Cynematik • Cyndi Greening

PODCAST - Cyndi Greening & Mike Curtis
The Inside Scoop for 2005-08-29 (Part 2 of 2)

Podcast on Monday, August 29, 2005
Posted from Phoenix, Arizona

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By Cyndi Greening.
Phoenix, Arizona USA (Cinema Minima) — In Part Two of this podcast,
HD and Post Production Expert MIKE CURTIS of HD
for Indies discusses a number of topics of great interest to the independent
filmmaker. (You might want to begin with Part
One first; follow this direct link or see the entry below.) In this section, Mike talks about compression, digital projection, Macintosh developments, color correction issues with greenscreen projects, real time color correction with Final Touch HD and lots of tips for improving Indie quality …

• Post Production Color Correction Partnership using Final Touch HD
• Understanding DV/HDV Compression
  • Uncompressed image data possible is 240 MB/sec
  • HDCAM tape formats compress data to about 20 MB/sec
  • HDV camera data is compressed to 3MB/sec
• Can’t color correct what was never captured and/or saved
• Understanding compression nomenclature
  (e.g. 4:4:4 vs. 4:1:0)
  • Brightness and Color, Chrominance and Luminance, YUV, RGB
    (for each four consecutive pixels, the compression algorithm uses
    the first value to determine how many pixels to capture the brightness
    value and the next two values for how many pixels of color)
  • HCAM SR can optionally capture 4:4:4 RGB as well as 4:2:2 YUV
  • DigiBeta and DVCProHD captures 4:2:2
  • DV captures 4:1:1
  • DVD and HDV captures 4:2:0 (which isn’t really 0, it’s an every other
    interlaced line)
• Impact of compression on GreenScreen projects
• Panasonic SDX900 sometimes called the "Poor Man’s DigiBeta"
  (or any DVCPro50 camera)
• An article from the American
  Society of Cinematographers article on Capturing Colorspace
  (a reference source from Mike)
• Digital Cinema Initiative (studio) consortium agreements
  on digital projection and distribution
  • Projection Options:
  • 2K size 2048×1080; 4K size 4096×2160;
  • CIEXYZ; frame rate; 12bit per channel format
  • Security issues to avoid copying
  • as for DCI specification, the DCDM (Digital Content Distribution Master ) is nothing for an indie producer to have to worry about producing themselves for about a decade
  • Article in the NYTimes that film prints are about $1000; virtual print fees expected to be around $2K - but what are shipping costs? $100-300? The math still doesn’t seem to add up
• Digital projectors not an advantage for theater owners under current leasing
  plan
• Danger of dark screens because of technical problems and/or security issues
• Macintosh conversion to Intel Processors; possibly PCX,
  quad processors
• How he came to work in HD
• Future SXSW Panel Discussion; HD/DV Camera Shoot Out
• Direct to Disk Recording to Gain Resolution and 10Bit per
  Channel color
• AfterEffects vs. Shake vs. Real Time Color Correction with Final Touch HD
• Stay tuned! Read the HD
  for Indies FAQ for more information!

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PODCAST - Cyndi Greening & Mike Curtis
The Inside Scoop for 2005-08-28 (Part 1 of 2)

Podcast on Sunday, August 28, 2005
Posted from Phoenix, Arizona

Direct
download link
Podcast feed
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Personal Weblog
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By Cyndi Greening. Phoenix, Arizona USA (Cinema Minima) — HD and Post Producton Expert MIKE CURTIS of HD for Indies discusses a number of topics of great interest to the independent filmmaker. A frequent panelist at SXSW Film Festival in Austin, Mike offers great insight and detail on high-definition specs, film deliverables and DV/HDV cameras. This excellent podcast covers …

• Various Flavors of HD
• Various Resolutions of HD
  • 720p = 1280×720
  • 1080i or 1080p = 1920×1080
• Currently, Panasonic Varicam Camera very popular 720p
  camera
• Progressive versus Interlaced
  • (p) = Progressive; whole frame at once, more like film
  • (i) = Interlaced; every other line, traditionally for broadcast video
• Early Canon XL2 and Sony DVX100A conversions from 30i
  to 24p possible but lossy
• Also, other considerations must be in place, cannot change frame rate and
  so on

As an independent filmmaker, where to begin thinking?

• Where do you want to go with this? What do you want for a deliverable?
• Sony HDR-FX1 and Sony HVR-Z1U reasonably
  priced cameras for independent filmmakers
  • HVR-Z1U offers better controls and better inputs (XLR
    for audio) and better post-production options like true timecode.
  • Also, HVR-Z1U records at both 50i (interlaced) PAL and 60i NTSC frames
    per second allowing for PAL interlaced recording, converted to 24 progressive
    with a slight speed change
• Comparison between higher end Sony F900 ($100,000 camera)
  and inexpensive camera; sensor, lenses, recording formats, latitude and sensivity
• Discussion about Panasonic SDX900, larger sensor, 24p,
  better light latitude, uses DVCPro50
• In Mike’s opinion, the best low budget cameras:
  • Sony PD170, Sony PD150
  • Canon XL2
  • Panasonic DVX 100A
• HD for Indies Five
  Camera Shoot and Comments
  & Pictures
• Post Production Tools for DV and HDV
  • Final Cut Pro, Final Cut Express, AVID and AVID Express editing
  • AJ and Black Magic DV input cards
  • F900 camera editing challenges because of cost of converting HDCAM to
    DV
  • Challenges with FAST storage
• Right Camera, Right Editing System, Final Deliverable

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It’s my father’s birthday today so the quotes are for him. He and my grandmother (his mother) are certainly the two most influential people in my life. They were both teachers — he in the military, she in a one-room schoolhouse in rural Wisconsin. I’ve always tried to please them, to be like them.

One of my favorite stories about my father occurred while I was in junior high school. He was putting a closet in our bedroom (my sister Sandy and I shared a room). It required knocking out a wall. While he was working, he noticed a flaw in one the original construction. Whomever had built the house had mismeasured one of the beams. There was at least a half inch gap that had been filled with a lathe shim. He pointed at the cobbled repair. “Do you see that?” he said. I nodded, waiting for a some sort of negative comment.

“That’s a nice repair!” he said. “You know, Cyn, everyone makes mistakes. The question isn’t whether or not you’ll make mistakes in your work or your life. The question is, how will you fix them.”

“My grandfather once told me that there are two kinds of people: those who work and those who take the credit. He told me to try to be in the first group; there was less competition there.”
    Indira Gandhi (1917 - 1984)
    Indian Politician, granddaughter of Mahatma

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Ross (the computer genius of Machinima fame) introduced me to something fantastic yesterday. While I love digital filmmaking and complex software, I can never quite wrap my head around networking. It just makes me go crazy. I was saying that I wanted a wireless card for my iMac (but I blew the logic board so it didn’t make sense to put one in) or I’d have to get a router and run wire for my cable modem. Turns out there’s a much more economical solution!

Ross showed me a USB Wireless Adapter that simply plugs into a USB port for instant wireless capability for only $39.95! And it works with Macintosh (if I had a PC, there are USB adapters for about $10). Regardless, it’s just unbelievable to me! So, if you’ve got a laptop and you want to use the WiFi at Starbucks, grab a USB Adapter!!

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With a little less than half a year to go, it’s always interesting to check in on previous Sundance films and see how they’re doing. MARCH OF THE PENGUINS has a very respectible $41 million, HUSTLE & FLOW has earned $21 million, and KUNG FU HUSTLE has earned over $17 million domestically.

The following table is for Sundance films that are still in release on August 26, 2005. If you don’t subscribe to Box Office Mojo, you should!