Hal Smith

As it has always been. The current generation of "fix it in post" film-makers think that the image capture stage is the easy one, they've been spoiled rotten by just how good film and digital technologies are now. As a result they off-load creative decisions to post...and then wonder why they blew their budget paying someone in a darkened room to fix what they could have shot correctly in the first place. Personally I shoot with my 7D pretending that I've loaded it up with 5285. For some reason I get good pictures the first time and don't have to suffer trying to push things around in post and fighting H.264 artifacts. Go figure!

I'm surprised no-ones chimed in on your questions so far. DOF is a function of lens focal length, aperture size (f-stop), and circle of confusion. Format size comes into the equation through required circle of confusion for different formats. The lens back focal distance does not come into the equation. If your adapter is passive (no lenses) all it does is hold the lens at the correct distance from the film plane to be able to focus at infinity, etc. If your adapter has lenses in it, IE: an optical adapter, it can change focal length so there may be a DOF change with it. That will be a fixed change ratio for all your Takumars and the Bower manual should tell you what that ratio is. If not, contact Bower, they'll know for certain what it is. PS: It'd be fun to put something like my Pentax SMC 70-210mm zoom on a passive Bolex adapter. It'd be slower than snails but be somewhere around the equivalent of a 35mm still camera 280-840mm, now that's a TELEPHOTO!

At least some "Dan in Real Life" trailers were radically different from the release prints. The trailer I saw at the local AMC24 was tack sharp, it looked like it could have been a contact print from the negative. But the prints released to theaters were the typical low resolution 35mm high speed duplicates that look like cr*p. I'm not a big Steve Carell fan, the only reason I bought a ticket and went out to see it was because I expected a visual treat. Instead I fell victim to what amounted to a photographic "Bait and Switch".

"Sometime, in 2013, all the screens will be digital," says Corcoran. "As the number of digital screens increase, it won't make economic sense for the studios to make and ship film prints. It'll be absolutely necessary to switch to Digital Cinema to survive." Not down in my "Theater Le Shoppe" will all screens be digital. 35mm Simplex SP/CAT702/DA20/CP55/JBL Speakers Around 25 good prints including several that won Cinematography Oscars. Anyone know of a good 35mm non-3D print of "Avatar" floating around?

There's a great Foley page at: http://www.marblehead.net/foley/index.html .

I think you answered your own question: Excellent mikes record excellent sound. Modern electronics in equipment like your Zoom are pretty good and not the limiting factor. The only "issue" with your recorder is the mike preamps might be a noisier than my Sound Devices USB Pre2 but they're not junk by a long shot. Keep in mind the sound you hear in a feature has been assembled from many, many elements mixed down into different submixes (stems) giving the final rerecording mix a polished sound that only can come from that approach. Also dialogue is commonly recorded after shooting in a professional grade recording ADR studio. Take a look at the sound credits on IMDB for a major feature to get an idea of the incredible number of people involved, AVATAR's credits list fifty-two(!) people in the Sound Department. That's only people directly involved with the creative aspects, not all the engineers and technicians required to keep the all the equipment humming along. Got the time to read a good book? It's on Google Books and therefore free to all. Practical Art of Motion Picture Sound by David Yewdall

First impressions are the extemely important. Do you think you'll be looked at more positively wearing a tattoo? Or less so?

Have a look at the scene in "Hannah and Her Sisters" where the three sisters are having lunch in a restaurant. It was done with circular track, shot by Carlo Di Palma, and with Zen focus pulling by Doug Hart, The shot looks like the track went all the way around but Doug told me there was a wall on one side of the table that prevented a full 360 degree dolly.

O'Connor still supports the 100. Here's a link to a drawing on their website. If you email them, they might even be able to supply a user manual. 100C Drawing

Try Ken Stone (Stonecine on eBay).

I've read that the 5D outputs SD when recording video. Have a look around http://hurlbutvisuals.com/blog/ for a more authoritative answer.

It's similar to the little 2.5" Delvcam V2500. Delvcam V2500

I wouldn't even attempt to pull measurements off of a lens mount without a set of ten-thousands micrometers, a ten-thou dial indicator and stand, Jo blocks, and a good surface plate. A dial caliper, even a good digital one like my Starrett, can't work at the accuracy required (.01mm = .0004"). And, as Dom points out, even then you're going to finish by shimming to get back focus distance right on. Alas, my frau's Uncle Steve has gone on to his reward with the saints. He was Chief of Tool and Die Operations at Cadillac for twenty years. Steve would have produced a PL mount drawing off my Arriflex manufactured Arri standard/bayonet to PL adapter in about fifteen minutes flat. Anyone know a good medium? Here's a PL mount illustration from Silicon Imaging's SI-2K Mini manual, it appears to be a dimensionally accurate CAD drawing and it may be possible to scale dimensions off it (I have a hunch all the critical dimensions are in even millimeters). It wouldn't hurt to give SI a ring and see if they're willing to supply a copy of the original with all the dimensions on it.

There isn't a "simple" explanation. It's a mathematical concept and requires math to solve it. (1 + (sqrt)5) / 2 is as simple as it gets. Since (sqrt)5 is an irrational number, the Golden Mean is irrational. Wikipedia Article

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Science and Technology Council has done a lot of research into solid state lighting. Their work hasn't been updated with the latest LED's but the research they have done is educational. They've published their videos and reports at: S&T Solid State Lighting

I considered demanding your first born child in trade but then realized you'll probably be training them as a 1AC and will need him/her when you get into production. Halsey

I saw Woody Allen's "Midnight in Paris" yesterday at the AMC24 here in OKC. It was digitally projected and Darius' Cinematography looked like cr*p. It was shot in 35mm and went through a DI (Woody's first). It was bright but very low contrast, the projected gamma washed out all the highlights. The opening scenes have been reviewed as being gorgeous but in this instance looked blah, not unlike what Canon HDSLR footage looks like if the picture style isn't set up correctly. Anyone else see it digital projected? How did it look to you? Other than that, I really liked the story...but then I've always been a patsy for Woody's movies.

Yes, DTS uses an optical time code track on the film located between the picture image on a print and its analog sound track. That track is read into a controller that syncs the sound being played off of dedicated CD players. The time code track contains an ID code that tells the system which print or trailer is playing in the projector. An advantage of DTS is that multiple language versions of a film can all use the same print distributed with different CD's for each language. Dolby Digital (SRD) uses an optical digital code located between the print's sprocket holes. Sony SDDS uses an optical digital code located outside the sprocket holes. All of the above plus the analog variable area soundtrack are located in different areas outside the picture area of the print. As a result, a print can have all four systems, analog optical, SRD, SDDS, and DTS, on it. Each system's information is located around twenty frames offset from the picture itself to allow for the fact that their readers are not located exactly where the picture aperture is located. That offset is standardized for each system. Image of a print with all four systems on it.

Wide angle lenses are much more critical with respect to back focus, the distance from the back of the lens to the film plane or sensor has to be right on. As a result any wide angle shot risks going in and out of focus as the lens moves around in the adapter. Telephoto lenses conversely are much more forgiving of back focus so an adapter that's useless on wide angles might be acceptable with a telephoto.

Disgusting! How primitive, not a single CGI shot. That Storaro guy is obviously a know-nothing amateur.

They expected you to cover your own expenses and equipment wear and tear? That's not working for free, that's financing their film. I helped a small Equity theatre company here in OKC get off the ground by being their resident LD and Master Electrician for the first six years of the Company's existence. All freebie work and more than a few dollars of my own money spent. To this day their Artistic Director buys me lunch when he's in town and I'll never have to buy a ticket to any of their shows, which included a production last year of "August, Osage County" which was every bit as good as the Broadway production. That's what happens when your freebie work is genuinely appreciated...and not just a means for the Producer to put more money in their pocket.

Unfortunately there seems to be companies producing adapters for various combinations of lenses and mounts that have absolutely no dedication to producing a quality product. I bought a Fotodiox adapter to mount my Pentax "K" mount lenses on my Canon 7D. My still film cameras were always Pentax and I've got a collection of Pentax SMC lenses. Fotodiox's adapter is a piece of poop, all of my lenses wobble around in their adapter.

Since cameras can be so much smaller now, why not just hide the camera inside an automobile, mailbox, furniture cabinet, etc. with a one way glass or small hole for the lens? Art Direction could probably figure out how to disguise the lens port. That wouldn't work for a shot where large amount camera movement would be required but otherwise might just work as a good low/no budget gag.

Ken Stone has had one for sale on and off for months on eBay. It's not currently on eBay so he may have sold it. http://stores.ebay.com/stonecine Being a camera he's selling I would expect it to be in top condition.

Canon 5D's come with a software disk that includes a USB link remote control program. I've used it on a Windows XP netbook and got good results. Here's a link to a video showing Canon's program in use with a 7D.