[Todd Terry]

By the way… does the SR2 have a capping shutter for time-lapse? For longish wait times between frames, I’m told by veteran time-lapse guys that a capping shutter is a must… that just the intervalometer is not enough.

Your 20-30 second spacing might be short enough to avoid needing that, I’m just not sure. Smarter time-lapse minds than me would know that for sure.

T2

__________________________________
Todd Terry
Creative Director
Fantastic Plastic Entertainment, Inc.
fantasticplastic.com

[Todd Terry]

No, your exposure is going to be bouncing around all over the place if you do that, it will look very jittery and uneven.

I’d suggest you pose your question in the forum over at konvas.org, which is another cinematographers forum that I belong to (it’s a forum where most of the users, like me, shoot 35mm film primarily with Russian Konvas and Kinor cine cameras).

Those guys are mostly shooting film (no offense to the great COW, but most of the production people here are video, not real film), and there are several people there with lots of experience in time lapse work.

And they are a friendly group… no worries, just because your camera is German and not Russian you will still be welcome. 🙂

T2

__________________________________
Todd Terry
Creative Director
Fantastic Plastic Entertainment, Inc.
fantasticplastic.com

[Todd Terry]

Looks fun as heck to me.

How high off the ground is the work being done?

I would think it would be difficult to get proper coverage of all the action while being strapped right to the thing with whomever is working on it. They probably tell these guys “Don’t step back to admire your work,” but that’s probably what you will need to do.

We sometimes rent boom trucks for higher-up work. There’s a tree service here in our city that has a sweet truck with an 80′ fiberglass double-articulated hydraulic boom… which is actually (and surprisingly) smooth as silk. The first time we used it I really just wanted a high stationary camera platform…. but found that it operated smoothly enough to actually get moving crane shots. The first time, I was sandwiched in the rather smallish bucket with the operator (it was pretty darn cozy), but subsequent times they let me fly by myself (the later guys weren’t quite as adherent to the owner’s safety regs). But I was harnessed in, and it was safe. The only problem was screaming instructions to the operator eight stories down the first time (and over the noise of the truck)… I didn’t know I would get to ride alone so we neglected to bring radios. This guy is really cheap, too… I think he only charges something like $600 for a half day, which really is peanuts considering what the truck is worth. We clamp a high-hat to the rim of the bucket, and it works very well.

It might be that something like that could get you high enough to capture some action from a different perspective.

There might also be some opportunities to simulate some of the work closer to the ground… as long as your camera perspective doesn’t give away the fact that you’re not high up. That might give you an opportunity for some coverage to augment the stuff where you really are high up.

T2

__________________________________
Todd Terry
Creative Director
Fantastic Plastic Entertainment, Inc.
fantasticplastic.com

[Todd Terry]

Got the specs from B&H, but yes, I misread them… sort of. The head is rated for that much, but the sticks I saw it suggested to be paired with were rated for only 11 pounds.

Moot point, I think… they list the Vision 3 as “discontinued” and no longer available.

I completely forgot a had (still have actually) a Vinten from years ago, it looked exactly like that, although I’m sure it was an earlier model (I don’t remember exactly, was there a “Vision 2”?… I think that was it). Maybe you got lucky with yours and I got a lemon (I do know a couple of people who like them)… but that particular set of ours was pretty poor. I loved the spider dolly made for it (great design), but the head and sticks were pretty junky. The leg locks were always failing, several plastic parts got broken easily (and we baby our gear for the most part), the head tilt brake stopped working as did the pan dampening, and the head developed a horrible squeak when tilting that we could not track down nor fix. On the upside, the light on the bubble level still works, and the battery was never changed even once. We eventually turned it into a studio monitor stand. Maybe their quality has gotten better… hopefully so. Glad yours worked out a lot better.

T2

__________________________________
Todd Terry
Creative Director
Fantastic Plastic Entertainment, Inc.
fantasticplastic.com

[Todd Terry]

Checked it out, since I use an XLH1 too… looks like a decent set, but even though I don’t have the weight of the stock zoom (I don’t use it), unfortunately my camera is saddled with a P+S Technik converter, matte box, follow focus, A/B battery, and some darn heavy prime lenses. It clocks in at a little bit over 21 pounds, about twice too much for the Vinten (specs rate it for 11 pounds).

Oh well…

T2

__________________________________
Todd Terry
Creative Director
Fantastic Plastic Entertainment, Inc.
fantasticplastic.com

[Todd Terry]

Rick’s right, as he usually is… we’d need a fair bit more info on the particulars of what you want to shoot to give decent advice.

I haven’t seen it in ages, but if I recall, a lot of the shooting in Shaun of the Dead (other than the night scenes or those in the Winchester) were either available light, or looked like they were mostly available light. Undoubtedly a lot more to them than that, though.

Early in the movie there is a long Steadicam shot that follows Shaun down the street and into and then back out of a store. That shot in particular had some nice exposure-riding work in it. It wasn’t seamless (watch closely and you can see where they ramp the iris up and down), but it wasn’t obtrusive and executed pretty well.

For the black eyes, there are probably a number of ways you could do that in post… but the easiest and cheapest way might be just to do it practically, with contact lenses…. https://02a5349.netsolstores.com/blacksclera.aspx

T2

__________________________________
Todd Terry
Creative Director
Fantastic Plastic Entertainment, Inc.
fantasticplastic.com

[Todd Terry]

[Nick Griffin] “Bob-
Here’s a tip: the coffee pot with the green handle is usually decaf.”

Congrats to Nick… the first person to genuinely make me laugh out loud in 2010.

T2

__________________________________
Todd Terry
Creative Director
Fantastic Plastic Entertainment, Inc.
fantasticplastic.com

[Todd Terry]

Thanks for the observations, Mark.

Sounds like you were working with the same exact Oconnor 35A legs that we use… with the ring at the top where you can drop or raise all three legs at once, and the funky cable-spreader. We’ve never lost a finger (or any other body parts) with either of our sets of those… but I’ll certainly be on the lookout now. The first time I saw them I thought “What kind of crazy science project is this?”… but the spreader works quite well and yes you can get into some neat oddball positions. My sticks are rarely used off a spider dolly anyway, so it’s not a huge factor.

I’m beginning to think that there is no other set that will let you instantly raise and lower the whole rig so effortlessly (and with one hand, with camera in place)… so we might just stick with the Oconnors that we have. I can’t give that feature up. I didn’t realize how much I relied on that until I had to live without it. Plus, I guess they really are fairly darn lightweight… and we regularly put 100lb+ worth of camera/head/jib/weights on it with no worries. Maybe I’m looking for a solution that’s in search of a problem, and we should just stay happy with what we have.

Height’s really not an issue… I can’t remember the last time I was wishing I had more tripod height than the sticks will regularly go. If we do need more, it’s usually quite a bit more, enough to warrant throwing the jib on, or popping the head on top of an A-frame ladder. I find I’m directing more as a “low shooter” these days, the camera more often finding itself on a high-hat than it does high on a crane. I’m sure my mood will swing back the other way from these Welles-ian angles eventually.

Thanks to all for the tips/observations/suggestions.

T2

__________________________________
Todd Terry
Creative Director
Fantastic Plastic Entertainment, Inc.
fantasticplastic.com

[Todd Terry]

Actually, yes, it’s brand new… in fact it’s so new you can’t even buy it yet, it’s just available for “pre-order” from Letus. I’m not sure when they are actually shipping.

Unfortunately it’s pretty pricey, about $3500 just for the relay lens. I’m not sure I’d spend that much just to be able to use a Letus… no offense intended to Letus, but they are fairly low-end converters. If I were spending that kind of change I think I’d move up to a higher-end DoF converter.

T2

__________________________________
Todd Terry
Creative Director
Fantastic Plastic Entertainment, Inc.
fantasticplastic.com

[Todd Terry]

Ah, ok, I see… the Hot-Pod is sorta like a tripod with a built-in bazooka, looks like. I might like that, might not… hard to say.

On the downsides, it’s a bit pricey. It’s also heavy, I’m not sure I’d be lightening the load… I’ll have to weigh one of my Oconnors. It might turn out that I’m wanting something that doesn’t exist (wouldn’t be the first time).

It’s one I’d definitely want to give a good test drive before committing to buy.

Thanks for the good info.

T2

__________________________________
Todd Terry
Creative Director
Fantastic Plastic Entertainment, Inc.
fantasticplastic.com