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Film stock for handheld


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Hi,

 

i am planning to make a documentary and I am going completely handheld for it. the location we are going to shoot(forest area) doesn't have much light and we are planning to use the fastest film stock available i guess kodak v2 800t...... i just wanna know what are the demerits of using a fast film on a handheld camera.....what is the best advice you can give me to keep the shake in the handheld to a minimum apart from things like goin for widelens etc

 

sun

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Could you give us some more specifics as to why you need a fast stock for handheld? Shooting outdoors, which is common in a lot of documentaries, would make it silly to use such a fast shot unless all of your outdoor shots are at night. I'd assume you are shooting 16mm, which would also mean grain would be an issue with 500T film, even moreso with a one-stop push. Also bear in mind that documentaries involve some of the highest shooting ratios of any sort of film production. Just saying that you probably should know more about film in general if you're going to shoot a documentary on it; this calls for independent research, not just asking questions on internet fora.

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Unless "Sun Brad" is your real name, you need to go to My Controls and edit your Display Name to a real first and last name as per the forum rules.

 

Deep forests can get very dark, so 500T may actually be the right speed in that situation. I've metered some woods in Oregon on an overcast day and there wasn't even enough light for a T/2.0 at 500 ASA.

 

Trouble is that as soon as you are in some greater areas of daylight, you'll either have to switch to some slower stock or use some very heavy ND filtration.

 

Smooth handheld operating is more or less a learned skill. Wide-angle lenses help, otherwise it's mostly operator skill.

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Unless "Sun Brad" is your real name, you need to go to My Controls and edit your Display Name to a real first and last name as per the forum rules.

 

I apologize. I haven't come here in a long time. Sorry for violating the forum rules for sometime there. Thanks for your reply.

 

 

David could you please elaborate on this "Deep forests can get very dark, so 500T may actually be the right speed in that situation. I've metered some woods in Oregon on an overcast day and there wasn't even enough light for a T/2.0 at 500 ASA."

 

What do i have to do for that?

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Unless "Sun Brad" is your real name, you need to go to My Controls and edit your Display Name to a real first and last name as per the forum rules.

 

I apologize. I haven't come here in a long time. Sorry for violating the forum rules for sometime there. Thanks for your reply.

 

 

David could you please elaborate on this "Deep forests can get very dark, so 500T may actually be the right speed in that situation. I've metered some woods in Oregon on an overcast day and there wasn't even enough light for a T/2.0 at 500 ASA."

 

What do i have to do for that? I know I gotta do a lot of research before going ahead. I m kinda looking for a start here, that's it.

 

thank you very much

sunny

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What I think Mr. Mullen is trying to say is that although 500T would be good in a dark deep forest (where you need the faster speed film) it won't work for an all around stock because it is very sensitive to light, so in situations of direct sunlight/harsh sunlight, you'll be overexposing the negative to a high degree, hence necessitating you to carry more than one stock for different situations.

500T is a nice stock, but it's an INT/Night/Low light stock primarily.

You might want to look into 250D or 200T for a stock which can work for both INTs and EXTs, though you run the risk of underexposing on the INTs unless you can bring light with.

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Well, if you reach a point where there isn't enough light for 500 ASA at the widest aperture your lenses will open up to, your choices are: (1) bring faster lenses, like T/1.3, (2) underexpose, and maybe push-process to compensate, (3) undercrank for longer exposures, (4) add lights to get more exposure, (5) go home.

 

There's no right or wrong method in terms of stock choices. Personally, if shooting in 16mm, I'd want to keep graininess down, so I'd probably use a 200T, 250T, or 250D stock for most of the interior woods and switch to 500T with no filter (maybe an LLD) when it got darker. If shooting in 35mm, I'd probably not worry so much and just use 500T if the woods were particularly dense on average.

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