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Bruce Watson

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« on: August 01, 2009, 06:31:09 pm »

I've been thinking of learning more about video. In particular I'd like to take a one or two week hands-on style workshop to learn some of the basics of using video equipment to make something watchable. One would think this might include lighting and sound aspects as well. Video and sound editing would likely take up workshops on their own.

I've only been able to find one such workshop. Surely there are others around the country, and surely some are more highly rated than others. Yet I'm having trouble finding information or recommendations.

These kinds of workshops abound for still photography -- there are dozens of 2-5 day workshops for inkjet printing, photoshop editing, learning to use a digicam, or an LF camera. I just don't see much that's similar being aimed at the video world.

Anyone have any suggestions along this line?
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Dan Carter

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« Reply #1 on: August 02, 2009, 01:43:36 am »

I too find it interesting how little material is available for video compared to photography. Maybe as still and video cameras merge this will change.

Quote from: Bruce Watson
I've been thinking of learning more about video. In particular I'd like to take a one or two week hands-on style workshop to learn some of the basics of using video equipment to make something watchable. One would think this might include lighting and sound aspects as well. Video and sound editing would likely take up workshops on their own.

I've only been able to find one such workshop. Surely there are others around the country, and surely some are more highly rated than others. Yet I'm having trouble finding information or recommendations.

These kinds of workshops abound for still photography -- there are dozens of 2-5 day workshops for inkjet printing, photoshop editing, learning to use a digicam, or an LF camera. I just don't see much that's similar being aimed at the video world.

Anyone have any suggestions along this line?
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Ken Bennett

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« Reply #2 on: August 02, 2009, 11:38:18 am »

I don't see these workshops in the Maine Media Workshops catalog, but the Platypus workshop is supposed to be very good. It's aimed at still photographers making the transition to multimedia.

http://digitaljournalist.org/platypus-video-workshops.html

http://digitaljournalist.org/archives/platypus-theater.html

This is something I would love to attend.

--Ken
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Craig Murphy

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« Reply #3 on: August 03, 2009, 12:52:16 pm »

This was supposed to have happened and I was interested in going but I'll be damned if I could contact them.  No response to any inquiries from me either through the website or directly with Robert Evans.   Kind of pisses me off.  He was part of PDN's Virtual Trade Show.
http://www.photofusiontour.com/
« Last Edit: August 03, 2009, 12:53:49 pm by Craig Murphy »
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CMurph

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« Reply #4 on: August 06, 2009, 10:21:04 am »

I saw the seminars on the newly released Photo Plus info page. (Suddenly I can't find it on the website)   Hard to tell which would be the best to take.  Two of them are running at the same time on Thursday.  Vincent LaForet and one sponsored by ASMP.  Jeez.  With the limited choices you would think they would at least run them at different times.  The other is by Lois Greenfield on Friday.  They also have a Red seminar but who the hell can afford one of those anyway.
« Last Edit: August 06, 2009, 10:21:26 am by Craig Murphy »
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Morgan_Moore

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« Reply #5 on: August 06, 2009, 03:34:05 pm »

It occurs to me that your choice of camera is important

Videography is very different from using a VDSLR

Cameras like the EX1 have steadyshot and near infinite depth of focus, sorted sound and smooth power zoom

Also rubbish 'ISO' and DR

Just because someone knows how to use one of them does not mean that the same lessons can be applied to shooting VDSLR

IMO it is a challenge similar to cinematgoraphy to shoot VDSLR

Most framing by vidoegraphers is offensive to stills photographers too

Incedentally VLF doesnt seem to know that much about videography - although he obviously knows an image

no course will tell you about dong both stills and video at once

cut your own path..

S
« Last Edit: August 06, 2009, 03:37:16 pm by Morgan_Moore »
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« Reply #6 on: August 09, 2009, 03:33:27 am »

Quote from: Bruce Watson
I've been thinking of learning more about video. In particular I'd like to take a one or two week hands-on style workshop to learn some of the basics of using video equipment to make something watchable. One would think this might include lighting and sound aspects as well. Video and sound editing would likely take up workshops on their own.

I've only been able to find one such workshop. Surely there are others around the country, and surely some are more highly rated than others. Yet I'm having trouble finding information or recommendations.

These kinds of workshops abound for still photography -- there are dozens of 2-5 day workshops for inkjet printing, photoshop editing, learning to use a digicam, or an LF camera. I just don't see much that's similar being aimed at the video world.

Anyone have any suggestions along this line?


For anybody who lives in or is visiting Los Angeles at the end of August....... this looks like a fabulous 2 day event concentrating on hybrid 5D2 video:
http://www.imagemechanicsexpo.com/
http://www.imagemechanicsexpo.com/blog/7-c...ce-announcement
conference agenda: http://www.imagemechanicsexpo.com/agenda

James R Russell

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« Reply #7 on: August 10, 2009, 01:15:17 pm »

Quote from: Wolfman
For anybody who lives in or is visiting Los Angeles at the end of August....... this looks like a ...


For a still photographer moving to motion, there is much more involved than just adding a follow focus, a loupe, some 15m rods, a high def lcd and a fluid head.

Even beyond the obvious need of story line; visual, oral or a combination, beyond the frame dimension 16x9, 2:3 or anything in-between, and beyond the ability to hit exposure, hold detail and go to a finished out piece is a huge learning curve.

Just like still photography the consumer guys have it easy.  Take a Sony handicam, I-movie, a soundtrack and making a short video is easy, in fact it's almost so easy it's fun.

Go to the higher quality cameras, Final Cut Pro, Avid, Vegas, and then mastering the skills even basic editing, input to output, color grading to tonal changes is like learning how to drive a car on earth, then somebody from Mars puts you into the Mars Car and you realize the gas pedal controls the brakes, the steering wheel actually runs the radio, the windshield wipers only work in sunshine.

It is that different and mainly because in digital video, regardless of what anybody tells you, there is no standard format. standard editing platform, standard codec, standard proof process, standard color suite, standard compression,  standard delivery even standard file size/type.

If you work in Broadcast High Def to Fox is a different Hi Def to ABC and few people understand that even compressing a movie or a real budgeted television show for I-move, dvd, or blue ray play is a huge process of compression, encoding, multiple pass actions that the movie studios spend millions on.

Just figuring out how to compress a file for web and Iphone play can be an art in it's ownself and whatever is the semi standard today, will change next week with the next update to qucktime, Avid, FCP or Vegas.

Converting a finished quicktime movie to flash in Sorenson Squeeze takes about a  two days of a learning process, understanding just the basics of final cut pro is weeks, actually many months and if your familiar with Lightroom, Photoshop, Capture One and think your the imaging master of the universe, just take your final cut pro edit and send it to apple color.

You head will explode like those cartoon characters when they're tricked into putting their face into a oven baking the dynamite pie and you quickly realize why the DiVinci is a million dollar machine and Apple Color is free.

Photoshop CS4 extended will work video and since the controls seem familiar once you import and start doing your normal type of adjustments adding filters, curve corrections, even liquify you puff you chest out and think s**t this is easy until you realize all of that work only applied to ONE frame and guess what you've got 24 frames a second to correct.  Then you learn about smart objects, how to apply them and now getting closer to where you want to be, but it's still a stretch and photoshop becomes a much different process than it was with stills.

Now there are ways to do this and nothing a still photographer or retoucher can do in photoshop can't be replicated in motion/video but the leap is huge and if you outsource it, very expensive.

Even if you want to lay off your footage to a colorists just make that call and the conversation will go like this.

Photographer:  Uh I've got like some really cool stuff of the model on a sofa and uh, this cool looking guy comes in with no shirt and uh, he's holding a gun so uh, I want to make it look like my stills when I shot the 6 page spread in Flapper Magazine, you know kind of move the curves, desaturate the reds, and uh, you know kind of tricked out looking.

Colorists:  What camera, format, settings, codec did you use?

Photographer:  Uh you know I shot it high def man, you know with the xha1 and that Canon 5deetwo . . . it's really great except they kind of look different and the male model's face is kind of red compared to the girl, but it should be easy right, cause it's all high def?

Colorist:  Actually the xha1 shoots 1140 x 1080 and the footage has to be de-interlaced, the 5d2 shoots 1080 x 1920 and the footage has to be de interlaced, xha1 filesuprezzed to 1920 x 1080, all files  progressive 23.98, all transitions removed, timecode intact,  you must give it to us in 10 bit rgb dpx sequences, which must originate from 10 bit uncompressed quicktime clips, etc. etc.

Photographer:  Uh, can't I just give you the footage and your find the good stuff and you fix it?   I pay little Darrin the retoucher like $120 an hour and he can do 10 images a day, so I guess the video will be like $1,200 to color because it's ahhh test man, right, right?

Colorists:  Without seeing all the footage I would estimate it at about $8,000 at a discount rate.

Photographer:  Uh, ok, well uh, I'll have to call you back and see if some client will pay for this.

Colorists: click.

You can color and tone your footage in a non linear editor with filters (slow and very difficult to match), CS4 complicated somewhat and very difficult to match scene to scene, Apple Color, whew better take a class, actually better take a month off and take a long, long class.

Once you've finished your video you'll know exactly why every DP and Cinematographer loves film, because film has standards.  Technicolor can do it for them and film is robust, the standards for processing,  viewing, proofing digitizing, correcting, effecting and output are set, but in digital video it's the wild wild west.

Actually, just the opposite of digital stills shooting digital motion is much more exacting than film because the files just don't have that many stops of dr and even if you fake it, it takes a lot of work.  Film is much more forgiving.

You'll also learn why video guys run those zebras to check highlights and you'll understand why video guys always have a kino flow or two, or twelve out there to balance the shot and make it look a little flat.

Digital Video is fragile beyond belief and if anybody remembers the transition from still drum scanned film to digital stills, you'll think the file from a 20d s is robust compared to any digital video camera I've shot.

Now I haven't used the RED and I will but I've used about everything else and they all shoot very tiny, fragile, files.

Personally, I think the 5d2 is one of the best digital still cameras ever devised "for the money" and an ok video camera and not because of the lack of auto focus or variable frame rates, but the video file to the still file are way different.  It's a pretty good video file, but compared to the still file it's kind of soft, kind of holds the highlights funny, kind of  too smooth, kind of a different color pallet and obviously takes a much different workflow than the still images.

http://ishotit.com/dsmc.jpg

Shooting a mixed media, (or is that mixed medium) project you will also realize that you better get the light meter out, because you can't rebuild highlights, or balance stuff with layer masks later . . . OK you CAN do this in digital video but it's a long process so the phrase garbage in, garbage out takes on a new meaning.

Also in still photography rarely do you have more than a few images run side by side, but with video, you have many multiple scenes many thousands of frames and a subject just turning their head away from the key can bump the color 10  points, or waking towards a key light can make a subject go to blowout in three steps.    Try fixing that with key frames where it looks natural.

It can be done, (sometimes)  but it ain't like working on a dozen stills in photoshop and there is no easy way to put in a background, remove a moving object, put data back into blow highlights, etc. etc.

I have a piece that's in post production now, with 50 something separate models in 50 something separate cuts on a solid background. Should be easy . . . but try to match up 50 something skin tones in video and wow, two weeks will slip by like it never existed.  

I now call my office the black hole of time. I walk in on Monday morning blink twice, and it's Sunday night, the wife hates me, I haven't shaved, the dog forgot who I was and barks at me every time I exit, I'm living on green tea,  olives, espresso and toast and my back feels like I've played 8 quarters as a running back in the NFL.

You'll understand why so many of those fashion stylized, cool looking videos are black and white or highly desaturated.

Right now I'm rendering 6,000 frames of one clip in cs4 and if you think light room is slow making web galleries, you'll understand  the new meaning of render times.

The biggest thing you realize is that this is work that has to be done by professionals using professional equipment.  Focus pullers, grips, gaffers, swings, dps, flicker free lights, editorial houses, colorists, exist for a reason and though a motion crew may look like they move at the same pace of  highway road repair, one small part of the process out of place can be a disaster.

Sure, for a documentary you may be able to grab a red or a handicam, slip on a zoom mike and start shooting and if the subject matter is interesting, the editor is good, the expectations of color, tone, are not that high, even a long motion piece with a good story line can work well, but take the same footage and try to give it the look of CSI and your just spitting in the wind.

I think this two day seminar would be a good first step, especially the talk by Rodney Charters as he has done a lot of testing of HDv cameras for 24 and has reported online.

I also know you have to keep in mind that right now there is a lot of hype about shooting a mixed media campaign and to some extent a lot of misdirection.  The references to W magazine and the Bruce Willis piece is actually just a still shoot using a video camera.  Yea it looks good, but as of today I haven't seen any video of the shoot, (I guess because W isn't going to spend 2 million dollars in post to replicated the still effects).  So in other words it could have been shot with a 1.5 cropped d-20 and had the same results, especially after all the retouching.

The Esquire piece I think was black and white and that makes sense because black and white is easy and all the other terms like Hybird, conversion, combo shoots is just a a bunch of words that have little to do with real world imaging.   That 5d2 movie was kind of cool, and sold a lot of fivedeetoos, but in a  world of "the client is paying type of gig", there are about twenty things in that video that most clients would expect to be different and could easily mean a change of cameras.

There is perception and reality and then the horrible leap to the real world.  Final Cut Pro is a great program, can do almost anything, but that's the problem you can do almost anything which means if you learn it, somebody is going to ask you to do about anything.

Just like in still photography the expectations of digital video get way different when a client starts paying for a project.  What a client may think is easy, like matting in a window scene can be a huge process and remember just like looking at still images that Pascal does for Vogue vs. what some local retoucher does for Bill's plumbing and auto repair, there is a world of difference due to budget, subject, time available and obviously talent.  The thing with motion is even the consumer is trained to see great imagery.  Every night just watching 2 hours of television, the standard consumer will see about 4 million dollars of production and post work and assumes all crafted motion pieces should look this good.   They may know that the crew to shoot a 30 second spot can be huge, the post production to edit and time and effect that spot can takes weeks, even months, but since we as still guys are moving into this territory, they're probably going to want the CSI Miami look on a still budget.

So what I'm saying is these shooting seminars are probably pretty good, will give you the basics of how to run the camera, how to stick the footage in FCP, maybe even make the transition to a 16x9 frame, but past that it's a whole new world.   Just keep in mind this and other seminars have a lot of dealer, manufacturer support which usually translates into dealer manufacturer sales messages.

These seminars are a good starting point, but they are just that . . . a starting point.

A day or two of shooting seminars is kind of like getting your learners permit and then somebody hands you a formula one car.  You can drive it but without a dedicated investment of leaning and time your gonna stuff it head on into a wall and probably take out a few dozen spectators.

In other words, don't try this at home, until your really ready.


JR


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DesW

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« Reply #8 on: August 10, 2009, 01:36:41 pm »

Quote from: James R Russell
For a still photographer moving to motion, there is much more involved than just adding a follow focus, a loupe, some 15m rods, a high def lcd and a fluid head.

Even beyond the obvious need of story line; visual, oral or a combination, beyond the frame dimension 16x9, 2:3 or anything in-between, and beyond the ability to hit exposure, hold detail and go to a finished out piece is a huge learning curve.

Just like still photography the consumer guys have it easy.  Take a Sony handicam, I-movie, a soundtrack and making a short video is easy, in fact it's almost so easy it's fun.

Go to the higher quality cameras, Final Cut Pro, Avid, Vegas, and then mastering the skills even basic editing, input to output, color grading to tonal changes is like learning how to drive a car on earth, then somebody from Mars puts you into the Mars Car and you realize the gas pedal controls the brakes, the steering wheel actually runs the radio, the windshield wipers only work in sunshine.

It is that different and mainly because in digital video, regardless of what anybody tells you, there is no standard format. standard editing platform, standard codec, standard proof process, standard color suite, standard compression,  standard delivery even standard file size/type.

If you work in Broadcast High Def to Fox is a different Hi Def to ABC and few people understand that even compressing a movie or a real budgeted television show for I-move, dvd, or blue ray play is a huge process of compression, encoding, multiple pass actions that the movie studios spend millions on.

Just figuring out how to compress a file for web and Iphone play can be an art in it's ownself and whatever is the semi standard today, will change next week with the next update to qucktime, Avid, FCP or Vegas.

Converting a finished quicktime movie to flash in Sorenson Squeeze takes about a  two days of a learning process, understanding just the basics of final cut pro is weeks, actually many months and if your familiar with Lightroom, Photoshop, Capture One and think your the imaging master of the universe, just take your final cut pro edit and send it to apple color.

You head will explode like those cartoon characters when they're tricked into putting their face into a oven baking the dynamite pie and you quickly realize why the DiVinci is a million dollar machine and Apple Color is free.

Photoshop CS4 extended will work video and since the controls seem familiar once you import and start doing your normal type of adjustments adding filters, curve corrections, even liquify you puff you chest out and think s**t this is easy until you realize all of that work only applied to ONE frame and guess what you've got 24 frames a second to correct.  Then you learn about smart objects, how to apply them and now getting closer to where you want to be, but it's still a stretch and photoshop becomes a much different process than it was with stills.

Now there are ways to do this and nothing a still photographer or retoucher can do in photoshop can't be replicated in motion/video but the leap is huge and if you outsource it, very expensive.

Even if you want to lay off your footage to a colorists just make that call and the conversation will go like this.

Photographer:  Uh I've got like some really cool stuff of the model on a sofa and uh, this cool looking guy comes in with no shirt and uh, he's holding a gun so uh, I want to make it look like my stills when I shot the 6 page spread in Flapper Magazine, you know kind of move the curves, desaturate the reds, and uh, you know kind of tricked out looking.

Colorists:  What camera, format, settings, codec did you use?

Photographer:  Uh you know I shot it high def man, you know with the xha1 and that Canon 5deetwo . . . it's really great except they kind of look different and the male model's face is kind of red compared to the girl, but it should be easy right, cause it's all high def?

Colorist:  Actually the xha1 shoots 1140 x 1080 and the footage has to be de-interlaced, the 5d2 shoots 1080 x 1920 and the footage has to be de interlaced, xha1 filesuprezzed to 1920 x 1080, all files  progressive 23.98, all transitions removed, timecode intact,  you must give it to us in 10 bit rgb dpx sequences, which must originate from 10 bit uncompressed quicktime clips, etc. etc.

Photographer:  Uh, can't I just give you the footage and your find the good stuff and you fix it?   I pay little Darrin the retoucher like $120 an hour and he can do 10 images a day, so I guess the video will be like $1,200 to color because it's ahhh test man, right, right?

Colorists:  Without seeing all the footage I would estimate it at about $8,000 at a discount rate.

Photographer:  Uh, ok, well uh, I'll have to call you back and see if some client will pay for this.

Colorists: click.

You can color and tone your footage in a non linear editor with filters (slow and very difficult to match), CS4 complicated somewhat and very difficult to match scene to scene, Apple Color, whew better take a class, actually better take a month off and take a long, long class.

Once you've finished your video you'll know exactly why every DP and Cinematographer loves film, because film has standards.  Technicolor can do it for them and film is robust, the standards for processing,  viewing, proofing digitizing, correcting, effecting and output are set, but in digital video it's the wild wild west.

Actually, just the opposite of digital stills shooting digital motion is much more exacting than film because the files just don't have that many stops of dr and even if you fake it, it takes a lot of work.  Film is much more forgiving.

You'll also learn why video guys run those zebras to check highlights and you'll understand why video guys always have a kino flow or two, or twelve out there to balance the shot and make it look a little flat.

Digital Video is fragile beyond belief and if anybody remembers the transition from still drum scanned film to digital stills, you'll think the file from a 20d s is robust compared to any digital video camera I've shot.

Now I haven't used the RED and I will but I've used about everything else and they all shoot very tiny, fragile, files.

Personally, I think the 5d2 is one of the best digital still cameras ever devised "for the money" and an ok video camera and not because of the lack of auto focus or variable frame rates, but the video file to the still file are way different.  It's a pretty good video file, but compared to the still file it's kind of soft, kind of holds the highlights funny, kind of  too smooth, kind of a different color pallet and obviously takes a much different workflow than the still images.

http://ishotit.com/dsmc.jpg

Shooting a mixed media, (or is that mixed medium) project you will also realize that you better get the light meter out, because you can't rebuild highlights, or balance stuff with layer masks later . . . OK you CAN do this in digital video but it's a long process so the phrase garbage in, garbage out takes on a new meaning.

Also in still photography rarely do you have more than a few images run side by side, but with video, you have many multiple scenes many thousands of frames and a subject just turning their head away from the key can bump the color 10  points, or waking towards a key light can make a subject go to blowout in three steps.    Try fixing that with key frames where it looks natural.

It can be done, (sometimes)  but it ain't like working on a dozen stills in photoshop and there is no easy way to put in a background, remove a moving object, put data back into blow highlights, etc. etc.

I have a piece that's in post production now, with 50 something separate models in 50 something separate cuts on a solid background. Should be easy . . . but try to match up 50 something skin tones in video and wow, two weeks will slip by like it never existed.  

I now call my office the black hole of time. I walk in on Monday morning blink twice, and it's Sunday night, the wife hates me, I haven't shaved, the dog forgot who I was and barks at me every time I exit, I'm living on green tea,  olives, espresso and toast and my back feels like I've played 8 quarters as a running back in the NFL.

You'll understand why so many of those fashion stylized, cool looking videos are black and white or highly desaturated.

Right now I'm rendering 6,000 frames of one clip in cs4 and if you think light room is slow making web galleries, you'll understand  the new meaning of render times.

The biggest thing you realize is that this is work that has to be done by professionals using professional equipment.  Focus pullers, grips, gaffers, swings, dps, flicker free lights, editorial houses, colorists, exist for a reason and though a motion crew may look like they move at the same pace of  highway road repair, one small part of the process out of place can be a disaster.

Sure, for a documentary you may be able to grab a red or a handicam, slip on a zoom mike and start shooting and if the subject matter is interesting, the editor is good, the expectations of color, tone, are not that high, even a long motion piece with a good story line can work well, but take the same footage and try to give it the look of CSI and your just spitting in the wind.

I think this two day seminar would be a good first step, especially the talk by Rodney Charters as he has done a lot of testing of HDv cameras for 24 and has reported online.

I also know you have to keep in mind that right now there is a lot of hype about shooting a mixed media campaign and to some extent a lot of misdirection.  The references to W magazine and the Bruce Willis piece is actually just a still shoot using a video camera.  Yea it looks good, but as of today I haven't seen any video of the shoot, (I guess because W isn't going to spend 2 million dollars in post to replicated the still effects).  So in other words it could have been shot with a 1.5 cropped d-20 and had the same results, especially after all the retouching.

The Esquire piece I think was black and white and that makes sense because black and white is easy and all the other terms like Hybird, conversion, combo shoots is just a a bunch of words that have little to do with real world imaging.   That 5d2 movie was kind of cool, and sold a lot of fivedeetoos, but in a  world of "the client is paying type of gig", there are about twenty things in that video that most clients would expect to be different and could easily mean a change of cameras.

There is perception and reality and then the horrible leap to the real world.  Final Cut Pro is a great program, can do almost anything, but that's the problem you can do almost anything which means if you learn it, somebody is going to ask you to do about anything.

Just like in still photography the expectations of digital video get way different when a client starts paying for a project.  What a client may think is easy, like matting in a window scene can be a huge process and remember just like looking at still images that Pascal does for Vogue vs. what some local retoucher does for Bill's plumbing and auto repair, there is a world of difference due to budget, subject, time available and obviously talent.  The thing with motion is even the consumer is trained to see great imagery.  Every night just watching 2 hours of television, the standard consumer will see about 4 million dollars of production and post work and assumes all crafted motion pieces should look this good.   They may know that the crew to shoot a 30 second spot can be huge, the post production to edit and time and effect that spot can takes weeks, even months, but since we as still guys are moving into this territory, they're probably going to want the CSI Miami look on a still budget.

So what I'm saying is these shooting seminars are probably pretty good, will give you the basics of how to run the camera, how to stick the footage in FCP, maybe even make the transition to a 16x9 frame, but past that it's a whole new world.   Just keep in mind this and other seminars have a lot of dealer, manufacturer support which usually translates into dealer manufacturer sales messages.

These seminars are a good starting point, but they are just that . . . a starting point.

A day or two of shooting seminars is kind of like getting your learners permit and then somebody hands you a formula one car.  You can drive it but without a dedicated investment of leaning and time your gonna stuff it head on into a wall and probably take out a few dozen spectators.

In other words, don't try this at home, until your really ready.


JR

Ha!-- I used the work with Rodney Charters back in New Zealand he was a Stills photographer there --lovely bloke.

Des
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Bruce Watson

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« Reply #9 on: August 10, 2009, 03:13:03 pm »

Quote from: James R Russell
.
.
.
These seminars are a good starting point, but they are just that . . . a starting point.

A day or two of shooting seminars is kind of like getting your learners permit and then somebody hands you a formula one car.  You can drive it but without a dedicated investment of leaning and time your gonna stuff it head on into a wall and probably take out a few dozen spectators.

In other words, don't try this at home, until your really ready.
Thanks Mr. Russell. That's a nice long rant. Unfortunately you didn't really tell me much I didn't already know. I'd already figured out that motion is a whole 'nother ball game and about an order of magnitude more difficult than still photography. You end up telling me to get educated. I'm trying -- I started this thread trying to get recommendations for workshops where I can learn the basics. Basics first, more advanced as needed. I expect it to be a life long venture if I actually do it, so one step at a time. Where do you recommend I start?
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Bruce Watson
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Ken Bennett

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« Reply #10 on: August 10, 2009, 03:19:36 pm »

Quote from: James R Russell
The biggest thing you realize is that this is work that has to be done by professionals using professional equipment.  Focus pullers, grips, gaffers, swings, dps, flicker free lights, editorial houses, colorists, exist for a reason and though a motion crew may look like they move at the same pace of  highway road repair, one small part of the process out of place can be a disaster.


Thank you. Seriously. We are having this discussion in-house right now, and this paragraph pretty much sums up my position. But I expect that I will be shooting video within six months. With any luck I can make the consumer side work pretty well.
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« Reply #11 on: August 11, 2009, 12:02:00 pm »

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Morgan_Moore

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« Reply #12 on: August 12, 2009, 01:03:30 am »

Quote from: thewanderer
http://www.rosenblumtv.com/?page_id=2460

Rosenblum has realised that video is easy if you use a small chip a wide angle and keep close and use AF and auto - that is basically his mantra AFAIK

Valuable observations and lessons that dont apply to DSLR filming or the aesthetic desires of most still photographers

I do know people who have done Rosenblum courses BTW

In terms of shooting to cut and emphasisiing the power of CONTENT the course has value

S
« Last Edit: August 12, 2009, 01:07:40 am by Morgan_Moore »
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Sam Morgan Moore Bristol UK

James R Russell

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« Reply #13 on: August 12, 2009, 12:22:29 pm »

Quote from: Bruce Watson
Where do you recommend I start?


This response is not specific to any single individual, it is just my experience of what a still photographer faces when they start to shoot motion, or digital video, or whatever the medium is called.

Digital video really is where digital stills were about 6 years ago, the basics of proofing, delivery and who assumes what role.

Just like still film photographers that would never dream of processing their own e-6 or c-41, tough now know the inner workings of lightroom, c1, photoshop, I have no doubt that digital motion photographers, will learn to use all of the various softwares for color timing and grading.

Maybe it's just because digital is a roll your own look, vs. the way we worked with film, maybe it's because we can manipulate our images in ways we never could before so the processing and look is very personal, though it is probably a combination of everything, including costs/time.

Digital Video cameras are also where digital still cameras were 4 to 6 years ago.

On the low side you have easy to use prosumer handicams that go for almost laughably cheap prices compared to the quality they can produce, on the top side you have cameras like the RED that compare to medium format still cameras in usability and the fact that though they offer superior image quality, tough  as of today they require more time, more crew and obviously higher costs.

I am sure we will see huge leaps coming in motion cameras that will fill the hole between a camera like the Panasonic and the RED.  I don't think anyone doesn't believe that soon we will have an autofocus, raw file, motion camera that works in variable frame rates, high iso and probably processes in some kind of color suite that mimics lightroom, c-1,etc.  

In fact I would be surprised if all the software makers are not adding the motion function to their software suites.

Anyway;

The real difference between digital stills and digital motion, other than the need for a story line, is the final use of the imagery.

With professional digital stills probably 95% of all use was going to some form of print which wasn't that much of a leap from scanned film imagery.  

With digital cinema/motion/video (whatever) probably 95% of the use will go to web play, which can be a much different process than shooting for any large screen projection.  Not that web play has to be dumbed down or cheaper, it's just different.

Also since Web Play is as of today, considered free, the budgets can be more limited than traditional print media, because traditional advertising production budgets historically were determined by taking a percentage of the costs of the media run.

The new business model of the great recession has changed how all advertisers view their budgets, media placement and production requirements.  Some clients understand that motion is a large process and will budget as such, others may think a few clips from a 5d2 will do everything they need.

The fact that still photographers and their clients are learning/moving to/requesting motion has and will change the landscape of how all professional imagery is produced, delivered and most of all the expectations.

When a still photographer asks me how to shoot motion, I always say learn how to do a basic cut in Vegas, Avid or FCP.  That's the real eye opener and though most of us will never attempt to be great dedicated editors, nothing will improve your ability to shoot motion than knowing what an editor requires to make an interesting piece.

When you shoot your first "movie" the editing process is interesting.  If the goal is a 3 minute piece, the first cut will probably be 10 minutes and you'll say to yourself I'll never get this down to 3 minutes and tell the story.  By final cut, you'll be a 2 minutes and thinking how can I stretch this thing to 3 minutes.

Given all of this, I think we will see some real break through imagery, because sometimes not knowing the rules is a good thing.  There is value in the uncluttered mind.


JR
« Last Edit: August 12, 2009, 12:23:22 pm by James R Russell »
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lisa_r

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« Reply #14 on: August 14, 2009, 12:19:58 pm »

Thanks JR, some interesting thoughts. Though you should fix that link you posted - is it something you shot?

re:
http://ishotit.com/dsmc.jpg
« Last Edit: August 14, 2009, 12:20:57 pm by lisa_r »
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