Gus Sacks

http://vimeo.com/10570139 Unoriginal, but a good display of some of the camera's strengths.

Unless you had a Tower with a Red Rocket I wouldn't expect you to render Rushes. I work with a Macbook Pro, which has a lot of punch, but rendering a ton of files is just too much, especially when you're using the same software to do a number of different operations. I think spot checking with REDCine-X isn't necessary - I'm still a proponent of the fact that if a Proxy runs all the way through then the camera did its job. Otherwise, I pretty much do all of that, plus assist my fellow Camera Dept members in some of their typical operations. So, sure.

Technically I would assume if any of the Proxies played correctly even in Quicktime then the clip had been processed properly. I would guess also for post a DMG as a back-up might be fine, but they're going to (again, more than likely) want an easily editable format for their Main hard drive. Sometimes there aren't continuity reports, or camera reports, depending on the type of job. I find that it's best to just do the do every time, be able to drop a PDF on the hard drives, and make it easiest for editorial to match clips, etc than having to wade through multiple reports, especially if there aren't any.

For 5x the price you get roughly 1/5th of the storage size.

John, totally true, but a one or two day commercial operation isn't going to hire two people to do the job. At least not out here. The person who did that should never be allowed on a film set near data management ever again. What a joke. I feel like taking a Seminar on this stuff is overkill. It's not rocket science. I think it just takes a careful and efficient workflow and often some creative problem-solving. I don't think you need training to do it on the level most of us are.

Hey Chris. I've done enough of this to fortunately or not be able to call myself a 'Digital Loader,' which is a silly title, but sometimes you have to differentiate yourself from a DIT, unless Production lumps both jobs into one title, but I'd say there is a difference. When I do "Loading" for a RED job, I manage the media - by means of doing the same as you'd do with Mags, Letter them and Build a numbering system - then doing file management backups into Folders, checking the clips, then I keep a detailed spreadsheet I combine with the 2nd AC's camera reports (which they don't always keep) to give Post/Editorial a clearly defined method of matching the Raw clips with the Scene/Take numbers, and if there were any issues or discrepancies with the footage. Then I generate TIFF files, similarly, for post and color correction. I reformat the Mags on my computer and send them back out relabeled. Sometimes productions ask for other things, but that's typically the base package, so to speak. Some productions don't want that all, so sometimes I don't do it. This workflow is for one/two day commercial jobs or low budget features. Otherwise, it'd be great to send the footage to be backed up a third time before formatting drives and cards. Hope that helps, Gus

Just DIT/RED Tech'd a commercial with a 3D RED Setup using ET's Quasar rig and Ultra Primes. I've got to say, it was a pretty big pain in the butt to work with, even with techs trained on the rig available. At high speeds the cameras had no hope of staying genlocked, and that, partnered with a few other quirks and kinks, made it a difficult shoot. It was a tad bit difficult for the Stereographer/CG representative to do some calculations involving windowed sensor sizes (especially the fact that when shooting in 4k you're still working with an APS-C sized sensor). But he was prepared and ready for the challenge. I wouldn't recommend it just yet.

If the shot isn't showing the whole window you could probably put a 12'x or 20'x solid behind camera so the reflection is just of the 'black' behind you.

Ari, I've personally read that article a few times over. It makes the point clearly that the majority of the look and feel of the film, including a large amount of the photography, was done before Fiore was even hired for the production. It seemed that more than likely a majority of the camera operation, lighting, framing, and "art direction" was done by the director, James Cameron. If the voters in the Academy (Cinematographers are the only ones voting at a certain point on the winner) felt like the look and feel and technical achievements of the film was the best of last year, then it did win for Visual Effects and Art Direction, for which I suppose it deserved it. Buuuut Cinematography is not in a basket with those two, as it relates to Avatar. The DP shot the live action sequences, which were few and far between, only a small fraction on practical sets. Otherwise it was his Director operating a camera towards Mo-Cap suits on a sound stage. Meh. Pretty unimpressive and the fact that Bob Richardson, Barry Ackroyd, Bruno Delbonnel and Christian Berger lost out to that sends a pretty bad message. Gus

Yeah... I saw able to get Abel down to a more reasonable price for just a two week feature, but I don't think the demand for the camera was high at that moment.

Lamont, I hate to say so but that's never going to happen. When I was just starting out, the only time a production I worked on got a "free" Sound Mixer (for a short - not a feature) he showed up drunk Day II and didn't know any of his poop Day I. And I think posting under the name 'The Robinson Group' is way more pretentious and unnecessary than you might realize. Good luck, but you're best off not making a film until you can actually pay to make one.

We saw it in 3D (Real-D) last night on a fairly small screen. I felt like the photography served the story well considering the content and themes of the story. I did not feel like the 3D served anything well in any way. I'm already getting sick and tired of 3D (especially films not even shot in 3D) and I can tell it's not going away any time soon, unfortunately, when the new Aliens is going to be done in 3D. I felt like those 3D glasses knock the brightness down some, but there's also a noticeable green tint applied I'm sure because of the tint of the glasses. But why wouldn't they tweak even the projection to counter-act that? I would take off the glasses when I could tell there wasn't much 3D going on, and it was so much more colorful and saturated and clean. Anyone else have anything to add to that or otherwise?

Productions DO use the Genesis. I don't know how it breaks down these days between Genesis, D-21, F23/35, or any of the other "expensive" HD systems out there. But at least they do have an HD system worth mentioning.

Huh? Did you watch it on your iPod?

Very cool. Thanks for the first-hand account, John. Related/unrelated chip talk - do you have any idea what a 3MOS chip is? Panasonic's started to put it in its lower-end cameras and I for the life of me can't figure out what it is.

Nah, with the hard copy you still get the digital one (at least I do... did I pay more for that?). I prefer the hard one anyway. It's annoying to take my laptop on the Subway just to read AC Mag...

Did they give up on the Dii then? It's taken them years to even put that thing out. With how much space the single-chip DNG files took up, I can't even imagine how much two would deliver.

Yeah... at least one of them went to my buddy Benji Bakshi at AFI. Not sure about the other one. Congrats either way for the nom.

That was actually a great article detailing all of the things people who actually work with the RED in real world environments have been dealing with since it debuted. Anyone who considers it a 'slam' is an a**hat.

By Q3 2010, Panasonic. Panasonic 3D

In my taste I had... In the Mood for Love The Assassination of Jesse James There Will Be Blood Children of Men The New World Memento The Fall The Diving Bell and the Butterfly American Beauty Fight Club

Well, Avatar just won the Critic's Choice Award for Cinematography and Art Direction among other technical awards...

Great names. I'd have many of others' lists on my own. A few I didn't think I saw on the lists: Stranger than Fiction Unbreakable One Hour Photo Oldboy Children of Men

See Where That One Lies

Bouncing in some light from another source with a bounce board works for a typically omnidirectional fill.