What camera would be best for me when it comes to color grading?

[Brian Drysdale]

Focus pullers usually put tape around the lens and put their focus marks on with a fine sharpie, It's more precise than a chinagraph pencil.

I assume you're planning to use your stills lenses on your current camera, rather than buying the BlackMagic. 4k.

[Ryan Elder]

Originally Posted by Paul R Johnson

You are hung up on mimicking big budget cinema production - giving each shot a 'title'. You are constantly talking about this "panning shot" as if it's somehow something special, yet in your movie, it seems to be just another connecting shot in the story telling.

Pete's talking about focussing on a real cine lens, while you seem to think that turning a focus ring on a lens is pulling focus, in terms of a role, or process. You've got into thinking technical terms are indicative of the link with a role. The difference between a photography lens and a moving image lens clearly you haven't quite got a handle on, so when people give advice, they have to guess if you really mean what you ask?

I'm often left wondering if the movies you shoot would be better off made on a simple handicam - point, zoom, and shoot. Some of these have quite decent sensors, but are a balance package of components. You could plonk the camera down, jiggle the actors around and have a notional lens angle of say 73mm, rather than this mystical movie focal length of 85mm? Would it matter? For you I doubt it would - you could use the zoom to set the composition, and wouldn't need to reblock actors and move the camera.

You are trying to shoot movies with tiny bits of pro movie production technique, and this isn't working. You started out with a training course that did NOT cater for your individual learning style, so you have picked up lots of really bad habits that you cannot now shake off. You have a warped interpretation of technical matters, and have nearly understood things. People give advice. You take little strands of it, and then apply it in new situations out of context. You MUST start to try to understand this. You are building a rule book that is flawed, yet you cannot understand this, or why it has happened. You are treating movie making as a collection of little elements that when all done guarantee a great movie. Your scripts - the very basic building block of movie making are from what we've seen, not very good at all. You use actors who really cannot act, mixed in with a few who can. You struggle to direct them, or often, let them direct themselves.

Nothing you can do with technology will improve the fundamental problem. I think yesterday we finally convinced you that lenses don't magically change the speed of light, and that fast lenses can produce deep depth of field - something you really should have been aware of when trying to make buying choices. Today, your cine lenses turn out to be photographic lenses. What else have we misunderstood from your posts?

Ask yourself some questions. Do you NEED cine lenses, or will the ones you have work well enough in your production. I suspect they will. Have you ever checked how accurate the lens markings actually are? Pop one on, find a suitable subject and find the sharpest focus setting - measure it. Then change the stop and repeat. Does the sharpest point shift? You may be surprised how much it does. Next question is does it matter? To a professional focus puller, used to marking tape with pens, yes it does. If the cameraman needs to change aperture, all the marks will be wrong. Is this something you're aware of.

If your team's technique is to set up, and then focus visually and then shoot, that's actually fine - but it is not how real cinematographer crew work. Is all this stuff sorted in your head?

Originally Posted by Brian Drysdale

I suspect they were suggesting you find another method for you to shoot your chase scene that doesn't involve using a long focal length lens. However, since you regularly seem to be given 4 + 4 and yet manage to come up with 3 it could be a misunderstanding on your part.

It was suggested to not shoot with really long lenses. I didn't think that meant necessarily change the type of shot too, depending. I thought I could still have the actor run in a circle with a shorter lens.

[Brian Drysdale]

Well, you can try, but chances are that the camera operator will end up in a tangle with the tripod legs as they rush around in circles following the runner using a relatively short focal length lens compared to the 300mm. The real world means changing your method if your lens changes, again, think things out.

[Ryan Elder]

Yes thanks, I actually thought of this too, that with a shorter lens they will have to run much faster. This is why I thought of the telephoto lens way back then, is because I felt the operator would not have to move as much.

[Pete Cofrancesco]

Why does everything need to be explained down to the smallest detail? You should be able to show up to the location and select the focal length needed for the framing you want.

[Ryan Elder]

Sure I can do that.

[Paul R Johnson]

So why ask here? Most of your questions you could answer yourself on the day with a moments thought. I like the new rule - shorter lenses mean actors have to run faster. I'll remember this one next time.

[Ryan Elder]

I mean shorter lenses, mean that the operator has to run faster to keep up with the panning. Well I prefer to storyboard everything to know more about the lens choice beforehand. It doesn't have to be firm and final, but just a preliminary storyboard list.

[Pete Cofrancesco]

The way I understood it. The camera would be stationery on a tripod in the middle of the park, the subjects running in a circular path around the camera. Depending on the framing and the distance they’re from the camera will determine the focal length needed. However the same shot hand held is a different story if you try to use a telephoto. Again we can speculate here all day but it wil still come down to whether you can execute it.

[Ryan Elder]

Oh I didn't say anything about handheld, did I? I meant the operator would pan with the actors in a circle, while the camera was on a tripod.

[Paul R Johnson]

er, yes - you did?

the operator has to run faster to keep up with the panning

if it's on a tripod, where would he be running too?

I think you have taken this circle technique slightly skewed. I think what we mean is a small arc of a full 360 degrees. We're thinking that with your long lens, you have the actors at a distance, so that their rate of change of angle is limited. let's say they are 20m away, and they run in an arc that is maybe 30 degrees of pan at the camera. This gradual change of direction is very gentle rate of change, compass wise - so they don't really run in a circle at all - they just gently change direction. The camera sees a straight line, the actor sees a gentle curve.

If you do it at 5m, a 30 degree pan is too short for the shot to last very long, and they have to run a more extreme curve, and the camera operator has to pan faster.

I had a similar problem myself a while back when doing my parachute experiments (as in before the real job, I spent a day with them practicing and experimenting) and found that being too close to the landing zone was a killer, because they would travel all around me, meaning the camera had to turn through maybe 500 degrees very fast, and I could not do it. I crashed into the tripod legs. I then tried a small jib, hoping I could rotate that through the huge range without running into the legs. I could, but I couldn't keep the image centred and framed properly AND run. Nothing I tried produced good images, so it HAD to be done with two cameras.

[Ryan Elder]

Yes that is why I wanted the long lens to begin with, so the camera operator does not have to pan the camera that much, while the camera is on a tripod.

But it was suggested to me to use shorter lenses, and forget the telephoto. So if I do the chase with shorter lenses, but still want to pan with the actors, the circle will be much tighter, if I still do that type of shot.

[Brian Drysdale]

To go back to a reference in another thread, I suspect this may be the idea for the panning with the runner. Although, the motivation here comes from the character and drama of the scene,

The Good The Bad The Ugly Cemetery Scene(1080p) - YouTube

[Paul R Johnson]

Interesting one, Brian. Ryan needs to watch this because it demonstrates how you can break loads of rules of normal camerawork and still have an end product that works for the purpose.

[Pete Cofrancesco]

The cemetery scene shows that type of shot nicely. Anyone notice the dog at the beginning? I’m assuming it must be intentional.

Btw here’s an example of shooting with wide angle lens and the dof it afford. He’s using a full frame camera with 16-35mm. 7:30 filming pov hardcoring is well done. Of course he’s talented gimbal operator. Imhop this style of shooting is more exciting than telephoto where you feel like a spectator rather than a participant.

YouTube (Short URL)

Btw if Ryan is looking for some scenes to emulate. :p

YouTube (Short URL)