Will Barber

My experience working on commercial sets has pretty much taught me that I'll do anything to avoid making commercials.

If it's only one shot, you could just get it close enough practically and then pull it the rest of the way down in color correction. On set, just try to keep the lights low, and consider cutting a hole in a piece of black cloth for the lens, so the cloth would cut down on any ambient light bouncing into the box.

Before you buy a $100+ roll of gel, I'd do what Adrian suggested and look into Visqueen. I don't know what kind of stores you have in Sweden that are similar to Home Depot or Lowes, but I was at Lowes the other day, and they stock several thicknesses of clear plastic sheeting. You can get a pretty huge piece of plastic for far cheaper than a roll of gel.

There is one caveat pointed out to me by a fellow student who DITs and color corrects on a lot of shoots in Rochester, and that is that all the controls that'd be normally adjusted by the 1st AC are on the smart side of the camera, rather than the dumb side, which means a handheld operator would either have to hand it off or do it himself. Not personally something that bothers me, but something that may get in the way of professional acceptance. He also mentioned that Arri would probably come out with an "Amira Studio" sometime soon, which would essentially be a stripped down Alexa designed to be more competitive in the indie feature market. Maybe they'll think about making a 16mm digital cinema camera, similar to how they once were a strong presence the 35mm and 16mm film worlds, designed to work with the old lenses made for the SR3 and their other old cameras. I'd definitely be interested in that.

Hm, guess I misunderstood the problem based on the examples he showed. I've never really considered how the diffusion affects the quality of the blacks.

I second the Opal, I personally haven't used it, but one DP I crew for uses it ALL the time and I'll probably pick up a roll for myself when I get my next paycheck.

Perhaps a black pro-mist or even black stocking on the rear element. To my eye, most "soft" filters tend to cut out the extreme dark tones, so maybe it's just an issue of bringing them back down in post. That second image really just looks like the first one but with the blacks brought back to their proper level.

What I like most about film cameras is that they're weighted correctly and the eyepiece is in the right spot for handheld. Most digital cameras nowadays are nearly impossible to shoulder mount correctly without adding a $1000+ EVF, which is difficult for a student to come by. Length isn't too much of a problem for me, I've gotten pretty good at navigating with the HPX cameras at crowded hockey games and I'm used to shooting hockey with a huge cord and buttpack hanging off the back, so I wouldn't see that personally being an issue. If I REALLY was concerned about that for a specific shoot, I'd probably be looking at an Arri M anyway. As far as a decent all-around camera though, I'd LOVE an Amira. It's nearly complete right out of the box, and I could easily finish out the package with gear from school. It's completely out of my reach at this point, but it's a relief to know that if someone asked me what camera in the world I'd like to shoot with I wouldn't even have to think about it. I don't think I've ever been as impressed with digital than the first time I saw an Alexa in action and then later saw the graded image.

Try using a bounce for fill instead of another light. It'll be far easier to control where the light goes if you're not using the umbrellas. Based on the photos of Johnny Depp you linked, you might even think about just using a soft key that lights about 3/4 of the subject's face and not using fill at all, even hanging some black cloth to stop the rogue light bounce if you have to because of the white room. Try looking at Roger Deakins' booklight technique, it's a pretty cheap way to get more desirable lighting when you don't necessarily have the correct tools for the job. If you want really contrasty, you might think about lowering your ISO or stopping down your aperture so that you can light for the highlights and get a better falloff to black.

Also, consider using a different sort of diffusion. Umbrella lights really blast light everywhere because of their shape. Something like normal diffusion paper or a silk closer to your subject may give you less spill and allow you to control the light better. Umbrellas can be overkill sometimes if you're trying to light carefully.

That's a good piece of information to keep in mind. I try my hardest to never use a gennie, but it's inevitable that I'll probably have to at some point.

I've had an Arri 575 HMI not strike on a gennie. Has anyone else had to jumpstart an HMI? Since all we had was Kinos at the time (no high watt lamps), I actually hauled an 1875w air conditioner out to the middle of the woods on a tractor to get the necessary juice flowing to strike. I was given that tip by a grip friend of mine, but I've never heard of having to do that before.

I love the form factor of ENG cameras. I work for a sports show, so the cameras I shoot on most are HPX370s and 500s. What the Amira did that really excited me was take away most things that'd make an ENG camera undesirable for cinema by putting the Alexa sensor in, recording to ProRes on CFast cards, and adding a higher quality EVF. Also, they improved on other characteristics of ENG cameras by adding the highly adjustable shoulder mount and EVF location. I'm glad they left the rail mounts on, just like the alexa, so all you'd need to do is stick some handles on the front of a studio rig and pretty much be set to shoot.

Isolate your high luma areas, like 80ish-100%, and keep those white, but feather the edge of the mask so that it doesn't get blotchy. If I knew how to do it in After Effects I'd be able to tell you how, I only really know Resolve. I think what's really missing is a true highlight that's not yellow. Alternately, you could make your yellow tint only apply to the low luma areas. Also your low mids and blacks are looking a little green, you might want to push them a little towards blue.

The silk and bounce Idea sounds like it'd work. It's the same basic thing as what we used on a car commercial once. I'm guessing the issues would be similar, lighting a reflective surface.

Why not just put whatever lens you want on it? Does it have the swappable mounts like I thought they said it was going to? I'd be more inclined to use it as a $40k Alexa, more like a production camera. Though the limit to Rec709 on the lowest priced one is kind of disappointing...if I could get that one with ProRes I'd be really happy. Not that I have any money to drop on a camera right now, but if I did I'm sure the mid-level Amira is where I'd try to start.

If you have the correct shoulder mount kit, the SR3 isn't too bad handheld. I've done some minor shooting handheld without the correct accessories, and even that wasn't terrible. SR3's are tanks, so maybe that's just my personal preference for a heavy camera, though I've never used an Aaton, so I can only speak about the features of the SR3 that I enjoy. I will say though, that they're a breeze to load even in a small changing tent, and I've never experienced an issue with the camera that wasn't due to simply not knowing every little thing about operating it.

I doubt they'd make the jump from an FS100 with AVCHD to a similar 4K without it. The FS700 with the update fills that need. the FS100 occupies a good place right now, and minus the lens mount it's a pretty decent HD camera. The AVCHD is my main gripe with it, since alternate lenses are pretty easily available.

In addition to brightening the subject with a bounce or lights, just try to avoid the sky in the shot if possible. Using longer lenses and thinking a little more about the background can help with that.

As far as I can remember without the kit in front of me, the kit I use with the Aspheron is a Distagon MK3. That's just comparing it to pictures online, but the MK1 and 2 really don't look similar to the MK3, so I believe that what I said is accurate.

It's an amazing film. Easily the best new release I've seen in years, granted I haven't seen all of the new films. Right up there with Moonrise Kingdom in terms of capturing a certain kind of world, albeit slightly stylized. Compelling and engaging plot, beautiful imagery, you can't ask for much better.

You can not win with white walls. They're like kryptonite for cinematography. Yet, we find ourselves in ugly white rooms constantly. It's merciless.

Because they're good for lighting as long as it's NOT movies. Just like 4400K fluorescents and mixed color temperatures. I don't get why they'd use those fluorescents, 5600K is much more pleasing to the eye. Green lights make me feel weird.

Well, a big room helps you with the fact that you can pull away from the walls so you aren't casting shadows, and you can more easily keep light off the walls. One solution to the white walls is to get some wallpaper, and adhere it temporarily to the walls as flat as possible, something I recommend doing the day before the shoot, not the morning of. That also gives you the opportunity to create your color scheme in the environment, rather than just in the lighting.

Well if it works with regular lights, maybe you want to look into a lighter silk for outdoors. It probably is close to a full silk, I find it odd that they don't say how strong it is. I definitely second the bleached muslin, possibly look into an unbleached as well for a nice warm glow. Maybe also a shiny white flag, I've found that to be useful for bouncing into a larger area outside. The kits I use come with a silk and a flag that's white on one side and black on the other. The flag's really useful, you get to carry 2 rags in the space of one!

WA adapter tends to kill light and they generally aren't optically very good. I played 'round with that on my GH2 when I had it and it just didn't work very well. tons of CA, focus acting strangely, and dimmer images.

I think the sigma in Nikon is manual-- but I"m not 100% on that. I know on Canon it's not.

 

Speedbooster isn't bad on the pocket, just expensive and weighty.

 

Have you looked into the Rokinon cine-primes? They're not the best lenses, but they're not the worst either, and for the price they are hard to beat.

 

Also apparently C mount 1" lenses will work as well. There are many made for CCTV cameras which are acceptable.

I'm pretty sure the Sigma is manual, my friend who owns the BMPCC just ordered one. It'll probably be our go-to lens, in addition to the 50mm 1.4 and whatever other prime comes with our D800 kits at school.

Why would you say it's weighty? You could put a 9" monitor and an Optimo on that camera and still come out ahead in the weight game. I actually think the Blackmagic pocket is too light. I'm gonna be strapping on matteboxes and anything else I can get my hands on just to add a little heft to my shoulder rig. Still beats the hell out of an HPX500, which is pretty much hell after 3 periods of hockey, and that's not even a heavy camera. But I'll gladly take a well weighted and balanced 20lb rig over a barebones BMPCC on my shoulder mount.

I also second looking at the Rokinons, they look great on the GH3, I see no reason why they wouldn't be as good or better on the BMPCC.

I'm assuming the white screen is just a silk, seeing as every butterfly I've come across has come with at least a silk and a flag.

What do you mean it's too strong? The sun is too strong for the silk, or the silk cuts too much of the sun?

 

 

 

I've looked at the SpeedBoosters, they're certainly interesting, a few hundred quids worth, not just at the moment though. Only thing with the SpeedBoosters that gets confusing is the "more light" side of things, the way I see it, you're not "gaining" any light, you're just not losing as much from the crop (and thus smaller aperture) if you use the SpeedBooster, no?

 

I'm not certain about the specifics, but the way i look at is it the glass element allows you to use more of the large lenses. Instead of taking the center "crop" from the lens, you're taking a larger "crop" that is equivalent to how much a 35mm film camera would see. So yes, you gain more light because you're using more of the lens and, to put it simply, putting more picture on the sensor. I'm not really a fan of the Speedboost part of it, at least on the wide end of things. If someone is using it so they can shoot at f/.74 like Kubrick, they're doing it wrong. Unless for specific effect, or absolute emergency, shooting that wide just ends up with a pissed off AC and tons of takes. It's greatest use is that you can stick an f/3.5 zoom on it and gain back over 1 stop, getting it pretty close to a f/2 I believe. I was testing one such zoom on my friend's BMPCC and we were blown away how shallow the DoF was and how bright the image was at 400ISO with the single bulb in his room. The lens was also a macro, and we got some insanely shallow DoFs using that.

EDIT: I haven't looked into this hardly at all, but what about a wide angle adapter that goes in front of the lens? I have an old screw on one from my handycam days and I was thinking about trying to get step down rings to fit it on a 10mm Bolex lens. I'm not sure if anyone makes them in good quality, the only professional one I've seen has been the Aspheron, which goes for over $3000 and is made to specifically work with the Zeiss 9.5 distagon.