Jim Hyslop

Depends on the skill of the carpenter, the size and kind of wood, and a bunch of other things. What do you mean by "4/8 screws" - I'm not familiar with that term. -- Jim

I think so. Timecode makes it easier but it's not an absolute necessity. I also subscribe to a production sound list, and many of the professional sound people there recommend the sticks as a backup even when using timecode. It's not unusual to have some kind of glitch in the time code (e.g. forgetting to jam sync, the RED and other cameras losing TC when you change batteries, and so on). A few months back, I shot a live event (year-end recital for the dance studio my kids go to). I have an EX1, and three mics. The EX1 only has two mic inputs. So I hooked up my shotgun mic to the EX1, used the on-board mic for the second EX1 track, and recorded the two wireless mics to my Macbook Pro via a USB audio interface (M-Audio Fast Track for those familiar with such things). I was using Apple's Sound Track Pro. Syncing was easy - the music for the first number had a clear audio attack, so it was easy to line up the audio waveforms. The first act was 48 minutes long, and at the end of it the two sound sources (camera and M-Audio box) were only two frames out. (Unfortunately the wireless tracks were unusable because I wasn't monitoring them, and they were way too hot - pretty much everything was clipping and distorted.) -- Jim

Yeah, I realized which forum this was in after I posted :-) -- Jim

Ah, I see. I take it the SDHC card is in an adapter of some sort then? It'd be easier just to use a laptop which has a PCI Express port, or rent a PCI Express/USB reader. That's how I do it, anyway. Sony's approach may have been to assume that copying would happen off-camera, since it's a time-consuming process no matter how you do it, and in many cases you'll want to be ready to shoot within seconds (or even continuously, by swapping cards while recording). -- Jim

If you want any kind of distribution in the U.S. then I'd get all the U.S. documentation sorted out now before everyone moves on to other projects. -- Jim

If by "square grids" you're referring to filters like this then no - those are called star filters. You can create your own custom bokeh effects. Have a look here. -- Jim

What Adrian says is VERY IMPORTANT - keep the entire BPAV folder intact. One of the surest ways to get into trouble is to try to copy individual files. Same goes for Panasonic P2 cards. -- Jim

That reminds me of a quote from Orson Welles: A writer needs a pen. An artist needs a brush. A filmmaker needs an army. -- Jim

For me, it's not the same at all. I grew up using an 8mm Bell & Howell spring-wound camera (and by the way, I really do mean "8mm" not "Super 8"). For me, the magic was in the anticipation - waiting for that roll of film to come back from the Kodak lab, setting up the projector and calling in the family, and finally turning on the projector to see how it turned out. Shooting on film and having it telecined still has some of the same excitement and anticipation, but it does lose something without it being projected. For digital, it's cool to see it right away if I want, but it really doesn't feel the same. Maybe that's why I avoid reviewing footage on set as much as I can - part of me still wants that fulfillment of the anticipation by waiting until it's been captured to the NLE, then reviewing the footage. -- Jim

Chris, can you please describe the light setup here? What was the key light, the fill light, how much ambient light is in the shot, etc? -- Jim

One thing to remember about the EX1/EX3 slow motion is that, unlike a film camera, overcranking does NOT affect shutter speed. In Slow & Quick Motion recording the sensor operates at 60fps, regardless of the recording frame rate you have selected, or the playback frame rate. For example, suppose you are shooting at 720/24p without Slow & Quick Motion turned on. That's your playback frame rate. You then turn on S&Q Motion, and set it to 48 fps (the recording frame rate). The camera sensor generates 60 frames, but the camera will drop 12 of those frames, thus recording 48 frames in every second of real time. In playback, it plays 24 frames per second, thus stretching one second of real time into two seconds of playback time - which is exactly what you'd expect. I hope I have explained that clearly! -- Jim

I don't know how Cleveland's rates compare to Toronto's in general, but here in Toronto you can get a basic EX1 package (with one 8GB card) for $250 for a weekend (for $350 you can get two 16GB cards and some other bells & whistles). I expect you should be able to find something reasonably priced there. -- Jim

I've found my success rate improves if I compress it into MPEG-2 format first, using Compressor, then import the compressed file into DVD SP. -- Jim

That's actually what I was looking for. Just as a note, whenever I refer to direction in this post I will be referring to compass direction. The quality of sunlight (or if it's not direct sun, reflected sky light) changes significantly depending on which direction you're facing and the time of day. And your latitude and the season, but that's another story. Also, any cloud cover, no matter how thin, will affect the quality of light hitting the window. Some of the more experienced folk here can correct me if I'm wrong but it seems to me if you have any natural light at all, you have to be aware of the effects time of day, direction you're shooting, and cloud cover have on the light quality, even if you're indoors. -- Jim

Which direction does the window face? -- Jim

Alas, I don't think so. As far as I can tell, it has no Mac OS X support, only Windoze. Pity, really.

As my kids say to me - stop making sense!

Unless it's for TV in which case you allow one frame per screenful of credits :-) Thanks for the tips. -- Jim

I haven't tried copy-and-paste (or maybe I did the first time I went through this, I don't recall). And don't call me Shirley! <rim shot> Now, I don't know why I didn't think of this before, but I just tried and you can select all the scroll behaviours (you have to command-click on each one, which is a pain) but once you have them all selected, any changes you make to the behaviour applies to all behaviours you have selected. The scroll speed is, to me, a minor issue compared to getting it laid out. Especially if you have to change anything. Thanks for the tip on lynda.com - I'll check it out. That sounds a lot easier. How big a TIF do you create - exactly the width of your image? For example if it's aimed at 1080, do you create a TIF image 1920 pixels wide by however many pixels high you need? -- Jim

While I'm on the topic of Motion, can anyone explain to me why, when I create a text object that has X,Y and Z coordinates all set to zero, the object's centre is about 15 pixels to the right of centre? I have to enter an X offset in order for it to be centred side-to-side. What's up with that?!?

Hi, all I'm currently wrestling with Motion, trying to get a nicely-formatted credit roll. Basically, I want something like: Some kind of heading maybe a sub-heading a list of names in one or two columns With Motion, you have create a separate text item for each font style, to attach a "credit roll" behaviour to each and every text item, fiddle around with each item to line it up, blah blah blah. There's GOT to be an easier way! Especially having to attach a roll behaviour to each text item. If I decide it's too slow or too fast, I'd have to manually change 50 or 60 behaviour items! Yuck! Currently I just render it out at a fairly slow speed, then play with time remapping in FCP. I mean, the $100 cheapo editing package I picked up at Best Buy a few years back had that kind of thing as a preformatted template - all I had to do was type in the text and let it render.

I would guess they hold up better than dry-erase or water-soluble, but would still be susceptible to running. Just a guess, though.

My thoughts mirror yours. -- Jim

One of the best creative uses of crossing the line I've seen is in an episode of Battlestar Galactica, "Final Cut" (season 2, episode 8). In this sequence, crossing the line adds to the dramatic tension of the scene by simultaneously giving the viewer what they expect, while subtly violating their expectations. The camera has followed Col. Tigh into his quarters. He stops, the camera stops, and his wife Ellen runs towards him. In the reverse shot, we've crossed the line. These days, crossing the line in and of itself is getting more and more common. However, Stephen McNutt didn't just leave it there - he added a couple of more layers to it, to really scramble our brains. In a "traditional" reverse shot, Ellen would be camera left, Col. Tigh would be camera right. As Ellen runs towards her husband, the camera would likely have remained stationary. The viewer would then see the figure on camera left move, and the figure on camera right remain relatively motionless. In this shot, however, the camera moves with Ellen: The visual effect of this is to keep the figure on the right relatively motionless, while the figure on the left moves within the frame - exactly what the viewer expects. However, because the camera crossed the line, the characters have switched places - something that the viewer would not expect. It also sets up a visual conflict - the figure that is running is remaining fairly motionless in the frame, but the figure that is standing still is moving. Talk about your conflicting visual clues!! And because the whole sequence lasts only a few seconds, the viewer doesn't have time to analyze the shots to figure out what is so jarring about them. With this much care and attention going into a sequence lasting five seconds, is it any wonder that Stephen McNutt was nominated for an Emmy?

What, no baling wire?