Rob McGreevy

Mario, In full agreement with pretty much everything Matthew said...just include your position, the project name and the year, but at a certain point you won't really need it. At this point I get most of my work through referrals or through the union, the only time I'm ever asked to submit a resume is if I'm gaffing an indie feature for an out of town DP i've never worked with before, and even then i just sent an email with a list of credits I've done...I haven't done a proper resume in years, and in this line of work it really is just a list of projects you've done and position, because no matter where you go in the country your job is pretty much the same and any potentially hiring producer is going to know exactly what you did on a job if you put down "grip" or "gaffer" or whatever...they know what your job is, usually when they're asking for a resume they just want to gauge your experience at it to determine if you're the right fit for the production.

I don't have that in my kit, the Toland app was serving pretty well until my phone started having software issues...I used to try to do those calcs based on that equation, I'm just pretty bad at math especially in my head, so once it became an option to let the computer do it for me, well, I kind of forgot about those old formulas... I was kind of hoping to find something reliable on the cyber-webs though, as I'm currently in the thick of it on a shoot out in BFE Texas and I won't be getting analogue equipment or equipment of any variety for that matter in anytime soon...

Can anyone point me in the direction of a solid online exposure calculator? I've got the Toland AC app on my phone, but it doesn't offer me all the settings I want and it's kind of malfunctioning on me anyway...I'm gaffing a feature and I need to know how many foot candles I need for exposure at 1000 ISO, 24 fps and 180 shutter...don't have f stop confirmed yet but dp tells me it'll be roughly in the 2-2.8ish range. I've got a balloon light system coming in from L.A. that I've never worked with and before I have production throw down $ on it I need to be sure it will be sufficient.

Speaking from my own experience, as David more or less said the role of the Gaffer during daylight shoots varies depending on the scale of production...typically on a big shoot the gaffer just kind of hangs out while us electrics take turns baby-sitting the power run...if there's a night shoot later in the day or even in the week he may leave one of us in charge and go supervise that set up...sometimes he'll just take a nap in the truck (everybody needs a break sometimes, even the boss). When I'm the gaffer on smaller, indie stuff...it still depends on the size of the overall crew. If there are enough grips then usually after running power to the set (which on a smaller operation usually just involves a couple stingers and a honda putt putt) I'll just sit in the truck and game plan for future lighting days with the best boy. if the crew is short on grips then I'll jump in and be a grip for the day. I've done a couple shoots where either the KG wasn't the most knowledgable when it comes to lighting, or the DP and I had a relationship and he just trusted me, and I would basically dictate what diffusions and reflectors would go where, essentially taking over that portion of the KG job but leaving set up and rigging of everything under the actual KG's jurisdiction...but I prefer not to do it that way and let the KG be totally independent in his job, sometimes it just shakes out that way. Sometimes on day exes I just find myself on cloud watch all day - I live in Texas, the weather can change on a dime here.

Anybody ever use lite panels from a company called Genaray and can offer a review? Specifically this is the model I'm looking at: http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/996876-REG/genaray_sp_e_240b_spectroled_essential_240_bi_color.html I've never heard of this brand before. They're very cheap obviously so I'm not expecting a top of the line light by any means, just something small and cheap and convenient. Or if anybody can turn me on to another brand/model that's similar in price, on the smaller end, bi color, and battery operated. I just want something that works OK without having to pay Lite Panel prices, any knock off brand is probably fine as long it's not hideously green or falls apart on the first use or whatever.

Cool, thanks David

Do dragons and scarletts only offer interchangeable olpfs? is this not an option for a regular red epic?

Thanks David, that was kind of the answer I was looking for...yes, we want the video to look professional-ish, but it should contrast with the short that surrounds it and be of lower quality...the link i submitted was just a sample the director gave me and maybe not a great one, it's a little more slick than what we're going for. Shooting with a 360 degree shutter is a great idea, what I really wanted to try to do was get it to look interlaced and I wasn't sure how to do that. When you say crop down the sensor are you saying shooting a lower res to use less of it? Or to crop the final image in post? Just wanted to be clear on that, I was already planning on shooting it at HD.

Sorry, forgot to post link:

I'm shooting a short the features a segment of a fictional youtube cooking show...I included a sample of one with a similar look that's in the ballpark of what we're going for - basically the idea is the host can afford decent prosumer stuff and knows basically how to use it, but definitely isn't a professional with high end stuff. We'll be shooting the rest of it with a red dragon and I'm wondering if I can get a cheaper more video look with that camera. My thinking is down res to HD, up the fps for more of a news-video look, record at a smaller color space and use a cheaper lens and overlight it. Is that enough to make it look lower quality? Anything else I can do in camera to achieve that look? Or would I be better off trying to use a cheaper camera that shoots that way natively?

How do rolling shutters on digital cameras work? Or more specifically, how is it that it's measured in degrees? With film cameras that made sense, it was a disc with a leaf that could be adjusted mechanically to created an actual physical angle measured in degrees, but my understanding of how a rolling shutter works is it's basically a scan line that moves down the sensor of the camera...is the expression in degrees a measured equivalent of the amount of sensor that would be exposed if it were an actual mechanical shutter? Or is there some other mechanism in play entirely that I'm unaware of? Also, i've read that rolling shutters can created serious artifact issues with CMOS sensors...but so many digital cameras still utilize both rolling shutter and CMOS sensors. There must be some advantage they offer over a global shutter, right? What's the advantage of one type of shutter vs. the other?

I've used said Kino CFLs before, I think they're pretty good...they can be dimmed down to around 30% with a variac before noticeable flicker starts, and work great with chinaballs...very bright too. Only thing is like with any kind of kino tube color temp can vary with the age of the fixture - I worked with them on a feature and we had two that didn't match, one had to be corrected at all times. But the good news is since they don't get that hot you can wrap the gel right over them and it won't melt. These were Kinos 5500 CFLs however, I haven't used the tungsten model but had heard they are pretty equivalent to standard 3200 kino tubes.

Thanks for the response, guys...as far as gaps in my knowledge goes, I guess largely what it comes down is I'll never understand the math. The book I've been reading up on covers stuff like de-bayering algorithms, nyquiest sampling math, etc...I think I have a general understanding of most of these concepts, but I'll never understand the math behind any of it, I'm just not mentally geared that way. So I guess I'm wondering, how much of that stuff do I really need to know? I'm sure I need to be at least somewhat familiar with most of it, but just looking at all those equations gives me a headache. Also, there's a bit of a gap for me between abstract concept and practical application. For example, I understand what a LUT is and what it does. But I have no idea how to apply one, either in camera or in post. I know these are things that just take some repetition to learn, but in the mean time is this the type of thing I can expect to rely on an AC/DIT to cover for me until I get a little more hands on experience? I feel pretty comfortable lighting/exposing in general as that's what I've been doing for years. As far as doing so for individual cameras no I'm not up to speed with how things expose on specific camera models. Going to the rental house and shooting tests is definitely good advice, I used to work at one and will be doing that soon.

Hey guys, I'll be attempting to shoot my first project in mid december and I could definitely use some guidance. I've been G/E for almost 10 years. I've done a little camera stuff during that time but...the technology has definitely gotten away from me somewhat and I'm currently playing catch up. I'm sure I'll have a lot of questions over the next month and a half as I prep for this thing, but here's two good ones to start: first off, can anyone point me in a good direction to learn some of the things I need to learn? I read online articles/posts on this forum everyday, I also have a big fat book on digital cin. that I've been going through...some of it just doesn't make sense in practical terms I guess. I've got a ton of abstract concepts floating around in my head, are there any resources that explains things in practical, this-is-how-this-concept-applies-on-set terms? Also, what kind of camera should I use? I know, I know, hopelessly general question with dozens of variables...let me be a little more specific: this is for a web series, main viewing platform would probably be youtube. Is 4k really necessary? What kind of bit depth should I be looking for? I think we want to color correct in post, what offers the best workflow/shooting format? Budget wise I'm not really sure what we have yet, but the director said she would try to arrange to get me whatever camera I wanted to shoot on...the only answer i can really give is Alexa because that's the one all the DPs I work with prefer. As a lighting guy I have to say I somewhat agree, the low light sensitivity sure makes my job easier... I know it also has crazy dynamic range and that's really the only opinion I can state on the matter. Other than those two things are there any other big advantages it offers over say a Red Epic (which I believe the director can get a good deal on and so is a very likely contender) or some other lower end, pro-sumer camera? I guess when selecting a camera I'm not really sure what technical specifics to consider other than light sensitivity, stop range, work flow and lens compatibility. Thanks guys, any advice is greatly appreciated

@Adrian, just what I was going to suggest as well, lekos can be great for that scenario. - they're punchy enough and the leaves give you such precision control over the beam the leko could be on the ground and moved around as needed to be out of frame/hit the actor being filmed. If the ceiling is white too you may not even need a show card, though that may give you more punch if that's what you want. One thing to keep in mind is spill from lekos can get messy, be prepared to throw up some bottomers/siders and maybe even hang duvy skirts from the celing if need be as the tops of the walls can get pretty bright if the ceiling reflection is too close. Depending on the lens you choose you can go pretty punchy with a very narrow barrel or just get overall ambience with say a 90 degree barrel. On the other hand a light with more spread just stuck in the corner somewhere and bounced into the ceiling would fill the whole room and mostly give you a big ambient boost. Depending on how low the ceilings actually are and if you can get permission to do so there's always drilling a baby/junior plate into the wall if you can find a stud and hanging something low profile - make sure to safety cable it and also drill that into the stud as well. Or if you have the room you could also try a menace arm with a low profile fixture on it, although those can turn into cumbersome beasts in no time when you're in tight spaces. Don't really know what kind of light you're trying to get up there and how much room you have for it, but another thought is stapling a run of zip stinger all the way up to the ceiling and simply hanging a practical, maybe with a china ball attached. Or you could tape up bare kino tubes, maybe with a cut of diff taped around them as well. Without specifics on dimensions, what kind of surface you're dealing with, how low you can go with the light and what tip of light you'd like up there and how labor-intensive you're willing to get to place it it's tough to say what might work best but there's a handful of options to consider.

I don't really do a whole lot of dolly gripping myself but I do get a call every now and then and can pull it out in a pinch when i have to. If it's a big project with a lot of money on the line and complex moves I'll turn that down, but it's not that hard if it's a small project and the moves are simple. I'm admittedly more familiar with the fisher 10 and 11 than chapman stuff as that's the one the rental house I used to work at carried, but they're pretty similar in concept. Best advice is to do exactly what you were planning and go to the rental house and spend some time putting it together and taking it apart, get real familiar with all the parts - if you at least start your day knowing what everything is you can at least fake it till you make it. For me the hardest part has always been leveling the track - not so hard if you're inside and if the floor's really level you may not even have to, but can be a royal pain on outdoor locations. A solid dolly grip can level in even the roughest terrain in no time, takes someone like me a little longer. If you're shooting outside just make sure you get all the leveling stuff you need from the rental house, and when you think you have enough cribbing, wedges, basos, and apple boxes, get more.

So I decided recently that I wanted to get a better understanding of how modern digital cameras work. So I picked up a copy of "Digital Cinematography" by David Stump. What a monster of a book. I read the first 30 pages and seriously had to take an Advil. I don't want to give the book a bad review, it's very thorough and goes into great detail on how digital cameras work...much more than I'm ready for at the moment, though. The book really presupposes that the reader already knows quite a bit as it introduces concepts by describing them with terms I already don't understand. I don't suppose anybody here is aware of a book/other resource on the technical side of digital cinematography that's maybe a little more basic and easier for a non-camera person to understand? Thanks ya'll

Quick correction Kenny, it's the Set Lighting Technician's Handbook by Harry C. Box. Generally referred to as the Harry Box Book on set because we low-minded juicers like the dirty pun :) Speaking of said book, re: Harry Box you lose or gain 10K of color temperature for every one volt up or down. So a 10V adjustment will also result in 100K of color temperature adjustment. As for empirical data, there is none posted in the book but I have no reason to disbelieve him; this is a law of physics that is measurable and will follow the same mathematical formula every time, like gravity. I'm sure empirical data exists somewhere and I'm sure Mr. Box researched said data before publication. But ultimately when you think about the basic principals at play common sense will tell you that CT shift is an inevitability anyway: a tungsten filament is the closest thing that exists in nature to Lord Kelvin's ideal black body radiator. Fewer volts means less energy, therefore less heat resulting in a drop in CT towards red. More volts means more energy, means more heat so it shifts higher towards blue (up to a certain point, then you blow the bulb). A few additional notes on dimmers to further the discussion: If you're using a variac dimmer they usually have the actual voltage level listed on the dial, so you can set it to a precise voltage level, then do the math to see where you are on the Kelvin scale, and make any correction adjustments accordingly. That's assuming that correcting it is important to the shot, I've noticed not all DPs will bother with it. I'm not inside the mind of a DP, so I don't know when they do or don't think CT is critical. Some general things I've noticed: If the scene is very warm i.e. lots of practicals/fire effects; CT is not that important because the DP is going for a very desaturated look; CT is important but the dimmed lights are not keying principal talent...these are some of the situations I've seen DPs be totally OK with CT drop when dimming a light. I'd be very curious to hear from any other DPs on what their thoughts are on this. Also, I think it's worth discussing SRC/electronic dimmers in this thread. They work differently than variac or rheostat dimmers do in that they don't use the voltage to effect intensity, but rather the voltage remains the same and the frequency is adjusted; there is mechanism in these dimmers that shuts itself on and off at different points in the sine wave, so the light is just off during a certain portion of the cycle. This can cause flickering in some scenarios but typically is not an issue. What I just realized I don't know is whether or not these dimmers effect color temperature...I've tried researching that online but haven't found anything that conclusive. Does anybody know the answer to that?

Light: Science and Magic: An Introduction to Photographic Lighting. More geared toward still photographers, but the concepts are still very useful for our craft - this book goes very thoroughly into the basic fundamentals of how light actually behaves in the real world, very much worth the read.

Well thanks Marc, that's good to know...but did you intend to address Ville with your post? He's the OP, it's his film we've been discussing.

...missed the part on trying to rig it another way other than the triple header. Sure, many things are possible if you have the right rigging tools, but I don't know your package so I can't say for sure. But aside from that at a certain point it becomes an issue of "is it worth it?" If it saves a lot of time and effort in the long run then sure, but consider how much of that you're going to be putting into an elaborate rig cause you didn't have the right gear to start with, versus just doing it the traditional way and putting each light on it's own stand. Don't get me wrong, it sounds like a fun challenge and I love getting creative with the gear for on-the-fly MacGuyver style rigging projects...but it's generally best to not do it on production's time unless you have to.

To be honest I'm not exactly sure what an overhead stand is, but gathering from the context it sounds like you're referring to what we in the States call Hi Rollers...either way that scenario presents some challenges for a couple reasons. First off, the rollers have flat, narrow bases in comparison to combos or cranks, so they're going to be quite top heavy and as such I would rule them out. But even with the combo stands, the combo wheels are great but they're small and hard - best used as an indoor studio toy, or at least on a perfectly flat surface...could be a pain to roll around on those brick streets you depicted. Roadrunners have big pneumatic tires that can handle surface undulations well, that's why they're well-suited for outdoor use. They're also heavier at the bottom. Also, if you need to go up on the stand the weight's going to be an issue, same as if it were one big light on a non-crank stand. Not saying it can't be done, but only you know your gear and your crew and your location, so you be the judge on whether it's going to actually save time/labor or not. Weird that they don't have triple headers...crank stands I can somewhat get, those are kind of expensive and heavy duty, but triple headers are a pretty cheap, standard grip item.

Just a quick thought here, you can try this out if your budget allows if not don't sweat it. You can use all three of those lights as one source if you so desire, bouncing or diffusing it can even out the beams so they act as one. However, it can get to be a huge pain to have to hike all three of those around when they're on separate stands. If you're able to afford a roadrunner or similar type of outdoor crank stand and a junior triple header, you can mount all three on it and roll it around as if it's one light. This is something I wound up having to do once when our 6k failed, so I took three M-18s and was able to approximate the output with 3 lights but still have them one stand. It worked out pretty well, you just need to be sure you have some good grips if you plan to go up with it and enough head feeder to give you the slack to dance it around.

This is what variacs are for, they don't make noise - more expensive and a lot heavier though.

You should also be aware that there is a significant price difference between HMIs and tungsten - a Joker 800 will get you similar output to an Arri 2k, maybe more but it will cost at least 4x as much. Kind of a bummer, but HMIs are pricey and that's just how it goes. I think you have a difficult scenario in that the camera left end of your set up juts right up against a huge open window, so you need a couple of grips and some solid rags or duvy to black it out completely and even if you did you can't put your own light on that side of it anyway. I think Satsuki is probably right in that you may need to just use the window light and use some grip stuff to control it as best you can, then maybe use other lights on the tops/right side to even it out as needed. Best of luck with it, that's a challenge.