Shane Bartlett

Hi David, Would you mind explaining, or giving an example of how flashing affected the look of Northfork (a screenshot, perhaps)? I am interested in the process, but know little about it. Beautifully shot film, by the way. --S

And I remember reading the "rest of our equipment got stolen and we only have this one body left" story sometime within the last twelve months. I have read that in the last month, and I'm pretty sure it was the same picture, but a different seller.

I was working on a project with a very similar situation. the gaffer tried something I've never seen before: taking a flex fill, (you may need more than one depending) and bouncing whatever you use to source the fire in the silver or gold side, and shuffle and shake it around. You can also use sheets of regular household aluminum foil, if you don't have a flexfill, or if your flex is too large for the space you have to work with. I agree it looks much more natural than dimmers and flicker effects. I've done two interior fire scenes, and for both I used an ungelled tungsten fill light, one light pointed away from the subject, gelled with Roscolux #19 Fire (http://rosco.com/us/filters/roscolux.asp#colors), and a second light gelled with CTS, bounced into a sheet (or sheets) of foil and wiggled around at whatever speed suits your vision. Add a little fog. Looks great. You'll have to fiddle with placement, or use a lower wattage lamp like a tweenie for the #19, else the red will be too heavy.

I just shot a short on the HVX200, and used an Ultracon the whole time due to the look I wanted. It works very well, and can be something of a lifesaver when you're short on lights. However, as mentioned, the contrast will be flat. What he is saying is that, in post, you will need to raise the contrast a bit. Otherwise your image will be muddy. This is easy to do in FCP. I don't know about a film-out, but I did project my short, and I was relatively happy with the look. Not too sharp, not too soft.

Difficult situation. I had a similar situation for a script once, and while I eventually figured out how to shoot it (a 180 MED shot around a woman that transitions smoothly from day to night, ending in a side-angle with a full moon in the background--very anime), unfortunately the script never saw production. I don't have any immediate solutions for your challenge, but, after my experience testing and trying to conceive the above, I can say that re-thinking the way you want to make the shot can help tremendously. I only arrived at that shot through testing--originally, it was much more complex. Simplify, simplify, simplify. And consider your subject matter. Barring a simpler setup, and I'm asking you here, would it work to shoot this day-for-night and very gradually (throughout what seems like a lengthy dolly run) rack open the iris? Perhaps have things wiping the frame--lamp- and sign-posts, etc--to further distract viewers from the bumps in exposure increase. I realize this might not be an attractive idea for most projects (and to be honest I have no idea what this would look like), but for your subject matter it seems like it could be a cheap possibility.

Something like this? http://www.filmtools.com/showcard.html You can also try bead board. (http://www.filmtools.com/1beadboard.html) From my local equipment house it comes in 4' x 8' sheets, silver on one side, white on the other, at $15.00. Cut in half for two 4 x 4's. The silver side is highly reflective, the white quite soft. I don't know what size you consider portable, but even 4 x 4 is pretty large. However, it is very lightweight. For a bit more kick in White bounce, I usually just buy small single sheets of white foam board, as well as the larger tri-fold project board, at just about any school/office supply. Very cheap, and does the trick. Ordering small quantities of these from filmtools probably isn't practical. I'd suggest contacting your local (or nearest) rental house for the beadboard and/or showcard.

"especially when you consider that the camera sounds like a 1960's-era Morris Minor in reverse gear when running." That was my fear. I will check into the Eclair NPR. Thanks. Kenny--Thanks. I missed that post. Tim--Excellent information. I've saved it, and the post linked above, to a file for later reference. For now, it's probably a bit more tinkering than I would feel comfortable doing. Thanks, everyone.

Hello, I am thinking of purchasing an Arri S soon (it is within my budget). I know that this camera can be converted to Super 16 (which I would later do), but it was my understanding that this was strictly an MOS camera. Can it be blimped for sync shooting? Does anyone have any experience with this? Is it worth the effort? Does it make the camera too unwieldy for practical shooting? I would like to start shooting film, but I really don't want to plunk down the money on a camera with limited application. All wisdom regarding this matter accepted with great appreciation.

Do you still have the following cameras? 2. Canon 1014XL-S 3. Beaulieu 6008Sd 4. Beaulieu 4008ZMII Thanks. --Shane

Hey, I know that old warehouse. Worked on many projects there. I agree about the lighting. In general, the footage is very lit. Aside from killing the reflections, I would have topped the lights with flags or blackwrap to keep the light off of the ceiling and the higher reaches of the walls. Given the large space to work with and the high sensitivity of the dvx100, I would have considered bouncing the front light, and flagging as needed (using the remainder of your lights for background dancers and the set). A 4x8 sheet of bead board can be had from Citation for $15. If 4x8 is too big, you can always cut it in half and tape the edges (be sure to overlap the silver side, as it will begin to peel).

I recently had a similar setup--small space, using a cookie, only a few lower-wattage open-faced lights and several 1k Par 64's (but no 35 adapter). Trust me, you will need a big cookie, and you will have to get the PAR 64 pretty far away. In a small space that is a problem. Since you mentioned that you are in your garage, is there a window you could aim it through from outside? Two-inch tape across the window-frame usually works for the venetian blind effect. And you can rig a duyvetyne tent outside to control the amount of sunlight coming through the window.

What's your price?

Or try IMDB.

For my first film, we used two Altman 1k PAR 64's (with VNSP bulbs, ellipsoidal) and some smoke to do the same thing. You can also, of course, use set pieces to help shape the light--like curtains, etc. If you're on a budget, the Altman cans are very cheap (search eBay). Soemtimes you can find Mole Richardson PARs for a reasonable price, too. They probably are not the most elegant lights, but when you're on a budget. . . .

Plays fine on my PC, which I handbuilt in 1999. Pentium 500mHz, 1.2GB RAM, Windows XP Pro. All software updated, and every codec I was ever asked to install . . . plus some. I have to admire you folks who work weddings. At one point, I thought shooting weddings would be great practice, until all of our friends went through a wedding craze and I had to attend 8 weddings in two years. Now I can't stand even sitting through a wedding. However, I think you've got something here, shooting weddings in super 8. I think if you can properly sell the idea, you'll start getting a better response. The nostalgia look, etc. More and more people are liking black and white, as well. My wife, in fact, will not let me photograph her in color unless I light her in such a way that her face is dark enough to cancel the effects of color (silhouette, or slightly washed-out). She says that color film always brings out the worst in a face--the angry red pimples, the scars, the color patches and blushes. At the last wedding I attended, they paid way too much money for a videographer who came in and set up two Canon GL1's, one at a distance, and one behind the altar. The guy turned them on, and walked away. That, to me, is a sales pitch--when someone shoots film, the young marrieds get someone constantly behind a camera, THINKING about what they are shooting. I think a similar pitch can work regarding still photography. I've seen too many digital shooters, most without any talent, who use the shotgun approach and hope for some successes. Some of our poor friends have had to sit and look through thousands of photographs to find the few they wanted to keep. The terrible thing is that a lot of these photographs are nothing more than snapshots--bad composition, unflattering angles and perspectives, etc. Good luck, and keep shooting.

David--everything looks beautiful. Thank you for sharing technical information for these. I, too, would like to hear more about the reversal stock. Next year, I will be shooting a short on 16mm, and I was hoping to shoot some of the project on reversal. The first grab you posted is quite close to the look I was hoping to achieve. How exactly do you deal with the contrast, especially when working in a low-lit indoor scene under tungsten lighting? Which leads to a question I was going to post elsewhere. I was hoping to find out the answers to these questions, and others, by shooting tests on an slr stock. Is 35mm slr Ektachrome at all comparable in response to motion reversal 16mm stock? Better yet, is any 35mm slr stock going to give me a reliable visual idea of how a 16mm motion stock will perform under certain lighting conditions?

The person on stilts at the beginning--very beautiful.

Try Film Tools. They have MSE wire scrims and scrim sets in a variety of sizes (including 6-5/8"), and a handy compatibility chart you can use to make sure you are buying the right size. A little pricey, but so far I have rarely seen a better deal on ebay. You can wait months for the right size to come up, only to find a starting bid of $9.99 and some bozo willing to bid $20 with 5 days left. compatibility chart: http://lib.store.yahoo.net/lib/cinemasuppl...EScrimTable.pdf all scrim sizes: http://cinemasupplies.stores.yahoo.net/wirscrimforl.html 6-5/8": http://cinemasupplies.stores.yahoo.net/658wirdifscr.html Film Tools website: http://cinemasupplies.stores.yahoo.net/ I've purchased a few items from Film Tools, and they ship fast, with good packaging. --

Hi Michael, I look forward to seeing this, if you do post it online. May I ask where you found the script? --Shane

Magnets and DVX is not a good mix. There is a reason the magnet trick is called a hack. Indeed. The DV Rack software will also flip your image for you both vertically and horizontally. It also gives you a waveform monitor and other goodies. Of course, the downside is keeping your laptop powered. . . .

Sounds like a good idea. . .but I have seen mirrors explode seemingly without cause. Almost always it is due to cheap construction combined with extreme heat (from lighting) and/or pressure and gravity. I'm sure a good quality mirror can be mounted on a ceiling safely for the long-term, but I agree that the time and money spent doing that could have been better spent on an arm, without the anxiety that comes with having a large, heavy piece of glass suspended over your crew and talent. I have also seen all manner of monstrously bad constructions that I like to call Lawsuits, all built to save money. Sometimes they work. It comes down to responsibility. If you can't do everything possible to get the shot off safely, don't do the shot. Not to say professional equipment doesn't fail, and not to say that DIY is always unsafe. But if the necessary and relatively safe equipment is stretching your budget, a professional carpenter/machinist/welder probably isn't part of the crew list, either. Wouldn't you, your crew, and your talent feel a whole lot better knowing that their lives weren't in the hands of some guy with a hammer, nails, and a bunch of suspect lumber?

Well, I can certainly see both sides to this, having been on either side of the argument. However, I know that some equipment (particularly thinking of HMIs, or at least the ones we use in school) will not immediately come back on once switched off. If I ever asked someone to "cut off that light", they would turn it off, and then we would have to wait. . . . I have found that redundancy is often the best course of action. "Let's use a flag to cut some of the light off that table, please." No problems, your request is understood, everyones does their job well, and you get the shot off. Hope it looks good. Either way, it beats waiting for equipment to power up again. It could be argued that this fellow knew exactly what you meant, but wanted to be a prick. You'll probably never REALLY know. If you suspect you're working with such people, again, redundancy. It will nearly always cover your tail.

As others have mentioned, practice. I use a changing bag for a lot of large format 4x5 and 8x10 still photography, and it is damned difficult. Even when using smaller 35mm infrared film, I had a difficult time at first. No matter how well you know the equipment, loading blind for the first few times will seem something of a nightmare. Good luck.

Oscar, Most of it is in a very nice book called "The Stanley Kubrick Archives". Regarding makeup, there is no information in the "Archives", and I don't know offhand of any other books. However, I did read an article online some time ago that mentioned a certain type of makeup used (I believe for a still photography shoot) that gave a very similar effect to that seen in Barry Lyndon. I can't remember where I read the article, but a google search ought to turn up something. If you are pretty sure of the look you want, a good makeup artist will know how to make it happen for you. Good luck with everything.