Lee Young

This will be shot at 200 ASA. Ideally I would like to shoot at an aperture no higher than 2.8. I looked into the surefires but they don't give that extra thin, long throw beam I am looking for. Don't get me wrong, I see why they are useful in certain applications, but I am shooting in a large area and I want the beams to show up from far away. I am going to use smoke to bring out the beams as much as possible. Has anyone tried using the high candle power incandescents or HIDs. Also, my plan for illuminating the actor's faces as they are walking forward: Put diffusion over a low powered flashlight and gaff tape it to the side of the flashlight not seen by the camera facing the actor. I did some test with this and it looked pretty damn convincing. Once, they start talking I am definitely going to do the strategic flashlight placement you are talking about. The general set-up is a 5K backlighting them (moonlight) and then the flashlights doing the rest. There will probably be some accent lights and some other supplemental light, but that's the general idea.

I have a scene that takes place in a small cemetery in which I need two characters to have flashlights. I've been doing a little research on what flashlights to use, but unfortunately none of it has addressed cinematography. It seems that most movies (Jurassic Park or X-Files for instance) are using maxabeams. I can't afford maxabeams (2500 big ones). But I have also noticed that television shows are using high powered led flashlights like surefires. I was think of using something like the tiablo A9. Here's some videos showing what its capable of. I know these videos aren't too helpful, but its all I have to work with at this point. The reason I am leaning towards this flashlight is its power and also its long throw pencil beam like that of the maxabeam. The other option I was considering is the cyclops CYC-S6X. http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000CZ3V1I/ref=s9_simh_gw_p60_i2?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=center-2&pf_rd_r=1DRJFPW911J408051GA8&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=470938631&pf_rd_i=507846 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=auaJVt1HJX0&feature=related The 2nd video is not the same as the one I am looking at, but its the same type of flashlight. The quality of light seems a lot better on these, buy these lights only last 30 minutes and take 18 hours to charge, which scares me a little bit. I would probably end up buying four. I would like to get your guys' thoughts on this. I will be smoking the set and I will be hiding a smaller flashlight on the side of whichever one I buy to give a little light on the actors faces. My budget is is $75 per flashlight. Thanks a lot. *BTW I am shooting in black and white, so color temperature in not much of an issue.

Thank you for the info Saul. I am about to obtain a Super Takumar 20mm f4.5 lens. Do you think it could possibly work with this lens? Have you ever tried derailing with a wide angle lens? I know that the FOV change change will likely be a problem, but don't you have to use a lens that is a format up in order to be able to tilt and shift? If i move the bellows as close to the gate as possible, would it be a possibility? Sorry, I have to ask. Even if it doesn't work, I need to do some macro photography on the picture I'm trying to make it for anyways.

Hey Olex. That is a very good article. That looks like a great lens. Unfortunately it is still out of the price range of our production. We were originally going to buy the Arri shift/tilt lens system, but we realized the adapter necessary to fit it on our cameras was around the same price as the system. I am working on getting a wide angle M42 lens for this. We will probably buy either a Takumar or Rikenon. Thank you for this info. I might have to get one of these for my medium format camera.

Hunter, I am sorry. I misread your post. You are correct that in order to get the sharpest images possible of the format, you need the newest equipment. For some reason I remembered you saying sharp images in general. I apologize.

"First, it would have been courteous to attempt to contact and resolve this issue directly with Cinelicious before publicly disclosing your issues, and of course if your needs weren't meant after contacting them, you could have told the world that the transfer was bad. However, jumping the gun on this can make a mess for a company and can leave a stain that isnt very easy to clean up- even after the issue is resolved now." I was unaware of what the issue even was. That is why I started the blog. I didn't start this blog with any preconceived notion the Cinelicious had screwed up. I think my first post is clearly not confrontational. I also have observed from working with a few different labs and post houses that they are very reluctant to admit that any mistake has been made on their part. I'm not saying this is true of Cenelicious, but it is in the interest of any company to protect the integrity of their workers and general work ethic. I understand that, but its not always the best way to get to the bottom of an issue. If I would have had the negative, I would have been glad to talk to them about the issue, but the director had the negative and I thought he was in contact with cenlicious through the process. BTW, I still have not seen the negative or the newly transferred material. Everything you have said about student filmmaking can be quite true and has been for me many times. I have shot a lot of 16mm and am aware of the limitations of the format. I am a student and have much to learn, but I have been around 16mm and film in general for a while. I have got back some wonderful looking and not so wonderful looking footage. An SR camera with this particular lens is capable of excellent pictures that in my opinion can look very good. Definitely not as crisp as HD, but certainly sharp. I would have to disagree with you that you need modern cameras and lenses to make sharp pictures. There are sharp old lenses and soft old lenses. There are also sharp new lenses and soft new lenses(not nearly as many). An old camera in good order, loaded properly, etc. should not hinder the lens from taking sharp pictures. That being said, it definitely helps having newer equipment. If I was shooting on a 416, there would have been less to settle. I do not feel I am expecting too much, but I have reasons to believe that the blame can go in both directions now. Here is what I have heard. 1. Definitely lens probelms-the director has told me that the wide shots usually have foreground elements that are not supposed to be in focus in focus. This leads me to believe there were collimation issues. That camera and lens are at Visual Products now. I now know it was time for that camera to be serviced. So, Tim, you are probably correct. 2. The director has told me that the telecine was set for reversal film instead of negative film. Of course, the thinner non-reversal film would be a little out of focus during telecine because of this. The director told me that Cinelicious was very nice and did what they could to make him happy. He considers the issue resolved. So, I'll speak for the director and say that Cinelicious is not the boogie man. They were extremely cooperative and did a great job on transferring the film a second time. Thank you Paul and the rest of the cinelicious team. PS Paul, if anything I said about your meeting with Dan is not true, I apologize. I am, again, going on second hand information. Thansk again.

Is the c-mount used for surveillance video the same as the c-mount used for 16mm cameras? I remember some c-mount video lenses working on a bolex. I just want to make sure.

I am making a shift/tilt lens for an eclair. I am making it based on this article(http://www.creativepro.com/article/build-a-tilt-shift-camera-lens-peanuts), but I am doing it in a different way. These are the materials I'm using: 1. M42 bellows macro set (http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=140341583995&ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT) 2. c-mount adapter for M42 lenses (http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/search?Ntt=c-mount+m42&N=0&InitialSearch=yes) 3. M42 Rikenon 50mm f1.7 I am basically going to derail the bellows system in order to move the lens freely and then secure it with a c-stand and gator clamp once I have found the position I want. Any reason this shouldn't work? Also, I know there are two different types of c-mounts. I am assuming the one I purchased was not the Leica type. Can anyone tell from the picture? To me it looks to be the c-mount used on 16mm cameras.

Well, I think anymore speculation is pointless. The director told me today that he was planning on going on Monday. He was going to go this week, but could not free up some time. If you have any questions for me Paul, feel free to call me during the meeting. I believe Andy did the telecine, so same goes for him. The proof is obviously with the negative. I definitely trust FotoKem, since they do great work. I believe those screen grabs from FotoKem were on a spirit. I really am not liking the situation I'm in right now. I wish the negative were with me, but what can I do. From now on, if there are any questions or concerns, talk to Dan. He has the negative. That screen grab does look much better than what we got back. So, I'm curious to find out myself. Thank you to everyone who's contributed to the blog.

It's actually not the same guy. That was another project. We used the same camera and lens. I will definitely take your advice about bringing all that stuff to the lab though. Tom, The camera is an arri sr. It's my schools and I don't know where they bought it from. The flange focal distance is going to be checked by visual products soon. The reason I posted the second set of images was to show that the flange focal distance was probably not to blame. I'm not saying that a few weeks can't make a difference, its just not very likely. The stuff with the long lenses does not look any more out of focus than the other stuff. There is nothing in the picture that is sharp. I have now seen some photos from fotokem and I feel fairly safe in saying that the negative is not at fault, although I've seen only a few stills. satsuki, I don't have any higher res versions of the jpegs. The director does. Here are the jpegs that the director gave me from fotokem that are high res: I must say these are not the best stills the director could have sent me me because in both the characters are in motion and in the outdoor one I am panning. O well. Its still kind of hard to tell.

The negative was taken care of. We kept it in the fridge and we kept the camera out of heat while shooting.

Hi Paul, I'd like to first say that I started this blog in order to make sure that my equipment or my judgment was not at fault. That being said, I am going off the word of my director and FotoKem that the negative has a lot more detail on it. The images telecined by Alphacine from my prior film look a lot sharper and detailed then the xfer from you guys. This was personally where my expectations were. I understand that you both use a rank telecine. Now if you're saying that your machine cannot preform at the same level as Alphacine's, fine. I'm still not happy, but if that's the best that machine can do, than there's nothing to be done about it. It sounds like you're saying you believe that machine is capable of better pictures as long as there are sharp images on the negative and the operator's not making mistakes. The reason I have not called you is that I didn't want to bother you about it unless I was sure that the negative was sharp. Also, the director plans on stopping by very soon. I appreciate your offer to allow us to use the spirit machine, although it is ultimately up to the director whether he wants to do it, since he's actually paying for it. I also feel that it would be unfair to expect that you guys make us this offer just because I did not bother to find out all the details of the the transfer. All I expected was quality along the lines of the budget HD tranfer I got from Alpha Cine. I very much appreciate that you want to make things right. I am just trusting that FotoKem and Daniel are correct about the state of the negative. If they are not, then I apologize and retract all of this. Again, thank you for the offer, you'll hear from Daniel shortly.

The negative is definitely much sharper and in focus, showing a hell of a lot more detail from what I've heard from the director. Anyways, I will have some high res film scans from Fotokem soon to take to get a refund or retransfer the film. I'd like to hear what places you guys prefer for a 2k scan. Thanks for all your insight.

Thank you. I did not know that is was a rank. Of course, the negative needs to be checked and then from there I'll have to see if I can do anything. I appreciate everyone's input. It has been extremely helpful.

here's a link to the process that was used