Call an organization that has an event already scheduled, video cameras, like an environmental group that will be planting trees. Ask them if you can videotape the digging and say that they can use the video in the future to promote Mother Earth. Don’t forget to tell them you’re giving the video away for good!
Setups - The Sun
Let’s start with the easiest setups and take advantage of the beautiful spring or summer sun. First of all, think of the sun as a very small, very intense light. The sun is best used during the morning and late afternoon hours to take advantage of its color, as well as the angle of the light. But, believe it or not, you can also use the sun at high noon!
If you do have to shoot at noon, place your talent in the shade of a tree with a shaded background. Place a smooth surface reflector in the sun at the 3 o’clock position and reflect the sun towards another smooth surface reflector or mirror positioned above and at the 11 o’clock position behind your talent. Focus this reflector onto the back of the talent’s head and shoulders. Use another soft gold reflector slightly above and at the 5 o’clock position and bounce the light from the back reflector into your talent’s face for a very nice soft warm light.
Sun in your eyes?—will you be shooting into the sun from where you’re sitting? If so, you might want to consider moving, even if it puts you in the visitors’ bleachers - just try not to cheer too loudly.
Hey, down in front!—is there a space specifically for press? If not, get a seat where people won’t be standing between you and the action. When Junior makes his touchdown, you don’t want the back of some guy’s head to be the only record you have of it.
Randy Hansen, chief photographer for WINK-TV, has been videotaping sports for years and recommends that at a minimum you should have a camera with a good quick zoom and extra batteries. That, however, isn’t nearly as important as understanding the game. “That requires,” says Hansen, “you know where to be when it’s 3rd and 9 (down field about 10-12 yards). If you don’t know, I wouldn’t shoot the sport until you could learn more about it.” Randy also says it’s vital to grab a copy of the program with all the players’ names and jersey numbers to reference later.
SONYhdr-hcs HDV Camcorder
• Record 10801 High-Definition Resolution • HDMI Output
• 1/3 ClearVid CMOS Image Sensor
• Carl Zeiss Vario-SonnarT Lens
• Cinematic 24 frame Film-like Mode
• 5.1 Channel Surround Sound Recording
Memory Stick Duo/Pro (up to 4GB) Card Slot
Smooth Slow Recording Mode
Canon
Canon’s HDV equivalent to its XL family of DV camcorders is the XL HI ($8,999). Like the JVC camcorders, this camcorder also includes the ability to remove the lens and put another on. The XL HI also has a significant number of film-like image settings, and a Professional Jackpack (HD SDI, genlock, and time code output).
JVC
The JVC GY-HD200 ($8,995) is designed more for electronic news gathering (ENG), along with digital cinematography and other forms of videography. It is very similar to the HD110, but has more features, including the extra ability to record in 60p and 50p in HDV mode.
The GY-HD250 ($10,995) is also similar to the GY-HD200 and GY-HD110, and is the most professional of its ProDV camcorders. This camcorder features HD SDI, genlock and time code output.
Although Vegas is under a different division, Sony Media Software, Sony opted to bundle the RM1 with Adobe’s Premiere Pro 2.0 editing software. There are currently some issues between Windows Vista and Premiere Pro, however—as soon as we launched the program, we got an error message about direct sound input not being supported, and that recording audio would not be possible. Once we clicked through that and started a new project, the program immediately froze. The solution, as it turns out, is to attach a mic to the machine, and to leave it attached. (Strangely, attaching a mic while the machine was running caused it to completely crash.) This workaround made Premiere Pro further issues with the software. captured HDV via a Sony HDR-FX7 with Sony DVGate Plus, a slightly confusing but very versatile capture tool. That yielded a smattering of M2T files (MPEG-2 trans, port stream), one file per press of the camcorder’s start/stop button.
We fed these files to Corel’s Ulead BD Disc Recorder, a simple program that generates simple discs, but just having the power to give someone HDI content on a disc should be a powerful-enough feature to stand on its own. The program claimed that it wasl performing some transcodes, but the process was so fast, we think it probably didn’t actually have to do much ol anything to the HDV clips we imported] (We later tried Roxio’s DVDit Pro HD, reviewed elsewhere in this issue.)
To play back our freshly-burned BD-RE of HDV footage, we launched Corel WinDVD BD for Vaio. Strangely,] it wouldn’t play our disc. We took the opportunity to install CyberLink’s| PowerDVD Ultra, which happily playei back the video (but didn’t output any audio). Just for giggles, we tried WinDVD BD again, and we got both audio and video! This means that we I encountered a strange little codec issti lurking there. We expect a patch to arl dress this should be out before long.
Definition DV, selecting from 480/60i, 480/24p and 480/24pa formats, JVC Pro GY-HD200U.
In our tests, we shot a variety of subjects in all modes and were particularly impressed with the silky smooth image quality of the 720/60p format. JVC’s new Super Encoder has now made recording this progressive frame rate possible in an HDV format. This is a really huge advantage for producers shooting fast moving subjects, or just anyone simply wanting an incredibly fluid look for their camera movements.
The native 24p will remain a favorite for independent producers (among others) looking to recreate the temporal likeness of film. Like all 24p frame rates, however, some strobing is inherent. Recording in the DV mode, the 24p format records in a 2:3:2:3 pull-down sequence for easy editing in a standard NTSC environment, while the 24pa format records in a film-standard 2:3:3:2 pull-down for film editing output.