The Rodriguez list is a collection of everything that you can use to add production value to your film in some way or another. Here is my list
Location:
- Hospital (well, a vet hospital)
- Garage
- Workshop
- Loft with huge windows
- Abandoned buildings (urban exploration FTW!)
Stuff:
- cars, but none looking especially bad ass…
- a few pelican case (military looking plastic boxes)
- plastic gun replica
- various computer for props and production uses (desktop & laptop)
- fake blood
- delicious cookies to keep the moral up
- cheap construction lighting
- almost portable diesel power generator
People with special skills/assets:
- Makeup artist specialized in special effects (yep, how convenient!)
- A few jazz/rock musicians with their instruments
- Sound specialist with his recording gear
- Heavily tattooed friends
- Friends who can look like tough guys
Looking at this list reveals some potential. I am definitely going to use the Pelican cases. They just look too good to be passed over. Of course the gun will be used, but with moderation since I don’t want to get shot at (for real) while filming in the streets.
Also, since this is going to be my first try at producing something based on a predetermined script, I want to keep everything in one location. It is just going to be simpler this way.
Finally, I want the clip to feel like it is part of something bigger. This way, if I ever want to add another chapter to the story, it will not feel out of place.
Next up: Sketching a story
Lots of speculations about the elusive firmware update these days. My conviction is that Canon already has the firmware or is working on it as we speak. Why?
Just imagine how stupid Canon would look if a lower end Nikon camera can do something that their camera can’t. So far, Canon has been able to keep the 5DMrkII above the D90 but since Stu ‘confirmed’ that Nikon is working on a firmware update, the wheels of competition have been set in motion.
Since the D90 has been released before the 5DMrkII and Nikon is not ready yet to release their firmware update, I guess enabling all these manual functions is not as easy as we think. If it was, Nikon would have released it already! This is why I think that Canon is still working on this too.
The thing I don’t understand is why Canon is not telling us that they are working on such functionality. Doing so is just counter strategic! Just imagine a potential customer who is looking for a video enable DSLR these days, he has 3 (real choices): D90 G1 or 5D. Which system do you think he will be moving too? Not Canon for sure! Knowing that the value of a new customer for a DSLR seller is so high, it is just does not make sense to not use every trick in the book to get them (à la Nikon)!
Anyways. I have a gut feeling the firmware will be released the day I decide to invest heavily in Zeiss lenses. Fate is like that!
I always wanted to make a movie. I have a lot of imagination (says my mom, girlfriend and pretty much everyone else) and I always tried to express it in some way or the other.
That is what got me into photography. I tried to stay away from video because it always seemed too involving and complicated. At the same time, the possibility of adding movement was just too good to be neglected.
Lucky for my wallet, the image quality of DV camera and the lack of DoF control pushed me back. Well, until I got my 5DMrkII! This camera revitalized my idea of shooting clips. I started to shoot animals, friends and family moments. No mater how gorgeous the clips were, they did not satisfy my creativity which revolves more around action/horror: usual male stuff.
While the hunger was there, the requirements to get anything at a quality level that I would be proud of seemed too Hollywoodesque for me.
Now enters the main topic of this post: Stu excellent book, The DV Rebel’s Guide
In fact, this book was so inspiring that it energized me to make my very own super short action packed movie! I still have a very long way to go (like watching all of Lynda videos about After Effects) but the will is there.
So from now on, this blog will feature posts related to this production with 5DMrkII related content. The idea being that if you are reading this blog for advices, you might benefit from all the mistakes I am going to do in the next few weeks/months.
Stay tuned! Next: the Rodrigez list!
This question has been asked to me so many times that I decided to make an ‘official’ list that I can refer people to the next time the question pops up in a forum.
Before going to the list, you have to know that the weather sealing of the Canon 5DMrkII is marginal. Unfortunately, it is not as good as the pro series, Nikon or Pentax. Still, it is better than nothing and if you are careful it should be enough for most situation. The first time I had to trust it, I was a bit scared but now I am not afraid to pull my camera out in light rain.
Lenses in italic are rumored to have some level of weather protection but this protection is not endorsed by Canon. So trust at your own risk!
- Canon EF 16-35mm/2.8L USM
- Canon EF 16-35mm/2.8L II USM
- Canon EF 17-40mm/4L USM
- Canon EF 24-70mm/2.8L USM
- Canon EF 24-105mm/4L IS USM
- Canon EF 70-200mm/4L IS USM
- Canon EF 70-200mm/2.8L IS USM
- Canon EF 28-300mm/3.5-5.6L IS USM
- Canon EF 50mm 1.2L USM
- Canon EF 85mm 1.2L II USM
- Canon EF 200mm f/2L IS USM
- Canon EF 300mm/2.8L IS USM
- Canon EF 400mm/2.8L IS USM
- Canon EF 400mm/4DO IS USM
- Canon EF 500mm/4L IS USM
- Canon EF 600mm/4L IS USM
- Canon EF 800mm/5.6L IS USM
I knew when I made the previous post that I had done something stupid. I double checked everything, made sure every setting was as I expected, etc… Still, there was something at the back of my head telling me that I should not made this public because it would hit me back straight in the face
Well, 15 minutes after leaving for work, I realized what the problem was: I forgot to remove the @#$%#$% polarizer! You have no idea how stupid I feel right now… To my defense, my protection and polarizing filters are from the same brand so it is hard to notice which one is on if you dont pay attention. Actually, it is not that hard, I was just stupid
Mea culpa, Canon 5D, I love you! I will never doubt you ever again!
Edit: I was stupid! Explanation here.
Last week I went shooting with my friend Christopher who is a D3 owner. It was more of a scouting trip, to find nice locations in downtown Montreal ,for future shoot than anything else. To make a long story short, we ended up doing some tests/comparison between our two cameras. Frustratingly enough, Chris managed to do a shot that I was failing to get. Wanting to get the same picture at a real man resolution (21>12), I dialed the same settings on my 5DMrkII and took the shot, expecting the same results.
Oh boy, I was in for a surprise! Glancing at my LCD I clearly saw that my image was different than his (mine was darker). It could have been and LCD brightness setting so we compared histograms. Technically, if we both shot at same ISO, shutter speed & aperture, the amount of light burning the sensor should be the same, resulting in the same image/histogram. Unfortunately, it was not the case! How comes?
I was about to post the two shots but unfortunately, it seems like I deleted mine (probably out of frustration!). Dont fear, I still have a valid example. The darkest image (left) is from my 5D @f4,5 for 1/60 and the other (right) is from the D3 @f4,5 for 1/100, both at ISO800, @70mm and were taken minutes apart. Even with 2/3 more light (1/60 vs 1/100) the 5D picture is still much darker, and at full resolution much noisier so imagine how the 1/100sec one was!
Anyone has an explanation?
If any of you are following Scott Bourne you are probably aware of his love affair with the Drobos. He has so many of these that I think he is secretly aiming to be in the Guinness book of record for the person with the most Drobos. Scott is not afraid to share the love too! Follow him on Twitter and you will see that he is giving away about 3 of these units per week!
On my part, I have a love-hate relationship with this product. While I strongly believe that it is very good at what it does, I also see its biggest flaws.
The first of these being its price and the second the lack of SATA interface. I also did not like the fact that contrary to what Data Robotics is saying, your data could never be fully safe with a Drobo. In case on drive fail, you are always exposed to total lost until the self healing procedure is completed. Same as RAID-5 you gonna say? Not really, a few people have reported huge rebuild time (over 10 hours) compared to minutes for a RAID-5.
It seems like Data Robotics is listening and yesterday they announced the DroboPro: a 8 drive enclosure with better connectivity and data redundancy. You can go read the announcement and visit the product page.
I would love to say how cool this new product is, if it wasn’t of its enterprise level price tag (1300$) and the lack of SATA port. I doubt the price will stop people from buying it since it is targeted at small (and not so small) businesses, and they have introduced a new Ethernet port using the iscsi protocol for really fast transfers.
My favorite feature of this beast is the new RAID-6 (but better) system. Now, if a drive fails, you don’t even have to rush to the store to get a new one since the system can tolerate a two drives failure without flinching. This drastically reduces the exposure to risk when the drive is doing its self healing which has always been my biggest concern with the original Drobo.
So, will I get one? I don’t think so. It takes too much space on my desk and too much money out of my bank account. But if you really need the storage and safety, I think it’s a great product!
I am currently developing a low cost automated backup strategy for my system (I have 2 RAID-0 arrays!) that I will share once it is perfected.
