Prime Versus Zoom

[John Sharaf]

Daniel,

The new F3 is a terrific camera (I have two already) but hand holding it is still an issue, as third party supports systems are not yet in the market. I’ve seen a Vocas unit that’s pretty good, but I suspect you’ll be at the mercy of what the rental company has.

I mostly use my Zeiss 15.5-45 LWZ with this camera, and I highly recommend it, both for its quality and light weight (4.4 lbs). I would suggest you use this as your primary lens and supplement it with a 50, 85, 100 and (possibly) 135 or longer prime lens set that you can use for your interviews and other more telephoto tripod shots, and also when you need a faster lens.

As I say, the camera is terrific and makes a beautiful film like picture, and with two 64Gb cards you’ll be able to shoot all day (500 minutes!). It does white balance a little green so I suggest you set the R-Offset (in the Picture Profile) to +3 (on both A & B AWB positions) and also roll out the detail a little, to -15 to minimize the the video look. Outside the Cine 2 is the most aggressive setting to crush the highlights.

Have fun!

JS

[Daniel Gold]

Thanks John
im also considering using the cineroid viewfinder – have you used that? i tested it and was impressed

id love to use the zeiss zoom but i dont know if i can locate one in time

have you heard anything about the angenieux optimo zooms? – they have a 15-40 that might be close to the zeiss

im also considering the nano flash to improve upon the 8 bit 4:2:0 35MBPS that the F3 offers so that i could bump it up to 10 bit 4:2:2 100MBPS – that way id have the SXS cards as temporary back up and the nano CF cards as the “master” footage

any thoughts on that?

Daniel

Daniel Gold

[Robin Probyn]

nano is also 8 bit,but you,ll be able to bump up the Mbps thats for sure.. nano is a good bit of gear and very small and light.. I can see them being used alot on this Camera and the pana version..

[Todd Terry]

Yes, there will be differences in your primes and zooms. What the differences are?… can’t really say. It will just bear some testing as all lenses are different.

Zooms, as a general rule, will not be quite as sharp and a bit less contrasty than primes. But as I said, all lenses are different. The biggest difference, I’m betting, will come from differences in color temperature. Primes are usually used in a “matched” set… all lenses from the same batch, and they will have exactly the same characteristics and coatings. They should all look the same. Others, whether they be primes not of the set, or zooms, will obviously not be matched and may (probably will) look different. I almost always shoot superspeed primes only, but I do have a zoom (a pretty slow one) that I use on rare occasions. Due to its different coatings, it is much warmer than the matched primes. Much. It’s also a bit less contrasty. None of these characteristics are real problems though. The difference is not so great that they footage can’t be “re-matched” in post… although (when I remember to do so) I usually turn the color balance down on the camera by a couple of hundred degrees when using that zoom.

I wouldn’t sweat the speed of those lenses too much, unless you are planning to shoot some “Barry Lyndon” interiors by candlelight. They’re not superspeeds by any stretch, but T2.1 is still reasonably fast. And actually T2.8 is definitely in the “decently fast” range as far as zooms go… unless you want to go zooming with something like a Cooke superspeed zoom… but there you’re talking about a lens that costs more than your camera, all your other lenses, and possibly your car… all put together.

T2

__________________________________
Todd Terry
Creative Director
Fantastic Plastic Entertainment, Inc.
fantasticplastic.com

[Bob Cole]

[john sharaf] ” Outside the Cine 2 is the most aggressive setting to crush the highlights.”

John, could you please explain what you mean, and why you would want to do that. I’ve only heard of crushing the highlights being a bad thing.

I was about to post a question about deliberately using blown-out windows for interior interviews. I like the look of big blocks of pure white in the composition, but I’ve been leery of going over the 100-ish IRE limit. Am I behind the times, with that concern?

Bob C

[John Sharaf]

Bob,

The Cine Gamma settings in the EX1/3 and F3 cameras mimic the HyperGamma settings ion the Sony Broadcast cameras. They make a gamma curve more like film than video with extended toe and shoulder. with the highlights it’s like an aggressive knee curve that crushes the whites down so you hold more detail before it’s clipped off (white clip).

As far as using pure blocks of white (like a white backing or cyc) it’s more common to put that value at 80ire. A window about the same. You want to be careful about making too large a portion of the frame a 100% video as it can distort the transmission and/or audio.

JS

[Bob Cole]

Thanks John. I’ll be exploring those settings.

[john sharaf] “As far as using pure blocks of white (like a white backing or cyc) it’s more common to put that value at 80ire. A window about the same.”

Two more questions arise from your comments:

1. I appreciate what you are saying about the possible distorting effect of too much area at or above 100ire. Is there any way to know whether you have given too much of the frame over to 100ire? I’ve been working by seat-of-the-pants, trying to make sure that not “too much” of the frame is 100ire — but how much is too much, and is there a way to make sure that I’m not using “too much”? If I play back the video in the camera (usually the EX1R in my case now), and the audio is clean, am I safe?

2. When you say that “it’s more common to put that value at 80ire”, do you mean that there is an option to do that electronically, or are you talking about putting up large rolls of ND?

I’ve actually been pretty bold about using white, in large part because it hasn’t yet resulted in a catastrophe (and because I edit most of my footage, I can use the “broadcast safe” filter in Final Cut Pro). I try to use doors and windows in the background, esp. if they are architecturally interesting. But I’d like to know how to “do white” more safely.

Thanks so much for your help with this.

Bob C

[Richard Herd]

[Bob Cole] “resulted in a catastrophe”

Odds are it will never happen, (and of course catastrophe is overstatement). Here’s where it will happen.

I shot and edited for a hotel, which had an internal broadcast channel, so guests could watch what’s happening in local restaurants, bars, etc. You’ve seen these before.

Well the facilities department who set up the system did not clamp the IRE at 100, so any broadcast over IRE 100, any white space at all that peaked resulted in a very poor picture. Massive amounts of lines and distortion through the screen and also distorted video. The reason is pretty simple. You are sending more “electricity” through the cable than it can handle. Much like audio distortion when you turn it up too loud.

This is not an issue for web because it’s a different delivery system altogether.

This is not an issue for cable broadcast because the cable stations will clamp it before it airs.

[Todd Terry]

You can also clamp too-high levels in post, of course. I shoot overblown windows (for effect) all the time, and just make it “legal” later. I don’t worry about that too much at the shoot phase if that’s the look I need and want.

T2

__________________________________
Todd Terry
Creative Director
Fantastic Plastic Entertainment, Inc.
fantasticplastic.com

[Bob Cole]

[john sharaf] “As far as using pure blocks of white (like a white backing or cyc) it’s more common to put that value at 80ire. A window about the same. You want to be careful about making too large a portion of the frame a 100% video as it can distort the transmission and/or audio.”

That reminds me of a shoot against a roll of white paper. I brought a waveform monitor to the shoot because I was so concerned about distortion. The producer kept saying “Whiter!” She was looking at the picture monitor, I was looking at the waveform monitor. I was thinking “Maybe this should’ve been shot greenscreen so we could make it white — safely — in post.”