Garrett Shannon

How are you liking the 858? I have one on the way but when shopping around I was surprised to see that Sekonic doesn't sell the 758 any longer; it was discontinued in Jan 2017.

Looks like the Tokina 11-16. That is probably a PL mount conversion? I've seen many places do them, that one appears to be by Duclos Lenses, pictured here: http://ducloslenses.com/Duclos_Lenses/PL116.html

Most of that is caused by shooting wide open. I would be willing to bet if you shot the same thing at 1/250th of a second at an F4 you wouldn't have that effect.

I picked up a spare copy this weekend (at the CineCon dealer's room) of the June 1979 issue of American Cinematographer, which has the article on "Days of Heaven". If there is a student in the U.S. that wants the copy because they are a fan of that movie and/or Nestor Almendros' work in general, I would be willing to mail it to them.

I would LOVE to have that issue. Days of Heaven is one of my top 3 films; I can't tell you how great it would be to get that issue. I'll send you a PM with my address. Thanks!

So much for that PM. Wouldn't let me for whatever reason. If you need to reach me, through my website is probably the best bet. Thanks again.

Hey, I was wondering if there was a mark on the body where to put the end of a tapemeasure for focusing? Or if there is none, where should the mark be theoretically? Thank you

If by body you mean body of the camera then you are looking for the universal symbol for the film plane. It is a circle with a vertical line drawn through the center, which extends past the edges of the circle on both ends. If you can't find such a symbol you want to measure from the film plane. The spot your are looking for has nothing to do with the lens, rather you are trying to measure from the sensor on a digital camera or where the film passes through the gate on a film camera so your measurement will need to start somewhere on the side of the camera.

If by body you mean a human body (the subject of your shot which you presumably you want to be in focus) the general practice is to focus to their eyes. BE EXTREMELY CAREFUL!! Usually the tape will be run to one side or the other of the actor's face to a point even with their eyes. In an extremely tight shot where the subject's eyes are not on the same plane as the camera and DOF is so shallow that only one eye will be in focus at a time usually the close eye is put in focus. Of course that is a personal choice and not a hard and fast rule.

Happy focusing.

 

1. I'd like the video to play 2.40 - without black matted bars above and below the frame. Does anyone know how to do this in Avid or Final Cut Pro (preferable).

2. If the DVD copies are H.264 is it a bad idea to pull from these - will this compromise the quality OR should I import from the d5 masters?

3. I plan to have the website play a quicktime - not a youtube or vimeo video. Anything in particular I should know about this and H.264 or any other favorable export format?

 

1. I would advise using compressor. In my experience the compression looks better when using compressor instead of FCP. Depending what version you have you need to either set the source dimensions to 2.40 and then set the export size to a 2.4 ratio. If you only set the export ratio to 2.40 then it will take your entire 4:3 or 16:9 frame and squeeze it into 2.40 aspect ratio. In the newest version I think you can just select export ratio and then check retain aspect ratio and it will do the crop automatically.

2. Start off the D5 if you can. Better looking footage in = better looking footage out.

3. If you plan to stream it from your website make sure you select compression settings for streaming not download and select the fast start - compressed header option.

I usually use the Apple Trailers videos as a guideline and the 1080 trailers come in between 8 and 25Mb/s (Megabits) so your 720 transcodes should come in between 3 and 12Mb/s. Use this as a baseline and then it is up to you to decide how big the file size should be compared to the quality and how long it will take people visiting your website to download the video. If it’s so big that it takes 5 min to download nobody is going to watch it. Same thing for streaming; if people can't start watching within 5 seconds and continue to watch the entire video without waiting for buffering they are likely to turn it off.

My 2 cents anyway.

Check out my website http://garrettshannon.com if you want and download my videos to compare compression settings. Feel free to shoot me an email if you have more questions.

-Cheers

My advise festival wise would be to keep it as short as possible. It is easier for the people doing the scheduling to fit in films which are shorter, especially under 10 min. But that is just what I heard.

Foul language probably won't be a problem just keep that in mind when you submit and make sure to check the entry requirements as well as the festival's "theme" or mission statement. Probably wouldn't do you any good to submit to festivals which advertise themselves as family oriented, etc.

If you aren't selling the script and the writing isn't so terrible or improperly formatted that it is causing problems for the actors or anyone else reading the script then I would advise you to write in whatever way best tells your story.

Good luck.

HAHAH. Ya, I have definitely used the gel filter holder in the bolex before. I remember I got a free swatch of lee gel samples. The one that comes in that mini booklet and then cut out small squares of ND to fit in that little slide in holder thing. So good...

Something like this http://www.motion.kodak.com/motion/uploade...ve_data5217.pdf

Ya. That is exactly what I am looking to be able to do. Just on any image.

Is this what I would need to do the test that Chris Keth talked about: http://www.stouffer.net/Reflection.htm ?

Also, how do I look at an image in a linear color space? Forgive my ignorance but I don't know that much color space and technical digital image lingo. Thanks everyone!

I don't need to know what the exact exposure is, only the relative exposure between one area of the image and another. Is there some way to translate luminance values in photoshop to stops so i can know for example that one area in the image is 1.5 stops brighter than another area in the image?

I was curious if anybody knew of a program or a way to do the following in Photoshop or something similar:

I would like to be able to look at a digital still image on my computer and know what the different levels of exposure are within the image. Preferably in stops or something easily translatable to stops ie: the left side of the face is 1 2/3 stops hotter than the right side.

Imagine having a still image from a movie and mousing over various parts of the image to get a general idea of how contrasty faces are lit or if there is a back light how many stops over it is. I think it would be a useful tool both to study the work of other DP's as well as review and make notes on my own work.

Let me know if this is confusing and I can try to clarify. Otherwise, thanks. =)

try this thread: http://www.cinematography.com/forum2004/in...8&hl=t+stop

You may also have more problems with flares/reflections in the gels as well.

Looking for a Super 16 SR2 1.85 ground glass. Arri or 3rd party. Thanks. Send a PM or reply. Cheers.

Looking for a Super 16 SR2 1.85 ground glass. Arri or 3rd party. Thanks. Send a PM or reply. Cheers.

Hey, just curious if anyone out there is working in Ireland and looking for crew or even just networking. I am currently working in LA but have family in Ireland and although I have never been, I have always wanted to move there for a time and experience life and the industry from a new perspective

Just thought I would throw out a line and see what happened. Love working with camera in any capacity as well as gaff, grip, etc. Feel free to PM me or check out my website, would love to make some contacts in that area. Cheers.

While I don't sit down and write out equations, I do run rough 'calculations' (if you can call them that) in my head.

Agreed. Usually when I am using the inverse square law I'm thinking to my self: I can move it back to bring it down which will make it softer or I can keep it where it is and scrim it down and vice versa. Initial placement of a light for proper exposure comes from practice as opposed to sitting down and calculating the FC output of a certain light compared to how far away it needs to be to get a certain stop.

My two cents: it sounds like daylight is going to be your main source of light thus your camera should be white balanced to match the daylight and then other lights changed to match the daylight. Will you see the overhead lights or can they be turned off completely?If they can't be turned off or you need to see them you could trying using minus green gel or even doing nothing. It is very possible the daylight will over power the ceiling lights and it won't be an issue.

It depends on many factors including but not limited to: what camera(s) you are using and what it is that you are testing for. The more information you can give us, the more we can help you. Are you wanting to test that the cameras are working properly or are you wanting to experiment with different visual looks with different film stocks/filters/etc? Cheers.

Try stacking the crowd members. Put some very close to the camera, some in the middle, some far away. Creating many layers of people and shooting on a longer lens will give the feeling that the crowd is bigger than it is. Also, sacrifice any hopes of a wide shot. Best of luck.

Atomic Studios in Korea Town or United Pacifc Studios ltd in downtown LA. Both are smaller low budget studios thet may be willing to work with students. Good luck.

I don't know that meter specifically but on many meters if you continue to increase the fps it will eventually cycle into a photo mode where you will see shutter speeds that are common in still photography. Sorry can't be more helpful.

It depends what you plan on doing with the film. If it is only going to be shown to a small group of people and you have no plans to make money off of the film then I would say don't even bother as nobody will every hassle you about it. If you absolutely need clearance that will be more complex. How old is the footage? Is it possible it has been released under public domain?

I agree with the XHA1, great looking image and edited on FCP with no problems. Pretty solid camera just keep in mind that HDV is a dying format. Don't be surprised when that is a has been camera in a few years.

Even thinking about the scarlet would be ridiculous. Once it comes out (if ever) it may or may not continue to be $3000 but that doesn't include any of the standard accessories let alone a lens, and a decent quality one will ending up costing you easily 5x the price of the camera.

Good luck.

Thanks so much everyone, all the comments have been really helpful. Thank you again.