2013 Sundance Institute Directors Lab: June 1, 2013 – June 11, 2013

Production (Camera) Blog 4
By: Jason Ball  –  Camera Assistant

After our first week of shooting at the Sundance Institute Directors Lab, we are extremely excited about the range of versatility the Sony F55 has brought to our productions.  Our quick turn around of shoot, edit and often same-day projection workflow has only been streamlined and made possible with the High Definition ready for edit images offered by F55.  With no time for color correction, most of our media represents the cinematographers personal settings that help establish the look and mood of every scene. 

The F55 has a native ISO rating of 1250 in the S-Log2 mode, giving it an amazing range in low light situations. We worked on a candlelight scene with two candles and a bare light bulb dimmed to 10%.  We turned the ISO up to 4000 and 5600 ISO.  When projected the image was very stable and clean.  When we set the ISO to 10,000, the image contained very little grain at all.  The grain that was visible looked very organic, even in the blacks.  When we were not shooting in Extended Mode, we were able to apply matrix settings on top of the S-Log2 gamma. We were able to shoot at a manageable f-stop when exposing low light scenes, instead of having to shoot completely wide open.  While wide open apertures offer a shallow depth of field, it was nice to not have to shoot wide open and allowed us more choices for exposure. When projected we didn’t notice any noise in the blacks until we went above 4000 ISO.

 

Post – Production (Editing) Blog 5
By: Liz Lewis  – Assistant Editor

Here at the Sundance Institute Directors Lab time is always a factor. Part of the challenge for our Fellows (Directors) is to accomplish their shooting and editing within specific time constraints. With the Sony equipment that we have this year we are able to support them in this.

The assistant editors are the connection between the set and the edit room. We must quickly move the footage from the camera into the Avid Media Composers. The Sony SxS Cards allow for a quick import, taking only minutes. Directors and editors can even view dailies off the SxS Card readers provided by Sony. The USB 3.0 connection on these readers allows for realtime viewing of non-transcoded footage. Another great feature is that we can move these readers from station to station very easily, allowing for the most flexibility possible.

Sony’s codecs in the F55 camera make for a simple post-production process. With the Sony supplied AMA plug-in installed in our Avid Media Composers we never have to transcode; we can stay simply AMA linked to the original footage. The Fellows and directors only view the highest quality image because of this process.

DP Jay Keitel and AC Rebecca Hodges prepare to shoot

(L to R) Script Supervisor Wendy Delouche, Directing Fellow Meredith Danluck, DP Nick Bentgen, and AC Jason Ball on the set of State Like Sleep

DP Andrew Reed on the set of K’naan’s Maanokoobiyo

Editor Joseph Krings begins dailies import process via SXS card

 

Photo Credit: Ryan Johnson