Hacking Photography - one Picture at a time
I am a naturally skeptical person. So, it was only natural that, when I first saw the PocketSkater2, I was a wee bit skeptical. There are numerous mini dolly hacks with subpar performance out there, so I wasn’t expecting much from a device claiming to be small enough to “fit in your pocket.” But, I was surprised.
Edelkrone, the same guys who brought us the Wing railless slider concept last year, have done, in my most humble estimation, a great job on this project.
You see it all the time in quirky behind-the-scenes videos and outtake reels, but slating, the practice of slapping down the arm on that cool little clapper thing at the beginning of a video shot, is more of an art form that most people realize. And, when I say art form, I mean this in the same way that driving a vehicle without running over pedestrians like Grand Theft Auto Gone Wild is a fine-honed skill. Slating is what video editors go by in post production to match video shots with the correct audio tracks and synchronize them so it doesn’t end up looking like a re-dubbed foreign film.
Tomm Jacobson, who bears a striking resemblance to Jimmi Simpson, gives us the lowdown on how you should and shouldn’t slate.
Have you ever been guilty of living up to the cliché of being a filmmaker? This long short by IFTH lists the 32 rules of becoming a filmmaker. The name is a bit misleading though, I would consider renaming it The 32 Most Annoying Clichés About Filmmakers. Sadly I am probably guilty on all 32.
Here are some of the more annoying ones:
AXSY T-Set is the latest motion control system, in a very long list, to try and find its way into the market via Kickstarter.
Boasting a 3-axis system controlled wirelessly by an advanced app, and a relatively low price, this could be the next best thing for timelapsers, astrophotographers and filmmakers.
Out of the top ten highest-grossing films of 2014, nine were either sequels or reboots for franchises already long-established – the remaining film was Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar. With the current film industry an unarguable golden age for comic book adaptations, it’s become customary for most studios to play it safe and rely on audience familiarity to sell their productions. And it’s unfortunate – original stories like Edge of Tomorrow end up suffering in sales as a result while at the same time gaining critical acclaim (Edge of Tomorrow was even retitled Live Die Repeat around the time of its home video release in an attempt to re-market the film).
Given the criticisms warranted towards Interstellar (Oh man, that dialogue…), it was still refreshing to see a new, original, and all-around good science fiction film become a box-office blockbuster in the middle of Oscar season. For directors not as well-known as Nolan, making a film like that is a particular risk when taking sales into account; back in 2013, Director Joseph Kosinski took that exact risk with the release of his second film. After his debut with Tron: Legacy, Kosinski brought the cinematographer Claudio Miranda on board once more for a story he’d been working on since 2005. The result was a film released eight years later, titled Oblivion.
The holidays are the time of year we all like to relax and spend time with our friends, family, our favorite filmmakers. Well, sorta anyways…Last year, when Foreground Films released the first version of “The Auteurs of Christmas”, it saw widespread popularity, quickly going viral. The team brought back the theme this year with “The Auteurs of Christmas 2” in what we are all hoping has officially begun a new holiday tradition.
The short film features the creators interpretation of a scene as though some very well known filmmakers were directing it. It’s impressive how on point they were able to get. The real film buffs out there will marvel in the attention to detail that went into making the shots truly match their individual directors style and quirk. For example, you can look for appropriate screen ratios, foley arts and sound effects, color grading, cinematography, even Godard’s take on color theory was so accurately executed you can’t help but to grin at the perfect silliness of it all.
In part two of The Auteurs we’re treated to the likes of Quentin Tarantino, Charlie Chaplin, Terrence Malick, Christopher Nolan, Alfred Hitchcock, Morgan Spurlock, David Lynch, M. Night Shyamalan, Michael Bay, & Jean-Luc Godard.[Read More…]
A set of color gels are incredibly useful to have around any studio whether you are a still photographer or a filmmaker. They aren’t even that expensive. You can pick up a set of 24 Lee gel filters online for under $40. Definitely worth the investment, BUT if you get caught without a set or just like the challenge and sense of accomplishment of a DIY project, you are going to want to take a peek at this short video from film maker, Ryan Connolly, as he shows us how we can replicate the look of a color gel using nothing more than a light source and a bath towel.
We love Canon for taking a positive stand with Magic Lantern (in fact, we would not be surprised if when the entire ML story unfolds, it would be Canon who either funded or heavily tipped the custom firmware team)
It’s not that Canon cameras takes bad video, but with Magic Lantern, the footage is unarguably better. The well known hack, is an open source project that is available as a third party add-on for certain Canon camera models. Filmmakers consider Magic Lantern essential and many still photographers utilize it as well. It delivers photographers full control over bitrate and framerate, while providing the option for custom bulb timers, bracketing for exposure, and more. It basically fills in all the gaps left by, what some may consider, underwhelming Canon firmware.
There’s resources available online that can teach you almost anything you want to know. It’s funny how at this point in time, we can learn almost everything college has to offer; unfortunately, the only thing we can’t get is an actual degree. But either way, for those of us who are always hungry to acquire a new skill, there’s always a way to do so. For those of you that are filmmakers and videographers, here’s a video that introduces you to the basics of cinematography within the span of about forty minutes.
One of the best thing about DSLR cameras is that they’ve made professional filmmaking become more and more affordable for the kids that wish to pursue it. But when your camera has the ability to shoot videos with quality that’s good enough for even filming House, M.D., you want to make sure your sound can match up with it. There’s nothing worse than having an outstanding looking film become completely pointless because of its sound quality, and the microphones that come built in DSLRs don’t really help that at all.
Luckily, there’s companies that offer both expensive and cheap solutions to that; one of them is Zoom, who delve into the latter. The microphones the company has offered give great sound quality for the prices they come at, and they’re expanding their catalogue with the newly announced Zoom H5.
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