Shooting Bufori cars on the Canon 7D
Posted by Matthew Allard in Canon Eos7D, DSLR video news on March 7, 2010
I usually shoot news and long feature pieces, but sometimes I get the chance to shoot something different. Bufori is a custom car company that hand makes luxury saloons and sports cars. They unveiled their brand new Bufori “Geneva” at the 80th Geneva International Motor Show and approached me about making a short film to showcase it, to be shown on various screens at the show. I decided to shoot this on my Canon 7D and also used three GoPro Hero Cams. In the old days I would have had to take a big broadcast camera and all the accessories to shoot something like this. Now I can take a much smaller DSLR camera, a few lenses and accomplish what you could only dream about a few years ago.
Bufori Geneva from Matthew Allard on Vimeo.
I shot both stills and a video for the company that were played on screens at the motor show. I decided to shoot the video on my Canon 7D using the following lenses – Canon 16-35mm f2.8, Canon 50mm f1.2 and a Tokina 11-16mm f2.8. For the on-board driving shots I utilized the GoPro HD Hero cams mounted on various parts of the car. I do have mounts and arms to put a full size DSLR on a car but decided against it (better to risk a $300 camera as opposed to a $1700 one!).
A GoPro HD ready to go
Inside the factory I shot various parts being manufactured and tried to concentrate on the detail of having almost every component made by hand. I cannot stress enough the importance of using good, fast glass when you shoot. Don’t let anyone tell you that it doesn’t matter as much which lenses you use when you’re shooting video, because it does. Would you put cheap tires on a Ferrari? In most cases you get what you pay for. My Canon 50mm f1.2 cost more than my camera but is worth every cent – the difference between the F1.2 and F1.4 is huge. My advice is to buy the most expensive lenses you can afford on your budget.
Dolly and 7D rig in action
For the shots of the car inside the factory I also utilized a broadcast jib and dolly. The Genus adapter plate is a fantastic piece of kit; it enables me to put my 7D straight onto my broadcast tripod or jib so you get rock-solid movement. I also used two Litepanels 1×1 LED lights to illuminate the car. I actually needed more light than I had but time constraints and the fact that I was doing this alone limited my options. The 7D was an absolute joy to use. It enabled me to work in low light with a small depth of field that allowed me to show incredible detail. I would not have been able to use a broadcast camera when shooting in the factory unless I used excessive light, something I try to stay away from.
7D ringlight rig
For the outside shots of the car I found a small road that had lots of twists and turns and plenty of character. By setting up in a variety of spots I was able to get plenty of different angles of the car without having to move around a lot. This was the first shoot that I used the Zacuto Z-Finder on. It is brilliant, but having said that I’m still waiting for someone to come out with an adjustable viewfinder so you can use it in whatever position you like. Coming from a broadcast background, I’m used to using cameras with viewfinders that move up and down so you can see what you’re doing regardless of where you put the camera. Someone needs to come up with one or take a leaf out of Sony’s Alpha range of DSLRs that have a moveable LCD screen on the back (are you listening Canon?). I spent a lot of time lying on the ground in the middle of the road to get some of the angles O wanted.
No matter how much I use the 7D, I’m continually blown away by the quality of the images. The DSLR has revolutionized the way I work. While it is not suitable for everything, it gives me a very useful addition to my arsenal of different cameras that I use on a daily basis.
Apart from the Hero cam vision all material is ungraded and shot on the standard camera settings. The entire video was shot in less than one day and I’d like to say thank you to Lee Ali, Mark Phillips and Felix Haller for all their help.
Win a 24-105mm f4L IS coffee cup
Posted by Dan Chung in DSLR video news on March 5, 2010
***Breaking news – Seeing as there has been a phenomenal response to this competition I went back to the supplier I got the 24-105mm cup from and managed to get some more. Obviously there were going to be a lot of disappointed people so I hope this will go some way to making up for it. The competition will continue and I will add an extra special prize for the winner, but for those who can’t wait to own a cup like this head over to Ebay now http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=330411657570#ht_500wt_1182 Apologies for the high shipping costs but they really are that bad from China. If anyone wants to club together for a shipment it should work out cheaper***
Now everybody has seen the Canon 70-200 f4L coffee cup over on pdnpulse given to sports photographers at the Winter games, it has caused so much of a stir that there is even a facebook group here
I have to say that I have one even better. This one is so authentic that when I first saw it I thought it was the real thing!
So I present to you the 24-105mm f4L IS coffee cup!
The 24-105 cup
Better still as a sign of my generosity I’m going to give one away to a lucky reader picked at random. All you have to do is register as a user on dslrnewsshooter with your real name and email, then post a comment below. At the end of March one lucky reader’s name will be picked out of a hat and I’ll be sending that cup out to them.
Comes complete with box
The 24-105mm f4L IS coffee cup in use
Be careful which one you fill with coffee
Canon officially announces 5DmkII firmware for 24 and 25p with manual audio control
Posted by Dan Chung in Canon Eos5DmkII, DSLR video news on March 1, 2010
Possibly the DSLR world’s worst kept secret was officially unveiled today. It gives the 5DmkII video mode 24fps (actual 23.976fps) and 25fps which filmmakers and newsgatherers alike have been calling for, it also changes the 30fps option to the NTSC video standard of 29.97fps. There is also a new feature of an onscreen histogram option to help gauge exposure.
A Canon 5DmkII with Rode Videomic on the Canon stand at a Chinese trade show
The firmware also gives users the option to manually fix the audio level using an onscreen level meter, a complete godsend for News shooters who have been wrestling with Auto Gain Control, external audio recorders, hacking the camera with Tramm Hudson’s Magic Lantern firmware, or using accessories like the Beachtek DXA5D or Juicedlink DN101/CX231 combo to get useable results. Now this doesn’t mean that you’ll be able to plug just any mic into the 5DmkII, it will still need to be a powered model such as the Rode Videomic or Sennheiser MKE400. Additionally the mic gain circuit in the camera is known not to be of the best quality, so for really good results an external pre-amp or audio mixer is still recommended. Adjusting the levels on screen will not be easy on the fly either, so for run and gun I intend to fix the 5DmkII audio level at minimum and then use the output of a mixer or audio recorder to provide the audio gain – with the added bonus of being able to adjust the levels with proper control knobs. The mixer/audio recorder method will also allow you to monitor what sound is being sent to the camera as even with the new firmware there is still no way to plug headphones into the 5DmkII for live monitoring. For the paranoid like myself I will also continue to record separate audio to a recorder and sync with Singular software’s Pluraleyes for important assignments and interviews so I can be really sure I have a good quality audio track.
Now the other big question is whether Canon will add this new audio functionality to its flagship news camera the 1DmkIV or indeed the highly popular 7D. There will surely be an outcry from owners of these cameras if no announcement is forthcoming.
Full details from Canon here
*Added – link to Canon sample video showing new firmware here
News photographer Rii Schroer tries her hand at film making and learns some lessons
Posted by Rii Schroer in Canon Eos5DmkII, DSLR video news on March 1, 2010
A snapper’s thoughts on how a stint in short-film shooting can provide valuable experience for creating cinematic documentary pieces
I am a newspaper photographer for The Daily/Sunday Telegraph and The Times (UK) and took my first steps into DSLR-video shooting when the Canon 5DmkII came out. I started with a “shut up and shoot” approach and an interest in short pieces I felt were better captured with video than pictures only, such as 16 Teeth, capturing Cumbria’s last traditional rakemakers:
16 TEETH – Cumbria’s last traditional rakemakers from Rii Schroer on Vimeo.
However, a recent stint in short-film making (taking part in the Canon/Vimeo contest: Beyond the Still by Vincent Laforet) was a real eye-opener into the wide possibilities of cinematic DSLR- video shooting. I found some of these experiences of great inspiration and good training for documentary/feature/news reporting.
In short-film making every sequence needs as much planning as possible, and the intensity of the visual side produces the discipline of looking at the shoot in-depth from as many different views as possible. It is about getting to grips with how to achieve certain shots technically and looking into what equipment can be useful in creating those shots.
HEARTBEAT – 5D Mark II from Rii Schroer on Vimeo.
Doing a cinematic short, you try to figure out how emotion, a sense of place, action, or the revealing of layers can be solved technically. What visual look and feel do you want to give your piece to transmit your message? How can this look be created? It is a good playground for trying out various techniques and equipment, such as pulling focus, car suction mounts and Glidetracks. You are also considering when to use static shots or steady/Glidecam/handheld rig images, what ratio of wide, middle, tight shots to go for, or whether a panoramic shot, timelapse or slow motion sequence might add to the story.
Experimenting with creating a short film was a fun experience, although a quite time consuming one. I have been told by a filmmaker, add 2 or 3 times the time you expect it to take, which was about right in this instance.
Day 2: Lucy running her heals off...took us a while to get the stop in the middle of the tree group right, but got there in the end, exactly when the sun came out. Nice!
Day 2: Yorkshire tea break - a finger warm up desperately needed!
Our piece was created in two-and-a-half weeks from the idea, through scriptwriting and three days of shooting, to editing – alongside our day jobs. Locations had to be scouted; permission for shooting in the parks obtained; schedules for team, composer, and actors drawn up (this was a no budget production); equipment, insurance and props organized; whilst praying for the weather to stay stable (no rain or snowstorms!)
We wanted to try out as much equipment as we could get our hands on to get as much experience as possible. Lighting for the moving image proved to be challenging; for example, in the moving car scene, getting rid of reflections from our modelling light flash units. LCD-lighting panels, which we gelled with CTOs, were great to use for the night scenes. As we did not go for much dialogue, we put sound issues to one side during the shoot. In retrospect it proved to be a mistake, costing valuable hours in the editing suite.
Not only did we acquire valuable experience during the shoot, we also learnt a lot in retrospect, analysing what we could have done differently and more coherently – especially regarding the running scenes (shorter edit, more camera movement). Setting a deadline for your project feels important though.
I found that, even if some equipment will not always be of use for documentary film-making (eg if you have to keep it small-scale for a “fly on the wall” approach), gaining knowledge about what works well in certain situations and how to use it is immensely helpful. No matter what field one is in, it is beautiful to create visually attractive pieces, and this is the fun part of using your photographic knowledge.
Day 3: Lantern Theatre, Sheffield was absolutely lovely - what a gem! Wished we could have used it more.
The five amazing entries that made it to the final of the Beyond the Still competition were produced by professional production/videographer teams not by the targeted sector of “photographers becoming filmmakers.” This is an interesting trend that was confirmed at the recent Broadcast Video Expo in London; it seems that it is the professional filmmakers, who are going crazy about DSLR shooting. But watching and creating cinematic shorts can be exciting for the documentary shooter and useful for creating strong sequences and story telling in the documentary field of work. And the amazing technical possibilities offered by HD DSLR cameras leave no excuse not to get your hands on one and use your knowledge and expertise, already acquired through photographic reportage/news work, to create those stories you want to tell.
Rii Schroer
www.riischroer.de
http://www.vimeo.com/user1008646
Haiti – how MSNBC’s David Friedman covered the quake on the 5DMkII
Posted by David Friedman in Canon Eos5DmkII, DSLR video news, Journalism on February 26, 2010
By David Friedman, photojournalist & multimedia producer, msnbc.com
“The earthquake happened. Now we cannot live here. We can’t. It’s unsecure,” Ramon Crespo told the dozen Haitian orphans gathered under a tarp for a somber meeting. It was six days after the earthquake and the orphans and staff had spent those days living in a makeshift camp – in limbo – in the garden. The meeting was a pivotal moment in the tale of the orphans and the church group caring for them. It was a moment I knew I needed to shoot as video, edit, transmit and get published on our site as quickly as possible that morning.
Reporter Bill Dedman and I were embedded with members of a church group from Allentown, Penn. They headed to Port-au-Prince the day after the quake to take care of the children at the Rescue Children orphanage, which their church ran. We were staying with them and publishing daily updates on their story in blog form on news website msnbc.com.
The wrap-up piece we produced after the trip, Bill Dedman narrates.
While Bill was covering the written word, my task was to shoot and transmit both stills and video from the field daily and gather material for a comprehensive piece afterward. For the first time in my career as a multimedia producer at msnbc.com I was doing both with the same camera, a Canon 5D MkII – that’s a big deal. Trying to shoot both well on a single, developing story is always complicated, so the ability to do both with a single camera is nothing short of revolutionary.
The point in the weeklong trip when I was fully convinced of the DSLR revolution was the morning of that meeting. Mission leader Crespo told the orphans they would leave their home in two days. The church group had grown increasingly concerned for the children’s safety as the days progressed and relief had yet to reach the surrounding neighborhood. As soon as the meeting was over, I began ingesting, transcoding and editing my footage, and Bill began writing and filing a new text piece. In Avid I hurriedly threw together a natsound piece from the meeting with Crespo explaining the move to the kids, some cover shots from packing belongings, and the prayer that closed the meeting. After some minutes compressing the piece in Sorenson Squeeze down to our site video publish specs, I fired up the BGAN satellite transmitter to begin transferring the video.
Crespo tells the orphans they’re moving. Shot, edited, transmitted and published that morning.
Just after I began the BGAN upload, there was some commotion at the gate. I grabbed my camera, now somewhat stripped down into “stills” mode and went to look. A large crowd from the neighborhood had gathered to beg for food, water and electricity – supplies the orphanage couldn’t spare. I fired off a few frames while it lasted and then moved to another scene where a smaller group of woman begged for water across a barbed-wire barrier. I fired off a few more frames there before the crowd dispersed. It was a tense couple of minutes.
Women from the neighborhood around Rescue Children orphanage beg for water. (David Friedman / msnbc.com
Bill went to send an update to the story he’d already filed, and I sat back down to quickly send a couple of the stills I’d just shot. My earlier video upload was done before I’d finished ingesting my new stills and the BGAN was still connected. I captioned, toned and sent one still from each crowd scene. While those were still transmitting, I heard across the garden that the church leaders had decided to move the kids that afternoon. They were packing up and evacuating their compound and Bill and I had to pack up and go with them. The website was leading with our coverage and we were loading into vehicles to follow the kids’ journey.
In a couple of hours a lot had transpired and I got good video and stills from a single camera. Could I have done the same work with separate video and still cameras? Of course. But the transition from one camera to the other would likely have taken me longer and I might have missed shots. Add to that the need to travel light and the Canon video DSLR revolutionizes my work. Oh yeah, the video quality is beautiful too!
Now some words about our gear and workflow. We’re an Avid shop and edit in the field on laptops running Avid. PluralEyes isn’t an option for us and we can’t afford to spend time manually syncing audio to every shot. But we’re also not willing to live with Canon AGC running roughshod over our sound. So our solution is to capture audio in the camera, with a JuicedLink box, external microphone(s) and running Magic Lantern firmware to get control over levels (plus other video niceties).
Was everything perfect with my kit in Haiti? Hardly. In full “video” mode, with a Sennheiser ME-66 shotgun mounted in the camera’s hotshoe and a Zacuto Z-Finder on the LCD, I couldn’t even get my eye to the stills viewfinder. If I wanted to quickly grab a still I couldn’t. So one thing I’ll change is adding a small Sennheiser MKE-400 mic to the kit for those times when I want to dynamically switch back and forth between stills and video. I’ll give up a bit of sound quality vs. the bigger shotgun, but I can still run it through the JuicedLink and Magic Lantern (Sennheiser makes a nifty XLR adapter for it), get my eye to the stills viewfinder and get a smaller, lighter rig. Also, our 5D MkII kits were so new when the earthquake struck I didn’t have an ND filter with me – that would have been a huge help shooting video outside down there. I have one now.
All of our blog posts are here (in reverse chronological order):
http://worldblog.msnbc.msn.com/archive/category/1402.aspx
A slideshow of stills (also reverse chronological):
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/34850400/from/ET/?beginSlide=1
A playlist of the video pieces I filed while down there:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/35100898#35100898
The Canon 550D / T2i – first video and initial thoughts
Posted by Dan Chung in Canon 550D / T2i, DSLR video news on February 25, 2010
Canon 550D / T2i production video – Zhongguancun gadget city from Dan Chung on Vimeo.
Today I bought some two Canon 550D HDDSLR’s which I intend to use as a general carry around cameras and for situations where I don’t want to risk damaging a 5DmkII or 7D. It retails for around £700 in the UK and so I wasn’t expecting too much on the video front. As it turns out this little camera is a really competent performer and the footage I’ve shot so far looks pretty much the same as my 7D to my eye. As with previous cameras I thought the best way to test it would be to shoot a short film. This time I shot in Zhongguancun, Beijing’s electronics district where you can find pretty much every gadget know to man. The results speak for themselves. The footage you see here is shot at 1080p/25 frames a second and not graded with only minor adjustments of gamma, sharpening and a little smoothcam in Final Cut Pro. The sharpness, contrast and saturation were reduced in the camera by using Picture Style as I do with my other Canons. The H.264 files from the camera were converted to Apple Prores LT before editing in Final Cut Pro. I shot mainly on a Canon 100mm f2.8 macro lens, a Canon 35mm f1.4L lens and the Tokina 11-16mm f2.8 lens. To get the gliding effect I used a small slider similar to a Glidetrack but sadly it was a little damaged meaning I couldn’t get it as smooth as I wanted, this may account for a slight stuttering in the image and is not a fault of the camera. The opening shots are at 1600asa and the interiors are mainly 400 and 800asa.
The Canon 550D/T2i with Zacuto Z-finder fitted
I’ve had the Canon 550D/T2i for precisely twelve hours at time of writing so these are my initial findings. It features almost identical video specification to it’s more expensive sibling, the 7D. It has 1080p at 24/25/30 fps as well as 720p 50 and 60 fps. It has a connection for an external mic via minijack but has no manual control over the input volume, same as the 7D. Instead of using compact flash cards it uses the smaller SDHC or the newer SDXC cards, I used a 16gb class 6 SDHC card with no problems for an hour today.
The camera is small but feels robust considering its size but I do find the controls a little fiddly compared to a 5DmkII or 7D. The camera does away with many of the more advanced controls of the 5DmkII and 7D for stills which mean the top plate and rear are relatively uncluttered. As with the 7D there is a dedicated video trigger button but unlike the 7D there is no rear control dial for aperture, instead you have to press a button on the back plate and then rotate the same dial you use to set shutter speed. Most of the other controls are accessed by using the menus on the rear LCD and there is a simple mode dial on the top plate that is used to select the video mode. Sadly I’ve found this dial can easily be knocked out of your chosen mode, in a similar way to the dial on the 5DmkII – I do wish Canon would fix this.
The 550D top plate
The large rear LCD is very nice indeed and has 1.04 million pixels compared to 920K on the 7D. When mated with the Zacuto Z-finder the image was easy to see and very clear, I’d go as far as to say its up there with the best I’ve seen. There is a new battery the LP-E8, sadly not compatible with the earlier cameras, which gave me at least an hour actual shooting today – pretty good going. Another key difference is the lack of the ability to dial in a precise Kelvin value for white balance, instead you have to choose one of the presets like daylight, shady, tungsten etc… or alternatively balance off a white card. The camera has a smaller range of ISO choices compared to the more expensive siblings, it has 100, 200, 400, 800 ASA etc… and misses the inbetween third stop values like 160 and 320 ASA. On the plus side it has Picture styles the same as the 7D, the ability to set Highlight tone priority in video to combat clipped highlights, and an IR trigger the same as the 7D and 5DmkII.
Rear view of the 550D showing the excellent new LCD screen
In terms of video image quality I think it is too early to make definitive judgements about quality, moire, aliasing and rolling shutter issues but I will do more testing later.
The Canon DSLR family compared - 550D, 7D, 5Dmk II and 1Dmk IV
In conclusion I think this camera is cheap enough that there is now little reason for pros who have not yet bought a HD-DSLR to not put their toes in the water and see if they like shooting video. This camera is excellent value and puts great video in the reach of many.
How to add a little Mojo to your video
Posted by Dan Chung in Video editing on February 24, 2010
Intro To Magic Bullet Mojo from Red Giant Software on Vimeo.
Here’s a great tutorial by Stu Maschwitz about Magic Bullet’s easy to use Mojo colour treatment software which can give your video more “Hollywood” look. I’ve been using Mojo’s sister software Magic Bullet Looks for a while now and can recommend the company. While I would personally draw the line at using this on live hard news videos, I think for some feature work it is acceptable and can really enhance the feel of a piece. Indeed, quite extreme colour grading is seen in television documentary all the time.
If you are going to use colour grading software on your DSLR please remember to dial back the in camera saturation, sharpness and contrast settings using Picture Profiles to get the best results, I would recommend you do this all the time but I know a lot of news shooters don’t as they worry more about speed. Here’s another good tutorial by a guy called Luka on the subject.
How to increase the Canon 7D dynamic range (Tutorial) from Luka on Vimeo.
What we can learn from Hollywood’s Shane Hurlbut
Posted by Dan Chung in DSLR video news on February 24, 2010
Recently I’ve taken to following the blog of Hollywood director of photography Shane Hurlbut, best known for his work on Terminator Salvation and the subsiquent webisodes shot on the Canon 5DmkII. He has become one of the biggest evangelists for DSLRs in Hollywood and his thoughts generally re-enforce my views on a lot of technical stuff – but he takes it to a whole other level. Shane is shooting feature films and commercial stuff but that doesn’t mean that we in the news and documentary community can’t learn a lot from what he has to say. His recent work with the US Navy is very documentary like and has the feel I would like to try to bring to News video.
In particular he has written some great posts on camera stabilization and working onboard a nuclear sub On stabilization I think he hits the nail on the head when he says “The secret is weight and where it is placed. This camera can be anything you want it to be.”
The Hurlblog - great place to learn some top tips
Also really interesting I found was his post entitiled the “Power of focus” which explains why super wide apertures and extreme shallow depth of focus are not always desireable and why Shane chooses to shoot at around f5.6 on a 5DmkII when there is any action. He also explains how the different sensor sizes mean that you have to shoot at f2.8 on a 7D to get the same focus feel as f5.6 on a 5DmkII. The cinematic feel of Shane’s work is a testament to the application of his theory about apertures.
Shane also recommends the use of a focus puller (person who focusses for you) but clearly this isn’t going to happen in most news environments, but given that even using a dedicated person Shane is still choosing to shoot f5.6 it follows that as a solo shooter your chances of getting accurate focus will be greatly increased by stopping down to f5.6 or greater.
I still value a fast lens, but mainly because of their light gathering ability and for stills, not the super shallow depth of focus in video. I might need to shoot f1.4 in a dark spot but would prefer to shoot f5.6 if poss. Sometimes on sit down interviews I find the interviewee can often times move too much forward and back and make even f5.6 seem too shallow to keep them acceptably sharp the whole time.
In another really good post Shane details the differences between lens brands when they are used for video. He favours other lenses such as Zeiss, Leica or older Nikon to the Canon lenses and explains his reasons why.
My collection of Zeiss ZE lenses
I’ve been buying Zeiss glass for a while now, originally the Contax fit lenses adapted to Canon and now the newer ZE lenses and can testify to how good them image they produce looks. I’ve also started buying old Leica R lenses too based on Shane’s findings.
I’d like to thank Shane for doing all this great research and testing and then sharing it with the rest of us. Please head over to his blog now and read up.
Learn Canon 5D mkII Cinematography with Philp Bloom ** Add to cart**
7D covers Sri Lankan Elections
Posted by Matthew Allard in Canon Eos7D, DSLR video news, Journalism, Regular HD cameras on February 1, 2010
I was sent recently on a two week assignment to cover the Presidential elections in Sri Lanka. This trip would take me from the far south of the country to Jaffna in the extreme north.
A soldier in Northern Sri Lanka
A destroyed building in Jaffna
Sri Lanka is not the easiest place to report or shoot in. The media is controlled heavily by the government and you need permission to do just about anything.
The last time i was in Sri lanka i spent more than a week with the Tamil Tigers during the middle of the civil war in a town called Killinochi. Most of the people i met and filmed are now dead. Killinochi itself is a virtual ghost town, having almost been completely destroyed during the Sri Lankan military’s main northern assault last year.
Young girl in an IDP camp
The majority who have suffered have been the Tamil people. Hundreds of thousands are now without a place to live or living in Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) camps. For those who have left the camps they are now returning to find their houses and lively hoods have been completely destroyed by war.
Myself and correspondent Wayne Hay spent a week in Jaffna, a place that until recently had been impossible to go to. The army have controlled Jaffna for more than 10 years but it still bears the scars of more than 30 years of cival war. 98% of the population are Tamil and most of them are still living in terrible conditions with their houses either having been destroyed or been taken over by the military. Such is the level of censorship over the media that we were removed from Jaffna on the morning of the elections. At 4am in the morning four large explosions rocked the windows of the guest house we were staying in. The government had complained about a few of the stories we had done in the north of the country and had sent the military around to demand that we left and to escort us more than 200km away. We were not allowed to film any election activity that took place in the north of the country. Only 17% of voters turned out to vote in the north according to government figures. Were they intimidated? Were they free and fare? Who knows….with no media allowed to report in the area the outside world would just have to assume they were.
Sri Lanka Tamils from Matthew Allard on Vimeo.
I created this small short film of Tamils praying in a Hindu temple using my 7D. It was quite dark and very early in the morning meaning it was too difficult to shoot with my broadcast camera. The camera worked well for this situation. I would of liked to have used it more on my trip but due to time constraints and remote filing of stories using a BGAN satphone it was not possible. I hope in the future that conversion times and ease of use will improve on DSLR cameras as i love the images they produce and would use them a lot more. Still for most news gathering events such as this trip the broadcast cameras convenience and quick turn around time meant i had to use it on 90% of occasions. Aljazeera’s response to me using a DSLR continues to be fantastic and i am now blogging about it on the Aljazeera website. They will continue to post not only the stories but short films i shoot in various countries. I commend them on their forward thinking and hope other news networks jump on board the DSLR revolution.
This same film will be running on the Aljazeera website shortly. Here are some of the other stories that ran on Aljazeera from Sri Lanka:
My article on using DSLR cameras to shoot the news is also running on the Aljazeera website. Click this link
Janek Zdzarski reports for Polish TV news using the Canon Eos7D
Posted by Janek Zdzarski in Canon Eos7D, DSLR video news, Journalism on January 19, 2010
Out shooting with the Eos7D and LCDVF finder
I’ve always been a big fan of multimedia and am fascinated with the tools that make it easier to create a video report. I believe that very soon most newspapers will have a video content on their sites, not just the big ones. Below is one of my latest reports about the cancellation of the Mr Gay China event – shot entirely on the 7D, when broadcast it would have a Polish voice over track to explain everything, but I’ve left that off here.
Beijing police cancel China’s first gay pageant from Janek Zdzarski on Vimeo.
For most of my years in the media I’ve been a news photographer for daily newspapers and also writing articles. In 2004 I obtained an MA from Warsaw University, my major was TV and Photojournalism. Then 2 years ago, right before Beijing Olympics, I was being offered a freelance job for TV.
I was using regular video cameras, the Panasonic AG DVX100, Sony PD150 and Z1. For unobtrusive field work I was carrying my small Sanyo Xacti 1010HD. But then 7D appeared. The image quality, ability to shoot in low light and portability are the things that make this camera a dream tool for me. I usually equip mine with the a LCDVF LCD loupe to make viewing the back screen easier, a small stabilizing rig and sometimes a monopod. For audio I mount a Zoom H4N audio recorder to the camera and then sync it with the camera’s audio track using PluralEyes from Singular software.
Moving pictures are rapidly taking place of stills. Generally my view is that people are bored and fed up with stills, they don’t have time or will to scroll pages full of pictures online. The video format makes it easier, especially when you add some visual devices like timelapse or maybe some stills – this makes the story visually more attractive. That kind of moving news feature or report can reach a far broader audience and the new video DSLR’s are the perfect tool to make this thing happen. For me another good thing about 7d is its price: it’s a really affordable camera for the quality it offers and that gives it potential to change our industry. Here’s another example of the street shooting I’ve been doing.
Merry Christmas in Beijing from Janek Zdzarski on Vimeo.
A couple more things – for me after shooting news photographs for many years I am familiar with DSLR cameras. I understand how to move around with them and the whole philosophy of being a photographer. But not I’m shooting video, I just need to wait longer to capture not just 1/250th of a second, but let’s say 10 seconds. I also need to take care with the audio (as one of my friend said: in the film the good light means good sound). The other area a photographer coming to DSLR video needs to learn and manage is the editing. It evolves more senses and more dimensions than straight stills. Take time to learn all these things.
I still take photographs though, using the 7D and also sometimes a Mamiya 7. I’d like to take the opportunity here to really encourage photographers to learn how to edit and produce a video features. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that photography is about to die; for me video is another challenge and as said before – the video story can reach the broader audience.
Anybody interested in these kind of News/Documentary features from China, please don’t hesitate to drop me a line.
I publish some of my stuff on my photoblog and here’s my picture’s portfolio: www.zdzarski.com
Below is CNN’s version of the Mr Gay China story – look closely and you’ll see it features Janek in action with his 7D.