Dror Dayan

I suggest you start by working as an electrician, on student movies or low budgets which don´t require much experience, and see how more experienced people are lighting.

Hallo everyone, I´m shooting a short in a month and have an interesting night scene to shoot and light. A car is driving through an empty city street at night, and as it goes by past the street lanterns the lights go out one by one. We still don´t have a location so I still haven´t discussed the shooting with the director, but I can imagine shooting it from the back of a car driving in front of the actor´s car, from a low angle so that I can see the lanterns go out. But the main question is of course how to light the scene. I´ll probably be shooting 16mm on 500t vision3, I don´t have the budget to push it, even though I´d love to, but I think I might be able to get away with underexposing 1 stop and correcting it digitally, we want it to look dirty anyway. So I guess this choice of stock makes any digital work of tracking the lights and making them black almost impossible, and I would like to do the whole effect analog and on-set anyway. so: my first thought was to hang black cloth on the actual lamps, rig a tungsten lamp underneath, gel it to look good and have an electrician pull out the plugs when the car is driving along. I know the best choice would probably be 5k´s on the lanterns, but I don´t have enough of them and would probably also wouldn´t have enough electricity for it. Would trying 800w´s be a total suicide? I have enough of them and they are also pretty easy to rig. 1k´s and 2k´s are also a little tight on my list, but I guess I´ll be able to get them if I have to. (It´s a student film so we may have some more lamps at school) I will probably try to either have some HMI give a hint of a moon light somewhere in the background, or, what I think could look the best, shoot the whole thing in the magic hour. But I guess for the magic hour the 800w´s would really be too weak, won´t they? so I guess my main question is if someone has a better idea, or if you see some major flaws and if it´s possible to do with the 800w´s. I would try to post some location stills as soon as we have a location. Thanks in advance for your opinions and help! all the best, Dror

Hello everybody, after digging up the archives of the forums I found some answers to my problems, but I wanted to post anyway since a lot of the posts were old or just not very detailed. so, here is our shoot: we are simulating a moving train, day, in studio. the windows are steamed, and the actor clears them up with his finger and looks outside, where the scenery is seen, rushing rapidly. so far I´ve reached the following decisions: - rear or front projection instead of green screen, because the windows are steamed with water drops on them and that would be a headache to key, and impossible with our budget. - we are shooting 35mm with the moviecam, 500t, (probably 5219) in order to have enough light and a to defocus the background enough to hide the projection. - I would like to have one laptop feeding two projectors, one for the rear projection and one as a key light through a frame, in order to sync the lights on the actor´s face to the background seen. would probably "strengthen" this one with a HMI. - I would be shooting the plates digital, probably with the sony EX3, and probably focused and defocus them in the post or on set. the plates will be shoot out of a real train. and now my questions: - DLP/LCD? any known issues? how many lumen to begin with? - should there be any rolling shutter problems with the plates, since I´m shooting EX3 out of a train? (I mean there probably will be, but will they be a problem as defocused back-plates?) - Sync and frequency problems? I´m shooting the MovieCam on 25fps. - any recommendations for the projection screen? I heard Lee Frost is good, and thought about taping two stripes together with fine and transparent tape. I also have a 1/2 Silk 12X12, which is probably too thick and too wavy, I would think. any other options? - any other ideas for planning the test shoot? I would like to know that everything works before going to the principal shooting. there would also be at least one shot where the background has to be pulled into focus. any ideas there, except of putting the screen as far away as possible? any experience, ideas, links or potential hazards are extremely welcome! Thanks and all the best, Dror

That´s also what I know. because the BPM is made up of tiny particals in the glass, if you use a longer lens you have less particals and the spaces between them are relativly bigger, hence less of a promist-effect, hence you need a denser filter... all the best, Dror

Oron, I totaly agree, but sometime I want to know what tools more experinced DP´s as me chose to tell their story with, so I´ll know better how to choose the tools to tell my specific story, and that´s when I usually go to cinematography.com... ;) all the best, Dror

Hallo Everyone, for my end-of-the-year paper at my film school I´m writing about the DV/HDV-shot movies of Michael Winterbottom with Marcel Zyskind as DoP. I´m mostly interested in the "smaller" shoots (in regards of team and lighting) such as "In This World", "Nine Songs", "Genova" or "Road to Guantanemo", but also "a Mighty Heart" and maybe "a Cock and Bull Story". I hope to catch "The Killer inside me" on the Berlinale next week so I can see the other side of the coin with 35mm Cinemascope, but the subject of the paper is the work process on the set and in the pre-production when working with a small and light video camera on original locations with a small team. What does it mean in terms of coverage, in terms of lighting set-ups? what does it allow the director and actors, which is harder with bigger shoots, what are the disadvantages? I know one of Zyskind´s habits is to allways have the camera ready, and sometimes shoot in a documentary fashion even between the takes, when the actors aren´t acting. (they talk about it in the making of of "a mighty heart"). I don´t want to write about it just in a way of "we take a DV Camera and go from pakistan to london", but also analyse the different asthetics that are possible, because "Genova" for example looks different than "in this world". I want to explore different approaches, not just the handheld semi-documentary look. In "Genova" there are also beautiful steady-cam shots through the small streets, and also more use of a tripod. Anyway, as an avid reader of those forums I would really appreciate your thoughts and maybe some links and hints for information, mostly about the way Winterbottom and Zyskind prep the films and how they work on set together. I´m thankful for whatever you got! all the best, Dror

I also liked the film very much, I am writing my second-year-paper in film school about the movies of michael winterbottom with marcel zyskind and about their use of DV/HDV cameras with small teams and set ups, in movies like "genova", "in this world", "the road to guantanemo" and "nine songs". if someone has some thoughts or information on this subject i would appreciate a word! all the best, Dror

You can also connect a 5k dimmer to a second one, and the second one to the lamp. will give you a flicker effect which you can also control with the knobs, but isn´t really very healthy for the dimmers... all the best, Dror

You can also connect a 5k dimmer to a second one, and the second one to the lamp. will give you a flicker effect which you can also control with the knobs, but isn´t really very healthy for the dimmers... all the best, Dror

You can also connect a 5k dimmer to a second one, and the second one to the lamp. will give you a flicker effect which you can also control with the knobs, but isn´t really very healthy for the dimmers... all the best, Dror

Joel: please advertise your rental at the appropriate places. this is a technical forum intended for technical help. thank you. Dror

Joel: please advertise your rental at the appropriate places. this is a technical forum intended for technical help. thank you. Dror

Joel: please advertise your rental at the appropriate places. this is a technical forum intended for technical help. thank you. Dror

Thanks a lot Mr. Mullen, those are really great examples. I´m sure to show that in class. Just wanted to say that I´ve been an avid reader of your posts for a long time now! Thanks again and all the best, Dror

Hallo everyone, I also posted it in "lenses and accessories" Forum, so sorry if I´m redundant: I have to do a lecture as part of my cinematography studies about Promist filters. I wanted to show some good and exciting examples of it´s use. Can anyone recommend a good movie or scenes that show an interesting use of Promist? thanks in advance, Dror

Hello everybody, as part of my cinematography studies I have to hold a short lecture about ProMist filters. Can anyone help me out and tell me of some good scenes that show an interesting use of ProMist? preferably something more than the usual candle-light-dinner setting or old actors with wrinkles... thanks in advance! Dror

A very useful thing to do is also to change the neon lights to a color temperature that suits your needs better, and maybe play around that temperature with your key and fill lights, balancing them to fit the neons. all the best, dror

Hallo Everyone, thank you for the interesting discussion, this is a question Ive been trying to understand and been asking myself and people for a long time. I was having a similar conversation with a cameraman friend the other day, and he said he thinks it is sometimes a very good idea to define the look on the set and in the camera as much as you can in order to (I will say it gently) "force" your visual dramaturgy at the editing phase - because you as cameraman usually dont get to grade the shots until the movie is finished, you can still have your influence on the way the different scenes look color-wise when theyre being edited. I told him I can understand that pretty well but think it may also show a certain communication flaw or lack of trust between cameraman and director when it has to come to this... I would love to hear your opinions on the subject... all the best, dror

The A2 is verx good for indoors, on sunny days on exterior locations you can have a lot of problems finding your point and measuring.

Hi Everyone. it may not exactly be the subject of this thread, but this is something that I don´t seem to understand and it bugs me, when shooting S16 with 35mm optics. I AC´d a student film last month, with the SR3 and BL optics, so we had 35mm optics on our camera. I asked the DoP if it means that we now have to use "wider" focal length, because if for example a "normal" lens for super16 is a 16mm, the 16mm from the BL will be too wide, no? he said the focal lengthes stay exactly the same. I just couldn´t understand how come it dosen´t make a difference if those are 16 or 35 optics. Because of the smaller format it´s like we´re "zooming in", so we should use wider optics to preserve our field of view, or so I thought. I know from photography that if you want to preserve a "normal" field of view for example with 35mm, middle-format or large-format, you have to use 50mm, 80mm or 135mm accordingly. dosen´t it also apply to film cameras? thanks, dror

Hey, On a shoot a couple of months ago we used an a shoulder system from P&S with HVX200 and P&S, and a Sony viewfinder because you really can´t use the LCD or the HVX Viewfinder with this rig. the only problem was that the viewfinder shuts out the composite-out cabel, so you can´t get pure HD signal to your Director´s monitor. but the rig worked perfectly, I had it on my shoulders for a whole week. we attached NP1 batteries to the shoulder System to power up the Adaptor. I´m attaching a picture of the whole system, supported by the "Easy-Rig", another nice supplement for hand camera. I hope that helps and all the best, dror

if the cameraman/woman/operator is using any kind of filter in the matte box, you can see the slate reflecting pretty clear in it. that way you can quickly center the slate. that in combination with the distance measuring technics mentioned before should get you pretty quick to the center of the frame. another thing i like to do is center the slate and then tip it forward, so that I hold it parrelal to the ground, so it´s out of the frame. it helps when the dp an director are still discussing the shot and want to thave a clean monitor. than you can tip the slate back down and are ready to go. hopes that helps! dror

I agree totally with Chris about the production design. we just shot a short film last week with just that look in mind, and the set looked wonderfull. almost no reds, lots of greens and grey. I found it very important to light a little soft, because you´re going to get a lot of contrast in the post-production. a good trick that I know is to simulate the chemical process - in BB they use a B/W developer, that makes another B/W image on top of the color one. you can make it with any NLE editing system, simply by adding another layer of the same image, desaturating it to full B/W, and then mixing the two layers with different layer modes. then you can play around with the transperence of the B/W layer and with the contrast and brightness of both layers, and you achieve a very interessting look that looks (to my taste) much like BB, with pretty much control. some food for thought for the forum: of course HDV will be better than miniDV, but there´s also a lot of talk that DV seprates colors better als HDV. for such a look, is it maybe better to shot miniDV? I shot the film last week with the HVX-200, DVCPRO HD, which was very satisfactory as color seperation. I also don´t know. I really like the FX1, and I also find the lens is better then the XL1, so that is also a consideration, if you´re not shooting with an adaptor. hope that helps! regards, dror

I just finished shooting my first short film last week, so I´d like to add a newlings point of view to that matter. We had a very long pre-production, where we really took the time to develop the visual concept of the film. the work with the production-designer was great, she really understood the pictures that I have in my head and did an amazing job. during the pre-production I had some arguments with the director, who made some visual decisions that I didn´t really understand. but I had the impression that we´re coming to the set ready and in sync with each other. like you mentioned, it was also her first "big" film, and she also dosen´t have a lot of technical knowledge (for example, we explained to her one month before the shoot the difference between different lenses, which is ok, I don´t think every director HAS to know the difference between 25mm and 50mm, as long as he understands the idea) but then on the set everything became terribile. I kept hearing "suggestions" from her like "maybe a 25mm will be better?" or "maybe if you shift your weight from one leg to the other you could creat a smoother movement for the camera". all in all it was like we were working on two different films in the pre-production. all the pictures that I had in my head were gone. and here comes the most important point, for my opinion, and that is trust. trust and communication. I really don´t think a director must have all the technical knowledge. but if he dosen´t know the difference between lenses, or even if he´s just someone who´s visual abilities are not very creative, he should at least be able to trust the cameraman in designing the look of the movie, based on the input that he/she provides in the pre-production. and be able to communicate his ideas in a way that would be clear for the camerman/woman/DoP/Cinematographer. and on a personal note: it´s no fun at all to work 6 months on a film, and to end up shooting a totally different one because of communication problems. my most important lesson from my first film: movies are teamwork. and little things that aren´t working on the personal/creative level in the pre-production tend to explode on the set. but it´s still lots of fun to make those movies... it will not be my last one. regards, dror

Hello everybody! I was pre-testing my HVX200 today at the rental house, with P&S Adaptor and Sony viewfinder. The viewfinder is connected to the camera with an s-video (pal), which, when connected, automatically disables the component output that I need for my HD monitor. The owner said the camera can only output pal OR component. so the choice is either to have an HD monitor for the director or to have a viewfinder for me! I can get picture to the monitor over another Pal-output, but than it´s not HD, or am I wrong? my camera-assistent said HD goes only over the component cabel, and I think he´s right. and I think my director deserves to see her film in HD on the set, no? I would appreciate brilliant ideas and experiences, we´re shooting next tuesday... thanks, dror