[Todd Obernolte]

Hi Susan,

I would suggest getting yourself a cannon Xl2 mini dv camera. I have used them alot and really like them. I think the SD cameras are priced around 3 to 4 thousand. They have interchangeable lenses so you can throw a wide angle on if you like. They get a nice warm picture and are better in low light than panasonics. You can use the camera as a capture deck thru a firewire straight to your edit bay until you can purchase a separate deck. I wouldn’t buy a used camera that I coudn’t demo first. You never know what kind of abuse they have gone through. Get 2 wireless Lavalier mics and a mount for them for your camera. I believe a new Xl2 out of the box comes with the mount and a 20x zoom lens. You can get a descent manfrotto tripod new for under 200 and search for a 3 pack set of soft box lights. Prices vary greatly by brand. I would suggest buying a new camera, I have never advocated for purchasing used. I consistently see people get burned this way. Go to a local vendor and tell him what you want. If he gives you a price that works for your budget and completes your list great. If he qoutes a price higher than what you want to spend, tell him what you will give him for it. With the state of the economy people are dealing with customers.

Hope this helps

Todd Obernolte
Commercial Producer
Hubbard Broadcasting
KSTP 5 KSTC 45

[Todd Obernolte]

That video was hilarious!!

[Todd Obernolte]

Dan,

I am curious as to what “work arounds” your writing about?

To answer your original question

“Is an Avid any better or is this aggravation just part of the job, no matter what system you use?”

I work at a station that has been using Avid for awhile but upon my hiring, purchased a MAC pro and the FCP Studio 2 bundle, and Adobe CS3 premium bundle. I spent sometime using the Avid until the FCP system came in. In short, I found the Avid system to be very cumbersome to use with a lot of “restsrictions” in its work flow, integration with AE and other adobe products I use regularly. I service 2 stations at once as the commercial producer and handle about 20 to 30 account reps everyday. So I don’t have time for that “aggravation” your talking about. For me expedition and integration are key to my daily success and that is something that in my experience Avid doesn’t deliver on. I have had trouble shooting issues from both systems, however when both are operating without the “aggravation” my money is on FCP.

Best of luck to you

[Todd Obernolte]

Usul,

Approaches will vary depending on what cameras your using and the lighting scenario of the event. I have produced and directed over 100 live events, mainly live music shows with extreme Intelligent light scenarios and drastic color temp and intensity changes. I know the Blue light issue your concerned with. It seems every light guy in the world is in love with their blue scenes. What I found works for me to handle going from a heavy blue scene to an extreme change to yellow or warmer light scene is to run at tungsten setting on all the cameras. Let the cameras handle it or your constantly change white balance presets.
If at all possible, meet with the house light guy and ask him to base his scenes with a light wash that won’t over power his intels. If their using spots, ask if they have any light opacity flesh tone gels they can filter them with. This will keep the shots from over exposing and allow the camera to see the images that are darker in the background. As far as camera placement goes that depends on the venue and your stylistic preference. In general its cam 1 through 3
house left, center and right. If you have 4 cams and a wide angle, put the wide front and center.
It looks great and when the shots are put to screen it gives the impression of the event being really big.

I hope this was helpfull for you and best success to you!!

Todd

[Todd Obernolte]

Hi Sandra,

Thanks for the response. I never received an email on it. I Defragged the HD on the tricaster and that took care of the playback stuttering. I don’t know of anyway to use animated lwer thirds in the tricaster. I have tried using the key on a green screen video and the key wipes out the whole image, not just the green area. I don’t know why. Have you had any problems with latency. The image i put to screen always seems to be about 20 frames behind the live action. Is their anyway to decrease this?

Thks

[Todd Obernolte]

Todd,

I watched your reel. My first immediate thought was your strength is your 3d animation. I could be wrong but I have noticed a division in the employee market. It seems that 3d animators are their own thing. I don’t know of many video professionals that are strong 3d animators, if at all. If I were you I would start putting all my focus into 3d and build a new reel emphasizing that skill set. You might look into taking some graphic design classes and really get into typography play as well. Your obviously competent and experienced. Your just not capitilizing on your strengths.

Hope this was helpfull.
Best success to you.

[Todd Obernolte]

Steve,

Thanks for all your help on this. In the end I didn’t use the motion tracking to pin video to the walls and floor. It just wasn’t the right option for this piece. I went with a straight key with a white background. I wanted to treat the video so it looked like film and bring the colors out. It seemed right for the video. So I put some suttle compositing effects in to compliment the color intensities and to give the piece more life. I used keylight, matte choking and blurring to get rid of the stepping. I think it all turned out very clean and sharp. I was very pleased with the end result and tried to let the edit drive the piece and have the efx compliment the edit. You can view it at

https://www.brightcove.com/title.jsp?title=979724176

Let me know what you think.

Thanks again for your help, Best success to you!

[Todd Obernolte]

Steve,

I ran into an issue. Their seems to be no DV matte pro for PC.
I am on a Dell precision 690. Any suggestions?

[Todd Obernolte]

Steve,

Thanks for all the advice, it is very helpfull. I have found a trial version of DV Matte pro and will give it a shot. I have done some motion tracking before but not to this extent. Your instructions
of how to execute this are extremly helpfull. Thank you. I am going to dive into this now. I will let you know how it turns out if your interested.

Once again, my greatest thanks!

[Todd Obernolte]

Steve,

Thanks for such an immediate response. Very appreciated. Yes this was all shot DV. Have you used the DV Matte pro plugin for AE?
As far as the 3d goes, I am stuck using AE for this. Their is zero budget. What I have been requested to do is to take alternate video files of the same properties and use them as the floor, walls and ceiling for the key video. How does one “glue” something to these markers? Is their a tutorial on this I can view?

Thanks a ton Steve, this was extremely helpfull.

Once again, Best success to you.