An Artist's Eye

[Steven Dempsey]

Moving shots done with an 8' Kessler Crane. Continuing in the tradition of the previous few films. It's the idea of penetrating the walls we build up around ourselves. Canon XHA1/Letus ULtimate combo.

An Artist's Eye By Steven Dempsey On ExposureRoom

Or on Vimeo:
An Artist's Eye on Vimeo

[Mark Williams]

Very nice piece. You just raised the bar for me.

[Jeremy Nemeth]

Very beautiful as always, Steven... Very inspiring...

[Jeff Anselmo]

Just wanted to add to the compliments. Really good work!

We also use the 8ft (plus the 5ft add on) for some shots (with our XL2); which fluid head are you using? Currently, I can't tilt manually with the fluid head we bought from Kessler.

Best,

[Chris Leffler]

I love all of your work! Great stuff once again!

[Morgan Crossley]

Your first line reminds me of a line from "Le Petit Prince"

“On ne voit bien qu’avec le coeur. L’essentiel est invisible pour les yeux"

[Steven Dempsey]

Thanks for the comments everyone.

Morgan, I'm sure the idea of seeing with your heart rather than your eyes is anything but original but it plays into the fact that answers to big questions always exist. They don't have a beginning or an end. Some people have found them already, others are still looking and then there is a number of unfortunates who will be satisfied only with questions.

EDIT: Okay, I read back on what I just wrote and it sounds like a riddle :)

[Herman Van Deventer]

Poetry in motion....

[Steven Dempsey]

Originally Posted by Jeff Anselmo

Just wanted to add to the compliments. Really good work!

We also use the 8ft (plus the 5ft add on) for some shots (with our XL2); which fluid head are you using? Currently, I can't tilt manually with the fluid head we bought from Kessler.

Best,

Jeff, I'm using a Bogen 516 Video Pro fluid head and it works just fine with the Kessler.

Thanks again for the comments.

[Annie Haycock]

Just watched several of your films. Excellent stuff, & inspirational too. The voice-overs were good - I missed them when I watched the earlier films.

I was a bit puzzled by one of the comments on this film - you said you used a Nikon 24mm lens at f8 to increase the depth of field. I thought the letus set-up was to reduce the depth of field, so why didn't you use the camera's own lens?

[Steven Dempsey]

Originally Posted by Annie Haycock

Just watched several of your films. Excellent stuff, & inspirational too. The voice-overs were good - I missed them when I watched the earlier films.

I was a bit puzzled by one of the comments on this film - you said you used a Nikon 24mm lens at f8 to increase the depth of field. I thought the letus set-up was to reduce the depth of field, so why didn't you use the camera's own lens?

Interesting question, Annie. I do not use my camera without the adapter anymore, it is now a permanent fixture. It is this way because with the Ultimate, the aperture settings I choose are limitless as are the shutter speeds.

The other reason is for aesthetics. There is a special magic in the picture when I use the Ultimate/Nikon combination that I do not see in footage I shoot with the native lens. The depth of field is subtle and if you take a look at some of the wide shots, particularly those by the river, you will see that the background is still slightly out of focus creating a three dimensional quality that is not there with the native lens.

Another reason is that the native lens maxs out at about the slr lens equivalent of 32.5mm. Being able to shoot with the extra field of view of a 24mm lens is also quite advantageous.

When I want to go back to shooting with a shallow depth of field, I simply adjust the aperture of the Nikon lens instead of having to completely reassemble the adapter onto the camera.

Make sense?

[Annie Haycock]

Of course it makes sense. Everyone has their own way of working, and understanding the whys and wherefores just helps the appreciation of the end result. While I have no intention of buying the letus, or carrying the extra weight, in the near future, it's useful to know what else could be done with my Nikon lenses (I tend to go out do do either video OR stills). The crane is likely to be more useful to me - for birds in trees and such like as well as those lovely panning shots you do.

For some reason, I had it in my mind (without checking) that the A1 lens came out at 28mm wide-angle, rather than 32.

Thanks for explanation.