Jason Hinkle RIP

I just finished a short film on the ACL and posted up a trailer. Thanks for checking it out! I ran into a whole mess of difficultly due to some lens flare problems that caused a blown out spot in the center of the image and horrendous flickering on about 25% of my footage. Correcting it took forever and the results are not that great, but I'm happy to have it done. I didn't think it would even be usable for a while. On the bright side, I now have some tricks for completely eliminating really horrible flickering from footage. I used a variety of nikon 35mm lenses on the camera and i've decided that I'm never going to use them again on 16mm film. I can't seem to reproduce it every time but there seems to be something with the rear element being really big and the mirror reflects light back onto the film. It mainly seems to be happen when there's a bright light source in the frame.

hey ben, sorry about your footage. it sounds like it could be the timing needs adjusted. of course if you can visibly see the claw not working then obviously that is a problem. here's how to check your timing: http://eclair16.com/eclair-acl/how-to-vide...eck-the-timing/

awesome! great looking stuff, nick. skateboard footage looks so cool on film - it really gives it some serious attitude. also those guys are totally insane without any protective gear!

I actually use Nikons on my Canon 7D simply because that's what I already own, but from what I understand everybody was originally doing that because there wasn't certain manual control in video mode? I have one Canon lens and it seems like I still have manual control, so I'm wondering if it's still necessary to use Nikons with the latest firmware? It is fun being able to use my old lenses on a new HD camera though!

Since you were curious, here's a clip shot off of the wall - http://vimeo.com/7700206 - it looks pretty incredible as you'll see! I get prints made all the time when I'm doing tests because it's slightly cheaper and without the minimum hourly fee of telecine. in fact, depending on what i'm testing, i sometimes just get the negative processed and run that through the projector (that is the case with this clip in fact). I tape two CTB filters over the projector, then I record it against the wall and use an invert filter in final cut. It looks like crap but it's fine for testing certain things like whether a mag is scratching, lens coverage for s-16, etc. getting a 100' negative processed only is about $25 and getting processing plus a work print is about $100

I have the same 3 mag designs as you and I've always loaded my the way that Bernie mentioned but I have on occasion wondered about the extra roller. I had always assumed that it creates a bit of a buffer loop between the two less-forgiving parts of the mechanics - those being the sprocket and the spool. If you don't go around that roller, it seems like the film is putting downward pressure on the lever/roller that holds your film against the sprocket and could possibly flip it open. That seems unlikely but I do have one mag where that little lever thing doesn't snap shut very tight and I could see it popping open. As Bernie has mentioned before, some things may work fine at 24fps, but when you try to run it at 75fps it could become more squirrely. Of course loading these things is a bit of art and science, people mod their gear and things are sometimes held together with gaffers tape!

cool thanks!

I just got a budget .9 ND filter on eBay and when it showed up it looks almost like a 2-way mirror. I hadn't really heard of this before but I did some reading about "hot mirror" ND filters. Is that likely what I have? The mirror effect is pretty strong, it makes me wonder if I need to take any special precautions when using this to avoid reflecting back into the lens? Do I need to press the lens against the filter, or tape up the matte box to prevent any crack of light? Or is it not that sensitive? any special precautions?

The higher the shutter speed the less motion blur you get, each frame is more crisp and you get more strobe-light effect like "saving private ryan" It is an artistic effect - if you like the look of a faster shutter, then go for it! If I were shooting in the sun with a 7D and I didn't have any ND filters, as a starting point I would set the ISO to 100, put the shutter speed at 60 and then probably have enough sunlight for shooting at somewhere around f11 - f16. If you prefer the look of 50 shutter speed, then everything is the same but you have to close down one more stop. I consider focus an artistic control so I always use manual. Because you don't have an ND filter, the compromise is that you are stuck with using the high f-stop. However you can still control DOF by zooming in/out. On your DIY steadicam if you use your 10mm full wide your shots will be very stable plus practically everything will be in focus. Then if you want shallow DOF move away from the models and zoom in to 200mm or so. You will have to be on a tripod for that. Sorry if you already know all of this stuff. This is just a general starting point that I would use in your situation.

cool - very interesting. i like the way you shot the identical scene with each camera, i think that gives a much better comparison than other shoot-outs I've seen. The 5D holds up surprisingly well considering the massive price difference. I think it has it's own look which is very good in the right hands. thanks for sharing.

I don't personally think 16mm film is dead, but there is a time and a place for it. Once you get past all the problems film is actually more forgiving in some ways than HD. If you like the "film look," though, to my eyes the 7D is the closest right now for under $2k. If you want a more all-purpose camera, though, I doubt you can go wrong with any of the suggestions here. They will all be different in their own way, but you have to learn the tricks of any camera.

Scarlet release dates are supposed to be sometime this year (not specific) but the price of the camera is announced to be $4,750 for a ready-to-shoot camera with lens. Of course a lot of people like myself got tired of waiting and got a 7D because it is somewhat similar. If you want to join the army of people waiting for the Scarlet, well it is a frustrating ride, but hopefully will be a game-changer camera. If I were going to buy a camera right now I would either get an SLR (for shooting movies, music videos, etc) or else an HVX200 (for getting video production work). All of the classified ads that I see for a camera op, a lot of them mention the HVX200 specifically so that leads me to believe you could get a lot of work owning that camera. The Arri digital stuff is not even in the realm of possibility price-wise, you're talking hundreds of thousands of dollars. Even feature film production companies just rent that gear when needed.

If you're not already a reader of Ken Rockwell's site: http://www.kenrockwell.com/canon/lenses/index.htm Maybe try a few lenses first and see what you like? I've rented from http://www.lensrentals.com/ - very reasonable prices and you don't need to have production insurance to rent. -j

Well I don't want to talk you into anything, but I am really enjoying my 7D. If your goal is to only make narrative films and you want the best image possible, I think the SLR gives you an incredible "film-like" image for the price. The negative aspects of the SLRS are not generally a problem when shooting single-camera scripted stuff. But if you intend to do broadcast work or shoot live events (concerts, etc), the SLR is not a good choice. If you can afford to hang onto your HV20 and get a 7D, that is basically what I have so of course I recommend it! I have always been a "Nikon guy" in the past but I don't think the D90 video features are quite ready - the Canons, though, people are shooting on them and doing really great work. Then again the Red Scarlett will be coming out this year if you can stand to wait around on them.

I think the 30Mbs (200x) are the minimum that you want to get, but I have read a couple of people who compared cards and thought that 30Mb/s did seem to be pushing it slightly. The 45Mbs (300x) is probably the minimum I would get if I were buying a new card. I have heard that the 90Mb/s (600x) is not noticeable enough to justify the cost vs the 60Mb/s, though.

Awesome video - I just got a 7D myself and it's really encouraging to see it being used for serious production work. The quality looks really awesome. I've only had my camera for about a week but it's a blast so far! I saw on your site that you shoot with RED, so I'm curious if you chose the 7D for this project due to it small size/weight in a crowded space, the budget, or was it just because you wanted to see what the 7D could do? I know everybody tries to compare these SLRs with the RED due to certain similarities, but what did you think? Also, how many takes did you get before the final? I bet that was nerve racking!

Ah perfect, thank you. I'm thinking about making my own telecine for little experimental projects that I want to shoot on film but don't need professional transfer quality. I'm thinking if I can get a projector that advances frame-by-frame, i can control it using a servo and capture frames on my SLR.

Anybody know if there are any 16mm projectors that you can advance frame-by-frame with a button or something on the projector? preferably something older that could be had on ebay or somewhere. If you know of a particular brand or model to look for that would be great too. Thanks.

I finally got around to posting the rest of the info from the original ACL Super-Site on http://eclair16.com/eclair-acl/ I've had the content that Mark (the original webmaster) sent about a year ago but finally just got around to converting the rest of it. There's a bunch of great info under "Repair" - camera mods, maintenance stuff, etc. I can't say that I've tried or even understand all of it, there's some pretty hard-core technical stuff there. Several people have posted manuals & pictures of camera internals too. If anybody has any other info, feel free to let me know. I'd personally like to see more info about tuning up the camera to run more smooth and quiet.

Thanks again everybody, I threw together one song really quick before sending off all the footage to the label. This isn't really a finished product but I figured I'd post something just for fun and to say thanks again for the advice. This is just a real-time edit using FCP multi-cam mode so it's got some rough spots, but you get the idea: http://vimeo.com/7370517 (pass = twilight) I got tons of sound-check footage but the lighting was still being set up so it probably won't mix with the show, but it will definitely work great as cut-aways, I think the label will be pleased that I got so much b-roll for them. After the show I learned a couple of things for next time: - All cameras should be moving almost all the time, even just subtle movement. the static shot looks cheap in comparison - steadicam merlin is hard as hell to operate without any previous training! - bright red lights make things look fuzzy, next time i'll see if i can have less red on the musicians faces Aside from that it was pretty fun. Any comments or suggestions would be appreciated. Thanks!

The google translation isn't too bad: http://translate.google.com/translate?prev...history_state0=

Thanks so much for the suggestions, after watching a lot of concert footage and checking out the venue I think I have my setup that I'm going to go with. The idea of shooting cut-aways during soundcheck is great -thanks Phil! I'll tell the band to get their show outfits on for sound check. The shoot is tomorrow afternoon. I decided to go with: a ) lead singer, zooming in/out between CU and medium shot - tripod mounted so camera can zoom in for shallow depth of field b ) wide coverage either off to side of stage or FOH whichever looks best - hand-held and/or tripod c ) steadicam on stage moving and going for interesting angles I'm not doing the editing so I don't know for sure how the label will use the footage but I'll post back when they have something online. Again thank you!

Anybody have any suggestions for how to place 3 cameras to cover a concert at a medium-size club? Each camera is on their own and the footage gets edited together later. I did this once before and just put the cameras stage left, stage right and one front of house. The FOH shot was really boring but usable. The stage left and right were pretty cool but inevitably there were times where they were both in between shots and/or on the same person (ie both on the drummer during a guitar solo). So I'm hoping to do a little better this time. This happens to be a 3-piece band, so we do have 1 camera per band member as a possibility. I don't have the luxury of a dolly or crane, just cameras and tripods. Thanks for any advice.

I see photos showing UV filters cleaning up exterior shots and it made me wonder if there is any reason not to just keep a UV filter on your lens at all times? does the filter really help that much and, if so, any negative to always leaving one on?

thanks very much for the info. i'm editing the simpleton way, i suppose. the only way i know. I get apple pro-res .mov files straight from the telecine lab and i just drag them into my project. i'm sure it's not the best way to do it. anyway, the repairs that have to be made are all over the map. everything from covering up some acne to removing flicker to fixing lens flare problems. Repairing the footage is not really the problem, I've gotten pretty decent at it. it's just that some shots take a few layers of mattes and some cpu-intensive plugins and they take so long to render, it made me wonder if I should just repair them first until they're fairly "normal" looking and work from there. i suppose the real solution is to shoot better footage in the first place, but try as i might a few shots always seem to be messed up. thanks a bunch for any ideas.