Undercity

January 7, 2011 in Filmmaking with 0 Comments

Undercity

Found this video on Inspiration: Undercity (ChurchCreate). It truly is inspirational – an urban adventure with some fun. Its a no excuses exercise – no “I can’t do” or “I don’t have the right equipment” or “I am not allowed”.
They shot this with a Canon 5D MarkII withCanon 24 f/1.4 (version 1) with the Zacuto rapid fire, Zoom H4N and a Sennheiser g2 wireless lav. Ok the Zacuto rapid fire is a bit expensive and a Canon 550D/T2i could have been used.
Gritty, adventurous and fun filmmaking. See more after the jump.
Continue Reading…

4K Firmware Shirt is not a Hoax

January 6, 2011 in Filmmaking, social media with 2 Comments

Classic.
I might just get me one. Check it out here.
Maybe this was the guy’s plan all along – to make money from it all.
4k Firmware shirt

Film Festivals 2011

January 6, 2011 in Filmmaking with 3 Comments

Hong Kong Film Festival replica

  1. Sundance

    2. When: January 20th – 30th, 2011
    Where: Park City, Utah, USA

  2. Osaka Asian Film Festival

    3. When: March 5th – 13th th2011
    Where: Osaka, Japan

  3. South by SouthWest

    4. When: March 11th – 20th 2011
    Where: Austin, Texas, USA

  4. Cape Winelands Film Festival

    5. When: March 16th – 26th 2011
    Where: Stellenbosch, South Africa

  5. The Hong Kong International Film Festival

    6. When: March 20th – April 5th
    Where: Hong Kong

  6. The European Independent Film Festival

    7. When: April 1st – 3rd
    Where: Paris, France

  7. London Independent Film Festival

    8. When: April 14th – 25th
    Where: London, England

  8. Malibu Film Festival

    9. When: April 29th – May 1st
    Where: Malibu, California, USA

  9. Swansea Bay Film Festival

    10. When: May 7th – 15th
    Where: Swansea, Neath Port Talbot, Wales

  10. Festival de Cannes

    11. When: May 11th – 22th
    Where: Cannes, France

  11. Pittsburgh Horror Film Festival

    12. When: June 3rd – 5th
    Where: Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA

  12. Rainier Independent Film Festival

    13. When: June 3rd - 5th
    Where:Ashford, Washington, USA

  13. The Brooklyn Film Festival

    14. When: June 3rd – 12th
    Where: Brooklyn, New York, USA

  14. Los Angeles Film Festival

    15. When: June 16th – 26th
    Where: Los Angeles, California, USA

  15. Omaha Film Festival

    16. When: July 2nd – 6th
    Where: Omaha, Nebraska, USA

  16. Zanzibar International Film Festival

    17. When: 2nd – 10th
    Where: Zanzibar, Tanzania

  17. Durban International Film Festival

    18. When: July 21st – 31st
    Where: Durban, South Africa

  18. Toronto International Film Festival

    19. When: September
    Where: Toronto, Canada

  19. International Documentary Film Festival

    20. When: November 16th – 27th
    Where: Amsterdam, Netherlands

  20. And a whole bunch more on IMDB.

[Photo from: coolmeow]

More Final Cut Studio Rumours

January 4, 2011 in Filmmaking with 7 Comments

fcs4

ok, now exactly what is going to blow us away in the next release?
To be honest, I did not even upgrade from FCS2 to FCS3 – it was just not viable for me and the money was diverted towards my move to HDSLR.
Will the next Final Cut Studio be a viable, sensible, must do upgrade.
It better, because Adobe Premier Pro is looking like the bees knees with every new release. The next Premier Pro is going to be hard to ignore. So the next Final Cut Studio better be aiming for a better mark than that.

What is in store for the next Final Cut Studio?
Continue Reading…

4K Firmware for the Canon T2i/Canon 550D is a Hoax

January 2, 2011 in Filmmaking with 0 Comments

Sadness.
It’s all a hoax
Should have known, but the idea of it was great.
Anyway I think that it was an irrisponsible hoax.
Fortunately there is Magic Lantern, rock on ML.

Win a Canon 5D MarkII

January 2, 2011 in Filmmaking, social media with 6 Comments

eos digital

Scott Bourne has another competition: New Camera Contest 5D MK II Happy New Year. And not only that, but almost a dozen planned for 2011.
For this one – to win a Canon 5DMarkII with 4GB Flash Memory Card and designer photo album from Album Epoca – all you got to do is follow Scott Bourne and Album Epoca US on Twitter, then tweet the following as is (just once) :

Enter to win a Canon 5D Mk II & a $500 designer photo album from @AlbumEpocaUS & Scott Bourne. Pls RT. Info at: http://bit.ly/hfjpxk

Here are the Official Rules of the Contest.

All the best.

Top 10 Posts of 2010

January 1, 2011 in Filmmaking, social media with 0 Comments

Was a great year in terms of blogging and making connections.
Thanks to everyone who reads SynapticLight and offers up their opinion and thoughts – you are all great.
Big kudos to OurChurch for hosting me – I really appreciate it.

So here is the list of the top 10 posts of 2010. I am pretty sure that 2011 will be a year of much more HDSLR as I have just gotten a Canon 550D :)

  1. The Ultimate Video Editing Interface: iPad Extreme
  2. Athlone Cooling Towers Demolition
  3. 5 Film Making apps for the iPad
  4. Video Editing on the iPad: Is it Possible
  5. iPad Video Editor
  6. 5 Weekly Filmmaking Links
  7. Zacuto Great Camera Shootout: HD-DSLR vs 35mm
  8. How many plugins do you use?
  9. Courageous uses RED One
  10. RED EPIC: Reservations have begun

My First Lessons in DSLR Video

December 31, 2010 in Filmmaking with 3 Comments

Canon 550D

I have my Canon 550D and I am over the dish, the spoon, the cow and the moon.

The stills capabilities of this camera have blown me away to the point where I have almost forgotten about the video component. Well, not quite forgotten :)

In this week that I have had my HDSLR, there have been a few questions that needed to be answered in order for the camera to be best used in taking good video. These are basically the first lessons I have learned.

4 Lessons

1. How to work with Focus

Auto focus should be a term associated with profanity – nothing worse that watching a video pumping in and out of focus as objects move in and out of the foreground. However, how does one focus correctly with HDSLRs when the D.O.F. can be very narrow. A suitable Follow Focus rig may be the answer, preferably with a dedicated focus puller, but hey, not many have the budget for that, me included. So I would follow a 2 step process.

1.1 Auto Focus

This first step just gets the focus as near as possible to the object, could be perfect first time – yet probably not.

    • Set the focus switch on the lens to AF (Auto Focus)
    • Focus using your method of choice.

Canon lens - AF/MF

Here is how I focus quickly with AF:

Continue Reading…

4K Firmware for the Canon T2i/Canon 550D

December 30, 2010 in Filmmaking with 2 Comments

Whaoooooh
This is insane.
I just go a Canon 550D and have been wondering about Magic Lantern.
And now this.
It is free, but what is the catch? What high speed SD card is required that is still in development.
Let us see what happens.

[ Some updates : Check out 4k hack firmware for Canon Rebel T2i/550D coming on Jan 1? for some great follow up infomation ]

Sketchpad – a FilmMaker’s Storyboard

December 29, 2010 in Filmmaking with 1 Comment

sketchpad

Sketchpad is a storyboard for the iPad. It’s for an artist and filmmakers who want a convenient, visual way to plan out their ideas for their next film. Its feels, functions and design just like the concept of storyboarding that gives you an experience unlike anything you’ve ever experienced.

This looks to be a great tool for filmmakers, especially independant filmakers.
Storyboarding has always been a stumbling block for me, I am not a good sketcher and once I have made a mistake it is not easy to fix (mess at the best of times). I could use a normal PC/Mac app but that is not always practical.

Enter Sketchpad.

Here’s an app that offers great tools and what looks to be a great interface.

Continue Reading…

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