Matthias Claflin

So I'm looking to buy a new lens and am curious how often people use the 135mm focal length. Current Camera/Lenses - Canon C100 (mki) Rokinon 16mm T2.2 Rokinon 35mm T1.5 Rokinon 85mm T1.5 Canon 50mm f/1.8 (that I hate) The Problem - I do a mix of corporate, music videos, and weddings. I shoot most of my corporate stuff on a Sigma 24-105 f/4 (owned by the company I shoot corporate work for) or a 35mm prime (that I own). I'm more interested in expanding my lens set for my creative work in music videos and weddings. I need something with some reach (for my second camera when shooting weddings) as now I'm shooting with a 35mm on my B camera and 85mm on my A camera. I would like to either match or exceed 85mm. Also, when I did have a 24mm rokinon, I hated it and when I had a 50mm rokinon I just never really used it. I mention these because they would fill the more obvious gaps in the focal lengths I already have. Just for reach, I'm considering buying a 135mm. I had the Canon 135mm f/2.8 soft focus lens but the CA on that lens rendered it unusable so it never came out of my bag after I tested it around the house so I have no idea if I would actually use a 135mm on a music video shoot for aesthetic reasons. So, I need a longer lens than 35mm for my second camera at weddings. I have three options in this regard. I can buy another 85mm (Samyang is $250 new), try the 100mm t3.1 macro ($550 new/couldn't find one used on any of my usual sites) or get 135mm ($400 used/$440 new). I could roll the dice with the 100mm but I don't need a macro (I had one and never used it) and I'm not in love with a minimum of T3.1. I know I love the 85 and it would mostly solve my reach problem. It would be nice to have a little more reach, but I know I can live without it. If I get another 85 I know it'll sit in my bag until I'm shooting a wedding that needs it. I'm hoping that if I buy a 135mm I'll find it useful for aesthetic reasons and not just for it's reach. If I can justify it aesthetically, I think it's worth the extra $150-200, but if it just sits in my bag till I need a second cam with some reach, then I might as well just buy a cheaper lens I already know I love, right? I'm not trying to be stingy, but I'm sure I could use that money elsewhere if reach is the only benefit. TL;DR - If I'm boiling it down, I want to know how often people use a 135mm focal length that for aesthetic reasons. Or is this focal length more about reach?

Well the Sony RX0 II has S-log and image stabilization built in. The S-log, would definitely help with the latitude you'd need.

I have heard good things about the Sony RX0 II. The GoPro doesn't specify what size the sensor is, but the RX0 II has a 1" sensor. I think the RX0 gives a better image and codec. The Sony is also has S-log and can output 4:2:2 4k from the HDMI output. If you chose to record to an external recorder you could save battery life on the cameras themselves, get higher quality footage, and record directly to SSDs instead of handling a bunch of micro SD cards. If you recorded into something like the Atomos Ninja V, you could record straight to a 1tb or 2tb SSD. At the lowest bitrate for DNxHD (4.3MB/s) you could get a full 8 hour day on 125GB, or up to 7 days on a 1TB drive. This does not allow for redundancies necessarily, though I don't know if that is something you are considering. The biggest downside to this approach is battery life for all these items. I think you can run the Atomos recorders on V-mount or Gold Mount batteries with a D-tap adapter, which could probably get you a good amount of time (someone with more experience with this type of power could probably get you exact times). I'm not sure how you plan to charge the batteries on the road, so the large size of a V-mount or Gold plate battery may not work well. I'm only recommending this as a "best image to size" option. Of course I didn't account for the budget, as one of these cameras can cost 2-3x the cost of a GoPro and then an external recorder (if you wanted to go that route) would cost extra, and batteries of course would be extra. Just a thought on an alternative to the GoPro.

On that budget, I'd probably suggest some second hand tungsten fresnels (which is what I currently have in my kit). I would recommend getting at least 3. I started with (2) 1000w fresnels and (1) 420w fresnel. The issue with fresnels (and why they seem to be selling cheap on eBay) is that they run hot and use lots of power. I got my two 1k lights for 75USD and 100USD and the 420W for 65USD. Of course I patiently watched eBay for deals and bought one of the 1k's with the wrong electrical plug and had to re-wire it. The 420W failed on me about two months in and it also needed to be re-wired as part of the wire had worn out. I also bought bulbs for all the lights because I wasn't sure the how long the bulbs that came with them would last. Your mileage with eBay lights may vary, but if you are patient and willing to make simple repairs, you can get them at a steal. I'm not sure what electrical circuits are like in Ireland (I live in the USA), but here most breakers are 15A or 20A (at 120v). So you have to be careful not to exceed the amperage of your breaker. However once you've gotten used to calculating this, it really doesn't slow you down too much. That said if you are going to buy tungsten lights I would recommend some CTB gels to match them to daylight if necessary. I'd also say get a roll of CTO in case the power of your lights with CTB just isn't cutting it (since CTB cuts almost 2 stops of light). The CTO can be placed on windows to convert daylight to tungsten white balance. I bought two rolls of CTO on eBay for 60USD so if you keep a patient eye on eBay, you can typically get most of this for cheap. I'd also recommend at least two reflector/diffuser discs. These things have saved me a few times when needing to bounce light in a tight spot or diffuse it. Very rarely do I use my lights without some kind of diffusion or bounce. Add a few light stands (get extra so you have something to clamp diffusers/bounces too) and you've got a decent little light kit. I'm not sure if you can get all of this for under 500€ but if you are patient you may just do it. ------------------ That aside, I use these lights for shooting music videos on a regular basis. I now have 7 lights in my kit and sometimes I use all of them, sometimes I use nothing but daylight. It totally depends on the location and feel that I want for the video. For the weddings I've shot, I don't use any extra lights. I have an LED in my bag, but I never bring it out because I cheaped out on it and the quality of light is terrible. It has a very strong green bias that is hard to get rid of and it's simply not worth the headache. So personally, for weddings, I recommend smaller tungsten or led fresnel fixtures. A number of friends of mine have used Dedo lights for weddings and some use the fiilex led fresnels. I've heard good things about both but never used them. I personally don't like adding lights to weddings because (to me) it feels inauthentic, however the best looking wedding videos I've seen use some amount of extra lighting. So it can go either way, depends on what you are going for.

Thanks Bruce, Thanks for the tip. I think i'll turn off one of the 1k fresnel lights so the soft zip acts more like a key. I have the green screen lit with two 500w lowel omni lights at the moment. I think I want to pull the output down on those lights a bit. Do you think that a diffusion gel would get the desired effect, or maybe just stick to buying some scrims? I'm just not sure what would be best (without buying new lights) to knock down the exposure of the screen. Just a bit.

I don't know how scientific this website is, but I've used this before to help with pre-planning. Worth a look. https://www.dofmaster.com/dofjs.html

Backstory: I work with a company doing corporate video work in my area. We recently moved into a new office where we were able to dedicate a 12x12 wall for green screen. We just finished painting it with Rosco DigiComp Green. I lit it for the first time yesterday and though I think the wall looks great, I'm not thrilled with the way it's lit. This is what it looks like: Lighting Diagram: Canon C100: ISO: 640, PP: WideDR, WB: 2900k, Lens: 35mm Rokinon T8.0 My Concern: I think the green screen itself is too bright. I find it easier to key (personally) if the screen is a little darker than the subject, I was going to just bring the lights closer to the subject, but I had a few people say they didn't like how bright it was already to look at. My next thought is that I could back the Lowel Omni lights off a bit, but I'm afraid I wouldn't be able to control them enough to keep them off the subject and I don't have a lot of space left. So I think I've settled on buying some 24x24 diffusion gels (so I can use them on any light later on, as opposed to buying some specific for the Omnis). I'm just not sure which ones to get. I'm not really familiar with using diffusion gels, so I'm not sure how much light I will lose or how much it will change the quality of light. Right now the Omnis are just bare bulbs. The only alternative that I've considered is buying lower wattage bulbs for the omni or perhaps investing in scrims for them. I'm just not sure what would be the best way to reduce the light, but also be versatile in other applications (scrims vs lower wattage bulbs vs diffusion gels). Any thoughts on this would be greatly appreciated. I'm not the most knowledgeable when it comes to lighting so I appreciate any advice at all.

I personally chose to switch from Premiere last year to Magix Vegas for almost the exact opposite reason. If you aren't running an Intel/nVidia rig, the optimization for premiere is terrible. I prefer Ryzen processors because of the sheer "bang for your buck" difference between them and the Intel offering. That said, Premiere runs poorly on AMD so I made the switch to Vegas which has better optimization for my hardware. I don't really recommend Magix Vegas because it doesn't have the same codec support that Premiere, Avid or Resolve has. That said, I do recommend at least installing and testing Avid on your system as it is similar in price to premiere (if I'm not mistaken). Resolve is a bit resource heavy, if I'm not mistaken so that likely won't be a good choice to switch. If you don't need raw support, Vegas may work for you (as it does for me). As Aapo mentioned, it might be best to just try working with proxies if you don't already.

Just wanted to add a quick resolution to this. It does appear all I needed to do was cut the cord a bit further down the line. I was able to get a few butt splices and got it working consistently again! Thanks everyone for the help!

Awesome. I'll grab some of those butt-splice connectors and have another go at it. I'll shorten up the wire (it was 8' when I got it I think so no real loss there) and I may take some of the white wire back (from where it burned). Thanks for all the help!

Well my wife is going to hate hearing that. I had never soldered before so I bought the soldering iron and solder for this specific task. I also spent all last night practicing it and then finally soldering the wire when I thought I was adequate to get a good connection... Oh well. That said, what is a crimp splice? Is this it? Also I cut about 1/2 inch off the cable running into the unit. How much would you recommend cutting? Should I take an inch or so? The cable did have a strain relief outside, perhaps cut off everything that was previously in the strain relief? Thanks for the advice!

So here we go... Last summer I started picking up some tungsten fixtures on ebay. The first one I got was an LTM Pepper 420W. I quickly realized I wanted more power and picked up a Mole 407, Mole 2581, Lee-Colortran 1k Fresnel, and finally a Lowel Omni. Everything has served me well except the LTM. So basically it started acting up shortly after I bought it. The connection to the GY9.5 socket was obviously wearing thin and in an effort to fix it, the connection broke off. So I bought a new GY9.5 socket already wired and rated up to 525W (if I'm not mistaken). So I went into the LTM and stripped the wires, soldered them together, applied heat shrink and re-secured the wires. I also used a brand new 420W GY9.5 bulb from impact. Turned it on and this happened: It seems like there is some issue with the constant stream of power. I'm not sure what to do next except to replace the cable- is this the right next step? What can I do to ensure a continuous flow? TL;DR I replaced the GY9.5 socket, stripped and re-wired the unit, and for some reason when I move the bulb from spot to flood the light flickers on and off. Any ideas what to do next?

Hey Eric, I shoot primarily with the original C100 and I shot the following whip pan with it. It was shot at 24p with a 180° shutter. if you pause it as it whips, you can see some distortion, though I'm surprised it wasn't worse than it was. That said, if you want to see the original clips, I'll see if I can find them and upload them.

Thank you! I don't know why I had such a hard time finding this. I appreciate it.

I totally understand that what I did in the picture above is not safe enough to use. I really don't know anything about this side of the business as all my previous light experience was with LED panels, CFL or full size fluorescent fixtures (which all draw far less power) so I never learned anymore than I had to. That said I may just buy the arri rocker because it looks closer to what was on before. Thanks for the advice and patience. I'm entirely uneducated on the electric side of filmmaking.