A. Whitehouse

Transformers always used convenient resuscitations to keep it interesting. All they have to do is call it "The rise of Galvatron". Is Mauro Fiore shooting it? Love his look, when he works with Michael Bay its like Tony Scott lent them his grad pack from the eighties. Somehow I can't quite see the sequel doing as well as the last one but they're bound to make more money than the animated Film from my childhood.

I wouldn't second guess it for a moment. Both this and the Scarlet (which is probably still being designed but Ive seen renders and am speculating) look like horrible cameras to try and operate unless they're hooked up to some sort of mount and rig. Whereas the Sony is beautiful to use and by all reports seem to produce a very nice image. Ergonomically the other two are a nightmare (At least at this stage), does the Scarlet really have its lens controls on the butt of the camera?. I guess its safe to say the resolution and fps of the video will increase on stills in the coming years, some really interesting effects could be created using all that image area

Very funny link. Is every thread over there filled with as much self congratulation and trash talking? I couldn't be bothered wading through all 8 pages but the first couple will give you the gist. I found the Wired a bit depressing as well, its a magazine I enjoy but it was so inaccurate that it casts a shadow on a lot of the other articles Ive read over the years. You would think they would hire a writer familiar with the industry to write the piece but I guess not. I'm glad to see the "Know1ng" (Clever spelling) trailer and would love to see it in theatre, script appears to be an odd cross of "Number 23" and Nick Cage's own "Next". Not a good pedigree but its always interesting to see Melbourne on screen.

Similar situation; I worked with a director once who managed to tell me with a straight face that he found calling action pretentious and instead chose to cry "performance" instead. He was a nightmare and the shoot was awful but I'd take that any day over someone who forgets to call cut.

I was just saying this yesterday, their politics are so similar that I was surprised that in this, of all elections, there wasn't a stronger 3rd party option. Its regrettable American politics are so locked into a two party system.

50% of the "grain" I see on Blu-rays (or hd-dvds) is better described as noise. It appears in parts of the image that I wouldn't normally associate with being a target for aggressive grain. Its also sometimes limited to one channel. I wonder if it has something to do with the codec used on the disc (are there three different options now?). Anecdotally, I was at a home theatre store last year talking to a salesman about bravias and bluray, who incidentally tried to sell me on the motion flow technology, and he was talking about the sharpness of a bluray disc and its ability to see grain in a film image. I didn't say anything but the Bluray demo disc he was using as an example had select scenes from "Click" and some Robin Williams RV camping movie, both of which were shot on the Genesis. The comments in the thread linked above show just how incredibly ill informed most of the public is and is likely to remain.

Very sad, one of the few "technicians" who's name would appear on the poster or cover art. I didn't realize he'd been involved in the formation of digital domain. A big loss...

Actually it does shoot 24p 1080i as ridiculous as the nomenclature has become. In much the same way that progressive material is stored on a format like digi-beta each frame is split across two fields which are temporally the same. Also I believe only the NTSC version of the camera shoots 24p, if you're in a PAL territory you might be up a creek (although it will do 25p). Its hidden in one of the hundreds of mindless and poorly labeled menus. For my money I would shoot 720p as it opens up the other functions of the camera. Good luck...

My understanding was that show was always going to be 4 seasons long and was written that way from the beginning. I dont think Sci Fi network would can the biggest hit they've had and a critical success to boot. I don't think an episode has been broadcast in the US for the last couple of weeks which would explain why it isn't online but it did screen in the UK which is why some people have seen episode eight. I might be wrong about this. Great series and looks to be building to a big conclusion, its worth a thread on its own.

Both will edit HDV material fine but if your buying a system for editing then I would go with a desktop. You just don't get the reliability, speed, and upgradibility on a laptop. Unless you intend to edit onsite or you need portability then there isn't really any benefit to having a laptop, especially as a work station sitting in your room. For the money saved by getting a moderately specced Mac Pro you could probably get a cheap laptop on top. This is my preference anyway. Good luck.

Two movies I love for the way they're lit in these types of scenes are "Altered States" and more comically a short by Wim Wenders which I forget the name of but its part of the "Ten minutes older: The Trumpet" shorts collection. "Altered States" does some great stuff with some unmotivated (or motivated in the minds eye I guess) sparklers and fireworks going off in the background early on when he first tries the Peyote. Im not sure your going to find anything definitive here but somethings I would look at would be Camera rigs the actors can wear like a Snorre cam perhaps with a set of Shift Tilts and a misaligned shutter effect like in a Paul Cameron film or like "The Limey"'s dream sequences. Good Luck.

Oh and as far as s16mm being to grainy to be considered 2K, while a 500 iso stock might be slower stocks are certainly not to grainy. In fact 7217 can be remarkably clean not to mention '01. Even '18 (I haven't used '19 yet) can look virtually grain less in HD. Its just that S16mm generally gets chosen for its flexibility and texture and its not often that an attempt is made to produce as clean an image as possible because the film makers would probably choose a different format if thats what they're looking for. The BBCs decision has been discussed here before and it seems pretty short sighted to me.

Ultra high definition and 3d broadcast? Is this Back to the Future 2? Film will definetly be to grainy for my romps on the Holodeck with Geordie and Data... Skin tones looked very odd, even after correction, to me. If you were to run the test again I would be interested to see more results shot under daylight. I imagine a better Telecine would eke far more out of the neg than is there but thanks for sharing, I found it interesting.

While it isn't as good as SFTSF it is much funnier. There are also a couple of clips online of behind the scenes footage and stills. I like his commercials as well. Go see it Freya its good fun.

Hi Stephen, How much is it to see a film in London? And whats the DCI standard in the UK, 2K - 4k? Here in Australia its still being discussed but perhaps Dominic Case could chime in there. Projection standard is so low in Melbourne that Ill be lucky to see it in focus with all the speakers working (I'm that guy that goes and complains at the counter in the middle of the film). Considering it was finished photochemically weren't you tempted to see a print? I liked the first teaser trailer... Sasha

Just a note to say that while my experience is limited to shorts I've found festivals very open to accepting genre films and I've had some success in that regard. The point is that generally festivals have a particular taste or even program that they're trying to fill and while they might enjoy your film it just isn't a fit for the festival. Fair enough. A waste of time? Well its the only place some films ever get screened (and on the big screen to) so while your expectation shouldn't be to leave with a picture deal at worse you got to watch your film with an audience. But; there are certainly some dodgy, rip off organizations out there and be very wary before entering a festival with costs involved. While I'm not against the service they provide (and they do it very well) I've always thought Withoutabox.com needed to do a better job of vetting some of the festivals involved. Its just so easy to blow $50 US on an entry and not really know anything about the festival you're sending it off too. There are some great European festivals which have free entries and provide accommodation to participants, that's hard to pass up. I agree that if your intent is to sell your film then you should be at a market like AFM or Cannes but I don't have any experience there. Sasha

Ive heard that before as well though it was told as a joke with some truth to it. Its hard to ignore the environmental expenditure of film and shooting with film but it strikes that its an area were there is a concerted effort to improve and financial bonus to those that operate efficiently. Plus a lot of regulation, government or otherwise. Manufacture of new film cameras is a small market due abundance of older capable cameras still in operation. While a BL is still chugging think about how many Video cameras have hit the scrap heap in the last 25 years. Ive used cameras that were older than I am. Moving to a "Moore's Law", quick obsolesce model for the Film industry is a tough one to bear and its environmental impact could be larger than traditional film practice. Digital is by no means green. Its all kind of moot point because of the complexities in calculating these things but in my experience most labs Ive encountered have made a point of mentioning some of their environmental efforts. How many digital manufacturers have ever even mentioned it. Circuit boards coming to a landfill near you... Up-gradability is all good and well but if your replacing the front, middle and backend of a camera every couple of years then it begs the question of why retain the steel frame. Surely the costs involved would be similar to buying the newer camera. As an anecdote, I'm upgrading my digital projector at the moment from an old data pj to something newer, HD DLP. When it came to getting a new bulb for my old PJ it was only going to be a bit more to get a totally new fully specced one under warranty While I'm paying twice the price of a new bulb Ill be getting a whole new unit which I'm much happier with. This is the kind of world which we're entering into.

There is a pro-boll petition now. The ass whupping he gave to those online critics a few years ago was priceless. I think this is what happens when you have a career despite everyone telling you that you shouldn't, he's obviously had to fight for everything hes got. The Eli Roth bit is great.

Hi Keith, Ive been looking out for this seven promo as well but have missed it (Very little to watch on 7). Was the Promo in HD? I only ask because we've delivered Digibeta for commercial work and my understanding was that commercials were all still broadcast in SD in Australia, I don't know whether that extends to promos. Also my understanding was that 7 broadcast in 720p so that may help explain some of the capture difficulties, I could be wrong though? I have the same setup as you, a usb stick HDTV which I got for $50 off ebay, it looks great and my reception is good but the capture is SD Mpeg2s. For what its worth I understand that the new Alex Proyas film shooting in Melbourne is a RED show but this is unconfirmed. There are going to be a lot of RED cameras for rent here, apart from the private owners I know of one larger rental house is apparently expecting 60 nationally. I expect the rental price is going to be very competitive, makes me wish I owned a set of PL primes their rental price will likely sky rocket. Does anyone else know of any local work on TV which is shot on RED?

Save up and get a 24' as all 22's, as far as I know, are TN panels which are good for gaming but poor for video and color rendition. Generally I like the Samsung and Dell panels, don't bother wasting money on an Apple display as the are very overpriced. A good monitor is something which can last you through several upgrades so its a safer investment than most computer equipment. If you need cheap but capable 22 Ive always thought the Chimei screens were alright, I really don't like Acer. Its surprising how often different brands have exactly the same panel in them. Hope this helps.

Hi Richard, Actually big companies have been using web forums for a long rime now to push there products and have been known to hire pr firms to pose as members of the public for long periods of time (posting innocuously, becoming part of the 'community') before 'activating' them to build hype about a particular product. Its quite insidious, and sometimes the pr firms will lie in wait for many months before starting the campaign. Quite a few tech firms have been caught out doing this as has Sony and I'm sure others. Its probably more significant in the prosumer world and I don't expect this is the type of site which would be targeted. Have a look at the history of alliwantforchristmasisapsp.com (I think thats what it was called) for a pretty hilarious blunder on Sony's part. Unfortunately the web works both ways and clever companies take full advantage. I think a well run and honest forum would be a good way for a company to engage with its customers but there would be a limit to how open a discussion that community could engage in. Food for thought. Sasha

I've done a couple of short film EPKs for different projects and they are pretty standard documents with the materials you listed. Generally the festival will use them to generate their programs or for their website so whatever you send them gets printed. My only tip would be to keep it as short as possible, two pages. I would send it in hard format and on cd with some stills. It's just about making it as easy as possible for the festival. Ive seen some 6 page EPKs for shorts and what busy festival office is going to want to wade through all that? Include shooting and screening formats and a picture of the director. I made the mistake of sending a picture of myself with a chimpanzee and thats what they printed in the program at one festival so there isn't a lot of vetting of the materials. Also include a list of your festival screenings as this is useful information for them as well. Hope this helps.

Why did you need a gun at the gym?

I have one still from set which I hope the crew don't mind me posting, its not particularly informative because you can't see the lens but I hope it gives some idea that its at least possible if not practical. This was a very complicated grip and lighting setup and it was quite tough pulling an exposure out of the eight rolling Xray lightboxes on set (yes, you read that correctly) which you can see some of in the background. I should also say I shot most of this film rated 1/2 a stop under on the various stocks I used and corrected semi successfully in TK although it was a bit of a battle. Minimum focus was a constant headache.

Hi Mark, Ive shot R16 with round front Lomo Anamorphics before on a PL mount R16 SR2 for a video finish. It was a short and it was all shot (apart from a DV and animation segment) with one FL 32mm lens (originally for 35mm obviously) in the spirit of an experiment as part of a graduate production. From my experience it's not necessarily a viable production pathway in particular when you do the math on negative area compared to cropped S16 but we did it for various creative and practical reasons including the fact we had the R16 SR2 and it was something I had wanted to try for a long time. After shooting with it for 7 days all I can really relate is that it was a big shift for me to go from an exposure base of T2 which I usually shoot around on 16mm and having to light it up to a F4 or 5.6. Because the lens was fairly long I lit most of the film from above and that was also a new experience. As far as it competing with S16 cropped or otherwise I don't really see why it would as R16 is mostly confined to the realm of art or education projects these days and most 'competitive' productions would opt for S16. Maybe thats been said already, I'm sorry I didn't read the whole thread. This has been discussed here before (infact it was this sight which sparked the idea several years ago) and its worth having a look at if you havent already, someone had posted some clips. I would post some images but I'm nervous about doing that without asking the permission of the director and producer who are in Japan but if theres interest I just might try and rip some off the dvd. Best wishes, Sasha