Robert Houllahan
-
Posts
2,236 -
Joined
-
Last visited
Posts posted by Robert Houllahan
-
-
Oh excellent, I'll keep an eye out for that Zenitar lens - sounds great! I really hate the distortion on the Peleng but it *could* be useful in some situations...
By the way, the lens / viewfinder on my K3 has been re-centred.
Did they do a full super16 mod to this camera, there seems to be an emulsion mark in the super16 area of the footage. When converting a camera to Super you have to mill all of the surfaces which come into contact with the area of the film just widening the gate will not assure a scratch free negative.
-Rob-
BTW I use my Peleng 8mm lens in a nikon mount on my eyemo, now thats wide! O
-
You might want to consider having a duplicate negative made of your print and then transfer that. This is a more expensive method that a straight transfer from the Print but can yield very good results. That said I have seen some very good looking transfers from 35mm print from new modern telecine(s) like the Spirit, DSX, etc.
-Rob-
-
Mr Kubrick seemed to like having all or most of his lighting in frame in some scenes of his pictures. Look at the Korova or the cat-womans house and there are tons of exposed practical bulbs in frame or the moonbase board meeting in 2001 with the large lit walls or the ball scenes in Eyes wide shut with the Christmas tree lights.
Rob "my aunt worked for SK on "killers Kiss" Houllahan
-
So, don't reuse it all to save quality and to save the masters for the future in case something goes wrong.
Correct? Thanks for the advice.
If you could link me to a place that sells tapes for 3$ for an hour I'd appreciate it, I bought mine from Best Buy for $10 for 2.
Check out edgewisemedia.com they have panasonic minidv's for as little as 2.60 ish per tape in quantity. i would, however, strongly recommend spending that 4 or 5 bucks you are currently spending by getting pro grade tapes which seem to be less prone to dropout which plagues dv when reused (and sometimes when fresh)
-Rob-
-
Hi, I also want to transfer 8mm 16 and 18fps to miniDV and edit it on liquid edition. 8mm is only video and no sound. Can liquid acquire single frames by external imput (like sync input)?
I have a liquid silver and I was a beta tester back when it was a Fast product. As far as I know liquid does not have a single frame timelapse style capture tool i.e. to work with a workprinter, etc. Any telecine house using a real telecine (rank, BTS, Spirit, etc.) can transfer to PAL and either do 25fps to 25fps or set the film speed to 24fps and record PAL 25fps. We can do it with our rank turbo with metaspeed servo.
-Rob-
-
You shouldn't really ever have the opportunity to compare, so thats a bit of a bold statement. :D The point of doing a DI is to do things you can't do in the lab - for example grading parts of the frame. So there should never be a point when it is possible to compare the two. Besides, modern film makers can't make their mind up without seeing 50 different options, and thats a bit expensive and time consuming in a lab!
It was late I meant to say that a 35mm photochemical finish will beat out 90% of the "Budget" DI work and I bet if you look into everything as a total package the "straight" 35mm job from stock through prints will be pretty even with either a HD or S-16 or esp. 35 with a Di of some flavor (is a Spirit/2k grade to D5-HD, assemble and filmout a DI??) and furthermore just having every possible option does not mean you will do anything competent with them.
That said I have a film we are working on which is 90% S-16 and a good 100,000 feet and the post path is a mess and that is my own fault :angry:
-Rob-
That said I have a film we are working on which is 90% S-16 and a good 100,000 feet and the post path is a mess and that is my own fault :angry:-Rob-
Oh and that is a film I am co-producing and shooting I do not want to give the impression I messed up a Cinelab customers film, just my own. Not that there is anything really wrong with it I just could have made it easier on myself if I had put a little more planning into the post path when I started shooting it.
:angry: :angry:
-Rob-
-
Hi,
That said, there's practically nothing you can't do in After Effects or even just a nonlinear editor that you can do in Baselight, but there does come a point where it's such a hassle that it's not really usable in that role.
You can make AE perform primary grades on a 1K proxy (which is what most Baselights work in) on quite modest hardware.
Phil
Phil there are many things that you can do in a color finishing system (scratch to baselight) which you cannot do in a NLE or are ridiculously hampered in a compositing package. I know of no nle system which can do self calibrated color management from scans to final print stock and account for the viewing enviornment in such a way that it will be consistent.
Furthermore all of the color grading systems do work in real time with 2K files and the Baselight will work in real time with 4K files all of these systems will play proxies but if you have a Baselight 8 why would you? esp. if you are working on finishing a 4K project.
-Rob-
-
I realize that you're actually praising the product here, but that's a bit like saying that a Boxster lacks some of the more mature performance of a Turbo Carrera - except that the cost differential between Scratch and a Lustre or Baselight is actually greater than that.
So true and a Baselight 8 might qualify for even more exotic car status than a mere porsche. And I have driven both and you can keep the boxter, really.
The fact is that there are really very few markets in the US or elsewhere in which there exists a client base that is willing to pay what it needs to cost to justify the more expensive toolset, given the volume of work. It's understandable that Los Angeles based DI companies may be using Baselight 8's, because in that market, there are large studios that will pay between $300K and $500K for a DI. Those clients, and those kinds of numbers, don't exist anywhere else in the world, with the possible exception of once or twice a year in London. While the volume of work done in DI suites may be growing, the prices being paid for them are shrinking. Cost effectiveness is the name of the game once you set foot outside of the city of Los Angeles. There is practically nothing one can do on a Lustre or a Baslight system that one cannot do on a Scratch system. The differences are primariily in operator convenience (you can also relate this to efficiency) and overall throughput.
While I agree with what you are saying there is market for 2K+ and Pogle products all over the world and a new Davinci or Pogle is certainly in the exotic car price bracket of the Italian variety. Both Assimilate and Filmlight were kind enough to lend us machines to evaluate and I have looked at a Lustre system and taken a look at speed grade as well, the only system I have not yet seen is Film master. My impression as of right now is that the Baselight4 could be a direct replacement for a 2K or Platinum with all of the added benefits of non linear workflow (as could Lustre) where scratch and speed grade could not compete with the rt hardware and the interactivity of the interface. This could easily change in the future as software features are easy to add and computer power grows day by day (along with their consumption of energy) so this market segment is a free running target right now IMO. Also I think that when you compare the cost of a full Spirit suite to a scanner/software suite a northlight or arriscan and a baselight seems relatively cheap :blink: and the quality is miles better.
Besides, the largest part of the cost of a "cost effective" DI is the scanning, recording, negative stock, and print stock - and those items have become such commodities in the eyes of the clients that they're practically given away. So if there is to be a healthy DI business, there must be some area in which a facility can make some money.
Well there is the crux but as a part owner of a lab and a filmmaker working on a feature project I feel I need to look. Furthermore a 35mm photochemical finish will look better than 90% of the DI work out there I really feel that we should not be lowering the bar for quality. Take scanning if it is a commodity what kind of scanner is the price based on, I have seen Northlight scans and Spirit scans and the spirit loses hands down but it is the bench mark right? The same applies in other areas.
Don't take this as a business plan :D because I do not know if we can justify getting into the DI business there are many factors and very heavy weights in this segment.
-Rob-
-
I hear a lot about the aforementioned color systems. Why does After Effects never get mentioned? Does it stink? Am I missing something here?
After Effects is a compositor and while it has color correction tools they would feel slow and cumbersome if you were accustomed to using a DaVinci or Pogle (RT hardware, nice interfaces) or the above mentioned software based color tools.
-Rob-
-
Assimilate Scratch is used by many facilities worldwide, from large to small. It is used for everything from playback of full resolution files for visual effects purposes to DI conforming to color correction.
We have been looking at software color grading systems and I had a Scratch system here for a while, I thought it was a good stable capable system for 2K and although in my opinion it seems to lack some of the more mature color grading tools found in a Baselight or Lustre it is more than useable and has impressive performance. I would think that a properly calibrated viewing enviornment (esp if you are going back to film) would be a more pressing concern.
I really wish assimilate would find a better name for this product as it matures, what were they thinking? Here let me put your film on this scratch machine! It detracts IMO from what is otherwise a fine product.
-Rob-
-
Kodak has a chemical sieve and fungicide available in the catalog a can (they come in a paint can, I do not remember exactly the quantity but it is a fair amount) is available for less than $100.00 this product or some similar dessicant might be a good idea if you cannot control the storage conditions or find another place to store your materials.
-Rob-
-
Hi Marty,
I asked AlphaCine Lab about that. While it is true that most everyone has switched to a video work flow, Alpha told me they get about two jobs per week requesting 16mm answer prints. The clients are mostly "experimental filmmakers" and few of them request optical sound tracks.
Our 16mm print and answer print workload is considerably higher than that during the school year, in fact our print machine runs daily for the schools up here in new England. There are schools in Boston who have traditional film programs that, I think, would surprise people even in the industry that they even had a film program, much less one based around the Steenbeck.
Dominic, I was trying (badly) to make some differentiation between what would generally be considered a "release" print (i.e. 1500 35mm prints, etc.) and a 16mm "release" print for the art house circuit. I like the term "show" Print. I should know better as I do work at a lab every day although, unlike my colleagues here, I do not have 30yrs. experience running a lab and if I did I would have practically had to start working in my diapers.. :blink:
Steve I think our pricing for this is similar to Alpha's and your 16mm re-estimate sounds right. We do get quite a few answer prints with optical sound, we send the track out for creation. I think this method will have to at least change to Cyan track in the future as soundtrack developer is not so nice....Maybe making some kind of sync track using the optical sound track and a modified projector which reads cyan and syncs to a digital audio player....
-Rob-
-
Hello friends -
I'm a director who has recently moved from the balmy environs of Los Angeles to arctic San Francisco. My garage here is unattached from the house and unheated. That means that the temperature at night is going to drop to 35-45 and during the day will soar to 55-65. Humidity is maybe 70% - 80%.
I think that the humidity will be your biggest problem, where there is water and food there is mold to eat it. Film of various types is food to mold and the glues used to bind the magnetic coatings to the backing on videotape are also tasty to mold. The ideal would be cool and dry but a decent de-humidifier is probably easier and cheaper to install/run than a complete climate control system.
-Rob-
-
Contact printinting an I/N ought to be fine. That was standard in ECO days. & reduction prints of 35mm features were B-wind, same as a reversal original or print from a contact printed I/N.
That was convenient for cutting in stock footage.
But the contrast today would be too high.
16mm prints have a double standard when it comes to print wind.
That has more to do with sharpness losses in a continuous contact printer. There really is a resolution limit
in the contact printers of around 50 l/mm.
But not in the optical step printer.
Not to go off topic here but I have recently seen allot of Super-8 optically blown up to 16mm on a JK optical printer and it looked great.
-Rob-
-
What's confusing then about your original post is the term "release prints" which implies mass distribution of large numbers of prints (usually from a duplication master), not a couple of prints made for screenings, which you would just call "prints" or maybe "show prints" or "composite prints".
Anyway, definitely you'd want to shoot negative, not reversal.
I guess when I say "release" print it means a print you would want to "release" to the (limited) public :D as opposed to a slot print (for sound check) or check print (to adjust color) We also commonly call a "release" print a "Answer" print which I will stick to in the future here perhaps that is a good one because it is a answer to whatever the filmmakers question is......
-Rob-
-
I just want to make sure that Steve Hyde is not under some impression that you can nationally distribute 16mm release prints to theaters for a feature, because it is unlikely.
I agree that it is not likely, I just wanted to point out that 16mm print is still alive and there are many people using this form for their personal work. Technical limitations like the optical soundtrack can be considered a plus if that is the aesthetic you are looking for.
I would not advocate a std16 print as a route to national distro in multiplexes :blink: but I did like what I saw of the film we printed that was played in a fairly big theater as this is not the normal venue for 99% of the 16mm print work we do.
-Rob-
-
It was a set of shutter blades in a box labeled to fit an Eyemo, containing about 5 different shutter blades, such as a 90 degree, a 45 degree, etc and the one I mentioned above. Sorry, I don't have a picture. They were not made by B+H, so they were not standard to the camera. Kinda sorry I didn't buy them, just to see what kind of novel effect that one shutter blade would have.
I have one of these kits which I bought new last year for my eyemo. It is a fairly simple procedure to take the front of the eyemo off and swap out the shutter disc. I bought this kit from From patrick loungway Email: <pokomoke@yahoo.com>
-Rob-

-
First of all, hardly anyone projects 16mm anymore, but even if you found some (rare) venues, how many prints do you need? You can make a dozen safely off of the original negative (but make a protection IP just in case). Do you need more than that?
There are still many people who are making 16mm answer prints and there are many venues from art house cinema, museum and underground which have projectors and will run a 16mm print. We printed a feature length film in 16mm, color with sound, and it ran in a local theater here in New England I was personally surprised at how good it looked projected on a multiplex screen.
16mm print is a big part of our business and I feel that "traditional" style film-making has merits which cannot be found in the digital world. I am just about finished cutting a 10 min short on my friends steenbeck everyone who does this seems to fall in love with their workprint I have cut many things on NLE gear and found nothing to fall in love with and furthermore I find nle cutting remote and impersonal compared to the flatbed.
All of the materials are available (IP/IN print MP, etc. stocks) and the heart is still beating on this creature.
-Rob-
-
Hey everyone,
I'm shooting a portrait project that's just starting up. I'm doing some pretty basic portraits of San Francisco artists & characters. But, the thing is I really don't plan on shooting more than 50' per person, and I have two people lined up so far for separate days.
I'm using an Arriflex SR, If I were to shoot someone on a Saturday and I wanted to preserve the rest of the roll for my shoot with the other person on Monday, will my film hold up fine if I leave it in the mag all day Sunday?
I'm assuming yes, it'll be fine. But would it be OK to store it in the fridge, or could that cause some condensation?
Your input will be appreciated :)
I have done this many,many times with no adverse reactions, I would not put the mags in the fridge, nor would I leave them out in the sun, etc. a nice cool dry place for the camera gear and mags should be fine.
-Rob-
-
Thanks allready for the reply's, I am talking with my producer at the moment what option is best!!
Are there special labs, because i'm shooting s16mm, where i should not go too because they are only specialised in 35mm?
Most labs will run 35mm & 16mm ECN in the same machine so if their chemistry and consistency is good with 35mm (it better be) it will be the same with 16mm. From there it is a handling issue after the roll is removed from the film processor, i.e. Super16 has to be handled with regard to the extended negative area.
Assuming that you are shooting Color Negative I would move towards a lab with a great 35mm reputation because it will carry over to Super16 as well.
-Rob-
-
i came across Cinelab which is based in New York as well, anyone had a good experienc with this lab?
We are actually based in Massachusetts, we have a drop at the Standby Program www.standby.org, There are many excellent labs in NYC.
-Rob-
-
Maybe it's mel proselytizing himself O-Dei style :blink:
Seriously in the 5 years now I have been at Cinelab we have never been as busy with 16mm. Not just Negative but zillions of feet of B+W reversal and Tons of 16mm color and B+W print. Film Film Film.
As to the Discovery network If I were shooting Old Man Teuttle squeezing Jr. Teuttle's head I would only use Todd-Ao 70mm as this would be the only way to capture the true essence of the beating.
-Rob-
-
Could someone point me in the direction of this particular screw?
On my LTR54 it is on the right hand top side of the camera at around the same level as the silver run switch there is a cap you remove and then you use a allen wrench to retract the beam-splitter from the optical path.
-Rob-
-
Certainly a test should be shot, but the usual exposure for cross processing is a stop faster than factory speed in regular chemistry, sometimes more, so in this case, ei. 200. Negative developer is much more active than reversal. What I like to do is rate it normally and pull one stop to keep the distinct cross-process look, but to just slightly curb some of the runaway contrast. I would imagine that if you rate '85 at ei 50 and cross process, you might have an excessively dense negative - highlights would become irretreivable.
We do a fair bit of X-process and i would agree with the above, if you want a 1 stop push rate it "normal" at 100 but if you are shooting normally a 200 rating seems to be correct from my experience.
-rob-
Super 16mm Krasnogorsk-3 footage shot with Peleng 8mm
in 16mm
Posted
You might want to look at the gate guides on the emulsion side if the rail on the S16 side has not been milled to the S16 dimensions it will likely scratch the emulsion because of the pressure being applied by the pressure plate. The other culprits might be the clip in rollers which hold the film around the center ssprocket.
-Rob-