Hal Smith

Earth ground and neutral are at the same potential at the power company transformer feeding the residential circuit. New construction always keeps the two separate for safety, not electrical load, reasons. Four wire plugs are starting to be seen in residential use, the newer range and dryer plugs have two "hot", one neutral, and one ground pin. Best practice would be to use the neutral pin for the lighting circuit, and connect the metal cases of any boxes, panels, etc. to the ground pin. I believe the ground connection screws are always painted green inside plugs, receptacles, etc. Normal residential wiring is single phase, the 240 circuit is just two 120 volts circuits exactly 180 degrees differing. Three phase in the US comes in two flavors, Delta and Wye. Delta has 240 or 480 volts between each leg. From the legs to ground 240 volt Delta has two legs with 120 volts to neutral, and one (the "wild" leg) with 177 volts to neutral. Three phase Wye has 208 volts between the legs and 120 volts to neutral from each leg. The current available from hot to neutral in each of the Wye legs is the rating of the circuit, that's the same for each of the ''normal" legs of Delta, I'm not certain about current capacity of the wild leg, I've only seen in\t used for lighting circuits in commercial buildings. I'd strongly recommend staying away from "jeeping" into 3 phase circuits unless one has a pretty good idea of the pitfalls. Yes, in 240/120 volt single phase circuits it's the difference in amperage between the two hot circuits that flows in the neutral wire. Edmond, OK

A good place to get more amps is the circuits used for ranges and dryers. For instance: my house has two 50 amp 240 volt breakers for them. If you unplug the dryer or range, all those amps are available for use. You can break down those 240 volt services into two 120 volt services for lighting (a 240 volt service is two 120 volt services back to back with neutral (ground) in the middle). If I unplug both my dryer and range, my house has 24kW of available power lying around waiting to heat up some lights. More or less modern houses usually have at least 48kW of power coming into them (200 amps @ 240 volts). I am talking about RESIDENTIAL power here - larger commercial buildings often have 3 phase "Y" or Delta service, you can "Jeep" into that power safely but the rules get more complicated. The safest and best way to confiscate some of that power is to build a separate box (distro) out of Home Depot (etc.) supplies. You'll need a matching range or dryer cord, a circuit breaker box with perhaps 8 spaces, 20 amp breakers, conduit quad boxes (METAL!) to mount convenience outlets in, cover plates, misc. short pieces of conduit and matching connectors, and a good DIY household electrics book for reference. You'll probably want to use a 20 amp breaker for each pair of outlets (4 plugs) - remember each 1000 watts is close to 10 amps (actually 8-1/3 amps). Wire the individual circuits with #12 wire - it's rated for 20 amps on reasonably short runs. Don't scrimp on wire size - if its too small it'll drag your voltage down which in movie work will cause lighting color temperature problems - your 3200K halogens may drop down to 3000K, etc. Buying an inexpensive meter to test the voltage at each outlet after construction will avoid any REAL unpleasant experiences such as accidentally wiring the 120 volt outlets with 240 volts - if you do that, your lights will be REAL bright for about two seconds - then you'll need new bulbs. By having "daughtered" your distro off one of the existing range or dryer breakers in the house, if you do something real stupid that breaker will trip and save the house's wiring. If you're nervous about DIYing the above, find a working household or industrial electrician and beg him/her to build the distro for you - doing it the way I described is child's play for someone who does construction electrics for a living. Or you could find a gaffer. :) Edmond, OK

What a great idea for a new forum. I've been getting surplus sale catalogs from C and H Sales in Pasadena for years. They've always got some stepper motors and from time to time have a reasonably priced driver card or two. They also have a large collection of modular power supplies to power things up with. It takes some electrical/electronic ability to work with what they have, they're strictly an old fashioned surplus house - they assume YOU know what you're doing. They're now on ebay at: http://stores.ebay.com/C-AND-H-SALES_W0QQssPageNameZl4QQtZkm Edmond, OK

Gentlemen, I thank you! Visual product's website has a photos of Arri 2's on two different stands, one of which is definitely an adapter that the motor fits down in to. No need to butcher one of my 50D's. Edmond, OK

Sorry to show my ignorance, but how is the 150mm measured? I've got an OConnor 50 with a bowl adapter it but have no idea what size I've got. Edmond, OK

emulsions, matching, etc...not sure what timing variances you're seeing, we (and the labs involved) never felt that was a problem, and we were keeping an eye out for it. Hi Sydney, Thanks for the encouraging words about using 35mm. I dabbled with 16mm in the past but got discouraged because my best work just couldn't match what I could do with a still camera. Now I'm older and have a few extra dollars so I'm going to have a fling at it in 35mm. What I was noticing was slight shifts in skin tone, but please don't take my word as coming from some incredible "look' guru, I'm not. My only expertise in this area is gained from a fair amount of theatrical lighting design experience on and off over the years - not years of sitting in screening rooms. I think I owe you the courtesy of trying to see your film properly projected some day before commenting further since all I've seen is what you've got on the web - not the best way of looking at things. The monitor I use on this computer is a 19" Viewsonic with their Ultrabright mode which does help a bit - but it's still a computer monitor. Sincerely, Hal Edmond, OK

Any advice on how to best DIY marry an Arri 2C to an OConnor 50D? I was given two serviceable OConnor 50's with legs so I can afford to cobble one of them to accommodate a 2C. Edmond, OK

How about "minimum budget"? From the posts in this thread, it looks to me like producing a 35mm feature with any quality at all takes $100-200K. I've got a short film project cooking and this thread does have me thinking that maybe 35mm is the way to go. Certain below the line costs go up but, if the Muses are kind, one has a chance of producing something that is visually superior. Is it possible to buy short ends that all come from the same batch number? "Pearl Diver" does look pretty damn good but I did notice what looks like small timing variations and was wondering if that could be due to shooting with the same emulsion but from different batches. Edmond, OK

Look around on Pomona Electronic's banana plug webpages. They make a double mini banana plug with a .5" spacing. They also make male single uninsulated mini banana plugs with threaded studs. If the .5" doubles won't work, you could make a custom spacing plug by taking a small rectangle of Lexan, drilling two holes at the Anton Bauer PowerTap spacing and mounting two mini bananas in it. The backside of the two plugs could be insulated with heat shrink tubing over each wire and plug mounting stud. Really slick would be to get a chunk of (perhaps) 1/2" Lexan and drill and tap it to take the mini banana plugs. See Pomona's webpages at: (the double mini banana plug is on page 4) http://www.pomonaelectronics.com/index.php...CK&getDetails=0 Edmond, OK

The new photos show the Arri and accessories moved around and with today's Calgary Herald newspaper in the background. I think our friend may be legitimate. Doesn't say anything about the camera's condition but it looks like he's got it in his possession. He did answer my ebay question with the link to the photos. The header on his email says the reply address is: mbenedek_savage@yahoo.com so that's probably his Yahoo email address. His Yahoo ID is: mbenedek_savage. I ran benedek as both a first and a last name on Yahoo.ca's people search and got a hit for an M. Benedek in Calgary, I'll respect his privacy and not repeat the listing here. An all Canada search for M. Benedek listed four of them. I've had fun with this: CSI cinematography.com? ;)

"You probably wont be getting a reply to that, but lets wait and see how good his photoshop skills are... and i guess, how keen he is to sell sell sell..." I thought about that, but it'll definitely take a Photoshop pro to figure out how to both morph the camera photo and put the newspaper under/behind it. If our culprit tries it, there'll be twenty-five posts here from Cinematographers who have spent a lot of time on the cross lining up green screen and rear projection shots and who will instantly notice any perspective problems! I suspect anyone good enough to pull off a faked composite off that's believable won't be wasting their time trying to sell air cameras - they'll probably have a roomful of commercial photo editing clients clamoring to be the next job in line.

A message to the recalcitrant from a newish forum participant This newby frankly rather enjoys running names of posters through his imdbpro account and seeing what falls out. My advice to the unwashed (and un-named): There are professionals in these forums who have real serious credentials in the business. If, for some of them, the price of replying to one of your posted questions is signing those posts with your real name, pay them their going rate. Look at it this way, just how much does USC charge for tuition? I'll bet their film program is a billion times more expensive than just signing your posts - and getting an instant education. Edmond, OK

I sent an "Ask the Seller A Question" message to dikdog6 asking him to prove he actually possesses the camera by shooting another photo of it AND PLACING A CURRENT NEWSPAPER WITH THE HEADLINES SHOWING IN THE BACKGROUND. Edmond, OK

Any comments from the "been there, done that" participants to this thread about the three act structure's relevance to short films? When I go to a movie, I have a habit of noting the running time and dividing it by three. It is absolutely amazing how often I'll been watching a movie, sensed a plot shift, looked at the time, and it's right on a 1/3 - 2/3d's time seam. I figured out that movies were made in a rigid three act form long before I read anything formal about that stucture. Edmond, OK

Stephen, Is optical letterboxing an added expense item, or just a matter of the lab putting the right gate in the optical printer? I'm a little concerned that MY letterbox as shot might not match theirs - where does one find the correct standard for letterboxed 16mm? I can imagine spending a bunch of extra $$$ in post because one has letterboxed camera negative that, when conformed, didn't match a lab's "one size fits all" letterbox gate.

At the risk of getting flamed by 3/4's of the participants to this thread, I have a question. Is there any practical (definition: cheap) way of letterboxing regular-16 in post for eventual optical prints? One could shoot slow stock, vignette in the viewfinder, use whatever amount of lighting that best minimizes grain, end up with an optical print in 1.66 or 1.85 aspect with a sound track on it, and have a print that projected in widescreen aspect on a standard projector - a zoom projector could be adjusted to fill the screen. It wouldn't be quite as nice as Super or Ultra 16 but as previously noted in this thread, one could spend one's money instead on goodies - really good lenses come to mind. I've got a later model, registration pin non-reflex Bolex H16 and a B & H 70KR and would much rather buy lenses, etc. than cobble the cameras at $700 a pop. :) Edmond, OK

I researched obtaining a ballast for a fixture modification a couple of months ago. GE Lighting was able to help me some but when got deeper into the process I found out that its real hard, if not impossible, to get any engineering level information on ballast coils themselves. Ballasts seem to be exclusively constructed on an OEM basis for fixture manufacturers. A lamp manufacturer knows what's required to strike and regulate their products, but it's the engineers at the fixture manufacturers who design and/or specify the ballasts. I am the original DIY guy, I've cobbled up all sorts of work-arounds but I hit a blank wall when I tried to improvise a ballast for my project. I did learn one thing from GE: hot restrike lamps do not have to be operated on a hot restrike ballast, they will work correctly off a properly designed ballast, in fact they last longer if NOT hot restruck. Edmond, OK

"Editorial make up" (stills in modeling world) is very similar to film make up (except in the area of SFX and monster mash) Rolfe, Thank you, knowing that fashion still photography makeup requirements are close to film ones is IMMENSELY helpful to me. Beauty pagents are a big business out here in the Oklahoma back country and their still photography makeup designs should be pretty close to fashion photography ones. I've got a pro photographer acquaintance who I'll bet knows at least one quality makeup artist working on pagents. They won't be cheap, no person who's competent in their craft is, but at least they'll be HERE! I love these forums - one post and I get an authoritative answer. Film-making is a collaborative business and that really shows in the help that flows back and forth in the forums. Makes it very easy for me to take my daily "humble" pill and accept that this is a very rich and deep business and not knowing it all is our common condition. Also explains why "know-it-alls" are very unpopular on sets.

Quite a few of the posts in this thread refer to makeup, which is certainly the other side of the equation lighting faces. How does one find a good film makeup artist? Is it possible to take a competent cosmetic artist and "teach" them how what they need to know to adapt to film? A good book maybe? I've learned to light faces in live theatre without much, if any, makeup by using gel combinations with directional color contrasts but there I'm lighting for the human eye with its vast latitude and ability to "white balance" in real time. (Example: Rosco R34 (flesh pink) key with R03 (dark bastard amber) fill and some R18 (flame) backlight is very pretty on most women).

get so far so this will be fine. However, for a few shots I want to have the actors with torches. I think that I will have the torch run out of battery quickly though, so I can do the rest day for night. So maybe one or two shots with require the torch. Dear Chris, There's a company that makes a line of flashlights called "SureFire". They're derived from the ones that people like Special Forces use - they're incredibly bright. I've got one that's about the size of the Maglite that runs two AA cells, it'll light up the top of a 500' tower at night. They're available at the Bass Pro Shop chain and Cabela's probably has them. They're NOT cheap but they put out a bunch of footcandles, I don't know this for a fact but my eyes tell me they're pretty close to 3200K, maybe a bit higher. A Surefire will balance against a lot more movie lighting better than anything else (IMHO). You might be able to talk a store that stocks Surefires into loaning you a couple of the two or three D cell models in exchange for a credit line. They'll probably want you to buy the lithium batteries Surefires run because they're not cheap either - but a least you'd save a few bucks by not having to buy the entire light. OOPS! Just noticed you call flashlights torches, UK? I don't know if Surefires are marketed internationally but I bet they are - try a police equipment supply company. Edmond, OK

Re: Lighting The best advice is exactly that: there are many, many ways to light subjects and scenes. And don't be afraid to try something that might not work - you can alway experiment with video to get a feel for looks, the key/fill ratios and contrast will change with film but not the basic lighting look. I learned a lot about theatrical stage lighting early on by looking at old master's paintings and trying to duplicate the lighting in them. (This longwinded tale DOES have a film point at the end of it) I just lit a stage production of "Meshuggah-Nuns" here in OKC. I used an ensemble of 12 scrollers in front of Source 4's 50's with 750 watt lamps in them for down and side lighting. In the past I've always "hidden" my scroller color changes 95% of the time, only changing in blackouts or by alternating pairs of lights and scrollers. The Director was a woman with extensive acting, choreographing, and directing experience. She played Grizzabella in one of the European "Cats" companies and "Jellyrorum" all over the States and I think Japan. So she's seen the big time - a bunch. When we were setting cues in tech, I was rolling scroller colors back and forth to find the best color for a given scene, and explaining to her that I could clean up and hide the moves later. I also showed her how I had designed and made the scrolls myself so that I could have 16 of my favorite colors on them and placed the color panels in a sequence where adjacent gels could make sense as sequential color changes. We ended up with no hidden scroller color changes, all the changes happened with the lights up - sometimes between numbers/scenes and quite a few right in the middle of choreography/mood changes in numbers. Finally the film point. I just saw the "Producers". Jules Fisher and Peggy Eisenhower (multiple Tony winners on Broadway) did the stage lighting and they're continually changing colors live in a lot of the music/dance numbers. They probably used theatrical CMY dichroic color mixing fixtures with HMI/MSR lamps, not scrollers - but the point is they weren't bashful about changing color in real-time. Jules and Peggy did the theatrical lighting for "Chicago", they had a great time collaborating with Dion Beebe on that project. I got the chance to talk with Peggy about "Chicago" at a Master Class in NYC last year. She said there was a huge amount of respect and admiration both ways making that film, Dion hadn't worked with lighting being cued and moved so extensively in real time within a shot and Jules and Peggy enjoyed working closely with a Cinematographer with such a mastery of film technique. I think Peggy blushed a bit when I told her I thought "Cell Block Tango" was the most gorgeous thing I'd ever seen on film. I'm considering changing my "Most Gorgeous" award to Uma in "The Producers" but for reasons that have nothing to do with lighting. My point? Don't be afraid to try anything if there's a good reason for it. It might work, it might not work, and either way you'll learn something. And don't be discouraged to find out that more experienced people got there before you, it's both humbling and encouraging to know that.

David, There's another movie with an incredible color palette - "How to Succeed in Business Without Trying". Mary Blair, Walt Disney's favorite Color Designer and Stylist for years was Color Designer on that project, coming out of retirement to do it. She worked on a bunch of the Disney classics in the 40's and 50's like "Alice", "Peter Pan", "Cinderella", etc. I grew up thinking that's how animation was supposed to look, I found out early this year that I had been admiring just one, very talented, woman's sense of taste all the time! There should to be a Mary Blair Institute of Designer somewhere - but instead just a few film nuts figure out that such an Artist worked in our world and admire her work. "Succeed" just glows with pastel colors. I wonder what stock it was shot with - and also the format. Anyone know?

I've got to join this thread, the item in question is off-topic but my information is relevant. I was in the market for a Spectrum Analyzer for my business last year. I ran across a possibility on the Government Liquidation website - they're the official contractor for U.S. Government surplus. It wasn't open for bids quite yet, opening a few days later. On ebay that week I ran across the same piece of equipment, complete with Gov. Liq's photo. The Gov. Liq. auction opened and the gear sold for around $1,500 - a good price but since government liquidation gear isn't warranted as working, that price was probably a bit high. The instant the Gov. Liq. gear auction closed, the ebay listing's seller increased the minimum bid to $6,500, more than one can buy that piece of equipment for in reconditioned, calibrated shape with a one-year guarantee from reputable test equipment houses. Watch out - sooner or later you'll run across this scam, this one wasn't criminal but certainly could have been if the seller had taken someone's money without actually having an analyzer to sell. I too have complained to ebay about scams and gotten nothing but form letters back. I complained to the OKC FBI office about these ebay scams and told them that I feel that ebay is partially criminally responsible for many scams since the a**h***s who run ebay don't really seem to care. The agent I talked seemed interested in that they asked a lot of questions and asked me to forward them as much documentation as I could provide. They also asked me for my DOB, SSN, etc. That's the kind of info they want when they're serious about follow-up, they check YOU out too, a bit too 1984 for my taste but understandable non the less.

Thanks to all who've answered (and will answer) my post. I understand the core fact that DAT's stays pretty much in sync by theirselves thanks to having accurate internal timebases. So slates and time code become all that one needs to be obsessive about. Sincerely, Hal

[ you sync up later in your NLE. EDIT: It's also called a 'slate' Thanks but apparently I haven't expressed my need clearly enough - I am absolutely out to sea with respect to just exactly how time relationship between the camera and the DAT while shooting/recording is maintained. I know that using a slate establishes the starting point but how are the camera and DAT kept in some form of sync so that one gets film and tape that later can be resolved? I suspect this all has something to do with crystal sync motors on the camera and the fact that DAT recorders internally have crystal clocks - but I'm just guessing. Maybe an example of an equipment list for a shoot will help me, that way I can research all the gear being used to figure out how the camera and DAT "talk" to each other. whether it be by a direct link between them as per a camera motor that generates a 60Hz sync tone passed onto the audio recorder or perhaps just because they both are running a highly accurate timebase in some form. Is this too "geeky" a post for the 16mm only forum? Is there a more appropriate place to address this issue?