SUPPATIME
Active member
Some of you guys may recall my day-by-day posting for "Dearheart's Bakery"... well, I'm at it again on a smaller scale. I'm currently DPing a short film entitled "Emotion", about a power-tripping young police officer and his compulsively cheating spouse.
For this, I essentially have a 1-Ton grip truck with the following:
1200W Desisti HMI and ballast
1200W PAR HMI and ballast
ARRI 4 Light Kit - 300W and 600W
ARRI 3 Light Kit - 600W and 1000W
Mole Richardson 1K
Kino Flo 4-Bank and ballast
Chapman/Leonard Super PeeWee II Hydraulic Dolly
Ultrascope Mark 1 Geared Head
O'Connor Fluid Head and Sticks
Car Mount Kit
Magic Box Flicker Generator
Assorted Clamps
Assorted Gels and Diffusions
Assorted Flags, Nets and Silks
6x6 Frame with Griff
I know I'm forgetting some of the stuff that's on the truck... but I've only gotten 6 hours of sleep in the past 50 hours or so.
In all honesty, it's been a disaster so far. Somehow, our check-outs got screwed up, so I ended up picking up the truck and running over to Hollywood Rentals to pick up the car-mount kit. Keep in mind, I was informed that I was to pick these things up at 10:00AM on Monday... and we were to start setting up for the shoot at 3:30PM. I was okay with doing it, but it would have been nice for some forewarning at least a day ahead of time.
The bulk of our gear checkout was at 2:00PM, and I assume you can see my dismay: checkout started at 2:00PM, and we were supposed to be setting up at 3:30PM. I was one of three people at the actual checkout, and they scrambled to pack the truck as I tested all of the lights... some of which did not work. They had to be swapped out and new paperwork had to be filed. I didn't even get to test any of the other gear, such as the Super PeeWee II dolly or make sure any of the other departments' gear was there. We actually thought we were missing the entire sound package until someone found it tucked away. Either way, I was furious that I had to take care of all of this when this responsibility should have been shared with other departments.
Second, I get a call asking me if I could also pick up tape stock. Here I am with a half loaded truck at 3:00PM and I had to say no. So I gave the guy this company's phone number to get the tape stock this camera needs (as the tapes you get at Best Buy aren't the best for the Panasonic cameras). He shows up to set at 4:00PM with Sony tapes from Best Buy anyway... and then we realize he has not purchased DAT tapes. Now we're running sync sound right into the camera. And the director is frustrated with me because of this?
The first set of scenes were the sex scenes. I felt bad for the actors there, as soon as they meet the crew they are taking their clothes off and screwing on a kitchen countertop. I've worked with the lead female talent, and she's one of the most amazing actors I've ever met. But still, there were 15 people in the room when all of this was going on, and I felt kind of bad about it. At least everyone had a good sense of humor about it.
I was told to throw a shadow across the kitchen cabinets. This shadow would be both actors during their sexual act, and the camera was to start on the cabinets and dolly out to the action, showing a practical in the shot that would explain why there was a shadow.
We laid 16 feet of straight track and lifted the 400lb Super PeeWee II onto it, then set up the camera. I know it loses a lot of light, but I'm loving the P&S Tecknik. I've had the option to use the PRO one before an a CineAlta, and love that even more. Anywho, once we had the camera set, I went to lighting the scene. Our practical source was a set of two small candles on the countertop. To fake the throw of those candles, we positioned one of the ARRI 1K fresnels on a homemade stand and attached it to the Magic Box flicker generator and put full CTO over it. This gave it a nice warm glow that cast a relatively defined shadow 15 feet away on the opposite wall. We added some fill to the scene and actor's faces and bodies with 2 lights on the 4 Bank Kino with tungsten balanced bulbs. We also diffused that with shower curtain. Yep, no fancy numbers like 216 or 250... Lee doesn't even make the crap... it's a simple shower curtain. You can buy 108310891246 of them at Bed, Bath and Beyond.
We also put 2 of the tungsten balanced Kino bulbs in the overhead kitchen fixtures. The Kino bulbs fit perfectly into standard fluorescent fixtures, and produce a prettier, brighter light. You might even want to do that in your house, if you can purchase the bulbs. Hell, I would. We stopped the camera down some to make this already hot scene look a little lower key. Its nice, because with all of that light, you have everything lit fairly evenly and have the option to stop down without losing most of your information in your shadows. Stopping down also meant that we didn't have to pull focus on our 14mm lens.
The last setup in this location was another lovemaking scene (I wouldn't even call the last one "lovemaking" if you get my drift) in the bedroom. We lit this very sparingly as well, with the 1200W Desisti HMI on full wide outside the window and about 10 feet in the air. The blinds were closed, but it cast this etherial glow, illuminating the edges of the window frame and some of the edges of the bed and skin of the talent. We then threw a sandbag on the short end of the gobo arm on a C-Stand and put the 4-Bank Kino directly above the bed, also with daylight balanced bulbs, but this time with 1/2 CTB and some 250 diffusion. That stuff is my personal favorite because I feel it diffuses the light the most evenly.
We kicked a very small amount of light into our lead female's eyes to illuminate her reaction when the male talent told her he loved her. I love using Kinos for two purposes: to evenly light a background in a very shallow area (meaning there isn't a great distance to throw the light to get an even look) and for throwing right above talent, to create a uniform rim light, or in this case, to accentuate body lines.
I've come from the world of fashion photography and love the human form. I'm a straight guy, but anyway you can accentuate a male or female's curves is very sexy. For girls, it's all in the lower back and hips... for guys, it's all in the shoulders and stomach. The 4-Bank Kino did just that in this sequence, and the male talent takes his time kissing up the back of the lead female talent until he reaches her ear and says his lines. Over all, the Director was very pleased with how this lighting setup turned out.
After another 45 minutes for a setup, we had a jib over the bed for the last shot of the female talent and the Police Officer character. They were in bed together cuddling and exchange dialogue. We had small mishap because the jib swung around and struck the Kino, but luckily no one got hurt when it fell on the bed and the camera and lighting fixtures were all fine as well. The jib from the foot of the bed to a medium shot of the young lovers simply looks great. I was even impressed... and I'm hard to impress. That's why I don't have a girlfriend at the moment.
Day One went off pretty well... we started off very late because of the aforementioned problems that arose, but we ended up wrapping only 30 minutes after our scheduled departure time. When I get my hands on some of the raw footage, I'll post stills.
For as much as I'm bitching about this, the images look amazing. Some people had emailed me drooling over being able to use Panavision Super Speeds on the last show I did and posted about here, but honestly, those lenses are giant pieces of crap. I'm getting better images using 5 Nikon 35mm SLR lenses than I did with a $100,000 array of the Panavision ones. My Nikon lenses are the following:
14mm Nikkor f2.8
50mm Nikkor f1.8
85mm Nikkor f1.4
70-200mm Nikon f3.5
28mm-200mm Nikon f3.5
I'll end this post and begin a new one on Day Two.
Mods, when I start posting images or clips from in-camera, please move this to the Screen Grabs / Clips section.
For this, I essentially have a 1-Ton grip truck with the following:
1200W Desisti HMI and ballast
1200W PAR HMI and ballast
ARRI 4 Light Kit - 300W and 600W
ARRI 3 Light Kit - 600W and 1000W
Mole Richardson 1K
Kino Flo 4-Bank and ballast
Chapman/Leonard Super PeeWee II Hydraulic Dolly
Ultrascope Mark 1 Geared Head
O'Connor Fluid Head and Sticks
Car Mount Kit
Magic Box Flicker Generator
Assorted Clamps
Assorted Gels and Diffusions
Assorted Flags, Nets and Silks
6x6 Frame with Griff
I know I'm forgetting some of the stuff that's on the truck... but I've only gotten 6 hours of sleep in the past 50 hours or so.
In all honesty, it's been a disaster so far. Somehow, our check-outs got screwed up, so I ended up picking up the truck and running over to Hollywood Rentals to pick up the car-mount kit. Keep in mind, I was informed that I was to pick these things up at 10:00AM on Monday... and we were to start setting up for the shoot at 3:30PM. I was okay with doing it, but it would have been nice for some forewarning at least a day ahead of time.
The bulk of our gear checkout was at 2:00PM, and I assume you can see my dismay: checkout started at 2:00PM, and we were supposed to be setting up at 3:30PM. I was one of three people at the actual checkout, and they scrambled to pack the truck as I tested all of the lights... some of which did not work. They had to be swapped out and new paperwork had to be filed. I didn't even get to test any of the other gear, such as the Super PeeWee II dolly or make sure any of the other departments' gear was there. We actually thought we were missing the entire sound package until someone found it tucked away. Either way, I was furious that I had to take care of all of this when this responsibility should have been shared with other departments.
Second, I get a call asking me if I could also pick up tape stock. Here I am with a half loaded truck at 3:00PM and I had to say no. So I gave the guy this company's phone number to get the tape stock this camera needs (as the tapes you get at Best Buy aren't the best for the Panasonic cameras). He shows up to set at 4:00PM with Sony tapes from Best Buy anyway... and then we realize he has not purchased DAT tapes. Now we're running sync sound right into the camera. And the director is frustrated with me because of this?
The first set of scenes were the sex scenes. I felt bad for the actors there, as soon as they meet the crew they are taking their clothes off and screwing on a kitchen countertop. I've worked with the lead female talent, and she's one of the most amazing actors I've ever met. But still, there were 15 people in the room when all of this was going on, and I felt kind of bad about it. At least everyone had a good sense of humor about it.
I was told to throw a shadow across the kitchen cabinets. This shadow would be both actors during their sexual act, and the camera was to start on the cabinets and dolly out to the action, showing a practical in the shot that would explain why there was a shadow.
We laid 16 feet of straight track and lifted the 400lb Super PeeWee II onto it, then set up the camera. I know it loses a lot of light, but I'm loving the P&S Tecknik. I've had the option to use the PRO one before an a CineAlta, and love that even more. Anywho, once we had the camera set, I went to lighting the scene. Our practical source was a set of two small candles on the countertop. To fake the throw of those candles, we positioned one of the ARRI 1K fresnels on a homemade stand and attached it to the Magic Box flicker generator and put full CTO over it. This gave it a nice warm glow that cast a relatively defined shadow 15 feet away on the opposite wall. We added some fill to the scene and actor's faces and bodies with 2 lights on the 4 Bank Kino with tungsten balanced bulbs. We also diffused that with shower curtain. Yep, no fancy numbers like 216 or 250... Lee doesn't even make the crap... it's a simple shower curtain. You can buy 108310891246 of them at Bed, Bath and Beyond.
We also put 2 of the tungsten balanced Kino bulbs in the overhead kitchen fixtures. The Kino bulbs fit perfectly into standard fluorescent fixtures, and produce a prettier, brighter light. You might even want to do that in your house, if you can purchase the bulbs. Hell, I would. We stopped the camera down some to make this already hot scene look a little lower key. Its nice, because with all of that light, you have everything lit fairly evenly and have the option to stop down without losing most of your information in your shadows. Stopping down also meant that we didn't have to pull focus on our 14mm lens.
The last setup in this location was another lovemaking scene (I wouldn't even call the last one "lovemaking" if you get my drift) in the bedroom. We lit this very sparingly as well, with the 1200W Desisti HMI on full wide outside the window and about 10 feet in the air. The blinds were closed, but it cast this etherial glow, illuminating the edges of the window frame and some of the edges of the bed and skin of the talent. We then threw a sandbag on the short end of the gobo arm on a C-Stand and put the 4-Bank Kino directly above the bed, also with daylight balanced bulbs, but this time with 1/2 CTB and some 250 diffusion. That stuff is my personal favorite because I feel it diffuses the light the most evenly.
We kicked a very small amount of light into our lead female's eyes to illuminate her reaction when the male talent told her he loved her. I love using Kinos for two purposes: to evenly light a background in a very shallow area (meaning there isn't a great distance to throw the light to get an even look) and for throwing right above talent, to create a uniform rim light, or in this case, to accentuate body lines.
I've come from the world of fashion photography and love the human form. I'm a straight guy, but anyway you can accentuate a male or female's curves is very sexy. For girls, it's all in the lower back and hips... for guys, it's all in the shoulders and stomach. The 4-Bank Kino did just that in this sequence, and the male talent takes his time kissing up the back of the lead female talent until he reaches her ear and says his lines. Over all, the Director was very pleased with how this lighting setup turned out.
After another 45 minutes for a setup, we had a jib over the bed for the last shot of the female talent and the Police Officer character. They were in bed together cuddling and exchange dialogue. We had small mishap because the jib swung around and struck the Kino, but luckily no one got hurt when it fell on the bed and the camera and lighting fixtures were all fine as well. The jib from the foot of the bed to a medium shot of the young lovers simply looks great. I was even impressed... and I'm hard to impress. That's why I don't have a girlfriend at the moment.
Day One went off pretty well... we started off very late because of the aforementioned problems that arose, but we ended up wrapping only 30 minutes after our scheduled departure time. When I get my hands on some of the raw footage, I'll post stills.
For as much as I'm bitching about this, the images look amazing. Some people had emailed me drooling over being able to use Panavision Super Speeds on the last show I did and posted about here, but honestly, those lenses are giant pieces of crap. I'm getting better images using 5 Nikon 35mm SLR lenses than I did with a $100,000 array of the Panavision ones. My Nikon lenses are the following:
14mm Nikkor f2.8
50mm Nikkor f1.8
85mm Nikkor f1.4
70-200mm Nikon f3.5
28mm-200mm Nikon f3.5
I'll end this post and begin a new one on Day Two.
Mods, when I start posting images or clips from in-camera, please move this to the Screen Grabs / Clips section.
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