HD For Indies

High Definition Video for Independent Filmmakers
A How To Guide for Digital Filmmakers
Welcome all! This is my blog to share my latest research,
thoughts, etc. on utilizing HD for independent filmmaking.

YES, I am available for consulting
Contact me at mike@hdforindies.com

All content copyright 2004-2007 Mike Curtis.

Wednesday, November 14, 2007

More Stills & Commentary from Mike's Red Spain Shoot: Sitges day 2 part 2

OK, here's another batch of images from the Sitges Day Shoot (this is Part 2) I did in Spain with Equipo Rojo España, shot by Jendra Jarnagin and Pol Turrents. In case you missed it, check out part 1, which I've updated with some more comments and how-done (screen shots of curves and hue/sat adjustments in Photoshop).

This was with Red One #17, and it had some of the same backfocus issues as some of the other early cameras, thus this series of shots are not as sharp as a Red One can generate. So don't refer to this as what Red can do for sharpness, just Red has fixed this camera and is working on a fix.

For the latest on that see Jim's post on Reduser.net:

Reduser.net - View Single Post - New Schedule:
"Improvements include a new lens mount system, less noise and higher data rate for improved dynamic range, new features and time to test. Several other minor improvements will also be made. We have also committed to bringing serial numbers 1-100 up to the new spec (at no charge to our customers). We also anticipate a few new formats, although they will likely follow in a firmware upgrade. We are doing our best to continue to improve the RED ONE. This effort won't stop as long as I am around..."

Bummer there has been trouble, but they are aggressively on it, so that's far better than them saying something like "Problem? What problem?"

As with Part 1, I've decided to apply no artificial sharpening. So feel free to Unsharp Mask in Photoshop or whatever you deem appropriate. UPDATE - speaking of sharpening, Jim posted his thoughts on the matter, and distinguished between Sharpening and Unsharp Mask:

Sharpening... ugh? - Reduser.net

I also found comments #7, 8, 12, 13, 20 & 33 most useful.

So back to it - here's a bunch of shots below, and to continue the discussion on original camera image vs. graded vs. what can be done in camera, I've taken the liberty of making three versions of each image:

flat=original camera image as shot, no modifications other than perhaps changing the white point to make all the similar shots consistent

graded=tweaked in Photoshop - I pushed these pretty hard to get a strong look, but didn't make much effort to keep them consistent from shot to shot. Just to show you've got ample room to push and still get good results.

RAgrade=adjustments made in Red Alert (so RAgrade=Red Alert graded) exactly equivalent to what COULD be done on camera (read part 1 if this doesn't make sense) - this COULD HAVE BEEN original camera image if we'd taken the time on set to adjust the knobs

Not all shots have an RA grade - for whatever reason I didn't make one or think it necessary.

==========

Shot: B1C1
Frame: 676
Description: closer shot of the base of the stairs (as compared to the shot posted in part 1) and the waves crashing against the shore, 4K@24p

Lens: 24mm UltraPrime
T stop: T8
Filtration: ND 1.2
Resolution: 4K
Frame rate: 23.976

B001_C001_071013_00676_flat

Clicking the above will open a 2K resolution JPEG at 100% quality. For the uncompressed 4K resolution, 16 bit 48 MB TIFF file, right click and Save As here.

Red Alert settings were the same as above, changes were all made in Photoshop.

B001_C001_071013_00676_RAgrade

Clicking the above will open a 2K resolution JPEG at 100% quality. For the uncompressed 4K resolution, 16 bit 48 MB TIFF file, right click and Save As here.

Red Alert settings
Standard Mode
Exposure (ISO): 320
Kelvin (white point): 5600
Tint: 0
Exposure Adjustment: 0
Saturation: 1.75
Contrast: 0.50
Brightness: 2.00

Shot:C1C1A (the "A" was a designation we put on it when we found out it IS possible to make two shots with the same name...ugh...there is an onset workflow to fix this heinous problem, though)
Frame: 5123
Description: is 2K shot at 72fps rocks, similar frame - so compare this to the above for the difference between 2K and 4K...sorta. Keep in mind we had the PL mount issue - none of these are as sharp as they should be. But perhaps the RELATIVE sharpness between the two can be instructive.

Lens: 16mm
T stop: T2
Filtration used: ND 0.9+1.2
Resolution: 2K
Frame rate: 72fps, 1/192 exposure duration I think - or was 1/125

C001_C001_071013a_05123_flat

Clicking the above will open a 2K resolution JPEG at 100% quality. For the uncompressed 4K resolution, 16 bit 48 MB TIFF file, right click and Save As here.

C001_C001_071013a_05123_RAgrade

Clicking the above will open a 2K resolution JPEG at 100% quality. For the uncompressed 4K resolution, 16 bit 48 MB TIFF file, right click and Save As here.

Shot: B1C8
Frame: 366
Description: 4k @24 rocks

Lens: 16mm
T stop: T2
Filtration: ND 0.9+1.2
Resolution: 4K
Frame rate: 23.976

B001_C008_071013_00366_flat

Clicking the above will open a 2K resolution JPEG at 100% quality. For the uncompressed 4K resolution, 16 bit 48 MB TIFF file, right click and Save As here.

Shot: C1C1a
Frame: 1446
Description: 2K272 rocks, pretty much same shot but cropped and faster

Lens: 16mm
T stop: T2
Filtration: ND 0.9+1.2
Resolution: 2K
Frame rate: 23.976

C001_C001_071013a_01446_flat

Clicking the above will open a 2K resolution JPEG at 100% quality. For the uncompressed 4K resolution, 16 bit 48 MB TIFF file, right click and Save As here.

Shot: A1C6
Frame:227
Description: stormtroopers wide - Mos Eisley? Most unlikely.

Lens: Unknown
T stop: Varies
Filtration: None
Resolution: 2K
Frame rate: 23.976

A001_C006_071013_00227_flat

Clicking the above will open a 2K resolution JPEG at 100% quality. For the uncompressed 4K resolution, 16 bit 48 MB TIFF file, right click and Save As here.

Red Alert settings
DI Mode
Exposure (ISO): 320
Rec 709 Gamma
Kelvin (white point): 5618
Tint: 22
Exposure Adjustment: -0.4

A001_C006_071013_00227_graded

Clicking the above will open a 2K resolution JPEG at 100% quality. For the uncompressed 4K resolution, 16 bit 48 MB TIFF file, right click and Save As here.

A001_C006_071013_00227_RAgrade

Clicking the above will open a 2K resolution JPEG at 100% quality. For the uncompressed 4K resolution, 16 bit 48 MB TIFF file, right click and Save As here.

Grading in RedAlert, I futzed around with Kelvin and Tint for a while until durf! I'd forgotten about the "Pick WB" button (that's Pick White Balance), which was one click easy. There is, of course, a button on camera to do this as well.

Red Alert settings
Standard Mode
Exposure (ISO): 320
Kelvin (white point): 9250
Tint: 15.68
Exposure Adjustment: -0.5
Saturation: 2
Contrast: 0.20
Brightness: 4.00

Shot: A1C6
Frame: 1100
Description: closeup trooper

Lens: Unknown
T stop: Varies
Filtration: None
Resolution: 2K
Frame rate: 23.976

A001_C006_071013_01100_flat

Clicking the above will open a 2K resolution JPEG at 100% quality. For the uncompressed 4K resolution, 16 bit 48 MB TIFF file, right click and Save As here.

A001_C006_071013_01100_RAgrade

Clicking the above will open a 2K resolution JPEG at 100% quality. For the uncompressed 4K resolution, 16 bit 48 MB TIFF file, right click and Save As here.

Red Alert settings
Standard Mode
Exposure (ISO): 500
Kelvin (white point): 5600
Tint: 0
Exposure Adjustment: -0.3
Saturation: 1
Contrast: 0
Brightness: 3

Shot: D1C2-C5
Description: Various exposures of a high dynamic range scene. These are all the modified flat originals - some we shot at ISO 320, some at ISO 100 to help us try to identify sensor clip, but here they've all been processed the same to allow more direct comparisons. The major relevant variable is the T stop.

Lens: 24mm UltraPrime
T stop: T11.5
Filtration: None
Resolution: 4K
Frame rate: 23.976

D001_C002_071013_00117

Clicking the above will open a 2K resolution JPEG at 100% quality. For the uncompressed 4K resolution, 16 bit 48 MB TIFF file, right click and Save As here.

Red Alert settings
DI Mode
Exposure (ISO): 320
Rec 709 Gamma
Kelvin (white point): 5600
Tint: 0
Exposure: -.040

...so yeah, this is taking forever. Given. But I wanted to do this at a certain level of correctness to be Worth Doing. More coming, and it gets better as we go...

-mike

Labels: Red, Red Alert, Sitges, Spain

Posted by: Mike Curtis / 11/14/2007 05:23:00 PM (3) comments links to this post

Thursday, November 01, 2007

Spain RED Shoot Day 2 Part 1: Sitges with Commentary - "Push it REAL good..."

This is my continuing coverage, analysis, and footage from my Red One shoot in Spain.

On Saturday, we got up and were ready to shoot. After last night's rearranged shoot (Mont Juic instead of Font Magica), we were itching to get what we wanted - some really gorgeous shots.

You can see the photo gallery of production stills here.

Today I want to do something a little bit different from what I've been doing - I had been posting source 4K TIFF files, completely flat and raw and unmodified. The benefits of such are well explained by Stu Maschwitz here, but not everybody is up to speed on that.

I've fielded a few complaints about the look of the Red One footage in Comments on prior posts, my favorite being that it simply looked like higher res HDV. Bwahahahaaaaaaaa.....let me show you how not true that is.

First up, let us take a look at an image from the same sequence I posted the other week:

B001_C002_071013_00306_flat

Clicking the above will open a 2K resolution JPEG at 100% quality. For the uncompressed 4K resolution, 16 bit 48 MB TIFF file, right click and Save As here.

For those of you just joining this game, these images are best viewed with your monitor set to Adobe 1998 - that's gamma 2.2, white point of 6500 Kelvin. If you're on a Mac, and you haven't done it yet, now is an excellent time to use the Advanced calibration options in System Prefs/Displays/Color/Calibrate/Expert Mode (on).

This is the ungraded, flat, optimized for transfer to DI version of this frame. And yes, it looks utterly flat and uninspiring. And yes, there appears to be a dead pixel at 2833 over, 167 down. Drat. I could paint it out, but that would feel like cheating.

For those interested, it was shot with a 16mm Ultra Prime lens, f2.8, with ND0.9 and 1.2, ISO 320, I processed it at 5600 Kelvin, 0 Tint, and I think 0 Exposure since Jendra nailed the exposure so well (perhaps because I convinced her of the rockingness of the false color exposure tool? :D )

EDIT - DO NOTE - this was shot with not one but TWO ND filters - a 0.9 and a 1.2 - so OF COURSE it looks flat!

But take that same 4K TIFF file and apply some aggressive Curves and Hue/Sat in Photoshop, and voila:

B001_C002_071013_00306_graded

Clicking the above will open a 2K resolution JPEG at 100% quality. For the uncompressed 4K resolution, 16 bit 48 MB TIFF file, right click and Save As here.

For those of you who felt the original images were flat and uninspiring, there you go - that's more like it.

EDIT - to answer those asking, Photoshop changes were as follows - I applied this curve:

....then pushed the master saturation +47. That's it.

Some are complaining (even one guy on the CML, but not indicative of the overall tone there -EDIT - I misrepresented this before, is why I'm rephrasing now) that you should be able to just shoot and get good results straight out of the camera, that all this post software nonsense is gobblygook, and that finished images should fall out of the camera like manna from heaven (after you stand around and tweak on it on set).

For starters, I heartily disagree - the more specific a look you create in camera, the less likely you'll be able to change it later...with a traditional electronic camera. The Red One is really most analagous to a digital film camera - you have a LOT of room to push it around in post, so notes from the DoP in the field are important if not essential to get your dailies the way you want them...if you shoot it like a film camera, not tweezing all the knobs on set.

This is an essential distinction between the Red One and a lot of other electronic cameras, especially the workhorses of the HD world, the Varicam and the F900. While you CAN shoot with those cameras in default modes, if you REALLY want to get the best results from Varicam/F900, you need to have (or be) a DIT - a Digital Imaging Tech. A DIT can get deep into the menus and tweak all the color parameters to get the optimal results off the sensor head, through the DSPs and color adjustments, then recorded in a compressed (and usually shrunken, excuse me, prefiltered) format to tape. INSTEAD...Red One records all of the image that hits the sensor, unaltered (colorwise) but in a compressed format, and any adjustments you make to white point, gamma, saturation,tint, etc. are all recorded as metadata. It is akin to the difference between making a Curves adjustment in Photoshop, and using an Curves Adjustment Layer in Photoshop - the former you're married to your choices and will further degrade the image to make changes, in the latter you can change your mind without damaging consequences.

SO...all that said, some folks are still cranky about wanting to be able to shoot with the Red One and get pretty images immediately, such as out of the HD-SDI to tape for some workflows (like live production).

This is where all that metadata gets juicy. It just so happens that all of the controls that you have in Red Alert (and will have in Redcine when that ships) are exactly the controls, that work exactly the same way, in the same units, on the Red One camera itself. You've got controls for Kelvin (your white point temperature), Tint, Exposure, Saturation, Contrast, Brightness, then gain channels for Red/Green/Blue. (You've also got a curves editor, but I don't think that'll be available on camera). So what I did was do a quick tweak of the controls in Red Alert, which adjusts the image in the same way it would had I dug into the menus and made all those changes in camera - so it is entirely possible to shoot on the camera and get something immediately like this:

B001_C002_071013_00306_RedAlert Grade.jpg

Clicking the above will open a 2K resolution JPEG at 100% quality. For the uncompressed 4K resolution, 16 bit 48 MB TIFF file, right click and Save As here.

This was quick - I spent about a minute doodling with the controls, mostly Brightness, Contrast, and Saturation. You could spend your time (and everyone else's) and their money on set messing with this...or just do it later if you don't have to have it Just So on set. This is by no means a match to what I did in Photoshop with more robust tools, this was just to show that you CAN get a poppy image straight out of the camera (and better than this I might add, I just hacked at it for a minute or so).

BUT...the REALLY juicy bit is this - if I HAD hacked around for a few more minutes in the Redcine software (when it ships), I'd be able to save that look, put it on a CF card and load it back INTO the camera (or all the other cameras running on set) for all the footage they'd shoot until I changed settings again, either by twiddling knobs on camera or mouse click 'n draggin' in Redcine to load a new or modified look.

This was not my most successful in camera simulation, so keep reading...

Next up is a shot of the top of the church. The original from camera, which we could consider a digital OCN (original camera negative), is not terribly inspiring.
B001_C004_071013_02474_flat

Clicking the above will open a 2K resolution JPEG at 100% quality. For the uncompressed 4K resolution, 16 bit 48 MB TIFF file, right click and Save As here.

This was shot with an Ultra Prime as well at T4, I don't have notes on which one it was nor whether any ND filters were used. Eyeballing it I'd say there were, probably the same 0.9 and 1.2 if I had to guess.

...but put that that into Photoshop:

B001_C004_071013_02474_graded

Clicking the above will open a 2K resolution JPEG at 100% quality. For the uncompressed 4K resolution, 16 bit 48 MB TIFF file, right click and Save As here.

....and you can push it FAR, as you can see here. Would I want to push it that far? Not very often, but you CAN, and that is the important thing. Did I mention I haven't sharpened any of these? At ALL? Sharpening is just adding contrast to edges. Feel free to do so in Photoshop or metric equivalent.

I got this look by applying this Curve:

...and then going into Hue/Saturation and pushing the master saturation 34 units, then applying this custom push in the cyans (note the widened/tweaked range):

For those who want snappy right out of the camera, here's that option as well. All image adjustments (except for the watermark, obviously) were done strictly within Red Alert by manipulating the controls in the exact same way you could/would on camera. So you could be rolling this kind of color if you wanted to out the HD-SDI (just not at this resolution, of course!):

B001_C004_071013_02474_Red Alert Graded

Clicking the above will open a 2K resolution JPEG at 100% quality. For the uncompressed 4K resolution, 16 bit 48 MB TIFF file, right click and Save As here.

The big picture is this: Even though these source images look flat and uninspiring, in a way that is GOOD - that means you have a LOT of room to push them around in post to get them where you want to go. This means you are less concerned than you otherwise might be about clipped highlights or muddy shadows, and that if you want to add a lot of saturation, you CAN, without having the image come apart like wet Kleenex in your grading app in a sea of mosquito noise and blocking artifacts. Open that source 4K image up in Photoshop and start going nuts with it. Then open up an image from your camera and try to push it as far. See what I mean? Yep. Red One rocks. Or more specifically, Graeme's Redcode RAW codec rocks, since it holds up so well to this kind of knob flailing abuse.

Actually, that's a good place to stop for today, I need to head out.

Thanks again to all the folks who worked on this stuff with me, we dubbed ourselves Equipo Rojo España - "Team Red Spain":

Directors of Photography:
- Jendra Jarnagin
- Pol Turrents, who was also Mr. Connection to hook us up with all of our Spain resources, a VERY special thanks to him

Technical director: Mike Curtis, HD for Indies (me)

Production Manager: Oriol Bramona of Utopic

Red Camera Equipment: Steve Tammi of Otter Creek Productions

Camera Equipment: Service Vision

Production:Independent Film Academy, Utopic, and Service Vision

1st AC: Gabi Garcia

Data management & 2nd AC: Ivan Garriga

Red Postproduction: Utopic

We all learned a ton, and are continuing to learn as I dig through all of this. It is striking how much you can learn about shooting in post production of this camera..and how much (more than usual) you can alter the results of the shoot in post.

This is a good thing.

More to follow, keep checking back,

-mike

As always, I'm available for consulting on your projects, especially Red related projects

Labels: Red, Red Alert, Sitges, Spain

Posted by: Mike Curtis / 11/01/2007 06:27:00 PM (13) comments links to this post

Tuesday, October 30, 2007

My Spain Red Shoot - First Night's Shoot

After our IFA Panel on Why Red Matters ended, we IMMEDIATELY set out to go shoot Font Magica, a gorgeously lit fountain in Barcelona. The week before when Jendra had toured me around Barcelona, she was adamant that we had to end up at the fountain at night, and I was pleased we did - see pics in the above link I took of it. So once we knew we had a Red coming, she lit up and insisted we'd have to shoot Font Magica...in 4K.

I really couldn't argue with that logic.

So as soon as the presentation ended, we hung out and talked with people for a short while, then immediately packed up and zipped up to Barcelona to shoot the Font Magica.

Unfortunately....it was done for the night already. We'd had our times wrong, and it had finished an hour before we got there.

Based on that, we did a quick reassess and drove up to Mont Juic, a beautiful overlook point in Barcelona and shot from there.

One of the great things we learned about the Red during this week is how amazingly well it does at night or low light situations, especially as compared to film. If you're wondering why these look flat or color biased, please read this.

If you look at my .Mac Web Gallery - MontJuicRedShoot, the second shot is highly instructive - it is a 1/5th of a second exposure with at 18mm focal length at ISO 1600 taken with a Nikon D80 (Jendra's I'll bet), and you can see the area we were shooting - the balcony to the left if where the first shot starts, and the boat on the right is where the first shot ends. Well, why not just show you. Clicking on the image below will open the 4.4MB nearly 4K resolution JPEG:

(Above NOT shot on Red One Camera!)

Jendra Jarnagin was operating most of these shots, but we had some camera hardware focus related issues that weren't resolved for a few days. We were shooting on Zeiss Super Speed lenses, I think I recall 85mm being used for many of the shots. All footage was shot 23.976 fps, usually 1/48th exposure but some tests at 1/24th.

Our first shot was A001_C001_071012_00000

It is a panning shot that starts here...

Clicking the above will open a 2K resolution JPEG at 100% quality. For the uncompressed 4K resolution, 16 bit 48 MB TIFF file, right click and Save As here.

and ends here...

A001_C001_071012_01031

Clicking the above will open a 2K resolution JPEG at 100% quality. For the uncompressed 4K resolution, 16 bit 48 MB TIFF file, right click and Save As here.

This is a panning shot that starts on a deck dimly lit and pans across a swatch of Barcelona's seaside port, coming to rest on a cruise ship at a dock behind a parking lot. This is the kind of shot you could never light in reality without a zillion trucks worth of lights...therefore you could never light it in reality. This is the kind of shot that shows off Red well in comparison to film for low light sensitivity. We processed the head of the shot at ISO 640, Exposure=0 in Red Alert for this still, and the tail at ISO 320 with Exposure set to -0.43 to capture highlight detail.

Already this starts to present some of the choices and conundrums of shooting RAW. If one were shooting with a traditional electronic camera, you could approach it one of several ways:
1.) expose for optimal results for either head (darker) or tail (brighter) or shot, biasing towards the capabilities of the camera
2.) expose somewhere in between and do post correction, compromised on both ends
3.) expose to capture max range and watch out for the noise floor.
4.) ???

Now that we're shooting RAW, we shoot wide open then can process it differently in post, much like processing the film - should it be processed at ISO/ASA 320? 500? 800? 1000? 1600? Trial and error reveal the pros and cons of each.

So instead of having to lock in a choice while shooting, we can process it different through Red Alert, perhaps doing a blend between two different ISO renderings of the same shot as it pans, or animating the grade through the pan. Yet to be done, more on that later, but creates fresh challenges. Having Assimilate's Scratch, with native support, suddenly sounds so much more useful than rendering out long multiple DPX sequences and blending them together, potentially with feathered masks.

The next shot was A001_C003_071012_00604 which includes the famous statue of Christopher Columbus pointing...the wrong way. Processed at ISO 640, 5600 Kelvin, 0 Tint, Rec 709 gamma (all are Rec 709 gamma unless otherwise noted), and Exposure set to zero.

Clicking the above will open a 2K resolution JPEG at 100% quality. For the uncompressed 4K resolution, 16 bit 48 MB TIFF file, right click and Save As here.

Next up was A001_C004_071012_00010, the cruise ship again.

Clicking the above will open a 2K resolution JPEG at 100% quality. For the uncompressed 4K resolution, 16 bit 48 MB TIFF file, right click and Save As here.

The next shot was A001_C005_071012_00268, a wide shot of the city below, shot at 4K (as the other shots above have been), processed at ISO 250.

Clicking the above will open a 2K resolution JPEG at 100% quality. For the uncompressed 4K resolution, 16 bit 48 MB TIFF file, right click and Save As here.

Then we shot was A001_C006_071012_00250, quite similar, slightly reframed, but processed at ISO 320. We locked down the head for this shot, you'll see why in a moment.

Clicking the above will open a 2K resolution JPEG at 100% quality. For the uncompressed 4K resolution, 16 bit 48 MB TIFF file, right click and Save As here.

For the next shot, we reset the camera to 2K mode and didn't touch a thing - A002_C001_071012_00000 is shot at 2K with the same everything. The point of this? You can drop this shot onto the above shot and compare how 2K mode and compression compares to a 2K crop from the above shot - we wanted to see if there were any meaningful differences. The focus and lighting aren't perfect in this shot to compare, but it does give you an idea of how to compare.

Clicking the above will open a 2K resolution JPEG at 100% quality. For the uncompressed 2K resolution, 16 bit 12 MB TIFF file, right click and Save As here.

Shot was A002_C002_071012_00000 is a similar 2K shot.

Clicking the above will open a 2K resolution JPEG at 100% quality. For the uncompressed 2K resolution, 16 bit 12 MB TIFF file, right click and Save As here.

Shot was A002_C004_071012_00132 is a another 2K shot.

Clicking the above will open a 2K resolution JPEG at 100% quality. For the uncompressed 2K resolution, 16 bit 12 MB TIFF file, right click and Save As here.

Do take a look at that .Mac Web Gallery, you'll see where and how we were shooting and with what gear. Plus the beautiful place where we had dinner later that night, and I was able to make dailies (or would you call them instants?) on the spot with Steve Tammi's laptop and play back for the group at dinner (note the Red One behind me in that shot). The workflow really is like a digital film camera, in that you need to develop it, massage it, make dailies coloring probably, etc. But a laptop is all that is needed instead of a lab - like that!

We didn't need to worry about data management on set since we shot so little footage and had 6 8GB CF cards. But it was MUCH more of an issue the next day. More on that aspect later...

Special thanks to the group we dubbed Equipo Rojo España, who all donated their time to get to work with the Red camera for several days:

Directors of Photography:
- Jendra Jarnagin
- Pol Turrents, who was also Mr. Connection to hook us up with all of our Spain resources, a VERY special thanks to him

Technical director: Mike Curtis, HD for Indies (me)

Production Manager: Oriol Bramona of Utopic

Red Camera Equipment: Steve Tammi of Otter Creek Productions

Camera Equipment: Service Vision

Production:Independent Film Academy, Utopic, and Service Vision

1st AC: Gabi Garcia

Data management & 2nd AC: Ivan Garriga

Red Postproduction: Utopic

Again, thanks to everyone for their time, dilligence, energy, and professionalism.

OK, that's it for today, the next post will include our Sitges day shoot.

-mike

Labels: Red, Sitges, Spain

Posted by: Mike Curtis / 10/30/2007 08:20:00 AM (5) comments links to this post

Monday, October 29, 2007

Video of my Red Spain Presentation is posted

I updated my post from last week with the DiVX videos of the 2 1/2 hour presentation on Red One. Descriptions, still pictures, the PDF presentation, and video are now all in the linked article.

-mike

Labels: IFA, Red, Sitges, Spain

Posted by: Mike Curtis / 10/29/2007 04:34:00 PM (5) comments links to this post

Thursday, October 25, 2007

My IFA Spain Red Presentation with video, pics and PDF of preso

My Red presentation the other week in Sitges, Spain at the IFA Conference with Jendra Jarnagin, Steve Tammi, and Pol Turrents went very well, I was very happy with it. We ran for about 2 1/2 hours and covered a lot of ground and answered a lot of questions.

This was the first public viewing of a production Red camera in Spain (after Soderbergh shot his movie over the summer there), so interest was high.

For those who couldn't make it, a DiVX version will be posted soon (I'll update when I have the link), and here is the PDF of my Keynote slides (4.27MB), and annotated stills taken during the presentation. The stills have a text walkthrough that actually goes into more detail, worth looking at - many things not in the Keynote slides.

MONDAY UPDATE:
Here's part 1 - good news is that it is all of it, bad news is you have to have DiVX installed to watch it:

Here's part 2:

(if you're having trouble watching the streaming embedded version above, you can download the DiVX clips to your local drive from the IFA page on Stage 6. Go to the page with the video you want, and there's two buttons over the video itself - one to play, one to download.)

Big, BIG thanks to Utopic and Service Vision for their aid, equipment, and support, and to the local Blackmagic Design folks for jumping in at the last minute as well. We couldn't have done this presentation 1/10th as well without them, and huge thanks to Steve Tammi for having the faith to get on a plane with his Red One #17 in Tennessee to join us and help us in Spain. Pol Turrents was critical to all this pulling together as well, it was his contacts and resources that got us what we needed.

And of course special thanks again to Juan and Inga, the organizers of the IFA Conference, for inviting us over, putting us up, and treating us so well, without whom NONE of this would have happened.

Here's how it went down:

After the crowd filed in, we introduced ourselves, gave a little history of Red and the philosophy behind it, and jumped in with with "Why Red Matters." I broke it down into six categories:

Image Quality/Resolution
Modularity/flexibility
RAW & Redcode
Filmless/Tapeless
Cost - both buying and integrating

After going through those categories in detail, we went into the workflow from both a DoP's perspective (Jendra) as well as the techie/post side (mine), talked about the camera a bit, then showed the differences in resolution between the primarily available formats. After that I showed a draft of an edit of the stunt car shoot OffHollywood shot when I was in NYC with them last month, and then showed a split screen before/after grading version - very effective.

Then the fun part - a live walkthrough of how the camera works - shooting, ingest, editing, grading, the whole deal. Since Steve Tammi had brought a Red over, he and Jendra fired it up, rolled a few seconds of the audience, then Jendra walked the CF card over like Vanna White - no tricks up our sleeves.

I put the CF card into a CF reader ("THIS is your HDCAM SR deck for Red."), pulled it into the Mac Pro (kindly provided by Utopic, a post facility in Barcelona, many thanks to Oriol).

I showed how Red set up their naming structure to try to prevent duplicate file names, showed the file/folder structure created on the card, and then opened up the clip in Red Alert. There I showed how RAW images could be manipulated beyond what a regular electronic camera can do.

From there I made QuickTime proxies, showing how 2K, 1K, and 1/2K proxies could be made on the fly from the 4K source instantly, then converted the 2K proxy to a 1080p ProResHQ file for ease of use in Final Cut Pro (including window burn for assurance during conform later). I dropped that into Final Cut and showed that playing, then went back to Red Alert and exported it as a DPX sequence, then conformed that simple shot from Final Cut into Color, and showed how much far you could push Red images around with a 10 bit log version of the audience shot.

After that, we did a Q&A, with Pol Turrents translating the techie for us between English and Spanish (with a bit of Catalan thrown in their too.).

Then we packed up and headed out to shoot 4K in Barcelona...but that's another story (forthcoming).

Labels: Red, Red Alert, Redcine, Sitges, Spain

Posted by: Mike Curtis / 10/25/2007 08:36:00 AM (3) comments links to this post

Detailed Notes from DoP Jendra Jarnagin's IFA Lighting Workshop in Spain

While I was at the IFA Conference the other week, I sat in on DoP Jendra Jarnagin's Hands On Lighting Workshop at the IFA Conference in Sitges, Spain. It was intended for a small group of relative beginners, so certain broad statements and shortcuts were used to keep things moving along.

Below are my raw notes, unedited, as I took them and added my own asides which might be wrong, so anything wrong is probably my fault (I'm a post guy not a shooter).

It was an enjoyable and highly educational day for me - it is always good to round out one's skillsets.

I took some pictures during the presentation, and then some of her big notepad notes, viewable here.

Big, BIG thanks to Service Vision for providing us with an F900R equipped with a rare 35mm adaptor, lights, stands, etc. - it wouldn't have been possible without them. We visited their facility and did extensive tests (including 35mm side by side with Red) while I was there the other week, that'll be another article next week probably. Also, thanks to Rosco for providing production gels and expendables, as well as sample gel kits for all students - very helpful and much appreciated.

-------------------

No camera recording today's talk, so I'll take notes. Jendra lighting seminar:

Sony F900R - handle dynamic range differently by having the highlights be a higher priority

Bad looking highlights are what make video look bad/not like film

-F900R has sophisticated and powerful controls, but the menus are complex and potentially confusing, so often need a DIT in order to get the best results out of it

-If doing a one day shoot like a commercial of music video etc., most DoPs will keep the camera in the default modes if they don't have the time and tech assist

-If you start mucking about in the menus and don't know what you're doing or forget and leave it tweaked for one scenario before you move on to a different one....BAD!

-If shooting outdoors in daylight of in other challenging situations, getting into the menus can really pay off

-Viewfinders are often black and white, and almost universally low res - therefore DoP doesn't want to be relying on that

DIT - digital imaging technician that knows all the techie nitty gritty of the menu systems to get best results

-Gaffer - in an interview setup if it is a simpler thing, there may not be an extra lighting person, sometimes you have a gaffer that you communicate with who will execute for you, on a big movie you'll have a whole crew of electricians, and the gaffer will manage that team to execute the DoP's intent

-Jendra started as a gaffer, was important for her to have an understanding of what your choices are and know what the lighting package should be, etc.

-Some DoPs light, others rely more heavily on their gaffer

- Different lights are different for different kinds of situations; some lights are more versatile for multiple situations

- The most common workhorse is a Fresnel - is a spotlight, come in different wattages, this is a 650 we're working with, have 300 and 1000-watts in same design

- The filament and the bulb is different between the U.S. and Europe

- Up to 20 amps in the US, up to 10 amps in Europe, you can run on house power - no generator needed, or tie into an electrical panel if you're working with lights of certain amperage. All the lights we have today we can plug into the wall. Fresnel designs can go up to 10 or 20 kilowatts, but those require a generator.

-Jendra can bring her lights from home, but has to buy lamps (bulbs) to use her gear in Europe.

- If you were traveling worldwide, you can use a travel transformer, but you have to pay attention to the watts.

- A 650-watts Fresnel in U.S. vs. Europe is still 650-watts, but the amperage is different based on the electricity.

- A lot of inexperienced folks will plug all of their lights into the same room and blow fuses and circuit breakers, and everyone gets mad at them as production stops for an hour and a half while it gets resolved.

- If you have an electrical outlet - you have to think about age of building and how modern the wiring is and how things are wired.

- Two outlets in the same room are likely on the same circuit - so not 10 amps per circuit, likely are all on same circuit

-MAYBE on opposite walls it is a different circuit.

- Older houses in the U.S. only have 15 amp circuits instead of 20 amps circuits.

- You can depend on 20 amp circuits out of kitchen outlets, since higher-powered devices are in there.

- Electrical code – You have to have two counter top outlets on different circuits - so if in a tight situation, run two lines to the kitchen.

- In the US, circuits are 15 or 20 amps.

- In an office or factory, circuits are 20 amps.

- If you want to be sure, see the electrical panel, it'll say on the circuit breakers 15 or 20.

- To play it safe if you can't get to the panel, presume 15 amp circuits.

- In 50Hz countries (instead of 60 Hz), then your circuits are 10 amps.

Hz is not that important to talk about, doesn't really vary - is a constant in the country, and it doesn't really affect our calculations of electricity. It DOES matter for transformers.

US 110 volts @ 60Hz 15 or 20 amp, Euro 50 Hz, 10 amps, 220 volt

- Plugging U.S. stuff into European stuff, will ruin it because the power is 220 not 110.

- Bulbs for a specialty movie grade is $60 to a few hundred dollars

BUT HMI bulbs are several hundred dollars; big ones are thousands of dollars.

-If you need to change a bulb, DO NOT TOUCH IT - your skin oil gets on it and can break the bulb

- Also unplug before changing bulbs.

- A 650-watt lamp is the same in the U.S. & Europe (but need different bulbs in different countries, U.S. bulb in Europe will kill it!)

- Amps=wattage divided by voltage.

- A mnemonic for that - watts=volts times amps (West VirginiA)

- I'd think A&W root beer

- For example, we're going to do easier math with a 1000-watt lamp

-1000-watt lamp, divided by 220 volts =4.55 amps

- In the US, 1000-watt divided by 120 volts = 8.3 amps

- For Europe, divide by 200 to keep it easy and add some safety factor, and in U.S. divide by 100 to make it easier & keep you in safe numbers as well.

- You can plug up to 10 amps worth of lights in one European plug, beyond which you risk popping a breaker or melting a fuse, and 15 or 20 in the US.

- Dimmer - plugs in between power and light.

- Dimmers only work on continuous sources.

-If a dimmer is at 100%, you've got max voltage. You can turn it down by giving it less voltage - the box still takes in the max voltage for your electrical considerations.

- A dimmer doesn't work on HMI or Kino Flo and won't come back on anytime soon - so DON'T DO THAT!

- In a big studio, some lights will be on dimmer boards and some won't. Best Boy is the secondary person on the electrical crew.

- Make SURE when plugging into a Kino Flo, you're on a NON-dimmer line in a big sound stage.

- With dimmers, as you dim, you're changing the color of the light, so for that reason, you don’t want to use a dimmer in many situations since it makes it warmer or cooler.

- Instead of dimming, use a scrim.

- A red one is a double scrim, cuts back one stop. A green one s a single scrim and that pulls you back a half a stop.

- A half scrim only covers a half circle, so it creates a gradation of cast light – can use it "lamp right half side double" - use the half one, covering only the right, and a double scrim to cut back one stop.

-Scrims do NOT adjust the color unlike the dimmer - that's the advantage.

- Every light that able to be scrimmed, should come with its own set of scrims, often there is a scrim bag that comes with the light.

- So at a moment's notice you don't have to go looking.

- You have to use them so much.

- Every light with your package will come with its own set of scrims.

- You might have 30 lights and only a few dimmers

- Portable dimmers - plugs into each lamp, this one only up to 10 amps, they have standalone dimmers for 10 or 20K big ones.

- A dimmer rack system for bigger shows with a dimmer console (dimmer board) for the dimmer pack (the box)

- The bigger your light, the more the dimmer gets noisy.

- Dimmers work through resistance for the smaller ones - it coils up resistance as you crank it up - so what happens is the resistance vibrates and hums and makes noise. The sound department can potentially hear it and complain. The bigger the light and the more resistance, the more hum.

- If shooting in an apartment and had a 10K on a dimmer, you'd have to have the dimmer outside the room.

- The hum is at 50 or 60 Hz, according to the European or U.S. power.

- This ARRI light is focus-able - it has a knob that softens or hardens the light edge.

- Protocol for focusing a light - start by putting it on full spot, aim it wherever you want it, then start flooding it from there

- A spotlight directly at a person is usually too harsh

- Light is most even when it is flooded

- When you flood, it goes wider, softer, and darker. Spotting it will make it narrower, softer, and brighter.

- You can tweak to adjust the exposure - spotting it in a little bit will tweak your brightness without having to scrim it.

- If you're flooded it'll usually look more naturalistic.

- Spot vs. flood is moving the light front/back between reflector and lens.

- Other lights have no lens on the front, they are open-faced lights. They are brighter because the lens on Fresnel uses up some of the light.

- If we wanted a bounce light off a wall to get soft light elsewhere, open faced lights are good for that to get maximum light output.

- Hardly ever would you light a person with an open faced light, maybe a building, from a distance.

- There is more light output per watt with an open faced light.

- The whole point of Fresnel is to be focusable

- An open faced 1K light casts a broader light source (wider angle light release, think 3D)

- Open face light is a point source only blocked by the body and barn doors

- Fresnel lens guides and diffuses the light

- Other kinds of spotlights used in theater, but are usable in studio, ellipsoidal, most popular are made by Source Four, those do not have Fresnel, and they have a little piece of glass.

TUNGSTEN VS HMI

Film and HD cameras are not as smart as our eyes and brain - our brain auto-white balances

- The definition of white light is that it has all the colors of the spectrum

- Our eyes are adapted to sunlight, and our eyes are more sensitive to blue lights

- Cameras are designed to work with the way our eyes work

- If our eyes see different kinds of light as white, we need a way to describe or quantify the differences between different kinds of white light

- Color temperature was the way defined to quantify different kinds of white light

- Black body radiator - heated up a filament, physically heated it up. At the point at which it glows, that is called degrees Kelvin.

- Plain old regular light bulbs use tungsten. 3200 degrees is the point at which it glows.

- Movie lights are 3200 degrees Kelvin. Household lights glow at about 2900 degrees

- Daylight changes throughout the day based on cloudy, sunny, and low vs. high in the air. Majority of the hours of the day when it is sunny is 5500 degrees. It ranges between 5000-6000 degrees Kelvin. Really late in the day when it looks really blue, it can be up to 8000-10000 degrees Kelvin.

- When we look at daylight, that is white. When we look at a light bulb, that is white too.

- So a 3200 K light looks yellow.

- So we shoot film that is optimized for the lighting environment we want to use

- Lower temps on the scale are more red, higher temps are bluer

- Fluorescent, which is green, is independent of this.

- You can get warm or cool light bulbs. Cool light bulbs are bluer to get more balanced for daylight. Warm ones are used to match internal lighting sources. Fluorescent color temperature varies wildly. And while there is some information on them, it may or may not tell you the color temperature. There are charts online to find out the color temperature of given brands and models of lights.

- During tech scout, you'll pull down some bulbs and write down what they are to find out what kind of bulbs they have

- Using filters on lights or tweaking camera, you can remove the green cast

- How new the bulbs are can also vary the color temperature

- You might even switch some lights around if an inconsistent bulb brand is used.

- If you had two different ones close to a wall, it might have bluer vs. oranger light on the wall - BAD. But a lot of different ones high up.... colors will probably all balance

- Fluorescent has to be matched too and you fix it in post.

- On the camera, however, when you white balance, you are telling the camera what you want it to consider white to be

- Video cameras are natively balanced to be 3200. Sophisticated cameras have a wheel with different filters of different strengths (working w/an F900R), she dials in 5600, and the camera should think that is normal with daylight from the window.

- There is a physical filter wheel to do this on big cameras

- Smaller cameras will have electronic white balance

- Unless shooting under fluorescent, she'll shoot default and then light to that

- In a fluorescent situation, she'll know she wants to white balance the camera

WHITE BALANCING

- With the physical filters, you got to pick one to start with. She picks the 3200 wheel on this F900R

- Take a white card or piece of paper; make sure that the lights you are balancing to is hitting it.

- More less fill the frame, camera will use middle 70 or 80%

- DO NOT overexpose! If your white card is overly lit, it'll error message.

- Needs to be well lit but not overexposed

- There’s a lever on the camera for white and black balancing.

- You hold the switch up; if we're over exposed, auto white balance will say error.

- In this case, 3.5K was the color temperature

- That will remove the green cast of the fluorescent lights

- You can do your white balance that is technically correct, but in this case she likes the present of 3.2K

- It is better to balance to stuff. In the making of paper, there's natural white, extra white, etc. - extra white has a bit of blue

- If you try to white balance to a t-shirt that has optical brightener in the detergent that reflects more ultra violet, that could throw off your white balance.

- Only one person - whether DIT, DoP, whoever the designated person is, is in charge of setting up the monitor.

- On a movie set, the DoP's monitor is in a black tent to block out ambient light that is either dimming the image or affecting your color perception (your eyes/brain auto white balances)

-CRTs have R/G/B guns, and you have phase & chroma & bright & contrast knobs.

In blue gun only mode you can calibrate (so need a monitor that HAS a blue gun only mode) using standard phase and chroma, bright and contrast controls. You CANNOT properly/easily calibrate a consumer monitor because they lack these controls.

- If you're set up right, you're good for the rest of the day.

- If you set your brightness, you only have to change it whenever the ambient lighting environment changes.

-Adjust until you can see the pluge bar, and then turn it down until it is just barely disappearing

- For instance, when we killed the fluorescents, the room is darker, so therefore the monitor needs to be readjusted

- LCD for monitoring - is sharp, but not good for color or shadow detail. CRT is better for color and brightness but not sharpness/detail. So for on set, where you aren't making super fine color decisions, LCD is more portable/practical. Computer displays don't have the professional controls (phase/chroma, wide brightness range adjustments, etc.) that a professional broadcast style unit would. Mike pointed out that the new Sony Luma series (the very newest, $3500 - $4000 ones) are some of the first, semi-affordable units for field production. I have, at home, a 23" 1920x1080 Apple LCD connected to a Multibridge, AND a 17" JV professional CRT- one for color, one for detail

- Daylight balanced light sources are HMI - (H is the atomic symbol for Mercury, since Mercury is used; M is for Medium arc, which is the blue part, and I is for Iodide.)

- An HMI works as an arc lamp.

- The lights we've been looking at are filaments - electricity flows through a filament, which gets hot and glows. Little of the power becomes light, most becomes heat

- Arc lamp works by creating an electrical arc across a gap in the bulb

- In the glass envelope is Mercury, and when it heats up, Mercury vaporizes and floats around in the tube. HMI's are bright

- A small HMI might be 125-watts and it'll kick out MORE light than a 650-watt Fresnel lens.

- MUCH more expensive and complicated and more pieces...but a smaller lamp

- They are balanced to be daylight color temperature, color temperature shifts over the life of the bulb.

- 5000-6000 degree color temperature

- As the bulb gets very old, it'll drop to 4300 or 4000. By the time it gets really old that you're putting so many blue gels on it that it is time to throw it away and get a new bulb.

- This is a 125-watt, 18K HMI's have an hourly usage meter for your bulb. When it gets to a certain age you change the bulb and reset the clock. Most don't pay attention to the clock, you can tell as compared to the other bulb that "eww that one's yellow". Since so expensive, as it begins to fade you start using blue gels to balance it out

- The way it works - the bulb with the arc gap in it is small. The power supply is called the ballast. The head cable goes from the light to the ballast

- "Pins to power" - the one with male ends sticking out of it goes to where the power is

- There’s a one way only connector with pins, then a locking collar

- Big lamps - if the big lights get turned off, it needs to cool down before you can turn it back on again. If you flip it off and back on it takes time. Big lights take a lot of cooling time. Unless you KNOW you're going away again, you leave it on.

If you're changing setups, it is time for a turnaround, and it is only 10-15 minutes between setups, you don't turn it off. If you know you're moving around, you equip it with a lot of extension cables from the get-go. For 18K's, you might put 100 feet of power between ballast and light (since ballast is so big and heavy), and that way you won't need to shut it down and be stuck waiting for it to cool before can be used again.

- In addition to being an HMI, it is also called a PAR. You can have tungsten or HMI PAR’s.

PAR means:
Parabolic (shape of reflector)
Aluminized
Reflector

- Two kinds of PAR’s - sealed beam and non-sealed beam

- Sealed beam is like a car headlight - it is all sealed in there. When you want to switch the bulb, you're changing out the whole thing, bulb and lenses.

- Non-sealed means the bulb and lens are separate

- PAR is more versatile than a Fresnel

- Her PAR kit, has a Fresnel, has a wide, medium, and narrow lenses to go on the front

- A spot for far away.

- When warming up an HMI, it warms up to brightness and color temperature, and changing as it goes

- Because of the arc (as in welding), there is a large component of ultraviolet radiation when you turn it on, especially when it first sparks and turns it on.

- YOU CAN DAMAGE YOUR EYES

- When turning on an arc lamp, do best to NOT point it at people

- "Striking!" is the term to use, so you declare that, which means everyone close your eyes and turn away. Say it LOUD, because with an 18K you can permanently damage someone eyes

- The glass has ultraviolet protection

- The plain glass has UV filtering in it

- If the UV filter isn't in place or it breaks, there is a safety sensor in place to protect you

- You’re always supposed to have a lens on it. If you point it unprotected at your arm, you can sunburn it

- HMI is efficient - more of the power goes to make light, not heat

- Building a Chimera - in a general sense - is called a light bank

- Chimera is a brand but is used as a generic

- Since so expensive, low budget uses tungsten lights, HMI's are expensive to rent

- The Chimera has different fronts, and you can put a baffle inside that diffuses and knocks the light down even further

- PAR’s come with a Chimera in the small kits, like 200 & 400 Arri, or Joker kits come with a Chimera.

- BUT a Fresnel does not usually come with a Chimera by default; you have to ask for it

- Benefit of having the diffusion further from the light source - the further the diffuser is, the softer the light can be - creates a larger non-directional light source for softer light, which looks better

- Chimera is also very contained with minimal spill, as opposed to hanging diffusion in front of a Fresnel.

- Without the Chimera we're harsh and contrasty, and spills all over the back walls as well

- In an interview lighting setup, you can shoot it with one light with Chimera - whereas without a Chimera, you might need other lights to fill in. Chimera is good.

-3 point lighting - key, fill, and backlight

- Key light is the perceived primary light

- Fill light should be diffuse and shouldn't be making additional sets of shadows

- Biggest enemy of DoP are noses - so where you put the lights has to do with the person's face and the shadows their noses cast

- The default/usual place for key light is about 45 degrees from where camera is, and a little higher than your subject. Shadow of nose falls down across the face and the nose

- Always look at the subject's face for light placement.

- Blocking with the scene is done with stand-ins – it is better if they resemble the actual subject.

- Keep in mind how your stand-in looks different from your main actor, and build that into your starting point. When the actor's come back, you might have to make some slight adjustments based on the face of the actor

- If stand-in for an actor has deep-set eyes and strong brow, which would dictate light placement to penetrate his eyes more

- Depending on mood of our story, it can alter the lighting. If going to talk about his childhood and it was bad, might want more dramatic/contrasty lighting. For something happier/emotionally nicer, bring in a fill light

- Fill light might be a bounce light or a Chimera

- Fill light should be less bright than the key light, if they are of even brightness than they look very flat.

- (With HMI's, dimmer doesn't affect color temperature as much as other types)

- Glasses - reflections can be an issue

- Is sometimes easier to make minor adjustments to actors (turn a little to the right) than move the lights around

- We have a daylight source on one side and a tungsten source on another - color mismatch. It’s an artistic choice. You use colors of light as an artistic choice.

- You can manipulate in post - film is easier to manipulate than video. The further you want to take it from original, the noisier it gets and worse it looks.

- If you're going to do strong choices like a strong yellow wash, you need to be confident it'll stick.

- The DoP may not be available in the color correction session, but locking it in on set protects the intent

- If you want to shoot for flexibility in post, you are safer shooting a neutral image

-CTB is Color Temperature Blue, CTO is Color Temperature Orange

- If want to make tungsten and make it look daylight, use a Full CTB

- There’s full, half, quarter, and eighth

- CTB is used to make tungsten (3200) look like daylight (5600)
- CTO is used to make daylight (5600) look like tungsten (3200)

- She’s got some quarter CTO - if she doubles it up, it is the same as CTO half, and quadruple it up it'll be the same as CTO full

- With full CTB, it knocks down 2/3 of the light - so a 300-watt light gives me 100-watts of output

- If use cheapie tungsten lights and I want to shoot next to a window, full CTB knocks the output down to practically useless

- A 2000-watt light that'll plug into a wall, with full CTB, you're only getting about a 650-watt light would give you. That isn't bright enough to compare to a window

- Shooting with someone in front of a window when you want to see stuff outside the window, on film you can do it with a few lights. With digital, do to lesser dynamic range, you'd need a truck full of lights and it would take longer.

- A polarizer is a filter that, when rotated correctly, can control the reflections/highlights.

- If we were shooting digital in this space, can get neutral density material to hang over the window - put a huge sheet of gel or hard acrylic to knock back the amount of light.

- And that would be EXPENSIVE

- SO WHAT DOES PARTIAL COLOR CORRECTION DO FOR YOU?

- It’s more of an artistic choice to use fractional CTB or CTO

- If full CTO turns 5500 into 3200 light, half CTB turns it into roughly 4350 Kelvin.

- The more dense the gel, the less light makes it through

- So more subtle changes can be made with quarter or half CTO

- Quarter CTO on tungsten lamps all the time to give it a table lamp look, for artistic/creative/mood reasons

KINO FLO:

Fluorescents in an office building have a predominant green cast to them.

- Fluorescent looks ugly on people - green - you rarely want that

- If you are shooting 25 fps in Europe, or 24fps in the U.S., because fluorescent isn't a continuous light source illuminated by alternating current electricity, you're OK - no flicker.

-If you change shutter angle, or shoot off-speed, anything different to exposure time, your camera can get out of phase with fluorescent lights

- Older HMI's without electronic ballast and have magnetic ballast can flicker when shooting off rate

-Kino Flos cycle at such a high rate, no flicker

- Also they are color balanced so aren't green – they are either tungsten balanced (yellow ends) or daylight balanced (blue ends)

-Kino Flo bulbs cost 20x more than regular consumer fluorescents

- There are green filters that come in fractional densities as well.

- You can put a Kino Flo bulb in a standard fixture to get the right color temperature, but you'll still have flicker, unless using a Kino Flo ballast

- The opposite of green is magenta, so you could put magenta (minus green gels) to correct the fluorescent lights. If you had flat diffuser panels can tape them to that

- If there's a ton of those, it is more practical to filter your own lights to match

- If shooting on the Metro - check the bulbs used (maybe Silvania cool white bulbs) and put them in the Kino Flo

- The green and the magenta is a different issue than the orange and blue

- But you'd have to adjust for daylight/tungsten as well

- Some lights can be driven off of battery - a 12-volt ballast is available for SMALL HMI's or Kino Flos.

-Once all of your lights are matched to one another, THEN you white balance your camera, which will remove the colorcast

- If you want maximum flexibility in post, shoot neutral and lower contrast
- If you want to get the maximum amount of "bend" or "paint" out of the camera for the strongest look with all that
- DoP's aren't in favor of that low contrast, neutral look because it is boring

Back to Kino Flo -

- Not heavy
- Not too big
- Doesn’t get hot
- Is soft
- Doesn't use much electricity
- She might diffuse it or color it, but for a fast setup, this gives a soft place to start
- The only issue potentially with Kino Flo is that the falloff is really extreme - because it is broad and soft and diffuse, as you move it back further from subject, the brightness on subject drops off quickly - has a quick falloff
- A spot doesn't do that

- Soft light goes everywhere and can be hard to control

- You usually put them on a c-stand not a regular light stand
- Like an HMI, they have a light (head), a head cable, and ballast
-"Light" applies to the whole system - head, light, ballast, but not any flags or other stuff like that

- Kino Flos come in 1, 2 or 4 bulb types, at 2 feet or 4 foot sizes
- And they are expensive
- They have really big ones with 8 or 10 or 2 meter blanket lights, etc.
- Popular because easy, fast, don't use much power, are soft, and don't get hot
- She has barn doors to adjust light on subject, but it can darken the subject too much as trying to limit light on the wall
- So now it is time to use a flag

FLAGGING

- The softer the light, the harder it is to flag
- With a spot light, can use the barn doors more independently than on a Kino Flo
- Since the barn doors of a Kino Flo do 2 things - reflect light towards subject, as well as possibly flagging - can't do both at the same time!

- The further from the light the flag is, the sharper the cut of the flag. If you want to have a soft edge (soft cut), be closer to light.
- If you want a hard cut, set flag further from light
- If want to only partially obscure, use a net
- Single net cuts a half a stop of light
- Double net cuts a full stop of light

OR you can use a silk

- Silk lets light through
- A silk diffuses, just doesn't cut
- A common problem - he's wearing a white shirt, his shirt is brighter than his face and draws your eye
- Put a silk in front of just the shirt with a silk flag
- If you just shine a spotlight on a person, it doesn't look real or natural
- Light doesn't hit things in real life in focusable circles of hot light
- In the U.S., a black one is a flag
- Also known as a solid
- A silk and nets are known as "Hollywoods" in Spain
- Silk is translucent and not opaque, it diffuses the light
- Using a flag with a soft light, you can't get the same level of flagging control, since it has a large emission source area - tougher to control
- A direct light through diffusion is tougher to flag

- C-stand or grip stand - used for holding flags (C short for century)
- There are all sorts of specialized clamps for certain uses
- When bouncing light off a wall...you have no control over the wall - can't tilt or move it
- For more control, use a bounce card and a C-stand and a clamp
- Arrange the weight such that if it tensions, it gets tighter not looser

Labels: IFA, Sitges, Spain

Posted by: Mike Curtis / 10/25/2007 08:00:00 AM (3) comments links to this post

Monday, October 22, 2007

Spain Footage Update

No new footage today - as I dig deeper into the way footage is handled and confer with my team, I'm learning things...things like mismatching previews in different applications (different from the usual gamma distinctions), the difference between settings for DI output and video preview, and the fact that prepping content in Red Alert is not something that I'd assign to a low level person - whilst in Spain, multiple knowledgeable people could reasonably disagree as to what optimal settings were.

So I'm taking longer, getting questions answered, and will post footage when I can get it exactly the way I want it.

-mike