Teddy Todd

I didn't know they had such focus characteristics. Is there a chart that can show this exactly? And I know - I don't like the light loss, either. Which is why we'll have to augment it with something else. Anybody know of a good digiprime rental house with good rates I might consider?

Brian, Thanks for the recommendation. I haven't heard of the Goodman's Guide but I'll definitely be picking it up. According to that website, it seems the 640 ASA recommendation is for filmmouts and is essentially an underexposure - they say you can't look at the monitor for exposure, because it will be too dim. So they're asking you to underexpose by a stop and a half or so(250 ASA to 640 ASA), right? Interesting.

Thanks for the recommendations guys. In terms of Digiprimes. We are going with the Pro35 adapter because we feel it will offer us more options in the visual storytelling. We're doing a horror film, and the ability to do shots with very shallow depth of field will be very useful to the storytelling. Digiprimes, as far as I understand, can't match the depth of filed and angle of view characteristics you get with the Pro35 adapter. Not to mention that it's simply cheaper to rent the Pro35 and some Zeiss Superspeed Primes over the DigiPrimes, and our budget is tight. We can get a 600 day rate on the former, while the cheapest I've seen the latter is about $200 more than that. Since almost all of the cave stuff will be shot on a set, and the real cave shots will be shot in an easily accessible commercial cave, I'm not too concerned about working with the Pro35 in difficult underground locations. Brian: Under what settings is the Varicam 640 ASA? I had recently seen somewhere that the Varicam was 250 ASA. Here is the link: http://www.jkor.com/peter/varicamasa.html I would be very happy if this wasn't the case and it was actually 640. We're shooting this for filmmout, and I am currently researching the best settings for that. But I figured they'd probably be pretty close to what this guy labels as 250 ASA. Any thoughts on his chart?

Guys, Thanks very much for the suggestions. They are very helpful. Next movie I hope I can afford to hire one of you two! http://www.knivesandtools.com/en/ct/surefire.htm Is there a flashlight in this bunch that you might recommend for use on this project? The biggest room is 25 X 15, but it doesn't need to be seen all at once - just in an arcing beam as he points the light around. Also, what would you try out for the glowsticks and flares, in terms of augmenting the light coming from those practical sources? Landon - I'll talk to the Producers today and make sure I can spill about the plot - they've been pretty tight-lipped and I want to make sure. I can tell you it's based on a well known caving story. Thanks again for the replies guys.

Greetings everyone, I'm new to this forum, but have already enjoyed the great discussions going on here. It is incredibly helpful to have such a large group of knowledgeable professionals talking film in one place. The internet rocks. I would appreciate any help you guys can offer to my questions below. Next month I'll be shooting a film which is largely set in a cave. We've built sets for most of the cave shoot, but we will also take a few shots in an actual cave as well. We are shooting on the Panasonic Varicam with the Pro35 adaptor and Zeiss Super Speed Primes. We will also have an HD zoom, and probably an Angenieux 35mm zoom available as well. About half of the cave action takes place in an area that can have some low level fill light, as in the story there are lights from a previous expedition strung about the area. However, the other half of the cave stuff takes place in a completely "virgin" area of cave that obviously has no lights except what the caver(s) bring with them. These will include flashlights, glow sticks, and later, flares. I want these scenes to look very dark, like the characters are actually carrying the only sources of light, and something could be right next to them and they wouldn't know it unless they pointed their light right at it. I will try to get a slight fill on the faces of those carrying flashglights, as if it is a bit of backspill or something from their lights. But other than that - dark. A few questions now: 1. What kinds of flashlights should I use for this purpose? I know the Pro35 adapter will eat up an extra two stops or so of light, and I do want to see the areas where they are pointing their lights as well as a bit of the flashlight carrier as well. Any ideas or suggestions? 2. I'll obviously have to have many shots of the flashlights themselves(not the beam) overexposed. I know this is a no-no in a video format like High Definition. Is this going to be too objectionable for us? Anything I can do to make these large overexposures look better on this video format? How bad could these overexposures be on the Varicam's HD? 3. What would be good ways to light these areas to look as if the light is coming from a flashlight, a glow stick, and a flare in otherwise pitch dark? Any pitfalls or other issues I should be aware of to guard against a bad result or to exploit for a good one? Thank you very much for your time. I'm especially concerned about #2, the overexposure issue, as I don't want it to look terrible on the HD video. Thank you, Teddy