Last week, The University held a ‘Skills Week’ – a week of perfecting and recognising our skills with others we wouldn’t usually work with. This year was the first time the film students did something outside the CMS (computer, mathematical and science) school. In previous years the Skills Week had very little in the way of a film aspect or were just incredibly boring. This year however, it was The 48hour film challenge. Where we had 48hours to shoot & edit the film. That in itself is a challenge. But we did have Monday to plan and Thursday to finish and then showcase all the productions. In this instance, being a third year, I had to Executive Produce said production along with another third year. Together we led a group of first and second years ranging in skills from a lot to not much. This is what Skills Week is all about, recognising our strengths and weaknesses and using this experience to better ourselves in the area we fall short.

My reasoning behind this post is simple. After watching all productions from the Skills Week challenge, it has come to my attention that many if not, all the productions lacked in having a decent audible experience. What this means is the sound levels on location may not have been set properly or the post production of the audio just didn’t happen. And if it did happen, it was a rushed job. My aim here is not criticise. It is to highlight the problem area and show how it can be corrected by doing a few simple things, both on location and or in post.

As a result of this experience I have learnt the hard way not to trust the universities equipment. Countless times I’ve been handed broken or missing items that result in bad sound. Batteries not charged, settings changed from default on the solid state recorder, broken shotgun microphones, leads bent causing artificial static, the list goes on… So to rectify this, I’ve taken the plunge, so to speak, and purchased my own shotgun mic. A Rode NTG-2. A phantom powered microphone of which is broadcast quality. I currently use the Zoom H4N solid state recorder for various sound applications, but it’s time for an upgrade to the on-board mics of the Zoom.

Here’s how to use this equipment to get decent quality sound every time. It’s the basics that count, so this should work for all solid state and shotgun microphone set-ups.

(Starting at the end of the shoot and then moving on…)
1) Keep your stuff clean, fully charged and packed away neatly after every use. After using the equipment for a prolonged time like on a days shoot, you should always clean it up, be it a quick wipe or a full on clean. It doesn’t have to be perfect, but don’t let it get clogged up with mud or dust or grime. Dust is the biggest killer in electronics, fact!
Replace or recharge those batteries, you don’t want to pick it up the next day and run out of charge before the day has even started, do it the night before or after the shoot!
Pack it away neatly, wrap the cables up nicely without bending the metal cabling inside. They’ll last longer! Plus you wouldn’t want to use something after someone else who just shoved everything back in the case without any regard for the next person and that next person could be you!

2) Check to see if you have everything and the microphone is working before going on the shoot. This applies to people who are getting it out of uni stores or even if it’s your own. You don’t want to turn up with broken or missing stuff.

3) Check to see if the mic you have needs phantom power 48 volts or not. This can be provided from the solid state recorder, or from a battery that gets placed inside the microphone itself. If you’re using the 48v from the solid state recorder, TURN IT ON. If you don’t know how, refer to the manual for that solid state recorder which you can easily find on the web or ask someone, that’s what they’re there for. Sometimes the preamps on the solid state recorder are too weak for these microphones, this is where you’ll need a preamp to power the mic. NOTE, the solid states at the university work fine.

4) Format or transfer the files from the current memory card and set your sample rate. You don’t want to run out of space, format or transfer files. Then set the recording quality. Usually these solid states can record at broadcast quality, I like to record at 96khz 24bits. But if you want to save memory you can record at 44.1khz at 16bits.

5) Set the audio to the right audio channel where the mic is plugged into and check your levels. setting and monitoring the audio can and must only be done by someone using headphones. Ideally you want someone tweaking the levels as you go, if your talent gets louder the levels need reducing. You don’t want to peak, you’ll never recover the peaked audio in post. You want it ideally at -6db.

6) Refer back to point number 1!

Other techniques include using a boom pole and wrapping the XLR Cable around the pole for safety and for general tidiness. For capturing dialogue, you ideally need to be 3ft away from the subject, pointing towards the mouth from above.

If I’ve missed anything, please feel free to add your comments below! :)

I am venturing into London today; Solar powered backpack strapped upon my back and a case full photographic goodies carried on one shoulder. Tripod attached to the bottom of my bag. AH MAN this is heavy!

So why am I lugging this stuff around? – It’s the London TimeLapse shoot, which is to go along with my dissertation as the product. I wanted to produce something that was iconic to the audience and also visually stunning- London is that iconic place and the astrological timelapses will provide some stunning attributes. But that’s not the only reason, the title of my dissertation involves the words “experimenting with the different forms of TimeLapse Photography” Which means, there needs to be a variety of different types. The London TimeLapse is one of three types that I shall do. London = City Scape.

I thought I’d do the City Scape TimeLapse first. My thinking was logical, it was to be the easiest and possibly the most fun, however I did learn a few things. Vital things are needed, such as:

A Decent Tripod. I thought my new tripod would stand up to what I wanted to do, but I soon found myself trying to stop it from minor wobbles, which would have a devastating effect. And that is true for the first TimeLapse I shot. it’s a bit of a write off. Reshoot is needed.

A Decent Variable ND filter for ALL your Lenses: Although it might be a costly affair, I found one on Amazon, it’s a Poloriod Varible ND filter which fitted on my widest lens. However, it’s not top notch, purple fringing is seen if zoomed in and if turned to the highest ND setting, ghosting appears, and it’s not the type of ghosting that you could get away with. I’m going to save some cash up for two DECENT variable ND filters. They are a must have, for video and TimeLapses, if I wanted the effect of people or vehicles moving fast I have a 1 second exposure. Without the ND filter it would be overexposed.

A very fast SDHC or Compact Flash card: Depending on your camera of choice. Without it, you can’t capture the timelapses fast enough, IE the writing of the data to the memory card. Also, you should be shooting in RAW format, it’s the highest quality and very easy to manipulate later, however it takes up a lot of room. I recommend Sandisks 32GB class 10 30mb/s SDHC card, works a treat. And although on the pricey side, you won’t regret purchasing.

A battery grip : we’re always in need of extra power and the cheap generic versions of canon battery grips work just as well. I had one on the timelapses in London and I found it worked perfectly, even after 2hours of continuous use!

Have a good idea of what your post production workflow will be. I’ve experimented with a few different ones and have settled with the Lightroom> LR timelapse> Lightroom> and then finish it off in After Effects method.

Here’s a sample of what’s to come.

But I believe now, after working over Ethernet – which is fast – I have to switch over to Wi-Fi. Reason one, the cable goes up the stairs to where the router is, and people keeping tripping over the wire. Reason two, I hate wires. So without further reason, lets begin buying, building using our new Apple Branded Airport Card!

What you’ll need:

There are two things that you will need. The first, the Apple Branded Airport Card. I say an Apple Branded one because it’ll work straightaway, no Kexts nothing. Just plain and simple plug and play.

Which one will I need though? – Good question, there are a few different models from 2006 all the way up to 2010. I bought a 2007 model The Apple BMC94321MC. It was £20 from Ebay, from this seller.
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=350284532372&ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT#ht_1174wt_907

Next you’ll need a Mini PCIe to PCIe adapter card plus antenna. I also got this from ebay, from here.
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=290546315378&ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT#ht_3388wt_907

Total cost: £33

Let’s build it! & Use it!

Hope you got everything you could of possibly wanted.

Have a great day,

Craig! X

I’ve been meaning to get round to using Twixtor for a while now and I remember this bit of test footage John, Chris and myself shot for a project earlier on in the year. So I had a crack at it, but it hasn’t come out great. I’m not overly pleased, lots of artefacts etc… but it’s John’s face that makes it worthy of posting here! If you’ve got any pointers on how to make this better, via tweaking Twixtor, I’d be very happy to hear them! (PLEASE!)

It's not this mountain... but you get the picture...

In regards to my Time Lapse project, looks like I’m heading up to Scotland with my Friend John. We’re planning on going up a mountain. Yep… A MOUNTAIN in January.. I know, I know, you must think us mad. We are. But it’ll be pretty fun and we should get some very beautiful time lapse stuff! I’ve been prepping all my equipment, gathering up batteries, chargers, etc… EVEN A Solar power back pack to keep me going! Just need to invest in some warm gear to keep, well, ME warm!

Here’s a day to night time lapse that I created in the summer during my friend/bosses birthday garden party. I wanted to see if it were possible to create a decent day to night time lapse on auto mode. As you can see, it’s not too bad. However, this was before I had a battery grip and I soon ran out of power! I’ve learnt from that and it should be alright now when creating a longish time lapse.

Using the Magic Lantern intervalometer, I set the setting to take a picture every 3 seconds (or 5). When putting it into quicktime I set it to 25fps, then put it into final cut for the final touches.

I’ve been experimenting with the picture profile on my canon 550D for some weeks now, it’s fantastic. But what exactly is it? It can be quite confusing so lets make it easy for you to understand.

“The Technicolor CineStyle™ is a Picture Style (profile) for Canon EOS DSLR cameras that optimizes the dynamic range in the image by leveraging the capabilities of the Canon imaging chipset. Cinematographers and their post-production partners will have greater flexibility in color grading and finishing their projects.”

A Picture Style (profile) is simply a look you can apply to your footage while shooting. The EOS camera’s come with various different ones, like Standard, vivid, black and white etc… but when working under a professional group of people where there are people who want a more specific ‘look’ they’ll turn to someone who colour grades footage. When doing this, it’s vital you get a flat image! This is what the CineStyle by Technicolor does.

Here’s an example of what it does in it’s raw form then a quick colour graded version.

Once you have captured your flat image, you take it into your colour grading software of choice (mine for this test was Final Cut x… YES I KNOW, better than iMovie) and grade it!

I hear you asking, how do you get it into my camera??

Simples. It’s NOT a hack. It WILL NOT damage your camera. It’s only a Picture Profile, and loading them into the camera is very simple! Navigate to this page: http://www.technicolor.com/en/hi/cinema/filmmaking/digital-printer-lights/cinestyle

1) Download the PP (picture Profile)

2) Once downloaded, go to the EOS Utility (if you haven’t got this, then do so!)

3) Connect your camera to your Mac/PC.

4) Select “Camera settings/Remote shooting” on the main window

5) Once the capture window opens, click the camera icon

6) Click “Register User Defined style” under “Shooting menu”

7) Once the new page “Register Picture Style File” opens, select one of User Def. 1, 2 or 3 at the top of the new page

8) Click the open file icon

9)Select the CineStyle.pf2 file you’ve just downloaded

10) Click on OK

11) it’s in your camera!! but we haven’t finished…

12) switch on your camera and turn the dial to the video mode

13) Press MENU

14) Navigate to the 4th icon (the one that has a camera and two dots on it)

15) go down to the “Picture Profile” setting and click SET.

16) scroll down to the User def. 1, click DISP. button.

17) click SET on the Picture style, and click down until you get to CineStyle.

18) click menu, then set. & You’re DONE!!!!!

19) GO AND EXPERIMENT! PS. when on the video screen click the Q button, scroll down the second icon and make sure it’s set to “1″.

Hope this helped ! :)

Super 8 style film shot on the iPhone 4. NOT BAD AY?!

An insight into the current state of the British Nation…

Producer: Chloe Gorsuch
Director: Chris Lovelock
Director of Photography: John MacDonald
Camera Operator: Craig Fields
Editor: Mike Moody