Any good books on DIT skills

[Bob Hayes]

I'm looking for recommendations for good books on improving DIT skills.

[Bruce Greene]

I'm looking for recommendations for good books on improving DIT skills.

 

What a great question! I have no recommendations for books though. I think the technology changes too quickly to publish a book on this.

 

A few years back I wanted to learn this stuff too, so I took a couple DIT's out to lunch and had a couple "lessons" with a Sonyf-900. But it wasn't enough to really get it. Camera menus were too complex etc.

 

But I did learn this stuff...by buying a digital camera and a Chorma du Monde chip chart and a waveform/vectorscope. Even if you don't buy this stuff, you'll need a week with it to really get a handle on it.

 

Part of the challenge is that most DIT's consider this knowledge somewhat secret, if they really have it. But, it's not rocket science. There's also a lot of mis-information about these topics, especially on the internet.

 

I do have a suggestion though: If you don't already know photoshop very well - learn it. The concepts of the gamma curve adjustment, and color spaces are fundamental to really understand what one is doing with the controls on a digital camera, exposure, and monitor set-up. And there are some very good books on photoshop and I'd recommend "Real World Photoshop". And now that I think of it, "Goodman's Guide to the Varicam" is quite good as well, if you want to learn on a Varicam. Once you've got the basic concepts, you can apply them to most of the other broadcast and e-cinema cameras.

 

Hope you find this helpful Bob and feel free to email me with any questions and I'll try to help.

 

Best of luck!

[Brian Dzyak]

I'm looking for recommendations for good books on improving DIT skills.

 

To toot my own horn for a moment, there is an entire chapter about the DIT in my book. There's too much to copy from it here, which is why I made it into a book format in the first place! :)

 

Otherwise, the DITs I know (the good ones anyway) update their knowledge and skills by taking various workshops, like the Gancie Santa Fe HD workshop. I know a few people who own a RED camera, but they are not DPs or Assistants... so they learn the camera and post-workflow so they can rent the camera out and they go along as the DIT.

 

It's just about keeping up with the technology and every change and upgrade that is made.