Robert Houllahan

I setup a shot where we had an actor shot back to front with a rifle I used a compressed air canister (small one for filling tires and the like) with a hose and a "duster" valve which was attached to a small poly hose I ran up the actors clothing. We rigged a rubber filled with red gloopy stuff and loosely taped it to the actors chest and placed a cut in his shirt where we wanted the blood to come from. The first take was great because the rubber did not break and there was a big balloon filled with blood and guts on the guys chest. :P The second and third takes came out great with a big blob of blood flying out real horror show... Not perfect but safer than squibs and paintball guns I think it's clothes and position dependent but looks great on film when it works right... -Rob-

I know a few engineers at hi end facilities in NY who have been stockpiling crt monitors (D24's and D32's) most of the lcd's which have been evaluated by these guys are not acceptable, including the really expensive "this LCD does everything perfect' ones like the sony's or ecinemas. CRT still rules. I was at a Filmlight show a while back and they had the Baselight hooked up to a nice 50" panasonic 1080p plasma I thought it looked great but I have a plasma at home and prefer the color and contrast to lcd. my .02 -Rob-

This is really good to know Mike, I am trying to setup a fix for a messy post start on a feature I am shooting, about half of the 300 rolls of Super16 have been transfered to D-Beta in 4:3 letterbox I was not in on this decision but that is film making and it worked at the time. I was wanting to make Flex files from my keylink and have 10bit 16:9 SD files to edit with so a simple timecode in to a quicktime recorder with free run record with LTC and hour 1 at the first "k" frame. Sounds like a intern torture job setting tc for every flat... rob

I am one of those people who recommend a "professional" (non DV) format for film matchback keycode reading. It is not because we make more on DvCam or Beta tape but the amount of trouble I have seen with people trying to use DV for matchback cutting. The only professional decks which accept external timecode in (LTC) for MiniDV are JVC's BR-600 and the newer 6000, we have a 600 it is not the most reliable deck and is basically unserviceable "prosumer" IMO all Sony and Panasonic recorders disable timecode in for DV record mode. Most DV equipment will only deal with drop frame timecode for NTSC you can set the JVC deck to non-drop but I have seen various cameras people try to use have problems with non drop timecode. Add to this cross compatibility issues between various cheapo dv gear it just turns messy the tape stock is just a few more bucks and if you want just run DV 63min tapes in Dvcam mode for 40 min each and the cost is the same. -Rob-

I believe the Resolve is a modified 2K+ that is Non-Linear grading capable, i.e. it has disk storage and can play multiple streams at once and conform scan files for DI. -Rob-

Computers..... I thought about setting up a DPS system the deck emulation with the reality software is really good, I think some Avid's have virtual deck control and of course more hi end solutions like clipster, etc. are great. I am not one who thinks FCP and or the Mac is the only answer, I find FCP clumsy to edit with on a number of levels and the lack of a cheap DDR on the mac is a problem. For sync to FLEX files with LTC coming from a Keylink I think free run recording with LTC timecode will match tape timecode close enough for the purpose. I would hesitate to edit from a disk recording for film matchback and negative cut but it would be fine for building scan reels with handles which need to be conformed and the advantage of uncompressed 10bit files is worth it for a good looking video cut to show.

FCP will not take in timecode from the keycode reader, nor can it be controlled like a deck by a TLC so there will be no sync to the flex files, you can do direct capture over SDI as we do in our telecine suites but the timecode is free-run. There are 2 solutions available now to ingest uncompressed sdi with timecode. The first is VVTR with the LTC option at around $2k for software and timecode support, and then uses your G5/MacPro and Decklink card, the second solution is Scopebox with the Horita TCI-50 LTC to 9pin translator box and the G5/MacPro/Decklink combo. VVTR will act as a deck for the TLC and seems to be the most robust solution but is a bit expensive, Scopebox is free run recordings with timecode which may be more of a hack but seems like it would work, I have Scopebox now and we are going to get the Horita box shortly so I can post again after I hook it up to the Telecine and Aaton Keylink keycode reader... -Rob-

You would scan the original negative. -Rob-

I looked at the Specs for the SI-2K and SI Mini I think they would be ideal for electronic long term timelapse with modification to ruggedize the camera and recorder and they already support WiFi and IP connectivity for remote management. You will want to get a copy of SOLII for the Palm and Sunpath for Mac/Win to be able to calculate sun and moon movements and sunset sunrise times and transit paths. Just google Sunpath software and Star Pilot for the palm os... Good luck.. -Rob-

If it is a HD image you are going for I would skip the HDV camera route entirely and look for a set of camera heads with HD-SDI outs to use with a PC/MAC based disk recorder. You could also think about using a camera like the SI-2k (siliconimaging.com) which is a raw hard disk recorder based system with a removable head that you could package as a whole in a case with a battery backup and then possibly connect to direct power on the pole and have a wifi connection to monitor the camera/recorders over IP.... and maybe even download files too. The camera is basically a PC with a camera head and I would bet the software guys at SI would be able to configure and customize your cameras for your needs. For something more proven a set of super16 modified 100' load camera like a Filmo or Bolex and the addition of a motor like the Revolution (intervalometer.com) a battery and a/c power to maintain battery life. Then come around and change out the 100' rolls every few weeks... no computers to crash runs hot or cold...go for any transfer you like...SD, HD 2K..... -Rob-

I know of a few people who do this professionally at a high level with both dslr and 16mm, I think it really depends on how much detail (i.e. interval) you want and how complicated you can make the taking rig. The Bolex/Norris is a classic but a HD camera head with a PC and can be flexible but be aware of long term power issues, where do you intend to rig the taking camera? will that location cahnge? -Rob-

I personally have shot in weather that was -15c in an ice storm and from a helicopter in the middle of January with the door off I think with the wind chill it was much colder (100mph + -10f out damn cold) look at the many productions that have been done on everest or the north or south poles, brittleness is not necessarily a problem.. -Rob-

It seems to me that Seinfeld was a more "created" bubble of a world which is meant to be ever so surreal where CYE is more as if it is a reality style doc than a film, of course both are highly "created" it was funny to see some early curb shows which were more doc (dsr500 ? ) and less polished... -Rob-

Cool, Did lucas use this technology to make Greebo shoot first? could viewers of his later "films" use this to remove jarrbar-binks? ("they removes-um me from da film massah?") if used on gangster films do guys in suits show up to the software developers cubicle farm with ak47's ?? the possibilities are endless... -Rob-

Just about any lab will do this for you for a small fee, esp. if you are going to do process and print ot transfer with them. -Rob-

You just need a camera which can be run with a long shutter duration, I have an eyemo with the revolution animation motor and i can program the motor to hold the shutter open i.e. 1 sec duration shutter2 sec interval or run at 1, 2 ,3 fps should get the streak you want. Depends on the speed of the motion, etc. -Rob-

This thing looks great is it reloadable? -Rob-

Furthermore, most still lab equipment I have seen in incapable of processing mp film because the still machines are not continuous like a MP processor, i.e. the have cards to attach a roll of 24-36 exposures too, and to do a push the machine stops and leaves the film souped for longer. I went to a few still labs recently to see if any of them had a used E6 machine we could adapt and found that the only similarity to our MP operations were the twin checks. Most any lab that runs ECN2 will run E6 in the machine for a cross process, this includes labs that do Super-8 ECN. -Rob-

Here is a great NY Times article about the real costs of film production: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/12/business...a/12strike.html They could shoot everything on DV for cost cutting and it would not make a dent in this monster. -Rob-

Was it a new 235 ? he is just helping to keep Arri in business... I actually liked that film I am sure it had nothing to do with the lead actress.... -Rob-

I have heard of people dumping mags of exposed film in the trash because the take was known bad...I have not heard of nor seen any used unexposed film sold as short ends, and I have to agree that this would be a hit or miss to catch in a clip test at the lab, you might just get blank loaded film in that foot.. A real bummer but I guess you have to trust the production co that sold the film as recans or short ends did not shoot it, these guys might have had 3 blank rolls come back from the lab when they shot and had a time wondering what happened to their takes... -Rob-

I was 1 :blink: I did see that NHK system at CineGear in NYC back in the day, it was some 16mm xfered to analog HD I thought it looked great. Did not know (other than vaguely) about the 1948 7551 system.... -Rob0

All proper telecine suites are capable of transfering film at just about any frame rate from 1fps to 40 fps and 30fps is no problem, actually it would be 29.97 run speed on the film to 29.97 run on the G5 or Deck so 1:1 is possible and easy to do. To make it 24fps you can then do a speed change in FCP. Rob "tireless answerer of questions and occasionally technically ignorant" Houllahan

I have asked around on the TIG and it seems I am wrong, :o and that doing a 3:2 removal does leave you with 24PsF frames like a F900 I believe..but doing the pulldown removal in post using cinema tools is the best way as I and others have run into issues with using the realtime on card inverse telecine as it does not always get the cadence right and leaves interlace artifacts sometimes.... -Rob-

On the first part I don't think DOF has much to do with the reasons, if anything shooting with Spherical lenses instead of anamorphic lenses for 2.40 can yield a potential for shallower DOF due to wider lens openings and less lighting requirements. The use of 3-perf Super35 for a "panavision" 2.40 wide aspect has to do with the use of less light, longer run times on mags, and usually the DI post workflow instead of photochemical/print workflow (You probably have to do a proper 4K DI to match the photochemical in many terms) I think many films opt for this hybrid Film/Digital workflow for any number of reasons these days... On the second, Yes! well more precisely all 16mm photography (std or super) is shot with spherical lenses (there may be a few experimenters out there with Anamorphic lenses for 16mm but it's rare) the basic answer to your question is the difference between Spherical and Anamorphic photgraphy, google Anamorphic and Panavision I am sure there are plenty of good wikki pages on the subject. -Rob-