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I recently shot a s16mm short and am now logging the footage after receiving the drive from the lab. Overall I am pleased with how it came out. However, there are a few issues that I am disheartened over and am wonder whether there are any solutions for a couple of the issues and what exactly was the cause of them (not the hair in gate).

 

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/WkMNikbFx14?rel=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

 

1) The first two clips are hair in gate. I'm confused about the second one as the hair is so soft, maybe it was on an ND filter?

 

- Has anyone had experience with removing a hair in after effects, or hiring a vfx editor to dust bust with Revival or PFClean. Do these shots look like good candidates, costs expected? There are several more shots that have the soft hair of the second clip in the upper right of the frame.

 

2) The next few clips show the fogging that would pulse across the frame after I'd stop the camera from speeding but only on the last few feet that had just been exposed. I was shooting on an SR3. One of the mags was nosier than the other and it would appear that fogging would appear on say roll 15 for instance but not on roll 16 and so on. Unfortunately, the AC's did not keep track for which mag on the camera reports, so I'm gonna have to figure that out before our reshoot of #4's issue.

 

3) This fogging happend during the middle of a couple takes and nowhere else on the roll. The guy doing my telecine said he'd never seen anything like it and ned to confer with the Lab Manager. They said it must have been xray damage.

 

- Think I could make an adjustment to this shot in after effects to neutralize the orange fogging or place an optical flare over it to downplay it? Not a setup we can reshoot easily.

 

4) Loop issue? This was the first night of our shoot and I guess the AC hadn't threaded the film correctly with too big of a loop? This was a big shot, and all takes were bad cause of this. We are planning on reshooting in late Jan. But I would like to figure out issue 2 and 3 before I check the gear out from the community college.

 

I should add that the footage counters on both mags where damaged to some degree, we had just been taping over them. I was really nervous about this when I discovered that on the first day, worrying that we would be getting light leaks through the busted dials. But fogging did not become an issue until the last couple days of a week long shoot with the worst of the fogging #3 happening on a pickup day, which was 2 weeks after our shoot.

 

Thanks!

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The fogging just before the end of a shot would suggest a light leak in the take-up side - maybe the door is bent or wasn't latched properly. It's unlikely to be the footage counter window, the slot for the indicator only leads into the gap between the platines (the inner plates that the spindles are mounted on), so unless there's a hole in the take-up platine you shouldn't get a leak from there.

 

I'm not sure about the mid-shot fogging. Looks like there was strong side-light, maybe it hit at an angle that accentuated the door leak?

 

#4 could well be a loop problem, especially if it was the first night and your AC was inexperienced. The camera wouldn't have sounded right, but perhaps the ambient noise masked it and being the first night you weren't quite sure how it should sound?

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The hair in the gate is sharper or less sharp depending on how far in front of the filmgate the hair gets stuck. It would also depend on the focal length of the lens used. It can be removed quite easily by a skilled compositor in Shake, After Effects, PFClean etc. I have found it pays to degrease the filmgate with alcohol or similar, hairs tend to stick less. Also clean your magazines and changing bag.

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