Comments on: HurlBlog Technology Guru: Mike McCarthy Part II

By: Shane

Shane — Sat, 10 Sep 2011 21:49:57 +0000

Fletcher Murray, in one word AMEN!!!! Thank you for your comments and support. You nailed it on the head. Story, story, story.

By: Fletcher Murray

Fletcher Murray — Sat, 10 Sep 2011 18:34:51 +0000

Shane,
Great blog. Thanks for taking the time to share your battle-hardened methods. (You’re not an engineer who shoots video on the weekends). My comment is about the importance of story versus technical issues that may not be visible in the final show, especially if the work isn’t headed for the big theatrical screen. I appreciate Mike’s guidance and attention to detail. He probably has made many D.P.’s look great. I follow the techno discussions, but, as you’ve said, the story is what rivets the audience. I’ve approached most of my work from more of a documentary camera style, i.e. a style that captures (or attempts to capture) action that is unstaged or feels uncontrived (not “Hollywood-ized”), and thus has raw power because it feels REAL. So, I’m speaking up for the grainy, battlefield camera shots of an Arri 16mmSR with a 5.9mm lens on the end of boom pole screwed into the top of the camera versus the gorgeous Super Panavision70mm color camera sliding along a perfectly smooth dolly track that the great director David Lean and his D.P., Freddie Young, might set up. (Although, if they had done a battle scene they would probably have shot with something that resembled the 16mm battlefield Arri. That’s the sign of greatness, matching the look to the story.) In conclusion, I’m just voting for the following priorities: first, have a great story, second, have a great storyboard that will engage the audience, and third, shoot with the most professional camera setup and crew the budget permits. Of course, we should know our equipment options but foremost get the shot that’ll make the audience say “wow”. That’s why I like the Hurlblog…you tell us how to get the shot with battle-hardened methods and tips that matter not minutiae. You’re about getting the shot. You’re not on the bandwagon that tries to convince young D.P.’s that technological accessories and software will compensate for a bad story, and a bad storyboard.

By: Louisa Nesslein

Louisa Nesslein — Fri, 06 May 2011 07:36:48 +0000

I have a completely new company that is retailing homemade baby toys on the internet and I am attempting to find an effective resourse to locate reasonable credit card processing rates that may work with me eventhough my company simply started out some time ago.

By: Shane

Shane — Fri, 18 Feb 2011 10:58:23 +0000

Mike McCarthy, thanks so much Mike.

By: Mike McCarthy

Mike McCarthy — Fri, 18 Feb 2011 01:50:18 +0000

The Cineform codec can be acquired directly from Cineform at cineform.com, in the form of the product NeoHD for about $500. You can contact me directly at mikemccarthy@hd4pc.com if you want further details.

By: Shelika Emmanuel jnr

Shelika Emmanuel jnr — Thu, 17 Feb 2011 11:39:46 +0000

hi mr Mike McCarthy, im a young filmaker from Nigeria. Ive been following mr Shanes work for a while now, and it has really inspired and improved my cinematography skills. Mr.Mike McCarthy,ill like for you to do a comprehensive talk on cineform raw, how to get the codec, use it and how to use it expand color space. thans- Shelikia

By: Shane

Shane — Tue, 12 Oct 2010 02:24:44 +0000

Conrad Chu, Hi Conrad, I wanted to get the best information for you. I emailed Mike Kanfer at Adobe who is an Academy Award winning VFX’s supervisor and Digital Production specialist. This is what he had to say:
Yes, the color and gamma inconsistency issues with QuickTime are definitely frustrating, both on MAC and PC. To their credit, Rarevision has made great strides to help users who are pulling their hair out trying to unravel the mystery of it all. However, please know that the way Adobe reads the H.264′s from Canon completely bypasses QuickTime, so it’s a non-issue in our CS5 workflow whether you do it on a Mac or PC with Windows. My post from the 28th of Sept. documents the imaging quality advantages in detail.

By: Conrad Chu

Conrad Chu — Fri, 08 Oct 2010 19:18:44 +0000

Hi Shane,

I understand you’re on a PC workflow, and though you mentioned how the Mac/FCP/ProRes combo is nice too since it’s 10-bit, I found that the Mac workflow is pretty painful in terms of color accuracy. Going from H264 to ProRes into FCP to output is a very hairy process, and there doesn’t seem to be any good solutions to keeping colors accurate.

This post is good illustration of the Quicktime gamma nightmare:
http://motionlifemediablog.wordpress.com/2010/09/02/5dtorgb-color-tests

Have you had any experiences with this gamma/color issues even on the PC workflow? If you have any tips on how Mac-based post production handles conversion while keeping colors accurate, I’d love to hear about it.

Thanks for all your hard work!
Conrad

By: Shane

Shane — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 04:55:54 +0000

Rich Savage, thank you so much for those kind words, I would have to direct you to jacob@banditobrothers.com for any adobe software information. He is the Adobe guru. Give him a shout and I know he can help you.

By: Rich Savage

Rich Savage — Tue, 08 Jun 2010 22:45:34 +0000

Oh i think I mioght know the answer actually. Im using the Media Encoder that was bundled with Adobe Flash, so it seems the formats are specific to Flash only.

By: Rich Savage

Rich Savage — Tue, 08 Jun 2010 22:42:17 +0000

Shane – love your site, its been a fountain of knowledge for me. One question – I have Adobe Media Encoder, and I want to use this to convert files ready for Premiere. However, the only formats in can convert to are FLV and F4V. Any ideas on why I can only use these 2 formats? How do you get it to convert to AVI?

Thanks again,
Rich

By: Shane

Shane — Fri, 07 May 2010 06:44:24 +0000

Gordon Segrove, something still seems fishy to me. I have 8 of these cameras and what you are describing sounds like it is in auto mode, do you see the aperature adjusting when you pan it into different lighting scenarios. I think that camera has got a problem. Have you tried another 7D,Micah Smith maybe a friends or a rental house in town. Just does not seem right. I feel like there is something wrong with that camera. Is all the firmware up to date. They just issued a new one about a month ago for the 7D to clean up some of the rolling shutter artifacts and the overheating. I would try another camera.

By: Gordon Segrove

Gordon Segrove — Thu, 06 May 2010 19:18:39 +0000

The camera was set in movie mode at 25P 1/50th, Neutral picture style with sharpening and saturation all the way down, light optimizer off, hightlight tone priority off, etc etc.

We used a Sandisk Extreme Pro UDMA card to ensure no frames were dropped. We tested 2 cameras. I’ve looked a third since. (We also had an Arri D21 in the room)

We looked at the footage at a post production house in London as well, where we even turned it into a 25P image sequence, as well as different transcodings . We all agreed the footage looks just like “The Pacific”, or “Saving Private Ryan” (reduced shutter angle, strobing motion).

We panned at all speeds across a scene on a head, super slow, slow, and fast. And then shot some handheld work.

In a nutshell, panning across a room with these cameras was unwatchable on a large screen at any panning speed due to the lack of adequate motion blur (even adhering to panning speed rules that we use on film).

A few more phone calls and everyone seems to confirm thats what their footage looks like as well. A bit “lively” or “stroby”.

At 30P its not as obvious, but still there.

I own an entire kit myself with ZE primes and RedRock gear and have sadly yet to find a solution to the problem. Its particulary sad as a static frame from the camera on a 1080P monitor next to that of an Arri D21 was surprisingly good!

By: Shane

Shane — Tue, 04 May 2010 04:40:04 +0000

Gordon Segrove, that sounds fishy. Was the sharpening tool on? Was auto light optimizer on? What picture style were you shooting in. Did you have your camera set in movie mode? Sorry but there are so many things that you have to turn off to get this baby to perform.

By: Gordon Segrove

Gordon Segrove — Mon, 03 May 2010 08:19:03 +0000

Thanks shane for your reply.

I only ask as we tested a 7D at 24P and 25P at a rental house the other day with some Cooke S4′s for a job, and when played back on a 1080 professional monitor the footage strobes terribly with even the slightest movement in frame (manual mode, 25P, 1/50, 320 iso). We looked at it on a monitor via the cameras HDMI cable via an HDMI-SDI converter, and also on 2 computers from the hard drive. The footage looks like no 24/25P footage I’ve ever seen, as if the motion blur is missing, or if we had shot at a reduced shutter angle (which we didnt). We cant work out if this is just a viewing problem or if when filmed out it will look fine. 30P of course looks more fluid.

Im wondering if shooting 30P and transcoding to 24P is in fact a better way to do it. Thats why I ask if youve noticed a difference in your footage since the native 24P setting was available.

By: Shane

Shane — Mon, 03 May 2010 05:48:56 +0000

Gordon Segrove, I have not had any problems with it. It comes down to operating and knowing how fast you can pan. You have the same limitations in film. We don’t use any Foundry plug-ins. We just shoot the camera the way I would use a film camera and it responds beautifully. I truly don’t get all jacked up with the tech stuff. If the story is there and you are engaged then I could shoot it on mini-dv. It doesn’t matter. So if the 5D is the right tool to get the most out of the story, which is was in “The Last 3 Minutes,” then that is what I use.

By: Gordon Segrove

Gordon Segrove — Sun, 02 May 2010 23:35:11 +0000

Shane,

How have you guys got round the motion strobing of 24P footage in the new firmware and 7D?

By: Tom Daigon

Tom Daigon — Sat, 01 May 2010 04:28:42 +0000

Hello Again Shane:
This was my first opportunity to use the Canon 5D with the new camera software…the new log and capture software…and my new Cineslider from Kessler Crane. It started as a test of the equipment and being an editor for 30 years I just got carried away with the fun!

http://exposureroom.com/members/Lasvideo/c0aca34818a94cd792ee4eea2e703dee/

By: Eric Ferguson

Eric Ferguson — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 06:09:37 +0000

FWIW, I edit cineform 4:2:2 (neoscene) on a quadcore2.66gh/8GB/NvidiaGeforceNothingSpecial PC that I picked up at bestbuy for $600. I get flawless real real time editing in PremiereCS4 for simple edits and colour correction, no dropped frames. I’d describe my system as the bare minimum though; just running a browser that’s stealing a bit of ram is the last straw for my setup.

By: Eric Ferguson

Eric Ferguson — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 06:05:19 +0000

I’d be interested to see a honest comparison of Cineform vs. Prores vs proresLT on a average-ish desktop editing setup at a variety of workflow stages. I’ve always strongly felt that cineform’s 4:2:2 space is an advantage for many types of work, so I’m surprised to see so many people going for 4:2:0 prores LT. Yep, I know that the Canon h.264 is 4:2:0 but IMO the intelligent algorithm cineform uses to up-scale the chroma works a small miracle: the difference when keying, for example, will knock your socks off. Why throw that away? It’s not like you have to archive the intermediate, just transcode, edit, and toss it. Costs you nothing.