The Holloway Chariot Rides Again - 6/12/11

James Holloway's bicycle dolly is put to good use once more. This time for a tracking shot along a pavement that travels over the kerb onto the road. The chippie built a ramp to enable a smooth transition from pavement to street. In conjunction with a vibration isolator the shot was rock solid and saved production the cost of a day's steadicam.

Alexa Plus at 120 fps - 5/12/11

This is what we have all been waiting for. High frame rate HD on your main shooting camera at the flick of a switch. In the good old days of the SR3 (75fps) one would need an HS SR3 to run frame rates up to 150 fps. And it gets better. Think you're losing two stops plus? Think again. Just dial in a 360 deg shutter (which has no noticeable effect on the picture) and you have only lost one stop shooting at 100fps. It's great. I love it!

5D on 'Case Sensitive' - 4/12/11

The 5D has been put to good use in and around cars on the Hat Trick Productions drama, 'Case Sensitive'. Our main camera is the Alexa Plus - more on that later with some slo-mo examples.

'We'll Take Manhattan' - The Hollywood Reporter 18/11/11

The buzz is building over 'We'll Take Manhattan' as The Hollywood Reporter weighs in with an article about the drama. You can read the piece here: http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/fash-track/david-bailey-jean-shrimpton-well-take-manhattan-258340

'Rough Skin' - BIFA Nomination

'Rough Skin', one of the films in Channel 4's recent series of 'Coming Up', has been nominated in the best British short film category at the 2011 'Moet' British Independent Film Awards. Congratulations to director Cathy Brady, Touchpaper Films, Channel 4 and all cast and crew. The winner will be announced on December 4th. For more information and a list of nominees go to: http://new.bifa.org.uk/press/nominations-announced/

'Funicular Track' - 5/5/11

Our grip on 'Being Human', James Holloway, pulls another one out of the bag. Here we are back on our steep gradient outside the main characters' house and director Phil John asks for a tracking shot UP the hill into a big close up. Choice A - Build up the track. How much wood that would take? Choice B - Run the track uphill. Impossible to push. Choice C - The ingenious counterbalanced 'funicular' track which took a mere fifteen minutes to build and offered our standby props man, Danny Clements, the ride of his life. Oh, and we only did two takes, the second of which was for 'Lloyds'. See the setup in action below.

 

    

'First Night' Opens 14th October 2011

'First Night' opens at screens across the UK tomorrow night. For a trailer, reviews and other details please go to: http://www.facebook.com/FirstNightMovie

How To Give Notes - 2/10/2011

Ask our intrepid director, Daniel O'Hara, for some tips. But the most important thing to remember, which Daniel clearly has down to a fine art, is to talk to the throat. You may be looking at a wild eyed, slavering werewolf but there's a man in there somewhere whose eyes only come up to the beast's esophagus. And while we're at it I'm still making more friends.

Some Tight Spots - 2/10/2011

The places you find yourself in eh? Everything in film making is about getting the camera in the right place and there is ALWAYS a way to get it where it needs to be. Yes indeed you might say but the camera still has to be operated. Ergo...

The Holloway Chariot Rides Again - 2/10/2011

I'm losing track now but I think this is the fourth guise in which the chariot has been used. And here to particularly good effect with operator Richard Stoddard's (but we all call him 'Stoddy') Garfield mounted steadicam for a three minute continuously circling shot. What makes the rig so successful is the articulation between the bicycle front end and the platform enabling James to steer the whole contraption around a pinhead if so desired whilst Stoddy keeps the shot rock solid.

Superb Stunt - 2/10/2011

Truly excellent use of the 5D for this crash stunt on 'Being Human'. A quick and simple rig devised by grip, James Holloway, enabled us to get a shot that would have been far more complex and time consuming to set up with a conventional camera. The pictures speak for themselves. The lens was an old manual focus 24mm Nikon with a Rayqual AI to EF adapter.

Canon 5D Polecam - 2/10/2011

More interesting ways to improvise with the 5D. This time with the help of our most obliging sound recordist Deian Humphreys and his generous loan of a boom arm. The camera, wearing a 15mm Fisheye, perched very neatly at the end of the arm though after three minutes of waving it around above the revellers it suddenly became surprisingly heavy and James the grip dived in to take the load and proceeded to rock and roll the camera in a far more interesting way than I ever managed. Thank you James - all your shots are in the final edit. And much respect is due to our great boom op, Ross Adams, who does this twelve hours a day. I did feel like a bit of a wimp.

'First Night' Nationwide Release - October 14th

'First Night' will be screening across the UK from October 14th 2011. Watch the trailer here:
http://www.facebook.com/FirstNightMovie. Screen International calls the film ‘A lush operatic romp set against the elegant backdrop of a stunning Scottish country house, First Night is an engagingly breezy romantic comedy-drama.’

Dr Who Season Finale October 1st

Don't miss the final episode in the current series of Dr Who. Episode 13, 'The Wedding of River Song' is on this Saturday October 1st at 7.05 pm on BBC 1. Who are 'The Silents'? The Doctor's most frightening enemy. You can watch the trailer here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/doctorwho/dw/videos/p00knpdl

'Rough Skin' Raindance Nomination

'Rough Skin' has been nominated for best film in the UK short film category at the Raindance awards on October 8th, 2011
http://www.raindance.co.uk/site/index.php?id=551,8017,0,0,1,0. Congratulations to production and crew for all your great work in getting the film this far.

A Tight Spot - 10/09/11

This was a simple and effective way to achieve the required shot in a very limited space. There was no room even to hand hold. I was thinking that we would have to put the camera on a steady bag but that would have made the shot impossible to operate and we needed to develop into the close up from a wide. James Holloway of course has far better ideas than I do. He whipped the base off the O'Connor and screwed the head straight into an apple box. Presto, with the on board battery removed from the back of the camera, it fit perfectly within the window recess and we were able to achieve the shot successfully. Nice! Thank you James.

The Holloway Chariot - 10/09/11

Ever resourceful grip James Holloway and his trusty steed - the Campagnolo, the Shergar, the McLaren of rickshaw dollies. The old adage about the daily film making process being akin to shooting 'Ben Hur in the morning and Benny Hill in the afternoon' bore some truth . In command of that chariot I was, for a fleeting moment, Charlton Heston.

Below is our wonderful loader Clare Connor taking James for a test drive. Then there's myself on the flight deck flanked by my trusty wingmen from left to right: Steve Rees - focus puller, Matt Lepper - camera trainee and the brains behind it all James Holloway, grip. By the way the 1' x 1' Lite Panels
http://www.litepanels.com/ LED worked well as an eyelight. The camera was tracking down a very long corridor with nowhere to rig any lighting.

Helium Balloons - 10/09/11

Successful use of Airstar http://www.airstar.co.uk/index.php helium balloons in the old Coal Exchange in Cardiff. It took three heavily skirted 5K HMI versions positioned end to end to give us the required effect. We needed to shoot 360 degrees in the space which negated the use of any floor lighting. The final image below is a frame from the rushes which shows how the light behaved.

Canon 5D Body Rig - 31/08/11

Mounted the 5D Mk 2 on a 'Body Rig' from Films at 59 in Bristol http://www.filmsat59.com This is the best body mount rig I have used and I have tried many. The single central column is incredibly sturdy and extremely quick and intuitive to set up. It is simple to make small adjustments on the fly unlike with other systems that require endless finessing of strut lengths to get the camera the right distance from the artist and at the right height. Thoroughly recommended! And for all you 5D boffins the camera was set at 1250 asa with a 35mm f2 lens at, you guessed it, f2.

Apptastic - 31/08/11

So picture the scene. The shot below is a simple two shot over the driver towards a character at the window. However the gradient of the street is incredibly steep and there is no way to rig the camera without using an inordinate amount of construction. The simplest solution is to sit in the passenger seat with the camera on a steady bag. But it is impossible to judge whether the camera is level. Due to the incline every vertical in the frame is skewiff and it is also very dark.

Then I remembered my 'Clinometer' App. The top plate of the Alexa is a perfectly flat nestling point for the iPhone and the app's large bubble display with numerical readings in degrees was easily viewable out of the corner of my eye whilst operating off a monitor. It's the closest I'll ever get to 'flying with instruments' and it was all working so well until...the phone's battery ran out in the middle of a take.

LED Streetlights - 31/08/11

Made a new discovery on a night shoot yesterday in Barry, South Wales - LED streetlights. I have never seen them before and was mightily impressed. To the eye they look like 'Lite Panels' LEDs and on camera they are a perfect match to daylight. Furthermore they are quite directional and project a more concentrated beam straight down without scattering light everywhere as traditional sodium lights do. Clearly the urban civic planning departments are finally talking to film industry practitioners about the aesthetics of available light night shooting. This might be the tipping point that finally makes me vote Tory!

Take a look at the framegrab below. Most of the backlight is supplied by these streetlights with a little additional punch from an HMI on a cherrypicker. The colours are indistinguishable. In the far distance you can see one of these lights giving a blue green glow to some foliage. And to the left are ye olde sodium jobs. It seems as if these LED variants are being gradually introduced one street at a time. Bring them on! And a big thank you to gaffer JT Truckle and his boys for doing such a great job.

New Doctor Who - 'Let's Kill Hitler'

Don't miss the first episode in the autumn season of Dr. Who on Saturday 27th August. New monsters, new characters and new settings galore! Who is Rory punching?

This should prove to be a super episode directed by Richard Senior who has made a very impressive directing debut on Dr. Who. And it was my first foray into the wonderful world of the Doctor and his companions as well. Thank you Richard for inviting me on board. It was a wild ride!

I would also like to thank the tremendous crew who graciously did not treat me too much like an interloper. Namely Steve Rees - focus puller extraordinaire who I have poached for 'Being Human'. "No, Dr Who Christmas Special, You Can't Have Him Back!" Camera operator Joe Russell - one of the best hand held operators I have had the good fortune to work with. And of course the inimitable triple Welsh Bafta winning gaffer, Mark Hutchings, who really runs the show. We would be all at sea without Mark.

    

Old School Grippery 19/08/11

Here are some examples of the Elemack put to good use. The snake arm works very well with a low angle prism. Trusty grip James Holloway worked out the geometry of dolly to drop arm to head to sliding base plate to camera very quickly in order to get the mirror within 'a thou' of ground level. The shot of a shopping basket being pushed along the floor was a breeze to operate. Try doing that on a Pee Wee eh?

Do you see the incline of the slope on the exterior shot? It must have been 5:1. Imagine how much more wood would have been needed to level a Chapman. Couple of small apple boxes and some wedges for the Elemack.

Alexa in Low Light - 19/08/11

We are continuing to have excellent results with the Alexa on 'Being Human'. I just wanted to draw your attention to some recent available light night work that shows off the high ISO capabilities of the Arri Alexa very well. Filming at night in Newport, Wales there was really no need for any additional lighting bar a couple of battery powered LEDs.

For the wide shot all we used was a 1'x1' Lite Panel LED around the corner of the building on the right and a similar unit behind the building on the left just to give the characters running across the road a little bit of a highlight.

For the close shot of the 'Heavy' the cooler light from the left came from a Lite Panel dimmed right down. The backlight and fill were provided by streetlights!!

The camera was set to 1600 asa and I took the colour temperature of the camera down to 2400 deg Kelvin to combat the excessive warmth of the sodium street lights. This setup seemed to be effective and I haven't 'tweaked' the images at all. They are framegrabs directly off the DVD rushes.

"We'll Take Manhattan" - In Vogue Magazine

The September issue of British Vogue features a spread on Aneurin Barnard and Karen Gillan, the actors playing David Bailey and Jean Shrimpton in the upcoming BBC4 drama about their seminal trip to New York for Vogue magazine in 1962. Even better, the photographs of the two young stars were taken by none other than the great Bailey himself. 

Throughout the shoot Aneurin had been taking photos with a vintage Pentax SLR. He had all the pictures developed and made up a photo book which he gave to Bailey on the day of the Vogue shoot. What a wonderful gift.

"First Night" aka 'Cosi' - Imminent Release

"First Night" is set for an October 2011 release. Click here to view the trailer:
http://www.timpalmerdp.com/film.html

"Coming Up" - Home. Behind The Scenes

To find out about the making of 'Home', Baff Akoto's film for Channel 4's new series of 'Coming Up', go to:
http://www.channel4.com/programmes/coming-up/articles/behind-the-scenes-on-home

"Coming Up" - Food. On Tonight 01/08/11

The Telegraph says:
"This ambitious short forms part of Channel 4's season showcasing the UK's up-and-coming film-makers. In the near future, Britain is in the grip of a catastrophic food shortage. Extremism is on the rise. An official from the ailing government (Patterson Joseph) risks his life to confront the leader of the dominant far-Right party (Roger Allam). Writer Christian Contreras and director Jonathan van Tulleken...conjure an atmosphere of oppression and fear with great effectiveness.

"Coming Up" - Currently On Air - 28/7/11

"Coming Up" is currently being transmitted on Channel 4 to great critical acclaim. See some reviews below. Another victory for the Canon 5D and great thanks to Adrian at RGB for supplying all the equipment and a particular mention to Jon Howard who did such a magnificent job focus pulling.

The Observer writes on 10/07/11:
"Rough Skin by Laura Lomas is the first of seven new dramas by emerging film-makers. After nine months in prison Kelly (Vicky McClure) goes home to live with her mother, but their relationship is shaken to the core when her mum uncovers her closely guarded secret. Naked emotion, spare dialogue, the drama of physical expression: this deserves an award."

And believe it or not, this in The Sun on 09/07/11:
"You may recognise the lead in this short film about a girl struggling with life after prison. Vicky McClure won this year's best actress BAFTA for her portrayal of Lol in This is England '86. So it seems apt that the rising star should feature in Channel 4's 'Coming Up' series for new writers and directors. The realistic dialogue, compelling camerawork and McClure's understated performance showcase some genuinely brilliant talent."

The last film that I worked on, 'Food', will be transmitted shortly. Congratulations to its director, Jonathan van Tulleken, who has been offered Channel 4's groundbreaking series 'Misfits' on the back of his work on 'Food'. Well done J!!

"Being Human" - 5D/Lensbaby Fun 28/7/11

Here are some examples of what can be done with a Canon 5D and lensbaby. The shot of the werewolf is with the lensbaby in its standard '50mm' guise and the frame of George was taken with the lensbaby and wide angle adapter which turns it into about a 15mm. Of course it is more interesting to see the results in motion as we were manipulating the lensbaby in shot but hopefully this gives you an idea of the distortion effects achievable.

And while we're at it, here's your host with some new found friends:

"Being Human" - Update 28/7/11

Alexa impressions so far? Forgive the platitudes but it really is a dream to work with especially as I'm lighting and operating. The camera is perfectly balanced, it converts from handheld to studio in seconds, changing frame rates is instant, the viewfinder picture represents the lighting accurately and most importantly of all the pictures are fantastic.

Any downsides? I've learnt my lesson that a 1.2 ND is not enough in daylight. Even combined with a pola I'm still having to shoot at T5.6-8 therefore having to load up on too much extra glass to cut the stop down further. Next time I'll make sure I get a 1.8 and 2.1 ND. These filters are quite rare at the moment hence command a premium to hire so we'll have to make do without for now.

The Viewfinder. No complaints about the picture and as far as video viewfinders go it is about the most adaptable after the D21. BUT still a pain in the proverbial to reposition on the offside of the camera. Here's what I ended up doing having become so frustrated by not being able to get it in the right place for an awkward to operate shot. Sorry Arri, but the only option was to ram it into the only available spot. Hint hint...how about a good old swingover viewfinder.  

"Being Human" Series 4 - Now in Production 20/6/11

We are currently into our second week's filming on the new series of 'Being Human', the ever popular vampire-werewolf-ghost drama. This is my fourth different camera so far this year!! It was never like this in the good old days of Super 16 but it keeps you on your toes. Let me see now...January/February-Canon 5D, March/April-Sony F35, May-Sony F3, June onwards-Arri Alexa. At last...I feel like I've slipped into the most comfortable pair of old slippers with the Alexa. It is everything an HD camera should be - simple, ergonomic, quick and pictorially brilliant. It does make you wonder why you should bother with anything else really.

We tested the camera quite thoroughly and something came up that reminded me of the Canon 5D. It has to do with effective film speeds. The Canon's native ASA for video work is 160 and it is recommended that you up the film speed in divisions of 160 hence 320, 640, 1280. Anything inbetween becomes a computerised interpolation and picture quality suffers. When testing the Alexa I ran through all the different ASAs. The native speed is 800 which can actually be very inconvenient in bright sunlight so I wanted to know how the camera performed at its lower ASAs. Well, on close inspection, it did not like anything that was not a division of 800. Skin tones leaned dramatically towards the red spectrum and sharpness dropped off. However at 400, 800 (obviously) and 1600 (interestingly) the results were remarkably smooth. Therefore our default speed is 400 whilst knowing that 800 works perfectly in very low light and, at a pinch, so does 1600. More soon.

"We'll Take Manhattan" - Write Up

High Definition Magazine follow up the making of this production with an in depth article in their current online magazine. The trials and tribulations of filming on Sony's new F3 are fully explored:
http://www.definitionmagazine.com/journal/2011/6/20/sonys-f3-shoots-david-bailey-drama-for-bbc.html

"The Road to Coronation St" Wins Bafta

More congratulations in order to the cast and crew. 'Road' wins 2011 Bafta for 'Best Single Drama'.

"We'll Take Manhattan" - Now in Production 10/05/11

"We'll Take Manhattan" is now into its fourth day of filming. Sadly we were not allowed to film on Super 16 as the format does not meet the BBC's HD requirements any longer. It is exciting though to be using Sony's brand new F3. The complication though is that because the native bitrate that the camera records to is too low to be considered full HD, even though the camera is a genuine 1920x1080P machine, we are having to use a bolt on nanoflash recorder to capture the footage.

Unfortunately this has given us no end of grief so far with unexplained crashes, random signal interruptions and general bad behaviour. Thankfully we have not lost any footage but we have lost time. My trusty focus puller Jon Howard - he who suffered the trials and tribulations of the 5D earlier this year - has been tearing his hair out trying to troubleshoot the problem. There is no definitive answer but so far we have ascertained that it shuts up shop when it overheats and it does not like having the genlock plugged in from the timecode Lockit box. No real comfort there as we're having to take the wretched thing to New York.

Now this is no reflection on the camera itself which is amazing. Here we have a proper 35mm HD camera that is the size and weight of an EX-3, is handholdable all day without a second thought, sits and operates admirably on a tripod, dolly or slider and with our bog standard set of old Zeiss superspeeds delivers fantastic, big screen worthy images. If only they could sort out the image capture. Forgive me for sounding cynical but perhaps Sony are reluctant to allow the F3 to deliver higher quality files natively as that might then steal the 9000 and F35's thunder - and customer base.

Here are some pictures of the camera, fully loaded, on the shoulder - with the nanoflash in full view. It's about the length of an Arri 416 but could be substantially shorter if there was a way of getting enough battery power out of the camera without having to use heavy duties. The eyepiece is made by Cineroid and connects to the camera via HDMI. It's very good but the downside is that it is powered by its own battery which does not last long. Trust me you'll need at least four batteries to get through a day. And a nice shot of our 'Bailey', the young Aneurin Barnard shooting his muse Karen Gillan playing Jean Shrimpton.

 

   

    

"We'll Take Manhattan"

A wonderful project to follow hot on the heels of Dr Who coincidentally starring Karen Gillan who plays Amy Pond the Doctor's helper. Utterly transformed now, in 'Manhattan' she is a youthful Jean Shrimpton who falls under the spell of David Bailey during their infamous shoot for British Vogue in New York in 1962.

The shooting format is still up in the air and we are hoping to film on Super 16 as the look of film and size of the cameras lends itself to the freewheeling, 'Nouvelle Vague' style of the 1960s. We'd like to shoot mainly on the zoom and to do this on any 35mm sized sensor HD camera would demand enormous lenses which are impossible to hand hold if you need a 10-1 zoom range. Can you picture an Angenieux 17-102 Optimo on a Sony F3? I can fit an Arri SR3 and Cooke 10-50 in my knapsack. So watch this space for equipment updates.

Dr Who 2010

Am currently in production on episode 8 of the new series of Dr Who with director Richard Senior. This is a highly complex shoot with multiple visual effects and enormous sets to contend with. The camera being used is the Sony F35 which is performing splendidly. The images are stunning and when the recorder is detached for handheld and steadicam work the camera is incredibly light and nimble. For daylight work I've eschewed the default 5500 Kelvin setting on the camera for 3200K and then used 85 and 81 filters. It's a bit old fashioned to work this way these days but it does seems to deliver much purer colour rendition and a greater separation between the cool and warm tones - always beneficial when going into the final grade. 

Then straight on to shooting episode 13, the series finale, with director Jeremy Webb who has already directed a magnificent episode this season set on a pirate ship. I have no idea what is in store. Can't wait!

CONGRATULATIONS

'The Road to Coronation St' wins Royal Television Society award for Best Single Drama 2010. "This year's winner received unanimous praise from the jury for its authentic evocation of period, its inspired casting, sharp writing and directing but most of all for the sheer enjoyment of watching it. And it tells an amazing story of our industry with wit, affection and great style." 

The director Charles Sturridge's speech to the RTS diners referenced the fact that the production was fuelled by a diet of special fried rice and fish and chips which no doubt will become BBC custom and practice from now on!

BBC HD DAY - PINEWOOD - MARCH 17th

Ian Potts, head of technology at the BBC, has asked me to give a presentation to fellow directors of photography about the use of DSLRs on the BBC4 drama "The Road to Coronation Street". This will take place at Pinewood on March 17th. It sounds like a fascinating day and there will be other DoPs and technicians discussing alternative camera and capture systems. See below for some framegrabs from the drama which aired in September 2010.

The camera was a Canon 5D Mk2 and Nikon prime lenses. The vast majority of the show was shot on two lenses - the 50mm f1.4 and 85mm f1.4. The 35mm f2 and 135mm f2 had the occasional outing. The reason for this spartan choice of lenses is that because the camera is so small, even in tight spaces, one is able to get the camera far enough back to enable the use of slightly longer lenses on wide shots. Whereas under normal circumstances, due to the bulk and length of conventional HD cameras, the use of wider angle lenses becomes more necessary. As a result the pictures benefited from the reduced depth of field characteristics shown by full frame DSLRs.

  

  
COMING UP

Wrapped Channel 4's new series of Coming Up. Shot on the Canon 5D Mk2 with Nikon AIS manual focus primes. In the past focus has not been a problem but I realised that most of the 5D work I've done has been dolly based enabling the focus puller to put down consistent marks. This job was mainly hand held which did make focusing that much more difficult - especially on the 85mm 1.4!! Our favourite lens. See some framegrabs below. All the night work was shot at 640 asa at around a stop of T2.4. And here also is the preferred hand held rig. The camera is mounted on a Movietube Kinomatik http://www.kinomatik.com which is hanging off my trusty Easirig. Notice the monitors (one for me and the other for the focus puller) taped off for 2.35. This is the format we shot. It's a fair amount of plant propping up the little camera but seemed the best way to make it all work.

The equipment came from Adrian Wolfson at RGB Photographic http://www.rgbphotographic.com Adrian is an expert and wealth of knowledge in all things DSLR. He's also one of the very few people to have a complete set of old Nikon manual focus primes.