[Nick Griffin]

Mark-
The good ones are union so they work for scale (as a starting point) and up. Many now do work from home and FTP stuff. Prior to that being available a few VO people had ISDN lines so their session would be routed from their home rig to a studio for recording.

Some producers like this and some insist on directing face-to-face.

[Nick Griffin]

And earlier this afternoon when David saw my name on his caller ID he answered the phone “Prima Donna Productions.”

[Nick Griffin]

[David Roth Weiss] “for straight time night shoot, you’d be … labeled a prima donna.”

Yup. That’s me. Prima Donna all the way. From my limited experience all night shoots, to be done properly, screw up the day before, the day of and the day after. That’s why I do what I can to avoid them. (I also don’t sleep well on planes so I build in an extra, get acclimated day when flying to Europe. Some people can hop off the plane and do a regular day of business. I find I’m not anywhere close to 100% so I do what I can to avoid being put in that situation.)

The majority of our work is in factories where the machines we’re there to shoot earn between $2,000 to $10,000 or more per hour. Therefore when they have to be stopped, or specifically tasked for shooting, it’s usually in the middle of the night or the machine’s manufacturer is buying the time from the plant. This forces a serious sense of purpose and efficiency on the shoots.

One of my less than satisfactory shoots several years back involved a plant where we were only allowed to work between 3 and 7 am. I came into the shoot after a full day of regular work so by the time we started at 3 am I’d been awake nearly 22 hours and, by the time we wrapped, awake for over 26 continuous hours. In the material the focus wasn’t what it should be in places and in other places the edge of a flag got into a couple of shots — all the kind of stuff that can happen when one is feeling like the walking dead and not paying strict attention to detail. So for me the lesson was to begin shifting one’s body clock a day or two before and try to become a night owl who has at least had some amount of sleep.

As to shooting in retail locations, years ago when I did this, on a couple of occasions we shot our wide masters in the store location and constructed a faux store in the studio for the close-ups and medium shots. Probably a slightly more expensive way to go, but a lot less pressure.

[Nick Griffin]

I don’t disagree, Mark. They DO get hot. Don’t most tungsten fixtures? I never use Totas in any situation where there’s a need to flag them, though. In my work I’m either using them to kick some light into really big spaces or, as I said, directing them into a ceiling to light an entire room in a highly diffused manner.

[Nick Griffin]

I think Mark’s advice is spot on, especially the part about buying used to get started. There are a great many deals coming and going on eBay. The trick is to be patient and not feel that you have to buy without taking a few weeks to get a feel for what things are selling for.

The one addition I would make to what Mark said is Lowel’s “Tota-Light.” It’s basically an open faced tube which, while it looks terrible aimed directly at a subject, is very useful when kicked into the ceiling to pull up a room while still looking like the room’s natural light. Tota-Lights are also fairly cheap at around US$125 brand new and considerably less on eBay.

[Nick Griffin]

Can Mark also have the movie function removed from smart phones? After seeing the stills that some clients supply I used to think the ability to take pictures should require a license. Now with Flip and other video I’m certain of it.

[Nick Griffin]

[Thomas Miller] “unfortunately, (it) would be cheaper for them to hire local … crew.”

Sad, but too often true.

[Nick Griffin]

Tom-
I’m sorry that there haven’t been more responses to your inquiry so I’ll try to contribute what little I know from coming CLOSE to shooting in Canada a couple of times and in other countries a few times.

First and foremost, the Canadian government takes the attitude that you are there taking work away which should have gone to Canadians. That’s their starting point, so be forewarned. The best protection for this is representing yourself as a part of the company or entity you are going there to shoot. In my case (industrial) I am there to shoot highly specialized stuff that a normal, non-specialist would not know and therefore could not do. It also helps if what you’re shooting is presented as being for “internal company use only” ie.- training, and not something which will go to the public here or there.

There’s been a lot of talk in the Business & Marketing COW in previous years about the need to get a “carnet” fro US Customs. The Exports Logistics guide describes this as “A carnet (car-nay) is an international customs document that allows you to carry or send merchandise for a one year period or less into another member country for display or demonstration without paying duties, posting bonds or submitting the normal customs documents.”

Then there’s a more simple (and much less safe) approach. Compile a full list of your gear complete with serial #’s, where purchased and current market value which you then take to US customs from where you are departing and ask them to stamp it for use as proof when you come back that you are not importing the gear. The point of this is to prove that any taxes and import duties were already paid the first time the gear came into the country.

Of course both of these approaches are based on the fact that when bringing stuff back into the US it generally receives a lot more attention than when it leaves. The carnet is also considered a promise that you are not going to sell your gear in the country where you are going, thereby attempting to deny them of any duties and taxes. Not having a carnet means you need to be a fast talker when convincing the border authorities of the other country that you have no attention of doing this.

And finally, there’s the cheap, really simple and REALLY unsafe approach that I know of some people doing and that is flying into Buffalo/Detroit/Seattle (and so on), renting a car and driving into and out of Canada with your gear in the trunk declaring nothing either way.

Or if you’re traveling with a really small camera like the Sony EX-1, just pretend that you’re a tourist… but have your sales receipt ready for US Customs when returning.

Hope this is of some help, but I still hope others will chime in. And BTW- the unsafe stuff is NOT recommended, just provided to stimulate discussion.

[Nick Griffin]

Ummm… Given that this is a forum about lighting for film, video and sometimes staged live events was I incorrect to assume that the survey would be about our professional uses of lighting and not about home lighting? I completed your survey anyway, but think you need a much more generalized and broad audience for the types of questions you are surveying. Just a friendly suggestion.

[Nick Griffin]

Zach-

Allow me to try to offer some basics and give you a little more direction.

1) Very few things in either film, video or, for that matter audio recording in general are recorded in stereo. Almost always individual sources/people/etc. are mic’d (or sometimes double mic’d to be able to choose the best sounding of the two) and either in a mixer going to the camera, or later in post production, are the individual tracks assigned to a space in the stereo spread via the pan function. The exception to this would be the attempt to capture an “environment,” be it orchestra, waterfall, crowd scene, whatever where a pair of mics are used a specific kind of arrangement and one is assigned to the left channel and the other to the right. This captures actual stereo, but as stated above that’s seldom done.

2) Some camcorder-mounted mics are stereo and, if they are professional “balanced” mics (see below) they will have 5 pins. Camera-mounted mics really aren’t of much use except for news (my opinion).

3) XLR connectors with 4 pins are for power, ie.- a line going from a power supply that converts 110volt a/c (US) or 220volt a/c (Europe and much of the world) to 12 volt d/c so the camera can be operated without batteries.

4) There’s more than stereo these days. Mixes are routinely done these days in 5.1 and 7.1 surround sound on high end projects like feature films, whether for the theatre or DVD/Blu-Ray. Certainly more complex than simple left-right stereo as it is assigning sounds in a 360 degree space around the listener.

5) Mics have three pins when they are “balanced.” A professional, balanced audio line is able to go much further distances because one wire “shields” the other two which are in opposite phase of each other. Don’t ask, you probably don’t want to know anyway. Suffice it to say, a line is balanced to prevent hum and other interference caused by power lines, radio transmissions, etc.

For better, more comprehensive answers you should post this question on the Audio Professionals COW forum, because this is the best info you can get from me.