Recently John Galt, Head of Advanced Digital Imaging at Panavision, and Larry Thorpe, National Marketing Manager at Canon Broadcast & Communications Division, opened a discussion on common misunderstandings in Digital Camera Specifications. Panavision has kindly granted FreshDV permission to present the seven-part in-depth video series here.

Demystifying Digital Camera Specifications Part 1: What’s in a Pixel?

Demystifying Digital Camera Specifications Part 2: Keeping Harry Happy

Here’s a beautiful tutorial on how to effectively fake full mocap using simple trackers and the Puppet Tool. Brilliant!

One of the production disciplines we talk about here at FreshDV is the all-important planning process. Hours put into a project on the front-end can literally save days when you are in the field. Unfortunately, pre-planning is all too often overlooked and marginalized…talk to anyone that has worked in production and they’ll tell you the horror stories. This article by Simon Wyndham talks about working with your client to clearly define their needs and expectations, as well as taking care to plan effectively for the location and shoot. It’s a good basic primer on how to approach a challenging shoot and (hopefully) turn it into a quality production that fully meets the needs of the client and properly impacts the intended audience.

“…while clients are often willing to spend less and less on video production, they still expect the same high quality. At the same time we, as the video producers, still have to pay bills. In other words, our overheads do not decrease just because clients have decided to pay less for the same work! The way around this conundrum is embedded within the entire video production process. At the end of the day it all comes down to project organisation, and importantly, project clarity.”

In the past we have walked through how to setup and calibrate a light meter with a given video camera, but once that’s done now what? Just walk around and randomly spout f-stops? While that may appear cool its not a very productive approach. As I mentioned in the original tutorial metering is mostly a carry over from film and while video cameras over much more intuitive tools such as histograms, waveforms, and other such tools to make setting exposure arguably more accurate for video systems, light meters in my opinion still have a lot of value on set. Determining precise contrast ratios, pre-lighting a scene to certain stop before the camera is setup, or working ahead of camera dept lighting the next setup, matching a scene shot on a previous day, and other task become much more precise with the aide of a light meter.

For example if you will notate meter readings for a given setup and you need to relight that setup later on in the week or you need pickup shots, it becomes much simpler to relight it using meter measurements than just eyeballing it. A meter is also a great communication tool between DP and Gaffer. A DP can give a gaffer a contrast ratio based on a look he wants acheive at a certain exposure range and the gaffer can light a scene to those exact specification rather than just using his eye and seeing things differently than the DP does.

I found several great articles that may help guide you in the right direction in getting familiar with using your meter on set.
Excerpt From the Full Length Primer:
Exposure Meters and
The Cinematographer
by
Gerald Hirschfeld, A.S.C

Published by Temple University and available for download here:

The Incident Light Meter and the Key Light
Using an incident light meter with a flat disc receptor, the
director of photography positions the “key light� (main light),
setting it at 40 fc. at the position of the main action. For this
reading the meter is pointed at the light source, not the camera.
The DP already knows the lens stop selected for that 40 fc light
level is f/4. Since all meters are factory calibrated to offer the
correct exposure for average mid-tone brightness, (18%
reflectivity from a standard gray card) the incident light
reading will be perfect for a normal “look� of average sub-
jects. The stage the DP is working on may be large but he need
only to read the one key light with the meter, all other lights
are set by eye.

There is another big difference between cine and still
photography. The motion picture cameraperson uses a “view-
ing filter� to judge light balances. When working with color
emulsions the viewing filter, sometimes called a contrast
viewing glass, is basically a “neutral density filter� which
reduces the sensitivity of the eye to more closely match that of
the film emulsion. When viewing the scene through the view-
ing filter the cinematographer can judge the relative brightness
of any part of the set, or actors, by visually comparing it to
who, or whatever, is in the key light. Looking through the
viewing filter the DP can discern dark areas that may need to
be brightened or overly bright areas that need reducing. The
viewing filter is held to the eye for a relatively short period of
time so the eye does not acclimate to the lower light level and
thereby cloud the purpose of the viewing filter. Many profes-
sional motion picture cameras have viewing filters built into
the camera’s eye piece for convenience. It does take practice
and experience to learn how to properly interpret, or judge, the
lighting contrast of the scene.

Excerpt From Fimmakers.com on Metering:
Full Article

Lighting ratios are another concept cinematographers must adapt to. It is important before lighting a scene to be able to visualize the lighting ratio they are going to use. A lighting ratio is the figure given to a measured relative difference in brightness two parts of a scene. It is very time-consuming to have to change the light ratios after it was thought that the lighting on the set was finished. The way films are funded these days, with often a significant amount of the production’s capitalization coming up front from television rights and video sell-throughs, it is important that the cinematographer knows when shooting a scene exactly how it will look when delivered on the two, quite different, media. The key to this is the lighting ratio. The first thing to realize is that the tonal range of the television version is going to have to come from within the tonal range of the cinema version. The most common use of light ratios is in the control of how the human face is lit. If the cinematographer successfully lights a face and is looking for the simplest way of noting their success, the easiest thing to do is to record, or simply remember, the lighting ratio. One way to keep track of you notes, like cinematographer Daryn Okada does, is to use a powerbook. “How did I get hooked on this method? I got into using a powerbook because I hated having to write my notes again and again. At each script revision and schedule came in, I had to find a better way to manage and keep track of photographic details with visual references and the means to accomplish them. At first, I made a lot of lists. Lists of visual ideas relating to the story, if camera movement, lighting, equipment, etc. I’m always writing some idea on some piece of paper. Soon, I began copying them into a notebook but thought it would be great to be able to always refer to the script and schedule, except as we all know, those elements keep changing during the pre-production process. So, I began to try programs and compartmentalize everything.” If the idea was to light a rather light piece with say, a leading lady aged perhaps late forties but playing a part written as thirty or so, a lighting ratio of 2:1 would be very flattering. This is because with the brighter side of the face only twice the brightness of the darker side the shadows in the smile lines by her eyes would only be half the brightness of the lit side of the face.
In order to establish the correct aperture to set on the lens, take a reading (using a spot meter) on the most important subject in the scene.
As there would be little difference in brightness between the smooth skin and the lined skin the lines would hardly show- all very flattering. If, on the other hand they were lighting a more dramatic piece, say a thriller, then they might let the lighting ratio on the leading man rise to 8:1 or three stops difference. The night scenes for the same film might rise to 16:1, but this is very dramatic- the detail in the shadowed side of the face is going to start to disappear soon and will almost certainly show as black on television.In order to establish the correct aperture to set on the lens, take a reading (using a spot meter) on the most important subject in the scene. As this will usually be the main character in the scene, their lit skin tone is generally used. If they are Caucasian then the reading on the spot meter used will be one stop over the setting for an 18 percent gray card. The only other caveat is that all the readings for this technique must be taken from in front of or very near to the lens, for only then will the reflectance of all the surfaces in the scene be the same for the spot meter as for the film. The second most important part of filming a scene (to cinematographers) is the shadows, and measuring these correctly is crucial. If the cinematographer finds that there is an important part of the scene which has read a little above the maximum white but wishes to photograph it, one relatively simple solution is to light the subject’s face a little brighter. This will enable them to stop down enough to bring the highlight within the recordable tonal range. After doing this, they will need to recheck the shadows to make sure none of them have now fallen outside the film’s tonal range. More simply, if there are some shadows that fall below the recordable tonal range then simply adding a little more fill light will bring them up to a recordable level. On an exterior this might simply be done with a reflector.

For the DIY crowd, here’s a simple dolly design that you can build cheap. Enjoy.

Mastering Multimedia has shared a basic list of things to check before locking your final cut and sending it out to the interwebs. A lot the suggestions deal with audio…ensuring that levels are correct, cross fades and L-cuts are used where appropriate, etc. As Norman Hollyn notes, the audio split edit one of the simplest methods of smoothing a cut point. So if you are looking for some guidance on how to wrap up your latest production, vacation video, or the next viral hit, here’s a good start. As the infamous Sen. Ted Stevens so wisely noted, the internet is “…not something that you just dump something on.” The tubes deserve our very best.

Splice Here has a handy tutorial on how to use the Stabilize effect in Media Composer to take the shake and jitters out of footage. Unlike FCP’s SmoothCam filter, the Media Composer stabilization analysis happens in realtime and is very similar in function to the tracker in After Effects. You have a tracker target that you manually select a track location with, and the search area is configurable if you run into issues with the shot’s movement. Great tutorial!

This short post at PrepShootPost talks about similarities in the flesh tones of people of all races. It’s a valuable lesson for color correction. And here’s a short Ripple Training tutorial excerpt (scroll down) that delves into topic of using the Flesh Tone Line in FCP’s scopes to assist in color-correcting skintones of all races and ethnicities. Their DVD on color correction techniques is an excellent primer and I highly recommend it. For a discussion on how colorists are retaining skintones in harsh lighting and color casts, read this post over at ProLost.

(Thanks for the link Pablo)

Editing Organazized has two great posts up with tips and tricks for getting the best-quality slowmo footage out of Final Cut Studio using Compressor. The first outlines the basic workflow, post #2 delves deeper into Compressor’s behavior at various retiming percentages and provides examples of the sort of results you can expect. In the footage for this example, best results degraded past 1/4 speed. At 25%, Compressor’s Optical Flow appears to preserve much more detail than what you can expect directly out of Final Cut Pro. Very informative articles.

Kenn Bell has a post up that talks about how he used the iPhone to storyboard a recent music video shoot. His technique is quick and looks to be very effective…take digital images while location scouting, throw together a quick iMovie video slideshow, and use the video on-set with the iPhone.

“Basically, we’d arrive at a location, I’d play the movie and let everyone, including Baby Jay, see what shots and looks I was interested in. It only took a minute and everyone was on the same page. I can’t stress enough how much time I saved! The three days went incredibly smooth and I really believe it was because the movie on my iPhone. It actually got everyone excited to see how cool the music video would look and I gained a great deal of trust from it.”

This would also be a good time to check out Kenn’s interview on the Digital Production Buzz podcast.

Editor Harry Miller has shared two audio editing/mixing tutorials for Avid NLE users. It’s great to see more and more user-generated instructional material for the Avid platform as of late.

(Via Norman Hollyn)

Zacuto is a full-service camera rental house in the Chicago area that also makes camera support systems. Their gear is customized to various camera packages and configurations to help shooters work more efficiently and effectively, whether for their own rental packages or for personal purchase. Some months back we had the opportunity to tour the Zacuto facility. At that time we also shot a short overview of the Basic Studio and Handheld Redrock M2 Adapter support configurations. In recent months they’ve also rolled out new packages and options designed to work with the Letus Extreme 35mm adapter and other recent HD cameras (like the new Z-Riser for the LEX and Red). The following 20-minute video takes you through the build-up of a Basic Studio HVX200 support kit, as well as the more in-depth build-up of a 35mm adapter support configuration designed for handheld use. So if you are a Zacuto rig owner and are looking for some instructional tips, or if you are simply new to Zacuto gear, we hope this video sheds some light on the subject.

Download the QT video, subscribe to FreshDV’s audio/video podcast feed, or watch via streaming flash below.

 Configuration and Setup of Zacuto Support Systems [20:30m]: Download

Here is a short tutorial that covers the basic steps necessary to prepare a Final Cut Pro sequence for color finishing in Apple Color.

Over at kenstone.net there is a FCP tutorial on how to get best results when outputting Standard Definition DVDs from PMW-EX1 sourced HD footage.

The crew over at Cinevate have announced a series of instructional videos and tutorials that thoroughly cover the Brevis 35mm Adapter system. They’ve launched it with three clips that discuss the basic adapter system and design philosophy, the basic setup and backfocus procedure, and how to collimate the 35mm lens. Future topics will include:

Image/Oscillation Tuning (including CF2, CF3 tips)
Rails setup/options
Mattebox use
Cleaning/Swapping CINEFUSE Imaging elements

I anticipate that the series will be very helpful to both new and experienced users alike.