Stump the Chef & Austin Connoisseur

Luis Caffesse

Luis Caffesse

Admin
I mentioend these in a post in the Cafe, but I guess this would be the right place to give them their own thread.

These are two shows I've been working on lately, "Stump the Chef" and "Austin Connoisseur"
There will be 12 episodes of each, once they all get finished up and turned in/uploaded.

Stump the Chef was recently renewed for another 12 episodes, so looks like we're going back to the studio in a couple of weeks to start cranking out more them.

I'm always interested in feedback from the people on here.
Both shows are being done with the HVX.
If you've got any questions on how stuff was done, etc, feel free to ask.
I always think it's better to let the stuff play on its own before giving a bunch of tech info on how something was made, etc.

The shows are all on www.onnetworks.com
Or go directly to:
STUMP THE CHEF
AUSTIN CONNOISSEUR

You can also view them through the Itunes music store.
Just look under the podcast section (or do a search).
You can also subscribe to them threre, if you have the urge.
:thumbsup:


Alright - let me know what you think.
The good, the bad, and the ugly.
 
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I watched a shitload of Stump the Chef. Its really fun! It keeps me watching, but the one thing that bothers me is that the announcers are obviously NOT live. But this is a cooking show I would watch.
 
I realy liked the way those 2 programs look. Nice lighting and great compresion for watching it over the internet.
How many k's of light do you have in the studio ? And how about the lighting kit for the efp's ?
What program do you use to encode to flash ?
 
Thanks, glad you guys seem to like them.
As far as the announcers on Stump are concerned, I completely agree with you.
But its one of our limitations given the time budget contraints, there is no way to realistically do the naration live. So, we cut the show together first and then record the narration in post.

As far as lighting goes:

There is a 1K bouncing off the ceiling to bump up the ambient light in the studio.
We have a 650 with a chimera hanging in front of the counter at a 45 degree angle.
2 650s on the floor at 3/4 angle, 1 from the left and 1 from the right - both with chimeras.
Another 650 on the floor putting a strip of highlights aross the counter for a little bit of side light.
And a small 250watt light hanging in the back for a little bit of backlight on the chef.

The nice thing is that we can leave that set up untouched all day. When we shoot our 'Tangent' segments, we just set up a white backdrop behind the chef and zoom in to cut out the countertop. So we shoot the whole thing with him standing pretty much in the same spot in front of the stove.

It's worked out well so far.

As far as Austin Connoisseur goes - that show is all shot with available light.
Literally just a mic, a tripod and the camera.

They are compressed using Sorenson Squeeze. I didn't do the compression myself so I'm not up on the details, but I can get the specs if you're interested. I need to get them figured out anyhow as I'm going to start doing the compression here soon.

Let me know if you have any other questions - meanwhile I'm going back to editing the next 'Stump' episode.
:thumbsup:
 
Very enjoyable for my eyes as well as my stomach, I was watching until my girlfriend surprised me with a great meal...She said the Shrimp, goat cheese and raspberry episode was her inspiration....I know we will be looking for more "inspiration" from the chef...Keep up the Great work.
 
Thanks for the great review!
Always good to hear that someone not only enjoyed it - but actually took something away from it.
 
I like the show. Online is a great approach.

I don't know who's in charge, but have they considered purchasing the .tv domain name for the site? Apparently the people behind .tv are pushing for it to be the premier domain extension for online film, television, and social networking sites.


Congratulations on your work. Look forward to more.
 
Thanks FatBird!
As far as the domain extention goes - the main hub of the site is onnetworks.com, but the idea is that they have a network of sites all using the .tv extension.

For example, "Stump the Chef" is on onfood.tv
"Austin Connoisseur" is on onaustin.tv

and so on.....
 
Thanks again -
I don't have the cam settings in front of me, I know we shot Stump using the B Press gamma curve, but that's only one of many cam settings
(camera is out with someone else right now), but I can tell you this -
GET BARRY'S HVX BOOTCAMP DVD!

The first episode of both these shows were shot literally a few days after we got the camera. The only training I had with the HVX was watching Barry's DVD.
I've tweaked settings here and there as we went on - but the foundation of everything I did was from Barry's DVD set. Definitely worth it.
One thing I definitely got out of that DVD was an understanding of the cameras settings - which will help you decide what setting to use for what situation, and what benefits and compromises come with each different setting.

Austin Connoisseur has a bit of color correction done on it - mostly to make it a bit punchier, bring up the saturation, and most importantly try to match the shots (because it is shot with available light). But what you see from Stump is what came out of the camera - we don't have enough time in post to do any color correction on it. Budget and time constraints unfortunately.
 
Haha, the goat cheese episode was DOOMED. How'd he get stuck with 3 judges who all have a thing against goat cheese?

I'm inspired by the cooking too. I haven't done any yet but I took away information about how to make vinagrette etc. that I'll be employing soon.
 
Cool Knoxworth - that's exactly the kind of thing I love to hear.

As far as the judges go - that was just an unfortunate situation for him.
We don't tell the judges what the ingredients are before the shoot - they aren't really prepped and the judging is not staged. So that's a risk we take - but its either that, or already give them an idea of what they'll be eating, which we would rather not do.

And before anyone asks - we DID ask them if they were allergic to anything first.
(and yes, that really is Matt's mom).

By the way, I noticed a new episode just went up today
"Catfish, Grapes and leftover rice"

There should be a new one going up every week from now on - as long as we can keep up with this schedule.

Speaking of which - I'd better get back to my audio mixing.... I have 2 episodes to turn in today.
 
A new episode of "Stump the Chef" went online this week for those who are interested.

Catfish Chunks, Leftover Rice, and Grapes.

We're going to be shooting some new episodes this weekend. I know some of you were interested in lighting/gear stuff on this. I could get some shots of the studio and post some stills. Let me know if it would be of interest - if not, I won't bother seeing as I'll be a little bit busy anyhow.

:thumbsup:
 
I think it's great that Brady Bunch kitchen set has found another use on Stump the Chef.

All kidding aside, the shows look great! Can you PM me with a little more information on the network?

We've done a fair amount of work for another on demand / cable VOD net based in NYC but the ON Network looks like it really has the upper hand in almost every way.

Thanks!

e
 
Hey - I would have LOVED to use the Brady kitchen!
Would have fit nicely with the tone of the show.
:thumbsup:

PM sent, by the way.

(and for the record, our studio looks NOTHING like the Brady kitchen)
:)
 
Yet another episode in the "Stump the Chef" odessey is now online.
This one is probably my personal favorite so far.

How's this for a combination...

Squid, Chocolate, and Buffalo

Check it out.

On another note -
We had a shoot this past weekend and I had someone taking some pictures of the set up. As soon as I get them emailed to me I'll post some here for those of you who were interested in the lighting and gear setup.

:thumbsup:
 
The first episode of season 2 of 'Stump the Chef' is now online.
New graphics and new intro...and now shooting with 2 HVX's instead of an HVX and a DVX.

I give you..."Bacon, Lettuce, and Tomato"

(yeah, we're trying a new approach with this one)
Enjoy!
 
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