Valerio Sacchetto

Thank you david, as usual you're very helpful. Unfortunately i can't hang anything (except for the smaller lights that i'll put on a bar that goes across the room) so i have to light from the floor, but i'll surely follow your suggestions for the CU's maybe mixing them a bit ;) I may put up a foamcore reflector above the niche and shine the 2.5k on it from across the room...don't know if it's feasible or practical, probably not tho. Tomorrow they'll start dressing the set and i'll put up what i can that will stay there. I don't know if i'll be able to check the forum since i'll stay there for the WE. Anyway if someone has to say anything i'll be happy to read it. I'll try to take some photos and maybe some grabs from the camera to criticize :P

unfortunately i can't bounce anything off the ceiling or walls since they're painted either blue or a warm yellow. i'll have to do with foamcore and such. In the end i asked for a 1.2k in addition just to be safe. that's exactly what i was going for :) great! well sorry for the late reply, here i have some more things. I hope someone else will give their advice. The director wants to keep a mostly cold tone with a bit of contrast, just a little more than a comedy, so I may not need to fill the place with huge amounts of light in the end. I made a diagram with the space, the most probable place where we'll put the camera and the available light sources red: camera blue: available lights the curve is a dolly from right to left and that's what i thought to do with my lights for the master (i didn't put flags nor nets), the 2.5k may be switched for the 1.2k 2 650w will light the inside of the casket with a couple pools while the other 2 will give something to the background mimicking the candles (they won't have the CTB on them, sorry) this is just my plan, naturally i expect everything to screw up on location :rolleyes: here i took a couple pics of the room that's to show you the colors and a bit of the the size and that's just a shot i took at 1/50 f3.5 400iso to have an idea of what i might get with the bare place.

Hi guys, it's been a while since my last post here. I'm back to ask for suggestions on my next project. I'll have to shoot an interior during the day with not one but two windows in the shot. They'll probably be covered with light curtains but i'm not sure. Anyway it's a no budget thing that i do for a friend, shot on video (canon xlh1a i believe) and that's what i plan to do. I'm asking for some black tulle (bobinette?) to be put on the windows to get down light levels a bit without the costs and worries of NDs (keeping in mind the curtains thing), i also asked for a 4x120 kino (fill in closeups) and a 2.5k HMI that i plan to bounce on some foamcore to raise the ambiance to avoid the outside to be completely blown out, maybe i'll get a 150w hmi or two to use as a very subtle fill/eyelight. The room is a large conference room dressed as a "display room" for the wake of a deceased guy (sorry, i can't find a better way to explain it :P), i still don't have the size but i just assumed i can place the 2.5k 6m (~20ft) away from the wall with the windows for a general fill for the wide shot from there hoping to get a reading at near 80fc (just a guess...or a hope). Since we're on video i'm quite a bit concerned with the light range i'll be able to use and still get acceptable results, maybe i'm a bit paranoid but i haven't shoot video in such a situation before. Anyway i'm looking for advices on the subject especially since i'm having some thoughts about the lights i've asked. I'm afraid i may have a too powerful unit for the closeups where i can cheat a bit more and maybe too few smaller units for the very same purpose. Maybe a 1.2k and a 575 would be better? I want to be covered in the eventuality the director asks for the curtains to be removed (the windows should face north so i shouldn't have harsh light coming in). The project is a short black comedy so i don't want to go too extreme with the contrast, yet i absolutely don't want to overlight, keeping maybe just a one stop underexposure on the faces that are against the windows (not really behind them, just facing away), would that be enough to look realistic while not being real (i.e. too dark)? Any other approach? Tomorrow (later today) i'll go to the location with the director so i'll have something more specific and seen directly by me. maybe some photos and a diagram. Until then any thoughts? Oh and sorry for any mistake but it's 5.30 in the morning here :rolleyes: please ask for further informations since i may have forgot useful infos (or maybe i don't have them...they called me today and the shooting is this week end...) Thank you in advance for anything, even just moral support. ;)

perfect, i may arrange something for that time. I'm just heading out to a dinner with a girl coming to the states...you're warned ;) oh and you spelled everything right :P hope to see you here then!

we'll see B) if get the chance to be in rome i'll surely search for an american girl paintings (there can't be too many, right?) just tell me when you'll be here... :lol: No seriously ;) is it switchable? like if you're in the UK you're the guy with a slight american accent?

aahh students abroad...you lucky dog :lol: you can play the guy who knows a bit of the language but not too well, i do the same everytime here with foreign girls :P

in this case it'd be "come" but, curiously enough, if you would have said "com'è?" it'd have been the same as "come stai" :P just to confuse you a bit However ciao francesco, mi accodo anche io ai saluti :D

Which is quite an accomplishment! Our politicians only get corruption or scandals related to money...they'd love to have a sex scandal...but they can't :P Actually WE would love our politicians to have sex scandals too, you know. As for americans being stupid...stupidity is endemic to the human being so it doesn't matter where you come from (look at us...we re-elected berlusconi as our prime minister... :rolleyes: ). I have american friends who are just as good as everyone else and many of them are pretty well informed. This may be the only thing, many americans are not willing to be informed and the general news reporter surely doesn't want to help.

Dude how serious are you about that? If you want you can find a job that may be so bad you wouldn't tell anyone but that will give you enough money to buy something being it a crappy camcorder or a ticket to your aunt place. Every single day of the last month and of another month earlier this year i took a train to get to a city 120km away from my home, 3 buses and 2 metro lines just to pursue my dream in an economical way. That makes 6 hours of travel per day and 7 hours of work (not paid...i'm in a rental facility learning and spreading the news of my existence :P btw...if someone is willing to raise a 2nd AC in europe... ;) ) I don't wanna brag (there's nothing to brag anyway...) but man if you really want to do this work you have to roll up your sleeves. Nothing come easy and you have to fight for what you want. Every job that will give you money is worthy if you use them to get where you want.

followed your suggestion, david, and got 'em today. :)

Then, but only then, you'll pay for the transfer. Until that moment why pay a useless service? You do that to learn. When you'll be "good" than you'll shoot your movies on film, get a transfer of them and show it to your potential clients as a demo reel.

Try splicers and rubber cement or tape

ditto I'd use a still slr camera for studying light, composition, film exposure etc and a cheap digital camera for motion. Ask your friends to act for you in some shorts, speech driven not action centered! Buy an inexpensive analog lightmeter, keep it with your slr and bring them everywhere you go. Take pictures and immediately (that's very very very important) take notes. very good notes, take your time and write down everything you think can be important. Date, time, lens, aperture, a brief description of the scene, iso, weather, how you decided your exposure, any variation...then while you watch your photos read the relative note and add your feelings, what's good and what's wrong. For stop motion there are many ways. In school (not film school unfortunately) i remember i borrowed a laptop with premiere, plugged in a cheap minidv camera with firewire and did some timelapse and stupid stop motion tests (like glassware running in circles and spelling my name :rolleyes: ) premiere has an option for capturing single frames (or group of frames) directly from the camera. I don't own a digital still camera and with film that can get quite expensive but you can put your dslr on a tripod, secure it so it doesn't move and take a shot for every frame. Inexpensive and rewarding. I haven't read it but there is a book about the work of Ray Harryhausen, that may be useful to you. Plus on the net there are thousands of sites and forums where you can ask and get infos about stop motion techniques.

Yeah i too have used mostly lee filters but it's good to be informed I'll try send rosco an email like david said, also because their "request a swatchbook" page is down ;) To whom did you send it, david? It's kinda strange, it seems that italy is seen as something different from the other european countries, i wonder if i have to worry :P

it's good to have it so you can choose not to use it ;) Personally i think that, like almost everything in this wonderful world of ours, it's all about subtleties. Shallow DOF draws attention to itself like too deep DOF, in my opinion. With the latest frenzy about 35mm adapters there has been a sort of craziness about shallow DOF that was dictated more by the medium than by a real choice. That created a new aesthetic in my opinion that many people consciously searched for afterwards. Something like when we try to get the flaws of older equipment in our 21st century videoclips.

I got mine by filling out the request form. They're very fast. They also included some other promotional material. I was pleasantly surprised because I've spent a year trying to get a rosco swatchbook with no luck :rolleyes: oh well...i guess i'll have to ask for only lee filters then :P

This was exactly my thought! What's so revolutionary about it?

Actually i would recommend that type of meters. As a beginner doing a bit of math and seeing physically the relationship between various elements may be a good thing. Surely it's more time consuming, the low light reading is not very good but it's quite rewarding, instead of having straight a number you have to understand what's behind and figure it out by yourself. That said it's obvious that you can, and will, learn well with both types. The only thing is that i wouldn't get that type of meters brand new because i think it's a bit too much expensive. I'd get it off e-bay (like i did, i own a sekonik l-398) and maybe invest in a digital one later, depending on how you feel maybe a spotmeter, which may be more straightforward and more sensible in low light situations. As for the ND...when you got your meter, measure it :P (or ask someone to do it for you)

Oh yeah, used it last year, i'm totally going to buy a set. Priceless.

On the lee filters website there is a useful "paper meter". It's the conversion poster. http://www.leefilters.com/lighting/downloads/

I know how nasty this may sound man but put out the names, tell everyone you know that may have something to rent to be aware of those people. They should never be able to do that again. Happy you got your stuff back tho, i know what that means :(

No to both. You add a kicker when you need one being it for any reason, truthfulness or look.

ah ah ah! I saw truck drivers making BBQ behind their vehicle many many times (usually ending up with the director and actors preferring it to the catering) but that rig beats them by a long way! :D mmm...i'm already hungry :P

Everytime i happen to be in the Tv section of a store i feel bad. People these days seem to like strange movement reproduction and artefacts :unsure: Anyway i've heard on a talk show some minutes ago an absolutely true thing about cinema, fundings, production etc. Without commercially successful movies there can't be artsy movies becuase they're expensive as well. In italy we don't have commercially successful movies that are funded by the government...nor artsy for that matter. Probably putting more fundings in distribution might be a good solution.

true, i have problems drawing the hangman figure... :P