Matt Sandstrom

cinematone actually performs less image manipulation than the standard gamma as far as i can tell, i.e. you get a flatter curve, but the other settings pretty much all destroy the picture in some way. but, since this is hdv it's more about getting a look that's as close to the final format as possible, since there's only so much you can do in post. what look *are* you after? black stretch is good if you want a flatter look in the shadows, and skintone detail is good if you want smooth faces. color settings are better applied in camera as well. i like to use cineframe25 but if you have the time and resources in post properly deinterlaced 50i will be slightly sharper. as for the softening, it's not really needed with this camera since the lens is very "smooth". i wouldn't call it soft, but it's never completely sharp with detail turned down. i like to set it in the 2-4 range. good luck, /matt

i don't think he said he has. i see your point but i think you're overreacting. internet posts always sound more condecending, patronizing and rude than real world conversation. /matt

25p is output frame by frame so the resulting image is the same, but you have to adjust the pitch of the audio if you want to screen the print at 24 fps, the normal for theaters even in europe. i'm pretty sure 30p would look even worse than 60i btw. /matt

one thing that comes to mind that at least a rough sensitivity figure would help with is determining how much light you need. i know the output of various fixtures as well as daylight levels for different times and wheather in my head and data can also be looked up in tables, and i often know from experience how much is needed for a certain asa and set size. /matt

me neither, but when you've moved a notch up the food chain you'll realize that many people don't pay list for film outs either. :-) just kidding about the food chain, you obviously know what you're talking about but i sure as hell do too. oh, i almost only shoot film myself even for video finishing and will continue to do so as long as kodak are being nice to me and my shooting ratios can be kept low. i'm just trying to protect the rest from rumors that are just contraproductive. you may say that people saying that it's so cheap to shoot "digital" are even worse spreaders of rumors, which used to be true but your side is starting to take over. "blow ups" are neither cheap nor expensive, just something that goes in your budget and the rest depends, as always. shooting hdv for theatrical release can be very cheap. if a 35mm shoot cuts corners by using cheap cameras and expired stock the hdv feature can do a diy blowup for example. and you can online on a home computer which is cheaper than both davincis and negative timing. and so on. /matt

maybe $50,000 for a feature at the most, same as at swiss effects it seems. minus the maybe $20,000 you'll pay for a timed 35mm contact print and you have $30,000 left. that buys you how much of 35mm stock, processing and telecine according to your price list? according to mine it buys you a few hours, like i said, not nearly enough for a serious feature. and even if you're fine with an arri II or konvas and post dub all audio it will cost you more than a z1, plus i'm still saying you need another crewmember to handle it. no, you need to bring out some hard facts to convince me. ;-) /matt ok, and you call those cheap? a package is still maybe $200 more per day than a z1, which adds up to $5,000 for a six week low budget feature. so now you have only $25,000 left. :-) /matt

older 35mm cameras need blimps and weigh a ton, so you need yet another crewmember just to carry them. i'd be happy to learn of any option i might have missed though. /matt

frankly i don't think it's about being with someone or not. it's about doing the math. read what i wrote again and let me know exactly where i'm wrong. maybe you pay extremely little for your 35mm services or you pay way too much for your film out? /matt

thanks, that makes sense, i think. ;-) i shoot very little video and when i do i rely completely on the monitor so i never paid much attention. i do use my light meter, but only to measure contrast when adjusting lights. /matt

i hear this all the time but i don't quite get it. if you point your camera on a grey card or scale, change the aperture until it registers as medium grey on your scope, doesn't that give you an accurate iso value? for that particular gamma and gain of course? /matt

that's a myth. do the math. and please don't assume a 2:1 shooting ratio "with careful planning" or anything like that. and don't forget that a print from 35mm costs a lot of money too. for the cost of the transfer you can shoot maybe a few hours of 35mm. and then i haven't even considered the cost for renting a 35mm camera suitable for sync sound, or the extra person needed on your crew since you pretty much need both a dedicated focus puller and a loader. /matt

thanks a lot, that's pretty cool. it seems like both gamma and color matrix are set up very differently between them though? at +1 stop the z1's white blows out while the rest is actually darker than on the hvx, which doesn't have a blown out white. and there's something fishy with the underexposure on the hvx. it looks way too bright at 7 stops under. sorry to question you like this but are you sure about the accuracy? the noise has increased a lot too, which leads me to believe that maybe you had the agc on? /matt

super 8 can look fantastic and done right it will be cheaper, and an optical print isn't much more expensive than a contact one so even if you're printing to 16 it probably will. do many fests still show 16mm though? seems like video has taken over that, with 35mm being the standard for bigger festivals. but!!! you will have a much smoother production on 16mm since it's supported by an entire industry. on super 8 you're on your own. plus us guys of course but it will be a pain asking for support here while shooting. although do any of you remember shane carruth on the usenet boards years ago? we taught him how to make a film online, sometimes laughing at him, and when the result was primer we didn't laugh anymore. ;-) /matt

economy. we got a very good price from kodak. david originally wanted to use e100d or v2 200t. when that was settled we tried to use it to our advantage. we knew that reds and greens would pop and that we would have grain, so that's how we chose the costumes, the location and the lighting. i don't think it would have looked as cool on negative, but then again we would have done a few things differently anyway and it would certainly have looked cleaner. /matt

cool. i know who that director is, but i don't know him. :-) i checked and en god dag was indeed in competition last year. what's the criteria for submission? i wonder why i never submitted anything. my films have played in many countries of europe, all the other nordic countries and north america but never norway. until recently at least when i had one in "wt os", my only submission to a norwegian fest ever. /matt

wait, last week, that could be forechecking morfar? same director and yes, david grehn again. :-) /matt

that would be "en god dag"? directed by per hanefjord, another friend of mine. yes, that's david. /matt

look, i was being sarcastic. sorry if the humor didn't come across. we both know that we've been discussing the beta sp issue to death before in all forums possible. ;-) /matt

betacam sp sucks. it's a good tape format and all but only slighty better than dv at a much higher cost, and it's analog so you lose several generations when you go to fcp and back. and if you're going to a digital tape, like dvcpro or digibeta, or directly to fcp sdi is better than component. an sdi capture card is cheaper than a component one and gives you better quality. can we take this discussion elsewhere though? start a new thread if you want. a beta sp sp discussion with alex has been known since the last century to often get nasty. :-) /matt

hey i noticed a lot of people say things like "nice stills" but never "nice clip". yes the link is smaller than the stills which are hard not to notice first, but the clip says more about the sharpness and grain in motion, at least in the parts where compression doesn't break it all into blurry blocks. ;-) /matt

nothing. it's available so why not use it to take beautiful pictures instead of bashing it around at various internet forums. that's all. :-) negative is more expensive, can't be easily developed at home, can't be transferred on a workprinter, and frankly you can never get the true reversal look out of negative just as little as you can get true black and white. i'm not sure what it is you think i'm trying to convince you about. /matt

i like the flashscan. like all camera based telecines it struggles with the contrast of reversal, although less so with 64t it seems, but the sharpness is great, the registration even better and the optical color correction very usable. it outputs dv, component and 8-bit sdi. we used dv. as long as you do most of your color corrections in the scanner i don't think there's much of a difference but if you intend to cc later you probably need uncompressed. /matt

canon 814e. it runs steady enough so that syncing up in post is easy. this particular clip was speed changed slightly, but in the final version all cuts will be a few seconds at the most, for which it always holds up. i've shot plenty of music videos with non sync cameras in super 8 as well as 16 and 35mm and while it takes some work it's never a major problem. i just play back the song 4% slower on set if i shoot with a 24fps camera, since pal telecine is 25 fps. for sync dialog it's even easier since you can stretch the audio to fit, which is obviously not an option for music clips. /matt

hey, i'm making a music video on 64t and since i'm very pleased with the results my dp david grehn got i wanted to share. there's so much negative vibes around this stock and i thought maybe this could cheer people up a bit. :-) if you hate grain it's not for you, but the depth, sharpness, and colors are great in my opinion. scanned on a flashscan by uppsala bildteknik. short clip /matt

i think you're right and wrong. do all flos have peaks? yes. does it usually matter? no. ;-) i've had much more problems with flos not being the exact color they claim than with spikes in their spectrums. perhaps that's what's given you weird colors as well? /matt