Archive for the ‘Craft of the Video Shooter’ Category

For accomplished cameramen and women shooting run-and-gun with the latest compact HD camcorders can be an exercise in frustration. Network broadcasters and news magazine shows including the top brand names with millions of viewers are turning more and more to these (relatively) cheap cameras not just for the occasional B-roll or specialty shot but for complete assignments top to bottom including craft intensive run-and-gun coverage of live events.

Even with my thirty years experience tackling such assignments I find the use of camcorders like the diminutive Sony Z5 very difficult to manage in a professional environment. Focusing in HD on a tiny EVF or swing-out LCD screen is not for the faint of heart, especially in bright sunlight. The awkwardly arranged, very exposed controls for manual-auto focus and the viewfinder diopter are easily bumped and inadvertently reset in the normal bustle of an actual assignment. The manually focusable lens while indeed adjustable is grossly ineffective; the entire focal range from near to far is covered in a maddening mere 1/8 turn of the focus ring!

Thus my usual method for achieving critical focus in these small camcorders proved ineffective in the Z5. Typically under run-and-gun conditions I use the distance readout in the viewfinder to roughly zone focus the camera. This avoids the need to constantly check and search mid-scene for critical focus. Owing to the short lens rotation however the readout is impractical in the Z5; the display toggling constantly critical focus info with a landscape or other cryptic icon. Grr.

Let’s remember as broadcasters and news directors cut corners wherever they can that it is easier to accomplish professional results with professional equipment. More and more correspondents and/or their producers are assuming the responsibility for capturing their own video and sound. The use of prosumer equipment with all the many compromises outlined here only makes this transition to one or two-person crews that much more difficult.

I’m currently in Singapore leading a series of 3D camera workshops with the new Panasonic 3DA1. Several of my students continue to confuse focus with convergence so it’s worth reiterating here: The convergence point, i.e. where the left-right camera lens axes intersect, defines the screen plane in a scene. As a matter of practice we always set the convergence point FIRST then focus. When the convergence point is placed BEHIND an object, that object appears in FRONT of the screen. When the convergence point is placed AHEAD of an object, that object appears BEHIND the screen.

Audiences viewing a 3D program are not immediately aware of the focal plane and can actually converge their eyes on the screen while focusing elsewhere inside the 3D volume. This is a fundamental conceit of 3D, and is the reason audiences are able to explore the 3D space around them.

3D Workshop Singapore • 12 June 2010

My recent month-long workshop in Cairo yielded many surprises to say the least, but student filmmaker Karim Soliman’s video SKETCH shot in four hours in the Garbage City section of the city was particularly impressive. The skillful use of close-ups, rigorous control of the frame boundary, and strict adherence to the exclude, exclude, exclude principle produced a truly amazing piece of work. Congratulations to filmmaker Karim Soliman for creating a lasting work of art!

View ‘SKETCH’ here:

NAB 2010. I’m in Las Vegas now strolling the Strip with Panasonic’s new one-piece 3D camera. It’s my second night out, and while my 3D skills are improving I’m finding the whole experience rather humbling with only a few usable shots mixed in with a lot of  rubbish.

In the first place the Panasonic AG-3DA1 camera is not a run-and-gun type affair. Rigorous control of the frame boundary, convergence point and placement of objects is imperative, as is the use of a steady tripod to support a compelling i.e. non-sickening 3D experience. Thousands of drunken strollers cutting into and out of frame at all angles do not a pleasant 3D experience. make!

Unlike more sophisticated rigs that use twin-mounted cameras, a beam splitter and precise control of the distance between the left and right “eyes”, the A1 uses a single-twin lens system with a fixed interocular setting. The advantage is a greatly simplified operation with key parameters such as image distortion and rotation automatically addressed inside the front-mounted binocular housing.  The downside of of the fixed distance between the left and right eyes is the inability to shoot objects converging closer than 8 feet (2.2 meters). Indeed a shooting distance of 10-100 feet (approximately 3 – 30 meters) is ideal to produce the most compelling 3D images utilizing the Panasonic A1.

Objects floating ahead of the convergence point in negative space can produce a nauseated feeling in the viewer, as can objects cutting through the frame boundary that might appear in one eye and not the other. The threat of “Window Violations” is a constant menace for 3D shooters, and is a major reason why documentaries utilizing a verité 3D camera are inherently impractical.

The close-focus prohibition can be highly disconcerting to accomplished shooters long accustomed to working optimally at a range of six to eight feet (1.8-2.2 meters), invariably capturing close-ups at this distance for reasons of gaining proper perspective with minimum distortion.

Accomplished 2D shooters are also long accustomed to anchoring the frame by placing objects at or near the frame edges. We trim head room as objects approach the camera, and use copious foreground action to enhance the three-dimensional illusion.

These techniques are not applicable or advisable utilizing an actual 3D camera, especially one with a fixed interocular distance like the A1. Indeed the veteran 2D shooter can forget about many of the hard-learned third-dimension-inducing techniques. 3D requires a much more rigorous control of the frame and frame boundary than any of our 2D work until now.

One area requiring specific expertise is the setting and re-setting of the 3D camera’s  focus and convergence points often simultaneously mid-scene; the convergence point is typically set first and represents the screen plane. The 3D shooter must thus always be cognizant of objects crossing behind and in front of the screen plane/convergence point; this understanding helping to minimize to the extent possible the headache induced in viewers that may result from objects floating in negative space ahead of the convergence point.

Shooting proper 3D will require training and close attention to imaging fundamentals. Even for the most accomplished among us, the new 3D models including the new A1 will prove humbling at first as we understand how much (or how little) of our previous knowledge and experience can be safely applied.

As many of you might be aware I’ve been in Egypt this month working with local filmmakers and conducting a cinematography workshop at night. The matter of adopting a tapeless workflow is a virtual imperative here since the old tape-based systems currently in use here are decaying and failing with age. The tape-based cameras I’ve encountered including a range of vintage Betacam and newer Z1 HDV models haven’t been cleaned or otherwise maintained in years. It’s simply too expensive to do so given the modest Egyptian market that can ill-afford even the most basic maintenance tools of cleaning tapes. For the many HDV tape cameras here the use of cheap consumer tape only exacerbates the maintenance issue, as the shedding and poor slitting of this bottom quality tape leads to frequent head clogs and tape drop-outs. On many HDV and DV cameras I’ve seen including some on substantial television productions, the on-board battery connectors are broken or missing leaving the power unit to fall off, one or more XLR audio inputs do not work, and most distressingly perhaps, the tape transports need a light tap on the side of the camera to get rolling. Jump starting cars in the streets here seems to be a common means of getting things rolling , and so it would seem the same logic applies to jump-starting ailing tape-based cameras.

Of course there is a considerable price also for investing in tapeless equipment in the first place, but so is continuing down the current tape-based path with all the issues of poor reliability and inconvenience. For many filmmakers here the capture of tape-based material into the NLE requires the rental of a deck or camera from across town, which in Cairo is easily an all-day affair given the dense choking traffic. The advantages of foregoing tape in favor or recording to flash memory is obvious to me, and it is especially apparent in more cash-starved markets that can benefit handsomely from the workflow advantages and cost benefits of foregoing video tape – if they can afford, that is, the initial cost of investment.

Confusion abounds in the land of 24p!  If you’re shooting at 720p24 with a Sony EX camera, you are recording native frames to the SXS card at a rate of 23.98 FPS. Importing this footage into the Final Cut Pro timeline will produce a 23.98 editing time basis consistent with an all-24 FPS workflow ideal for output to DVD and Blu-Ray. The 24p frame rate in the Sony EX is also ideal  for mixing native 24p footage from other cameras like the Panasonic HPX170 and HPX200 P2 models.

On the other if you intend to shoot 24p for broadcast or web applications  at 1080i60, you will likely prefer an editorial time basis of 59.94 fields or frames per second.  Recording the HD SDI output out of the EX1 or EX3 to the AJA Ki Pro or Kona capture card will also give you the option of adding “pull-down” to create a 59.94 FPS time basis in the NLE. While the 23.98 workflow is efficient, especially for output primarily to disc, the 59.94 setting provides best compatibility with the web and certain tape-based cameras like the original Panasonic Varicam and HDV variants on the market from Canon, JVC and others.

To avoid unnecessary rendering on the NLE timeline and a potentially severe loss of quality, make sure you’re right!