 2010
The Last 3 Minutes
This is one of the short films used for test purposes during the Zacuto shoot out. I liked it so much, I wanted to give it a seperate post. It was shot on the Canon 5D.
"The Last 3 Minutes" Directed by Po Chan from Shane Hurlbut, ASC on Vimeo.
The Great DSLR Shoot Out
While looking through Philip Blooms website, I stumbled upon the Zacuto Camera Shoot Out. Basically they grabbed a bunch of experts, DPs, Editors, Colorists, and Directors, and took all of the top DSLR cameras, the Canon line up, a Nikon 3Ds, Panasonic GH1, as well as Fuji and Kodak Film cameras and put them through a bunch of tests to see how they perform.
The Fuji and Kodak film cameras were used primarily for comparison, however, they prove to have some short comings compared to the DSLRs, mainly in low light, and high ISO speeds. Despite the gratuitous use of technical terms, it's easy to understand how things stack up throughout this hour and a half series. *spoiler alert: the short comings of the DSLR cameras seems to consistantly be a loss of detail in highlighted areas, however, many of the experts agree, "if you know this, you can plan your shoot accordingly".
The end conclusion, digital technology is still no match for the tried and true film cameras, however, that wont last long. The footage taken from these cameras is sooo close to looking like film today, that it will only be a few years before technology will advance to where the DSLR may replace the film camera.
Check out the tests, they really put this cameras through the rigors
The Fuji and Kodak film cameras were used primarily for comparison, however, they prove to have some short comings compared to the DSLRs, mainly in low light, and high ISO speeds. Despite the gratuitous use of technical terms, it's easy to understand how things stack up throughout this hour and a half series. *spoiler alert: the short comings of the DSLR cameras seems to consistantly be a loss of detail in highlighted areas, however, many of the experts agree, "if you know this, you can plan your shoot accordingly".
The end conclusion, digital technology is still no match for the tried and true film cameras, however, that wont last long. The footage taken from these cameras is sooo close to looking like film today, that it will only be a few years before technology will advance to where the DSLR may replace the film camera.
Check out the tests, they really put this cameras through the rigors
Thursday, June 17, 2010
A True Loathing for Yahoo
I attempted to send out an email to a large number of the people from address book at Yahoo.com, and they locked me out of my account.
Twice now, I've filled out all the verification crap, gave a blood sample, and an eye scan, and I still can't access my email. Sure, I can sign in and read the crappy news feed, but God forbid I be able to read the three new emails I have.
Let's ignore all the phishing emails I've received disguised as yahoo customer care agents, and think about this. I've verified who the hell I am, and I still can't get into my email. I'm super pissed right now.
Twice now, I've filled out all the verification crap, gave a blood sample, and an eye scan, and I still can't access my email. Sure, I can sign in and read the crappy news feed, but God forbid I be able to read the three new emails I have.
Let's ignore all the phishing emails I've received disguised as yahoo customer care agents, and think about this. I've verified who the hell I am, and I still can't get into my email. I'm super pissed right now.
Finished Promotional Video
Here is the promotional video for the Bococa Arts Festival, kicking off in Brooklyn tomorrow. I shot, edited and color corrected the video using my Canon Rebel T2i, Final Cut Pro 7, and Magic Bullet Looks, among other things.
The camera performed outstandingly well, and I was working with a great group of people. The actors were upbeat, and willing to try different things. Eileen, the Producer was also quite chipper, and was great at getting what she wanted out of the actors.
Early on in the shoot, the group of us started thinking that the original script...well left something to be desired, so we made some changes as we made our way around Brooklyn, and I think the final short is better because of it.
The pigeon scene was actually the most difficult shot to get. Originally we tried getting that shot in an alley way next to Cobble Hill Park, but the trees were dropping seeds, and the pigeons had no interest in our stale bread crumbs.
We then shot the bridge scene, when I remembered from my college days, all the birds in the Brooklyn Bridge park, so we tried our luck there. At one point we had about 50 birds covering the BoCoCa sign, until a truck roared by and scared them off. The shot I ended up using wasn't 50 birds, but it still looked pretty cool.
In conclusion, it was great working with such a flexible, fun group of people. Film is a creative process just like any other art, and I've found the final product is always better when you involve members of your cast and crew in the process. When everyone is an active participant in the creative process, and not just standing by taking orders, the energy of the shoot is totally different, and I love it. That's how I like to work. At times I will draw the line and say something can't be done, but all and all, I like to go with the flow.
Oh, and next, sun block is a must. We all got wicked sun burn. It was difficult to hide it on the actors, and I think it can be seen in some shots. Oops!
The camera performed outstandingly well, and I was working with a great group of people. The actors were upbeat, and willing to try different things. Eileen, the Producer was also quite chipper, and was great at getting what she wanted out of the actors.
Early on in the shoot, the group of us started thinking that the original script...well left something to be desired, so we made some changes as we made our way around Brooklyn, and I think the final short is better because of it.
The pigeon scene was actually the most difficult shot to get. Originally we tried getting that shot in an alley way next to Cobble Hill Park, but the trees were dropping seeds, and the pigeons had no interest in our stale bread crumbs.
We then shot the bridge scene, when I remembered from my college days, all the birds in the Brooklyn Bridge park, so we tried our luck there. At one point we had about 50 birds covering the BoCoCa sign, until a truck roared by and scared them off. The shot I ended up using wasn't 50 birds, but it still looked pretty cool.
In conclusion, it was great working with such a flexible, fun group of people. Film is a creative process just like any other art, and I've found the final product is always better when you involve members of your cast and crew in the process. When everyone is an active participant in the creative process, and not just standing by taking orders, the energy of the shoot is totally different, and I love it. That's how I like to work. At times I will draw the line and say something can't be done, but all and all, I like to go with the flow.
Oh, and next, sun block is a must. We all got wicked sun burn. It was difficult to hide it on the actors, and I think it can be seen in some shots. Oops!
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
A Question on Speed
I've seen and read lots of great tutorials on making beautiful slow motion, and awesome timelapse sequences with DSLR cameras. My question is, how do you remap the time of a clip, essentially combining the two? To clarify, I once took a clip shot on a Canon HV30, a consumer grade camera, recording in 24p to HDV tape. After all the transcoding, I dropped the clip in the timeline, and using the time remap tool in Final Cut Pro, slowed the clip down, and gradually brought it up to normal speed.
Is this possible with DSLRs, and how?
Granted, I've haven't done a lot of test with the camera, so I still have a lot to learn and figure out, but I've tried using the time remap tool, and despite looking cool, it doesn't look as smooth or natural.
For anyone with more experience, please feel free to drop some knowledge on me. To give another example of what I'd like to achieve: I have a clip of someone kicking a soccer ball. I like to have the player running up to the ball at faster than normal speed, gradually step down to slow motion as his foot contacts the ball, and then snap to normal speed as the ball goes flying off.
Is this possible with DSLRs, and how?
Granted, I've haven't done a lot of test with the camera, so I still have a lot to learn and figure out, but I've tried using the time remap tool, and despite looking cool, it doesn't look as smooth or natural.
For anyone with more experience, please feel free to drop some knowledge on me. To give another example of what I'd like to achieve: I have a clip of someone kicking a soccer ball. I like to have the player running up to the ball at faster than normal speed, gradually step down to slow motion as his foot contacts the ball, and then snap to normal speed as the ball goes flying off.
Monday, June 14, 2010
Lenses
The every time I use my camera, I start thinking that I may have bought some things that aren't best suited for my needs. I bought some lenses before getting my camera, and am beginning to realize that they were premature purchases. For the type of filming I'm doing, I don't really see a need for the Canon 70-300mm lens. I've been thinking about doing some trading and swapping so to speak.
I saw a Sigma 18-50mm f/2.8-4.5 which looks pretty nice. I'm thinking about trading my Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 for that. Although the Sigmas come with mix reviews, this particular lens is much faster, has nearly the same focal length, has a shorter minimum focal range (meaning objects at a foot from the lens are still in focus) and the length of the lens doesn't change during focusing or zooming. This is important, as it means I can use this lens with my follow focus, something I can't do with the Canon kit lens.
I saw a Sigma 18-50mm f/2.8-4.5 which looks pretty nice. I'm thinking about trading my Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 for that. Although the Sigmas come with mix reviews, this particular lens is much faster, has nearly the same focal length, has a shorter minimum focal range (meaning objects at a foot from the lens are still in focus) and the length of the lens doesn't change during focusing or zooming. This is important, as it means I can use this lens with my follow focus, something I can't do with the Canon kit lens.
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