[Bruce Greene]

There are a bunch of tiny washers/spacers in the eyebrow axel. You may need to add more or re-orient them so that the wing-nut creates enough friction to hold the eyebrow.

Varicam/Steadicam Owner
Los Angeles, CA
http://www.brucealangreene.com

[Bruce Greene]

Hector,

I’ve used both, though it’s been many years since I’ve seen a mini worrall.

From my experience, the only gear heads that work with sufficient smoothness are the Panahead (not for sale) and the Arrihead. The original Worrall is pretty good, but is very heavy and doesn’t have 3 gears, and I think you’ll want all three gears.

I remember the mini as being kind of sticky and wobbly. The old mini mitchell head was just sticky. Sticky is not good in a gear head.

Varicam/Steadicam Owner
Los Angeles, CA
http://www.brucealangreene.com

[Bruce Greene]

Mauricio,

I couldn’t agree with you more. The Quicktime gamma thing is a huge problem for using Quicktime for internet or computer display of video.

Why? Even if you get your own computer sorted out (I use OS Leopard, and set my monitor to 1.8 gamma for viewing and displaying QT), no one else who uses Quicktime has this sorted out and one never knows what they are seeing.

Ironically, Apple was ahead of the curve with “Color Sync”, or using ICC profiles to characterize the computer display and talk to other applications (look how flawlessly Photoshop handles this issue now, for users who understand Photoshop!). Finally Safari uses ICC profiles to display web still images.

Unfortunately, Quicktime doesn’t tag the video with gamma and white point, and doesn’t (I guess until Snow Leopard) even consult the monitor ICC profile tag. And I don’t know what the heck Quicktime does on Windows or iPhones.

Finally, I’ve noticed significant gamma shifts when converting from one codec to another and playing in the same Quicktime player software.

I guess what all this means is that for color correction, an output card/device and broadcast monitor are the only way to be sure you are seeing the correct gamma and color using FCP. If your FCP window and / or your Quicktime player match pretty close to your broadcast monitor, you’ve got the settings in the computer monitor gamma about right and other Quicktime preferences set ok. But you still will have no way to know how other computers without calibrated displays and Quicktime or gamma settings will display your video.

The closest you’ll get in this world is to standardize your workflow to the broadcast monitor and use the broadcast monitor like the sRGB color space is used as a web standard for still images.

But perhaps we over react to this whole concept. What audience will be viewing our final product on a professionally calibrated HD broadcast monitor? Practically no one!

Every consumer display has so many image enhancements and white point choices that this whole thing is like shooting an arrow in the air and we have to learn not to care where it lands.

Varicam/Steadicam Owner
Los Angeles, CA
http://www.brucealangreene.com

[Bruce Greene]

[gary adcock] “[Bruce Greene] “I’m not quite the nincompoop you think I am:) ”

I have never thought you were my friend, please no offense was intended.
“

Gary, no offense was taken. I was trying to be lighthearted! 🙂 🙂 🙂

Thanks for your suggestions.

Varicam/Steadicam Owner
Los Angeles, CA
http://www.brucealangreene.com

[Bruce Greene]

[gary adcock] “[Bruce Greene] “Any clips with speed changes get all screwed up and the audio levels get all screwed up.”

Com’on bruce how many years have you and I worked with Varicams???

your camera does not capture audio offspeed never has, Audio is captured at the base rate you are shooting – so you do the same thing, you need to separate the audio from video when doing speed changes -especially in fcp.
That levels bug with speed changes was fixed in 7.0 from what I understand.- are you current with your software?
“

Gary,

I’m not quite the nincompoop you think I am:)

The speed changed clips don’t use any in-camera audio, just music and effects.

The directed just received the newest fcp from Apple, but is reluctant to update the software in the middle of the project. Would it be safe to do the upgrade? Would it help when we go to Apple color for the grading?

Would it fix the problem to render out all the off speed clips to new qt files and replace them in the timeline? I guess we’ll have to do that anyway before sending to Apple Color.

Yours truly,
Amateur editor:)

Varicam/Steadicam Owner
Los Angeles, CA
http://www.brucealangreene.com

[Bruce Greene]

I, or should I say, the director editor, has been having a similar problem media managing a movie captured with the I/O HD.

The media managed project seems to mostly work…except when it doesn’t. Any clips with speed changes get all screwed up and the audio levels get all screwed up. He also reports some changes in the timeline clips.

Any thoughts if this is related to capturing 23.98fps with a Varicam to the I/O HD?

Varicam/Steadicam Owner
Los Angeles, CA
http://www.brucealangreene.com

[Bruce Greene]

While the F model is not quite as noise free as the H model, it shouldn’t be bad in the best set-ups.

There was a firmware update to the “F” cameras that added a menu item in the VTR menu called “Compression”. Check if you have this item and set it to “Dark”. Use this all the time. It will virtually eliminate nasty compression artifacts in darker areas of the image that may resemble “noise”.

For the cleanest images, always shoot in “Film Rec” mode. You can set the “dynamic level” menu item in Vid Rec mode, but it will do nothing.

Because the camera records in 8bits, I normally shoot in Film Rec at a dynamic level of 200% to minimize banding in color correction. If I need more dynamic range to cover a scene, I will turn up the “dynamic level” as necessary to capture it. Note that shooting at 200% dynamic level will still produce an image that is low in contrast and color saturation and will require some color correction to look good.

Also, from my experience, don’t use a dynamic level of greater than 300% when the gain is set to -3db, or you may clip one of the colors before the others, generating a color shift in the whites.

If I shoot in Vid Rec mode, even my H model will look a little noisey. Don’t know why, but it does:(

All this said, the most important factor is to set the “compression” menu item in the VTR menu to “dark”, otherwise you’ll likely to be disappointed.

Varicam/Steadicam Owner
Los Angeles, CA
http://www.brucealangreene.com

[Bruce Greene]

Kevin,

480×720 is a standard definition camera. It’s not high def.

DVCproHD records 960×720 and plays it back as 1280×720.

BTW, there is no 720 60i HD format. It’s always 720 60p.

I believe your camera is a 480i camera.

Hope the movie came out well 🙂

Varicam/Steadicam Owner
Los Angeles, CA
http://www.brucealangreene.com

[Bruce Greene]

You are very welcome Joe.

Feel free to email me with any questions, if you ever have any (as you seem pretty knowledgeable).

Varicam/Steadicam Owner
Los Angeles, CA
http://www.brucealangreene.com

[Bruce Greene]

Joe,

I’ll add one more opinion:)

A couple years ago I shot a test of both cameras with digi primes and made a filmout of each.

Each camera looked fabulous in the film print.

The f-900r had a very, very, very slight advantage in detail–but I’m not sure one can see it when the camera and/or subject are moving, even a little bit.

The HDcam compression is better than DVCpro HD. That said, DVCproHD on the Varicam is vastly improved when the VTR menu is set to “compression mode=dark”. Then the difference is not so great.

The Varicam (H model), to me, has a better camera. The lower number of pixels actually helps the camera be more sensitive to light. When used in “FIlmRec” mode, the camera is very clean and not noisy. But for the very best image quality, use the lowest dynamic level setting that you can. I shoot at 200% unless I really need to go for lower contrast (depends on the scene).

For the picture that we shot the test for, we chose the Varicam. (hey, I own the thing:) The movie was distributed theatrically on film (600 screens) and was shot without the digi-primes as they were just too expensive.:( It made several million dollars in profit.

Last year I shot another movie with the Varicam and we recorded directly to hard drive using the AJA I/O box. This helps end my concerns about the DVCproHD codec, but to tell the truth, some scenes were shot on tape and it’s really hard to see any difference (provided no extreme color corrections in post).

Overall, I just find it easier to control contrast with the Varicam and since I’m color correcting these projects in post, it’s just tilts the advantage to that camera for me. This is partially because I don’t like knee corrections as I feel I see the knee point in a not so good way, and it’s easy to over knee and get a color shift in the highlights that I don’t like.

Best of luck to you, and enjoy your shoot!

Varicam/Steadicam Owner
Los Angeles, CA
http://www.brucealangreene.com