John E Clark

Yeah, I had presumed with your request, that you had been making your clips with something like a phone camera or internet camera and wanted to move 'up' from there... The list I gave is from my own experience 'moving up', and others may have differences, the 'price' would be about the same to move beyond iPhones or Web Cams. The only better 'deal' would be slewthing out ebay for the best rock bottom deal... but that takes time...

With any 'flicker' lighting, shouldn't one consider wither the capture is digital or film, and if digital, rolling shutter issues? With that in mind, perhaps some older 'louvered' light may be better for digital with rolling shutter, than 'strobe' or similar lightning simulation.

For me going to a movie house is as close to 'ritual' as I come... and just as many religious believers can 'read their holy book' at home... often they go to a meeting house for that 'group' event. I like to see what the audience reaction is to the story. I've not got into these 'internet' group view deals... and I really don't think it would replace the theater experience in this regard... I would probably see more artsyfartsy films but the closest theater that shows such, is 40 miles away... the ones closest show the usual fare Hollywood has been producing of late... So that's what I see... ok... I do go on 'discount night' or 'sunday mornning matinee' prices... And for the most part, technically, Hollywood films have something to learn from, even if the story is well trodden into the ground.

I'd recommend looking at the Panasonic Lumix GH-1 and GH-3. The GH-1 is pretty 'old' so you may be able to get one cheaply. The GH-3 is 'last years' version, and so will be cheaper than this years, GH-4... That and the 14-140mm zoom lens that often is sold as part of the kit with the GH series cameras. It can take reasonable moving pictures, as well as reasonable stills for the money. For microphones, I'd recommend looking at the Oktava MK-012 with at least the hypercardioid capsule. For a recorder, Tascam DR-100. This may be about 1000-1500 when all is said and done.

This is sort of why I have been objecting to the whole 'crop' thing, relative to 35mm Still film negative size, and relating it to Motion Pictures. I know that when I first got into still photography, there was no 'crop factor' when I moved between 35mm still, 2 1/4 x 2 1/4, or in my case, because I'm weird... 2 1/4 x 3 1/4, and then when I got a 4x5 view camera, again no mention of relating the lens to 35mm still negatives... It is of course a conjecture on my part what Motion Picture photographers may have done when moving around the various 35mm Motion Picture formats... My guess is most looked up a table or the like, or just because they had shot with someone else as DoP, 'acquired' an understanding of the lens and format. There was one rule, that is the 'normal' lens was the length of the negative diagonal... but even there, there wer deviations... for example, using that formula 150mm (approx) was the diagonal for 4x5... but I preferred the 'look' of a 210mm lens... The issue of coverage is a bit different, because of the often 'unique' mounts for lenses, people tended to by the particular manufacturer's lenses, or some 3rd party supplier which had the same mount, and attendant 'coverage'. One could in to trouble with 4x5, because one could move the film plane around with swings, tilts, etc.

To answer your question... yes the 'coverage' of a lens designed for a 'full frame' 35mm Still negative, will cover a smaller sensor such as the T3i. To answer a question that probably has not really occurred to you... get an iPhone or Android app that calculates for a given camera and sensor, what the important parameters are for that lens with that sensor. The most important, for 'framing' is Angle of View or Field of View. This will tell you if you need to go down or up in focal length for that sensor/camera. The other feature of these tools is they usually also have 'Depth of Field' values, so you can know that say if your subject is 6 feet from the camera, at F/4 that the subject will be in focast from nose to the ears, etc. I use pCam and would recommend it to anyone. http://www.davideubank.com/Good_Focus/pCAM_FILM_+_DIGITAL_PRO.html

Watch "Who Framed Rodger Rabbit"(1988)... from the wiki... --- One of the themes in the film pertains to the dismantling of public transportation systems by private companies who would profit from an automobile transportation system and freeway infrastructure. Near the end of the film, Judge Doom reveals his plot to destroy Toon Town to make way for the new freeway system. This is an indirect historical reference to the dismantling of public transportation trolley lines by National City Lines during the 1930s in what is also known as the Great American streetcar scandal. The name of Doom's company, Cloverleaf Industries, is a reference to a common freeway-ramp configuration. The assertion that a conspiracy caused the demise of electric urban street railways was the subject of a session at the 1999 Annual Meeting of the Transportation Research Board entitled "Who Framed Roger Rabbit: Conspiracy Theories and Transportation", which concluded that such systems met their demise for a number of other reasons (economic, cultural, societal, technological, legal) having nothing to do with a conspiracy, even though it was true that National City Lines, Inc. (NCL) was a front company—organized by General Motors' Alfred P. Sloan, Jr. in 1922, reorganized in 1936 into a holding company—for the express purpose of acquiring local transit systems throughout the United States. "Once [NCL] purchased a transit company, electric trolley service was immediately discontinued, the tracks quickly pulled up, the wires dismantled ..." and General Motors buses replaced the trolleys.[ --- LA has been trying to get a region wide transport system. But cars are realistically the only way to get around, due to sprawl. Unlike New York, and most European cities I've visited, everything in LA is about 20 miles from anywhere else. And that 20 miles is filled with traffic. The 'lightrail' does help getting around some of the region, and some distances, but for example, my Daughter lived in the Brea Area (near the LA County Museum of Art (LACMA), and it took her 2 hours to get to Union Station in Downtown LA, and only 1.5 hours to get to Oceanside California, about 90 miles to the south... When I travel to San Francisco I often go by car, and I leave at 4 AM, hit LA about 5:30-6 AM, and am headed out of the region by 7 AM... and the traffic is piling up 40 or so miles north of LA going south by 7... San Francisco is more like NYC and similar places because the bus system/trolleys/BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit) is pretty effective. When the Daughter lived on SF itself, she did not need a car (and parking a car was expensive as street parking was short in supply and long in ticketing...). I've only driven myself once in Europe, and that was from Amsterdam down to Frankfurt and back, but I was picking up typewriters that were well away from train stations. Had I only gone to Frankfurt, I would have taken the train...

There's the Getty Museum and the Getty Villa. Both are pretty good if you are in to art galleries. There's also the Huntington Library. The biggest problem with LA is it take 2 hours to get anywhere... Garmin is your friend...

I'm not so pedantic when I read 'sharpness', but interpret that to mean the image apparent 'sharpness' to the human observer. MTF may set a limit on how well a film will record an 'edge', which for humans is significant in the evaluation of 'sharp'. And obviously, an image 'in focus' is more 'sharp', that is edge information is recorded with higher fidelity, than one which is not. Lens characteristics of course play into how 'sharp' an image may be, or appear to be, which of course are not factored into a film stock's listed MTF... The often used 'unsharp mask' filter really does not 'add' sharpness but contrast to edges, but the human observer considers the result to be 'sharper' than the unfiltered image. (Well, until edge 'ringing' becomes visible...). The net result is that an image that has higher contrast, may be 'evaluated' as sharper than an image using a medium which has a higher MTF, but lower contrast.

But it is nice to know some of the variables, and while many 'lab' people are forthright, in my 'stills' days, I have met some who will 'let you make a mistake' and then require more money to correct that 'mistake'.

For stills, by the time Kodak came out with T-Max... I had switched to Fuji Neopan, and Fuji Color(which I still have a number of rolls in the refrigerator... been there for 10+ years... no... I don't clean out the refrigerator frequently...)... so it didn't matter to me what Kodak did. I think the lack of B&W motion picture film 'non' development from the late 60's on, is pretty obvious... few major motion picture projects, only 'highspeed' industrial photography applications, etc. Just an odd thought... when did NFL Films switch to color film?

I would think there are more options that just "ProRes" codec... such as bit depth, 422 vs 444 sampling, HD, 2K, 4K, Log vs Rec 709. etc. Since I've never done this, I obviously can't give detailed options... And aren't there othe codecs that are used for Film scanning? Although I think ProRes probably is the most accessible by most... It would be nice to know what other options are and their 'features'...

As far as I can tell, pop music is 'alive and well'... personally I'd rather it disapear but apparently some people like Justin Bieber enough to make his income last year to be in the 10's of millions... And I'll note that the music industry has had 'digital' pirating a lot longer than films, and even in the olden days, there were 'pirate' records either of studio sessions that never saw the official light of day, or ripped from concerts that were not officially recorded and distributed... There may be markets were pirating is far more significant, but in the US, its not, even if all the torrents and pirate bays were closed... there are places were 'institutional' piracy seems to be the norm, and out of reach of US law. I do think the industry is changing, but I don't think it's going to 'disappear' due to piracy... The reason for the drop in attendance may be more due to the waining enthusiasm for All Things 3-D, and the running of franchises to the ground... or rebooting them for no good reason...

Re: Boycotts... I still don't regularly buy California Table Grapes... and I stopped watching Broadcast TV when CBS canceled the Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour... I don't know that boycotts do anything... I have recently watched a couple of broadcast TV offerings... "Switched at Birth" on ABC, and that was due to the Wife and I taking an ASL class, as the story revolves around two girls, switched at the hospital shortly after their birth, then 16 years later, the switch is found. One of the girls, who was in the 'poor' mother's house, lost her hearing due to disease. So, she signs quite a bit, and the actress in fact is a signer. There are other deaf cast members as well. Anyway... watching it reminded me of why I hate Broadcast TV and commercials... But back to boycotts... my boycott accomplished 'nothing' in terms of changes to Broadcast TV... the thing that changed 'tv' was the development of cable content, and funneled through cable as 'TV'... These days I make a distinction between cable produced content and Broadcast (as in FCC regulated) TV. Even if the FCC reduced some number of regulations on content, I think the 'advertisement' pattern would still remain... Some cable content suppliers do think towards syndication on Broadcast channels, and so they have material which does have the ad insert pattern, but others do not.

There is quite a bit of difference between the music industry, and what one needs on entry, and 'making a movie'... One 'problem' that I have with the modern theater situation, is that a 'metroplex' is directed to maximizing audience, and also will not show films that may cause their other presentations to suffer audience wise... with a more decentralized theater setup, a theater across town (maybe even on the otherside of the tracks) could run films that were out of the ordinary, and perhaps contained 'morally objectionable material' while still not being 'porn'... I see some of that sort of capability returning with small audience venuues and 'digital' projection... So, you will not see a 'Midnight Cowboy'(1969) (when first released was rated X and is the only X rated film to win an Academy Award...) in a metroplex (or only in some major market like NYC, SF or LA...)

Perhaps it is some 'age thing', but I don't have people I talk about 'film' surrounding me. The Boss will comment on 'I liked "The Imitation Game", you should see it' is about as close to a non-film industry person will get to a recommend for me. The Sister-in-Law has 'recommended' a few films in the past, but they don't go to the movies that much... the last one they attended with us was "Into the Woods"... they 'loved' it... the Wife and I were somewhat disappointed, and that opinion was pretty much based on 'story'... I also don't idealize The Past... If you've never seen any of the following, you may think that there were many more films in the past that had better story, better presentation, etc... Tammy and the Bachelor (1957) Tammy Tell Me True (1961) Tammy and the Doctor (1963) Tammy and the Millionaire (1967) And while I'm somewhat embarrased to mention that I've actually sat in a theater watching "Tammy and the Doctor"... it was the only movie showing in the single theater in Cedar Rapids Iowa where I spent that sommer... I think I'd rather watch the Twilight series in full 5 times in a row, before watching any of those films... and needless to say... my opinion of the Twilight series is not that high... Which leads me to... The reason the Twilight series was shot on film... was directly due to the fact that digital had not yet developed to the point it is today. I also think they did the series a 'disservice' by replacing Catherine Hardwicke as director... the first "Twilight"(2008) I could almost stand... I think if the series were to have been started today, it would be digital capture. I don't think the fact that Film film was involved had anything to do with the mass appeal to women and girls... since the books, and by various literary standards, those were not well received... were very popular with girls and young women.

For me the 'biggest' cinematography technique that may have me 'walking out of the theater'... is shaky cam. I have gotten use to it now, but early on, in many situations, I would begin to get motion sick feelings, which simple is not a theater experience I like... the last film where I would have walked out was "Beasts of the Southern Wild"(2012), however, the Wife had waited months for a showing near us... sort of... like 100 miles away that was captioned... so, basically this is the only film I've 'watched' with eyes closed for most of it... I watched several of the Best Picture nominees last year, and I was 'wrong' on several counts as to Film film vs Digital film... For example, I though "Twelve Years a Slave"(2013) was 'digital' because the grain pattern looked 'so obvious'... ha... shot on film... The problem of course is that with Digital Intermediates there are no internegs/positives, which were standard in the olden days, and so, there is a certain 'sharpness' that is retained. One can see many flaws in older films that have been newly transfered, which were not really 'visible' in the olden days. I may go up to the New Beverly, which Tarantino is turining into a Film film only theater, and see some Film film projected movies... but probably not any time soon...

I don't agree with that Film film some how creates a 'deeper connection' to the viewer than Digital film. Since I had been watching Film film for over 40 years by the time Digital film rolled around in significant numbers, this 'deeper connection' should have been clear on the switch over... I preceive no such 'connection'... Perhaps I suffer from some wort of 'Asperger's Syndrome' in relationship to such a 'deeper connection'. I will agree with the claim that some number of films made today, are 'throw away entertainment' films, and as such, I go, see, buy popcorn, leave, and consider the night out a 'success', if the Wife and I don't get into a fight on some trivial issue... It may also be the case that some set of independent , and this term is getting more vacuous as time goes on, as most 'studios' are not bankrolling films as they once did, so 'everyone' is independent... take on subjects and themes that have potentially a more 'deep' connection to viewers... say, a film like "Dallas Buyer's Club", whould be a hard sell for a studio to consider since it doesn't sound like a mega blockbuster, with follow on franchise possibilities... oh... wait... it was shot digitally on an Alexa... with 'no {Hollywood} lights'... I thought it was a pretty good film... and I'm not alone... If that story doesn't have some 'deeper connection' to many viewers... I don't know what would... (of course there may be some who reject the film on some sort of 'religious/philosophical' grounds.. but that aside...). I don't think it would have been 'better' shot on film, and given the 'no {Hollywood} lights'... probably would have been technically 'worse', for some value of 'worse'.

In many theaters these days, and it has been the case for quite some time even in the Film film projection days, there is a 'digital' and mostly 'video' program, with ads and various little 'behind the scenes' promo videos... Now, if you can't tell the difference between that 'video' content and the main 'digital' film presented, well ok... perhaps there is still a difference for some people, especially if they have to look up how the film was shot... I see a distinct difference between the 'video' program and the main film... and these days, I could care less how it was originated. I will say that 3-D does strike me as 'washed out' in terms of contrast... but it is still not 'video'... for me. What I go to movies in theaters for is the film story... the last film I saw was "Into the Woods"(2014)... I did not like it, not because it was shot on a digital camera, because I've seen now any number of films shot with an ARRI Alexa of some sort... but it was just a 'less than' movie... as for technical considerations, it was very good... I saw the 2-D version, and the 'dark' scenes had detail and were 'dark'... etc...

Just a random guess... car 'safety' glass is a composite of two glass surfaces with a plastic film in between. The 'green' may be from the plastic material that is used, or the other ingredients of the glass mix to make it more resilient to impact. The same is true for other 'safety' glass such as shower doors, which have a 'greenish' cast as well as 'bullet proof' glass cash windows.

'grain' is used in painting/drawing as well... after it was clear that to get a 'real' image, one need only use photography, a large set of painters moved into 'impressionism', and used a variety of technqiues to invoke in the viewer an 'emotion' rather than document 'reality'... there's that word again... In any case Pointillism, which closely corresponds to 'film grain', was one branch of the impressionistic movements. A classic example: (This example is far more saturated in color than the original, and has compression artifacts, which unless things have changed, is at the Arti Institute in Chicago... but it brings out the pointillism technique.). Since your 'location' indicates Des Moines... I suggest take a weekend trip to Chicago... perhaps in the Spring... and stay a couple of days in the museum... well hotel at night...

Yes 'real', 'realism', and even 'reality shows' all have philosophical problems... Even in the world of painting and drawing... realism is problematic. These days surveillance cams are probably as 'real' as it gets... I don't know that making an entire feature film with such cameras would be successful... but heck there's a project for an artist to explore... probably could get the work in some gallery somewhere...

Personally I'd like to see a 'Sound of Music' adaption in the Film Noir style... with perhaps a modern Kurt Weill composing the score... Grain is a technique for setting an the emotional content of a scene... Then there's 'smoke'... now of course, I can see dust in rooms with bright streaming light... but the amount of 'dust' that is usually present in 'real life' scenes, is enhanced... sometimes big time... for Movie Picture Making. (On the other hand, I've never really liked David Hamilton's 'grainy' stills of nubile young females in various states of uncladness.) I've also seen 'smoke' used to create 'haze depth in outdoor shots... which does exist... but often does not... so the effect is enhanced from whatever the outdoor location has to offer at the moment of filming.

I a strong believer that 'classic' can only be designated when the film has passed into history, and then is evaluated for its merits. You mention Sergio Leone... I first saw the Clint Eastwood westerns that have now become 'classics' in theaters that were 'on the other side of the tracks'. At the time porn was illegal, but these theaters whould show 'soft core' sexploitation films, biker gang films, and westerns such as the Leone opus... Fast forward nearly 50 years... and his works are 'classics'... Some films from the late 60's early 70's that were 'wow', I find 'hard to watch' these days. I like Hitchcock, but I do see 'his era' imprinted on the films... sound stage sets, big lights, etc... that were required in the era. I especially like "Strangers on a Train"(1951), and of course "Psycho"(1960), but the others really strike me these days as studio deals, whether big studio in the US, or his early British works. I've been meaning to get the BD update to "Peeping Tom"(1960), one of the last films directed by Michael Powell... which was a contemporary film of "Psycho" and legend has it that one of the reasons for Hitchcocks approach to the 'media' and disallowing press previews of the film, was due to how "Peeping Tom" was killed in the press before its general release. Of course the media hype for "Psycho" was a 'classic' media campaign in its own right...

My guess would be the Kino engineers never expected Kinos (the old ones...) to be used on small generator supplies... because most productions, required big power even if at a location that required generators. And in studios or locations with power company power... the 'problem' was not an issue. (Unless shooting in an old house/building... and then the production would have brought in heave power anyway...). Due to the running lighter in all senses of the modern digital age... more people are using smaller generators that exacerbate the problem. This is not a problem limited to 'movie making'... my day job involves desiging and getting equipment working in the ugly places of the earth, and so I deal with this anytime someone mentions 'solar cells', 'hydrogen fuel cells', gas/diesel generators, to power equipment these problems arise with the computer based systems that are supposed to run 'flawlessly' in conditions ranging from subzero arctic moutain top conditions to the middle of the desert... (perhaps with a few changes in optional equipment...).