DMA Notes 7 July 2004
Cameras, lighting, production!
DMA Digital
Storytelling
7 Jul 2004
Today we are working with a Panasonic DVX 100A (these will sell to DMA participants for approx $3000 rather than the 5K they usually sell for
Can shoot at 24 fps rather than the standard 30 fps (the frame rate of video that you see on TV)
- video in the US with NTSC standard works at 30 fps (actually 29....)
- shooting at 24 fps, you can get a more "filmic" feel
-- other things at work: gamma range (control over color)
-- this is a better range of control over color, specifically over the gamma range (the mid range of color and light)
--- other parts are highlights and shadows
-- gamma range is where the color really happens
Can use this camera to make video look like it was shot on 16 mm film and transferred back to video
Sony research several years ago
- showed clip to non-professional
- first projected image shot on 35 mm film
- then projected same thing on high-quality video
- audience survey, to question about "what looked like reality"-- almost everyone said "the film version," except in Japaan where they said "video"
-- truth is: neither one of them is really like we see the world, our minds are always doing editing
- telecine: process of transferring film to video
-- most every film you can checkout on DVD or VHS was shot on film and transferred to video
-- if it was shot on video you would know it: it would look different
-- part of that is frame rate
-- also lenses: better lenses were made for panavision type film cameras
George Lucas and what he is doing with Star Wars
- he hates film and thinks it is a real hassle
- esp true to him because so much is created on computer, that is very close to video
- his latest camera is a collaboration between Sony and panavision
-- front end is like panavision, can take expensive lenses, backend is a digital signal processing unit, very high-def format
- the benefit is that his crew can immediately start working with it on the computer
- this keeps the whole process digital from beginning to end
- rental rate on that camera is about 50K per day, the camera cost about $1 million
There are now more cameras like that in a lower range
- vary-cam: you can change the frame rate on it (Panasonic makes that)
24 fps influences the way motion looks
- it is subtle and hard to explain, you really have to see it (on Panasonic site they may have an explanation of the difference)
- more important: the color and gamma range control factor
- can handle contrast better, video tends to not handle that well, this camera makes people look better, has a Leica lens
- not so cool because of its sharpness (Sony camera takes sharper pictures, but there is actually a control to soften it a little and make it look more like film)
-- lens is naturally a little wider, about 15-20% of a wider field of view
-- makes it better to compose and frame images that are wide open
-- ratings: .5 or .6 or .7 are normal, different equivalents than 35 mm
Also is a very manually controlled camera
- my Sony PD 120 is one of the best automatic cameras to ever be created
in a perfect world I would have 6 cameras, because each one is a trade off
Issue with tapes, and dropouts...
- most tapes that are out there are equivalent, but each has a type of lubricant that helps them glide over the video hardware
-- because the video lubricants are incompatible with each other, they can gunk up the camera video heads
lesson is for tapes: pick a brand and stay with it
- cheapest Sony's (PRs) are good
In the 50s people stopped going to the movies and stayed at home to
- anamorphic is a widescreen format, way of compressing a wider frame and then expanding it again in movie theater
high def TV's native size is 16:9
- that is because of the anamorphic format
DV is somewhere in between standard TV size (it is a little wider) but it is not as wide as high def
before DV came out, standard was 640 x 480
- DV is 720 x 480
- some cameras have an electronic adapter inside them, crops
Good composition contains content!
Rule of thirds
- see curriculum p. 80
- dividing picture plane into 2 equally spaced lines vertially and again horizontally
- this gives you a grid to shoot against and compose along
-- Greeks came up with this, we didn't
looking into the frame can be a more interesting composition
- compose on the frame lines, not in the center / middle
putting subjects on the lines creates more space, makes
this is just like basic composition like art school
Good technique to teach this: attach camcorder directly to the projector and show examples
Key: whatever you shoot don't put it in the middle of your frame
- now it does become formulatic
- it is what you do with the rest of the frame that is the key
DV is really 3:2
TV is almost 4:3 although TVs are different sizes
new tax on TVs for the next 2 years, FCC is trying to make transition to totally digital televsion to help the system transfer over
Things are going over to 16 x 9
- computer always adjusts display
- eventually everything is going to be 16 x 9 and everything you shot in 4 x 3 will have black bands on the sides
Most cameras now shoot in 4x3, there is a Sony camera out now that can shoot in native 16x9
3 chip versus 1 chip cameras
- in video camera there is no gate, the light always streams in
- CCD = charged couple device
- CCD is a chip that is full of pixels / sensors looks at little bit of light hitting it, looks at color, shape and all the variables and makes decisions about what its characteristics are
- in single chip camera: it has 1 of those chips for all 3 primary colors and all light
- for 3 chip cameras, you have 3 different chips: 1 for red, 1 for green, and 1 for blue spectrum
-- together the info for those are put together: DSP (digital signal processor) is the integrator
-- get much better color fidelity, colors more saturated, more contained, don't bleed through (esp red), better gradiation of color, you have more detail
-- 3 things are sampling the color
--- this is the major thing that defines a low end and a high end camera
New technology called fauvon for digital cameras, layering colors, that may spill over to
Everything on the DV tape is numbers, zeros and ones
Now tape is getting old
- The cameras now that write straight to DVD work with MPEG compression, so the quality is less
- Sony and Panasonic are working with flash memory so you can write directly to the RAM, that is where this is going
- cameras can write directly to a firewire drive instead of a tape
- you can get firewire drives that clip to your belt, and the camera can write that info straight to it
Idea of blue screen / green screen
- have 1 constant satured color that you can color out of the frame
- if it is very saturated, it is easy to sample it out
- we use green or blue because those colors are not normally found in healthy human skin
- process of doing this in software is complex: we are identifying a color and telling the software to sample that and make it transparent, and make everything else opaque
- getting a good key starts with lighting and your setup
- idea is to hard light the background and soft light the person
-- nice even wash of unfiltered / undiffused light on the background
-- get soft light to illuminate the person in front
- it is very hard to do this properly
- pros often use flourescents to light the back, makes it very even
[INSET PHOTOS HERE]
A company called photoflex donated the light kits we are using
- their bulbs are all 1000 watt, 500 would be better for our small room
- it is going to get hot in here as soon as these lights get turned on
we are using a boom / shotgun microphone
diffusion panels on front of lights
want to get your talent as far away from the green screen as possible but not so far away that you see the edges of the screen
- can be good to even throw the green screen out of focus a little bit
You don't want to light your talent in a way that will be very different than what they will be in front of
- could use colored light covers, use red and orange filters and wave them in front of the subject/talent lights
distance from camera to subject depends on may factors
- size of room
- framing of your shot: close up or medium shot
When you start shooting a new tape, record something for at least 30 sec at the start
- tapes usually drop frames during the first 15 - 30 sec
when doing lighting, there is a 3 light rule
- key light: main light for the subject
- fill light: fill in the shadowns
- back light: helps set apart the subject from the background
companies to order equipment from:
- Shure: mid-range audio equipment
http://www.shure.com/
- B and H Photo and Video:
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/
- to order green screen paint or film stuff specific for keying: Ulti Mat
http://www.shure.com/
tail slate: do the slate upside down, it tells the editor that was for the last take
timecode is the address of every frame of video on the tape
- it is very important you write consistent timecode to the tape
- if you put your tape in and out, or fast forward into the blue and start the camera over again, it starts the timecode over from zero
- the reason this is bad is because your editing application looks at the timecode
-- if you are doing batch capturing when you use in and out points (logging shots that you like: in and out points) then that feature won't work if your timecode gets reset
- sometimes cheaper cameras will give you timecode breaks when you just turn the camera on and off
-- way to get around that is to preblack your tape: put tape in the camera with lenscap in camera
--- then record the entire one hour of video with just black
--- then the timecode will be set
once you have written timecode to an entire tape, it will keep that timecode
generally you don't want to use a tape more than three times
- all tape will degrade over time
- after the 4th or 5th time you may get dropouts, depends on whether that tape has gotten hot: it is just oxides on the outside of the tape
shotgun mic rig we were using costs about $700 retail
There is a button you can use (one button auto on Sony cameras) that, when you are in manual mode, you can switch temporarily to autofocus mode
in dark situations you absolutely don't want autofocus, because it is always searching for focus
- only time to use autofocus when you are a really experienced videographer in situations with lots of action
- use autofocus to get in focus (periodically)
Trick to throw background out of focus is easier in telephoto mode
- that is why many cinematographers like long lenses, allows greater control over depth of field
- also means you don't have to have your camera right in the actor's face
You can go into the menu and turn off the digital zoom for the camera, because the quality is really poor
- there is really no "good" digital zoom
Apeture adjustment on Panasonic AG-DVC30 is really smooth, doesn't seem to be as "stepped"
in a wider shot, you tend to have a wider plane of focus
- harder to stay in focus when you are in telephoto
a camera dolly cost about 150K, silent motor and pneumatic wheels, or stage hands push it, some run on tracks
steadycam balances your camera on a gimble (ball and socket joint), camera is balanced to the steady cam, often has a small LCD monitor readout
- 35 mm cameras have an entire harness that a person has to wear, it can weight 50 or 60 lbs.
news cameras like beta cams are so large they sit on your shoulder
- lenses on betacam cameras are generally better and interchangable
- a lot of time it is impossible to tell the difference between a DV image and betacam
-- beta can hold more color information
white balance: video cameras don't see the world like we do
- different types of light can make things look differently: daylight is actually blue light
- on video cameras and digital still cameras, they have settings for white balance
- if you can get the white to look right flesh tones will look more natural
- can move the white balance to a "sun" setting and that warms the colors a bit, so people look more natural (where the light is blue)
incandescent bulbs: it is good to turn the light bulb setting, light bulb filaments tend to make things look red
When I get a new camera, for a week I am obsessed with it: read the entire manual
- then go out with your camera in all conditions, talk into the mic, push all the buttons and talk all the time
- then go look at your tape on the TV
- between that and the manual, this is how you learn to use your camera
I am about to do free tech support for friends and family
- I am a storyteller! Everybody calls me!
get friendly with your manual!
don't use any other mode on your camera besides SP! The quality is terribly degreated and you are more prone for dropouts, and your tape can get eaten in other settings like LP!
There is so much technology and often people do not scratch the surface of its capabilities! Read the manual!
Zooming:
- I really hate the way a zoom looks, many directors and cinametaographers do
- better to cut to a close shot and a wide shot
a "creep" is an almost imperceptible zoom
- that is a good dramatic
zooming is like hosing the scene down
- use the zoom lever to compose a shot
amateur video is defined by lots of zooming!
7 Jul 2004
Today we are working with a Panasonic DVX 100A (these will sell to DMA participants for approx $3000 rather than the 5K they usually sell for
Can shoot at 24 fps rather than the standard 30 fps (the frame rate of video that you see on TV)
- video in the US with NTSC standard works at 30 fps (actually 29....)
- shooting at 24 fps, you can get a more "filmic" feel
-- other things at work: gamma range (control over color)
-- this is a better range of control over color, specifically over the gamma range (the mid range of color and light)
--- other parts are highlights and shadows
-- gamma range is where the color really happens
Can use this camera to make video look like it was shot on 16 mm film and transferred back to video
Sony research several years ago
- showed clip to non-professional
- first projected image shot on 35 mm film
- then projected same thing on high-quality video
- audience survey, to question about "what looked like reality"-- almost everyone said "the film version," except in Japaan where they said "video"
-- truth is: neither one of them is really like we see the world, our minds are always doing editing
- telecine: process of transferring film to video
-- most every film you can checkout on DVD or VHS was shot on film and transferred to video
-- if it was shot on video you would know it: it would look different
-- part of that is frame rate
-- also lenses: better lenses were made for panavision type film cameras
George Lucas and what he is doing with Star Wars
- he hates film and thinks it is a real hassle
- esp true to him because so much is created on computer, that is very close to video
- his latest camera is a collaboration between Sony and panavision
-- front end is like panavision, can take expensive lenses, backend is a digital signal processing unit, very high-def format
- the benefit is that his crew can immediately start working with it on the computer
- this keeps the whole process digital from beginning to end
- rental rate on that camera is about 50K per day, the camera cost about $1 million
There are now more cameras like that in a lower range
- vary-cam: you can change the frame rate on it (Panasonic makes that)
24 fps influences the way motion looks
- it is subtle and hard to explain, you really have to see it (on Panasonic site they may have an explanation of the difference)
- more important: the color and gamma range control factor
- can handle contrast better, video tends to not handle that well, this camera makes people look better, has a Leica lens
- not so cool because of its sharpness (Sony camera takes sharper pictures, but there is actually a control to soften it a little and make it look more like film)
-- lens is naturally a little wider, about 15-20% of a wider field of view
-- makes it better to compose and frame images that are wide open
-- ratings: .5 or .6 or .7 are normal, different equivalents than 35 mm
Also is a very manually controlled camera
- my Sony PD 120 is one of the best automatic cameras to ever be created
in a perfect world I would have 6 cameras, because each one is a trade off
Issue with tapes, and dropouts...
- most tapes that are out there are equivalent, but each has a type of lubricant that helps them glide over the video hardware
-- because the video lubricants are incompatible with each other, they can gunk up the camera video heads
lesson is for tapes: pick a brand and stay with it
- cheapest Sony's (PRs) are good
In the 50s people stopped going to the movies and stayed at home to
- anamorphic is a widescreen format, way of compressing a wider frame and then expanding it again in movie theater
high def TV's native size is 16:9
- that is because of the anamorphic format
DV is somewhere in between standard TV size (it is a little wider) but it is not as wide as high def
before DV came out, standard was 640 x 480
- DV is 720 x 480
- some cameras have an electronic adapter inside them, crops
Good composition contains content!
Rule of thirds
- see curriculum p. 80
- dividing picture plane into 2 equally spaced lines vertially and again horizontally
- this gives you a grid to shoot against and compose along
-- Greeks came up with this, we didn't
looking into the frame can be a more interesting composition
- compose on the frame lines, not in the center / middle
putting subjects on the lines creates more space, makes
this is just like basic composition like art school
Good technique to teach this: attach camcorder directly to the projector and show examples
Key: whatever you shoot don't put it in the middle of your frame
- now it does become formulatic
- it is what you do with the rest of the frame that is the key
DV is really 3:2
TV is almost 4:3 although TVs are different sizes
new tax on TVs for the next 2 years, FCC is trying to make transition to totally digital televsion to help the system transfer over
Things are going over to 16 x 9
- computer always adjusts display
- eventually everything is going to be 16 x 9 and everything you shot in 4 x 3 will have black bands on the sides
Most cameras now shoot in 4x3, there is a Sony camera out now that can shoot in native 16x9
3 chip versus 1 chip cameras
- in video camera there is no gate, the light always streams in
- CCD = charged couple device
- CCD is a chip that is full of pixels / sensors looks at little bit of light hitting it, looks at color, shape and all the variables and makes decisions about what its characteristics are
- in single chip camera: it has 1 of those chips for all 3 primary colors and all light
- for 3 chip cameras, you have 3 different chips: 1 for red, 1 for green, and 1 for blue spectrum
-- together the info for those are put together: DSP (digital signal processor) is the integrator
-- get much better color fidelity, colors more saturated, more contained, don't bleed through (esp red), better gradiation of color, you have more detail
-- 3 things are sampling the color
--- this is the major thing that defines a low end and a high end camera
New technology called fauvon for digital cameras, layering colors, that may spill over to
Everything on the DV tape is numbers, zeros and ones
Now tape is getting old
- The cameras now that write straight to DVD work with MPEG compression, so the quality is less
- Sony and Panasonic are working with flash memory so you can write directly to the RAM, that is where this is going
- cameras can write directly to a firewire drive instead of a tape
- you can get firewire drives that clip to your belt, and the camera can write that info straight to it
Idea of blue screen / green screen
- have 1 constant satured color that you can color out of the frame
- if it is very saturated, it is easy to sample it out
- we use green or blue because those colors are not normally found in healthy human skin
- process of doing this in software is complex: we are identifying a color and telling the software to sample that and make it transparent, and make everything else opaque
- getting a good key starts with lighting and your setup
- idea is to hard light the background and soft light the person
-- nice even wash of unfiltered / undiffused light on the background
-- get soft light to illuminate the person in front
- it is very hard to do this properly
- pros often use flourescents to light the back, makes it very even
[INSET PHOTOS HERE]
A company called photoflex donated the light kits we are using
- their bulbs are all 1000 watt, 500 would be better for our small room
- it is going to get hot in here as soon as these lights get turned on
we are using a boom / shotgun microphone
diffusion panels on front of lights
want to get your talent as far away from the green screen as possible but not so far away that you see the edges of the screen
- can be good to even throw the green screen out of focus a little bit
You don't want to light your talent in a way that will be very different than what they will be in front of
- could use colored light covers, use red and orange filters and wave them in front of the subject/talent lights
distance from camera to subject depends on may factors
- size of room
- framing of your shot: close up or medium shot
When you start shooting a new tape, record something for at least 30 sec at the start
- tapes usually drop frames during the first 15 - 30 sec
when doing lighting, there is a 3 light rule
- key light: main light for the subject
- fill light: fill in the shadowns
- back light: helps set apart the subject from the background
companies to order equipment from:
- Shure: mid-range audio equipment
http://www.shure.com/
- B and H Photo and Video:
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/
- to order green screen paint or film stuff specific for keying: Ulti Mat
http://www.shure.com/
tail slate: do the slate upside down, it tells the editor that was for the last take
timecode is the address of every frame of video on the tape
- it is very important you write consistent timecode to the tape
- if you put your tape in and out, or fast forward into the blue and start the camera over again, it starts the timecode over from zero
- the reason this is bad is because your editing application looks at the timecode
-- if you are doing batch capturing when you use in and out points (logging shots that you like: in and out points) then that feature won't work if your timecode gets reset
- sometimes cheaper cameras will give you timecode breaks when you just turn the camera on and off
-- way to get around that is to preblack your tape: put tape in the camera with lenscap in camera
--- then record the entire one hour of video with just black
--- then the timecode will be set
once you have written timecode to an entire tape, it will keep that timecode
generally you don't want to use a tape more than three times
- all tape will degrade over time
- after the 4th or 5th time you may get dropouts, depends on whether that tape has gotten hot: it is just oxides on the outside of the tape
shotgun mic rig we were using costs about $700 retail
There is a button you can use (one button auto on Sony cameras) that, when you are in manual mode, you can switch temporarily to autofocus mode
in dark situations you absolutely don't want autofocus, because it is always searching for focus
- only time to use autofocus when you are a really experienced videographer in situations with lots of action
- use autofocus to get in focus (periodically)
Trick to throw background out of focus is easier in telephoto mode
- that is why many cinematographers like long lenses, allows greater control over depth of field
- also means you don't have to have your camera right in the actor's face
You can go into the menu and turn off the digital zoom for the camera, because the quality is really poor
- there is really no "good" digital zoom
Apeture adjustment on Panasonic AG-DVC30 is really smooth, doesn't seem to be as "stepped"
in a wider shot, you tend to have a wider plane of focus
- harder to stay in focus when you are in telephoto
a camera dolly cost about 150K, silent motor and pneumatic wheels, or stage hands push it, some run on tracks
steadycam balances your camera on a gimble (ball and socket joint), camera is balanced to the steady cam, often has a small LCD monitor readout
- 35 mm cameras have an entire harness that a person has to wear, it can weight 50 or 60 lbs.
news cameras like beta cams are so large they sit on your shoulder
- lenses on betacam cameras are generally better and interchangable
- a lot of time it is impossible to tell the difference between a DV image and betacam
-- beta can hold more color information
white balance: video cameras don't see the world like we do
- different types of light can make things look differently: daylight is actually blue light
- on video cameras and digital still cameras, they have settings for white balance
- if you can get the white to look right flesh tones will look more natural
- can move the white balance to a "sun" setting and that warms the colors a bit, so people look more natural (where the light is blue)
incandescent bulbs: it is good to turn the light bulb setting, light bulb filaments tend to make things look red
When I get a new camera, for a week I am obsessed with it: read the entire manual
- then go out with your camera in all conditions, talk into the mic, push all the buttons and talk all the time
- then go look at your tape on the TV
- between that and the manual, this is how you learn to use your camera
I am about to do free tech support for friends and family
- I am a storyteller! Everybody calls me!
get friendly with your manual!
don't use any other mode on your camera besides SP! The quality is terribly degreated and you are more prone for dropouts, and your tape can get eaten in other settings like LP!
There is so much technology and often people do not scratch the surface of its capabilities! Read the manual!
Zooming:
- I really hate the way a zoom looks, many directors and cinametaographers do
- better to cut to a close shot and a wide shot
a "creep" is an almost imperceptible zoom
- that is a good dramatic
zooming is like hosing the scene down
- use the zoom lever to compose a shot
amateur video is defined by lots of zooming!
Posted: Wed - July 7, 2004 at 06:14 PM
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Total entries in this category: 7
Published On: Jul 07, 2004 07:00 PM
Total entries in this category: 7
Published On: Jul 07, 2004 07:00 PM
