[Todd Terry]

We do this all the time, and it works fine. Remember, a teleprompter doesn’t have to be on the camera… it can be wherever you want the talent’s eyeline to be.

We often just put the teleprompter screen on a stand away from the camera. We have two prompter systems, and the one we use most often uses tablets as both the screen and the controller, so I just bought a cheap iPad holder (either eBay or Amazon, don’t remember) that you can put on a light stand.

As for “best bet for them to deliver their lines without looking robotic,” that pretty much just depends on the level of the ability of both the talent and the director.

T2

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

[Todd Terry]

[Casey Wilson] “When you look at the original picture, what are your opinions of the shot? “

Well, it’s pretty bad from simply a camera perspective. It might look perfectly fine from a live audience view, and it seems like that is the priority. The frame is just extraordinarily busy, with a guy with either flat (or just available) lighting, he’s in front of a very busy fireplace, there’s a mantle growing out of his head, all kinds of flora and tchotchkes around that give the frame a very busy look. That visually makes your job of lighting him in an interesting and “popping” way so much harder because you are not only physically constrained by the space, but visually your talent is fighting all of these other elements in the frame. Sounds like there’s not much you can do about that.

[Casey Wilson] “What do you like, dislike about the lighting and color?? “

Well the color is a bit unnaturally warm, but at least it looks uniform… you don’t seem to be having any color issues because of mixed lighting types, which is good. Fixing that could be as simple as lowering the color temperature on your camera…

…which still isn’t great, but at least isn’t unnaturally warm. If you can’t do that in camera (although you should be able to), it’s easy to do in post.

[Casey Wilson] “I know I am being selfish and not very flexible with the room situation. “

No, you are not… we are all often constrained by things on location we can’t change. The only inflexibility doesn’t seem to be your fault, and it’s a little bit of a no-win or non-solution kind of situation. It’s a bit akin to going to a doctor with a broken leg and asking “Which of these band-aids do I need.” You’re told “No, you need a cast,” but insist “No, I can only use band-aids.” Sometimes in the face of absolutely-immovable situations things just can’t be done exactly as you like, and often just doing “the best I can do” or even just not doing something is the best (or only) option.

Hope it works out well for you…

T2

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

[Todd Terry]

Well, you have a conundrum then, and are saddled with some logistic situations there that will be difficult to change.

Mark’s advice there about two lighting instruments, at 45° to the sides and down at about 45° (I’d recommend a little bit less of an angle than that) is, pardon the pun, spot on.

As far as specific instruments go, in a situation like that I’d recommend Source Four fixtures… and you can pick up the tungsten versions on eBay for less than nothing these days, although if you have any decent budget I’d look at the LED versions.

BUT… you say they create unacceptable shadows. That’s understandable. But your talent is simply too close to the background to avoid that (actually much much too close). That proximity is causing you all kinds of problems… not only the shadows, but making it impossible to put any backlighting in place which is what you really need to make your talent pop from the BG and give you good separation, and it is also going to make utilizing a shallowish depth of field difficult which could help separation by softening the background.

BUT… I get the sense that you cannot move the position of the talent. Therefore, you are a bit stuck.

If you absolutely can’t move them, you can help eliminate the shadows somewhat by using large soft instruments, ideally fairly close to the talent. BUT… you say you can’t have anything obvious or obtrusive in the room. SO… that’s out.

You’re probably going to have to decide which is the lesser of two evils.

You’re in a situation that comes up often, where there is a live event of some kind that also appears on camera. In a situation like that we’d all love an arrangement that allows for absolutely perfect (and invisible) lighting for the live audience, and absolutely perfect lighting for the camera. Sadly, that usually doesn’t exist because those two things are so very very different, and there just isn’t one solution that perfectly covers both.

So, I guess my next question would be, which is more important? The live audience?… or the on-camera image? Knowing that will help you decide what you can do.

Oh, also, I still don’t know if you can turn off the overhead house lights. I asked, but the answer (“Most video will be taken with guest in the room. Conference, speakers, sermons…”) only told me who was in the room… it didn’t tell me if you can turn out the house lights.

I know you’re not getting any fast and easy solutions here, but this is not a fast and easy situation.

T2

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

[Todd Terry]

You certainly have an ideal “upper half” for mounting instruments… that don’t necessarily have to be obtrusive or ugly.

Are you just trying to light the speaker? Are the other areas that you are trying to light as well? Does the whole room need to be lit? Will those windows be in the shots and will you need to balance them for both intensity and color temperature (or are they a non-factor)? Is there any reason you can’t turn off all the overheads if you need to? Do you have a particular “mood” you are going for?…e.g., dark and moody/serious, bright and happy, flat, edgy, or any other descriptors you can give?

And… super importantly… do you have a budget?

A lot of questions, I know…

T2

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

[Todd Terry]

It’s no big deal… sometimes, maybe once every six months, someone will wander in here and ask about lighting for their bathroom, or whatever. It’s infrequent enough that it’s more amusing than bothersome.

The forum names are a gray area. The suggested “Lighting for Film/Video” is technically Cinematography (although that of course also encompassed the camera side).

Actually we probably get far more posts in this forum that are really cinematographic DP questions than they are about lighting design.

Those two forums should really probably be merged, especially considering how low the traffic is in both these days… but I’m not one to rock the boat.

T2

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

[Todd Terry]

Hey Erik…

I generally travel with one battery for each instrument (or other device) that I’m powering, and maybe a spare. I know that doesn’t sound like any wiggle room but I have yet to run out of juice on any instrument (and if I did, I can AC backup).

When we first got the LEDs we use now, after I had configured them for goldmounts I decided to run a real test, and picked a couple of different ones, put on a fresh batt, turned them on full blast, and started the clock. I killed the test part-way through, because I was ready to go home and they were still going strong six hours later. So, I stopped worrying about batteries.

I always use goldmount when I can, because those are the batteries we have and also because I HATE V-mounts. A couple of things we’ve had came with V-mounts, and I swapped them out for goldmounts (goldmount plates are not cheap but you can find them inexpensively on eBay… I’ve paid as much as $40 or as little as $5 for them).

I use them for as many things as I can… almost all lighting fixtures (except a few little ones), the field monitor we use, and some cameras. I use the Canon batteries with my C300 now, but with my previous camera the XLH1 I used a brick with it… I had a goldmount adapter from Canon that cut the voltage in half and and I rigged it so that a single battery would power both the camera and the P+S Technik 35mm lens converter that I was using at the time.

I used to be super picky about only using real Anton Bauer batteries, and would have them re-celled when needed by an authorized AB place that guaranteed matching cells, etc…. but no more. Now, I a little embarrassed to admit that I chiefly use these cheap Chinese-made batteries that we get off eBay.

Why? Because they are frikken awesome, that’s why.

These aren’t full bricks, but the pancake size, and they are great for several reasons…

Firstly they are cheap (compared to AB)… it’s been a while since I’ve needed to buy any but if I recall they are well under $200.

Secondly, they are very reliable and powerful.

Thirdly, they have an on-board push-of-a-button fuel gauge so I can instantly see my juice level.

But the best best BEST thing about them is they need no charger. That bears repeating… THEY NEED NO CHARGER. You just plug ’em in, and off they go. I no longer need a $500 charger, and can charge as many as I like all at the same time. Our makeshift “recharging station” used to have a boatload of chargers on it… now, it’s just a bunch of cords.

The only problem I’ve had with them is once the seller shipped me the wrong ones, and I got V-mount versions instead of goldmount. Maybe not normally a big deal, but while it is easy to import batteries into the US, it is much more difficult to send them back to Hong Kong and that part was a big pain in the neck. I’m not sure if the same rules are still in place, but at that time you could not export batteries…. so, it took a while and there were some hoops to jump through (and maybe a little fibbing on the Customs form) to get them changed to the right ones.

Otherwise, they are great.

T2

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

[Todd Terry]

[Erik Anschicks] “Bill’s wish of a universal lighting kit with an unbelievably small footprint, both in actual size and power draw, is closer than ever”

It is, indeed. Not that long ago (and I’m talking five years or less) I traveled with a truck full of instruments and all kinds of assorted grip and gak.

Not anymore…

Today, it’s almost unbelievable the size/weight difference in what we travel with. It’s almost nothing, compared to the “olden days.”

Three things happened…

Number one, I hit the big 5-0 two years ago and realized I (and my similarly-aged crew members) was tired of dragging around so much weight.

Number two, cameras got soooooo much faster, it changed the entire way of thinking about lighting. Back when I was shooting film, I didn’t really like shooting 5219 because it was a tad grainy for my taste, but when I did break down and shoot it we would all marvel at how fast it was. At 500 ASA. Yes, FIVE HUNDRED, and we thought that was like lightning. Today I regularly shoot at 850 ISO, and sometimes several multiples of that (I shot something at 16,000 ISO a couple of weeks ago), so it has changed everything about the way we think about lighting. Much less firepower is needed now, and often times DP work is now much more subtractive and thinking “What can I turn down, kill, or flag?” rather than the old additive way of thinking.

And thirdly, LED instruments are so much better, smaller, and affordable now. And I run all of mine on bricks (some of which came equipped that way, some of which we added goldmount plates to ourselves). I still use tungstens and flos when on stage, but when on location with the occasional exception of HMIs I never use AC power anymore. And if I never have to look for juice or run a stinger again, that will still be too soon.

Can I light as well with the instruments I have now? Good question. Sometimes yes, sometimes its more “Ehhh, close.” I have given up some control, but I think that will be changing as LED instruments improve, more true LED fresnels are developed, and the fixtures become more flaggable and cuttable. But mostly my lighting now is not really “better” or “worse,” it’s just “different.” And it’s a whole heckuva lot easier.

Yes, times are changing.

T2

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

[Todd Terry]

Rick beat me to the punch… the same exact punch.

No one’s camera opinion should matter more than your DP’s. And of course, many DPs will already own their own camera and/or lens packages (and possibly lighting), so that might already be decided (and provided) for you. If your DP doesn’t own lighting, a good gaffer (who you would want anyway, and that your DP could recommend) might. I know a couple of different gaffers who started out just as single guys for hire, but can now bring along a truck full of instruments, if needed.

The same for sound, even more so. Many if not virtually all sound guys do own their own gear. So the decision-making on that front might end with deciding which sound guy or gal… and you won’t have to worry about the particulars of audio gear.

I still think though that even though you discounted renting, it still might make the most sense. Firstly, I doubt that 10 months means 305 actual continuous shoot days for when gear would be needed. Secondly, even if it did, your $25K would still go a lot farther in the rental market than it would likely in the sales market. $25K isn’t much when you talk about purchases for outfitting an entire production, if that was purchasing everything you could spend that in the bat of an eye. But used judiciously, $25K might go reasonably far for rentals. It won’t get you everything including the kitchen sink, but could get you the basics.

T2

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

[Todd Terry]

I was curious enough to download it… (and can confirm from the earlier question that it is indeed a 29.97 file, progressive)….

I put it on a 29.97 timeline, watched it on a 1080 monitor, and sorry to say I can’t see any sign of the “vibration” you were talking about, in any background leaves or anywhere else. It doesn’t seem to have any compression issues or artifacting of any other kind that I could see.

Yes, of course it is extremely shaky footage, but that’s normal and to be expected of an unstabilized walking handheld shot… but I know that is not what you are talking about.

Although there is no metadata to tell me what the shutter speed was, it does look like the shutter speed might have been slighter higher than optimal (for this frame rate a “normal” shutter speed would be 1/60th of a second), and the higher shutter speed might be adding to a little bit of a staccato look that you are getting… although there is still some substantial motion blur in the images so it’s not too much of a “narrow shutter” look… a little but not much. And that’s not what you are asking about, anyway.

Bottom line, I just cannot see or find this “vibration” issue that you are seeing. Maybe someone else will have better luck.

T2

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

[Todd Terry]

Well, you are obviously not talking about the inherent shakiness of handheld work, so we are not looking for that or 24fps judder or anything.

The bottom line is that your clips are too short and/or too highly compressed on the COW’s video player to really tell what problems there are, if any. I personally can’t see anything that you are talking about.

If possible, you might have better results showing us what the issue is if rather than a video upload you can do an actual FILE upload instead (it’s the far right of the icons above the box where you compose a message, just to the right of the Video Upload icon). If you can upload a file that is the raw ORIGINAL CAMERA FILE before any compression or any other voodoo has been done to it, we might be able to tell what is happening there.

T2

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