Todd Terry
1
COW Coin
Forum Replies Created
-
I just now was able to view that video for the first time now end to end (just watched a couple of spots before).
I have never felt so inferior as a photographer in my life.
Besides using available light so brilliantly and posing and framing his subjects so beautifully, I think one of that photographer’s greatest skills is anticipating the exact millisecond when to snap. Even when his subjects make a “mistake” or can’t hold a pose, he knows when to click so that those become some of the most beautiful accidents you’ll want to see.
Pure genius.
T2
__________________________________
Todd Terry
Creative Director
Fantastic Plastic Entertainment, Inc.
fantasticplastic.com
-
Totally agree. It ain’t the sun gun that’s making those pictures great.
I bet that guy could turn out equally brilliant stuff with a flashlight. Literally.
T2
__________________________________
Todd Terry
Creative Director
Fantastic Plastic Entertainment, Inc.
fantasticplastic.com
-
They’re neat… I just wish they were smaller… and cheaper. Oh, and focusable (and cuttable) like a real Fresnel, but you’re not going to get that from any LED instrument. Barn doors are darn near useless on them, even Phil from Aadyntech said he wondered why they even sell them.
And as I said, they’re pretty darn pricey. But I don’t think any more so than a JokerBug800, which are also darn expensive. Worth it, though.
T2
__________________________________
Todd Terry
Creative Director
Fantastic Plastic Entertainment, Inc.
fantasticplastic.com
-
Lowel tungsten lights are great… they will let you fry an egg almost anywhere (although Mark Suszko seems to be a huge Lowel fan).
I just don’t consider them very high-end instruments, and many models are a bit flimsy and do get very very hot.
Lowel does have a little hand-held LED instrument though. I haven’t seen it in person, but it looks cool.
T2
__________________________________
Todd Terry
Creative Director
Fantastic Plastic Entertainment, Inc.
fantasticplastic.com
-
Can’t answer your question or tell you why that’s going on… but there are one or two things you can do to zero in on the problem.
You say
[Brandon Lied] “It seems that upon import to my computer that the C100 footage changes.”
Well, we don’t know that for a fact. It could easily be that your computer is displaying the footage exactly as shot, but your on-board LCD is lying to you. Do the images look the same in the LCD screen and the viewfinder?
If I have this right, you play back the footage in camera and I looks “right” to you on the LCD screen… but in Premiere it is over-saturated, correct? If that’s the case, the first investigative step is to see what the footage looks like when you play it back straight from camera, but to a monitor, not the on-board LCD (for reference I’d compare the other two cameras straight out to the same monitor as well). If the footage looks “normal” on that external monitor (same as on the LCD), then something funky is happening with the way your NLE is handling the footage. If it is oversaturated on that monitor (same as you see on the NLE), then it sounds like an on-board LCD issue. It might just need calibrating… or there might be something more nefarious going on.
At any rate, if you were trying to match three cameras during setup, the only way to get that even halfway accurate is to use an external monitor, not the three cameras’ individual LCDs. Those can vary very very wildly.
T2
__________________________________
Todd Terry
Creative Director
Fantastic Plastic Entertainment, Inc.
fantasticplastic.com
-
It’s really hard to tell because the shot is so fleeting/moving/blurry… but looks like it could be one of the little Frezzolini sun guns.
That certainly would be a wild choice for a wedding photographer (or any still photographer, really), but you sure can’t argue with his results… really beautiful images.
I wouldn’t get too obsessed with tracking down that exact same make/model of instrument. Any dimmable hard light source (open face, Fresnel, whatever) will give those same results.
It’s also interesting to see someone using hard light in a world where soft light is the king. Pretty pretty stuff.
T2
__________________________________
Todd Terry
Creative Director
Fantastic Plastic Entertainment, Inc.
fantasticplastic.com
-
Hard to say exactly… but obviously very soft instruments. Could be softbox, Kinos, white 4×4 bounce card… a variety of things.
Just make sure whichever type of instrument you use has a large front surface area for that very soft “wraparound” look.
She’s fairly nicely lit, although her key was a fair bit too high for my personal taste. I also think the scene could have really benefitted for at least a little bit of a back/hair light.
And Mark’s right, while the lighting is ok, the framing is terrible. I know you weren’t asking about that…. but don’t do that. Ugh.
And for what it’s worth, you can have a subject speak TO camera or speak OFF camera (as she did)… either is perfectly acceptable, depending on the look/feel/mood you are going for. But the fact that she introduced herself by name is, at least to me, very weird for someone speaking to off camera. I’d only do that for someone speaking to camera.
Not that anyone even remotely asked my opinion on that, of course.
T2
__________________________________
Todd Terry
Creative Director
Fantastic Plastic Entertainment, Inc.
fantasticplastic.com
-
I’m not sure how they would stack up… Jokers are pretty bright. I’d almost compare a JokerBug800 to a 1200w Fresnel HMI.
But a LED version of something like a Source4 would certainly have plenty of great, albeit very different, applications.
I looked it up and notice that they call it the “Force 4,” which is pretty borderline clever.
T2
__________________________________
Todd Terry
Creative Director
Fantastic Plastic Entertainment, Inc.
fantasticplastic.com
-
The Aadyntech instruments are the only ones that I really KNOW of that have comparable firepower to an HMI.
I haven’t used them on a shoot, but the Aadyntech guy Phil did come to our place for a demo about a year ago. He demo’d their JAB instrument and it looked pretty good (although fairly huge and a bit unwieldy). I didn’t put a meter to it, but I did put up a 1200w HMI beside it and I’d say at least to my bare eyeballs the output was quite similar.
I didn’t notice any green spike, but I did not shoot any footage, and the eyes can lie.
If anyone else in here is familiar with any LED instruments (especially battery powered ones like the Aadyntechs) that are HMI comparable I’d sure love to know about them as well.
We shoot almost all LEDs now (at least when on location and not on stage), with the exception of HMIs when needed. Very rarely use tungsten or flos anymore, and almost never have to run a stringer (LOVE that).
T2
__________________________________
Todd Terry
Creative Director
Fantastic Plastic Entertainment, Inc.
fantasticplastic.com
-
[Mark Suszko] “There’s such a glut of applicants for any entry level video post facility job today…”
True true… and sadly quantity doesn’t equal quality.
I get tons of reels across my desk (which I do watch… just maybe not right away). In almost 17 years of business I can think of about only four or five that I would even consider hiring. And those weren’t even to the level that I’d consider “ready,” just people with potential.
In fact, only one of them would I hire right on the spot today if given a chance. Incredibly smart and creative guy… unfortunately for me though he went to college on an ROTC scholarship and is having to give Uncle Sam a few years back before I can get my claws in him.
And we pay very well, so I can only imagine the quality we’d get if we paid peanuts.
Now, full disclosure, we’ve had the exact same staff for 10 years, so we have never advertised a job opening. So maybe if we were actively fishing the talent pool would be better. Oops, I take that back, we did once actively solicit resumes/reels when we were just considering adding a position, but I don’t recall those applicants being any better, either.
I think the main key, other than pounding the pavement and being uber-persistent is just to be very VERY good at what you do, or a least show tons of real potential.
Unfortunately, that’s seems to be the hard part.
T2
__________________________________
Todd Terry
Creative Director
Fantastic Plastic Entertainment, Inc.
fantasticplastic.com
