Matt Sandstrom

absolutely. aside from the fact that the film is more sensitive to daylight you'll also get different tonality, especially in faces and foliage, and especially with partial spectrum sources like sodium lights. but if you mean whether it's a problem to mix, then no. go right ahead. /matt

when i've rented kamios they've come with "regular" osram bulbs. the daylight ones are balanced while i find the tungsten ones to have spikes all over the spectrum, sometimes looking green, sometimes magenta, depending on subject and distance. /matt

i've built my own using regular household bulbs. if you use enough of them, at least 10 or 12, they become a soft source. the more the better i assume. i screwed sockets in a round piece of plastic, wired them up (a bit tricky to find the best solution for that), and attached to the camera using a magic arm or simply put it on a separate c-stand for tripod shots. /matt

i love rifas too. /matt

i know, that's why i had to ask. i've worked as an assistant electrician/grip on dozens of projects and you're always sent off to hang some lights or roll up stingers whenever that kind of stuff is about to happen. maybe i should ask the one i hire for one of my own gigs and don't pay him until he lets me in on some stuff... ;-) /matt

actually, i'd also like to know but i'd never do it myself. maybe you can explain in layman's terms for those of us who are curious and just want to understand the gaffer's work a little better? you don't have to give enough information to explain for somebody to actually try it, do you? /matt

i've simply put a mirror in an aquarium tank and aimed a light straight down into it, then you can create as much ripple as you want and add any objects or tints to the water. but i guess there's some special equipment you can rent too since it's a rather commonly used effect. /matt

sounds like a good deal and a good kit. i say go. remember that you need lots of grip stuff to control your light. ideally a bunch of c-stands, clamps, flags, scrims, frames and so on. and now that i think about it i'd rather have open face 2k's than fresnels. my main reason for using 2k's is to get plenty of light and those are more efficient. /matt

yes, i would probably paint the background with light, creating some sort of pattern. perhaps a soft edge spot that leaves the corners dark or a hard light reflected through water? just a few ideas. /matt

it's especially useful if you have "a lot of light". i find it very hard to judge contrast when everything is lit. it just looks bright, until i use the glass and i see that there's actually a whole range. another situation is where you have a lot of contrast and you want some parts of the scene to blow out or go black. of course your meter will tell you this as well, and is the only way to adjust for the latitude of the film, but being able to see the contrast is still great for confidence. /matt

yeah, that looked really good. much better than the stills you posted which i thought were average. good work and congratulations. /matt

ok, i bought a 3 million fc one, i think it was. the reflector is very big so just taping some half diffusion on the glass creates the chimera effect. it creates a very even 25 cm disc of light. here are a few stills from a scene i lit with it. shot on 16mm vision2 200t at f/1.1. the light was handheld maybe 2 meters away. for full res as well as more stills from the same music video, look here: http://www.filmshooting.com/scripts/gallery/forum3/apee /matt

if you use cineframe 25 in sd it's true progressive scan. it only interpolates in hd. /matt

listen to fredrik, he the man. we have to work together again soon. i'd be happy to set your lights again but if you want in on any of my directing gigs you better start returning my phone calls. :-) /matt

gaffer's tape will come off the car no problem, no marks that you can't wash off. you can use the same to fix the bounce card to the hood as well. the angle can be quite small and still get plenty of light in there so i wouldn't be too concerned about it falling off at that moderate speed. good luck. /matt

in that case i would put it 5 stops over so it blooms a bit. /matt

for night i like to use litepanels. for day some sort of bounce mounted on the hood works well, plus nd on the windows that are in the frame. you don't mention your budget though and whether you'll be towing the car or driving it, and how fast? /matt

it wasn't. it was an nd. he *thought* it was a uv. at least that's how i read it. /matt

i'm a little confused. blown out windows doesn't sound like sunset at all to me. anyway if you do want them blown out you need more than three stops over. smooth white objects three stops over will blow out but if you have detail it will most likely show. the easiest way of ensuring that they turn white is to put diffusion outside, or a white curtain that you light to the desired level. if you don't put the diffusion directly on the window you'll have space to shine that 600 next to it onto the faces. but i'm not sure what look you're after by doing that. it sounds like you need to think it through. /matt

it is? the amateur filmmakers i know who want to make films borrow their cameras and the ones who want to own cameras buy new ones. the first category soon move up and start renting while the latter sell theirs (not) used on ebay and buy an electric guitar or a new muffler for their bmw instead. :-) /matt

i see. thanks. i've been using the fx1e though, which i think is even more recent? did they incorporate those fixes in that? /matt

is that meant as a joke or what? hdv uses a perception based codec, meaning that image data the eye is not as sensitive to is taken out. this gives you an image that *looks* very close to the original but the data *is* taken out, which you will notice all too clearly when you try keying or color correcting. my understanding is that the component output of this camera outputs a signal that hasn't been compressed, which solves the problem. /matt

really? i thought they were essentially the same camera just with different options and settings. /matt

from what i've heard the component out gets its data before it's been compressed, so yes you can record full hd if you have a recorder with component in. /matt

what do you mean? have you seen it? i think it works very well. perhaps you're thinking of the cineframe 24 mode? i've only heard bad things about that but you're shooting pal so you can use the much better cineframe 25. if you're shooting sd video that means true progressive scan. it only interpolates in hd and even then it's doing a pretty good job. /matt