Mark Bonnington

Not sure of all the differences, but I know the 50D had the ability to hold two handlebars at once, where the 50 seemed designed to hold only a single handlebar. Also, somewhere during the manufacture of the 50D's they began shipping with 100mm ball bases, rather than the slightly larger claw ball base. Early 50D's might still have the claw ball though.

If I'm shooting a movie in an apartment that I'm renting, do I need to get a property release from the owner of the apartment building, or is my own signature satisfactory for the property release since I am the paying tenant of the property? How about if I'm renting a hotel room? Or a house?

Regarding the CF cards, the 8GB cards are not nearly as fast as the 16GB cards. The 16GB cards can capture faster frame rates from the camera.

Are there any other recommended insurance companies? What are the drawbacks to putting gear onto a homeowner insurance policy?

RedOne does not handle strobe bursts very well, which you will likely encounter in a lot of the clubs. Specifically, it'll cut off the strobe flash mid-frame such that part of the frame will be lit by the strobe and the other part will not be lit. It's not much of a problem if the strobes take longer to flash than the shutter speed of the camera, but strobes are usually faster than the shutter speed and that's where the problem comes in.

I hope film does die away, those film manufacturers (both Kodak and Fuji) pump ridiculous amounts of toxins into the environment... Kodaks Toxic Colors

DSLR's are GREAT for learning on! Forget the lazy aspect, it pales in comparison to the eduction you get when witnessing the immediate feedback of what your personal choices are doing to effect the picture. With film, you're stuck having to wait for a film lab to process everything, and the film labs may compensate your exposure without you even knowing it, further distancing you from the real effect your manual settings are having on the final picture. Plus, DSLR's give you the chance to compare framing while you're still on location, instead of having to drive back to it a month later because you found out from the developed film that the shot wasn't quite right. Here's something else... digital captures usually include the camera/lens settings in their info, making it easier to see exactly what the camera settings were to get a certain look. Get a DSLR, look at the histogram after each shot to understand light levels, try different things and shoot lots and lots of pictures to understand what works and what doesn't. Digital is cheaper per-shot, and the more shots you take the better your understanding will be of what's going on.

I'd like to propose that references to resolution be suffixed by a letter "-V" or "-H" depending on whether the vertical or horizontal axis is being measured. Are you talking about 2K-V or 2K-H? I think the argument of comparing Bayer chips to film resolution is a bit tricky. The best comparison would be to count the total number of grains on the film plane, then count the number of photo sites on the chip. If the two match up then the resolution should be similar: any deviations and one will have higher resolution than the other. Does anyone have time enough to count all the grains on an S35 film frame? Or maybe those numbers are already posted somewhere? Well, if not, that's ok, because the old-style charted resolution tests were already done a long time ago (wish I could remember where they were posted). Back when DSLR's were getting more and more packed with pixels, there were extensive tests (heated arguments between digital and film shooters) to compare the Bayer chips to film resolution. The point where the comparison broke even was hovering just above 8Mp, and the tide would sway depending on interpretations of grain patterns and CMOS noise and all sorts of other little issues. If the RedOne is built with 11Mp, then that's a good bit more than the 8Mp resolution and is likely to be as good as film resolution, if not better. Now, whether film is up to 4k resolution is a different story. I've scanned high quality slide film at 2k and been able to pick out grain pattern, and scanning the same frame at 4k did nothing except make the dust blotches bigger. So, I think it could be contended that the RedOne might not capture perfect RGB 4k, but then film isn't capturing it either. And if you are convinced that film can hold 4k resolution, then an 11Mp Bayer chip will hold 4k resolution as well. Ultimately, the goal is a good final image and whether the camera shows an official 4k resolution or not is kind of beside the fact. Who listens to advertising anyway? Phil, I wouldn't worry about the support issue, I think the last thing Jim and Company would want to do is give you fuel to justify arguments against the camera. In fact, they'd probably treat you better than Soderbergh.

Cheap 4k projectors are on the horizon, so converting Red footage to film reels may ultimately be a waste of time and money.

Who says that you'd be directing them on how to do their jobs? What you're doing is telling them specifically what you want from them in order to get the project finished in a way that satisfies you. The crew on a movie are no different than a contracted computer programmer - they follow the specifications in a document, but then make changes according to requests from the hiring company. The mere fact that the production is a short-lived project, using short-term workers, is justification enough for giving them the classification of being contract employees. Perhaps if you had the employees permanently working on every production, then you could justify them as employees instead of contracted help. Don't over-think the process, and don't let the vaguities of the IRS definitions scare you.

I don't think people perform well beyond 6 hours of work. I wish more companies would adopt a 30-hour work week.

If they offer less than it cost to make, then say "Sorry, but that's less than it cost to make. If you can raise the offer to X amount of dollars then I can at least walk away breaking even."

What what?? What case did the supreme court announce this in? Does this mean I can get any SAG actor and they don't have to pay any fines for doing a non-SAG movie? Why is a non-SAG production called a "SAG Corp" production? That sounds like I'd be announcing that I'm piggybacking my production onto a different, SAG associated, corporation.

Interesting to hear that there are a lot of lazy independents. I suppose that's good though, keeps the competition in a more relaxed position. If you look at making movies as being a business, then wouldn't it make more sense, financially, to avoid actors guilds and the higher-cost employees? If most movies fail financially then wouldn't the only chance of profit depend on keeping expenditures to a minimum, actor and crew salaries included? I'm not saying "don't pay them", I'm just saying that keeping those salaries down to manageable levels makes the most business sense. My own personal choice would be to utilize deferred salaries based on success of the movie. I don't see how SAG has any magic wand that makes their actors better than the average Joe on the street. It's like singing, either someone can hold a tune or they can't. The only benefit the guild has is that they have a bunch of the known actors stuffed in with the rest of the lot. Does an independent NEED those known actors? I don't know. People seem to put a lot of value in those actors, but maybe that's part of the reason why the system doesn't work so well. As for romanticism, I think it needs to be kept and fought for. Its too easy to fall into the trap of believing in the black and white solution of capitalism and business economics. If I walk into a national forest with waterfalls and wildflowers and little fluttering butterflies, I don't want the first thought in my head to be "I wonder how many board-feet of timber I can harvest from this place?" Same deal with making movies - if I walk onto the set and start thinking "gotta check the numbers to see if we've gone over the guild limitations for our designated expenditure size.", then the romanticism is seriously lost in that situation and I might as well quit and go back to work in an office. Regarding my experience, I have very little. I'm mostly utilizing the information I've read in books and on the bulletin boards. The general consensus is that most indies will never see reasonable levels of distribution. I also know, from years of systems analysis work, that if something requires hard work and money to succeed, then there's room for process improvement. Our of curiosity, which films did you have involvement with that were successfully distributed in theaters? Do you know how they went about getting that distribution, did they do well at the film festivals or something?

Wouldn't this just be an issue of setting the camera to a slower shutter speed?

I think most of them are very interested in learning... hence these sorts of websites and all the educational books and stuff like that. Most of them, I think, want to pay their cast and crew. But money is tight for independents, and the trade unions, insurance, lighting equipment, etc., are expenses that have to come under serious scrutiny. Besides, there's a romanticism about the process which is the idea that a few people and a camera are enough to make a great movie. If you introduce legalities, insurance and unions it kind of squelches that romantic atmosphere. I tried it the other way around, getting poor while doing the most work possible... it didn't work out like I'd hoped. So through process of deduction I'm figuring the rich and lazy way is better. But seriously, I don't think any of the independents are lazily floating through their productions, on the contrary I think they probably have things more rough than the professionals. The smart filmmaker gets value out of their limitations. One of those limitations is time, and at some point (80% completion probably) the return on effort exceeds reasonable proportions - they've gotta cut off the planning stage and just shoot the thing. Anyway, it could be that they don't look deep into the whole process because they know they don't have any leverage to deviate from their drafted plans. There's not much use in designing a castle if you only have enough materials to build a shack. But the current system doesn't work, at least not for independents, so it makes sense for them to try a different way of getting things done. If they were to do things exactly like the successful filmmakers, then independents would have nothing unique to offer. They would essentially be identical to the major players, except for one little difference; one of them would be able to throw tons of money around and the other would be dirt poor. Guess which one is going to get distribution on that playing field.

The movie maker does not have to pay money or penalties to SAG if the movie maker has not signed a contract with SAG. If the actors are signed with SAG and choose to work on a non-SAG film then that's strictly an issue between the actors and SAG, and any penalties therein have nothing to do with the movie maker. As a safety measure though, I can see the importance of being explicit with everyone in explaining that the film is non-SAG, so that there aren't any lawsuits from SAG actors claiming "I didn't know it wasn't a SAG shoot!". An unlikely event, but you never can tell.

Who's the person that needs to sign this? In an educational setting, does it have to be the president of the school or can it be someone lower on the totem pole?

Is the lack of indie films in major theaters tied to the consistently lower DV image quality coming from most indies? Are the theaters saying "I'm not even going to consider playing your movie because it's an indie, and those things never look good on the big screen."? If all the indies are putting out film-quality pictures, would the theaters be more likely to take them seriously?

As long as item #17 is in place in the SAG Ultra Low Budget Contract, I will have nothing to do with them. I won't allow my freedom of speech, my right to choose who I thank or don't thank, to be contractually bound. Besides that item, I also don't like item #4 (forced profit sharing), #12 (due to the ambiguity of it), #14 (Actors are more like independent contractors than regular employees, and should be treated as such), and #15 (they already have security from item #12).

I thought that too, until last night! I went to see Harry Potter 5 (which by the way sucked and was a total departure from the book). They were showing advertisements before the movie, and the ads were slightly blurry (probably DV quality), so out of curiosity I asked the guys on my left and right whether they would see a movie if it was that blurry. They emphatically said "No!", and proceeded to explain that they wouldn't waste their time with anything less than a reasonably sharp picture and would probably ask for their money back if the movie wasn't film-like quality. They go to the movie theater for the big detailed picture, and they don't want to sacrifice their viewing pleasure just so a movie maker can spend less money on video quality.

In order to hire an actor of moderate to lesser fame, perhaps one at the tail end of their career, does the shoot have to be SAG signed? How much does a waning/obscure star usually charge for a week's shoot?

My last post is beginning to push off topic... so I'll rephrase it in a separate thread.

In order to get that waining actor, doesn't the shoot have to change to SAG? In which case don't certain salaries have to be met and certain rules and positions have to be filled? It seems like whatever budget might have existed would no longer exist. Besides, even a has-been star must expect many thousands to do a role... right? What kind of money does it cost to get one of those people?

Quick solution as in a solution easily thought up... not necessarily quickly executed. The thing preventing someone from successfully getting a distributor is the lack of having anything to push... micro-buget indies can't afford name actors, fx and the like. Everything I've read so far has indicated that modern distributors won't buy micro-budget because of the lack of those elements, and the distributors won't take the risks they took a decade ago. I have to assume that Blair Witch came along at a time when distributors were a little more risk-friendly. If by some random luck and tremendous effort an indie movie finds an audience, only then will the distributors get interested because they will see tangible attention from the public. But at that point the audience for the movie has already been acquired, and is potentially growing through positive word-of-mouth. Getting the audience seems to be the whole point of a distributor, and with that work already done then a distributor would merely swoop in and take a huge cut of the profits. Wouldn't it make more sense to take that discovered audience, continue to nurse it with the same efforts that got the audience interested in the first place, and then collect 100% of the results? Why struggle so hard to get a distributor's attention when that same effort could be applied directly to consumers? If you're constantly going hungry, do you keep begging the fisherman to catch you a fish or do you try your own hand at fishing? Personally, if the fisherman doesn't want to give me fish, then I'm going to catch my own meal. And if I hook a fish on my line, I'm not going to give the pole over to the fisherman in exchange for a tiny piece of the catch.