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Cinematography Feature at Creative COW

WORTHY EFFORTS

There are a number of other high end players to watch now. While the high-speed footage from Vision Research's Phantom is still surprising any number of shooters, how many of you noticed that the Phantom 65 has a true 65mm digital imager? That's over two inches across!

Silicon Imaging has been making inroads with the SI 2K systems, especially in the 3D space, because the physical design of their cameras. The 2K mini is under four inches long, including the PL-mount!

More important, by embedding the IRIDAS Speedgrade Onset directly into their camera systems, SI has taken the lead on the workflow side of high-end production. Nondestructive "looks" can be added while shooting, with the full color management metadata able to be passed through to post.



James Cameron on the set of AVATAR.
Photo courtesy of Mark Fellman, Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation.


METADATA

The time has come for all manufacturers to embrace the capture and maintenance of metadata from the camera through delivery. As it is, except when using a transferring function for the newest codecs like AVCI, PhantomCine, ARRIRAW or R3D, the NLEs and post apps we currently work with have the nasty habit of stripping off all incoming metadata. No matter how carefully we guard metadata through production, it is too often decimated in post.

Manufacturers, start with this rule for metadata management: Do No Harm. If you don't use it, don't mess it up.


STEREOSCOPIC 3D

This is not your parents' anaglyph. No red and green lenses. No spears coming out of the screen to shock you like some amusement park attraction. With over $1billion in ticket sales for James Cameron's "Avatar" worldwide in 17 days, and with over 75% of viewers choosing to pay higher ticket prices for the 3D version, it is time for us all to see: 3D isn't going away this time.

At 162 minutes, "Avatar" also proved to me that a stereoscopic feature could run that long without giving viewers the profoundly pounding headache normally associated with extended viewing of 3D content. Digital projection has helped make it much easier, by combining cross polarization and brighter projectors with specialty screens created to enhance the visual experience and reduce fatigue. Be thankful.



The Phantom® 65 Digital Cinema Camera.


3D isn't just for movies, either. Nearly every manufacturer at the 2010 Consumer Electronics Show was showing some flavor of home 3D display. This was mirrored in announcements from Discovery, Disney, HDNet and DirecTV, all adding dedicated 3D channels to their lineups by midyear, and with ESPN planning to broadcast 85 live events in 3D in the first year. Expect 3D technology to take leaps and bounds using newly-created post and production tools specifically designed for this workflow.

Companies like Element Technica and PACE -- whose Fusion 3D system, co-designed by Vince Pace and James Cameron, was used on "Avatar" -- are at the forefront, yet there are creative places for other niche players. One huge leap in 3D came from IN- 2CORE, whose QTAKE HD was created to provide realtime stereoscopic 3D video assist.

Funny as it may seem, this has been difficult, if not impossible, until now. On "Avatar," the production crew had to use secondary Codex captures to be able to provide real-time playback of the stereo signal on set. That meant requiring both SRW-1 and Codex recorders on every camera -- a rather pricey way to handle the issue, but at the time production on Avatar began, it was the best way to handle the stereoscopic playback process normally done by the video assist person on set.


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