Notes On Video

So You Wanna Be a Filmmaker Zacuto hosts Part Deux of Ron Dawson's series on becoming a filmmaker, and in this episode he discusses the pros and cons of working as a subcontractor, or "growing your own studio." Zacuto : So You Wanna Be a Filmmaker – Part Deux by Ron Dawson Lens Correction for Video is Photoshop CS5 Richard Harrington shows up at TipSquirrel.com with a short tutorial on using the Lens Correction filter on both Stills and Video: The Lens Correction filter can also be used on DSLR video files. This is a useful way to remove lens or geometric distortion. When your’re done, you’ll need to render the video file back out of Photoshop (File > Export > Render Video). TipSquirrel.com: Lens Correction in Photoshop CS5 Richard also pops up in the latest episode of D-Town TV to talk about tools to monitor your video while shooting on DSLRs (loupe's and monitors.): D-Town TV: Episode 40 Garrett Brown and the Steadicam Tango Cinema5D has a sho...

Redrock Mico has updated details about their microRemote the combination wireless/wired remote follow-focus that can be used with the iPhone/iPod Touch . microRemote Wireless Handheld 2.4ghz production-quality proven wireless radio: no wi-fi or bluetooth Wired "tethered" connection via integrated connection port Advanced power management: integrated rechargeable battery, concurrently powers iPhone/iPod D-tap power connection Ergonomic handheld design fits comfortably in hand Left- or right-handed operation Reversible direction Still lenses can calibrate to full cinema rotation for precise focusing Camera start/stop Can be used for focus, zoom, iris control Optional iPhone/iPod Touch software interface Redrock microRemote software for iPhone/iPod Touch the first Apple-certified iPhone/iPod touch application for advanced focus automation real-time graphic and numeric display of focus distance and focus scale real-time display of microTape sonar range find...

Making It Look Like Film Videomaker has an overview of the many techniques used to make video look like film; from frame rate and shutter speed, to depth of field, filters and lighting. Videomaker :  Making It Look Like Film James Mathers gives a DPs perspective on DSLRs Cinematograhper and co-founder of the Digital Cinema Society James Mathers has written a piece on DSLRs for NewMediaWebinars.com. He opens with the quote " To the man who only has a hammer, everything he encounters begins to look like a nail ," and then proceeds to describe the history, and list all of the shortcomings of using DSLR's for shooting films and video. But he hasn't come to bury Ceasar: I’ve mentioned a number of shortcomings, but to be honest, these are mainly just the result of using the camera to make professional motion pictures, a use they were never really designed for. Yet with all these “deficiencies,” there must be a reason they are in such demand, and that is simple; they...

Tonight at 6pm at the Boylston Street Apple Store, Taz Goldstein of HandHeldHollywood.com will take an in-depth look at the latest apps and filmmaker accessories that can turn the iPad , iPhone and iPod Touch into powerful production tools. BOSFCPUG FINAL CUT FRIDAY Boylston Street Apple Store 815 Boylston Street Boston, MA 02116 (617) 385-9400

If you can't get enough of bad movies, check todays broadcast of OnPoint [11AM EDT], which will be on " Judging the Worst Movies Ever ." OnPoint is broadcast on a lot of public radio stations, or if you check back with the website tomorrow you can hear a webcast of the show. OnPointRadio.org

“Boris RED Version 5 brings RED’s award-wining 3D compositing, titling, and effects capabilities to 64-bit video editing applications,” commented Boris Yamnitsky, president and founder, Boris FX. “30+ new filters cover many common post-production tasks including 3-way color grading, the ability to uprez SD video to HD, video noise reduction, and a range of image restoration tools.” Boris RED 5 New Feature Highlights New Support for 64-bit Video Editing Applications . Boris RED 5 will support Adobe CS5, CS4, and CS3 under 64-bit and 32-bit Macintosh and Windows operating systems and Sony Vegas 9 under 64-bit and 32-bit Windows operating systems. 3 Way Color Grade Filter provides a professional color grading process complete with three custom color wheels for pedestal/gamma/gain adjustment. New Noise Reduction Filter smoothes out video noise using spatial and temporal information derived from the video clip - especially in dark areas of an image. New UpRez Filter for high-qualit...

-adjective 1. A zoom lens that remains in focus as you zoom from one focal length to another. -Why you should care 2. If you manually focus by zooming in on a subject and then zooming out to take a picture. 3. If you want to zoom while shooting a video segment. -Idioms 4. Some feel the 70-200mm L IS lens is not parfocal at distances less than 20 feet from the camera [9] 5. I want to get a parfocal zoom lens with the longest zoom range possible. -Origin 6. par + focal (par = a level of equality) -Discussion 7. DPReview.com: Not all zoom lenses are parfocal 8. DVInfo.com: Is a parfocal lens necessary? -References 9. Doug Chinnery Photography: Canon Parfocal Lenses 10. Wikipedia: Parfocal lens -Other Canon does not officially list lenses as being parfocal, but these L lenses are considered by most to be parfocal. You can find a list of other lenses at [9]. Canon EF 16-35mm f/2.8L USM [ B & H $1,520.00 (take $100 off until 7/10) ] Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8L ...

Canonrumors.com reported a couple of days ago that a "hybrid" camera might be coming in September, though they had no details of what that might be. Today they're speculating it might be a 5D Mark II replacement, as there is a $500 rebate on the camera in Canada right now. Unfortunately, US buyers only get $100 off... [ B & H $2,399 ] I think it's a bit of a leap that the 5D Mark II replacement would be billed as a hybrid camera; a true hybrid camera would require some body and functional changes that would - probably - move it away from the SLR design of the 5D. And the last rumor was that the Mark III wouldn't be out until next year at the earliest....but then we're dealing in rumors here. They are also reporting that a 60D is on the near horizon, though  on May 31st there was a report that there would be no 60D...

...I'm trying to remain disinterested... But for those who can't, B & H has it up for pre-order . Interestingly, if you search for "Zoom H1" on Amazon, the first item listed is: Canon EF-S 55-250mm f/4.0-5.6 IS Telephoto Zoom Lens for Canon Digital SLR Cameras .

Graham Sharp from AV3 Software demoed their phonetic search tool ‘get’ at last weeks Boston Final Cut Pro meeting. It was a pretty impressive demo. ‘get’ is an application, though within Final Cut Pro it acts like a plug-in. You set up a watch folder, and any media placed in that folder will be analyzed and indexed phonetically. The program can index any audio media that Final Cut can understand. Indexing is fast; an hour of material can take as little as 10 seconds. The search is purely phonetic; you can type out the words you are looking for phonetically, and it will find them. Note: this is not a speech-to-text tool. Evidently the phonetic analyzer was originally written for the military, and is licensed to AV3 Software. The demo was quite impressive; searching for multiple word phrases, as well as short words like “the,” worked seemingly perfectly. There’s also a drop down called Score that can be used to adjust the accuracy of the search. Graham demoed searching thr...

If you're interested in stop motion, animation, etc., the music video J'ai pas le temps / I have no time by Carlos Lascano is simply amazing. It was shot using a Canon 7D, and high-lighted in the recent Great Camera Shootout - Part 3 . Now they've posted a making-of video, and I'm really glad they did as it turns out it wasn't made in quite the way I had imagined. I thought it was all stop-motion, but while some stop motion is used, much of it was done by shooting puppets in front of green screens, and then compositing layers. It's a very clever technique - and a great time saver! Awesome! Making of J'ai pas le temps / sneak preview from Carlos Lascano on Vimeo .

It seems to be the rage to run video/film making competitions. Make a video, write a script, everyone's doing it. Heaven's, I've even been suckered into entering one or two for the fun of it. But sometimes, you have to wonder what's really going on. Take the latest one from American Express in partner with the Tribeca Film Festival. The My Movie Pitch offers a grand prize of your "pitch idea will be turned into a short feature film....complete with a dream indie budget." Only problem is, it's somebody else's dream! Read a bit closer, and you find that, the 60 second video pitch is the beginning and ending of your involvement; the film gets made by " movie professionals selected by Sponsor. " Read the small type and you find that the winner has absolutely nothing to do with the film: Short Film: Sponsor, in connection with Tribeca Enterprises LLC, plans to bring the Grand Prize Winner’s Movie Pitch to life by making it into a short fil...

Chapter 5 : "You & Your NLE": Always be careful to first copy any source material your client gives you from their thumb drive to your media folder before adding it to your Final Cut Project . Otherwise, when the client leaves with their thumb drive, you'll be surprised to find that the [ audio/video/images ] stops playing! I hate when that happens...

Boinx Software has announced the release of FotoMagico 3.5 a tool for animating and manipulating still images. This release adds new plug-in support for Apple Final Cut Pro , Final Cut Express , Motion and Adobe After Effects . The native plug-in integration allows videographers and motion graphic artists to animate still images and render directly within the host applications. FotoMagico 3.5 Pro (including PhotoPresenter 4) is available today for $149 USD. The update to FotoMagico 3.5 is free of charge for existing FotoMagico 3.x owners at their current license levels. Existing FotoMagico 2.x owners at their current license levels can upgrade to FotoMagico 3.5 Pro for $89 USD.

In writing about the Zoom H 1 earlier, I said that because it lacks XLR inputs the recorder was less appealing to me . Which is not to say that it's not going to be a good and useful product, it's just not something I see using for most video applications. But it's been pointed out that you could use an XLR to 1/8" stereo adapter, and then use the H1 with good external mics. This is true, but it's not something I'd personally recommend. Generally, the more cables and adapters you have, the more likely you are to have trouble; you can't find the adapter, it's not as secure a connection, it's two connections instead of one. It all seems like trivial stuff, but it does impact what you're doing. I've used 1/8" adapter's prior to getting both a camera and a recording deck with XLR inputs, and there really is a noticeable difference in the way things just seem to work better. In fact, I now shy away from using anything but the XLR inp...

DIGITAL CONVERGENCE EPISODE 18 - Philip Bloom - Director of Photography, Cinematographer, DSLR Video Pioneer Carl Olson of 16x9 Cinema interviews Philip Blom in his latest podcast: Episode 18 H.264 and VP8 Compared Jan Oxer at StreamingMedia.com takes a first look at VP8 compared to H.264. His initial conclusion; VP8 does pretty well, matching or slightly outperforming H.264 in low motion clips, depending upon the background, but H.264 does better in high-motion pieces, though the differences are probably not even noticeable in most applications. StreamingMedia.com : First Look: H.264 and VP8 Compared Meanwhile... Google's new video codec may infringe other patents As was previously reported , Google's new Web video format/codec may not be free from patent licensing; or the threat of it. Sometime's the threat is all that' needed... CNET: Patent cloud looms over Google Web video plan New iKan ID 400 iKan describes the ID-400 as the perfect ENG-style r...

This Friday, June 4th, 6pm at the Boylston Street Apple Store Taz Goldstein of HandHeldHollywood.com will take an in-depth look at the latest apps and filmmaker accessories that can turn the iPad , iPhone and iPod Touch into powerful production tools. JUNE BOSFCPUG FINAL CUT FRIDAY Boylston Street Apple Store 815 Boylston Street Boston, MA 02116 (617) 385-9400

If you're in LA this weekend, check out the Cine Gear Expo : The Film and Digital Media Conference June 3 – 6, 2010 The Studios at Paramount The event includes Exhibits, Seminars and a Film Series. There will also be a 3D Symposium on Friday.

Steve Jobs spoke at the D8 Conference last night, and had a few words to say about the Apple TV (and Google TV , etc..) ...no one wants to buy a box. Ask TiVo, ask Roku, ask us... ask Google in a few months. [...] The only way that's going to change is if you tear up the set top box, give it a new UI, and get it in front of consumers in a way they're going to want it. Reading between the lines, does this confirm the reports of a $99 Apple TV replacement ? Engadget : Steve Jobs on TV: 'no one wants to buy a box'

Zoom has announced the H1, a digital recorder for $99! With 24-bit/96kHz recording to included 2GB microSD it looks pretty cool, and they even show it being used on top of an HDSLR camera. You just have to wait until the end of July for delivery. BUT, there's no XLR inputs [ of course not with something that small! ] and while having something small and compact is appealing, frankly, I'd rather use the Zoom H4n  and plug some good mics into it, but that's just me... Samson : Zoom H1

A few months ago I bought a VholdR ContourHD 1080p Wearable Camcorder  ( $309 Amazon ) with the intention of sending it up in a kite. That hasn't happened yet, but I did buy another accessory for it and have been putting it to some good use. The VholdR 2800 Windshield Mount Kit  ( $39 Amazon ) is actually made by PanaVise, but has a mount on the top designed for the ContourHD camera. You slide the camera into the metal rails, and then tighten two screws on the bottom of the mount to keep the camera in place. The camera bracket is metal, but the rest of the arm and mount is plastic, which - along with the camera - keeps it light. I'm a little concerned about the long-term survivability of the top ball joint. My suspicion is that it's the part that's most likely to fail, and it's the part on which the camera mount spins and provides most of the positioning flexibility. However, the lightness of the ContourHD itself may help the longevity of the mount. Since I ha...

Unless otherwise noted, these events are held from 10am to 12 noon at Rule's Boston office. For more information, check Rule Events page ( which is not yet updated !) Jun 2: Multi-camera Live Productions Covering communication devices, recorders, sources and switchers for live multi-camera set-ups in the studio and in the field. Jun 9: Monitor Solutions for Field Shoots Field monitors (both on-camera and on-set) to address composition and critical focus issues as well as solutions for wired and wireless client viewing stations. Jun 16: HD-SLR Cameras as the New Production Weapon Highlight tools, accessories and specific applications for the Canon line-up. Also, engineering staff will be present to perform free firmware upgrades. Jun 22 5pm to 9pm Boston Tech Expo Jun 24 10am to 3pm New Hampshire Tech Expo Jun 30 Phantom HD Gold - Unleashed! The Phantom HD Gold camera is capable of shooting up to 1000 frames-per-second, with shutter speeds as fast as 2 microsec...

Fresh from the problems with the Flash -to- iPad conversion, Adobe has now announced a software viewer that let publishers create digital versions of their documents created in Adobe Indesign . For those that haven't been following, Apple has already banned an Adobe technology that converted Flash movies into an iPhone/iPad runtime on the basis of it using links to Documented APIs through an intermediary translation or compatibility layer or tool , a process that Apple now prohibits. It appears that Adobe's latest technology binds content with a viewer application (the application, since it's written using the Apple toolkit, wouldn't be covered by Apple's prohibition on the Flash conversion tool.) It will be interesting to see what the viewer app will support; maybe it'll play back Flash movies! No pricing or release information. CNET : Adobe reveals magazine iPad-izer software

Jag35.com Shoulder Rig If you're looking for an inexpensive should rig for your HDSLR, you might want to look at the Jag35 Shoulder Rig. It features: 3lbs Counter weight included Adjustable shoulder pad Compatible w/ 1/4-20 threads Durable Aluminum Shipping Mid-June Price is $649.99 with $100 off for pre-orders. Jag35.com Shoulder Rig HDSLR Talk Radio show! Planet5D is considering an HDSLR talk radio show: All it takes is for someone to use Skype (something everyone can install and it is free from around the world!) to call me during a specified time and I’ll answer the calls. And I will also have some stories prepared to discuss when there aren’t any questions coming in (just like the talk shows do on the radio). I have all the equipment set up now, I have a Skype ID (planet5D), and now all we need to do is schedule the time. Go to the Planet5D site and vote for the best time to do the show... Planet5D : planet5D starting an HDSLR Talk Radio show! And now a...