Steve McBride

Since I'm moving away from editing to focus on cinematography I'm going to be selling my Mac Pro system that I have when I get my MacBook Pro (which is in a few days). I got the computer in July 2007 and it has 2x 2.66GHz dual-core Intel Xeon processors, 5gb DDR2 ram, 250gb 7200rpm harddrive, 500gb 7200rpm harddrive. It comes with the keyboard, Logitech Z4 2.1 speakers, and I'll throw in a Hanns-G 22" widescreen VGA/HDMI monitor (it has a bright spot that I think is getting larger in the bottom middle, doesn't effect anything when editing in FCP since it's in the lower half so it should work fine until you get a better one). Let me know if you're interested in buying, the price will be pretty cheap compared to a new system and the whole package has everything you need to get started editing (minus FCS2) including the OSX Leopard installation disk.

Wow... Thank you to everyone, especially Satsuki for all the feedback. I printed out your post Satsuki for reference when I'm planning the lighting for the shoot :P . The locations that I'm going to be shooting in are lit mainly by overhead fluroescents and/or daylight coming in from windows. There really aren't many tungsten sources that are naturally in the locations. Since this is very low budget (the preliminary quote I got back from the rental house was less than $200 for all my grip and electric), I'm going to be going with tungsten lights due to the cost of KinoFlo and HMI lights. Should I buy a roll of 1/4 CTB to put on the lights to cut down on the warmth coming from the lights? Also for the cafe location, it's hard to tell how I'm going to light the wide shot. I'm thinking about getting a 2k and bouncing it off of the ceiling and then using Satsuki's idea of the "dark-light-dark" idea with the overhead fluroescents and then using the smaller fixtures to create the sillhouetes within the crowd of people. Does this sound like it will work? Jonathan, I have definitely seen where blowing out windows looks good, I'm just worried that if I do blow them out then I would get too much light into the scene and creating unwanted sillhouetes, especially in wide shots. How could I go about avoiding this? Thanks again for all of the help, I really appreciate it. Everyone will be getting a special thanks credit for the short :) .

Thanks for the advice. I had a feeling I'd get a reply from you fairly quick :P . I've never done color correction, but now that I have FCS2 I'm going to be using this project for learning the whole workflow of capturing to a rough cut and into the final cut and then into color correction. And I'll definitely work on the 1/2 face darker. It was something I was going for, but I didn't have control over the current lighting at the locations so I wasn't able to control the fill and the most powerful light I had was a 600w, so it was hard to get enough contrast without completely blowing out highlights.

This is the first time that I've posted any work that I've done on these forums and I really hate that it is this project. The project is one that I wrote for a scriptwriting class and put into production twice but had to cancel both times before I was able to shoot it two weeks ago. From the grabs, you'll obviously see that they are not very good. The project was shot HDV on a Sony HVR-HD1000 with some really cheap lights that a friend of mine had. I would like to get some feedback about the screen grabs and please be as brutally honest as you can be. I know that it isn't that great of work and I am looking for some feedback on it because I am heavily considering a reshoot for the whole project (which I don't mind since it was one day and I spent $17 which consisted of a trip to Wendy's to feed the cast and crew). What I am really looking for is advice on making it look less fake. It looks very staged and not natural (especially in the two shot of the boy and girl). Also if you could recommend hardware to use next time, that'd be greatly appreciated as well. Again, please be as honest as you can be. I'll try to get some footage up as well. Thanks in advance!

KinoFlo BarFly, definitely get one or two of those. They're somewhat made for this kind of situation. I also think that staying away from hard sources would be smart, stick to your soft sources or fluros if you can.

Filters will help in "shaping" the image before it's recorded, but it won't really help with your depth of field or color space (which is what makes film's visuals look the way they do). The XL1 doesn't have settings for different gamma setups like the XL2 or DVX100 does, nor does it have the ability to shoot at 24 frames per second (24p) like the other mentioned cameras. An ND filter is what you use when you need to reduce the amount of light actually being recorded by the camera without adjusting the exposure. Using an ND filter lets you keep the aperture open more and keep your depth of field shallow instead of widening it as you stop up. Since the XL1 uses 1/3" CCD's, your depth of field isn't going to be close to that of film's. If you want to make the DOF shallower you need to get a lens adapter like the Letus or RedRock or any of the other 35mm lens adapters. With these you are able to use your higher quality lenses and get the shallower depth of field.

Guess I was probably wrong. I need to find that article...

Make sure your shutter speed stays at 1/60 of a second. The fluros run at 60hz which means 60 cycles a second, so when you're frame rate is 1/60 of a second you are getting 1 full cycle in the lights every 1/60th of a second which makes for 60 full cycles in a second. That basically means that the lights will look fine. I may be completely off, or just slightly off here. Wait for someone else to confirm or deny what I have said before you trust it :) . I also just realized that that really didn't make any sense, so hopefully someone can come through and help me out also. I'll look into it again because I know I read this not too long ago and if I find it I'll reply back.

Don't change all the fixtures to daylight. Keep your practicals tungsten and just keep some minus orange ready to cut down on the temp.

Assuming you mean using cine lights for still photography, from the images you've shown it looks like two-point lighting with a hard key and soft fill. Getting an Arri tungsten kit with a 600w,and 1kw light as well as a 2 or 4-bank Kinoflo with tungsten balanced tubes will probably get you started. You'll be able to get shots like the first image by using the 600w above and behind the model's head a bit and then using the kinoflo to fill in the front of the model. Then using the same principles you can just adjust the size of fixtures you're using to get the right amount of shadow required for the shot. But looking at a few of the last pictures, you would probably need a stronger light to cast those long, strong shadows on the ground. I've never really worked with high powered fixtures so I can't really help there, but HMI would be the way to go but the price will start to raise pretty quickly. Check out www.coollights.biz for some good and inexpensive fixtures. BH Photo Video also carries all of the Arri lighting packages. And as Adrian stated, go to your control panel and change your name to your REAL first and last name.

The HPX has 2/3" chips in it so you're going to have better low light performance with less noise in your shadows. You're also going to have a shallower depth of field. There are some ways to remove noise from noisy footage but that's just adding to the digital end. If this is a low budget shoot and you have to pay extra for the HPX, I'd just stick with the HVX. But if it's the same price (why can't you get it for the entire shoot?) I'd try and schedule all of your scenes that you want to look different for using either one of the cameras. If you do shoot on both you don't want to have it change mid-scene (this could become hard if you have to do pick ups) because people are getting more perceptive and will notice a slight change to the picture.

I've done one wedding by myself with one camera, which sucked, but you seem to have all the right equipment. The only thing I would suggest picking up is one of the Mini LitePanels LED lights for doing interviews during the reception. For the ceremony, have one of the cameras (probably the XL1 because of the longer zoom) at the back of the location preferably up higher than ground level, if it's at a church it will probably have some sort of balcony which is perfect. Put this on one of the tripods and use it for you overall coverage of the event. Then have the other camera on the Glidecam but make sure you can easily move it to the tripod. Use this camera for your cutaways during the ceremony. Make sure you hit all of the major parts of the ceremony and that at least one camera is rolling at all times. You can usually talk with the wedding coordinator or whatever they're called and get a list of the events during the ceremony which will help a LOT, especially for your first time. As the others said, definitely pickup a wireless lav mic. Before the ceremony ask the groom if you can put it in his inner jacket pocket and then clip it onto his lapel. Have this audio recording to whatever camera isn't in the back. If you can't patch into the sound at the location, have the camera in the back setup with the shotgun mic and record audio to this. That's really all I can think of now. Just make sure to not get lazy or bored when you're there. You will get pretty bored especially since you don't know anyone there, but you want to make sure you have everything you need before you get to editing. And don't forget to eat. Most weddings will have a table set aside for the photographer, DJ, and videographer. It's free, so eat it.

Looks really good. The only one that irked me was http://www.flickr.com/photos/26198548@N04/...57615280673415/. It could just be the angle the picture was taken from, but the light on the right side of the face (in frame) looks like it's daylight and the window is behind him (light hitting back of the couch). Again, I don't know the set so there could be another window on the other side. Looks great though. Any chance on some clips or a trailer anytime soon?

Wow, I watched the trailer a week or so ago on Apple and immediately started sending it to friends to check out. I definitely love the feel to the cinematography. I don't know much about the story other than what was in the trailer and what you've said, but the look that you gave to it with the warmer tones definitely brings the emotion out. I like your reasoning for the 2.40 also. A lot of people want to use 2.40 just to get the "film" look, so it's always great to hear that there is a reasoning behind the decision. I was also amazed to see you on the forum. Definitely a pleasant suprise!

It all depends on the script and story. You can have a complete narritive that is dialogue driven and shoot with one camera using 1000' mags and with simpler lighting setups than a war epic where you have multiple cameras running at the same time and going through X times the amount of film than if you were shooting with just the one, then you have to go to your lighting which will also be a lot more.

Use the HMIs (1200 or 4k) and point them up into an ultrabounce so that you get a nice fill over the entire scene. Use different angles on the lights to get a broader range for the fill. You can either do that or rent some balloons to have over the set. Just make sure you don't go too crazy with the light and make it too bright, use what you have for practicals (headlights, taillights, dashboards, flashlights, etc.).

Just about every sound editing app has some sort of "Stamp" tool where you take a sample of the humming and set it as the source and remove it from an entire clip. I do this a lot with background noise when I shoot DV with an on cam mic. Just make sure you have room tone to lay underneath your dialogue and foley.

Depends on the framerate you shoot... 24 fps 24 * 60 * 7 = 10,080 frames 30 fps 30 * 60 * 7 = 12,600 frames etc.

Check out the DVD "Cinematographer Style." It has interviews with a TON of cinematographers and has a lot of good advice and information. David Mullen is on it as well.

How many movies has he made? That's how many times he's used it. I definitely respect Michael Bay as a director, I mean with his budgets and the fact that he gets what he wants just about everytime he wants it, and he pulls off blockbuster movies everytime. But I really hate how he reuses the same shots, lighting, and time ramping in every single one of his films.

Yeah, an EX would be amazing since it has a full manual lens. And I agree with Jonathan, get a 35mm still camera and a couple lenses for cheap off of Craigslist or something and you will learn a lot.

If you're talking about a wide shot and then cutting to a close up, you want to light your area evenly so that you don't get the high levels of exposure levels, because you don't want to change your aperature in the middle of a shot because that just looks bad. Then when you cut into your close up, relight the setup for the close up. If you're talking about a wide flowing into a close up, you're going to want to do the same as before for the wide shot and then have a PA or grip standing next to you or somewhere with a reflector so that when they go in for the close up you can bounce the light into the subject's face to have them stick out. Hope that's what you were looking for.

You'll look more professional going around with an XL1 with it's size and shoulder mount, but I would personally go for a Panasonic DVX-100. The features are better and it has better manual control, the one big plus that it has over the XL1 when shooting documentaries is it's focus ring. The XL1 has an infinity zoom where the ring will just keep spinning and spinning much longer after you've passed the min and max, and most importantly the marks aren't repeatable. The DVX-100's focus ring is repeatable making it easier to keep subjects in focus when doing standing interviews and such. I also like the XLR ports on the DVX-100 a lot better since they're right on the body, while you have to use another mount on the butt of the XL1 and then connect some wires into the rear of the body to be able to use XLR ports. Welcome to the board.

I still think it will go to Wally Pfister for The Dark Knight because of the use of IMAX and just the overall complexity of a lot of the setups that they had.

Try to dolly grip a bit when you can, even if its a digital shoot (on a higher non-prosumer camera) the dolly grip and focus puller have to be in good sync so that they hit their marks at the same time. Sure, it isn't the same as the focus puller (far from it actually) but with talking back and forth with the focus puller you'll probably pick up some good tips and hints along the way.