Please add to my equipment list/workflow

S

StreetsofPlastic

Member
Hey all,

I just wanted to know if there was anything I left out of my checklist.

We have a small budget of $15,000 and I already have 1 HVX200 but we need a B camera so we are getting another. I need to know what else I would need to get up and running. We will be shooting narrative features and a few short films mostly on location. I need a basic equipment list for shooting/capturing/editing. Here is what I have so far:

Panasonic HVX200
M2 35mm Adapter
SLR lesnes for the M2
Firestore HD
Matte Box
Manfrotto tripod
Field Monitor (maybe a Marshall)
Case of MiniDV tapes (if we shoot SD)
Cheap laptop to connect the firestore and external HD so I can dump clips in the field
Apple 2.66ghz quad Xenon Mac Pro
(500GB HD, 4GB DDR ECC Memory, GTech Raid 2 500GB external HDs)
20”Cinema Display
Apple Final Cut Sutdio 2

I realize that all of that probably runs over $15,000 but I need to know what can be deleted or substituted. IS there anything else I would need to add to this to shoot, capture and edit a film?? ( I will send the final master to discmakers to get it burned to DVD)

Thank you for reading and looking forward to your suggestions and input!

Ed
 
Save yourself some headaches and ditch the firestore. Just go with 2 16GB P2 Cards for the Same Price. You wont have to worry about batteries or cabling for the FS-100, or dropping frames. Also it makes the camera a lot easier to deal with if you do any handheld.
Just my own preference, but I thought I would share.
 
20" monitor isnt big enough. get 2 24" dell 2407's

from what ive seen, i prefer the sgpro and brevis to the M2 adapter

have you thought about a basic light kit? mics? crane? steadicam? a rod setup (all the 35 adapters except the brevis REQUIRE rods) batteries for your field monitor?
how about color correct friendly monitoring? try the matrox mxo or black magic intensity card.
there is a really cool and super cheap shoulder mount called the cb-105, its like $90. but be sure to order the $10 extra weight. or you could drop $2k on a bad-ass zacuto rod/shoulder setup.
backdrop/screen frames, reflector cards... i could go on ; )
 
If I go with the P2 cards and I am shooting in 1080i or 720, won't the P2 cards only hold a total of 32 mins of HD video?

If I go the P2 route then what is the workflow for dumping the clips to an external HD to reuse the cards?
 
I should have mentionted it in the original post but lighting equipment will be handled by our lighting guy. I am thinking about renting a steadicam and crane. I apologize if I sound *stewpid* but what do you mean by color correcting monitor? The field monitor will not do that for me?

Thanks
 
StreetsofPlastic said:
If I go with the P2 cards and I am shooting in 1080i or 720, won't the P2 cards only hold a total of 32 mins of HD video?

If I go the P2 route then what is the workflow for dumping the clips to an external HD to reuse the cards?
Click to expand...

16 Minutes (maybe a little more - i never shoot 1080) of 1080i 24pa on a 16gb card and 42 minutes at 720 24pn. So 2 16gb Cards would yield 84 minutes of record time, which on a feature schedule would probably get you through an entire day, unless of course you shoot 70 takes of everything.

The process differs slightly from pc to mac. You can mount the card in a PCMCIA slot, or a compatible slot using an adaptor then dump manually or use spoftware such as P2 Genie. Another option is a P2 Store which has really slow transfer times compared to other methods and then you have to effectively dump the cards twice - or the newer P2 Gear which looks somewhat promising.

Does anyone know if the P2 Gear will transfer files faster?
 
i dont see a follow focus on your list. a must if using a 35 adapter. the redrock one is great. i agree on earlier comments about firestore. p2 workflow is easy and reliable. also, forget mini dv tapes. if you shoot sd, shoot dv50 on p2 cards. compression is much much better. and for your cheap laptop, get a used powerbook g4. it has the pcmcia slot you need to dump p2's and it works great for that.
 
unless you are planing to do single takes more than say 5 or ten min, it doesnt really matter what size your p2 cards are. get two, and shoot to one while your assistant transfers the other and swap between takes. i just dump my 8gig cards to an old mac 17" powerbook (also use that machine to do scratch edits in the field)

renting a steadicam and crane arent really advisable as to be competent with each you really need to have practice! i have a kessler crane that mounts on a higher end manfrotto tripod and head (no smaller than 3193 legs and a 510 head or you'll crush it!) tripod and head $1200, $700ish for crane - cnat beat that!

and you might look into a steadicam merlin. the bare HVX just barely gets in under its max weight limit. i bought one for $800 last month and it works great for shoots that dont have the budget for a full blown steadi setup.

ok, if you have to ask what a color correcting monitor is for, you might want to do a little more homework. thats pretty much CRUCIAL. as you need to have a good, color accurate monitor (NOT just a consumer TV or standalone computer monitor) to judge the image properly
 
If you are only editing 720p DVCPRO HD, the Mac you have spec'd is greatly overkill. You can edit just fine on a much lower-end system. The demands of DVCPRO are a lot lower than HDV footage shot in MPEG2 format. You could edit DVCPRO on a simple Macbook Pro even. I would suggest scaling back the computer and investing more in a good light package. You'll need it with the M2.
 
cheap laptop

cheap laptop

cheezweezl said:
i dont see a follow focus on your list. a must if using a 35 adapter. the redrock one is great. i agree on earlier comments about firestore. p2 workflow is easy and reliable. also, forget mini dv tapes. if you shoot sd, shoot dv50 on p2 cards. compression is much much better. and for your cheap laptop, get a used powerbook g4. it has the pcmcia slot you need to dump p2's and it works great for that.
Click to expand...


I was hoping I could get away with using a cheap pwoerbook. How about the external HD that I am dumping the clips to. Can I just use any off the shelf external HD? Of course I will make sure it is firewire and 7200rpm. They are pretty cheap and I have a Western Digital Mybook 500gb external HD that maybe I can use...or can I?
 
got it

got it

wgzn said:
unless you are planing to do single takes more than say 5 or ten min, it doesnt really matter what size your p2 cards are. get two, and shoot to one while your assistant transfers the other and swap between takes. i just dump my 8gig cards to an old mac 17" powerbook (also use that machine to do scratch edits in the field)

renting a steadicam and crane arent really advisable as to be competent with each you really need to have practice! i have a kessler crane that mounts on a higher end manfrotto tripod and head (no smaller than 3193 legs and a 510 head or you'll crush it!) tripod and head $1200, $700ish for crane - cnat beat that!

and you might look into a steadicam merlin. the bare HVX just barely gets in under its max weight limit. i bought one for $800 last month and it works great for shoots that dont have the budget for a full blown steadi setup.

ok, if you have to ask what a color correcting monitor is for, you might want to do a little more homework. thats pretty much CRUCIAL. as you need to have a good, color accurate monitor (NOT just a consumer TV or standalone computer monitor) to judge the image properly
Click to expand...

Great tip about the crane and steadicam!

ACtually I reread your post and do understand what you mean by color correcting monitor sorry bout that. I saw a nice Panasonic HD monitor in the B+H catalog that might work great.
 
i DO NOT recommend the WD mybook drives, nor ANYTHING from LaCie. there are only two brands of FW drives ive never heard problems with - OWC and PROMAX. however, if youre not going to do heavy edit in the field, id suggest a couple small 40 to 60 gig bus powered drives. no need to foist power supply needs upon yourself in the field.

you can pick up a used g4 powerbook for like $500-$700 and you simply cant beat that for p2 dump and basic field editing ; )
 
the matrox mxo with either a dell 2405/2407 or apple 23" cinema display is about the cheapest good quality reference monitor setup you are going to find.
 
requirements for used G4?

requirements for used G4?

wgzn said:
i DO NOT recommend the WD mybook drives, nor ANYTHING from LaCie. there are only two brands of FW drives ive never heard problems with - OWC and PROMAX. however, if youre not going to do heavy edit in the field, id suggest a couple small 40 to 60 gig bus powered drives. no need to foist power supply needs upon yourself in the field.

you can pick up a used g4 powerbook for like $500-$700 and you simply cant beat that for p2 dump and basic field editing ; )
Click to expand...

What do the specs need to be for the used G4 to dump my footage from the P2 to an external HD. Do the actual specs of that laptop even matter? I guess as long as it has a slot and firewire connection right?

btw, thanks fr all the great advice!
 
StreetsofPlastic said:
I was hoping I could get away with using a cheap pwoerbook. How about the external HD that I am dumping the clips to. Can I just use any off the shelf external HD? Of course I will make sure it is firewire and 7200rpm. They are pretty cheap and I have a Western Digital Mybook 500gb external HD that maybe I can use...or can I?
Click to expand...
My experience with the WD MyBooks drives isn't the best. They are relatively slow in terms of responsiveness on my system. The drive itself lags my system by about 5-10 seconds when opening the My Computer screen with all of my drives on it. If you don't mind this, no problem.

The models I've worked with are USB 2.0, which would be just fine for off-loading P2 cards. I wouldn't trust it as an external editing drive, though--and I'm not sure what type of drives they use in them. I would much rather buy a reliable internal drive and mount it in an enclosure. That, and you can swap in other drives easily.
 
for your external drives, just buy raw drives and enclosures and put together yourself. you can't go wrong with seagate or maxtor drives. for the enclosure, try to get something with an oxford chipset. they are fast.
 
wgzn said:
i DO NOT recommend the WD mybook drives, nor ANYTHING from LaCie. there are only two brands of FW drives ive never heard problems with - OWC and PROMAX. however, if youre not going to do heavy edit in the field, id suggest a couple small 40 to 60 gig bus powered drives. no need to foist power supply needs upon yourself in the field.

you can pick up a used g4 powerbook for like $500-$700 and you simply cant beat that for p2 dump and basic field editing ; )
Click to expand...

I totaly agree -
WD do have issues but less than Lacie. Using a Lacie is like putting your footage on an iceberg in the middle of a forest fire and crossing your fingers that wont melt.
they are very prone to faults and crashing (so are their external DVD drives).
I know so many people that have lost stuff because of faulty Lacie drives. I was at an Apple training session and tehy had some people from MTV there saying they used to use only Lacie for back ups until they had over 30 drives fail in a 2 week period. The guy said they have a joke sign nearthe archives that says no "Lacie beyond this point."
 
cheezweezl said:
for your external drives, just buy raw drives and enclosures and put together yourself. you can't go wrong with seagate or maxtor drives. for the enclosure, try to get something with an oxford chipset. they are fast.
Click to expand...

or a hitachi deskstar - its the heart of the apple xserve.
 
MAc Pro comes with an external

MAc Pro comes with an external

:happy:I might not get another external HDD to transfer. The turnkey MacPro I am getting comes with a G-Raid2 500GB 2-Disk FireWire-400, FireWire-800 and USB 2.0 External Hard Drive Array. I might just take that with me and use that for dumping to.

I tiwll save me some money too
 
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