Jesse Rosten

Extra! Extra! This just in. Canon has announced their newest flagship DSLR. I’m watching the walk-through video as I type this. Here’s what I’ve gleaned so far:

• 16.1 Megapixel APS-H sized sensor
• ISO Range 100-12,800 native with extend ISO up to 102,400. It’ll be interesting to see how this stacks up to the low light performance of the new Nikon D3s
• New 45-Point AF
• Auto Lighting Optimizer. I have no idea how this is supposed to work, but it looks kind of like it may add a little “fill light” to the picture. Similar to how Photoshop’s shadows/highlights feature works. Don’t quote me on that though.
• 1080 24p + 720 60p. I wonder if they are still employing line skipping to generate video image? And…does anyone shooting for web or SD broadcast care?

Find out more for yourself with these tasty links.
Canon USA
Vincet Laforet Video in HD

Here are a few spur-of-the-moment shots from the local skating rink. We threw this shoot together very last minute with the help of a Facebook casting call (don’t forget to follow via Facebook and Twitter!)

I first tried setting up the light on a stand and had the skaters roll by as I shot. This yielded horrible results. I quickly realized that I needed to get the camera and light rolling along with the skaters, at a consistent distance, to get consistent focus and exposure. Well, it just so happens that I spent a good portion of the ’90s roller skating on a weekly basis. Yes, I was THAT kid. I skated in front of the subject and had an assistant (thank you Jeremy and Lyn) on wheels skate along side holding the flash (580ex, shoot-thru umbrella, triggered via PW). Shooting blind meant I shot a lot of frames and hoped to get some keepers. Doing a photo shoot on roller skates really got me wondering how much more efficient my life might be if I could wear roller skates all the time. Imagine how fast shopping at Costco would be with a pair of skates.

I’ve been seeing a lot of motion graphic spots on TV lately that rely more on well designed graphics and less on dazzling motion. Figured that might be a good approach to this spot since I only had a few days to complete. Wish I could have spent more time on transitions between scenes but I like how it turned out thematically.

No rest for the weary. I was in Cleveland last week working on a campaign video for a US Senate race. Had one night in my own bed and then was off again. Spent last weekend in Santa Rosa filming pro cyclist Levi Leipheimer during his Gran Fondo ride. Lyn and I enjoyed a thrilling day wrestling the Red and a tripod on the back of a couple of motorcycles. Thumbs up to Bill and Chad our excellent moto drivers. Thumbs down to the angry rancher who used his truck as a weapon, driving over my tripod bag and stopping literally inches away from a *very* expensive camera. I’ll tell you the story over drinks sometime.

I’m home for a week now, long enough to catch up on some last minute editing before I fly off to Colorado to shoot a wedding. Can’t wait to see the fall colors in that part of the country. I leave you with a few iPhone shots from the last few weeks of whirlwinding.

I’ll be the first to admit I don’t know a thing about 3D. But I do know how to push software buttons. While waiting for some proxies to render, I thought I’d have a go at Cinema 4D. These are simple test renders, nothing fancy. Inspiration came from watching some videos on Greyscalegorilla.com. Hopefully, I can create more of this stuff. It would definitely add another dimension to my work. Oh yes, I went there.

Lyn and I had the honor of shooting Ryan and Nancy’s nuptials a few weeks ago. Here are few of our favorites.

Storyboards are a valuable production tool, but creating them is such a pain. Why is it so hard? Well, filmmaking is hard, and when you storyboard you are essentially “writing” the visuals of your film. Many creative decisions come into play. You’re acting as director, director of photography, and editor all at once.  You’re deciding what shots, with what lens, and in what order tell your story best. No easy task. And when you can’t draw your way out of a paper bag (like me), spontaneity and creativity gets stifled. Wondering what that shot might look like from a bird’s eye view? Sure, just give me…20, 30 minutes or so. And I’m going to need a couple more erasers. Enter Hitchcock (frame left).

Hitchcock is a mobile storyboarding application for the iPhone. Instead of tediously drawing each panel, you use photos. This is a no-brainer for me. I’m already using my iPhone camera for location scouting. Now I can have a working storyboard before even leaving the location. The process is simple. Launch the app and import photos via your photo library or shoot photos straight from the camera. Each picture becomes a “panel” in your finished board. You can rearrange panels, set their duration, add characters (silhouettes), add markup arrows and text, record audio, keyframe pans and zooms. Wow. But by far the best feature of this app is that it gives you an animatic of your board. At any point you can hit play and see how your shots cut together, complete with recorded audio and camera moves. This is an invaluable feature for anyone storyboarding with time constraints (like a :30 commercial spot for example). When you’re finished, you can export the whole thing to a PDF and email it to the client or crew.

Reasons to buy Hitchcock:

1. It’s Mobile. You never know when and where inspiration will strike.
2. It’s intuitive. If you know how to work your iPhone, you can work this app. I love the tactile feel of positioning characters and rearranging panels.
3. It’s cheap. If $20 is too much to spend on a tool that will likely enhance your creative process, well then maybe filmmaking isn’t your thing. Twenty bucks is how much I used to spend at Starbucks scribbling with a pencil for three hours trying to finish the shading on that upper lip.

A few things I’d love to see in the next version. An export-to-video feature so I can email myself the animatic. I don’t know how the guts of the iPhone work but I’m guessing this might be an OS limitation. Also, the ability to add a music bed would be sweet. 

Here’s an example of a Hitchcock storyboard being turned into an actual spot. Check it:

This app is a valuable tool that every filmmaker should have. Do yourself, your productions, and your clients a favor and check it out.

Visit Cinemek.com for more juicy info on Hitchcock.

Canon 100mm Macro + Red One. Yes, I hate these things too, but I love to hate them. Working with this guy for about an hour emptied my adrenal glands. Definitely will need a spider wrangler next time. The spider was either sitting completely motionless, or scampering away off the table. That made me think that a subject like this would work really well for a “living photograph.” Click the pic to see what I mean.

Here’s a really simple way to rig your dSLR to your body for those high-action, POV-type shots (think skiing, biking, motocross, etc). No expensive helmet-cam rigging required.  All you need is a bungee cord.

Check it:
Most cameras come standard with a neck strap. You’ll need to make sure this is attached. Next, hang the camera from your neck. Good, now you look like a tourist. Chances are your camera is hanging somewhere near your stomach. You’ll probably want to shorten up the camera strap so that the camera hangs over your chest. Unless your tummy is sporting a six pack (I’ve got a six pack IN my tummy), you’ll find it much easier to wear the camera higher so it’s pushing against your chest rather than gut. To accomplish this, I had to shorten my camera strap by tying a knot in it. Your mileage may vary.

Next, attach the bungee cord, hook facing out, to one side of the strap near the body of the camera. Wrap the bungee around your back and hook it to the other side of the camera strap. Done. That’s it. If the bungee is the right size, you should feel the pull of the bungee holding the camera tight against your body. Notice as you move, the camera moves with your body. Now your hands are free to hang on to the handle bars, ski poles, or dog sled(?)

A couple things to note:
* You should be ’slightly’ uncomfortable. In order to hold the camera tight against your body, you’ve got to get the bungee cord relatively tight. If your torso goes numb and you can’t feel your legs, it’s too tight. 
* Try to find a bungee cord with plastic hooks. Plastic is less likely to scratch your camera and less likely to poke you in the sides. Do not attempt this mount if you are ticklish.
* This method holds the camera tight for most lateral forces, but the camera is still free to bounce a little up and down. For jarring activities like running or pogo sticks you might want to add a vertical strap as well. Let me know if you find something that works.

Here’s a clip of me on my trusty lil’ Suzuki 450GS. This was shot with a Canon MKII and a 17-40mm f/4. The POV riding shots were accomplished with the bungee-mount method.