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Rick Gates

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Everything posted by Rick Gates

  1. Thanks Phil, this will help a lot. I especially appreciate the safety concerns. Cheers!
  2. We are trying to light a barn in a remote location at night. Even at over 100 feet, the generator is too loud to allow us do noise-reduction on the dialogue. All our lights are LEDs. The main 3 lights we want to use are the Aputure 300D (300w), and 2 Aputure Lightstorms (120w each). We are thinking about trying to hook together a couple of deep-cycle batteries with an inverter. The numbers say that we should be able to power all 3 lights for a few hours. But I thought we should ask the pros before making the purchase. I hate ADR!!! Rick
  3. Here's the ceiling grid we put up: This was a low key piece, so we ended up not dropping lights further down from the grid because they didn't make much difference compared to the flex-light over the table.
  4. OK, I've come up with what I think will work for dropping lights into the alcove behind the talent for the seated mediums and closeups. (In the images below, please note that the goal post simply simulates the wall-spreaders/pipe-stretchers that I'll put up high in the alcove) I used 3 pieces of speedrail and 4 cheeseboros to create a U-shaped structure hanging down behind the talent. The bottom of the U can hold whatever lights I need. Again, all my lights are LEDs so I'm not talking about much weight. So what do you think of this approach? Safety? Efficiency?
  5. So I'm planning a shoot where I'll build a speedrail ceiling grid in a tight 7x10 alcove with 10 ft ceilings. I'm planning on two wall-spreaders/pipe-stretchers, for the 7 ft span, and then 4 cheeseboros to add a couple of 10 ft cross rails. This should allow me to light the wide shot the way I want. The talent is seated below. However, when we get to the mediums and the closeups, I'd like to drop a light down behind the talent and get a nice reverse key. I could probably boom in a light from outside the alcove, though it would be a hassle. But it occurred to me that if I could just drop a 4 ft piece of speedrail from the ceiling grid, and put a cardellini on the end of that, I could pretty much hang light anywhere I want in the alcove. (Note: All my lights are LEDs of less than 10 lbs.) My question is about how to attach the vertical 4 ft piece. My inclination is to use another cheeseboro to hang the 4-ft speedrail. But would that be safe? Or would it be better to do all the wide shots first, and then bring down the whole ceiling grid for the mediums and closeups?
  6. The rail I'm getting here in town is schedule 40 6061-T6 extruded aluminum. I measured the OD at 1.657. The info from on B&H from an "Avenger Expert", is that the clamp range 1.65" to 2.04". I don't have any experience with Big Bens. Are they usually designed to work with both 1 1/4 and 1 1/2 speedrail? Ed must be right about the optimal minimum diameter, and I'm at the bottom end of the range, so I guess it makes sense I'd run into this problem. At least I can easily wrap the pipe ends with silicon before clamping. Thanks!
  7. Hah. Kupollini. Good instincts JD. The speedrail was indeed turning. So I cut a couple of pieces of silicon mat, wrapped them around the ends of the speedrail and clamped down on that. Result? Absolutely no movement on the fixture. It stayed completely vertical throughout all jostling of the goal posts. As always, thanks for the help.
  8. OK, here's the latest developments. I decided to try the cardellini (actually, a knock off from Kupo, but seems solid). This time I cranked it down as hard as I could. It's a new clamp, and here's a couple pictures of the pads, and of it hanging straight before mounting the fixture. So I mounted the fixture and went back and forth raising and lowering the goal posts. When I finally got it back down to square one, here's what it looked like: So next I thought perhaps the problem was the couplers that I have in the junior receivers atop each stand. I actually used some pliers to crank them on tight, but noticed that there's still some gaps where they contact the speedrail. Anyway, either I need to get something like a real Big Ben for the top of the combo stands, or maybe I can cut up a silicon pad and use them under the clamps for a better fit. Either way, I think I'm going to take Ed Conley's advice and purchase a Baby Grid Clamp, which has the advantage of the baby pin hanging straight down from the center of the clamp.
  9. This is probably a no-brainer for all of you, but I'm running into a problem getting my fixtures to hang straight down from a goal post. As you can see in the pictures below, the stage clamp which started out perfectly vertical, has slipped around the speedrail as I jostled the goal posts raising and lowering them. I've also tried cardellini clamps of various types to no avail. The speedrail is clamped firmly into the combo stands. So, it's probably obvious, but is there some sort of clamp that will hold a baby pin vertically and not slip around the rail?
  10. I might start with a piece of a 1/8 inch thick silicon mat that I cut into shapes to keep things from slipping. Great idea, thanks.
  11. Yeah, I can see why the Kupo head is cheaper ($56 vs $92). I do have a rubber gasket, but the metal on both sides of it is smooth, not grooved like the Matthews. Check it out: Since there are grooved surfaces between the two main metal discs in the head, I tried putting the ear in there, and it seems to hold better. I have about 12 ft of the speedrail in front of the ear, and about 4 ft behind it. It can be balanced as long as I incrementally add the right number of sandbags. Right you are about the safety cable. Can't let that potted palm suffer. Thanks JD, as always.
  12. Well, I just finished putting together my first menace arm. I joined two 8 foot pieces of speedrail with fixtures from Barn Door Lighting. Here's a shot: https://static1.squarespace.com/static/59f8be3032601e5caccf02ac/59f8be85c830252d97f3a9c4/5a8b4c5271c10b58453f10ef/1519078488478/menace+arm+1.jpg?format=1500w[/img] It seemed to go well except for one thing. I had a hard time balancing the rig because no matter how hard I cranked down on the lollipop in the middle, the boom would move slowly up or down on it's own. I even followed the right-hand rule. Here's a picture of the ear inserted into the lollipop: https://static1.squarespace.com/static/59f8be3032601e5caccf02ac/59f8be85c830252d97f3a9c4/5a8b4c3d08522933c2550d2f/1519078467119/menace+arm+2.jpg?format=2500w[/img] Am I doing this right?
  13. Thanks for the local fabricator tip. They have speedrail for $3.77 per foot.
  14. Roger Deakins has done a nice job with some of the Coen bros comedies.
  15. Aha! Discovered that I can get away with a 13' span for the shot. Also saw that Dave Donaldson at the Youtube channel "Grip Tips" recommends joining two pieces of speedrail with a coupling to make a larger span. Here's a grab from his video: I think I'm going with this technique. I can get the Modern Studio wall spreader kit at Barn Door for $80, and their couplings are $33 each.
  16. Yeah, I'm gonna play it safe and design a different shot. Thanks for all the tips.
  17. Hmm, if you had to span 24 feet, would you consider 3 eight-foot pieces of speedrail? Or would that be tempting the fates too much?
  18. JD, I thought about that. I was thinking it would be easier to cut 2x4s than speedrail, but it would be nice to get double duty out of the pipe. Do you consider joining 2 pieces of speedrail for a wall spreader to be safe?
  19. Hi, I'm getting the hardware to make wall spreaders out of 2x4s. But I'm anticipating a problem. The maximum length 2x4 my vehicle can handle is 8 feet. Is it safe to join a couple of 2x4s to make a longer span for the wall spreader? As I'm not seeing any 2x4 coupling hardware, I'm thinking maybe this just shouldn't be done.
  20. Michael what I do is backup to a cheaper 2TB USB drive (a Passport) during an active production. Once the production is finished and I'm fairly certain I'm done with it, I archive using Premiere's Project Manager function. It can create a much smaller Premiere project, by keeping only the assets that are actually used, with handles on each clip in case I want to fudge it a little. It was hard letting go of all that footage, but I got over the empty nest when I saw how much space I was saving.
  21. Yeah, here's what I do to combat the storage issue with UHD footage: I have a Seagate 8TB drive ($150) for footage, and a Mushkin 1TB SSD ($250) for active project files. Then in Premiere, I use 720p proxies stored on the SSD. Takes a little while to generate the proxies when I first ingest the footage, but then everything seems pretty smooth. So it ends up costing me about $400.
  22. Speaking as a 4K newbie who edits his own stuff, I like the flexibility 4K provides me in post. Since I export 1080p, shooting in 4K (UHD) has allowed me to do some minor frame adjustments, and even allowed me to make some cuts that I didn't actually shoot for in production. Hey, I just thought of something. I should also be able to do a digital zoom over time on a character who was shot in 4K. Sort of a simulated slow creep.
  23. Aha! Local metal fabricators! Great idea. Thanks JD, hopefully they'll sell me some of their stock.
  24. Hello all, I'm looking to start putting my new combo stands to good use, and am interested in building some standard goal posts, and for constructing my first menace arms. However, I live in a small place (Eugene, OR), and am having a hard time laying my hands on some speedrail (or more specifically, 1.25", 6061 T6 extruded aluminum pipe). I hear this is the lightest/strongest/cheapest way to go. I'm sure if I was down in L.A. I could get some pretty cheap. The online options all seem pretty expensive. For those of you in smaller markets, how have you gotten your hands on the pipe?
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