I recently needed to uprez some footage from 160×120 to HD. I used the occasion to give Red Giant’s Instant HD a try-out. The results looked decent, but for comparison I also simply adjusted the motion settings in Final Cut Pro. Surprizingly, to me those results looked actually better.
A fun compilation of all those films that use the (non-existing) enhance function that is part of any science-fiction/tech-thriller/computer-action movie. Enjoy!
(via)
Barb Dybwad has collection a nice list of online resources where you can find free multimedia content for your use. My favourite one would be the Creative Commons search.
I came across this beautiful shortfilm by a young film maker named Jesse Rosten, shot on no budget on a RED one.
http://www.vimeo.com/5843895Watch it in full quality on his website – but try not to read the story before seeing the film.
Scott Simmons wrote an open letter to cameratechs, Please label tapes and disks: An open letter to DPs, camera ops, DITs. He pleads to label tapes/harddisks in the following matter:
a descriptor of the project date of acquisition resolution w/ progressive or interlaced frame rate acquisition codec camera used contact information for questions notes
So a tape label might look like this:
Fluffo corporate video
6/25/09
1080i
29.97
HDV
Canon HV20
Michael Bey cell 555-1212
director shot 24p
All pretty reasonable, and should be adopted as common practice. Actually, I would suggest adding ratio, operator and sound information.
I prepared a simple form in the popular .pdf format that you can download here: Tape card
I also added a line for ratio, pre-filled some standard values, and added some info as to sound. Feedback is very welcome!
You can print out a couple of these sheets, cut them in fourths and have them in the camera bag. Even when you are in a hurry, you can quickly give valuable information to the hard working editor. (If you have an inkjet printer, it might be an idea to get those labels photocopied, so that they will survive the rain you and your camera will have to endure.)
Dear editors, it would be great if you could give us camerafolk some feed-back about the raw footage. Both what you liked (we are humans, too), what is useless, what would make your life easier, and any other form of constructive criticism. (And if you could make a copy of the finished edit in the highest possible quality, you are entitled to some serious cameraman love 
)
As a follow-up to yesterdays’s post on Clients not paying, here is one from the writer’s perspective – but that one works just as well for any one who has ever worked for “deferred payment.” I’ve done that mistake as well, and of the maybe dozen (mostly short) films I’ve done that way, I ended up getting paid exactly zero times. And I have never met a single sould who did end up getting some money from a deferred payment job.
If you need the experience, you may consider working for free – just do not fall for the production assistant’s crap promising money down the line. If a film by chance should turn out to be a financial success, any self-respecting producer will immediately start a new production company, sell all rights to the film to this new company, and can rake in all profits.
And when it is time to make the next, proper budgeted, film, guess who they will not call? You. Because if you work for free, you can’t be any good, right?
Ellison is a veteran Hollywood writer, and even he get occasionally asked to do freebies. Here is an extract from the documentary “Dreams with sharp teeth”
If you are intrigued as I was, have a look at the well made trailer:
It made me order the DVD.
Jay Moeller has been working as an editor for over 10 years. Here are her 21 (funny, fitting) tips to clients on how to behave in the editing room
http://www.vimeo.com/4594520
It is not often that I get to play games, and even more seldom that I write about them, but Splitter is a game that has many of the elements I like:
Another game I can recommend is Buggles Connect over at the Casual Collective. Here you can play against other online players. It is quite fun trying to guess what the other player(s) might do and adjust your own strategy accordingly.
You place your markers in an empty spot and try to grab as many little Buggles as you can. Whoever has caught most of them at the end of 10 rounds, wins.
Enjoy.
Before Graeme Nattress started at RED he was very well known for making exceptional plug-ins for Final Cut Pro. To celebrate his interview in the Digital Producer Magazine, Graeme currently makes his Bleach Bypass filter available for free. You can read the whole article to find the link, or click here. Installations instructions are on page two of the interview.
nVida just announced a supercomputer that would feature 960 cores and the speed of 250 computers, all for the price of under 10 grand usd. Read here for more.
Looks like our Birger mount is on its way home.
Soon I’ll be able to give our Contax Zeiss lenses a proper try.
And my new laptop from Apple (MBP 2.8ghz Intel Duo, 4gig – my first Intel Mac) is also on its way, enabling me to work R3D files on the road.
Exciting times. All puzzle pieces are coming together.
