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Filed under: Cameras •Production •

RED on location: Art Adams shoots a spec spot

11:36pm: We rig the RED on a P+S Technik Skater Dolly for a roving shot of the TV.

11:37pm: It’s like a Hi-hat with three precise, individually-steerable wheels.

11:47pm: Art meters the screen. We adjust the TV’s brightness to match it to scene illumination.

11:50pm: The Skater Dolly can be moved with a light touch to the camera.

11:53pm: This is fun! (photo: Simon Sommerfeld)

11:54pm: Adam crouches low to avoid being seen in reflections.  (photo: Simon Sommerfeld)

11:58pm: The footage (bittage?) is rushed to wrangling to check for problems.  (photo: Simon Sommerfeld)

11:58pm: In REDCINE at 1:1, the image shows none of the TV screen moiré that appeared on the camera’s 720p preview output.  (photo: Simon Sommerfeld)

Sunday, 00:57am: Art lines up for the final shot.

00:58am: Recording the final shot.

Once done, the drive is handed to the wranglers. Adam offloads it to the G-RAID, then hands it to Tim; Tim makes a second backup to his MBP’s disk, then both wranglers make additional copies to Art’s FW400 drives. Having two computers running in parallel let us transfer data twice as fast.

The location is struck and cleaned up, and as soon as footage is copied the drives are handed off to Art and Jono. Jono will edit; Art and Craig will color-correct the show.

Sunday, 1:56pm: four minutes shy of ten hours on location, we depart the scene, allowing Craig and Diana the privilege of sleeping undisturbed in their own house. Art and Simon are headed back to Chater (the gear is booked out later that morning, so it has to be back ASAP), but take the wrong exit from highway 24 to 580, headed into downtown Oakland instead of up to Emeryville. While I have since spoken to Art (who will be describing the shoot in more detail in his upcoming postings), Simon has not been heard from since…

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“I was a bit confused by the finger resting on the drive to avoid some sort of loss of data?”

This music box uses punched metal disks to play music; the disks rotate, and the disk’s fingers (created by punching out three sides of a hole and bending the “chad” down along its fourth side) pluck the tines of the sound-generating comb. The comb is mounted solidly to the cabinet which resonates to the vibrations, generating a rich, warm, and complex sound.

The disk is driven by a sprocket, which engages a track of holes along the outer rim of the disk. The disk can flex, and sometimes rises up on the sprocket teeth, allowing the teeth to jump the track. The resulting “loss of data” is that the disk stops rotating, and the music stops! Had you heard the incredibly lush sound coming from this box, you’d understand that it would be a serious loss indeed. As it is, I’m very sorry this shoot was MOS; I’d love to have tried capturing the music in all its glory.

Craig simply used a bit of finger pressure along the top of the track to keep the disk’s edge from rising up.  While we were shooting MOS, Art was capturing the turning of the disk, so having it proceed smoothly and without interruption was important.

Posted by Adam Wilt  on  04/30  at  07:13 PM

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“they take the wrong exit from highway 24 to 580, headed into downtown Oakland…. Simon has not been heard from since…”

HEY! I’M HANGING OUT ON THE CORNER OF 18TH AND… WELL, I’M NOT SURE WHERE EXACTLY…. BUT ARE YOU GUYS STILL COMING TO PICK ME UP???

SOMEHOW OR ANOTHER I ENDED UP WITH AN ULTRAPRIME IN MY POCKET….

SIMON.

Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)  on  04/30  at  11:23 PM

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