Daily Inspiration - Nuit Blanche

What do you get when you mix a unique story concept with unearthly special effects and a stirring soundtrack? You get this stunning dose of filmmaking inspiration…

Canon is a Battleship, Red is a Destroyer

There’s been a lot of speculation on the new camcorder that Canon is revealing today at the SF SuperMeet. Some (myself included) have been hoping wistfully for a proper camcorder body and controls wrapped around a DSLR sensor, perhaps APS-C sized, with an interchangeable lens mount for common Canon L-series lenses. Well, pictures of what appears to be this new camera model are out, and it seems that we are fools for dreaming. Read on…

iPad SchmiPad

It’s not even been a week since Apple introduced the iPad, and there have already been literally volumes penned about this new device. These opinions are generally polarized, there seems to be either love or hate, with rarely someone falling in between the two. I’ll spare you my long-winded personal opinions, this post is simply a roundup of some of the more thoughtful and insightful articles and opinions I’ve read about the iPad. Read on…

Steven Soderbergh featurette on shooting Che with RED

The upcoming Criterion release of Steven Soderbergh’s “Che” has a brilliant little featurette in the disc that talks about the Red One camera, and how digital cinema affected the production of this film. If you aren’t familiar with the story, Soderbergh basically took the Red One camera’s digital promise on faith, and was the first to use the system in a true production environment, and a very rough one at that. “Che” was shot on-location in the damp jungle and in extremely hot conditions. Essentially a trial by fire situation for a camera that was largely untested for real production.

Watch the featurette “Che and the Digital Cinema Revolution” in the video playlist embedded below the fold.

Throughout the course of these interviews, a portrait of Steven Soderbergh emerges...he is driven, unrelenting, and wants no compromises in production and post. He seems willing to cede a number of technical concerns that would cause most directors to pause, in exchange for greater control and flexibility in attaining his filmmaking vision.

FreshDV Reviews the Genus Mattebox

In the fall of 2007, FreshDV released a detailed review series of 4 popular matte box solutions for 35mm adapter and HD camcorder applications. We tested units from Chrosziel, Cinetech and Petroff. Today we’re adding another review video for the Genus Mattebox. The Genus unit is a compact, lightweight 4x4 15mm unit that is well-suited for use with HD cameras and HDSLR rigs.

Watch FreshDV’s review of the Genus mattebox here. You can also view FreshDV’s full matte box review series in this video playlist. Images of the Genus unit are embedded below.

Fuze Movie Announced

Before the days of FCP theater there was a software called SyncVue Pro. SyncVue was a remote collaboration software that piggybacked off the Skype infrastructure to allow realtime collaboration and sharing of content. I personally was a real fan of this software and was disappointed when I visited their site a while back and was informed that while the current software was still supported, the technology had been sold to another developer. Fast forward to last week when I discovered that SyncVue Pro had been purchased, and was to be re-released as Fuze Movie. So what does that all mean for end users?

FreshDV Reviews the Cinevate Durus Follow Focus

In the fall of 2007, FreshDV released an extensive review series of 5 popular follow focus units. We’ve continued to update this video review series in the following months and years. To date we’ve tested nine individual units, from ARRI, Chrosziel, Cinetech, Indifocus, Petroff, Redrock Micro, Shoot35/SGPro, and Zacuto. Today we’re adding another review video for the new Cinevate Durus follow focus. The Durus is a new arrival as of 2009, a single-arm, all-aluminum follow focus unit that is designed for 35mm adapters, HDSLR’s, and Red/Cinema applications (with the 19mm rod option).

Watch FreshDV’s review of the Cinevate Durus Follow Focus here. You can also view FreshDV’s full follow focus review series in this video playlist.

Everything is Amazing (and Nobody is Happy)

Over at CanonFilmmakers, I ran across a good post that tries to inject a little perspective in all the technical discussions on VDSLRs, Red, and really filmmaking tools in general. The author links a (hilarious) Louis CK video clip in which Louis does a little bit about everything in life being amazing, yet nobody is happy. There’s a clear correlation to filmmakers and gear discussion. We have amazing tools at a fraction of the cost of of previous generations, yet we still want more. We tend to get bogged down in the technical minutiae of each system, and sometimes can’t see the storytelling forest for the trees. Paul Zadie wrote a good post on this a couple of months ago…

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