Bryan Fowler

An LD is a common position. Often in live events or tv. the LD's I've worked with were very talented people. I do believe Lighting Technician is a common title in Europe.

Feels like they'd figure that out quickly enough. ?

For me the classifications are mainly the same. However I think of DP / DoP as a roll that covers short projects, concentrating on visuals and how to accomplish the needs of the project. Possibly that's Commercials, industrials, short form docs. For me, Cinematographer leans more to a more formal narrative story telling through the directing of the photography. Tons of overlap. That's just an internal classification I have. I don't correct clients or think much about it.

Others might have different thoughts.

You saying there are productions in your area hiring a director, a cinematographer, and a director of photography? 

Great Options Ed. Thanks for that.

And yes, realized after the fact that I should have said 100w max for my 12A batteries. But it's ideally for charging a laptop, which I think mine is a 60w power inverter.  (I do realize it's converting DC to AC then back to DC... I wonder if there is a way to direct charge a laptop?) Although I can see powering a small 45W fan I have for the summer months of hell.

It would be great to be able to use a gold mount battery to power a small 100-150watt AC inverter.

Is there already a solution out there for this? Just to run small things like a laptop, or tiny fan, etc?

sorry. humor over internet is weird. = ) 

No rocks planned. I'm basically wanting to copy, or mimic a super duz-all mini cart, to fit in my sprinter a little better. So a few Cstands, 4x4 things, a skypanel and some shot bags won't be near 800lbs. At least I don't think.

I was considering 10in wheels for better clearance coming down the back ramp. (no lift gate on my sprinter) And maybe a little easier rolling over art dept's feet. (joke)

Hoping to find something with a hand brake system so whoever is rolling it down the ramp can easily stop it from getting away from them.

Thanks guys. 

I looked through Backstage's website. I didn't see where I could buy the wheels / casters, with or without breaks.

Luckily I won't have to pack these up, since they'll live on the cart they'll be welded (or bolted) on, in the back of the sprinter. 

I know Inovativ has some very nice ones, and it looks like the disk brake was something custom for them. I'll keep looking, and maybe call them and see if they have ideas.

Hi ladies and gents.

I'm possibly building a custom cart for all my...rocks....or something.

I think having casters that have a remote handbrake would be awesome. Hydraulic would be cool if Google hasn't helped me find anything.

I'm guessing the cart and all the... rocks... will be 800-1000lbs max. Can't imagine it being more, but you never know. 
Any thoughts?

One reason you might hear people talk in watts on set is to make sure the don't trip a breaker when they're on house power.

If you're using the mushroom kind, you should probably get circular polarization antennas. And make sure that your RX, and your TX both have the right kind of polarized. left hand twist or right hand twist. LHCP and RHCP are not that compatible.

At least that's what I heard someone talking about while I was 10-1.

Yeah XQ and 4x4 is 12bit. HQ is 10bit.

Try a test first. it's easy enough.

Shoot Prores 422 HQ, white balance "correctly" then make it clearly wrong. like, 3200 instead of 5600. Then go fixit in post. Same with ISO

Personally, the "easier grading" argument doesn't work for me. if you shoot ProRes HQ there's plenty of data to push around. If you shoot 4444 there's TONS.

I haven't grossly missed my white balance since we had B&W viewfinders. (1995) Sure I've shot at 4000k and later thought, I should have warmed that up some. But that's easy even with Prores LT. hehe

I feel Geoff was right with the politics point. Agency people might think shooting RAW will instantly be noticeable in the final product, so if they want to do that it's fine. Just costs more. 

I think a lot of RAW misconception comes from people coming from photography RAW. If that's the case, they're comparing a JPEG with baked in "look" to RAW, so there is definitely a case for RAW in that situation since it DOES give you more options. 

I'm looking for input on how you guys handle the question of; who is responsible for insuring the production you are on, mainly when you are bringing gear to the shoot. I.E. DP with camera package, Gaffer with truck, or Grip with a box of random gobo heads and a ratchet strap. (that's a joke, I love my Key Grips)

I work in a small market, surrounded by larger ones. So I get everything from, "great, glad you're available with your camera and truck, where should we send your COI" to "Hey, go do that interview with your camera and truck, but first send us proof that you are insured!"

When I ask for a COI from THEM, There seems to be all sorts of opinions on why I should be the one to insure someone else's production. Some calls have told me, "since we're not there, you have to insure it" and, "it's your gear, you should insure it yourself!" as well as, "I wouldn't have to insure a plumber if they came to my house to do work, I would expect them to be insured." - In those situations I'm always trying to kindly explain what is normal. But what is normal? Is normal changing? 

I'm wondering where freelance people like you land on this. Do you require your client to give you a COI for that gear? If you ask for a COI and they say no, how to you judge when you are going to take the risk on yourself, vs pass on the job?

Thanks guys for the input. I ended up doing a underslung thing with a dana dolly. 

This was just a test. But it was close in the end to what we did. It was on a 35mm. Tilted down for the plates, pulling back and tilting up for the end. Didn't see the rails. The actual shot we dropped the camera down just a little bit. This test shot camera build was wonky. Can't post the clip here, but if it shows up on social I'll come back. 

Hi everyone. 

I have a shot I'm trying to replicate on a budget. The camera needs to pull back over a table linearly, revealing 3-4 plates of food. Maybe a 3-5 ft move?

If we had the budget I'd use a fisher with a ubangee, and maybe an RO. But we cant' do that. 
We DO have a dana dolly. I'm wondering if anyone has done something like that with the dana dolly?

Ryan, when you say you compared the inverse square, are you saying you measured the same falloff with both sources? As in, you took a measurement, x=distance from the 216 frame, then doubled that distance and it was 1/4 of the brightness?

I'd try opening a clip in resolve, or FCPX or something else. see if it's a Premiere thing, or in the clip. (maybe you did that already)

But it's not something I remember seeing personally.

Try exporting a clip, or frame. Is it still there? Premiere does dumb stuff to the color and gamma. 

Is this a screenshot from Premiere? Or is it a exported still?

Hi Phil, I like Kits too. 

Generally what I'll be carrying is handheld monitors with 3stud mounts on the back for batteries. Camera accessories that usually all go out together. Naturally every job isn't the same but they're usually close enough. 

What I used to have was the Portabrace Car2 bags (semi rigid) for most things, and Pelican hard cases with padded dividers for batteries and chargers. I usually fit around 6 blueshapes, and 1x 4bank charger in an im2500 carryon size case. (not for flight, that's just the size)

I love that custom case. Makes me wonder if Lmount would work for me now that I need to kinda start over. hah... *whimper*

Hi everyone, I recently have a unique opportunity to replace most of my kit after 15 years or so of building it up. ? Over that time I ended up with different cases and bags to protect things in and out of regular production. Now that I have to repurchase stuff I'm interested in what people are doing for every day use. 

Most of the time the gear is in my house, then in the Sprinter, so I've usually gone with semi rigid bags instead of pelican cases because of the big waste of space with hard cases. When I fly, or someone rents something, I put it in hard cases.

How do you carry the following:

• Handheld monitors (ready to go, with wireless)
• matte box and filters like VIV or Obox
• Wireless Follow focus like WCU4 or Bartech
• Misc cables?
• Primes lenses like Sigma FF, and Canon Cine zooms like 24-105mm etc.
• Batteries? I hate the giant cases to carry 4 batteries, how do you carry 8-10 plus a charger?

Would love photos if you have them. I liked the system that I had, and will just do that again if needed. But I'd love to see what you guys are doing.

Yeah!

Funny you bring it up, it was after hiring Luke, and using his Skypanels that I bought my own S60 (he's in CA, I'm in TN) Then I saw his video on the J16 and it made me more interested.

Good points. As for rentals, most of the time it will be with me. Only occasionally do I send it out with clients when I'm not with them.

I've used the M18 for years and it's been great. But it was just a solid 1.2/1.8k light. nothing special.

I've rented the Joker1600 a few times and it seems great too. Slightly more versatile, but that might be a placebo.

One of the reasons I liked the joker was because of it's size. I have a sprinter, and it seems to pack better in the sprinter.

Is a 1600 too big (hot) for a jem ball? or Leko?

Just wondering what your opinion has been between those two lights.

Easy to use, durability, usability? I'm asking as a purchase, not a rental.

I have my own opinion about them after using them both, but I'm looking for others.

Thanks!

Thanks everyone for the advice. I'll check out these things and see what I can find.