JD Marlow

Hi everybody, I'm just finishing up a 35mm short film that I shot back in November and I'm looking for a good post-production house to shoot titles for me. I've called DuArt but have had a hard time getting a hold of anyone over there (nobody is picking up!). Does anyone have suggestions of companies that they've worked with for doing titles? It doesn't have to be on the east coast. Basically, I've got 7 static titles and 120 lines of crawling text that I need for the film. Like most people, I'm looking for a good rate from a place that can also produce nice looking, and yet pretty basic, titles to put to negative. Any / all suggestions would be helpful. Thanks everyone. -JD

Hello, Just as a follow up, we shot this film in November using the 2000' of discontinued Vision 1 stock that Kodak donated to us. Not only did the film turn out great but the scene we shot with it is really beautiful. Here is a screen shot so you can see. Unfortunately this originated from a Beta SP tape format, so it's not the greatest quality. But you get the idea. -JD

What about doing an HDCAM or straight-to-hard-drive telecine of the final answer print of the film? I'm thinking that would be cheaper because we're talking 1800 feet instead of 18,000 even though it's a separate transfer from the one I'm doing now. I've already made the decision to get the footage on Beta SP tapes with the Keycode burned into the black letterboxed frame (so that I could matte it out if I needed a clean version from these tapes). Would I encounter any serious difficulty in just waiting until I had the answer print to make a separate transfer for highest resolution DVD distribution? -JD

What about going straight to hard drive simultaneous with Beta SP transfer? There's about 18,000' feet to transfer (3 hrs 20 min) to eventually be about a 20 minute short. Could I hi-res in AVID using the straight-to-hard-drive transfer files later on for a DVD? -JD

Hi, I just finished shooting a 35mm short film and will be doing a straight one-light telecine to BETA SP with Keycode burned in (for eventual print back). My question is, to do a separate transfer version for DVD distribution, what is the best tape format to use for the telecine? I was considering doing two versions of Beta SP -- one with keycode and one without, then just doing a 1:1 export from AVID with the no keycode version. But after doing some research (and realizing Beta SP is wasteful of 35mm's high resolution) I've considered just doing one with keycode, then doing a separate, shorter telecine using an EDL later on to a better format like HDCAM for the finished film. Does that make sense as something to do in this situation? -JD

Hi, I'm shooting a short film on 35mm upcoming this weekend and have two 1000' rolls of Kodak Vision 5274 (200T) in addition to the Vision 2 200T stock. This is the older discontinued stock from Kodak that they stopped selling over a year ago. It is a donation from Kodak for my shoot and I want to be able to use it. They told me it is approx. a year old but it has been stored in their own facilities during that time. In anyone's opinion, will this stock be OK to shoot with? -JD

I shoot all the time with my Canon XL-2, usually shutter speed at 1/24, frame rate at 24p advanced, and 16:9 aspect ratio. Even when i'm closed down pretty far, blacks seem to always come in fairly grainy. Is there a way to shoot source footage from the XL2 that doesn't have the grain that blacks almost always show? Thanks in advance. -JD

Joshua, Thanks for your help. I don't have an 11-pin Fischer cable. But I wouldn't really need to power the thing from the SR, would I? I'm really looking for a cost-effective alternative for getting a Video Tap so that a BNC cable could run to the SR1. Do you know of any rental houses or companies that can offer a video tap cheaply?

Hello all, Is there any way to do a video tap from the Arri SR-1 16mm camera to a small LCD monitor? I'm not really talking broadcast monitors here -- just something as small as a 2.5" LCD screen. I've been told different things about having to re-wire the inside of the camera, etc. But if anyone can provide a straight answer it would be much appreciated. Thanks in advance.

I'm an editor working on a 16mm short film that is in the can. The director and DP are making a transfer this week but want to know what the best format for transfer would be. I suggested Digibeta under the assumption that going digital (opposed to Beta SP) would create a lossless format for capture / re-capture / export, etc. What is the best format to transfer to from 16mm color film stock? AND will transferring to Mini-DV or DVCAM result in loss of quality for import or export??? Thanks.