Back in August Bruce traveled to a farm in upstate New York to work with Stephen Colbert and the fabulous team at The Colbert Report as Stephen continued his series called Stephen Colbert's Fallback Position.
The result from this particular piece was that Stephen was called to be a special witness before Congress today. Bruce and Gonzalo are covering it live, again with HDX900s, for a piece that will air in the near future on The Colbert Report.
Here are some behind the scenes photos from the shoot on the farm:
The Cube is made by a company called Teradek and, as the title of this post says, it allows for wireless monitoring of audio and video from any camera with an HD-SDI out to a laptop, iPhone or iPad via WiFi. There is an HDMI version as well but we picked up the HD-SDI version as we're more excited about the possibilities of using the Cube with the majority of our HD cameras.
The biggest question when setting up a new piece of production gear is always, "how easy is this to do on set?" As with any piece of gear it's something you SHOULDN'T be setting up or playing with for the first time on location. However, it's pretty easy to do and doesn't require a member of the Geek Squad or a 12 year old Japanese schoolgirl. The Cube itself is a piece of cake, power it up, feed it video over HD-SDI, connect the antenna and you're done. Now you need to set up your laptop and, conveniently, there's a video to help you:
You will need to download some freeware called VLC, which you'll use to view the video stream. Once you have that downloaded and installed there's another video to watch that will show you how the final steps to watch the video coming from your camera:
That's it. Seriously.
We've tested the Cube on our cameras here at Visual Edge and can tell you that it works flawlessly on the Sony F900R CineAlta, the XDCAM F800, the HDW-730 and the EX3 as well as Panasonic's Varicam, HDX900 and HPX2000 in all resolutions and at all frame rates.
There is a slight delay in the feed to a laptop, which we've timed as right around 0.5 seconds. The delay to an iPhone was more fluid and less workable, timing out at somewhere between 4 -13 seconds. The good folks at Teradek are aware of this and are working on resolving the issue, which is rooted in Apple's devices.
The possibilities are quite staggering. Producer can't make the interview due to a last minute flight cancellation? Stream the feed straight to them and they can see what you're shooting over the internet. Marketing companies can stream events out live to an audience or a news organization can get footage to the studio and on the air without a truck. Record the stream onto your laptop and the producer can walk with high quality video files to review on the train home and prep for the edit. Or, at it's most basic level, have the producer sitting comfortably with their laptop open watching what you shoot while you wander around grabbing shots.
I may well be in love. Give us a call to give it a test drive and you may well be, too.
Yes, you should be clicking on the link above. We've overhauled the site and added some new features. There are operating manuals for all the cameras online, ready for download. Our Video page features some of the work we've been doing and our Tips & Tricks page is back with, well, you get the idea.
So, what will become of this site? We're going to keep it updated but our main online focus will be over at the new www.visualedge.tv.
One of the big issues with DSLRs is monitoring and the 5DMkII is especially awkward. Not only do you have to deal with HDMI, which can be a pain to split, you also have to deal with the signal dropping to 480p when you hit record. We bought the AJA HA5 thinking that we’d be able to send HD-SDI to our Panasonic HD-LCD monitors only to find that the device can’t handle 480p and, after talking to AJA at NAB, it doesn’t sound like this is an issue that can be resolved via a firmware update. That leaves the unit from BlackMagic as the only option.
Until yesterday. Ladies and gentlemen, the HDFury2:
The HDFury2 takes the HDMI ouput from the Canon 5DMkII and converts it, while keeping all the high def goodness, to a component HD signal. That can then be split out, using T-Adapters available at Radioshack, and the signal can then be sent to 2 monitors, one for the DP and one for the client/director. The HDFury2 comes with a power supply but I diodn’t have any issues at all not powering the unit — instead, it took power over the HDMI connection. That might drain your batteries, though, so make sure you have spares or a charging station.
The HDFury2 works with both the 5DMkII and the 7D so it should work with the 1DMkIV although I don’t have access to one to test that out. Another nice feature of the HDFury2 is the ability to monitor audio, either analog or digital optical — there’s a multi-port on the bottom of the unit that allows for either a 3.5mm jack to be plugged in or a Toslink cable. Finally, the unit can be switched between RGB or YUV, so you’ve got all the options you could ever want.
Is this is solution to monitoring? Probably not. One thing I learned at NAB is that there are a TON of manufacturers working on DSLR solutions to there will probably be something bigger, better and more ready for the field in the future. But for $200? I haven’t seen anything else like it.
You can buy the HDFury2 from Curt Palme. The version we bought was the GREEN kit, although we actually don’t need the 5 BNC cable that comes with it as the regular RGB cable it comes with is all we’re using. You’ll then need some T-Adapters and RCA:BNC adapters. All in, you should be dropping about $220 for the ability to monitor the video from your Canon DSLR to two professional monitors.
On Wednesday, April 7, Bruce and Chris headed out on a shoot for a client to capture footage of three statues in Washington, DC. The client had requested the Canon 5DMkII as the camera for the project and we shot in 24p, taking advantage of the recent firmware update from Canon. We took a decent number of lenses with us and a new toy, picked up the client at Union Station in DC and then headed out to start the day.
The problem most people are aware of with the 5D is it’s inability to deliver an HD signal via it’s HDMI output when recording begins. As such, we chose to simply take the standard def output from the camera and fed that into a Panasonic BT-LH900 HD monitor — the Hoodman was an absolute must have with the sun beating down on us! The monitor also allowed our client to see what we were shooting and offer input so that they got exactly what they wanted.
We were also playing with a new toy — the 3′ Shot Shifter from Bright Devices. It’s a slider dolly that utilizes your tripod as the base and then your fluid head screws into the bowl adapter on top. Regular light stands are then used as support under the ends, allowing for a smooth move all the way through. Quite bluntly, this was THE tool for the job. It allowed us to get moves on the statues we were shooting without the time and hassle of setting up dolly and track and also gave us a much smaller footprint which, in downtown DC, is absolutely key. And although we were using it with a DSLR, the Shot Shifter is rated for larger cameras so can be used with a Varicam, CineAlta, or any 2/3″ system. Brilliant. There’s also a 22″ version for interviews, allowing the operator to perform subtle moves with the interview subject, and the mondo 5′ version.
Here’s the complete list of the gear that we used on the shoot:
Canon L-series 16-35mm 2.8 – a fantastic wide lens.
Nikon 85mm 1.4 – one of our cine-modified primes from RP Lenses.
Nikon 135mm 2.0 – again, cine-modified from RP Lenses.
Nikon 70-200mm 2.8 – we borrowed this lens for the shoot and we’re still dreaming about it, just gorgeous.
Zacuto Z-Finder, follow focus, DSLR plate, Z-American arm and lens gears – there isn’t anyone making better quality accessories out there at this time and the Z-Finder is essential. Again: ESSENTIAL.
Chrosziel 5×5 mattebox with the Zacuto flexible donut – shooting in the sun with a fast lens and camera made it imperative for ND filters in front of the glass, along with the requisite Polarizer.
LightCraft Fader ND – screws right on the front of the 50mm lens and allows for very easy adjustments to the amount of ND filtration you need.
The shoot was a success, the client left happy and we sent them a hard drive with all the raw footage via FedEx the next day, after we brought it back to Visual Edge and made a back up copy.
The emergence of DSLR film-making has really been a stunning development in this industry and we’re thrilled to be a part of it. For more information feel free to give us a call at 301/530-8210 or email us at info@visualedge.tv
Back in December, right after Christmas, Bruce and Michael flew out to Utah to shoot a segment for the Colbert Report -- Stephen challenging Olympic speedskater Shani Davis to a race. After he got some basic training on, well, how to speedskate:
The piece was shot with two Panasonic Varicams, with one outfitted with the Letus Ultimate and B4 Relay Lens. WE also had with us our Matthews Doorway Dolly and Long Valley Seven jib. The background was painstakingly built by Bruce by cutting out the squares from large piece of foamcore and then attaching sheets of Opal. Finally, we had a flicker generator and a smoke machine for effect.
Big thanks to ESPN for having us be part of a really fun shoot and thanks also to the folks at the Baltimore Ravens for being so generous with their time, especially Terrell Suggs who was a blast to work with.
