Notes On Video

Either things are firming up in the rumor department, or the same rumor is coming around again, but a week or so ago CanonRumors reported that Canon was working on two large-sensor video cameras; one with an EF mount, and the other a PL mount. Now Wide Open Camera is reporting the same thing, with almost identical details (mounts, pricing of around $15,000) though it also adds the possibility of 4K resolution, which, if true, could be very, very interesting. A 4K, PL mount camera that costs $15,000 would definitely give Sony problems, and may hurt ARRI and even RED. And Canon has already shown a prototype 4K camera last year at the New York Canon Expo , so it's not like that's completely out of left field. It looks like it's going to be another interesting few months... WideOpenCamera: Canon To Announce New Camera In Hollywood November 3rd, 2011. *Update*

My Venture on Building a DIY Camera Dolly | Danny Salazar | Danny Salazar's Production Blog Extensive description of a DIY dolly project that cost about $200. Sony Alpha NEX-5N makes clicking sound when moved, renders captured audio useless (video) | Zach Honig | Engadget Troubling reports of a clicking noise the NEX-5N makes, that can be heard in the audio when making video recordings. Turn your Sony NEX 5N into a mini FS100 with Zacuto EVF and Canon lens adapter | Andrew Reid | EOSHD For about $1,600, Andrew thinks he can turn the NEX-5N into a mini NEX-FS100 . Sony FDA-EV1S | Darin McQuoid Photography Report on the OLED FDA-EV1S viewfinder for the Sony NEX-5N . He likes it, even though it's pricey. A New Entry Level Full Frame Camera? [CR1] | CanonRumors Now a report of a "6D" full-frame DSLR. I don't think this will be related to the Hollywood event in November... Does the 3rd of November have anything to do with this event? | Philip Jo...

People who alter or destroy works of art and our cultural heritage for profit or as an exercise of power are barbarians... In the future it will become even easier for old negatives to become lost and be "replaced" by new altered negatives. This would be a great loss to our society. Our cultural history must not be allowed to be rewritten. - George Lucas see: I Watch Stuff : George Lucas's 1988 Speech About Preserving Films...

At August's Pub Night at Rule Boston Camera , Frontline 's Director of Broadcast, Tim Mangini spoke on the subject of making documentaries under tight deadlines. Specifically, he talked about issues encountered during the production of two episodes; one on the Egyptian uprising, and the other on the death of Osama bin Laden. His story of the production of the Egypt episode, Revolution in Cairo - Frontline, Season 29, [ view it online : Frontline ] begins with a producer flying into Cairo, while production crews were already on location, but they were running short of media and other supplies. Tasked with furnishing these supplies immediately, Tim's team first considered renting and buying the equipment from stores in Dubai, as the producer had a two hour lay-over there on the way to Cairo. This idea was quickly abandoned - partly because it was two in the morning in Dubai - in favor of sending someone from Boston that day with the gear. This posed other problems, be...

The web is buzzing with the news that Canon is having an event in Hollywood on November 5th. What could it be? The 5D Mark III or a large sensor video camera? Or something else? If I had to guess, I'd think large-frame video camera, but I have no information to really confirm that. If it is, my bet is that it will be expensive; well out of my budget (probably Sony PMW-F3 prices, or more.) Guess we have to wait and see (and endure another couple of months of rumors!)

Mark your calendars, the 2011 Boston SuperMeet will be held October 27th, at the Stuart Street Playhouse, Radisson Hotel Boston, 200 Stuart Street Boston MA 02116 Featuring Oscar & BAFTA Award-Winning Editor Walter Murch . Registration is not yet open: BOSFCPUG

Moire and Aliasing no more?! A solution for the 5DmkII. Full review now up! | Philip Bloom | Blog Philip posts his complete review of the Mosaic Engineering anti-moire filter for the Canon 5D Mark II . He found that it provided a "massive" improvement in image quality, removing most aliasing and much of the moire. NEGATIVES ; Not good with wide angle lenses. Some lenses work better with it than others. Not parfocal. Slight image softening. Close up focus changed. Be careful with old Nikon lenses with the bit of metal that sticks out. It can damage your filter and if you are not careful like me…your camera too! 35mm f/1.4 Showdown | Matthew Duclos | Circle of Confusion Matthew compares the budget Bower/ Rokinon (actually made by Samyang) 35mm f/1.4 [$499.00] with the Zeiss 35mm f/1.4 ZF [$1,843.00]. Noting that there's some material and functional differences, he finds the image quality to be very, very similar. He also notes that the Samyang is a little closer t...

Final Cut Pro to Adobe Premiere Pro "Gotchas" 1 | walter biscardi, jr. | Vimeo "For the Final Cut Pro editor migrating over to Adobe Premiere Pro CS 5.5 , there are a few quirks within the application that will drive you absolutely bonkers. Here's a few of the "gotchas" that got me and how to avoid them." CINEMA Picture Profile. Worth the money? | Chris Marino | Wide Open Camera Chris downloaded the $19 CINEMA Picture Style for Canon cameras, and tried is out compared to Technicolors Cinestyle Picture Style. A Portal Effect in After Effects | Video Copilot A video tutorial showing how to make a smokey portal effect with turbulent Particles in After Effects . UnderWaterRealm Blog WEEK 31 - 5DmkII vs EX1 Underwater! | Realm Pictures A shootout between the Canon 5DmkII and the Sony EX1 underwater! It starts with an interesting discussion about shooting a scene underwater. The Canon loses due to usability, but also because depth-of-fiel...

Selling Your Film Without Selling Your Soul | SellingYourFilm This eBook by filmmaker and consultant Jon Reiss and inbound marketing strategist Sheri Candler is available in several formats, and is free - in some of those - until October 1st. How to best use twixtor for extreme slow motion | Salomon Ligthelm | PhilipBloom.net Guest blogger Salomon Lighelm explains how to get the best results from the software Twixtor , both during shooting, and in post. He also notes that he thinks it works best in After Effects : Consider using an aspect matte to hide warping. I often use an aspect ratio of 2.4:1 in my work as a lot of my warping happens at the edges of my shots, thus a matte will hide the really bad sections. One instance of this was a shot in the short of mine called [Fo'tis'ma], where my good friend Franzwa is taking off from a ledge [Its the tight - slightly angled down shot at 34s]. The warping on his hand was REALLY bad – especially because the shot was rath...

Now We Can All Use the FBI Anti-Piracy Warning! | David Kravets | Wired Evidently, it is illegal to use the FBI warning on your videos unless you are a member of certain trade associations. That should change soon... Color Match in Sony Vegas Pro | Boris FX A 16 minute video tutorial on color matching in Sony Vegas with Boris FX. PMWTD300 XDCAM EX 3D Shoulder Mount Camcorder | Sony Sony product page for their ENG 3D camcorder. It can be yours for $33,000.00! Episode 29: ALZO Transformer DSLR Camera Rig | DSLR Video Shooter A look at the ALZO Transformer DSLR rig . Sony NEX-FS100 on Steadicam Merlin | Derran | Vimeo Nice little video shot on the Sony NEX-FS100E with Sony SEL1628 16mm F2.8 pancake lens and VCL-ECU1 Ultra Wide converter on a Steadicam Merlin . Moire and Aliasing no more?! A solution for the 5DmkII | Philip Bloom | Blog Philip has added a few more pictures to his page documenting his experiments with the anti-aliasing/ moire filter from Mo...

PHYR Resolve HD | PHYX A new Mac application from PHYX for up-rezing video footage from standard def - or other resolutions - to HD 720p or 1080p. Features include: reduces noise and pixelation artifacts batch list function interlaced footage converted to progressive format It's $49.95, and though it works on Snow Leopard and Lion , they note that it encodes video twice as fast in Lion . At least one person has wondered whether it's a good idea to use the name Resolve , when the color grading tool DaVinci Resolve is often simply referred to as Resolve . Litepanels Files Complaint with the ITC | IKAN IKAN has published a short statement about the complaint that Litepanels has filed with the United States International Trade Commission against IKAN and 15 other companies that import and sell solid state and LED lighting devices and components: IKAN will oppose the complaint. Interested parties may contact the U. S. International Trade Commission and voice their co...

Panasonic announced the AVCCAM Importer back in April, but only just got around to releasing it. The AVCCAM Importer is actually a component that adds support for direct playback of AVCCAM files within QuickTime . With it installed you can play AVCCAM files inside the QuickTime player, or even within Final Cut Pro 7, without conversion. The really cool thing is; it's free, and it seems to work for AVCHD files from other manufacturers as well. I downloaded and installed the plug-in without trouble. The installer does force you to restart the computer, but that's the only hitch. You need Snow Leopard or better, and Final Cut Pro 7.0.3 . Once installed, I tried it out with some video shot using the Panasonic AG-HMC70P  camcorder. The movies opened in the QuickTime Player, and played well; though the performance during playback from the SD card was similar to the performance I get when playing .mov files from my Canon DSLR card i.e. it tends to hiccup a bit. I tried...

B&H says they have limited quantities of the NEX-5N in stock: Sony Alpha NEX-5N Digital Camera with 18-55mm Lens (Silver) [$699.99] Sony Alpha NEX-5N Digital Camera (Body Only) [$599.99] And then there's...this interesting video comparing the NEX-5N , NEX-FS100 and the Canon T2i : Sony NEX-5N vs FS100 vs Canon T2i from Will Vazquez on Vimeo . and, video showing the NEX-5N menu and LA-EA2 adapter: Sony NEX-5N menu and LA-EA2 adapter from Imaging Resource on Vimeo .

IBC 2011: JVC 4k camera, Sony F65 and more | Philip Bloom | Philip Bloom Sony announced the price of the F65 4K camera last week, but JVC showed a prototype 4K camera at IBC that may be announced early next year, and may cost less than $10,000. It's about the size of a handicam, and probably won't have all the bells and whistles of the F65 , but could this be another game changer? 1/2″ 4k CMOS sensor. Records at 144 mb/s AVCHD. To do this it has FOUR SDXC slots onboard (!) to record the 4k image split into 4 quadrants. There are also 4 HDMI sockets to externally record 4 streams. Bundled software with it joins the 4 quadrants on ingest before going into your NLE. Sony Professional - IBC 2011 - Introduction to the F65 and 4K Workflow | Sony | Vimeo Speaking of the Sony F65 , Sony has posted this short video description of the F65 workflow. Video Showing The New Sony SCL-Z18X140 Zoom Lens for the F3 | Cinescopophilia back when it was introduced, Sony hinted/promi...

Once again the Adobe Press eBook Deal of the Week is Adobe After Effects CS5 Visual Effects and Compositing Studio Techniques by Mark Christiansen, which currently sells for $37.79 on Amazon , or $26.39 as a Kindle book: Adobe After Effects CS5 Visual Effects and Compositing Studio Techniques . I wrote about the experience of buying the eBook deal of the week here: Adobe Press eBook's . I think the $9.99 eBook is a good deal, but note that the DVD material is not included. I don't think this is a serious issues as you can replace your own media assets when working through the book. Adobe Press: eBook Deal of the Week