Digital Video April 2013 by Виталий Яскевич

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April 2013

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vol. 21 | no. 4

04.2013

editor’s view

ediTorial editorial director Cristina Clapp cclapp@nbmedia.com managing editor Katie Makal kmakal@nbmedia.com tecHnical editor Jay Holben jayholben@gmail.com Web editor Sarv Taghavian, staghavian@nbmedia.com contributing editors Jay Ankeney, Chuck Gloman, David Heuring, John Merli, Carl Mrozek, Oliver Peters, Geoff Poister, Dick Reizner, Stefan Sargent, Jon Silberg, Ned Soltz, Jennifer Wolfe, Joy Zaccaria

adverTising east coast sales manager Susan Shores sshores@nbmedia.com 212. 378.0400 Ext. 528 West/central sales manager Jeff Victor jeffvictor@comcast.net 224. 436. 8044 europe sales director Graham Kirk g.kirk@audiomedia.com +44 1223 911224 digital video expo sales Contact your Digital Video representative classified ad sales Susan Shores sshores@nbmedia.com 212. 378. 0400 Ext. 528

arT & prodUcTion senior art director Nicole Cobban associate art director Walter Makarucha, Jr. production manager Davis White 703. 852. 4615 dwhite@nbmedia.com advertising coordinator Caroline Freeland cfreeland@nbmedia.com

circUlaTion group director, audience development Meg Estevez circulation manager Kwentin Keenan circulation customer service Michele Fonville

sUbscripTions

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dv.com | 04.2013

The Universe is expanding

s you know, I love to see how the role of video is expanding and evolving in our everyday lives. This could mean video as art—like the works from Greg Barth (see p. 30), Diana Thater (see p. 16) and the creative minds at KLIP Collective (see p. 34)—or it could mean video as science, like the videos being produced on the International Space Station (see dv.com/ space for some of my favorites). Gallery One at the Cleveland Museum of Art Video is also an imaginative—and, yes, occasionally whimsical—means of connecting and engaging people. For example, there was a lot of video at the Walker Art Center’s Internet Cat Video Festival (@CatVidFest) in Minneapolis last year. The event received such an enthusiastic response (it drew more visitors than any other event in the museum’s 86-year history) that show organizers are staging the event at the State Fair Grandstand this August. Another example: Secret Cinema (@secretcinema) is a location-based “immersive” screening series that combines media to offer audiences an unrepeatable experience. (For last summer’s screening of Prometheus, the Secret Cinema team constructed a spacecraft inside an abandoned warehouse that served as the screening room, played a custom soundtrack by Radiohead and projected graphics designed by visual effects house Framestore.) That said, I believe it’s video as education that has the most far-reaching potential. In January, the Cleveland Museum of Art (www.clevelandart.org) opened Gallery One, an interactive gallery that offers a 40-foot multi-touch “microtile” wall that displays images of more than 3,500 objects from the museum’s collection. Elsewhere in Gallery One are “lens” stations with multi-touch screens and interactive activities that allow visitors to create experiences and share them with others through social media. The museum also offers ArtLens, an iPad app that enriches the visitor’s experience. Using the app’s image recognition software, visitors can scan objects throughout the museum’s galleries to access up to nine hours of additional multimedia content, including audio tour segments, videos and additional contextual information. Editorial Director

Digital ViDeo magazine is now available for The iphone and ipad

Digital Video magazine, dv.com p: 310-429-8484 e: cclapp@nbmedia.com Twitter: @DigitalVideomag Pinterest: pinterest.com/digitalvideomag

to read Digital Video on your iphone or ipad, download our app at www.dv.com/app. this month’s iphone/ipad edition is free compliments of abelcine

04.2013 | vol. 21 | no. 4

contents

LOOK 26 30 34 38 40

Cross-Platform Creativity Syfy’s Defiance Integrates TV and Gaming Content Essays on Reality The Methods Behind Greg Barth’s Multimedia Madness “What’s He Building in There?” Realizing KLIP Collective’s Video Mapping Vision Scary Monsters Captured with Nikon DSLRs, “Broken Night” Conveys Tension and Terror The House I Live In Eugene Jarecki’s Documentary Moves from the Personal to the Political

LISTEN 46 48 50 52

The D May Be Silent, But Little Else Is The Rich and Kitsch Sound Design for Django Unchained Les Misérables The Audio Mastery in Mixing A “Live” Musical Feature True Story, True Sound Design Creating the Documentary-Style Audio for Argo Fantastic Voyage Imagining and Realizing the Sound for Life of Pi

LUST 54 60 64 66

2013 NAB Show: What’s the Next New Thing? Identifying and Analyzing Technology Trends Start Streaming NewTek’s TriCaster 40 Opens Up Opportunities Smartphone Shooting Tiffen’s Steadicam Smoothee Transforms Your iPhone or GoPro Toolkit Showcasing New Gear

feature 20 4K Future

LEARN 68 72 73 74 82

Black and White and RED All Over Early Experiments with RED’s EPIC-M Monochrome Tips to Clip Instant Expert: Sounds Good Advances in Field Audio Recording DV101: Making the Invisible Visible Understanding Infrared Filtration Production Diary: Stefan’s Giveaway A Tale of Two Cameras

Oblivion Captured with Sony’s F65 CineAlta Camera

Digital Video (ISSN 1541-0943) is published monthly by NewBay Media L.L.C. at 28 E 28th Street, 12th Floor, New York, NY, 10016. Telephone: 212-378-0400. Periodicals postage paid at New York, New York, and at additional mailing offices. U.S. subscription rate is $29.97 for one year; Mexico and Canada are $39.97 (including GST); foreign airmail is $79.97; back issues $7. Prepayment is required on all foreign subscriptions in U.S. funds drawn on a U.S. bank. All rates are one year only. Digital Video, Videography, Digital Content Producer, Millimeter, Digital Cinematography, Cinematographer, 2-pop, Reel Exchange and Creative Planet Network are trademarks of NewBay Media L.L.C. All material published in Digital Video is copyrighted © 2013 by NewBay Media L.L.C. All rights reserved. postmaster: Send address changes to Digital Video, Subscription Services, P.O. Box 221, Lowell, MA 01853. Return undeliverable Canadian addresses to Bleuchip International, P.O. Box 255542, London, ON N6C 6B2. Digital Video makes every effort to ensure the accuracy of all information published in the magazine; however, it assumes no responsibility for damages due to errors or omissions. Printed in the USA.

departments 3 8 80 81 81

Editor’s View Update Company Index Classifieds Advertiser Index

dv.com | 04.2013

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JON SILBERg

photos by joe lederer

Freddie Highmore as Norman Bates and Vera Farmiga as Norma Bates

Creating SuSpenSe and SurpriSe for a&e’S Bates Motel

&E’s Bates Motel is a re-imagining of the early life of Norman Bates, the knife-wielding villain of Alfred Hitchcock’s 1960 classic Psycho. In the series, we meet a teenage Norman (Freddie Highmore) and his young mother, Norma Louise Bates (Vera Farmiga), and explore the bizarre, insular world they share at the old motel. Cinematographer John Bartley, ASC, who shot the final half of the 10-episode first season (DP Tom

Yatsko left midway through to fulfill a previous commitment for HBO), explains that the visual tone of the show is deliberately designed to keep the audience guessing. Bartley says he shot many of the scenes using wide-angle lenses. “Body language is very important on Bates Motel,” he notes. “The scenes are not so much about tight closeups. We watch the actors from a little further away.” The action was covered by two

ARRI Alexa cameras recording ProRes 4444 with a Log C color profile to SxS cards to capture more information for use in the final grade. A Canon EOS C300 shuttled around for second unit work or for use as a third camera. “We used a lot of dollies,” Bartley adds, “and we got a lot of use out of a 50-foot Technocrane. It’s great following people up and down that long staircase.” Without wanting to give away spoilers, he notes, “The Technocrane is perfect if maybe we

need to follow a character cleaning blood off the stairs.”

online Read more about Bates Motel at www.dv.com/Apr2013

dv.com | 04.2013

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a GlimpSe inSiDe the poSt of Charles swan

t American Zoetrope, colorist and visual effects artist Ryan Bozajia used Blackmagic DaVinci Resolve Lite for the early conforming and initial color correction processes of Roman Coppola’s A Glimpse Inside the Mind of Charles Swan III. Footage was then sent to SPY for final color correction with DaVinci Resolve. Bozajian and Sin Cohen, American Zoetrope’s digital postproduction manager, worked with SPY head of technology Steve

Maggioncalda and senior colorist Chris Martin on system calibration to ensure a seamless transition to SPY for the final color grade. “We developed a great workflow where certain nodes meant certain things, so when the project was handed over to Chris, there was a system for him to interpret right away,” recalls Bozajian. “Resolve’s innate flexibility made the migration easy, and it was a huge advantage for the production.”

Surf Documentary SteaDieD with Sachtler

ilmmaker Kellen Keene recently documented surfer and surf photographer Chris Burkard at work, discussing photography and showing how he approaches his work. Keene shot “most of the project on a Canon EOS 5D Mark II and Nikon D800s. We also used the GoPro HERO3. We had multiple water housings and stabilization gear and various Canon L series lenses and Nikon glass. For support, my choice was Sachtler’s Ace M. “When you’re shooting action like surfing, it is critical to get every shot smooth and steady as you pan with your subject,” Keene continues. “You never know which shot is going to produce the exact moment you are trying to capture, so consistency and trust in your fluid head is key.” Keene’s completed project is available online: vimeo.com/55117394.

Exploring “Radical Openness” in TED Talks Video

edia artist Jason Silva is always looking for creative ways to communicate ideas related to technology, imagination and the human condition. Silva calls his “Radical Openness” video, produced for the TEDGlobal Conference, “an ode to the power of ideas to change the world.” To portray ideas connecting with other ideas and spawning even more, Silva used visuals from Shutterstock’s library of still and video footage. This resource, Silva recalls, “made the experience of ‘visualizing’ the ideas far superior than it would have been otherwise. My video is done in the rapid-fire pace at which I deliver my ideas. One of the challenges was to find imagery appropriate to visualize this stream-ofconsciousness download. Shutterstock proved invaluable. Using keyword searches, I was able to track down images to illustrate everything I was saying.”

online Extended versions of these articles are available at www.dv.com/Apr2013

dv.com | 04.2013

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Update

NEWs

Twitter Feed 4 @PeterAPeel Munch on tonight’s “SVU” for some reason says that surveillance footage looks like it was shot by Godard. 4 @somebadideas The least Stanley Kubrick thing you can do is to try to be Stanley Kubrick. 4 @MattDentler The first installment of Jane Campion’s new miniseries, “Top of the Lake,” is available to watch for free here: itun.es/i6JG37p 4 @oldfilmsflicker Enjoy a 10-minute study of Paul Thomas Anderson’s use of Steadicam and some of his best scenes — fb.me/1WpaU12dE 4 @FilmLinc Shane Carruth on the romantic side of “Upstream Color,” identity and personal narrative — ow.ly/iEk2F 4 @cobblehillis Just watched “Upstream Color.” [head explodes] [decomposed head expels blue liquid] Not enough characters here to discuss, but LOVED IT. 4 @BlackDogFilms Here it is... Floria Sigismondi’s video for @DavidBowieReal starring Tilda Swinton — bit.ly/Xye9E6 4 @TheAtlantic NASA releases stunning video of “Fiery Looping Rain on the Sun” — theatln.tc/Yfw6ay 4 @slashfilm “Much Ado About Nothing” Trailer: Joss Whedon Does William Shakespeare — goo.gl/O7KG5

online Digital Video’s Twitter feed is at twitter.com/ DigitalVideomag

Phantom stays oN CoursE With LitEpaNELs

major portion of director Todd Robinson’s submarine thriller Phantom was filmed in the confines of an actual Russian submarine. “While Todd and I spent a considerable amount of time establishing the look and feel that we wanted for Phantom,” explains cinematographer Byron Werner, “I have to credit gaffer Steve Lundgren with the innovative lighting approach. He built a lot of custom lights, but Litepanels bricks were the best and only movie

lights we could use in many parts of the sub.” “Whatever units we decided to use needed to provide versatility as well as concentrated output,” notes Lundgren. “Litepanels became one of the most obvious choices because of the amount of light they put out and their diversity. Also important was that we needed to be able to put lights in areas where standard rigging would not be possible. Litepanels made all this easy.”

NewTek Shoots the Piano Player

amaha’s 125th anniversary dealer concert, featuring a performance from Elton John, was streamed using NewTek’s TriCaster live production system to viewers throughout the world. Audiences viewing the event remotely were able to hear John’s piano performance as if he were in the room with them; as John played a Yamaha Disklavier piano on stage, his actual keystrokes were faithfully reproduced, via MIDI data delivered using the TriCaster, on remote Disklavier pianos in some 200 locations. Says Jeff Hawley, director, Consumer Experience Group of Yamaha Corp. of America, “The fact that I was using the exact same TriCaster for video switching projection screens at a Yamaha dealer meeting in the morning and live streaming Elton John around the world in the evening truly demonstrates the portability, reliability and flexibility of this magic little unit.”

Elton John performs on a Disklavier piano at Yamaha’s 125th anniversary concert.

dv.com | 04.2013

Update

NEWs

 

On the Creative Planet Network

4 Björk’s “Mutual Core”

Has a “MidnigHt MoMent”

MEthod studios aNd Kia MaKE “spacE BaBiEs”

ethod Studios collaborated with agency David&Goliath on “Space Babies,” a Kia commercial directed by Jake Scott of RSA. The spot centers on a boy posing the classic question “Where do babies come from?” Caught off guard, his father conjures up the wondrous tale of “Babylandia” in an attempt to answer his curious child. In order to visualize this mystical planet, the Method team developed CGI environments, rock-

et ships and a host of infant creatures including penguins, elephants, pandas, giraffes and hippos. Explains Method VFX producer Mike Wigart, “We needed to create something realistic while making sure it had a sense of something imagined.” Method VFX supervisor Andy Boyd adds, “From a VFX standpoint, it was all-encompassing: CG animals, vehicles, clothing, environmental elements, matte painting and compositing.”

Audio in the Arctic and Antarctic

4 Bat for lasHes’ “lilies” BlooMs

witH PuPPets and Polygons

or Frozen Planet, the BBC/ Discovery Channel documentary series, location sound recordist Chris Watson turned to Sound Devices’ 744T recorder and MixPre compact field mixer for portable audio recording. Watson configured his 744T with a Sound Field ST450, an ambisonic recording instrument. The 744T worked directly with the ST450, with Watson using all four-line inputs to record the signals in B format. The 744T has a B format decoder in the headphone amplifiers, which proved especially handy for Frozen Planet. Even though Watson was recording to this less-

As part of “Midnight Moment,” a presentation of the Times Square Advertising Coalition and Times Square Arts in association with the Streaming Museum’s Nordic Outbreak exhibition, Björk’s “Mutual Core” music video was shown just before midnight throughout March as part of a synchronized program on more than 15 of the largest digital signs in New York’s Times Square. “Mutual Core” was directed by Andrew Thomas Huang and shot by August Jakobsson.

Chris watson

common surround sound format, he was able to decode it and listen to a stereo approximation of his recordings. “The construction, portability and reliability of my Sound Devices gear were fantastic,” recalls Watson. “In fact, it was so cold that on several occasions I had to stop before my 744T did.”

Mixed media director and stop motion specialist Peter Sluszka of Hornet directed “Lilies,” Bat for Lashes’ imaginative video that features life-sized puppets, a flock of 2D spirits, miniature landscapes, morphing polygons and an animated version of singer Natasha Khan. Creating a universe in constant flux, Sluszka conjures pulsing cloud contraptions, lightning effects and numerous animated spectacles.

online Go online to read more and view additional images and video: www.dv.com/Apr2013

dv.com | 04.2013

Update

NeWs

Trending Online

(Links at www.dv.com/Apr2013)

3“Day for Night” Covers Walls With Clematis Video artist Diana Thater’s solo presentation at David Zwirner’s booth at the 2013 Armory Show, “Day for Night,” was projected on three video walls constructed of nine monitors each. Each of the video walls presented footage of purple clematis flowers shot by Thater on 16mm film using several camera techniques, including in-camera double exposures and day-for-night filters. One work was presented flat against the wall like a painting, while the other two, turned at 90-degree angles, “wrapped” around in the corners of the booth. The image, Diana Thater at The Armory Show, 2013, is courtesy David Zwirner, New York/London.

liNus saNDgreN Creates a Dark Work for JohN hillCoat Cinematographer Linus Sandgren loves to push boundaries. He did so recently for director John Hillcoat and musician Trent Reznor’s new band, How to Destroy Angels. For the video “Ice Age,” he mounted Soviet Union-era anamorphic lenses on ARRI Alexa cameras. “John Hillcoat really appreciates cinematography,” Sandgren says, “and he liked the idea of shooting with those very imperfect Lomo lenses that have their own unique characteristics.” Imagery was shot in anamorphic 2.35, with the full, squeezed image captured to SxS cards, then finished as a 2.35 image letterboxed inside a 16:9 HD picture.

Dell Helps soHo VFX siege tHe Castle

tony goss with ag-af100

Welcome to Happy Valley Recorded with AG-AF100

W D

ell media and entertainment solutions installed at Soho VFX streamlined the delivery of 214 visual effects shots for the Warner Bros. film Jack the Giant Slayer. The effects team created the film’s castle siege scene and enhanced action scenes with burning trees and intensive fire simulations, among other tasks. Dell’s contributions to Soho VFX’s technical toolkit included Precision T3500 workstations, PowerEdge blade servers and UltraSharp

U2410 monitors. To achieve the film’s data-intensive visual effects, Dell helped Soho VFX expand its render farm of PowerEdge M610 blade servers by 20 percent in less than 10 days. The studio also upgraded the Intel Xeon processors in its blade servers to better handle the film’s intense technical requirements. The upgrades enabled the company to decrease render times by approximately 55 percent.

riter, director and DP Tony Goss shot the feature Welcome to Happy Valley with Panasonic’s AG-AF100 large imager HD cinema camera. “The appeal of the AF100 is that it inherently delivers the shallow depth of field and wider field of view of a large imager, and it has sophisticated video controls,” Goss explains. “What’s more, it’s very easy to use—a real consideration for me as my background isn’t in cinematography.” Set on a horse farm in Middleburgh, NY, the feature was shot in 12 days. Goss says, “Shooting 96 pages in fewer than two weeks meant I didn’t have a lot of time for setups. I relied on the AF100 to make us quick and efficient.” Goss shot in 1080/24p and made liberal use of slow motion. “I shot off-speed of the horses coming out of the pasture,” he recalls. “The images are beautiful.”

dv.com | 04.2013

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Innovation Without Compromise

Update

nEWS

Q&A

Spotlight:

Tiffany Shlain Writer, Director and Co-Editor Connected

Joy ZACCARIA

ackling the effects of the breakneck speed of today’s world and the efficiency and ubiquity of the technology that connects us all, Connected is filmmaker Tiffany Shlain’s (@tiffanyshlain) eighth movie. The film explores the good, the bad and the potential of connectedness in the 21st century. Blending original animation, archival footage and home movies, the film is equal parts documentary and memoir. Its take-home message is summed up in the last line: “For centuries we have been declaring our independence. Perhaps it’s finally time to declare our interdependence.” What was the original concept? Tiffany Shlain: The film I thought I was going to make was a look at the history of connectedness and communication in humanity, from the Big Bang to the Industrial Revolution to literacy to where we are today and where I think we’re going. That was the way I originally intended it and how I raised money for the film. After two years of working on it, I sat and watched a rough cut of this movie about connectedness. And I had this sinking feeling. I was not emotionally connecting to the material. At that moment in my life I was going through a very intense period. My father had been diagnosed with brain cancer and given nine months to live. I also found out I was pregnant. I was thinking about life, death, connectedness and losing connection. I remember sitting in the editing room and thinking, How can I make a film about connectedness without exploring my own connectedness in the world? So I decided to interweave my own personal story to get to the core of connectedness. What was the process for editing and production? I love editing. To me, it’s all in the edit. Hitchcock used to say you make the movie three times: when you write it, when you shoot it and when you edit it. And I agree with that. I worked with another editor who did a great thing where she would watch rough cuts and film her face as she was watching it. She would send us video notes and written notes. It was very provocative. We got to see what she was experiencing, when she laughed or when she was emotionally engaged. I loved it and it was fascinating to get notes that way. What has happened since the movie’s release? Since we made the film, we put the ideas from Connected into action and are now experimenting with “cloud filmmaking,” a new way to make movies collaboratively. We [at Let It Ripple: Mobile Films for Global Change] made almost 500 short movies in the last year. The concept burst from Connected in recognizing all the potential there is for connectedness. We’re making movies with people from all over the world that we will never meet. Working from a grant, there’s no profit. It’s all about how we can make something together. dv

Stills from Connected

dv.com | 04.2013

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4K FUTURE Oblivion Captured with Sonyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s F65 CineAlta Camera By DAviD Heuring

photo by david james/universal pictures

Tom Cruise and Morgan Freeman

for the look he and Kosinski envisioned. On The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, which brought him his first Oscar nomination, he used the Thomson Grass Valley Viper FilmStream camera, along with 35mm film. On TRON: Legacy, he shot with a Sony CineAlta F35. For Life of Pi, he used a 3D rig made up of two ARRI Alexa cameras. This time around, Miranda chose the Sony CineAlta F65, a camera that captures images at 4K resolution on a chip that is roughly the size of a Super 35 format film frame. The filmmakers used RED EPICs for scenes that required a compact, nimble camera. “Joe liked the way the Sony camera looked on TRON,” says Miranda. “He was after the 4K resolution. In the end, I think the F65 did really well. In the right hands, the data can be handled amazingly well. Some of the post houses we took it to brought the most out of it. It’s clean and sharp. It’s a good camera.”

photo by david james/universal pictures

reshly minted Academy Award winner Claudio Miranda, ASC, followed up his stunning work on Ang Lee’s Life of Pi by re-teaming with director Joseph Kosinski, his collaborator on 2010’s TRON: Legacy. Their new creation is Oblivion, a sci-fi tale based on a graphic novel written by Kosinski that reportedly nods to science-fiction classics from the 1970s. The cast is led by Tom Cruise and includes Melissa Leo, Morgan Freeman, Olga Kurylenko and Zoë Bell. The plot line follows an ex-Marine who is stationed on an airborne town above the surface of Earth, which was nearly destroyed in an alien invasion some decades prior. He rescues a female stranger, and what he learns makes him question everything he knows about the society that employs him. As is his custom, Miranda performed extensive tests to determine the right camera and lenses

Tom Cruise as Jack Harper in Oblivion

dv.com | 04.2013

perfection evolved Sony OLED monitors have won top honors from TV Technology, Broadcast Engineering and the Hollywood Post Alliance.* And most recently—an Emmy Award.* Still you asked for even more. And we’re delivering. The improved OLED panels on our new A series BVM and PVM monitors now extend your viewing angle so color shift is a thing of the past. Our PVM models now include built-in vectorscope, improved waveform monitor and focus assist. Of course, all TRIMASTER EL™ models have the Sony image quality, build quality and reliability that is legend. Some things never change. Seeing is believing. Visit sony.com/oled to arrange an on-site demo. Screen image simulated. © 2013 Sony Electronics Inc. All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part without written permission is prohibited. Features and specifications are subject to change without notice. Sony, TRIMASTER, TRIMASTER EL, and the make.believe logo are trademarks of Sony. *Our TRIMASTER EL trophy case includes the STAR 2011 Award from TV Technology, NAB 2011 Pick Hit from Broadcast Engineering, the HPA Engineering Excellence Award for 2011 and a 2012 Engineering Emmy Award.

photo by david james/universal pictures

Left: Director Joseph Kosinski Above: Director of photography Claudio Miranda, ASC

Miranda eschews on-set color correction, preferring to tweak later, under ideal conditions, when the clock is not ticking on the set. “I like the film model,” he says. “I feel like people can get a little crazy on set. I just want to know that I got it, and move on. In some ways, I think digital can be

faster than exposing film. You’re doing it all from a screen point of view, from a single calibration point, which I like. More than one or two LUTs can get too complicated.” The camera was configured to capture 4K raw format. The aspect ratio was 2.35:1, extracted from

the F65’s 1.9:1 sensor. “There’s complete latitude to do whatever you want,” says Miranda. “We shot 4K because we imagined that there might be a 4K release, but there never was. But I think 4K is better for visual effects. We could always down-res. I’m of the mindset that 4K is too sharp anyway. Skyfall [shot on ARRI Alexa at roughly 2K] looks great. Why do you need more?” The production was mounted on locations and sets in New Orleans and Baton Rouge, La., and travelled to Iceland and Hawaii for bits and pieces. Some shots were staged in New York City and others in rural California. The budget was reportedly in the neighborhood of $140 million. Miranda points out that Kosinski brings an architectural background to his work as a director, and that this predilection results in some interesting filmic language, not to mention structures and sets. On Oblivion, one example was the Sky Tower, the lead character’s home base high above the Earth’s surface. “I thought it was the most stunning, beautiful set,” says Miranda. To shoot the extensive scenes that take place in the Sky Tower, Miranda passed on the usual blue or greenscreen backdrop, choosing instead to use projected moving-image backgrounds. He sent a crew to a Hawaii mountaintop to shoot 15K sky plates with drifting clouds. Back on the set, 20 projectors threw the moving images onto a 45-foot-tall surround screen that was 500 feet in circumference. The setup took ten technicians weeks to install and tune. The actors much preferred the more realistic

dv.com | 04.2013

photo by david james/universal pictures

environment, as did Miranda. “Tom came on the set and said, ‘I love being here,’” Miranda says. “Plus, it gave me tons of light, naturally. Normally, with bluescreen, you’d have to make all the surfaces of the set less shiny to avoid blue spill. Here, we could make all the textures exactly the way we wanted. All the skin reflections and refractions were present, so skin looks so much better and realistic. We thought initially that it would only work for long and medium shots, but we ended up doing wide shots all in-camera as well. It’s ironic—we went from projection to bluescreen years ago, and this was going back to projection. But it looks great. And in editorial, you’re editing in-camera shots instead of terrible looking precomposite bluescreen shots.” The camera’s ability to shoot at 800 ASA helped make the projectedbackground approach work. Miranda worked at a 1.4/2 split. “We actually needed work lights on our set—that’s how dark it was,” he says. “We had LED practicals running at 2 percent. Ten percent would have been like a flare.” The lenses were ARRI/Zeiss Master Primes. “The Leicas are amazing, and they’re probably the sharpest lenses out there,” he says. “But as an emotional thing, for a cinematic quality, maybe a little softness is good. The Master Primes have that little bit of softness.” Miranda is currently overseeing the final color timing on Oblivion. Looking back, he says, “I love Joe and his aesthetic, and when he comes up with a story, you just want to be part of it. Darren Gilford is the production designer, and the whole team does interesting work together.” Miranda is also shooting tests for a new Brad Bird (Mission: Impossible— Ghost Protocol, Ratatouille) project. The tests include a wide variety of formats including 15-perf and 8-perf 65mm film and a range of frame rates. “I don’t wave the flag for any particular camera,” Miranda continues. “I judge a camera by whether it fits the job at hand. Sometimes people are fans of a certain camera, and sometimes fans are a little blind. All these companies are doing a good job with their cameras. They do certain things well. But I liked what the F65 did on Oblivion.” dv

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dv.com | 04.2013

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DefianCe JoHN MerLI

Cross-Platform Creativity Syfy’s Defiance Integrates TV and Gaming Content

t was destined to happen sooner or later. In the case of NBCUniversal, it’s coming sooner—as its Syfy cable channel preps for the premiere this month of American television’s first series directly tethered to a video game. Defiance will debut April 15 in the television realm, following the April 1 online rollout of its companion video game, which is designed to enhance and interconnect the production’s near-future storylines. The two-hour cable premiere and subsequent one-hour Monday episodes center on the postapocalyptic town of Defiance—which, we learn ominously, has been built atop the ruins of what was once St. Louis. Humans continue to exist but now must try to live peacefully among seven newly arrived alien races. For the video game, the action shifts to the “new frontier” of the San Francisco Bay region, for reasons that are explained in the game’s early days. NBCU reportedly has invested tens of millions of dollars into this first cable/video game hybrid— encouraged by a major sponsor, Dodge, which plans to resurrect its Dodge Dart, along with a supercharged Dodge Challenger and other brands within the context of the co-production. So how might the artistic approach differ in the creation of a TV series and video game with co-dependent storylines and characters? “The simple answer is, not at all,” says Michael Nankin, director and supervising producer. “My job as a storyteller in [television] is to make sure a clear and emotional story is being told. And my job is to find the humanity in every scene. I suspect that’s why gamers will want to view the TV show—to experience the humanity of the characters. To see what they’re ‘really’ like. There are things the game can do very well that we couldn’t achieve on our television budget, such as large-scale battles. [Yet] what we can do on the TV set, which is difficult to achieve in the game, is create dramatic, subtle

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photos by ben mark holzberg/syfy

These children are Castithans, a striking race of humanoid aliens.

Stephanie Leonidas plays Irisa, a young alien raised by Nolan. Irisa is an Irathient.

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Michael Nankin, the seriesâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; supervising producer/director

photo by joe pugliese/syfy

Defiance stands on the remains of St. Louis. Despite the Pale Wars and a transformed landscape, the arch still stands. (L-R) Tony Curran as Datak Tarr, Jaime Murray as Stahma Tarr, Julie Benz as Amanda Rosewater, Mia Kirshner as Kenya Rosewater, Grant Bowler as Joshua Nolan, Stephanie Leonidas as Irisa Nyira, Graham Greene as Rafe McCawley

human behavior,” adds Nankin, who has worked on several successful TV series in recent years, including Monk. In the early stages there was a lot of discussion between the game and show creators to ensure continuity, Nankin says, to be sure they were correctly planning “crossover” elements—the designs, characters and events that appear in both game and show. “Once those were set up, my job as director on the [TV] set was the same as on any other drama. The show must be satisfying for those who have never seen the game, and vice versa,” Nankin adds. “One of the particular challenges of Defiance was dealing with the prosthetic makeup and contact lenses required for the various alien races. Actors and background players had to be cast weeks in advance—which rarely happens in episodic TV—so they could be custom-fitted. The greatest challenge was our short seven-day shooting schedule and low budget. We were constantly fighting for time and money. We had a rule that we would not try to do anything that we could not do well. We didn’t want to shoot anything that looked cheesy. “In episode two, a search-and-rescue team descends into the underground remains of St. Louis. This had to be created entirely with CGI, so the actors worked in an all-greenscreen environment. This requires a lot of vigilance for the

entire team. Everyone from camera operators to the cast has to remember we’re filming what’s not there,” says Nankin. “Our director of photography, Tom Burstyn, and I created a ‘photographic approach’ to Defiance. The show is shot 90 percent handheld, to reflect the gritty reality of a post-apocalyptic Earth. But in each episode we would select two or three scenes that we felt were emotionally critical or that depicted some dynamic plot turn and shoot them ‘static,’ with no camera movement, not even panning or tilting,” he explains. “We also used some cinema lenses made back in 1961 [Canon f/0.95 50mm], when lenses were ground by hand. They’re imperfect in a beautifully painterly way. We used them for very emotional close-ups and it was very effective.” Cinematographer Burstyn says his crew used two EPICs as their A- and B-cameras, as well as

a RED SCARLET-X permanently mounted on a Steadicam. They also deployed a Sony PMW-F3, recording to a Convergent Design Gemini 4:4:4 deck. “We carried a Nikon D5000, which we used in a wild handheld style—something you couldn’t do with the heavier cameras,” Burstyn says. “We also had three GoPro cameras to record stunts, for wild car mounts and such.” The video game version of Defiance that went on sale April 1 is playable on Sony PlayStation 3, Microsoft Xbox 360 and PC, says Rob Hill, the game’s senior producer. “It’s a high-action third-person shooter, so it creates a really social experience for gamers.” (Players will team up to fight the bad guy aliens together, instead of fighting among themselves.) “Early on, we knew the TV side would have a small number of very intimate characters in a very focused narrative, whereas on the game side we’d have lots of other characters and more stories. But we share several alien species between both [formats] and so we had to be careful to get the characters’ physical characteristics and personalities consistent,” Hill says. “The characters that the [TV series] wanted to use a lot we made sure we made quite ‘humanoid,’ so they could use actors” instead of CGI. Going online in early April, two weeks before the TV premiere, means the video game is introducing the two lead characters of the Syfy series. “It’s quite tricky to produce because we want to make sure the viewers/players don’t miss any key [elements] of the storylines if they either don’t play the game or watch the TV episodes,” Hill notes. After the original 13 episodes air on Syfy and the series goes on hiatus, Hill says, “That’s when we’ll have several months to really let the gamers affect what is likely to happen for the TV show’s second season.” At that point, he says, assuming the series is renewed, the video game will bridge the TV series’ first and second seasons. dv

Scenes from the video game component of Defiance, created jointly by Syfy and Trion Worlds

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Essays on REality

JAMES CARElESS

Essays on REality The Methods Behind Greg Barth’s Multimedia Madness

From Essays on Reality Episode V, “Virtual Un-Reality”

reg Barth’s Essays on Reality is social commentary in the form of six videos bundled into two chapters of three episode apiece. As social commentaries go, Barth’s are quick, cartoonish and hard not to watch again and again. “I like to express how I relate to reality and people based on what I see in the news,” Barth explains. “A story triggers a caricature in my mind, and I set off to express it in video. Although I do rely on greenscreen and stop motion, I never use CG in my videos, despite the fact that some of them can be mistaken as computer-generated productions.” When not making social commentary videos,

the Swiss-born Barth has been making a name for himself as a multidisciplinary artist and video director. He’s known for a spare, clean style that exploits bright colors and strong lines. His clients include Sony Music Entertainment, McDonalds, ESPN, Subway and the United Nations Geneva. Barth directed the well received Passion Pit music video “I’ll Be Alright” (featuring the visions of a bored art museum security guard tripping on drugs) and led the bold stop motion rebranding of 7TV in Russia. Barth’s passion for “real” effects comes from his study of 3D and Adobe After Effects while

training in Montreal. “I was really sick of working on computers, including time wasted waiting for rendering, when Ubisoft approached me to create an opening video for their annual meeting,” he says. (That video is a frenetic stop motion piece looking top-down at the ever-changing surfaces of office desks, with everything that happens on them.) “I ended up having a lot of fun working in real effects, so I decided to focus my energies in this area.” Practically speaking, the creation of Essays on Reality was comparatively low tech. “I shot everything using a Canon EOS 5D camera in a real set, using actors, greenscreen and stop motion,”

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Barth says. Sometimes he put himself on screen, as in “Virtual Un-Reality.” Other times, as in “Camcorder Girls Never Win,” he brought in outside help. The videos were all shot at Barth’s own Studio 402 and Nomad Nation, both located in Montreal. “I use [DZED Systems] Dragonframe stop motion software to put the videos together because its viewing function helps me ensure a smooth flow between frames,” says Barth. “Obviously I edit the final product on computer, using After Effects and Premiere. But as to the effects you see on screen? They’re all based in reality.” In some of Barth’s Essays on Reality, the visual effects are quite simple. In “Today Is A Good/Bad Day,” the TV set’s blackened interior has a conveyor belt concealed in it, giving Barth a quick and easy way to send bottles flying out of the screen. For the effect in “Camcorder Girls Never Win,” Barth shot one actor on one side of the set, then mirrored the image electronically to create a pair of

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“To have the glitch between the real and virtual world” in “Virtual Un-Reality,” Barth says, “we had to create the set twice. Once we shot the painted one, and then we covered the set entirely in paper.”

Examining Essays on Reality Greg Barth explains in a statement on his site, “Essays on Reality is an ongoing series of short video art installations influenced by the existentialist and surrealist movements, and inspired by sociopolitical and economic events from around the world.” The theme of Chapter 1 is American Idiot. It is separated into three essays: • Episode I, “American Airhead,” is a critique of American Ivy League education. In it, a headless football jacket-wearing male blows bubbles into a glass of red soda, causing red balloons to expand from the neckline of his jacket. • Episode II, “Today Is A Good/Bad Day,” focuses on the evolution of consumerism. A TV remote control-holding white hand rises out of a floor. When it activates an old analog TV set— the only other item in the frame—plastic bottles of various hues pour out of the TV screen. • Episode III, “The Spring in Bahrain,” is a visual interpretation of the brutal suppression of the Arab Spring uprising in Bahrain, which was centered in the country’s Pearl Square. In the video, a flower pot is watered, causing black and white hands to grow out of its soil, and a sign labeled “Pearls” burns nearby. The theme of Chapter 2 is Generation Y. It is also presented in a series of three essays: • Episode IV, “Camcorder Girls Never Win,” is a caricature of hardcore pornography. Two identical boxers face each other, each wearing the curled moustaches and pomaded hair characteristic of the late 1890s. As they take turns pummeling a dark pink punching bag mounted between them, the camera pulls out to reveal a wall painting of a woman’s spread legs—with the boxers apparently battering her anatomy in a pornographic contest. • Episode V, “Virtual Un-Reality,” is a visual interpretation of our relationship with social technology. A hooded figure, his face variously covered by fabric or masks made of geometric shapes, tries to get some work done at a desktop computer. At first he is interrupted by incoming messages and Error 404 pop-ups. Things get worse when reality flips from bold colors into wire-framed drawings, and his computer screen starts to bleed thick white ooze. For this unfortunate, the line between reality and cyberspace has become irrevocably blurred. • Episode VI, “Twelve Stars Minus One,” is a critique on the collapse of the European Union. The video shows eight shelves neatly stacked with same-sized paint cans evoking national flags. A shopping basket sits on the floor between them. Nothing happens until one can drops, then the shelves collapse and fall to the right side of the screen, suggesting the tenuous economic/social realities of that alliance.

“American Airhead”

“Today Is A Good/Bad Day”

“The Spring in Bahrain”

“Camcorder Girls Never Win”

“Virtual Un-Reality”

“Twelve Stars Minus One”

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boxers facing each other. The seamless alignment of the overlay, plus the precise timing of the punching bag hits, is a wonder due to the video’s apparent simplicity. “Virtual Un-Reality” was a tougher nut to crack. “We had to do the shoot in the ‘real world,’ where the computer monitor was black and the wall was orange, and then reshoot the entire scene with white coverings and black lines to resemble a wire-line drawing,” Barth explains. “The male character’s 3D geometric faces, which look like incomplete polygons in a CG rendering, were actually handmade paper masks that we had to switch out while watching for continuity.” As for the white ooze? That was white paint, poured behind a board covering the monitor that— like the entire set—was masked entirely in green. (This is the only time in Essays on Reality that Barth used greenscreen.) The alignment between

Barth’s critique in “Camcorder Girls Never Win” is the objectification of women.

Visit www.gregbarth.tv to watch Essays on Reality and Barth’s other video projects. Also visit http://cargocollective.com/essaysonreality/. the original set and the greenscreen overlays had to be perfect to allow for seamless A/B switching. Any variance in the height and focal length of the Canon 5D camera, and the physical effect would not have worked. Clearly, the devil is in the details when it comes to Greg Barth’s Essays on Reality videos. What looks simple on screen is the result of careful preparation, camera work and editing. Effects that would be easy to knock out of After Effects are all done lovingly by hand. For Barth, Essays on Reality is a chance to use video like a newspaper’s editorial cartoon, conveying his view on current events in a way that is fast, to the point and imaginative. His dream is to see these videos turned into 3D art installations that could be housed in a gallery someday. “I would love for people to be able to pick up the TV remote in a room set up to resemble ‘Today Is A Good/Bad Day,’ and have the bottles come out of the screen in real life,” Barth says. “This would really drive home the observations that I am trying to share through these videos.” In the meantime, Greg Barth will continue to express his life insights through stop motion video, whether in commissioned work or more Essays on Reality. “I love working in stop motion and real effects,” he concludes. “Reality doesn’t require rendering time.” dv

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Of “Twelve Stars Minus One,” Barth says, “Since the illusion is about reversing gravity, we had to create a set that would not shift when we flipped it vertically. To get the same exact light vertically and horizontally, we had to attach the lights to the box.”

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What’s he Building in there?

JAmEs CArELEss

“What’s he Building in there?” Realizing KLIP Collective’s Video Mapping Vision

A still from Ricardo Rivera/KLIP Collective’s “What’s He Building in There?” at the Sundance Film Festival’s New Frontier creative space. The anonymous man is battling a tongue in the middle of the photo.

he setting: A warehouse, formerly part of a lumberyard, L-shaped and clad in old metal sheeting. You are standing in the yard looking toward the building. The time: Night. The building exterior is illuminated, tempting you to peer inside. And suddenly you can: The façade eventually falls away, revealing an intent little man laboring in an antiquated control room on the building’s right

side. To his left, a conveyor belt whirrs along, transporting hay bale-sized chunks of meat to a dark, gaping pit. Look around and other video windows reveal further insights into the evil taking place within— an anonymous, industrial, bureaucratic evil that lulls the viewer with its mechanical monotony while it disturbs with bizarre imagery. Be careful going through the entrance! There are metallic

jaws chomping away next to the building’s door. Every so often something rises up out of the pit: a gigantic eyeball on a spinal cord-like appendage or a monstrously large rogue cow tongue. Lurching along like a zombie, the little man feverishly combats each apparition until it retreats. But his fate is inescapable: The machine devours him and he too becomes a bale of meat. Until he is resurrected and returned to his place on the line,

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“What’s He Building in There?” uses the building’s 150 feet of exterior wall space, exploiting the possibilities of video mapping via a playful multi-projector installation that combines live action, stop motion and CG animation to gruesome effect.

starting the process of tending the meat conveyor system all over again. Relax. You have not been deposited into a sequel to Eraserhead. This is the 15-minute multimedia installation that greeted visitors to the 2013 Sundance Film Festival’s New Frontier creative space. “What’s He Building in There?” was inspired by the haunting Tom Waits’ spoken-word song of the same name: “What’s he building in there / He’s hiding something from the rest of us / He’s all to himself / I think I know why.” The building that serves as the projection screen is the New Frontier lounge, and the video playing out is the brainchild of director/writer Ricardo Rivera and Philadelphia’s KLIP Collective. “What’s He Building in There?” uses the lounge’s 150 feet of exterior wall space, exploiting the astounding possibilities of video mapping via a playful multiprojector installation that combines live action,

stop motion and CG animation to gruesome effect. The dimensions and angles of the building were mapped in 3D space. This data was then

used to alter the dimensions and angles of the projected video. The result is a projected sequence that accommodates the size and shape of the building being used as a “screen.” Here, Rivera has created a seamless three-projector video playout that makes it seem to the observer that he is looking inside the building and seeing reality unfold. “I had this dark meaty vibe, with the meat cubes, the cow tongue and the giant eyeball, contrasting with the industrial/mechanical thing going down,” Rivera says. “It all played on the paranoid tone of the Tom Waits song, which really drove the narrative.” The idea of video mapping, which Rivera and KLIP Collective have pioneered, is to turn ordinary architectural spaces into 3D projection screens. By altering the video to work with the angles and depth of the projection surface, the distortions

Watch the “What’s He Building in There?” teaser: http://klip.tv/project/sundance-whats-he-building-there

dv.com | 04.2013

Rivera camouflaged the boundaries of each projector’s throw with a clever use of architectural features, making the overlay appear seamless.

associated with conventional 2D video projection onto 3D objects are eliminated. Taking the time to remove these artifacts makes the projected images more believable to the viewer: They appear to exist naturally in three-dimensional space. Rivera and KLIP have done similar video mapping projections for other clients, such as a 3D projection on the University of Texas office tower in Austin. In that installation, still photos projected onto the tower’s sides spin in Rubik’s Cube-like

layers, moving so freely and dimensionallyaccurately that the building itself appears to dissolve and reform before the viewer’s eyes. Ricardo Rivera is no stranger to Sundance. His video mapping technique was displayed on furniture in 2007, when festival organizers launched the New Frontier program. For 2013, Rivera was asked to vastly expand his scale by using the former lumberyard building as his canvas. The setting inspired him to write “a quirky parable” on the interrelation of man, machine, consumption, comedy and horror. The New Frontier video and stop motion images were produced at KLIP Collective’s Philadelphia studios. The live action footage was shot with a Canon EOS C300 camera. Actor John Luna played the anonymous little man. Ricardo Rivera and KLIP delivered a projection mapping installation for the University “The overall space of Texas. In that installation, still photos projected onto the tower’s sides spin in Rubik’s within the lounge was Cube-like layers, moving so freely and dimensionally-accurately that the building itself 150 feet, but we only appears to dissolve and reform before the viewer’s eyes. See the Austin installation online: http://klip.tv/project/gsdm-university-texas. had 35 feet available

in our greenscreen studio,” says Rivera. “So we created a greenscreened treadmill for the central character to walk on.” To determine how long the actor had to walk on the treadmill, “I had a mockup of the space on my computer and a scaled version of the man in stride, and I would measure how many paces it took to ‘walk’ from one part of the set to the next,” he says. “We then counted the paces on the treadmill to match.” Stop motion sequences were captured using a Canon EOS 5D Mark II DSLR and DZED Systems Dragonframe software. Rivera explains, “Dragonframe is a great application that controls the DSLR and allows for live onion-skinning and previews.” His team used Dragonframe to capture the cow tongue—“We had to insert five metal armatures into the tongue. It was mega-gross!”—the eyeball tentacle (which was later motion tracked using CGI), the meat cubes and the mechanical claw. The stop motion team consisted of Ricardo Rivera, Josh James, Thomas Roland, Luka Berlin Rivera and Steven Rivera. The video was composited and animated in Adobe After Effects and edited in Apple Final Cut Pro. This work was done at Monogram in Philadelphia. Masa Wakabayashi was head animator, with compositing/animation provided by Ryan Uzilevsky and Steven Rivera. Josh James

dv.com | 04.2013

directed the installation and handled sound design. The installation was set up at the New Frontier lounge building exterior in Park City, Utah. To cover the building, “we used three brand new, awesome Barco HD projectors that each blasted out 18,000 lumens,” says Rivera. Rivera camouflaged the boundaries of each projector’s throw with a clever use of architectural features, making the overlay appear seamless. Projectors one and two merged their images at the lounge’s right-angle corner on the left side of the structure, while the seam between projectors two and three coincided with a vertical drain pipe, Rivera explains. The video was sourced from a server using Modul8 playback software. Adobe After Effects handled the video mapping. Getting “What’s He Building in There?” up and running was not an easy task. “We spent three days on site before the festival, getting everything properly synched and working,” says Rivera. “I didn’t sleep for 72 hours straight.” But the effort paid off. The video attracted big crowds and won rave reviews … despite the anonymous horror of the little man’s recurring annihilation— digestion, really—and rebirth. Ricardo Rivera is pleased with the success of ‘What’s He Building in There?’ and looking ahead to his next video mapping project. “My goal is to create a video mapping project on a series of buildings within the same space, with different stories playing out at the same time,” Rivera says. “In this installation, you would walk from story to story. It would be a truly immersive experience!” dv

dv.com | 04.2013

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Broken night

JON SILBeRG

Scary MonSterS Captured with Nikon DSLRs, “Broken Night” Conveys Tension and Terror

irector Guillermo Arriaga and cinematographer Janusz Kaminski, ASC, collaborated to shoot a “beautiful horror movie” entirely with Nikon D800 DSLR cameras. Arriaga, screenwriter of Amores Perros, 21 Grams and Babel, wrote and directed “Broken Night,” a tense and unsettling short film. On an empty stretch of desert road after a car crash, a mother and her young daughter find that the accident is the least of their troubles. Completed over the course of two very long days, the shoot involved a total of nine of the DSLRs, which Arriaga delighted in placing in locations where a larger camera would have been difficult or impossible to mount. He says, “We could put cameras underneath the car or on the inside of the windshield. The size of the cameras offered a lot of freedom.” Images were recorded primarily to an external hard drive via the D800’s

Director Guillermo Arriaga

HDMI out. “We put cameras all over the car for the accident,” the director adds, “and we only lost two of them. When we did that, we didn’t want to record to another device, so we used the standard cards [and the 1080p setting with H.264 compression].” Though the D800 demonstrated the ability to capture robust imagery even at very high exposure indices, Kaminski still made use of an extensive lighting package, Arriaga recalls. “We had to work very quickly,” he explains, “so it was very important to have complete control over the lighting.” The director also notes that Kaminski wanted to get as much in-camera as possible, rather than significantly altering the piece in post. “He did extensive tests to see how the images drop off into black and how much we can bring them into the frame from complete darkness.” Arriaga adds that Kaminski factored the sensor’s low-light latitude into his lighting scheme. While “Broken Night” will play primarily on the small screen, Arriaga says he was very pleased with the way it looked projected onto large screens during the sound mix and the film’s Sundance premiere. “It really looked good,” he says. “There was nothing distracting about the image that would make people think, ‘That was shot with a DSLR.’” dv

dv.com | 04.2013

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look

THE HOUSE I LIVE IN

Jon SILBERG

The house I LIve In Eugene Jarecki’s Documentary Moves from the Personal to the Political

photo by samuel cullman

Maurice Haltiwanger, above, is currently serving 20 years for crack cocaine distribution.

ocumentary filmmaker Eugene Jarecki (Freakonomics, Why We Fight) explores issues in his films from a wide array of intersecting perspectives, often starting with very personal anecdotes and expanding to large questions of public policy. His latest feature, The House I Live In (this month on PBS’s Independent Lens), weaves multiple interviews, file footage and the filmmaker’s narration together to present an overall assessment of the decades-long project referred to by supporters as the “war on drugs.” The film, from executive producers Danny Glover, John Legend, Brad Pitt and Russell Simmons, comes at the topic from many angles, including

Jarecki’s own marginal connection to it by way of the level of comfort they felt with me and my team, a childhood nanny. But throughout, Jarecki makes but even more to the fact that we’re at a place in the case that the war is lost and that it’s only being the history of the drug war where everybody knows perpetuated by those who have a monetary interest it’s a disaster.” in an ever-swelling prison system. Jarecki and his crew of Sam Cullman The filmmaker interviews a wildly and Derek Hallquist (principal DPs diverse group of subjects, from whose work was supplemented by lawbreakers to law enforcers, each of many others) worked with Panasonic whom illustrates the failure of current P2 format cameras from the HPX policies. “So many of the people— series—the AG-HPX170 for more police, drug dealers—say things you intimate communications with dealers can’t believe they’re saying!” Jarecki or police officers in an unmarked car, marvels. “It was the same with judges Eugene Jarecki, director and the somewhat more robust (in size and wardens. I attribute some of that to of The House I Live In and image quality) AJ-HPX3000 for sit-

dv.com | 04.2013

photo by samuel cullman

Maurice Haltiwanger is escorted to a courtroom.

downs and wide vistas. The 3000 was the go-to camera “anytime nobody was going to be freaked out by the larger camera,” Jarecki explains. Jarecki likes to work with a small crew and the most minimal amount of equipment necessary to get the job done well. “Usually it’s a couple of camera people, a producer, someone who helps

with sound and dealing with the digital media, and then myself,” he elaborates. “Depending on the situation, we might have two or three people for lighting and grip. Other times we might work with much less if we have to be inconspicuous. “For lighting, we want to be able to use what fits in a few bags that we can take on airplanes,” he

adds. “We use a lot of LEDs now.” Much of the film also made use of some compact camera grip gear developed by cinematographer and frequent Jarecki collaborator Étienne Sauret. The shooter founded Myt Works, a New Yorkbased manufacturer specializing in streamlined camera accessories such as dollies and sliders, many of which are designed specifically for smaller cameras. “This was one of the first films that he tried his new line of tripods and dollies on.” Jarecki is fond of being able to include the occasional cinematic camera move frequently absent from this kind of film. “If it will make a difference in the feel or ambiance, I like it,” he says of elegant camera movement, “but never to a degree where the move becomes a fetish.” He attributes the candor he elicits from his subjects primarily to their conviction about the topic and his crew’s behavior and attitude more than the low-profile equipment. When the audience hears police officers freely admitting to illegal profiling, judges acknowledging that they’ve handed down harsher sentences than they believed were justified, or prison officials expressing frustration at the prison system they

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Videographer Kristen Jensen taKes on tanzania with the help of two new rigs

Videographer Kristen Jensen

In light of shrinking production budgets, it is common to hear of three- or even two-man crews, but lifestyle photographer and videographer Kristen Jensen recently took to Africa to shoot a short documentary for Build Tanzanian Family Futures, a non-profit organization that supports the illiterate and poor families and children of Northern Tanzania. She had no crew. It was just her, a Canon EOS 7D, some equipment, and a couple of new rigs, which she had the opportunity to test during her two-week shoot.

The Ready Rig Challenge Because she had to interview people while also shooting, it was critical that she be self-sufficient, so she chose to bring along the Ready Rig, an upper body mounted camera support system to help her handle it all. “The great thing about the Ready Rig is that you can shoot with the camera, lighting, sound and monitor on one rig. You are pretty much a one-man show. You can be the cameraman, the producer, the gaffer, the lighting guy, sound guy and assistant all at once.” Jensen shot with the Ready Rig for the first five days of the trip. On it, she mounted the following: • Canon EOS 7D • 24-70 f/2.8 lens • Lilliput 5” monitor

• Ledgo LED light (color temperature 3,200° K - 7,500° K) • Zoom Handy Recorder H4n • Audio-Technica lavalier mic “I shot all day long and did not get tired because the way the Ready Rig is designed, the weight is evenly distributed, and its unique vest design makes it very comfortable to use. “The Ready Rig also provides so much flexibility, range and freedom in the field. I can lock focus, look at the person I’m interviewing, and actually have an engaging conversation, which you typically cannot do without having the help of a crew. But with the Ready Rig, I can adjust my lighting while I’m talking. I can even experiment with different angles. All in all, it gave me much more confidence in being able to shoot all by myself.” That said, when it came to trekking and flying from village to village all across Tanzania, the Ready Rig was much too cumbersome for the task.

ShooTing wiTh The dougmon

visiting different tribes because she said that it was unobtrusive and much less intimidating than the Ready Rig. According to Jensen, most people in Tanzania, especially in the remote villages, are not comfortable with people filming them, but the Dougmon was so inconspicuous, they didn’t think much of it. “The Dougmon is far and away one of the best handheld support rigs I’ve ever tried. It really felt like an extension of my own hand.” The Dougmon is designed to support up to 7 lb. in weight, so Jensen used the following equipment with the Dougmon: • Canon EOS7D • 24-70 f/2.8 lens • Zoom Handy Recorder H4n • Audio-Technica lavalier mic • Slingmon The Slingmon is a support sling that allows for two-handed operation of the camera, for use with slightly heavier cameras. “When used with the Slingmon, I was also able to set the Dougmon up as a monopod, rest it in the sling, and go from shooting video straight to stills. It was extremely versatile in the field and allowed me to do much more than I thought I would be able to with such a small rig. I would definitely recommend the Dougmon for shooting news, documentaries, weddings and other events that require guerilla-style shooting.”

For the second half of the trip, Jensen was travelling seven hours a day for seven days, so she wasn’t able to bring all of her equipment, but she did bring the new Dougmon handheld rig. “What I loved about the Dougmon is that it is so compact, quick and easy that I can have it on my lap, jump out of a plane and start using it right away. It’s very intuitive based on how your hand actually works. It has a support bar that goes along the inside of your arm. You grip the handle, and with a slight turn of the wrists, I can make it turn left, right, and even do circular motions. Plus, the Dougmon has a quick release button so you can get out of it quickly if needed, which is ideal when you are moving from location to location.” Jensen preferred using the Dougmon while traveling Kristen Jensen shooting an interview with the ready rig from village to village and

dv.com | 04.2013

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Dougmon Rig ShootS foR function & flexibility Cameraman/Inventor Doug monroe Calls It HIs swIss utIlIty KnIfe of HanDHelD rIgs The Dougmon is the brainchild of 30-year veteran cameraman Doug Monroe, who specializes in documentary and reality television shooting and is the current DP on the TLC show Sister Wives. After ten years of research development and a string of prototypes, he developed a rig for small video cameras and DSLRs that actually mimics how the hand, wrist and arm work together so operators can have the flexibility and support they need to easily produce smooth and steady shots, while also reducing hand and arm fatigue. The camera sits on a patented adjustable friction ball head system that, when held in the center of the palm, imitates the movement of the wrist, so users can twist slightly to the right or left or up or down. The arm of the Dougmon adjusts to fit the length of the user’s arm, and

a padded cuff with adjustable straps secures it in place. “I like to call the Dougmon the Swiss utility knife of handheld camera support systems because it is simple yet functional,” says Monroe. “The Dougmon allows the camera to go wherever the user’s hand or arm goes, so there is a higher range of motion. Users can shoot high, low, over the shoulder, or even use it as a monopod.” Used with the Slingmon, a support sling Monroe designed for the Dougmon, users can set up the rig into monopod mode and then use both hands to operate the camera. The Dougmon weighs 28.5 oz., supports cameras up to 7 lb. and comes with a Manfrotto 577 style quick release head. Street price for the Dougmon is $530, while the Slingmon, which is sold separately, costs around $200.

Inventor/Cameraman Doug monroe with the Dougmon

fatheR & Son cinematogRapheRS builD ReaDy Rig togetheR

from Bungee CorDs anD Car seat Belts to an upper BoDy Camera support system alessandro Di leo with the ready rig he and his father developed

dv.com | 04.2013

Veteran cinematographer and director Mario Di Leo, whose credits include shows such as Miami Vice, Baywatch and The Untouchables, came up with the idea for an upper body mounted camera support rig trying to shoot on a boat. His shoulder rig could not capture the handheld shots he envisioned, so he made a rig out of a car seat belt, bungee cords and pieces of aluminum. Not only did it work, but his son, Alessandro, also a filmmaker, eventually decided to further develop his father’s idea and take it to the next level. Together they created what is now known as the Ready Rig. The Ready Rig is composed of two adjustable sliding rods attached to a spring-loaded back support, a camera mount with an almost 180° tilt head and hand grips, monitor and accessory mounts, and an adjustable corset that distributes all of the camera’s weight evenly over the user’s upper body. It balances and completely eliminates camera weight, while offering users

total hands-free operation of the camera. It allows users to quickly adjust a camera’s positioning, while still ensuring smooth and stable footage. Users can switch angles instantaneously, push out or pull in, drop low, shoot high, pan from left to right, tilt and rotate, and even pull focus and zoom simultaneously, while the camera stays centered and balanced. The Ready Rig can support up to 17 lb. and is designed for use with both HDV and DSLR cameras. It is made of high strength aluminum, weighs 10 lb. and can be assembled in less than two minutes. All Ready Rig products and parts come with for more information about a one-year the Dougmon and/or the ready rig, please contact: w a r r a n t y. International supplies Street price (800) 999-1984 is $1,999.99. www.internationalsupplies.com

ContaCt

photo by derek hallquist photo by derek hallquist photo by samuel cullman

Two police officers in New Mexico

Kevin Ott is currently serving life without parole on drug charges at the Lexington Correctional Center in Lexington, Oklahoma.

work for, the openness, he says, comes naturally from the subject being discussed. “All shoots have challenges, whether you’re interviewing a drug dealer or shooting in a prison,” he notes. “To me, the headline was how much access we had and how welcome we were made to feel. Prison personnel offered to help carry our equipment. Cops rearranged their schedules and stayed late so we could shoot longer. Federal judges worked hard to help us gain access to federal facilities. Up and down the line we found caring people doing what they could to get more information out about this misguided war.” Jarecki has worked with the same crew members for many years. He believes that the team’s attitude and work ethic contribute to elicit the frankness he gets from his subjects. “I think if they thought we were going to proceed sensationally, we wouldn’t have gotten the same kind of chemistry,” he explains. “We’re all ‘people’ people. It’s a unifying quality of everyone on my team. That puts the people we’re speaking to at ease. A hectic crew generates a hectic environment, and that can make an interview subject feel like a deer in the headlights. If you work with a calm crew, they’ll be more calm too.” Jarecki and editor Paul Frost began cutting The House I Live In in 2008, while shooting was underway. “We shoot and edit in concurrence,” the director explains. “That gives us a greater amount of shooting at the front end, but we continue to shoot throughout to give the piece added development and fleshing-out and nuance.” The editing process continued in 2009 through to 2011, after the bulk of shooting was over. Jarecki and editor Christopher St. John (a producer on this film) would work together in parallel with Frost. All were working on Avid Media Composer. Jarecki believes that films of the type he directs will generally reap enormous benefits from the input of more than one editor. “We would work for a while and then Skype each other to show the scenes we’d cut and discuss them,” he explains. “I think that the film gets much greater mileage in terms of its arguments when you work this way. If you’re trying to grapple with complex public policy matters and also capture all the emotion involved, you really want that constant feedback and discussion. “There are a lot of issues and a lot of stories in The House I Live In,” he adds. “It takes a lot of backand-forth discussion about every sequence when you’re trying to arrive at a clear-eyed and passionate look at a topic so broad as the ‘war on drugs.’” dv

dv.com | 04.2013

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The D May Be SilenT, BuT liTTle elSe iS The Rich and Kitsch Sound Design for Django Unchained photo by andrew cooper

Set in the South two years before the Civil War, Django Unchained stars Jamie Foxx as Django, a slave whose brutal history with his former owners leads to an encounter with German-born bounty hunter Dr. King Schultz (Christoph Waltz).

uentin Tarantino’s relentlessly brutal and frequently hilarious slave rescue and revenge saga, Django Unchained, definitely has a soundtrack unlike any other film. Yes, the fact that it’s Tarantino explains a lot, but more important is that the film has roots in a very stylized genre—the Italian spaghetti Westerns of the ’60s and ’70s, with their broad characters, at times cartoonish dubbed sound, overblown musical interludes and copious blood. Leave it to Tarantino to turn all those elements up to 11 and

have the kitsch supported by a brilliant, Oscarwinning screenplay. Wylie Stateman, a six-time Academy Award nominee who has worked on all of Tarantino’s films since Kill Bill: Vol. 1, notes, “With a filmmaker like Quentin, the goal is to make every scene stand out. They are all his children and every one of them needs great attention to detail. Rather than approach this film with specific individual needs [for each scene], we decided to have a very cohesive collective view of the film, and that was

to create something that felt as if its genre was part of something that would have been born out of the spaghetti Westerns of the 1960s, but presented in a sort of hyper-exaggerated form so it’s clearly a Quentin Tarantino film.” The “hyper-exaggeration” is both visual and aural. Never has a film with such mainstream success been quite this relentlessly bloody. But sonically, too, it often seems as though every action, no matter how small, is clearly audible. For instance, in the scene in which we first encounter

dv.com | 04.2013

photo by andrew cooper

Django and infamous plantation owner Calvin Candie (Leonardo DiCaprio)

the calm but cruel Mr. Candie (Leonardo DiCaprio), we hear the paper burning on each drag of his cigarette, each drip from the bottom of a champagne bottle as it’s carried across the floor, every nuance of a glass being filled with beer, and so on. “What it does to the soundtrack is it creates a hyper-enhancement of the visual image, and it also pulls the audience’s focus into it at a very granular level,” Stateman says. “The detail is very satisfying to your mind because as you’re listening to dialogue, this extra-enhanced detail blends wonderfully with the production track. It puts a magnifying glass on the soundtrack and it allows us to get a little bit of a three-dimensional pop from the visual.” Stateman has high praise for production sound mixer Mark Ulano’s work on the set, but he also notes, “The job of the sound designer is to embellish that and then make it feel right. “Hyper-detail is not about finding the sound,” he continues, “but creating a feeling and creating something for your ear that’s more often than not the combination of many elements. For example, simply pouring a glass of beer or a glass of wine

dv.com | 04.2013

becomes the sound of the liquid, the glugging of the bottle, the twinkle of the crystal, followed by the extraordinary sip performance by the actor.” Meanwhile a savage “Mandingo fight” between two slaves is occurring in one part of the room for Mr. Candie’s amusement. “That’s largely offstage and used to punctuate the intensity and the horror of Leonardo’s character. He’s totally casual about this thing that’s happening right there, so we use sound to punctuate the cuts and give it an emotional horror that’s very violent and physical and percussive.”

Sound editor Wylie Stateman

Stateman, who did his sound design work at Soundelux in Hollywood, says he didn’t do any original gun recording for the film. “Guns are something that’s been pretty well explored by myself and my colleagues, but the environmental sounds associated with it are wrapped around the gun recordings, and that’s what we were concentrating on. Quentin wanted the film to feel very analog, so instead of using echo plug-ins, we recorded echoes and various environments and then worked that material around very detailed recordings. “We recorded impulse responses in Monument Valley and Zion [National Park] and Death Valley. These impulse responses sometimes were used as an Altiverb impulse response, and sometimes we modeled the echoes themselves and made them tails—created them as tails for sound design elements like the crack of the whip. Even for vocals, somebody screams or somebody gets shot, you would create a tail for their vocals out of these interesting acoustical elements. [Sound designer] Harry Cohen worked all the gunshots that [effects editor] Dror Mohar and I recorded.” dv

LISTEN

LES MISÉRABLES MUSIC PRODUCTION • LIVE SOUND • SOUND FOR PICTURE

BLAIR JACkSON

Les MisérabLes The Audio Mastery in Mixing A “Live” Musical Feature

Russell Crowe as Javert

irector Tom Hooper came up with an audacious idea for the film version of the smash hit musical Les Misérables. “In my first meeting with Tom, he said, ‘I don’t think we can make this movie unless we record the actors singing live,’” recounts production sound mixer Simon Hayes. “He made it very clear that he wanted the movie sung completely through from start to finish because he felt it would be very difficult for the audience to connect with mimed performances for two and a half hours. “Not only did he want the cast to sing live, he didn’t want them tied to a pre-recorded music track,” Hayes continues. “He wanted the actors to be able to take pauses, to reflect on certain emotions within their performances, to basically set their tempo with

Madame Thénardier (Helena Bonham Carter) rules her inn in Les Misérables

their own thought processes as they were acting rather than having the tempo set by a pre-recorded music track. So we had two fantastically experienced Les Mis musicians sitting in a soundproof box off the set, playing a Yamaha electric piano, and we piped that into the actors’ earwigs so the piano wouldn’t pollute the live singing that we were recording. We gave the piano players a monitor of each camera— we generally shot with three: tight, mid and wide— and Tom expressed to the piano players that he didn’t want them to ever lead the actors; he wanted the actors’ performances to lead them. Then, later, the piano was replaced with orchestrations that were based around the vocal performances. The challenge for me was, first, recording clean live singing, and second, making sure the actors could

always hear the piano in their earwigs.” Those in-ear monitors were artfully painted out by the visual effects department in post, as were visible lavalier radio mics. (Hayes chose DPA 4071s “because their frequency response and the SPLs they can handle are very well suited to singing.”) In addition to an abundance of radio mics, Hayes and his crew used up to three booms— two Schoeps SuperCMIT shotguns to capture the solo performances as closely as possible, and a Neumann RSM 191 for “width and texture on the chorus numbers”—recorded to two Zaxcom Deva recorders routed through a pair of Audio Developments AD 149 12-channel mixers. Music and dialogue mixer Andy Nelson—an 18-time Oscar nominee and a winner for this film

dv.com | 04.2013

photo by abc/rick rowell

and Saving Private Ryan—concedes that Hayes “was really the star on Les Mis for the recording; it’s the live singing that really carries the film. I did Les Mis right after Lincoln and used the same process: Let me go through every single microphone and clean it up and present it to the screen exactly how I want it to sound, and then add the music. “The real task, after I’d done all that, was the music levels—because you’ve got a long film where the music is constant along with the singing. I actually did a couple of passes of the film with Tom, [producer] Cameron Mackintosh and [composer] Claude-Michel Schönberg all in the room with me. [The film was mixed at Halo Studios in London.] We’d go through and try different approaches— you had to let this thing play for half an hour or an hour to really get the effect of how it was working with the orchestrations. ‘How strong does it need to be around the vocals here?’ If the music was too strong, you’d overpower the singers, but the point was that the actors were so dominating in the way they performed and the way they were filmed. You always wanted to feel that everyone was supporting them and not trying to overtake them. So it took a little while to sort that out and

Sound mixers Simon Hayes, Mark Paterson and Andy Nelson (L-R) received the Academy Award for Sound Mixing for their work on Les Misérables.

really settle on the way the language of it and the performances would tell the story.” Effects mixer Mark Paterson and supervising sound editor Lee Walpole “prepared the effects and Foley so they were fully covered as if we were doing a regular movie,” Nelson says. Then it was just a question of deciding how much of that to

apply to the final. “I felt, ‘As long as we’re going for live singing, let’s create the atmosphere around them, because it makes it more like a movie in that sense.’ The danger, of course, is there’s a point you can’t go beyond, because then you start to intrude too much on the singing. But I think we found the happy medium and it all works together well.” dv

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LISTEN

Argo MUSIC PRODUCTION • LIVE SOUND • SOUND FOR PICTURE

BLAIR JAckSOn

True STory, True Sound deSign Creating the Documentary-Style Audio for Argo

photo by keith bernstein

Ben Affleck as Tony Mendez in Argo

rgo, director Ben Affleck’s gripping and occasionally funny film about a secret attempt to extricate a handful of Americans trapped in Iran during that country’s 1979 Islamic Revolution and the famous hostage crisis that it precipitated, required sound designers Erik Aadahl and Ethan Van der Ryn to go for a gritty, realistic, at times almost documentary approach to portraying real events in what is at heart a Hollywood action movie. “Sound is such an important player in this movie, and a lot of that encouragement and support came from Ben,” comments Aadahl. “For the entire opening of the film, where we’re at the protests outside the U.S. Embassy in Tehran and as the embassy gets taken over, he wanted the sound to play the reality of all of that as much as possible.

He elected not to use music there. Alexandre Desplat’s score—which is amazing—comes in after the embassy gets taken over, and I think it’s so powerful because of that interplay: We play the reality of it, and then through the music we go into the internal emotional context of what has just happened. “On a script level, reading that opening, we’re out on the streets with all these thousands of protesters chanting ‘Margbar Amreeka!—‘Death to America!’ or ‘Down with America!’—and then we’re cutting inside the U.S. Embassy through the windows as [embassy workers] are listening [to the protest], and sound is such a great tool for describing the geography of those spaces. So for me that was the central sound design challenge— making those crowds sound really real. We got

some great stuff from production in Istanbul [where exteriors were shot], from Jose Antonio Garcia, an incredible production mixer. “But we found we needed some more material to really sell the scale and some of the specificity of it, so Warner Bros. put together 100 Farsi-speaking extras and we got them on the [WB] backlot. It turns out Los Angeles has the largest Persian community outside of Iran, so we had this amazing talent pool. We set up all these microphones—in and around the crowd, up on the rooftops, behind windows, behind doors, down alleys, inside cars—so we could get the real angles and not do too much post trickery to make it feel real. We knew we would be cutting from behind these bulletproof windows to out in the crowd and all that, so we tried to do things that would match those cuts in the picture.”

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photo by keith bernstein

(From left) Rory Cochrane as Lee Schatz (in vest), Christopher Denham as Mark Lijek, Clea DuVall as Cora Lijek, Tate Donovan as Bob Anders (holding script) and Ben Affleck as Tony Mendez

Equipped with a few Sound Devices recorders and various mics, Aadahl and Van der Ryn led the Farsi group in various chants. “I wanted to get this vocal stuff out on the streets, not on an ADR stage, with real air, acoustics and dimension. At one point we had a small group of 10 on the backlot and they were doing these yells, and as we were going they were getting better and better because their voices were starting to fail and you could hear them pushing it more. There was a desperate feeling that was starting to ripen. It got to the point that security actually came out—people in adjoining offices

apparently thought there was a real demonstration happening. I took that as a compliment that we were getting the right kind of energy. “For the bigger crowd things, we used many Sound Devices with different types of microphones and different types of spreads. Physically, I like to be in the center position and kind of directing the crowd because I can listen as I’m going.” Because verisimilitude was so important, Aadahl notes, “We also recorded 25 different ’70sera vehicles—old Mercedes 220s, Peugeots, this whole fleet of ’70s international vehicles, most of

Argo sound editors Ethan Van der Ryn and Erik Aadahl

them diesel cars. The headaches we would get after a full day of recording these! You could almost feel the oil dripping off us. We also had to go out and find the sirens of the time, the telephones, the old teletypes and all that. We wanted that all to be real. So many of those things and their sounds have become almost extinct.” Aadahl says that he and Van der Ryn “share an obsessive perfectionism, but our aesthetics can be a little different, so we challenge each other quite a bit, which for me is quite inspiring. It’s a great partnership.” dv

LISTEN

Life of Pi MUSIC PRODUCTION • LIVE SOUND • SOUND FOR PICTURE

BLAIR JACKSOn

fantastic Voyage Imagining and Realizing the Sound for Life of Pi

image by rhythm & hues

ound editors Eugene Gearty and Philip Stockton collaborated on director Ang Lee’s vivid and imaginative Life of Pi, a film that required them to construct largely from scratch the audio world in which much of the story takes place: a large lifeboat adrift at sea, populated by a young Indian boy (Pi) and a remarkably realistic (digital) tiger named Richard Parker. There is little dialogue for much of the film, and how it was shot demanded that most of the on-set audio be either replaced Pi Patel (Suraj Sharma) and a fierce Bengal tiger named Richard Parker must rely on each other to survive an epic journey. or newly created. “One of the first points Ang made to me about “John Fasal [the recordist] and I spent a whole considerable effort recording several captive tigers the film is that the sound of the water was going to day with the lifeboat that was in the movie,” Gearty at a facility north of L.A. called Hollywood Animals. be extremely important—and that it had to be con- explains. “We took that boat out to the Catalina area “Richard Parker is an amalgam of three or four stantly changing and also be from the perspective and we he had a [Sound Devices] 788 going—we had tigers,” Gearty says. of being in the water,” says Gearty, who has worked an omni quad, an omni spaced pair forward and an As a specialist in preparing dialogue, Stockton as the sound designer on all of Lee’s films dating omni spaced pair rear; then we did an M-S setup in traveled a tougher road on Life of Pi than many back to The Ice Storm in 1997. “I did a lot of record- the middle of that. Plus I had a stereo mic hanging films he’s worked on. Because the ocean scenes ings where I mounted a mic in a huge inner tube over the side on a ‘magic arm’ were shot in an enormous and ran a 200-foot tether off the end of a boat and recording the water lapping manmade tank in Taiwan, and recorded open water ambience and close-up waves, on the exterior of the hull. We many scenes involved wind which sound different out in the water than they synched all that up so I could and/or wave machines, much do on shore, obviously. I put a Sound Devices 722 make anything I wanted to in of production recordist Drew [recorder] in a dry bag and mounted mics pointed terms of multitrack surround Kunin’s work was usable only down toward the water and also pointed straight up recordings.” as a guide track and was ADR’d to get this open-air presence that I could use in the Given the importance of later. Stockton adds, “The 3D surround. In 7.1, I could put that in the walls and in the tiger to the story, Gearty Sound editors Eugene Gearty (left) and cameras are incredibly noisy— the back so it gave us some nice spatial depth. and his team also spent Philip Stockton it’s pretty brutal.” dv

dv.com | 04.2013

LUST

preview

NAB SHow 2013 OLIVER PETERS

2013 NAB SHow: wHAt’S tHe Next New tHiNg? Identifying and Analyzing Technology Trends

s the wheels touch down at McCarran International Airport in Las Vegas for this year’s National Association of Broadcasters’ NAB Show, attention is bound to turn to the buzz topic of 2013: 4K acquisition, post and distribution. Like stereoscopic 3D before it, will 4K go from niche to mainstream product— only to return to niche status next year? That’s an unknown, but the consumer electronics industry has already signaled that 4K is the next big thing for them. Despite that endorsement, broadcasters are also trying to deal with the other end of the spectrum, the so-called “second screen” phenomenon. This is the challenge of how to offer unique, complementary content for tablets and mobile devices. The NAB Show remains the largest international exhibition for all aspects of professional production, post and distribution technology. It comes together in one place, providing attendees an opportunity to kick the tires on new and updated technologies. Veterans of the show—especially those who make buying decisions—view this weeklong affair with a mix of excitement and dread. According to facility owner Terence Curren of ALPHADOGS in Burbank, “NAB tends to come in two-year cycles. One year they show the next ‘new’ thing, then the next year companies show their workflow solutions for that ‘new’ thing. This year will be all about 4K as the manufacturers shove it down our throats, as they did with 3D a few years back. Then next year will be the way to work with four times the data, with new codecs that squeeze that down to the exact same bandwidth we are at now.”

The 4K ConTenders Leading the 4K parade will be the camera manufacturers, particularly RED, Sony and Canon. RED pioneered viable 4K production with the RED ONE digital cinema camera and followed that up with the modular EPIC and SCARLET cameras.

Autodesk’s nAB show demonstrations include a focus on how editors have been using smoke. There will be four hours of presentations daily from smoke users, including Jeremy hunt, the filmmaker behind “Fix It in Post,” which received 20,000 views in its first 48 hours online.

sony PMW-F55

EPIC is scheduled to get an optional sensor upgrade with the 6K Dragon sensor. For its part, SONY’s high-end F65 was followed by the recent release of the F55 and F5 cameras. Unfortunately RED and Sony arrive at the NAB Show in the midst of a pending lawsuit. RED holds patents based on recording large Bayer-pattern images in motion using data compression schemes. The company has filed a lawsuit against Sony based on the belief that the F65, F55 and F5 infringe on those patents.

I doubt this issue will prevent Sony from showing and marketing the cameras. Such litigation tends to drag out and might ultimately be settled out of court. In any case, it will make for some interesting discussions over drinks during the show. CANON, which uses different technology in its EOS C500 and EOS-1D C 4K cameras, is not involved in this lawsuit. Company reps will have a good story to tell with the Cinema EOS line of cameras. The C300 has become quite popular, as has the newer, cheaper C100. Canon eos-1d C The C100, C300 and C500 cameras sport a similar body style, while the 1D C maintains a DSLR form factor. The C500 and 1D C are 4K cameras and rather expensive,

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at NaB, editShare is upgrading its line of tapeless workflow products, including editShare 7, editShare Field 2, Flow 3 with air Flow and Flow automation, Geevs Sports and Geevs Post. also debuting at NaB will be a Mac oS X version of Lightworks, editShare’s free, professional nonlinear editor that also runs on Linux and Windows platforms.

so it’s too early to tell whether they will enjoy the same sales success as the other Canon models. The C500 needs an external recorder, such as AJA’s Ki Pro Quad, for its 4K camera raw images, so an investment in the C500 requires adding an extra device. The Canon EOS-1D C records 4K files to onboard media using a Motion JPEG codec. Since the signal isn’t camera raw and Motion JPEG is an easily decoded format for most NLEs, the 1D C may ultimately provide the easiest 4K workflow when you factor in post. You can’t go anywhere meaningful aJa Ki Pro Quad with 4K content if you don’t have 4K presentation devices. RED aims to fill that void with professional and consumer versions of the REDRAY 4K Cinema Player, which uses a 2.5 MB/s version of the compressed REDCODE codec to deliver true 4K playback. Prototypes were

dv.com | 04.2013

demoed last year, so this year we should see some actual products in the booth. RED has further set up a partnership arrangement with Odemax for 4K content distribution channels.

More CaMera Buzz Not all digital cinema cameras have to be 4K to be successful. ARRI has done quite well with its Alexa camera, which tops out at 2,880 pixels wide when recording uncompressed ARRIRAW. Studio films on which Alexa was the main camera are routinely projected at 4K and even IMAX sizes in movie theaters without complaints. Alexa’s latest firmware update allows recording up to 2K in the Apple ProRes format to onboard SxS media. With all of the 4K buzz, the industry is waiting to see whether ARRI will show a 4K camera of its

reD Digital Cinema reDraY

own. ARRI has certainly come up the winner as the camera of choice for many tent-pole projects, but will that last if they don’t have a 4K model? Last year’s biggest camera surprise was the 2.5K Blackmagic Cinema Camera from BLACKMAGIC DESIGN. Although the company has had some bumps getting this camera to market in sufficient numbers, I’m sure you’ll see Blackmagic build on the BMCC at this show. Other camera manufacturers that expand the digital cinema camera universe (that may or may not be attending the NAB Show) Blackmagic Cinema Camera include Ikonoskop, Digital Bolex, GoPro, Silicon Imaging, Aaton, Nikon, Vision Research and Panasonic. You can’t mention Blackmagic Design without wondering whose toes they will step on this year by disrupting another segment of the market. Blackmagic’s introduction as a camera manufacturer last year was completely unexpected.

Past corporate acquisitions have included Echolab, DaVinci Systems and Teranex. In all cases, Blackmagic has breathed new life into the acquired products, along with significant price reductions. Naturally there’s speculation about who will be in the Blackmagic Design fold in 2013. Forgetting such speculation and focusing on actual products again, Blackmagic’s most touted new product is a DeckLink 4K Extreme I/O card. It supports 4K over Dual Link 3G-SDI.

The PosTProducTion Free-For-All Ever since the release of Apple Final Cut Pro X, the post segment has been in flux. Walter Biscardi Jr. of Atlanta-based BISCARDI CREATIVE MEDIA summarizes it this way: “I firmly believe the days of the ‘One NLE to Rule Them All’ are over since the fall of Final Cut Pro 7. Editors who left the Apple platform have discovered a whole new world out there—and in many cases a better world. Apple has certainly made strides with the new X, and the early adopters are reaping the benefits, but for those who have left FCP, there seems to be universal agreement that there isn’t much there to lure them back to Apple. For 2012, Adobe definitely has had momentum on their side, so it will be interesting to see where they go with Premiere Pro in 2013. CS6 is by no means perfect, but with Adobe’s attention to the postproduction market, they are definitely getting the lion’s share of the FCP 7 void.” This brings us to the four “A” companies of post: Adobe, Apple, Autodesk and Avid. APPLE hasn’t been an official exhibitor for years but will likely be at the show in “stealth” mode, holding private meetings with journalists, bloggers and key customers. The company did this last year to quietly pre-announce new FCP X features that ended up in the October 10.0.6 update.

Autodesk smoke 2013

new Fujinon lenses at the FuJiFilM optical devices division nAB show booth will include the Premier Pl 85-300 cabrio lens (model ZK3.5x85, pictured) and XA99x8.4 ultraWide field production lens.

ADOBE is bound to have a strong show. Company reps have publicly acknowledged that Adobe products are on an annual development cycle, so expect to see the next version of the Creative Suite. Undoubtedly they will showcase Adobe Anywhere as a shipping product. This is Adobe’s collaborative editing platform based on

beta period. According to Biscardi, “Autodesk showed very strong last year with Smoke 2013 but lost some of their momentum with a delayed release of the final product. I’ll be the first to admit, once we started down the Adobe road, I put Smoke on the back burner because we had to invest so much time transitioning our entire workflow from

Autodesk and Jeremy Hunt Present “Fix It in Post” http://autode.sk/15cBPkt Premiere Pro. It was previewed at NAB last year and officially announced later in the year. At the 2013 NAB Show we will most likely learn the product specifics, like price, availability and system requirements. In addition, many editors are eager to see better suite integration of the SpeedGrade color correction software. When CS6 was released, Adobe and SpeedGrade engineers had had only a few months to integrate the application after the acquisition by Adobe of the IRIDAS technology. They’ve now had a year to work on it, so expect improvements. AUTODESK made a splash last year with a redesign of Smoke for the Mac to make the application more “Mac-like.” Smoke 2013 ultimately had a slower rollout than expected but benefitted from a long public

Apple to Adobe. But I’ll be really curious to see how Autodesk comes out in 2013 to regain that enthusiasm and excitement they started in 2012.” At the show, Autodesk plans to focus on how editors have been using Smoke. There will be four hours of presentations daily from Smoke users, including Jeremy Hunt (the filmmaker behind “Fix It in Post,” which received 20,000 views in its first 48 hours online). Hunt co-directed the first viral video ever (“405”). Autodesk will also showcase its other creative tools, including Flame Premium, with customers who are already using the Flame 20th Anniversary edition in production. Finally, check out the Autodesk Entertainment Creation Suites (animation software, including Maya and 3ds Max). AVID enters the NAB Show once again with a new CEO at the helm, as board member Louis Hernandez Jr. takes over for the departing Gary Greenfield. It’s unclear how this transition will affect Avid’s diverse portfolio of audio, video, news

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and graphics products. In the past year Avid shed the Pinnacle consumer products division, so it won’t be unexpected if Avid enters the NAB Show with a more streamlined product family. Or will the changes be purely cosmetic? The last management change brought revamped branding that featured a weird mechanical head, and then a full-on logo change a year later. One highlight of the Avid booth each year is the series of presentations by prominent industry pros, including Oscar and Emmy-winning editors and such crowd-pleasers as director Kevin Smith. Specifics weren’t announced in time for this article, but these presentations are always a great way to see how the highest-level users tackle the same problems you do. Editing isn’t only about the “A” companies, of course. GRASS VALLEY has enjoyed success with its EDIUS 6.5 editor, thanks to an industry in transition and the application’s dexterity with a wide range of native formats and codecs. The STRATUS workgroup platform and EDIUS editor appeal to broadcasters and provide turnkey solutions. Another company with strong ties to broadcast as well as film post is QUANTEL. The company will present Pablo Rio v2, its software solution. Rio—an acronym for “real time, interactive and open”—has been ported to a 64-bit version that runs on turnkey, off-the-shelf PC units with multiple NVIDIA GPU cards. A new 4K output option is capable of supporting Ultra HD (3840 x 2160) and 4K (4096 x 2160) at 24 and 25 fps over quad 3G-SDI. New v2 features include support for the Sony F65, F55 and F5 and Canon C500 cameras.

Hitachi will be introducing the SK-HD2200 studio/OB camera and Z-HD6000 CMOS studio camera at the show. Other products on display will include the SK-HD1500 slow-motion HDTV camera and HV-HD33 POV HD camera.

available as part of the v5.2 software for Quantel editing products. The NAB Show will give attendees a peek at the advance of new technologies. For instance, where are vendors like AJA, Blackmagic Design, Matrox and others headed in their support of USB 3.0 and Thunderbolt? Are these technologies reaching ubiquity on both Mac and Windows platforms? Will we see more professional use of the all-in-one computers, like the Apple iMac and HP Z1? What applications are there for tablets?

matrox mXo2 dock

the i-moviX X10 system is able to deliver a continuous real-time output of up to 250 fps at native hd resolution and image quality. for sports productions requiring higher frame rates, the X10+ system can operate in an extreme slow motion mode at frame rates up to 2,600 fps in 1080i/50 or up to 5,600 fps in 720p/60 with instant replay.

Look for the SmaLLer Productivity itemS Beyond the big name vendors, it pays to look a little harder to find the lesser known items at the show. The best at that is BOB ZELIN, an independent engineering consultant. According to Zelin, “Axle Video is the number one buzz asset management solution for NAB 2013. It’s the top hit of NAB 2013 for me, even before the show starts. Because I see the demise of VTRs approaching, I will pay much more attention to LTO archive, particularly larger archive solutions, like the Power Cache from Cache-A, the new Argis from TOLIS Group and whatever Storage DNA has to offer. I’m not only paying attention to the AJA Ki Pro series and Blackmagic Design HyperDeck Studio Pro, but also to higher-end products like the Cinedeck. These will not only replace Sony and Panasonic VTRs, but probably the EVS recorders in trucks.” Other asset management, scheduling and facility management software vendors include Square Box Systems (CatDV), Farmers Wife, ScheduALL and Xytech Systems. Audio tends to be short-changed in video articles, but the NAB Show is a great place to shop for audio products too. At NAMM (the primary music industry trade show), AVID launched the Pro Series line of AAX Native and AAX DSP plugins, which support the new Pro Tools plug-in

architecture. These will likely be demoed in the Pro Tools section of the Avid booth. If you haven’t been paying attention (and most video editors haven’t), there are new laws and guidelines in the United States and EU countries related to loudness specifications. For U.S. broadcasters, that’s the CALM Act. NAB is the place to find tools that make compliance easier. One such vendor is NUGEN AUDIO, which makes real-time plugins for audio limiting and monitoring. NuGen has already forged a relationship with Quantel. NuGen’s VisLM loudness metering software is

Not all of these questions will be answered, of course, but certainly manufacturers like MATROX have embraced Thunderbolt with products like the MXO2 Dock. From a single Thunderbolt cable, users can connect an MXO2 I/O device, plus add multiple peripherals. A gigabit Ethernet port, one USB 3.0 and two USB 2.0 ports are also provided. There are currently three NLE applications available for the iPad (that I know of), but the one getting the most buzz among pro editors is TOUCHEDIT. It’s unlikely that TouchEdit will have its own booth, but products like this often share space with some of the smaller manufacturers or in partner pavilions. Keep your eyes peeled. NAB is an opportunity to investigate the newest in graphics tools and effects plug-ins. Don’t miss BORIS FX, which recently released

Sound devices will showcase an update to its PiX 240 and PiX 240i production video recorders, enabling them to record 12-bit, 4:4:4 content from video sources over 3G-Sdi in apple Prores 4444. additionally, the rack-mounted PiX 260i file-based audio/video recorder offers 32 tracks of audio record/playback as well as control functionality from browser-capable computers and tablets.

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the Final Cut Pro X/Motion 5 version of the Boris Continuum Complete 8 effects package. Its more than 200 filters include extruded text, particles and cinematic effects. New Final Cut Pro X templates give editors easy-to-use glows, lights, particles and tilt-shift effects. Editors are also able to create their own FCP X templates in Motion 5. Many of the smaller plug-in developers can be found in an area known as the Plug-in Pavilion. One new exhibitor this year is RAMPANT DESIGN TOOLS, a developer of royalty-free stock elements such as graphic effects and element movie files, sound effects and After Effects templates. Lastly, don’t forget that the NAB Show is a place to learn and to have some of the best in-person interaction with pros from all over the world. For official NAB members, there are numerous educational and business sessions. FUTURE MEDIA CONCEPTS partners with the NAB Show to put on Post|Production World, a series of concurrent software training classes. NAB, FMC and some manufacturers sponsor various keynote addresses by industry luminaries, many of which are open to all attendees. Past speakers include Steve Wozniak, Rob Legato, James Cameron and

Grass Valley will show how “nonlinear production”—the idea of a single collaborative platform providing a true “create once, publish everywhere” environment—is supported by its new and updated Live Production products, including GV STRATUS, EDIUS XS, EDIUS Elite and LDX Series camera systems.

Kevin Smith. Popular social events include the Media Motion Ball and the Las Vegas SuperMeet, not to mention a slew of customer parties hosted by manufacturers at clubs, restaurants and hotel ballrooms all over town.

Whether you go to find the latest and greatest in technology, or just to hook up with friends from around the world you see in person only that one time a year, the NAB Show is the place to be in April. dv

lust

NewTek TriCasTer 40

NEd SoLTz

sTarT sTreamiNg NewTek’s TriCaster 40 Opens Up Opportunities

 Quick Take Product: NewTek

TriCaster 40

Pros: Powerful, full of

features, streams to any provider, TV-like, easy to use, stable, reasonable entry price.

Cons: Componentcomposite-Y/C only. Needs SDI or HDMI, even at that price point. Add-ons bring price up to $8,000. Bottom Line: Nothing

touches TriCaster in the streaming arena. And now TriCaster power and functionality are available in a less expensive, featurepacked product. Suitable for churches, schools, nonprofits, smaller content providers.

MSRP: TriCaster 40 $4,995, TriCaster 40 Control Surface $1,995, LiveText 2 software $995 Online: www.newtek.com/ products/tricaster-40.html digital

video Excellence Award

Based on a Microsoft Windows 7 architecture, TriCaster 40 combines video in, switching, effects, titling, keying, virtual sets, recording, video overlay output and streaming in a portable 19 lb. unit.

NewTek continues to innovate in the world of all-in-one video streaming solutions. Few products even come close to the capabilities of the NewTek line. The streaming space continues to gain significance for content creators at all levels, from religious institutions, educators and event producers to broadcasters. The proliferation of offerings from providers such as Livestream and Ustream gives producers access to streaming services that range from free to the level of a professional broadcast. Smaller content creators have a variety of software and hardware tools at their disposal. Streaming applications such as BoinxTV and Telestream Episode work in conjunction with a user’s existing hardware and may be configured to stream to a number of different service providers. Hardware devices such as products from Teradek and Livestream enable output directly from the camera; this output may be streamed to a server or brought into a streaming app for production. I don’t mean to detract from these applications or hardware devices—I own and use products from Telestream and Teradek—but they feel more “computer” than broadcast to me.

The TriCaster line has the feel of a broadcast control room. To put it quite simply, if you are a video tech and have ever used a switcher, you can use a TriCaster with a very short learning curve. If you’ve never used a switcher, you will learn its intuitive workflow much faster than you will a “computerish” application. For many lower-budget operations, the TriCaster was only an aspirational product ... until NewTek released the $5,000 TriCaster 40. TriCaster 40 hits a price point that will attract religious institutions, the education market and low-budget enterprises. With one of these units, a previously unstructured web stream can become a polished production. The TriCaster 40 enables entrylevel streaming users to upgrade their deliverables, with a basic feature set approaching the next product in the TriCaster line, the $20,000 TriCaster 455. TriCaster is a dedicated hardware/software solution. While the higher-end TriCaster 8000, 855 and 455

dv.com | 04.2013

TriCaster 40 accepts inputs from four simultaneous live video sources (usually cameras) over component or composite connections. It accepts HD, SD or a mixture of sources.

models come in a rackmount form factor, TriCaster 40 sits on the desktop. Based on a Microsoft Windows 7 architecture, TriCaster 40 combines video in, switching, effects, titling, keying, virtual sets, recording, video overlay output and streaming in a portable 19 lb. unit. All you need to add is a computer monitor. Optional add-ons include the

TriCaster 40 Control Surface. TriCaster 40 accepts inputs from four simultaneous live video sources (usually cameras) over component or composite connections. It accepts HD, SD or a mixture of sources. Since it is designed to work with multiple cameras—many times of different models and capabilities—each

input has an independent frame synchronizer and proc amp controls. It also has two video outputs as well as analog audio in/out and a headphone jack. TriCaster 40 has fewer inputs than more costly products in the TriCaster line, of course. Additionally, the absence of SDI or HDMI inputs can be somewhat limiting and is a feature I hope NewTek will consider in future versions of the product. The 40 accepts network input via gigabit Ethernet or Apple Airplay. It’s a great way to get content from your iPad into the TriCaster. Video can be loaded from external sources into the unit’s DDR. (Higher-end TriCasters have two DDRs.) There are four independent channels for effects, keying, virtual sets or composite creations, and each channel can have three fully configurable controls. NewTek provides 24 HD live virtual sets, and users may purchase additional sets. The superb real-time keyer handles blue/greenscreen. TriCaster software allows for such controls as specular highlights, multiple camera angles and real-time reflections. A graphics overlay channel may be output via the TriCaster’s video card via DVI, VGA or HDMI

TriCaster 40 connection diagram

connectors. You could use this channel to feed a PowerPoint presentation from a network source to a projector while also being able to use that channel as one of the switching sources. TriCasters get the name “tri” from their three methods of content delivery: output, stream or record internally. TriCaster 40 ships with a 1 TB media drive that can store 20 hours of 1080i video in .mov format (more when transcoded in real time to H.264). Users may add external drives via builtin eSATA ports for extended recording. The unit accepts and plays back virtually any media format. Most users will buy or rent a TriCaster for its streaming prowess. The TriCaster 40 will output a live stream either as Adobe Flash or Microsoft Windows Media. NewTek works very closely with streaming providers and offers a TriCaster SDK for third-party development. Thus, setting up a stream is as easy as entering a configuration menu and entering account and program information. TriCaster 40 includes presets for the most common streaming profiles, in resolutions up to 720p.

TriCaster 40 user interface

Operating a TriCaster is essentially the same as operating a production switcher. TriCaster 40 has 14 switcher channels: six external, four internal and four virtual inputs. Cue up a selection, select a transition if desired, have a graphic or bug ready to insert, cue up a DDR source, mix an audio source, and then punch it up or switch using the T-bar. It’s easy to use. What impresses me is that the TriCaster 40 is just as responsive as the higher-end models. NewTek offers a $1,995 control surface for the TriCaster 40. The TriCaster 40 CS is a more basic offering than higher-end control surfaces (TriCaster 8000 CS and 855 CS, for example), but it is a perfect complement to the 40’s functionality. I strongly recommend purchasing one. The workflow of punching up programs requires both speed and rhythm, and I find doing it much more difficult with a keyboard and mouse. Because this is an entrylevel product, the TriCaster 40 Control Surface is not as intimidating for a new or more casual user than a switcher in a typical control room. Another add-on is LiveText 2, which is included

with the educational version of TriCaster 40 but adds $1,000 to the price of the retail version. LiveText 2 is effectively a complete titling workstation, with 3D graphics, rolls, crawls, credits and graphics. It can use imported graphics to create titles and goes beyond the TriCaster 40’s native titling capabilities. If that extra $1,000 isn’t in the budget, however, TriCaster 40’s built-in text capabilities and its ability to import text from applications such as Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop might be adequate for your needs. The TriCaster 40 is a worthwhile purchase for those expanding from simple streaming to polished production. It works and “thinks” like a video production system and emulates real-world studio hardware. Years of NewTek experience have made the software and hardware rock solid. Its basic plug-and-play architecture and portability allow it to go virtually anywhere with power and an internet connection. NewTek has put a lot of power into users’ hands at a price point that will attract even more. dv

NewTek offers a $1,995 control surface for the TriCaster 40.

dv.com | 04.2013

3 June 19, 2013 Metropolitan Pavilion, 123 W. 18th St. NYC DV Expo East is where industry pros like you gather for networking, education and to view the latest product innovations that will shape the way you create, store and distribute video content. Get hands-on with new products and speak directly to the company experts who have answers to your questions. This event is FREE if you register in advance with code DVE1 at www.dvexpoeast.com.

Exhibitors include:

New for 2013! DV Expo East co-locates with Broadcasting & Cable and TV Technologyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Sports Business Technology Summit (requires separate paid registration). The Sports Business Technology Summit will feature keynote speaker Mark Lazarus, Chairman, NBC Sports Group as well as additional panel discussions.

Co-located with*

ideas for life For info on exhibiting: creative PLANET network.com Jackie Gospodinoff | 212.378.0493 | jgospodinoff@nbmedia.com Susan Shores | 212.378.0400 x528 | sshores@nbmedia.com Jeff Victor | 224. 436. 8044 | jeffvictor@comcast.net creative PLANET network.com

Produced by:

*This event requires separate, paid registration

lust

Tiffen STeadicam SmooThee

ChuCK GLOmAN

SmarTphone ShooTing Tiffen’s Steadicam Smoothee Transforms Your iPhone or GoPro

Steadicams come in all sizes to accommodate most shooting rigs. The latest is the Steadicam Smoothee from Tiffen, a camera stabilization device designed for iPhones (3GS/4/4S/5) and the GoPro camera (hERO2 and 3). The Smoothee does exactly what full-sized Steadicams do, except on the much smaller scale appropriate for iPhone videography. This 1.75 lb. unit does a fantastic job of stabilizing the roughly 5 oz. Apple iPhone, turning a lightweight media device into a steady shooting platform.

 Quick Take Product: tiffen

steadicam smoothee

Pros: Very easy to mount

and master. Much shorter learning curve than with other steadicam models. ready to use right out of the box. Compact and easy to carry.

Cons: Quality limited by what your iPhone/GoPro shoots. Bottom Line: the

easiest way to get smooth, stabilized shots with an iPhone or GoPro.

MSRP: steadicam smoothee $169, iPhone or GoPro mount $25 Online: www.steadicam. com

Features Steadicam Smoothee ships with camera mount (iPhone 4, in my case), user guide and belt clip. The only assembly required is mounting your phone to the top plate. The process is no different than mounting any camera to a tripod, so users should have no trouble. (Note that the addition of an iPhone case or attachment may prevent your phone from fitting properly into the Smoothee device mount.) The next step is balancing. The Smoothee is the easiest Steadicam device to balance of all I’ve reviewed. The initial “rough” balance is achieved by sliding the plastic Steadicam nameplate up or down the stabilization bar. Fine balance is accomplished by using two red knobs: the knob on the back, which controls the fore and aft movements, and the side knob, which adjusts left and right tilt. These minor adjustments to fine-tune the Smoothee’s stabilization may require a few moments to execute, depending on wind conditions and other factors. The comfortable ergonomic grip fits easily in your hand and takes no effort to use. Once you’ve balanced the Smoothee, you might want to consult the great online tutorials Tiffen offers. There’s a video that explains exactly what the Smoothee can do—it’s well worth spending 20 minutes or so to watch it. Keep in mind, however, that the Smoothee is

probably the only device I’ve ever reviewed that needs no instruction manual. It’s very intuitive.

In use I’m not a big fan of shooting action with an iPhone, as I have access to all of the video capture devices in our school’s equipment cage, but a lot of my students had been bugging me to get my hands on a Smoothee. iPhones have come a long way in image quality, and the next logical step was for someone to create a stabilization device to make their good shots look even better. I examined the Smoothee with a few of my students. The test scenario was capturing a fluid shot in one of our university’s cornfields. We mounted a student’s iPhone 4 to the Smoothee—I needed to make only minor adjustments with the red knobs for leveling—and she took off, shooting a smooth POV shot as she ran. A DSLR or standard video camera would have been awkward to use in this situation because of its size and weight, but the Smoothee’s compact profile was easy to maneuver through the stalks of corn. We quickly learned that the trick to moving quickly with the device is to make sure your legs—or corn stalks—do not jostle the Smoothee. Capturing a reverse angle of someone running was as simple as mounting the iPhone so that the camera portion was facing rearward. It would have

Smoothee tutorial: www.tiffen.com/steadicam_smoothee_operations_video.html

dv.com | 04.2013

tear on the operator.

Summary If you’re shooting with an iPhone or GoPro and need stabilized shots, look no further than the Steadicam Smoothee. With its extremely short learning curve, anyone can master it quickly. And as with any stabilization device, the more you use it, the more adept you become. dv

Steadicam Smoothee may be operated onehanded with just a thumb. Hold the gimbal handle with your dominant hand and place your thumb on the slot used to lock the gimbal in place for travel mode. With a light touch of your thumb you can pan/tilt and guide the Smoothee.

been much more difficult—and possibly dangerous—to run through the cornfield backward. Instead, by mounting the camera facing toward the rear, the operator had a pretty good idea of where to shoot. The student ran through the corn again and, holding the camera slightly higher, kept her shoulder out of the footage. The last shot in the sequence was of the actor’s feet running. Simply holding the Smoothee with the camera upside down (pointed toward the ground) and flipping the image on the iPhone, we got a great low-angle shot. The Smoothee certainly makes these types of tracking shots easier, without a lot of wear and

Steadicam Smoothee Specs Weight

1.75 lb.

Size

Approximately 8” x 14.5” x 2.5” (WHD) in operating configuration

dv.com | 04.2013

toolkit

New Gear

JVC

Gy-Hm70 The GY-HM70 ProHD shoulder-supported camcorder delivers 60p full-HD images at a price point JVC hopes will appeal to markets where budget is limited but a full-sized camcorder is the preferred choice. With a 12 megapixel CMOS imager, the GY-HM70 records 1920 x 1080 footage in the AVCHD Progressive format at 28 Mb/s to dual solid-state memory cards. It also allows high-speed video recording at 300 fps (720 x 480). Other features include a hot-swappable dual battery system, 0.24” LCOS color viewfinder and 3” LCD flip-out touchscreen display. Users will appreciate manual focus, iris and shutter controls, as well as manual and automatic white balance. The GY-HM70 has an MSRP of $1,995 and is expected to be available in May. pro.jvc.com

Tiffen Company LoweL prime power LeD 800 Available from Tiffen, the Lowel Prime Power LED 800 studio light comes in daylight and tungsten versions. Ideal for studio or EFPstyle location productions, the 800 has a CRI of 90+ and a 50° beam angle. With 126 footcandles

Grass VaLLey LDX fLeX

at 9’, the 800 model has almost twice the output of the Lowel Prime Power LED 400.

The LDX Flex studio camera system is the entry-level offering in Grass Valley’s LDX Series of upgradable system cameras. LDX Flex delivers the same image quality and performance—and supports the use of the same accessories—as other cameras in the LDX Series, but it can be upgraded through the LDX range (LDX Première, LDX Elite and LDX WorldCam) based on the level of acquisition format required. A simple upgrade advances every LDX Series camera to the next camera in the range. The LDX Series supports the following formats: LDX Flex 1080i 50 or 59.94, or 720p 50 or 59.94. LDX Première 1080i 50/59.94 and 720p 50/59.94. LDX Elite 1080PsF 25/29.97, 1080i 50/59.94 and 720p 50/59.94. LDX WorldCam 1080p 50/59.94, 1080PsF 25/29.97, 1080i 50/59.94 and 720p 50/59.94. www.grassvalley.com

BeaCHTek

DXa-BmD aDapTer for BmCC This adapter mounts neatly under the Blackmagic Cinema Camera for a portable, all-in-one audio solution. It allows the user to connect pro audio gear such as boom mics, wireless mics and audio mixing boards to the camera, providing control and monitoring features for high-quality audio capture. With the DXABMD adapter, the user can record professional audio directly to the camera without the need of a third-party audio recording device and having to sync the audio in postproduction. It’s expected to be available by April 1 for $299. www.beachtek.com

Like all Lowel Prime Power LEDs, the model 800 is dimmable (via DMX or manually on the back of the unit), with “tweakable” color

for

critical

balancing

against other light sources, and offers silent fanless air convection cooling. Retail price is $3,895. lowel.com/primeLED

dv.com | 04.2013

axle Video axle Gear

axle Video’s rackmount axle Gear system integrates browser-based media management with powerful transcode capabilities. The system consists of two coupled Apple Mac mini systems: one Mac mini is the primary server for axle’s media management software, while the other runs a tuned version of Telestream’s Episode Pro transcode software, providing high-throughput processing of a wide range of media files. The Telestream software generates the H.264 streaming proxy files used in axle’s iPad/laptop browser user interface and outputs a range of HD and SD video formats for mastering, broadcast and Web applications. axle Gear is compatible with nearly any networked storage system, including SAN, NAS and LTO tape technologies. www.axlevideo.com

FREE EDUCATION FOR PHOTOGRAPHERS VIDEO TUTORIALS

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how did they do that? digital photography 1 on 1 product reviews behind the scenes

VariZoom

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Stealthy

Stealthy hangs from a belt clip and can be quickly drawn to capture images. With one simple move, Stealthy transforms into a lap monopod. With another move it becomes a fully functional gimbaled stabilizer for steady walking shots and simulated crane motions. Another adjustment delivers a three-point shooter, allowing steady shots with full adjustments to fit nearly any DSLR or video camera, from 8 ounces to several pounds. The Stealthy device also converts to a tabletop tripod. The optional extended monopod goes to 6’. MSRP is $599. www.varizoom.com/ stealthy

dv.com | 04.2013

WATCH. LEARN. CREATE.

VISIT US AT ADORAMATV.COM, ADORAMA.COM/ALC OR THE iTUNES STORE.

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Learn

Red ePic-M MOnOchROMe JAy AnKEnEy

Black and White and Red all OveR Early Experiments with RED’s EPIC-M Monochrome

Justin Timberlake’s “Suit & Tie” video was shot by director David Fincher and cinematographer Matthew Libatique, ASC, with EPIC Monochrome cameras.

ast October, RED Digital Cinema astounded the professional production community once again by bringing out a new camera: the EPIC-M Monochrome. In an era of high-framerate 3D, 4K/8K and expanding color gamuts, it’s a glorious black-and-white throwback to an era when images favored greyscale over chrominance and dazzling contrast over spectrum saturation. The first question I wanted to ask RED’s Ted Schilowitz was, Why? “Good question,” he laughs. But if you look at RED strategically, the question comes back as, Why not? Actually, if you visit one of the sites RED recommends to see images recorded on the EPIC-M Monochrome—vimeo.com/51795418, for example—the answer is obvious. This remarkable B&W camera shoots images you can drool over.

The EPIC-M Monochrome has a 14-megapixel black-and-white Mysterium-X CMOS sensor with a 5120 x 2700 pixel array that is rated at ISO 2000. The camera can capture 24 fps up to 5K, and 5K frame rates up to 120 fps. Frame rates expand to 300 fps in 2K mode. The list price of the EPIC-M Monochrome (brain only) is $25,000. But almost any other digital cinema camera can be set so that the chroma component is removed. So why is RED producing a $25,000+ camera that can only shoot black and white? (Readers should note that RED also offers the EPIC-X Monochrome, which is essentially the same camera as the EPIC-M Monochrome, but it’s assembled differently and from cast aluminum rather than machined metal. EPIC-X Monochrome (brain only) lists for $20,000.)

EPIC-M vs. EPIC-X

RED Digital Cinema’s EPIC-M Monochrome camera is often referred to as the “EPIC-M” in the production industry and on the REDUser Forum (www.reduser.net/forum), but that name isn’t technically correct. As Brent Carter, global brand manager at RED Digital Cinema, told me, “RED makes two versions of the EPIC camera body—the product-run EPIC-X and the hand-assembled EPIC-M—and both can be fitted with either their normal color sensor or the new 14-megapixel monochrome Mysterium-X version.” This article uses the term “EPIC-M Monochrome” to reference this awesome new B&W 5K camera.

dv.com | 04.2013

“It’s all about the purity of the B&W image,” Schilowitz says. “Most high-end CMOS cameras use Bayer color filters to distribute a sensor’s output to red, green and blue photosites. This reduces the practical resolution to 4K. But if you remove the color filter array of the Bayer pattern, you gain roughly another 20 percent of the true resolution of the sensor. That provides our EPIC-M Monochrome 5K recording capability at an effective 18 megapixel resolution with the extended ISO 2000 sensitivity.” It is for this reason that the EPIC-M Monochrome has generated so much interest in the world of fashion and for experimental applications, Schilowitz says. But the camera’s appeal isn’t nearly so narrow. Some of the best digital cinematographers have adopted the EPIC-M Monochrome to exploit its unique capabilities.

Paul Ellington Paul Ellington (@Paul_Ellington) is almost as proud of the Pulitzer Prize he accepted in 1999 on behalf of his grandfather, jazz legend Edward Kennedy “Duke” Ellington, as he is for having shot the short film “Dream Gamblers,” an official selection at the Cannes Film Festival in 2012. Now a master’s degree candidate at the NYU Tisch School of the Arts, Ellington has hopes of using the EPIC-M Monochrome in combination with other cameras on both a TV miniseries and a theatrical feature about his world famous paternal forebear

Paul Ellington receives two screenplay awards at the california Film awards.

dv.com | 04.2013

Patrick Faith’s EPic-M Monochrome captures footage for Puddles of Light.

who was one of America’s greatest composers. “It is an incredible camera because it handles black-and-white images better than anything else,” Ellington says. Ellington is especially impressed with the camera’s HDRx recording for extended dynamic range. With HDRx enabled, the EPIC simultaneously shoots two image tracks of whatever resolution and frame rate the user chooses. The primary track (A-track) is normal exposure, while the secondary track (X-track) is a “highlight protection” exposure that the user determines in the menu settings. ISO and aperture remain the same for both exposures. Both tracks (A and X) are stored in a single .r3d file. Ellington explains, “For example, one track could be set to store the motion video at 24 fps with a 1/50th of a second exposure, and the other track could be set to record at 1/200th of a second shutter speed,” he tells us. “This all happens at the same rate that a single normal frame would be recorded. It can be used for exposure protection or to reduce motion blur.” Some users have complained that the EPIC-M Monochrome can get too hot during shooting, but Ellington says he thinks RED is already working on

improving the fan’s cooling efficiency. “Actually, this has only been an issue [for me] when I am shooting nonstop somewhere like in Florida’s 110° heat,” he says. “But if you are faced with that situation, having a second body along can be a good precaution.”

Patrick Faith While you may not know Patrick Faith as a cinematographer, you have almost certainly experienced some of his work. Nearly every credit card transaction or airline ticket purchase goes through the artificial intelligence software he created. Faith the cinematographer is currently working on a self-funded film called Puddles of Light (www. puddlesoflight.com), a narrative feature that concerns hunger in the United States. The story is about an augmented reality painter who finds malnourished children in his backyard. The film will combine virtual and live-action images. If that sounds pretty avant garde, think Roger Rabbit with a message. With help from software including The Foundry NUKEX for compositing, Luxology modo for rendering, Next Limit RealFlow

a still from Puddles of Light

for water simulation and a suite of Adobe tools, Faith thinks of this EPIC-M Monochrome B&W photography as setting the stage for his subsequent visual effects work. Faith’s film is actually being shot with a combination of RED SCARLET color cameras and an EPIC-M Monochrome. The SCARLETs have their saturation set to zero for a black-and-white result. During post, he’ll use the X-Y coordinates from both cameras (which were positioned on a 90° angle from each other) to determine how to create the characters’ dimensionally modeled look on screen. He is finding ways to take full advantage of the EPIC-M Monochrome’s impressive dynamic range. “It lets me drop production costs by bringing in inexpensive LED lights,” he says. “I can even light an entire room with just a candle by using ambient light to put some depth in the blacks. That lets me eliminate noise in the shadows by lowering the black levels in the background in post.”

begins. “So we asked RED Digital Cinema to replace the camera’s OLPF [optical low-pass filter] with a custom-made one that would allow illumination in the infrared spectrum to come through. Combined with the EPIC-M Monochrome’s high native sensitivity to infrared, we could really see in the dark by getting the equivalent of ISO 4000.” KipperTie’s tests actually revealed they could expect ISO 4000 at 5K, ISO 3200 at 4K, ISO 2000 at 3K and ISO 1280 at 2K. You can see the results of their experimentation online (www.kippertie. com/red/mono). Another benefit Marchant has found of the

EPIC-M Monochrome is that its HDRx feature lets him grab stills while shooting video. “When we are interviewing corporate executives, we can come back with stunningly beautiful B&W stills at the same time,” he says. “That gives us spectacular head shots for the client’s web site.”

conclusion I started this article by asking whether the market needs a black-and-white camera. It’s interesting to note that David Fincher (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and House of Cards) recently shot the music video for Justin Timberlake’s “Suit & Tie” with an

John Marchant KipperTie is a sophisticated corporate video production company and rental facility in Surry, England. John Marchant, who serves as technical director there, has found some unique ways to employ his company’s EPIC-M Monochrome camera. “We had some major clients shooting nature documentaries who wanted to photograph animals in the wild at night using infrared light,” Marchant

left: John Marchant with EPic-M Monochrome right: Kippertie’s chroma response test with EPic-X, EPic Monochrome and infrared

dv.com | 04.2013

Infrared photography with the EPIC-M Monochrome

EPIC-M Monochrome. Also keep in mind that last year’s Academy Award for Best Picture went to Michel Hazanavicius’s The Artist, which audiences seemed

to accept in all its monochromatic glory. That feature was shot on celluloid—Kodak Vision3 500T 5219 B&W Super 35mm negative film—but you can bet that if a sequel emerges, it will depend more

on bits and bytes than sprocket holes. The EPIC-M Monochrome camera is just one more exciting tool for the rapidly expanding universe of digital cinema production. dv

Learn

TIPS TO CLIP

DICK REIZNER

no reflection

Doing Dutch In Hollywood “dutching” has nothing to do with wooden shoes or paying your own bill; instead, it refers to tilting the camera sideways. Most tripods will let you tilt up and down but not from side to side. If your tripod features ball leveling, it is not too hard to dutch the camera for a specific shot. If you do not have that feature, try mounting the camera sideways and tilting the head up or down.

When shooting through a glass museum display case or window, one way to handle reflections is with a polarizing filter. Another, suggested by John Wetmore of Bethesda, Md., is to position a black cloth so that it is the only thing being reflected back to the camera. It will read as no reflection and your problem is solved. The same idea will often work to prevent reflections in shiny objects like car bumpers, jewelry and silverware—in this case, use a large white card or cloth.

a Quiet sPot You want to record a voiceover audio track or interview in the field but there is just too much noise to get a clean recording. Try putting the talent in a parked car and rolling up the windows. If you want just a little ambience, open the window slightly, or make a separate recording of the outside ambience and combine the audio sequences in post.

If you have ever been working at a large venue and had your wireless microphone glitch because it is “stepping on” another system in the area, you may want to follow this suggestion from Leonard Chris of Dallas, Texas. When testing your system, say your location so anyone on the same frequency can find you and the two of you can work it out.

Whiter than White Mike Peters of Burbank, Calif., does a lot of work in hospitals and used to have major contrast problems when shooting white uniforms or bedding, especially when the people involved had dark skin tones. His answer was to ask the hospital for several sizes of lab coats and two sets of bed sheets. They were all washed with a small amount of black dye, which turned them slightly grey. As long as his fabrics are the only ones in the scene, they photograph as white without the contrast problem.

DeaD or alive

What to Wear A common question asked of video folks by those who will appear before our cameras is, What should I wear? Most folks will agree that earth tones work best. Along the same lines, don’t wear anything brighter than your skin and avoid reflective jewelry that might flash in the camera. Of course,

Wireless Mic test

interviewees should stay away from any kind of houndstooth or tight pattern to avoid moiré, which occurs when the clothing pattern mixes with the pixel pattern in the camera. If you have any clothing rules of thumb, send them to tips@dv.com and let’s share them.

Most of our portable equipment is fueled by rechargeable batteries. But a good number of those reusable power supplies have a major fault in common: a fresh battery looks just like a dead one. Joe Rankin of New York, NY, keeps track by putting a small piece of tape across the terminals of newly charged batteries. The tape must be removed for the battery to be used. Writing the charge date on the tape can let you know if the battery might have had enough time to self discharge.

share Your tiP Now it’s your turn to share a favorite shooting or production tip or question with your fellow professionals. Please send e-mails to tips@dv.com. All submissions become the property of Reizner & Reizner. None can be returned.

dv.com | 04.2013

compiled by ned Soltz

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A stereo mic for iPhone, iPod or iPad. Combine with the RØDE recording app (RØDE Rec or RØDE Rec LE) for sampling rates up to 96 kHz. Turns your iDevice into a perfect dual audio recorder for DSLRs, among other great uses. The iXY is currently sold out at the RØDE online store, but give them your e-mail address and they’ll let you know when supplies are replenished. The InVision INV-7HG MKIII Stereo Pair Kit is a vibration-resistant, low-noise suspension system designed to mount paired microphones for stereo recording. The unit can accommodate larger shotgun mics from 19 to 25mm in diameter, and up to 300mm long. Spacing between mounted mics is adjustable from 40 to 200mm. Each mic may be rotated and/or inclined, then secured once optimal stereo imaging has been achieved. The portable R-88 integrates a recorder, mixer and multichannel audio interface. With eight discrete channels of audio recording plus a stereo mix, the R-88 is ideal for demanding multichannel applications. Up to 24-bit/192 kHz uncompressed linear PCM recording (up to four channels). Eight-channel mixer with three-band EQ. SMPTE timecode in/out, embedded BWF and iXML metadata. And AES/EBU in/out. A fully featured device for any field application. The new flagship in Sound Devices’ line of portable audio mixers. Six input channels, four output buses. Built-in production recorder, records all inputs and output buses: 10 tracks total. With CL-6 attached, 16 tracks total. Broadcast WAV recording to dual memory card slots, CF and SD. Builtin ambient timecode reader/generator. Carbon fiber body. You must look at all the specs. Newly introduced. Wireless system that operates on two AA batteries. Configurations include bodypack, handheld, lavalier, XLR wireless plug and combination of all. Automatic frequency configuration. Excellent quality at a price lower than much of the competition. A great entry-level wireless system. This compact directional on-camera mic with mount is a perfect match for DSLRs, camcorders and portable audio recorders. With 1/2” condenser capsule, provides audio via 3.5mm minijack connector. Super-cardioid polar pattern for directional pickup. Selectable high-pass filter at 80 Hz. Level settings include -10dB attenuation for loud sources and +20dB to reduce noise generated by DSLR audio circuitry. Integrated mount for shock protection. Introduced at AES 2012. The Digital 9000 wireless series is designed for theatrical or broadcast applications and includes SKM 9000 wireless microphone, SK 9000 bodypack transmitter and rack-mounted receiver. The EM 9046 receiver is tunable between 470 and 798 Mhz. Twelve microphone capsules to choose from. A high-end solution. Built around the Q Mini Shotgun PRO Microphone, the Q Sniper PRO Microphone Kit includes all the accessories needed for on-camera mini-shotgun-style audio capture for DSLR cameras and HD video camcorders, and location sound booming. For a very reasonable price you get a pro mini shotgun mic, assorted mounts, boom pole, shock mount, phantom power module and a carrying case. All of these products are also offered separately. Introduced at AES last year, this System 10 digital wireless package from Audio-Technica includes a MT830cW omnidirectional lavalier microphone, ATW-T1001 UniPak transmitter and ATW-R1100 diversity receiver. The important feature here is that there is no interference with TV or DTV frequencies. This diversity system sends signals on two different frequencies to ensure no lost audio. Other configurations available. Ten-channel USB mixer for your edit station. New Macs may not have dedicated line/mic inputs, so it’s best to use a USB mixer. The Allen & Heath is a great product combining reasonable price with four XLR/Neutrik inputs, three-band EQ and everything else you would expect from a mixer for studio recording or edit station mixing. Even has effects such as reverb, delays, flange and chorus.

You'll find links to these products at www.dv.com/Apr2013. dv.com | 04.2013

Learn

DV101

JAy HOlBeN

Making the invisible visible Understanding Infrared Filtration

Wavelengths of light visible to the human eye (380 nm to 700 nm) make up only a small portion of the electromagnetic spectrum, which ranges from gamma rays at the short end (less than 0.01 nm) to radio at the long one.

et’s take a brief trip back to high school science class and revisit the electromagnetic spectrum. Sound waves, radio waves and gamma waves represent specific frequencies in the electromagnetic spectrum, the range of all frequencies of electromagnetic radiation. The spectrum includes wavelengths from 1 angstrom (one ten-billionth of a meter, or one-tenth of a nanometer) all the way up to AM radio at 100 meters in length and beyond. A tiny portion of this spectrum—from about 380 nanometers to 700 nanometers—corresponds to light visible to the human eye. It’s via this small area of the spectrum that we see the world. This segment of the spectrum is sometimes referred to as “visible light,” but that’s a redundant term. All light is visible. If it’s not visible, then it’s not light; it’s radiation. Just before the range of light visible to human eyes is ultraviolet radiation (UV), which we know as the harmful rays from the sun that fry our skin. Ultraviolet wavelengths range from 10 nm to 380 nm. Beyond light is infrared radiation, which takes up a large portion of the scale, with wavelengths

This image depicts infrared and light passing through an ND filter. Each wavelength of the visible spectrum (color) is reduced equally by the filter, while the infrared radiation is unattenuated and passes through at full strength.

from 700 nanometers to 1 millimeter. The infrared part of the spectrum is also called “radiant heat.” Our eyes are not sensitive to radiation, at least not in ways we can visually interpret, but digital sensors are, which causes some problems. Remember that both light and radiation are forms of heat, and it can be very difficult for an electronic circuit to differentiate between the various forms of heat as to what is good (light) and what is bad (radiation). All digital cameras (except those specially designed for “night vision”) feature infrared cut filters that limit the amount of infrared radiation that strikes the sensor and can be misinterpreted as light. Generally speaking, the IR cut filters inside the camera do a good job of keeping IR contamination out of our imagery. However, sensors are becoming more and more sensitive. ISOs are increasing substantially and, counter to that, our apertures are expanding. Many artists behind the camera prefer to shoot with a wider aperture in order to minimize depth of field. If you’re in a situation where you’re faced with a lot of light—say a daytime exterior—

and you want a large aperture for minimal depth of field, you need to incorporate neutral density (ND) filters to reduce the light striking the sensor. ND filters reduce the intensity of all wavelengths of light equally (in the visible region of the spectrum), so they don’t impart a color bias to the image. ND filters are great for decreasing light you can see, but they don’t block a proportional amount of ultraviolet or infrared radiation. The

Electromagnetic Spectrum name

Wavelength

Gamma ray

less than 0.01 nm

X-ray

0.01 nm to 10 nm

Ultraviolet

10 nm to 380 nm

Visible

380 nm to 700 nm

Infrared

700 nm to 1 mm

Microwave

1 mm to 1 m

Radio

1 mm to 100,000 km

dv.com | 04.2013

Figure 1: this is the control image. it shows how correction should look if it’s working properly and eliminating ir contamination. this is the reference to refer back to when interpreting the quality of the filtration being used.

higher the light levels, the greater chance there is also high infrared radiation. This is true for highkey tungsten lighting, HMI lighting and natural daylight, among other sources. Since you’re cutting down on the visible spectrum with an ND filter but not the radiation spectrum, this infrared radiation is seen by the camera’s sensor and captured by the photosites on the sensor closest to those wavelengths— namely the red photosites. The more photons of light you have in a photosite’s well, the less the IR contamination is noticeable. When you have fewer photons in a given photosite, then the contamination will be more obvious. This means you will notice the contamination primarily in shadows and dark colors. Blacks start to look redder with IR contamination, and it can skew the image substantially. Luckily, tools are available to decrease the amount of IR radiation entering a lens. Every camera sensor reacts differently to IR radiation, though, and no single tool is perfect for every system. Recently I spent a day with cinematographers Christopher Probst, Phil Holland and Jesse Brunt at CamTec Motion Picture Cameras in Burbank to take a look at several IR-cutting options on both RED EPIC and ARRI Alexa cameras. Our testing methodology was simple. We took several different black fabrics—including black

Figure 2: Utilizing traditional Nd filters, without additional ir control, we easily see the effects of the ir contamination in the image.

cotton, cotton blend, nylon and velvet—and several calibrated color charts and lit them to a very high stop: f/16 at 500 ISO. Then we incorporated ND filters and various ND/IR filters from various manufacturers to reduce the light passing through the lens to a T2 or T2.8 (depending on the strength of ND we had available) to see which combination worked better to cut the light and cut the IR contamination on each camera.

Filters tested • Tiffen ND 1.8 Traditional neutral density filter in 1.8 (-6 stop) density with no additional infrared filtration. Used

as a control to provide a basis of comparison. • Tiffen Full Spectrum IRND 1.8 Combining an infrared filter and 1.8 ND filter, this offering cuts down wavelengths equally until 680 nm, at which point it cuts off sharply to cut IR contamination. • Tiffen Hot Mirror Introduced in 2008, the Hot Mirror filter cuts only IR radiation and does not affect light. These filters start at 700 nm and continue to block IR all the way through the 1,000 nm range. • Tiffen T1 An IR-cutting filter that incorporates a slight green hue that helps to reduce oversaturated

dv.com | 04.2013

•

• •

•

reds that can bleed and cause trouble in standard definition signals. Formatt Hitech Prostop IRND 1.8 Introduces a slight blue cast to a neutral density and infrared-cutting filter. Formatt states that this design is intended for outdoor photographers to optimize the image while reducing IR contamination. Formatt Hitech Hot Mirror ND 1.8 A neutral density and Hot Mirror combined in a single filter. Schneider Optics ND 1.5 Classic ND without IR filtration. Used as a control. Schneider Optics True-Cut IR-750 Schneider’s version of a Hot Mirror, this filter lets light through but blocks wavelengths starting at 750 nm, allowing more red wavelengths through before cutting infrared. Schneider Optics Platinum IRND 1.5 With a cut starting at 700 nm, Schneider’s premium line of IRND filters incorporates IR filtration into standard ND.

Results of ouR test with ReD ePiC In this month’s column we’ll look at the results of various filter combinations on the RED EPIC. Next month we’ll see what happened with ARRI’s Alexa. To further simplify this presentation, I’m going to concentrate on the bottom left of the test image, which includes the black nylon material and an X-Rite ColorChecker Classic color check target. Figure 1 (on p. 76) is the control image, with no filtration and a T stop of 16. Here we are not attenuating visible light at all, except by the iris, so there is no IR contamination. Figure 2 (p. 76) shows the results of using only basic ND, which stops the light but allows infrared radiation to pass through. You can see the ugly bias not only in the blacks but in all the colors in the image. This is a significantly compromised image. We’ll start with some combinations from the Formatt line of filters. (See figure 3.) The Formatts generally do an excellent job of curbing infrared contamination, although the Formatt Prostop IRND alone isn’t enough. The combination of the ND 1.8 and Hot Mirror obtains excellent results. Note that the Prostop filter deliberately introduces a blue cast into the image to help counteract the red corruption. This is most evident when the Prostop filter is used alone, but it’s also visible when used with a Hot Mirror. In figure 4, you can see that Schneider’s IRND alone isn’t enough to combat the contamination—it’s

dv.com | 04.2013

Figure 3: three formatt filter combinations

Figure 4: four schneider filter combinations

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Page 2

DV101 actually worse than the Schneider ND by itself—but combining a Hot Mirror or True-Cut IR filter cleans up the image considerably. There is a magenta cast to the image with the Schneider ND + True-Cut and the ND + Hot Mirror combinations, however. It is certainly correctable, but the Schneider Platinum IRND and the True-Cut are the cleanest options for the EPIC in the Schneider family. Finally, Tiffen was a bit surprising. (See figure 5.) Tiffen’s IRND filter and T1 filter together were not enough to combat the contamination, but the combination of the Tiffen IRND 1.8 + Tiffen Hot Mirror gave us the cleanest, most neutral image of all the combinations for the RED EPIC. The slight green cast that the T1 introduces (deliberately) is definitely visible in the iterations at top and bottom left in figure 5. The key to combatting contamination on the EPIC seems to be a Hot Mirror with any other ND filter: Formatt’s ND or Prostop IRND, Schneider’s ND or Platinum IRND, or Tiffen’s ND or IRND. A very important note here: the filter combinations that worked well for the RED EPIC will not work equally well with a different camera or a different sensor. Every camera requires its own filtration solutions to combat IR contamination, and only testing can tell you what the right

Figure 5: Four Tiffen filter combinations

combination is. Although some of these filters were less than effective for the RED EPIC, that

doesn’t mean the filters don’t work—they may work wonderfully for another camera system. dv

company Index Aaton .........................................................55 Adobe ................................ 30, 36, 56, 62, 70 AJA Video ..................................................55 Allen & Heath ............................................73 AlphaDogs.................................................54 Altiverb ......................................................47 American Zoetrope ..................................10 Apple ......................36, 56, 61, 64, 67, 73, 82 ARRI ..................................... 8, 16, 22, 55, 76 Audio Developments ...............................48 Audio-Technica.........................................73 Autodesk....................................................54 Avid ......................................................44, 56 Axle Video ...........................................58, 67 Barco ..........................................................37 BBC ............................................................14 BeachTek ...................................................66 Biscardi Creative Media ...........................56 Blackmagic Design .......................10, 55, 66 BoinxTV.....................................................60 Boris FX .....................................................58 Cache-A .....................................................58 CamTec Motion Picture Cameras ...........76 Canon U.S.A. ................. 8, 10, 28, 30, 36, 54 Carl Zeiss ...................................................25 Cinedeck ...................................................58 Convergent Design ...................................28 David&Goliath ..........................................14 Dell ............................................................16 Digital Bolex ..............................................55

Discovery Channel ...................................14 DPA Microphones ....................................48 DZED Systems ....................................31, 36 EditShare ...................................................55 EVS .............................................................58 Farmers Wife .............................................58 Formatt Hitech..........................................77 Fujinon ......................................................56 Future Media Concepts............................59 GoPro....................................... 10, 28, 55, 64 Grass Valley ...................................22, 57, 66 Halo Studios ..............................................49 Hitachi .......................................................57 Hornet .......................................................14 HP ..............................................................58 Ikonoskop..................................................55 IMAX..........................................................55 Intel ............................................................16 JVC .............................................................66 KipperTie...................................................70 KLIP Collective .........................................35 Kodak.........................................................71 Leica ..........................................................25 Let It Ripple ...............................................18 Litepanels ..................................................12 Livestream .................................................60 Lomo .........................................................16 Lowel .........................................................66 Luxology ....................................................69 Matrox .......................................................58

Method Studios.........................................14 Microsoft .............................................58, 60 Modul8 ......................................................37 Monogram ................................................36 Myt Works .................................................41 Neumann ..................................................48 NewTek ................................................12, 60 Next Limit ..................................................69 Nikon ....................................... 10, 28, 38, 55 Nomad Nation ..........................................31 NuGen Audio ............................................58 NVIDIA ......................................................57 Panasonic ......................................16, 40, 55 Quantel ......................................................57 Que Audio .................................................73 Rampant Design Tools .............................59 RED Digital Cinema ......... 22, 28, 54, 68, 76 Reduser.net ...............................................68 RØDE Microphones .................................73 Roland Systems Group .............................73 RSA.............................................................14 Rycote ........................................................73 Sachtler......................................................10 ScheduALL ................................................58 Schneider Optics ......................................77 Schoeps .....................................................48 Sennheiser ................................................73 Shure..........................................................73 Shutterstock ..............................................10 Silicon Imaging .........................................55

Skype .........................................................44 Soho VFX ...................................................16 Sony Electronics ..................... 22, 28, 57, 82 Sound Devices ........................ 14, 51, 52, 73 Soundelux .................................................47 SPY .............................................................10 Square Box Systems..................................58 Storage DNA..............................................58 Streaming Museum ..................................14 Studio 402..................................................31 Sundance Film Festival ............................35 Syfy.............................................................26 Technocrane ...............................................8 Telestream ...........................................60, 67 Teradek ......................................................60 The Foundry ..............................................69 Tiffen........................................ 28, 64, 66, 76 Times Square Arts.....................................14 TOLIS Group .............................................58 TouchEdit ..................................................58 Trion Worlds .............................................28 Ubisoft .......................................................30 Ustream .....................................................60 Varizoom ...................................................67 Vision Research ........................................55 Xytech Systems .........................................58 Yamaha ......................................................12 Zaxcom ......................................................48

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Mac Tech LED

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B&H Photo-Video-Pro Audio 78, 79

Company

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BeachTek

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Blackmagic Design

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Edelkrone

6, 7

www.edelkrone.com

Glidecam

glidecam.com

Shutterstock

footage.shutterstock.com

Ikan

ikancorp.com

Sony

sony.com

Take 1 Insurance

take1insurance.com

International Supplies

59, 61

internationalsupplies.com

JVC

pro.jvc.com

Videoguys

videoguys.com

Kino Flo

kinoflo.com

Zeiss

zeiss.com

dv.com | 4.2013

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production diary

STEFAN SARGENT

Stefan’S Giveaway A Tale of Two Cameras

emember last month’s Production Diary? I wrote that I put my two Sony HVR-V1U camcorders on eBay. What a fiasco!

aaarrrggghhhBaY Winner of camera #1 complains that it is broken; the cassette mechanism is jammed open. Would I sell a broken camera? Of course not. I pay for the UPS return and refund his money. And guess what? It really IS broken. Hmmm… No choice but to send it away to be repaired. Two lots of UPS shipping charges plus a $550 repair bill. Can it get worse? You bet…

“Thank you! Thank you.” He’s thrilled—so am I.

Final Cut Pro X It’s a month since Lucas received his camera. I’ll swing around this Saturday. “How’s it going?” “The camera doesn’t appear on the desktop, I can’t drag and drop.” I’m about to explain that he has to use Apple FCP X, but he already knows. In fact, he’s shot and edited a dramatic short complete with actors. The timeline has added gunshot flashes and sound effects. “Should I use library music or compose my own?”

gee, i was only trying to sell a camera.

Worse and Worser The winner of camera #2 thought he could buy now—pay later. No dice. Then he asks his mum. Nope, she won’t lend him money either. I click an eBay button saying something like “buyer didn’t pay” and he goes BALLISTIC. His e-mails are in CAPITALS accusing me of VENGANCE and THREATING (his spelling, not mine).

mY giveaWaY to You I still have that other camera. It came back from the repairers looking like new, with a six-month guarantee. Will it be you? I’m looking for another Herzog, Rodriguez or Tarantino. When fame and fortune eventually strikes, just say you owe it all to me.

hoW to Win From hate to halo Fate steps in. An e-mail from Peter Meyers, my first U.S. client, from ’99. “Stef.”—He always calls me Stef. I hate it.— “Stef., Lucas wants a video camera—tell me what to buy him.” Lucas is 12 and as smart as a tack. In ’99, he simply didn’t exist. Weird. “Oh Peter, have I got a camera for Lucas!” I wait until Peter’s Christmas party. Lucas can’t believe his eyes. He’s so happy. We sit on the floor and I do a quick run-through of the camera. Here’s the auto/manual switch. Use the ND filter for exterior shooting. You can drop the shutter speed in low-light conditions. All meaningless mumbo jumbo, he’s just too excited to listen.

Simply e-mail Cristina, our beloved editor, a few lines about why you should win my camera and what you want to do with it. No more than 250 words. The e-mail subject line must be GIVEAWAY. Entries to be in by May 1, 2013. The winner will be announced in the July 2013 issue. Here’s the e-mail address: cclapp@nbmedia.com.

Future movie director with his sony hvr-v1u camera

not so Fine Print Your name and the winning e-mail will be published. I want to see some amazing videos from you on YouTube. Dare to sell the camera on aarrgghhBay: you will have your subscription to Digital Video magazine canceled, a horse’s head placed on your pillow, and the bad fairies will come and get you. Now write that winning e-mail. Good luck. dv

the sony v1u comes in this nifty case—with all accessories, battery, charger, tape stock and owner manual.

dv.com | 04.2013