Ken Maxwell
Forum Replies Created
-
ND the windows and light the subject to match. If you don’t have sufficient equipment rent what you need and be done with it. OR . . . light your subject with what you have and then ND, or double-ND the windows to match. . . and be done with it.
-
I don’t think I would touch it with the proverbial “10-foot pole”. If these guys are going into a recording studio they’ve most likely rented the smallest studio around (cheapest). There most likely won’t be much atmosphere lighting and it certainly won’t be adequate for imaginative shooting.
Space is another problem. Most likely any space not occupied by the performers will be stacked up with music racks and mike stands, etc. Further, if they are live recording you won’t be able to make any noise or move around much. Small recording studios are notoriously jammed and you won’t be able to do much in the way of lighting.I suggest that the best approach would be to shoot their music on location against a track playback and in a location suggested by the theme of the music. A location with good opportunities for camera angles, etc.
I certainly wouldn’t shoot the project without having seen the suggested location. Your product is the main thing to suffer from inadequate planning and shot under difficult conditions. Most unenlightened people don’t realize the value of a good video. You don’t want it to look like grandpa’s home movies. One must consider the talent and energy required to produce a video that has the same attention to details that they put into their music.
If you are going to a large studio with a high quality lighting system and plenty of space . . . and no time restriction, then go to it and have fun.
Good luck. -
Bob, Mark, Todd, Steve – I couldn’t agree more than with your comments. My remarks were not intended to criticize, but to simply say that we all have a sophisticated technique that has revolutionized our industry and we have to compromise and innovate in order to deliver a quality product.
I, too, have shot greenscreen under undesirable conditions. . . over a desk in a secretary’s office, in an isle between inventory racks in a warehouse. We’ve even rented a meeting room at a nearby hotel; and once shot greenscreen in an equipment trailer.
We would never turn a job down because all is not perfect, I just meant that it is a shame that we have to shoot under such a compromised situation when we bust our butts to do a good job for our clients. -
I find it incredible that we in the production community are allowing ourselves to be put into the position of shooting a complicated process, such as chroma-keying, in a limited space such as a hallway or small location room.
Chroma-key, and/or green-screen processes are wonderful techniques for placing subjects into unusual backgrounds that allow us to apply controlled lighting to the subject. Surely we should insist upon adequate space to satisfactorily perform this marvelous technique. After all, our reputations are at stake, aren’t they. -
Mark – Hear, hear!!
Now if we could just get some people to say “shooting video” rather than “filming video” it would be a better world.
-
Around here it’s called a “Pedal-Tone Suspension”. . . a colored fundamental tone “suspended” through a musical (or dramatic) passage. It can be generated by a low register musical instrument or synth. The tone is manipulated by effects, to taste.
-
Interesting enough, a number of years ago I was directing in television. We bought a couple of the Rosco polarized sheets that Mark referred to. We trimmed and mounted one of them into a blank circular baby fresnel scrim frame, built a motor driven bracket to hold and rotate the polarizer in front of a baby and with it back-lit a regional weather map that was drawn on a 4’x5′ sheet of ground glass. We then randomly cut out weather symbols from the other Rosco sheet.
When the weather person placed the symbols (with double-faced tape) onto the map they randomly blinked and no one could figure out how we made the little symbols blink. Kind’a fun for those days. -
The cost for repairing the HD100U firewire is $300-$400. If you like the camera and it does the job for you, keep it and get it repaired. Not many of us have the need for a boat anchor these days, nor the deep pockets to be able to just pick up another camera anytime . . . but it’s your call
Ken Maxwell, president & director
Cinema Arts, Inc. -
If you really like the camera you might find it cheeper to have the firewire repaired than to purchase a new camera. There is a lot to be said for staying with that which is comfortable and successful.