Brevis35 and Sony EX1 Shooting Guide

[Dennis Wood]

We've just update Cinevate's Video University section with a Brevis35/CFXL shooting guide for use with the Sony EX1 camera. CFXL is the imaging element we designed and launched this month to turn the EX1 into a pretty amazing adapter "host" camera with our system.

 

[Lenilenapi]

Dennis,

Very nice tutorial.
I'll be very excited to try it out.
BTW - You look awfully good on camera - maybe your next career move?
Very nice lighting on the part of your crew as well.

- Lenny

 

[Beat Takeshi]

We received our CFX element this morning and started breaking it in on the feature we are shooting. I will be posting some screen shots later tonight on the DP blog in my sig below. We are using it on the HVX though.

 

[Dennis Wood]

Lenny, flattery will get you everywhere. I don't expect I'll be pursuing this type of thing as a career out of respect for our viewers out there I will pass the comments along to Chris and Nick about the lighting as they were the guys setting it all up. Most folks don't realize that most of our team here have formal backgrounds in film and whether they're getting orders out the door, taking stills, or setting up for our little shoots, I'm learning a lot from them.

Aram, I'm very excited to see what you guys come up with on the HVX. In our testing on cameras other than the EX1 we were pretty impressed with how well CFXL performed. In your hands it will be magic.

 

[Beat Takeshi]

Thanks Dennis. So far the 2 days we have had the new CFX we have not shot anything that shows off what it can do yet since one day was in a dark office and the other day was all hand held and frantic but here are some grabs from the 2 days.

dolly in shot then we dolly out as he follows us.

Getting my Hitchcock on.

These were all hand held. Used a 17-35 zoom at around 20mm to keep everyone in frame with all the frantic movement.

 

[Beat Takeshi]

 

[Dennis Wood]

These look great Aram. Your footage is always nice and crispy with the adapter. A few tips/tricks

1. Tweak the microprocessor a bit for oscillation...a bit more if you can, testing at 1/48s shutter.

2. You should be seeing DOF approximately twice as shallow as CF1Le and much tighter bokeh...which is apparent in that 2nd grab.

3. If you're panning across bright skies, limit aperture to the f4 to f5.6 range. In the darker environments, you'll be shooting open anyway.

4. Night lights will look best at f2.8 with CFXL.

Cheers,
Dennis.