Ari Davidson

I make x's out of bright colored 1/2" paper tape and stick it to the camera, wall, and one time my forehead

Are they film lights? Most manufacturers list this data on their website. Do you have a light meter? See here for some information regarding Lumens/Watt: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luminous_efficacy

I second this approach. Usually a redhead into some foam does it.

It depends heavily on what you're shooting on. The traditional approach is expose for proper skin detail and then come down in post.

Statement released by Kodak on CML: "Please be assured that Kodak’s motion picture films are not part of this announcement. Motion Picture will remain with the company as the largest driver of film manufacturing volume. Film manufacturing is not included in the sale. It will remain within the Graphics, Entertainment and Commercial Films group, including consumer and professional still film. In addition to manufacturing film, we are pursuing market demands that will utilise our technologies for a variety of alternative and exciting products. This includes Functional Printing applications as well as Thin Film and Specialty Chemicals growth opportunities. And if you haven't caught up with this news yet, we have just launched a new Kodak Asset Protection Film, an affordable, innovative color film solution optimised for content owners who originate or finish their productions on digital formats and want to protect their valuable media for the future. http://motion.kodak.com/motion…../index.htm "

I would get the kino's and pickup tungsten sources as you grow as a filmmaker. People are always dumping their moles and arris these days because everyone wants soft light, so you can get moles nothing. I bought two 2k's and a 5k for $600…

The short answer: Shoot on a Canon T3i with a 50mm 1.8 Don't use candles, there's no real reason to do that. Observe candle light, study it, recreate it with practical incandecents Use Davinici lite in post. There's a technicolor preset in there that will get the images looking that way. Dial up the saturation throughout the timeline.

What you do is get production insurance, which I'm sure you'll have in the event of a car stunt. A good grip crew would also know better than to place any gear in harms way. As would the AD, DP, UPM, Dir. etc... Not to mention if this car plows into a nest of stands, they will effectively become spears and likely kill the driver and destroy the camera. By all means though, tread off into an abandoned urban building to hunt down sufficient amounts of non-oxidized pipe, bring it back back to set where I'm sure you have a pipe cutter and threader handy to save the day. Meanwhile everyone else will be dealing with what's important: The welfare of the crew, and the camera. All hypothetical of course. Under the mundane and less catostrophic circumstances these are not worth it because: The C-stand is a marvel of engineering that is tried and true. Hence the few evolutions of the apparatus over the course of it's existence. C-stands are often suspending lots of mass, or sharp points which when combined with gravity and/or an unaware human being, will seriously HURT someone. I prefer not to leave this responsibility to frugal engineering. My responsibilites on set extend far beyond teaching people how to use any DIY gear. Productions don't have time for me to teach every day-player or production assistant how to build my gear. I'd much rather be blocking while the truck of industry standard gear is being unloaded. Yes, the knowledge to make something like this could prove useful in some unlikely scenario, but you're not right. Don't be a **(obscenity removed)** prick about it.

You can try messing with the contrast, exposure, and brightness. Use some power windows for fine tuning. To avoid this in the future verify IRE levels with a vector scope and/or don't shoot/monitor in 8 bit

Let me preface with this: If your story is good (or bad), no one is going to give a poop what you shot on. That being said, I've operated both in many face paced handheld environments (including action feature), and also been spoiled by the studio setting. The Epic/Scarlet body style is compact before you outfit it properly (batteries, mags, monitors, handles, rails, FF, etc...), in fact I know an operator that added an additional 5 lbs to a fully outfitted Epic handheld rig because it was too front heavy. As to such I actually prefer the feeling of the One for handheld. You do get higher frame rates per resolution in the Epic but all that data will cost you on the back end. Make sure you allocate this properly. The Epic menu navigation is MUCH easier, but after a few days with the One it's navigation becomes second nature. Lastly if you have a chance, try doing what we used to do with film and shoot tests. Good Luck.

Watch non-Orange/Cyan movies Like everything else in this industry it takes training, and even then it's relative interpretation. I think Wes Anderson uses very good and meaningful palettes. I can't think of any films offhand, but there are some out there that discuss this sort of thing in the commentary. The best training I had to observe meaningfulness in color was actually in literature, specifically poetry.

It'll take extra long to watch cat videos on youtube There's a significant difference between size and latitude, but are often defined as 'resolution'. There is also a significant difference between cameraman and a camera owner I reckon we'll spend a good deal of time explaining that to producers.

Vision 3 5213

Get some ND's and/or a polarizer so you can avoid high shutter speeds. Stabilization is key, especially with DSLR as every sway will introduce rolling shutter that will be enhanced with most high shutters speeds. You'll need plenty of cards too since it seems you won't be offloading so long as you're driving. A camera light could help too.

Avoid filters and seal the lens/mattebox to prevent internal reflections what will appear as duplicate-offset pin sources in the frame. Those are more annoying to me, than alittle flaring

Arri MFF-1/2 & Arri LMB-1/2

Thank you! Loved it. Tough Spun (although not featured) is my personal favorite.

In my experience there is no one size fits all when it comes to this, and just like everything else you have to tune out the marketing and look straight at the specs. For many people those systems are perfect, and an equal number of others rue the day they walked on set and had to use them. In essence, they all do the same thing: Place the camera somewhere more operator friendly. Which is great but again, it doesn't suite everyone. If you can test drive them that'd be best so you could solidly say "rig x is the one for me". I have an operator that shoots for me quite frequently that uses a neon orange PVC pipe rig. I hate the way it looks, I get nervous every time he busts it out in front of judgmental clients, until I see the footage. He's a great operator with an excellent eye for composition! The rig (although ugly as sin) doesn't make the shots. The operator does. So no rig is ever going to make your shots prettier, though aggressive marketing will tell you otherwise... What I've experienced across the board is you get what you pay for. There are plenty of cheap rigs out there, the cheaper you go the more down time there will be due to setup and CONSTANT configuring. My favorite is the ET Mantis, and I rent it whenever possible. Happy Hunting

A piece of a stocking (yup, like for women's legs), stretched and mounted on the rear element of a lens. Other practices also include mounting on an optical flat or filter stage in front of the lens. On my first shoot with the Sony F3 the AC's used double sided tape and stuck it right on the camera, just in front of the sensor. It looked great! I first tried it on my Pentax P30, and really let me know how to work with it by the time I had to use various shades and weaves in production. If you want the best results, stretch the F%#! out of it!

Balloon lights. See Space Lights

I was able to pull it off once with a project, but I shot on film. If you're limited on budget or time for reshoots, try to recapture the tighter shots and CC with wider stuff.

I agree with Bill's approach, but do test if you have any means to. It will greatly improve your results. I believe the ASC manual has some lengthy and technical advice for this type of exposure. I like this exercise they're giving you. Open faced lights combined with lots of grippage and a high ASA film! Sounds like a great lesson in controlling light, something often missed in the digital age...

Good enough for segments on SNL: http://nofilmschool.com/2012/02/saturday-night-live-dp-alex-buono-shoots/

I would go with pars into mirrors, and smack on some party colors. I prefer to have movers in the background, and an on-camera key. What are you shooting on? Strobes are always a nice addition but they split that damn CMOS frame. I just did a spot for a club where we used strobes, but since we used the Ikonoskop Dii, which has a CCD chip, we didn't have any issues with split frames. I think The Social Network executed this type of environment very well. Check it out.

Shoot 16x9 and mask the image. Festivals aren't going to take the time to setup anything special.