Definition May 2018 - Sampler

NO WIRES Nine new wireless tech products definitionmagazine.com

May 2018

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HOME GROWN

REVIEWS SONNET FUSION DRIVE DJI ZENMUSE X7 CAMERA KINEFINITY TERRA 4K

UK PRODUCTIONS RIVAL BEST IN THE WORLD

AERIAL SPECIAL

ARE DRONES REALLY CHEAPER THAN HELICOPTERS? SEE PAGE 38

CRYPT COLOUR Tomb Raider’s pipeline

SCANDI NOIR

Marcella’s nightmare take 2

NEW CAPTURE Immersion suits

LOOKING SHARP

New 8K from resurgent giant

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03 VERA

Drama and production out of the top draw – and it’s home-grown.

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Welcome

New things, and especially new places, are attractive. Like magpies we are attracted to the shiny but sometimes to the detriment of what we have always known. So it has been with our relentless search for the best drama productions. But like the characters in the Pina Colada song we have gone full circle this month and searched closer to home with two shoot stories from ITV, Vera and Marcella Season 2.

Vera especially caught our eye, with DOP Ed Moore bringing his full toy box to the episode called ‘Darkwater’. He, his director and editor strove to bring the relationship between the look and the narrative closer than ever with unusual framing, clever drone shot selection, smart use of shallow focusing, multiple shots of certain scenes and a minimal lighting design.

Unfortunately for a group of ex-BBC camera people all this progressive shooting technique was too much and they waged a turgid campaign against Ed, calling for his return to film school.

We thought that Ed had pushed the art of cinematography on and that’s to be celebrated when there is so much great-looking content vying for your attention.

JULIAN MITCHELL EDITOR @DEFINITIONMAGS

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A-list Hollywood Director Stephen Soderbergh shoots a movie with Claire Foy using only an iPhone 7 Plus camera. Discuss...

07 ou might be amazed that a Hollywood director whose film credits include cinematic delights like Solaris, Ocean’s Eleven and Erin Brockovich has shot his latest movie, Unsane, with just an iPhone 7 Plus mobile phone. But remember that Steven Soderbergh did make Sex, Lies and Videotape for $1 million and it went on to make over $24 million! Unsane stars Claire Foy (the Queen from The Crown) and Juno Temple. The film was shot in 4K, and the director heavily used a DJI OSMO stabiliser and FiLMiC Pro software to bring some semblance of cinema to the look.

IMAGE Director Steven Soderbergh on set, directing and shooting Claire Foy using the stabilised iPhone. Š 2017 20TH CENTURY FOX

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NEWS INTERVIEW

SHARP’S 8K MISSION After their purchase by Foxconn, Sharp has targeted the wide broadcast and growing non-broadcast 8K camera market WORDS JULIAN MITCHELL

harp has been a pioneer of flat panelled displays for a long time. They launched the first LCD display and also the first 8K display commercially in Japan roughly two years ago. European general manager Sid Stanley lays down Sharp’s pedigree for what’s coming. “R&D and pushing the boundaries of advanced display technologies for the business and consumer markets is nothing new to Sharp. What we’ve seen is an acceleration in that, after we were DEFINITION MAY 2018

purchased by Foxconn almost two years ago. It has injected more R&D into Sharp’s agenda, which has benefitted our day-to-day roadmaps and added 8K as one of two key pillars of where we want to push for the future.”

For Sharp, there is a plan to produce professional video cameras and monitors, and this is a long-term strategy for the company. “Sharp was in real difficulties for four or five years, basically from the crash up until Foxconn bought it,” says

ABOVE The new Sharp 8K camera – out now.

Sid. “We were in survival mode and didn’t have any long-term plans, but once Foxconn were in the equation we secured our day-to-day business, and it became possible to flesh out roadmaps and think about where we wanted to go.

“Sharp decided that with its 8K expertise already in place, it wanted to broaden the 8K ecosystem by having content creation technology as part of the company’s portfolio. So we added a camcorder to the monitor range.

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INTERVIEW NEWS

NOT JUST OLYMPICS For those who might have thought that the new Sharp camera and monitor were just bound for the Tokyo Olympics, Sid explains that this is a long-term initiative. “When you’re a vendor that has the capacity to lead and to make markets, that’s where innovation comes from.

Sharp’s heritage is around LCD and clearly NHK’s plan to show the 2020 Olympic games in 8K is a stimulus in our domestic market, if you like.

We see both in the consumer space mid- to long-term globally, but in the business marketplace today an emerging requirement for higher resolutions than has previously been available. Clearly it’s at an incubation stage, but we are committed to working with partners in key verticals to understand what the business cases for those applications are and what the opportunities are.

We are already spending quite considerable sums, not only in R&D but in exhibitions like IFA and ISE, where we had 8K taking a prominent position, to start showing to the market what the technology can do and discussing possible applications.”

NON-BROADCAST MARKETS Content creation means different things to different people, and the fact that Sharp launches at IFA and ISE – which is more of an install show – makes you think that non-broadcast markets are also on their minds, as Sid explains: “Sharp is attending NAB and I’ll also look to exhibit at a

European broadcast show somewhere but for Sharp, it’s a learning experience. Clearly the professional market is still adopting 4K both in terms of a resolution to display and a resolution to move around networks with the bandwidth that’s available – it’s still in the early stages of getting to grips with 8K. Moving 8K around in a broadcast transmission sense is probably a long way off.

“If I assess the enthusiasm we had at ISE where we had resellers from medical, automotive, corporate reception areas where they are superexcited about what this technology could do for them, whether it’s just simply showing off in the reception sense or whether in an R&D sense, showing images and components going through various processes and gaining insight in to what’s going on. So if you think about medical diagnostics, we had medical research resellers who were really excited how this sort of technology could help diagnosis.

“We’ve got a bag full of leads from ISE and will continue to support those leads. Broadcast and production is not an area that we are experts in, but we’ll learn from NAB and we’ll learn from further sales and marketing activities in Europe.”

Sharp’s current camera form factor isn’t going to change in the short-term, but might react to the markets that it has been exposed to.

The company is presently on this fact-finding exercise. “If there’s a

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BELOW The camera’s form factor isn’t going to change short-term.

WE HAD MEDICAL RESEARCH RESELLERS WHO WERE REALLY EXCITED HOW THIS SORT OF TECHNOLOGY COULD HELP DIAGNOSIS @DEFINITIONMAGAZINE |

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SHOOT STORY VERA

Darkwater Darkwater

ITV’s popular police drama Vera has also been championed for its cinematography, we think this ITV’s popular dramaexample Vera has episodepolice is a great of also it been championed for its cinematography; the Darkwater episode is a great example WORDS JULIAN MITCHELL IMAGES WARNER BROS. STUDIOS WORDS JULIAN MITCHELL IMAGES ITV/ED MOORE

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VERA SHOOT STORY

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IT’S BECOME A KIND OF PROVING GROUND FOR NEW DIRECTORS AND DOPS AS YOU AREN’T HELD BACK he production world is moving so fast that there are bound to be some casualties.

Improvements in technology like LED lighting and new sensors impact on technique and craft but also new blood has new ways of doing things. So it was with Vera, a UK police drama series with featurelength episodes. Each series has four episodes shot with different DOPs and directors; similar to many other episodic shows in that respect.

Unfortunately, the new series of Vera and Shetland have attracted some internet trolling, especially from a group of retired BBC camera people. They actually wrote a letter to Ed Moore’s agent, the DOP of both, saying that he didn’t know how to frame anything and should go back to film school. We think that they should applaud this superb example of new style visual storytelling.

You can tell that we at Definition are big fans of Vera and especially an episode from the latest block called Darkwater. DOP Ed Moore and Director Lee Haven Jones teamed up for this show and have gone on to shoot a few Shetland episodes, also for ITV in the UK. Vera isn’t as serialised as it used to be so episodes don’t need the same story thread entwined through each. This has encouraged this swapping out of talent with the safety net of the same colourist to match anything that needs it.

As a result, you get four individual little films, each with an identity of its own, something that was encouraged by the series producer. DOP Ed Moore thinks this approach is very refreshing and has unveiled new talent. “It’s become a kind of proving ground for new directors and DOPs as you aren’t held back by fitting a house style,” he says.

“That said, of course there are only a number of ways to shoot the same sets. You watch a few episodes and get a sense of the style so you’re not wildly out.” @DEFINITIONMAGAZINE |

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MAY 2018 DEFINITION

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GRADE STORY TOMB RAIDER

Colour the Crypt After last month’s description of the shooting of Tomb Raider, this month we follow the dailies route WORDS JULIAN MITCHELL IMAGES WARNER BROS. STUDIOS

ith most filming taking place in Cape Town, then moving across the globe to finish in London, planning was paramount, especially when it came to DIT, dailies and colour pipeline priorities. DOP George Richmond, put his trust in Joshua Callis-Smith, with whom he’d worked on projects including the Kingsman films and Eddie the Eagle.

The scale of the film, alongside the contrasting shoot locations, meant the colour pipeline had to be seamless. Prior to principal photography the pair spent time with Company 3 to ensure monitors were calibrated. Two primary looks DEFINITION MAY 2018

were developed with colourist Greg Fisher, based on test shooting in South Africa. LUTs were created to deliver George’s desired aesthetic on a scene-by-scene basis on set. “Rich, warmer colours were used for the exteriors, set on the tropical island of Yamatai, while interiors such as the tombs, took on a darker, cooler palette. These juxtaposing looks add to the dynamic shift tonally in the film,” says Joshua.

The film was shot primarily in 4:3 anamorphic, with a 2.8K ARRI raw negative captured on the ALEXA SXT and ALEXA Mini as well as 2.5K CinemaDNG RAW shot on the Blackmagic Cinema Camera.

ABOVE The interior shots required a dark, cool colour palette.

CDL Heading back to Cape Town to begin primary photography, Joshua set the initial look using Pomfort Live Grade Pro, and created a CDL for each scene. This was then passed through the on-set DaVinci Resolve system to be applied to the dailies’ colour.

“I graded each roll on a shot-by-shot basis, matching any inconsistencies in lenses or exterior light, keeping to George’s exact look,” he explains.

Joshua used an iMac as his primary DIT machine, mounted onto a foldable cart, allowing him to move around set. “I monitored all the camera feeds on two 25in monitors, fed by a Smart Videohub DEFINITIONMAGAZINE.COM

TOMB RAIDER GRADE STORY

WE HAD TO FIND A SYSTEM THAT WOULD ALLOW FOR A SMOOTH TRANSITION BETWEEN CAPE TOWN AND LONDON

matrix,” he explains. “This allowed me to feed graded or log images to the monitors and scopes, while also distributing pictures to the relevant departments. Working with George, we used SmallHD OLED monitors on the cameras, which I sent a graded return feed to, so he could light his shots and refine that lighting set-up if required.”

Transitioning between live colour and dailies colour, Joshua found this approach allowed him to work more efficiently. “Using Resolve, I can work at an incredible speed; the software is very intuitive when it comes to colour. My project is organised in a way that allows me to navigate through hundreds of hours of material and pinpoint what I need quickly,” he comments.

“Meanwhile, the colour tab allows me to match material and – when needed – work into the image further with secondary corrections to enhance a shot. All of this can be fed easily through to the dailies team who then process the colour information and pass the soft deliverables on to editorial and marketing.”

IMAGES The movie was shot partly in Cape Town, partly in London.

“Having an entire dailies department on any large job is essential,” Joshua comments. “The volume of material, sheer number of cameras and number of units requires sizeable, dedicated dailies teams that can run 24/7 whenever and wherever it is needed.”

Ensuring that George’s vision translated all the way through the colour pipeline fell to Joshua . “We had to find a system that would allow for a smooth transition between Cape Town and London. DaVinci Resolve acted as a base for this, with both companies reproducing dailies based on the colour information passed on from set,” he says.

The Refinery took responsibility for the first section of dailies. After wrap each day, Joshua delivered a Resolve project and rushes to the lab.

Allan Taylor, dailies colourist at The Refinery would then log and sync pictures and audio to populate his colour timelines, relying on Resolve’s support of custom metadata to process the media, whilst retaining all the metadata needed for editorial exports.

“When we were happy that everything was logged correctly we ran off the various soft deliverables, including editorial MXF files and viewing dailies,” explains Allan.

“Where anomalies were found, I would rebuild timelines based on new bin structures to accommodate new footage. In these instances, we would use the ColorTrace feature

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in Resolve, which allowed us to replicate the colour work done on set by Josh, often utilising multiple nodes beyond that of the primary.”

“With Tomb Raider, what helped immensely was the ability to create a custom metadata view for media processing, whilst retaining all the metadata for exports for editorial,” Allan continues. “This allowed us to focus on the main tags required by Company 3, yet also gave us flexibility with editorial’s requirements. The fact that Resolve is now a fully-fledged NLE means we could process any small editorial requests: a massive time saver, as we didn’t need to jump into another application or render out proxies before fulfilling these occasional requests.”

Techniques developed throughout the Tomb Raider project have now been incorporated into The Refinery’s day-to-day workflow.

“Attention to detail was integral,” reflects Allan. “We now set up custom metadata views as part of our standard procedure, even when jobs aren’t going to utilise media sharing platforms. It helps operators focus on many details at a glance, and enables us to move more quickly through the initial stages of any workflow.” Once filming was completed in South Africa, and dailies delivered, the crew flew to the UK for the final leg of the shoot, with Greg Fisher at Company 3 London completing the final DI.

TERABYTES With 180TB of principal photography, equalling 186 hours of footage processed through Joshua’s on-set rig, having a dailies team in South Africa as well as the UK was an important contributing factor to the smooth running of the colour pipeline. @DEFINITIONMAGAZINE |

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FEATURE ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT

SMOOTH OPERATOR

DOP Patrick Stewart is a master of the handheld shot. He’s currently bringing his skills to bear on Season 5 of Arrested Development, making full use of his favoured set of Fujinon Cabrio lenses WORDS TERRY HOPE IMAGES NETFLIX / PATRICK STEWART DEFINITION MAY 2018

successful handheld shot has a documentary-style vibrancy and immediacy that can sometimes be lacking in footage that’s fully stabilised, while still retaining enough of a professional feel to make it clear that any movement is intentional.

Several highly successful cinematic and TV productions have used this approach and when it works it can be outstanding, becoming an intrinsic and crucial element of the finished whole. There is, however, an art to the process and it takes years of practice to acquire the necessary skills as a camera operator to pull it all off.

One of those that has very much mastered the process is DOP Patrick Stewart, whose list of handheld camera credits stretches back some 35 years. One of his landmark successes was the iconic Mike Figgis movie

Timecode, shot in 2000. The final production was constructed from four continuous 93-minute handheld takes that were filmed simultaneously by four camera operators. Patrick was one of those, and the experience of shooting what was essentially a live production over that amount of time had a huge influence on him and confirmed him as an acknowledged expert in his field.

Since then he’s filmed many other productions that have centred on handheld footage, such as Flight of the Conchords and seven seasons of the hit US TV series The League. He’s currently bringing his skills to bear on Season 5 of Arrested Development, the highly influential TV sitcom featuring the dysfunctional Bluth family with a cult following around the world. Originally aired on Fox for three seasons from November 2003 DEFINITIONMAGAZINE.COM

ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT FEATURE

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I WANTED THE LOOK TO STILL BE DOCUMENTARY STYLE BUT MAYBE JUST A BIT MORE CINEMATIC

LEFT When master

of handheld shots, DOP Patrick Stewart joined Arrested Development he brought along his own Fujinon Cabrio lenses. Why?

BELOW Patrick © Mike Yarish

Stewart with his Fujinon Cabrio lens on set.

I knew that this programme had a number of seasons left in it – four in fact – and so was guaranteed work.

Also at that time I think myself and many others didn’t really understand Netflix, and so I wasn’t aware of how big and influential they would become.

“Fortunately I got another chance when Season 5 was being envisaged, and I was approached because I’d been working with art director Dan Butts on Flight of the Conchords. He called me up full of enthusiasm and told me that they wanted me to be involved.

“So I met up with the show’s creator, Mitchell Hurwitz to talk it all through, which was a little awkward because I had to tell him that I’d been watching the early episodes and, although I’d found them really funny, I was struggling to cope with the camera work in the earlier series to the point where I’d had to give up!

“That’s the problem when you’re a cameraman yourself, because you can’t help looking at that aspect of things and it can sometimes prevent you seeing the bigger picture.

“I went back and persevered a little longer and, after watching around 25 shows, I’d really got more

of a feel for it and was impressed by how inventive it all was. It’s just so full of references to other things that are going on and every line is a clever line. And the voiceover approach is one of my favourite ways of working: just one line can bring the viewer right up to speed in the action. So I loved the show and wanted to sit down to talk through what I could bring to it. I wanted the look to still be documentary style but maybe just a bit more cinematic.”

THREE CAMERA SET-UP One of the major changes Patrick envisaged was the use of three camera operators, up from the previous two. To the trained eye the use of two cameras was placing restrictions on the number of shots that could be utilised, particularly in instances where three to five people might be talking to one another, when an additional viewpoint would enable a greater range of choice and lead to fewer scenes having to be setting up again and reshot.

Another big plus was Patrick’s discovery of a new camera to use, the Panasonic VariCam LT. “Prior to starting the Arrested Development job I’d done a lot of testing,” he says,

to February 2006, the show, despite critical acclaim, disappeared from the screens for several years before being revived by Netflix in May 2013.

The style of the programme has always been fly on the wall, as though the actors were unaware they were being filmed. It relies heavily on running gags and a voiceover narration from director Ron Howard that brings the viewer up to date with the storyline as each episode progresses. The revival of the series has proved to be a big success, hence the decision to commission a further season, and Patrick is enjoying being involved in such a high profile project.

“I was actually approached to be involved in the filming of Season 4,” he says, “but the timing wasn’t right for me then. For a start I would have had to have walked away from my work at The League to take it on, and @DEFINITIONMAGAZINE |

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AERIAL DRONES VS HELICOPTERS

DRONES VS HELICOPTERS Is it a question one of ‘one or the other’ or is it more complicated than that? David Baillie asks the question WORDS DAVID BAILLIE IMAGES HFS / PDG / LEC PARK

elicopters are expensive.

Especially with a fancy gyrostabilised camera on the front.

Current logic has it that drones are cheaper. After all, a drone is just a few rotating butchers’ blades held together by bits of carbon fibre and powered by some fancy batteries that haven’t heard of the Duracell bunny.

But as an aerial DOP who works with both, I’m increasingly unconvinced by the economics of the rate card.

Don’t get me wrong, drones are amazing. My gripe is with the system that means the decision on whether to book a drone or a helicopter is usually based on the day rate, rather than cinematographic or financial creativity.

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ABOVE Which makes the best financial sense: a drone or a helicopter?

MISCONCEPTION There’s a misconception that drones can now do what helicopters used to do. They can’t. They can do incredible things, including much that a helicopter can’t; they can take your camera through open windows, let it drift down forest tracks, and have been fantastic in sports coverage and upping the game of programmes like Grand Designs. But if you need a sweeping shot coming in off the sea on the Northumberland coast in winter, I’d put my money on a helicopter any day.

Drones don’t do wind, and they don’t do endurance. Mixing blustery wind, complicated background artist choreography, and an eight-minute

flight duration is a sure-fire way to lose a lot of friends on set and money.

At this point I can feel a budget (is that the collective noun?) of line producers bristling with irritation.

And I understand that (some of my best friends are, or were, line producers). Helicopters are expensive.

But if you’re shooting somewhere likely to be windy, at least you’ll get the shot with a 2000kg helicopter, you won’t with a 20kg drone.

But there are even better ways to make helicopters pay their way. And for me this is the nub of the problem.

Too often we aerial DOPs are booked at the last minute on the basis of getting a couple of shots on one day’s shoot of one episode of a drama DEFINITIONMAGAZINE.COM

DRONES VS HELICOPTERS AERIAL

ABOVE Helicopters have the edge on drones for fast longer focal length work but the new DJI X7 drone can replicate that.

series. If I was ever granted three wishes by a passing fairy godmother, my first would be the chance to sit down with the line producer at the planning stage of a shoot and show how they can wring the maximum value from an aerial shoot, be it drone or helicopter. (My second would be for an ALEXA LF, and the third is beyond the scope of this article.)

PLANNING If producers, directors and main unit DOPs engage with us at the planning stage we can offer two important services, which I wouldn’t even charge for. The first is our creative judgement, based on experience, as to whether the aesthetic and mood the director @DEFINITIONMAGAZINE |

AT THE PLANNING STAGE WE CAN OFFER TWO IMPORTANT SERVICES. THE FIRST IS OUR CREATIVE JUDGEMENT

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and main unit DOP are after is best achieved by hanging the camera under a drone or a helicopter. And there will be many times when a drone is the right choice. There may also be times when a stabilised head on a Russian arm might be a better bet.

But if we feel the camera does need to leave terra firma to tell the story, and we reckon a helicopter is the most likely way to guarantee the shot, then we can also suggest ways to get more bang for your buck. A fair chunk of the cost of a helicopter shoot is the stabilised system on the nose and the money you’ve spent flying it to your location. Once it’s on location, the only extra cost is the flying time.

And the more you fly and the more we shoot, the more value you’re getting for those fixed costs.

So what else can we do with a helicopter if we are in at the planning stage? Well here’s one example. Some years ago I shot some aerials on a drama. The scene involved a chase between two quad bikes on open ground. We did the planned aerials in a couple of takes and landed. Nearby the grips were still struggling to rig a Libra mount to the camera quad for a lower level tracking shot.

We had a quiet word with the director and reminded him that helicopters can fly at any height, including the couple of feet above ground planned for the lens on the tracking quad. Within five minutes we were airborne and knocking off tracking shots so low that we got mud from the action quad’s wheels on the camera. If we’d been involved at the planning stage on a similar shoot we might have saved the production the

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cost of that tracking vehicle.

Another clever trick of helicopters is zipping around very fast. And carrying people. So if you need a dramatic establisher of a character or two in a different location, pop them in the helicopter, we’ll fly to that location, drop them off, shoot them, and bring them back. What’s more we’ll shoot some GVs on the way there and back.

SHOTOVER There’s no end to the number of useful extra shots we can get if we’re in at the planning stage. If an aerial shoot is budgeted for block one of a series, but block two could do with some dramatic sunsets, and we know that in advance, we might be able to pick those up on our flight back to base.

And just to show what a fairminded aerial DOP I am, here’s a money-saving tip for a drone booking. The new Shotover U1 drone has a Shotover G1 gimbal hanging underneath it. And guess what?

It comes off and can be fixed to a tracking vehicle or a boat. Yet more bang for your buck and less time for your aerial DOP to be left hanging around the catering truck.

Since that fairy godmother hasn’t turned up, here’s an open request to directors and line producers: if you think you want aerial shots of any kind, talk to us in pre-production. Use our experience to help you choose between a drone and a helicopter, and listen to how we can give you the best value for money for either. I guarantee there will be times when a helicopter is cheaper than a drone.

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AERIAL DJI REVIEW

DJI ZENMUSE X7 Ever since DJI bought Hasselblad we’ve been waiting for bigger sensors for the drone market. Now here’s the Zenmuse X7 camera WORDS LEC PARK IMAGES LEC PARK / DJI JI’s is an amazing story: becoming a powerhouse of innovation that has just about taken over the drone world, save the heavy-lift part that embeds separate cinematic cameras. In fact, from the heavy-lift drone point of view, it was this seeming lack of true cinematic imagery that was used as a stick with which to beat DJI. The company’s purchase of Hasselblad in 2016 caught everyone’s attention as it opened up a world of larger sensors and respected lenses for the drone company.

Dealing with DJI can be frustrating or abrasive, especially if you want to be first to a certain product. Some of the problems are teething ones while others are quality control, but you work around these things.

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Straight out of the box you can tell that the Zenmuse X7 is a beautifully engineered piece of kit, but perhaps better than that is the new glass. This is a big step up from the X5S camera, which used thirdparty and rebranded glass. These new lenses are DJI’s own. The move closes DJI’s ecosystem as the D mount is its own innovation. This makes perfect sense; support now is easier as they are not trying to reconcile working with and supporting other brands.

The four new lenses – all primes: 16mm, 24mm, 35mm and 50mm – are designed to work perfectly with the camera, both optically and balance wise, which eliminates many problems. If you work with lens adapters, you’ll run into all sorts of problems that DJI’s support can help with.

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DJI REVIEW AERIAL

sensor, low light, multiple aspect ratios, multiple frame rates – it does 4K 50p. It ticks all the boxes for the high-end. I’ve been using it quite a lot on high-end of TV. That market doesn’t want that sharp look, they want a subtler image and they know what’s available. There have been occasions where I have persuaded productions that they don’t need to be spending money on heavy-lift drones because they’re limited enough as it is when you’re trying to fly in tight situations.

But it is the low-light capabilities that really shine. The previous sensors, the X5 and X5s, started to fall apart when fully open and you had to work with the ISO to get anything. It was never really respected as a lowlight camera; it was never like a Sony A7S for instance.

HASSELBLAD IMPACT When DJI bought Hasselblad I wondered whether together they would develop something for the heavy-lift market with a heavy-lift style camera and gimbal. Going that way would have made it difficult to close the ecosystem. Just think, for instance, of the glass combinations with a PL mount that people would try and make work. DJI products’ strength is their stability; the way they retain their stability in some conditions is almost like witchcraft.

When the Zenmuse X7 came out it was like DJI’s first steps in attacking the high-end market. I wouldn’t say the film market especially as that market wants to retain what they are used to, what they want to use.

But the specs on the X7 speak for themselves: 6K Raw, Super 35mm @DEFINITIONMAGAZINE |

ABOVE AND TOP

Working at over 4000m and -30°C is a real test of any drone – and the human operator.

Grab is Jungfrau research station.

LEFT The wait is

over: The Zenmuse X7 is the fruit of DJI and Hasselblad’s joint labours.

SHOOTING WITH THE X7 I bought the camera and all the lenses and went straight to work.

I really had to keep an eye on my focusing with the bigger sensor as it offers a significant depth-of-field, especially when you’re shooting high resolution like the 5.2K ProRes 4:2:2 – which is definitely the way forward for post work.

The Raw stuff is lovely, but unless you have a DIT with a powerful workstation and the ability to do it, you almost have to wait for your results. The 5.2K ProRes is great and I use it all the time. It’s a wide image and not far off the full width of the sensor and keeps the height of HD so 2160x5280 which is 2.44:1 so if you need to drop it in with anamorphic

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footage, which I had to do on my first job with it, it’ll work.

That job wanted to fly anamorphic lenses on the drone but it just wasn’t the right situation.

I showed them a 6K image where they could take their crop out of the middle. I’ve seen the result and you wouldn’t know the difference. So you had a situation where they might have wanted a big heavy-lift drone and Hawk anamorphic lenses, but then there’s the insurance that goes with it when you’re chasing cars really close.

For me it was a great feeling to see this new camera work like this on its first outing and to see people very impressed with what it could do.

The speed and flexibility of the craft coupled with the sensor gives you the results that you just can’t do with other kit. I don’t think there is any other 6K kit you can throw around in any weather condition and get immaculate results from. There is no point in having a 6K image if it isn’t useable.

In Switzerland I was at 4200m (14,000 feet) at -30˚C with about 20mph winds and I was flying it around like I was at sea level on a nice day. I was using high altitude props, but you just wouldn’t have taken any other kit out in those conditions.

Also the truth is that the human gives out before the drone so if you’re setting up say a heavy-lift drone you wouldn’t have time for what you wanted to shoot as you would be too cold. On that project it was so cold that the airframe froze absolutely solid when I brought it in but I didn’t have a problem in flight.

I DON’T THINK THERE IS ANY OTHER 6K KIT YOU CAN THROW AROUND IN ANY WEATHER CONDITION AND GET IMMACULATE RESULTS FROM

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MAY 2018 DEFINITION

definition_May.indd 64

06/04/2018 16:14

SONNET FUSION DRIVE USER REVIEW

65

LIGHTNING FAST

SSD technology mixed with a Thunderbolt 3 connection promises speeds unheard of in single unit storage WORDS JULIAN MITCHELL

onnet asked us to review its new 1TB Fusion PCIe SSD with a Thunderbolt 3 connection, but it took us a while to find a home for it. As it turned out not many of our contacts had a full Thunderbolt 3 infrastructure so we couldn’t test the advertised speeds. We wanted to test the claims of up to 2600MB/s or at least to the 1400MB/s that would be available through a Thunderbolt 3 to Thunderbolt 3 connection.

Other than this important speed factor, the Fusion drive is definitely housed as a ‘pro’ product with a solid aluminium enclosure and heat sink all around.

Importantly the Fusion drive is bus powered, which in the time poor world of production is very important; nobody wants to be looking for a mains lead when you need a last-minute transfer or render.

The unit is eminently grab-able but you wouldn’t say it was pocketable so you wouldn’t want to turn it into a portable device as such.

Another point in its favour though is the use of a captive cable so you’re not searching for the right one. Fusion is also PC and Mac workstations agnostic. @DEFINITIONMAGAZINE |

ABOVE Offering Thunderbolt 3, this SSD is a real speed machine.

THE FUSION DRIVE IS BUS POWERED, WHICH IN THE TIME POOR WORLD OF PRODUCTION IS VERY IMPORTANT; NOBODY WANTS TO BE LOOKING FOR A MAINS LEAD

The Sonnet Fusion PCIe SSD is available from Holdan for £1,015+VAT.

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SPEED MACHINE It’s obvious that workstation replacement doesn’t necessarily happen as soon as a faster connection is announced. However, it was great news that Cinelab, one of the only film processing labs left in the UK, had just invested in a new iMac Pro and immediately plugged in the Fusion drive to see how it could fit in to its way of transferring scanned film. They found almost instantly that 16-bit 4K DPX files were flying through and they were rendering programming at the unheard of speed of 100 frames per second.

They also recorded transfer speeds of 1300MB/s which is as advertised when some computers connect only two PCIe lanes (x2 PCIe Gen 3) to some or all ports. Most computers

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equipped with Thunderbolt 3 connect four PCIe lanes (x4 PCIe Gen 3) to Thunderbolt 3.

Whatever the spec says the team at Cinelab were mightily impressed. They had kept an eye on SSD technology over the years and it was only this experience that made them serious potential buyers of these types of drive. For the company anything that increases the throughput of scanned film from scanner to server to portable drive is the way to go. For Cinelab, a drive like the Sonnet Fusion would sit on the end of the iMac Pro and deal with any type of transfer or rendering project without moving files from the drive including output to all edit file formats and final DI conforms from select take scanning.

MAY 2018 DEFINITION

66

4K CAMERA LISTINGS

DEFINITION’S 4K CAMERA LIST

We’ve decided to take the brakes off the list as far as capture resolution is concerned.

Now our starting point is 4K; after that the sky’s the limit

ARRI ALEXA LF 90FPS

14 + STOPS

LPL MOUNT

4448x3096

ARRI ALEXA MINI SxS / SXR

ARRI’s long awaited large format camera arrives with a package of camera, new lens mount and new Signature lenses. Expect plenty of use by Netflix. Sensor tech is still the ALEV-III technology with big photosites.

SPECIFICATION

200FPS

14 STOPS

PL MOUNT

2880x1620

SxS

New features include the EXT Sync function, which allows sensors and operational parameters of up to 15 ALEXA Minis to be synchronised to a master ALEXA Mini. Slaves can assume parameters like frame rate, shutter angle or ND setup of the master.

SPECIFICATION

SENSOR – FORMAT AND SIZE

CMOS, 36.70x25.54 mm - 4448x3096, ø 44.71 mm

SENSOR – FORMAT AND SIZE

CMOS, 16:9 (1.78:1), 23.8x13.4mm – S35

FRAME RATES

ARRIRAW: 0.75 - 90fps ProRes: 0.75 – 60fps

FRAME RATES

Up to 200fps in ProRes

LATITUDE (STOPS)

14+

LATITUDE (STOPS)

14

LENS MOUNT

LPL with PL-to-LPL adapter

LENS MOUNT

PL, EF, B4 w/ Hirose connector

EXPOSURE INDEX

EI 800

DIGITAL SAMPLING

2880x1620, uncompressed ARRIRAW/1920x1080

RECORDED BIT DEPTH FORMAT AND TIME

16 bit linear ALEXA Wide Gamut/Log C colour space.

Output colour spaces: Log C, Rec 709 or Rec 2020

RECORDED BIT DEPTH FORMAT AND TIME

3.2K: 3200x1800; 4K UHD: 3840x2160 (up-sampled from 3.2K); 4:3 2.8K: 2880x2160 (up to 2944x2160)

RECORDING RESOLUTIONS

Sensor modes – LF Open Gate 4448x3096; LF 16:9 3840x2160; LF 2.39:1 4448x1856

WEIGHT (KG)

2.3 (camera body with titanium PL lens mount)

DEFINITION MAY 2018

DEFINITIONMAGAZINE.COM

4K CAMERA LISTINGS

ARRI ALEXA SXT EV 120FPS

14 STOPS

PL MOUNT

2880x2160

ARRI ALEXA SXT W

SxS/SXR

SXT ALEXAs get the sensor from ALEXA, the electronics from the A65 and the colour management from AMIRA. In-camera rec is ProRes 4K UHD/CINE. A direct response to requests for cutting-edge digital capture with traditional elements of the film cameras.

SPECIFICATION

67

120FPS

> 14 STOPS

PL MOUNT

2880x1620

SxS

Based on the ALEXA SXT Plus, the SXT W has replaced the SXT Plus and Studio models with an industrial version of the Amimon chipset for wireless transmission.

ARRI has ruggedised the W mainly for feature work.

SPECIFICATION

SENSOR – FORMAT AND SIZE

16:9 or 4:3 sensor mode. 4:3 output only for ARRIRAW and ProRes 2K recording

SENSOR – FORMAT AND SIZE

16:9 or 4:3 sensor mode. 4:3 output only available for ARRIRAW and ProRes 2K recording

FRAME RATES

At 16:9 – 0.75-120fps/60fps max when recording 2K ProRes/speeds adjustable with 1/1000fps precision

FRAME RATES

At 16:9 – 0.75–120fps/60fps max when recording 2K ProRes/speeds

LATITUDE (STOPS)

14+

LATITUDE (STOPS)

+14

LENS MOUNT

54 mm stainless steel LDS PL mount

LENS MOUNT

PL

DIGITAL SAMPLING

2880x2160 uncompressed ARRIRAW

DIGITAL SAMPLING

2880x1620, Uncompressed ARRIRAW/1920x1080

RECORDED BIT DEPTH FORMAT AND TIME

SxS PRO 64GB; SxS PRO+ 64GB; SxS PRO+ 128GB; LEXAR 3600x CFast 2.0 cards 256GB; XR Capture Drives 512GB; SXR Capture Drives 1TB & 2TB

RECORDED BIT DEPTH FORMAT AND TIME

16-bit linear internal image processing in full ALEXA Wide Gamut/Log C colour space. Target output colour spaces: Log C, Rec. 709 or Rec. 2020

WEIGHT (KG)

6.5 (SXT EV body with PL mount)

ARRI ALEXA 65 60FPS

> 14 STOPS

XPL MOUNT

5120x2880

ARRI AMIRA SXR/XR

With a sensor larger than a 5-perf 65mm film frame, ALEXA 65 heralded the start of large format. Now shooting as a main production camera for Netflix, Amazon and the rest. Only available exclusively through their global network of rental facilities.

SPECIFICATION

200FPS

14 STOPS

PL MOUNT

2880x1620

CFAST

Amira is now split up into standard, advanced and premium. Features include in-camera grading with preloaded 3D LUTs, as well as 200fps slow motion. From reportage and corporate films to TV drama and low-budget movies. Multicam mode too.

SPECIFICATION

SENSOR – FORMAT AND SIZE

ARRI A3X CMOS sensor, 54.12x25.58mm active image area. Open Gate aspect ratio of 2.11:1 (6560x3100)

SENSOR – FORMAT AND SIZE

Single CMOS, 16:9 (1.78:1), 28.17x18.3mm – 35 format

FRAME RATES

Capable of recording 20-60fps (open gate) using new SXR media. XR drives allow 27fps

FRAME RATES

Up to 200fps in ProRes

LATITUDE (STOPS)

14+

LATITUDE (STOPS)

14

LENS MOUNT

ARRI XPL mount with Lens Data System (LDS)

LENS MOUNT

PL, B4 mount w/ Hirose connector

DIGITAL SAMPLING

1.78 crop mode (5-perf 65mm): 5120x2880 and 1.50:1 crop mode – 4320x2880

DIGITAL SAMPLING

2880x1620, uncompressed ARRIRAW/1920x1080

RECORDED BIT DEPTH FORMAT AND TIME

Codex SXR Capture Drive 2000 GByte capacity Max. frame rate capability: 60 fps (Open Gate) Recording time: 43 minutes at 24 fps

RECORDED BIT DEPTH FORMAT AND TIME

HD 1920x1080, 2K 2048x1152, 3.2K ProRes 3200x1800 4K UHD 3840x2160

WEIGHT (KG)

10.5

WEIGHT (KG)

4.1 (camera body with PL lens mount)

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MAY 2018 DEFINITION