Albion Hockney

created or not there is some level of fill on the camera side because I can see that side of the talent's body you know even if you didn't create it there is a natural level of ambiance there.... which is still some sorta fill light. if there was no fill there would be no detail on them camera side. I here what your saying I bring this up because I to have had bad results filling from camera side ....im finding that fill light needs to be interesting too ....like it needs to be yea a top light or have some kinda of interesting presence.

still looks great David the backlight worked well there ....amazing backdrop....is it swooped toward the talent? has a really interesting luming feel

do you really never fill from camera side ever? ....that seems like it would be tough to hold to in some situations? for example in that wide shot if there didnt happen to be any light coming from the camera side they would just be basically silouhettes but there happend to be some natural ambiance ....just curious how you would handle that ?

The best crane is going to be the one you can get in your budget with an operators whose reel looks good and can also do what you need done your going to want to talk to OPs and look at reels ....its like hiring a steadicam

Everytime I have ever rigged or seen a Red or Alexa to the side of a car it has either been a window jam "hostess tray" mount or sunction cups with baby pins and C arms connected to some platform which the camera is mounted. my personal experience has been on smaller shows but this includes just seeing pictures as well from big US productions....its the generally the way its done as far as I know

the panasonic looks really good.... all cameras these days ship with problems and need updates sony,red, canon....the only company who has put out simple solid products is arri. that said the images look good ...alexa good I'd say ...im excited to try to shoot on one in the coming years. this is clearlly a whole differnt bread then other panasonic offerings ....they have developed this thing for sometime....that said its there first real step into this world in the right way so yea maybe wait to buy one but again....the images look good and the dual native isos looks very interesting (has a 2nd "native" iso at 5000 that looks really nice)

chimera is a good call ....it not directly over head but straight on to the talent pointed at a bit an angle. yea I realized could just do the goal post thing but was hoping maybe there is a easier lighter weight solution im just not thinking of.

here is a funny little question....Its kinda a grip question but think it fits here. Im shooting a little commerical its a series of ECU's we are shooting in a studio. We want to rig a 1k right above the talent pointed down ....probably through a 4x4 frame of diff. If it was a smaller light I would just throw it on the arm of a c stand but a 1k seems a little heavy. what is a nice easy way to rig a little bit stronger peice of grip gear to do this? I was thinking we could just get a menace arm but that seems too heavy duty.

Hey David, A random question I've never had to do this type of work....and maybe never will ....but I wondered if you are doing a "direct sunlight" look in a stage how do you go about that.....do you still create a base of the overhead top light and then just a add big source on top.. do you need a huge stage where you can get a big huge source really far away for wides so the fall off is right?

if your budget is tight you can also do this stuff with kinos ...daylight image 80's through light diff create a nice source and can give enough power. everybody hates kinos though haha me included

Generally people like to light from ourside of windows for day interior, but that means usually "tenting" the windows to get rid of the real sunlight and using pretty big lights. If your shots are mostly close ups and MCU's and you have a big enough space you can maybe get away with having the lights inside the house. Satsuki's ideas to use natural sunlight as your BG is great and I would recomened that for sure. Something also to consider is if your going to show windows in frame as if you are you will probably need atleast 1.2k probably better with 2.5-4k hmi The book light is a good call and its how most people do this kinda work now, It seems like you will have a pretty tight day trying to get a lot so I would recomened figuring out a nice simple key light setup whether it is a book light or maybe just hmis through diff and just moving that around through out the day occasionaly agumenting it with another source or two for backround or an edge or something. One thing I do alot instead of booklights if I don't have a big enough light or want to do something more simple...I usually just get an 8x8 or a 6x6 frame and tbone it (so you just use one peice of the frame to hold the rag) and use something like light grid or frost and then I also will have a 4x4 frame of diffusion or just on the lamp head with something like 251 or 250 so you get a similar very soft source with a nice wrap around the face. I would also consider the softer the source the more power you need to get your exposure so you need something like a 2.4-4k which is bigger and require more time and effort .....if you are all in Mediums and MCU's you can probably get away with a 1.2k or try the 1.8k arri if you can get it but that is really only going to light singles of people and not a whole shot if you are seeing natural daylight or windows. as for it being light and airy and feeling a little dynamic just think of contrast in frame you will want some parts of your frame to have a little contrast....the can be a production design thing too! ....something people do a lot now days is flare up the lens for this kinda stuff too....if you can get the sun backlighting your talent through a window and put your book light or super soft source on once side of them you will get a nice flary look that is kinda the "light and airy" thing I think you are talking about.

I wouldn't treat it any different then shooting it for real. the only thing is your inside so you need to create the sun and or ambient daylight. usually in studios people use space lights for a soft ambient top light and use another source as the sun.

...I mean it does reflect poorly on zeiss though. I think the cp2's are over priced and the zeiss and canon both rushed to fill a spot in the market without developing new lenses to do it. when looking at lenses in this price range the schneider xenons are much more interesting

Most "regular" rigs use suction cups including some in the pictures you sent although many involve more advanced rigging to get the camera off the car a good distance.

I think it should be fine, but yes always have secondary saftey cables in place if the mount fails for some reason.

so in that first wide there is nothing added on their fill side that is just what was present in the room? I think that first wide is the strongest shot looks really dark, but without a heavy hand at all. Yea hopefully they won't bring it up in the grade, doesn't need it at all.

Yea people use these filters on the 35mm all the time. Its not such a simple thing to get a comporable look going from 35-16mm .... the filteration effect will be the same, but 16mm is lower resolution so the effect maybe be a little more subtle....at a certain point though it depends on what resolution your film is getting scanned/screened in. I use these filters on a digital camera and If I know something is Web Only even at 1080p im more likley to use strong filtration if I know its going on a larger screen I am more apt to use a lighter weight diffusion. I think as everyone on here kinda always say you just need to do tests.

I think this is actually true for the most part dennis there may be some small differences but I think this phrase "optically identical" is not marketing talk as if anything Zeiss wants use to beleive the CP2's are optically better then the ZF lenses as they are far more expensive. The Cp2's are known as rehoused ZF's ....they took the glass and put it in a bigger housing, put on new coatings, and added more blades to the aperature. The reason the CP2 is T2. and ZF is 1.4 is because zeiss locked the aperature at t2 beacuse under T2 the lens just doesn't hold up......People complained about this and then Zeiss released the Cp2 "super speeds" which just have the aperature open up as wide as it did on the ZF's

are you talking about buying or renting? I would say the visual differences you will see in the resulting footage will be subtle. the bokeh being the biggest and maybe yea the CP2s coating performing a little better. The Cp2's are far more expensive so in my opinion the question is really about how to best spend your budget and where that money will go. If you can afford it get CP2's....or if this is to own I would think about the long term value stay and also if you plan to ren them out. The Zf2 and Cp2 should have the same aperature's btw.... Zeiss released the Cp2 "super speeds" which have the wider stops ....although they are not sharp at those stops at all and neither are the zf's as for as operating handheld alone....without a follow focus its easier for sure to pull off the barrell of a photo lens the long focus throw on the cp2s is good for critcal focus and narrative work and really needs a follow focus.

hmm yea never tried the schneider stuff I should try to test that next time around. any other companies making a similar product worth testing you know of? curious if you have a preference or notice differences?

Looks great, would you mind breaking down your lighting setup for the wide cabin interior ...or just your apporach to that stuff in general.

I have started using Black Pro Mist filters when shooting on the RED and I have really liked the effect the 1/8 takes the edge of the digital very subtly and the 1/4 is great for a bit stronger of an effect at certain times. I feel ideally I'd love to use a 3/8 density and I looked that up and found someone on here long ago said Tiffen would make a custom filter. I have emailed tiffen with no response. Just curious if anyone here has used 3/8 density or have heard of this custom 3/8 filter.

Yea Actually I don't agree with either David, I don't think the goal is to: I think this is a very interesting area to bring up though.... I think most people would agree that is the goal of mise en scene in general....But I think I like the idea that the goal is instead to get closer to some sort of truth. Sometimes that truth is found through a more "realistic" depiction and sometimes that is found through creating a fantastic world where things are glamorous or funny or w/e.....but I think in general I question the notion of film as entertainment first and I feel that there is something problematic in general with the Idea of making actors more attratcive or even more interesting then people in everyday life. I was just listening to something and heard David Byrne say something like "the goal of art is to raise the banality of everyday life to the sublime" ....I think in the past the approach in cinema was more direct and based on older beauty standards .....the idea being we will cast beautfiful people into films and make everything look really special and impressive.....now I think that is coming into question more...and we are often finding the way we make things look can be offensive or shallow...For example the idea of hollywood making films about foregin issues where pretty actors are cast into a situation real people have faced....often these films can be distasteful and ignorant. I think your example of Terrance Malik as and Art Filmmaker might not be the best example, Terrance Malik although has an image of an "art house" guy comes from the studio system and has always used big name talent in his films. I only really brought him up because of lubzekis work. I think if you look at some of the most interesting work being done today you will find many directors using "normal" looking people in their films as its more relatable and honest and cuts through some of the problematic nature of commerical cinema. I just watch Urlich Seidl's "Pardise Love" which has lighting work by Edward Lachman and is a beautfiul film with very real looking people. Again I think its important to consider why we think these people are more pretty and why it helps tell a story.... and if there is anything problematic about that. Personally I feel like the answer is yes it is often problematic and why should I have to look at pretty face to be engrossed in a film. I walk down the street everyday and everybody looks pretty damn interesting to me.

in the first still there is a big hmi really far away backlighting trees and haze....that is just for the backround. then in the forground you can see another probably medium size HMI source giving an edge on the man. camera right there looks to be some sort of soft fill at a low level of illumination ...probably a soft source bouced into muslin or something then off of frame left from above the Police van there is another source side lighting....its hard to tell but it appears it might be a gag that emulates the lights on the cop car. You can tell they are using big sources and shooting at reasonable stop (like a 4 or 5.6) by the depth of field and also probably at lower iso/asa as the cop lights on the car are on and not even overexposed at all really.... They might have cut ND filters around them but it seems like they are just using really powerful sources. the 2nd frame is just more or less relianet on that big backlight source as everyone is basically a silhouette the last frame again you have the big backlight and fog (im guessing its an 18k actually in all of these) and then you have some frontal fill I would guess its a big frame of muslin with like a 5k bounced into it maybe but I couldn't really say.

Dana dolly is ok. If you have a heavy camera you really need heavy stands and a middle support for 8ft of track and even then it can wobble a little. but I think any of the slider systems you run into stability issues as they are smaller/lighter.