By Dan Chung

I’m back in the UK on the 9th and 10th of January 2012 for more training workshops run with the Jacobs Pro lounge in London’s New Oxford Street. As before there will be two days of training aimed at photographers and videographers looking to shoot video in real world situations on DSLRs. It will be useful for anyone shooting news, features, documentaries, corporate assignments or just walking around.

These are guaranteed small group workshops with only a handful of places available so everyone will get some hands on tuition.
 
On Jan 9th I will cover the basic of DSLR shooting and how I work day to day. It will include the use of ND filters, audio adapters, support rigs, led lights, sliders, LCD magnifiers and EVFs. I will demonstrate my personal approach to shooting, illustrated by examples of my work. There will be plenty of tips learned from experience on assignment.
 
 On Tuesday the 10th January will be an intermediate level and storytelling workshop which picks up from the previous day. It will also be suitable for anyone who has previously attended the introductory workshop or already has a good knowledge of DSLR video. We will discuss planning a shoot and story, practical sessions on interviewing technique, how to use motion to tell a story, more advanced audio techniques, multi camera shooting, timelapse and slo-mo.
 
The workshops will be £150 per day and will take place in the Jacobs Pro lounge, 74 New Oxford Street, London WC1A 1EU.
 
To book a place please contact Filip or Donal on 0207 436 6996, or e-mail prosales@jacobs-photo.co.uk

Participants should bring their own equipment if possible but there will be a limited amount of demo kit on show too.
 
Members of the British Press Photographers Association receive a 10% discount.

By Jonah Kessel

Wukan Video Journal from Jonah Kessel on Vimeo.

Using a fat Chinese man, a large backpack, a baseball cap and the hood from my sweatshirt, I attempted to hide myself.

I was sandwiched in between the beefy man and a f-stop Satori backpack jammed with gear on the rear of his motorcycle. He drove me down a dark dirt road in the middle of the night near the uniquely autonomous village of Wukan, Guangdong Province, China.

I was hiding from police and those who might not want attention drawn to the small village of about 13,000 people.

Earlier in the week, pissed off villagers had overthrown their leaders and in mass numbers chased the police out of town. When the police came back, they set up barriers and created a stronghold in their fishing community, only letting sympathizers and foreign journalists into the village. These outsiders started to grow in numbers and after a couple of days, a small media circus had developed.

The New York Times’ Edward Wong described the situation like this:

“The outsiders had come to see how furious residents had transformed their village on China’s southeast coast into a temporarily autonomous zone. Their anger focused on two issues: what they called illegal land sales by village officials, and the death on Dec. 11 of a village advocate while he was in police custody. The villagers chased out Communist Party officials, repelled an assault by police officers and barricaded all roads leading into Wukan with tree trunks. The two police stations in the village stood empty. So did the headquarters of the Communist Party committee.”

The villagers used this media circus and created a bit of a propaganda war. They shared their homes and food with us and drove us around on their motorcycles whenever we needed. This was a funny sight: I would be on the back of a motorcycle with a DSLR rig hung to the side, flying through small alleys and passing other motorcycles — all carrying journalists on the back as well.

With the global spotlight on this village, provincial officials were cornered and agreed to start negotiations with the angry mob.

Within 24 hours I filed one basic news video and one video journal (above) on my experience in Wukan. The video journal was paired with a text journal by Edward Wong. You can read his story “Canny Villagers Grasp Keys to Loosen China’s Muzzle” here. I shot mainly with one camera and a prime 24mm lens. While I love using jibs, sliders and mechanical movement, this video journal seemed most real shot hand-held.

While there was a lot of media there, I was the only DSLR video shooter (that I saw). All other newspapers, TV stations and wire service photographers were using standard video cameras — and with good reason. This was a tricky shoot and using a standard camera would certainly have been easier.

However, I knew it would be tricky and planned accordingly. Before I left I was told to pack light — bring no bells or whistles. Nothing extra. There would be limited car space, I would be riding by motorcycle and I would most likely have to run, so should bring only one bag.

Knowing this I created a really small franken-rig and minimized everywhere I could. Above, you can see what the franken-rig looked like disassembled and in use.

Above: f-stop Satori bag, Blackrapid RS-7 strap with Canon 60D with Canon 70-200 f/2.8 L USM, Canon 5DMII with Canon 24mm f/1.4 L USM, 2x Redrock Micro microHandGrip (Part # 2-19-0009), Redrock Micro Handlebar clamp (Part # 2-017-0002), 2x 18″ 15mm carbon fiber rods (Part # 8-011-0002), Porta Brace Universal Shoulder Pad, Jag35 Top Handle, Jag35 Tripod Plate Pro, Jag35 Quick Release Gorilla Stand with Zucoto Gorilla Plate, D | Focus Follow Focus, Jag35 90 Degree Clamp with ball head attached to a Ruige 5″ TL-S500 On-camera HD LCD monitor, Genus Counterweight for CSMK Shoulder Mount System (3.5 lb) and topped with a Rode VideoMic Pro Compact Shotgun Microphone.

I got all of this to fit into a single f-stop bag. The rig was small enough to fight for territory in press scrums and stable enough to run around in a less than stable environment.

This setup was also small enough to take onto a plane without checking anything. I kept one small tripod with me — although I barely used it.

The videos were largely edited during during the middle of the night or in the back of moving cars as I was fighting US East coast deadlines.

To see the strange conclusion to this story see my blog post “Wukan Journal Unfinished.” To see how this story unfolded check out these stories:

• Canny Villagers Grasp Keys to Loosen China’s Muzzle
• Demonstrators Who Took Over Chinese Village Halt Protest
• Officials Meet With Protesting Chinese Villagers
• Wukan Protesters Seek Return of Xue Jinbo’s Body
• Wukan Revolt Takes On a Life of Its Own

– Jonah M. Kessel is a Beijing based freelance visual journalist working with the New York Times. See his web site here and follow him on Twitter here.

By Dan Chung

I’m generally not into hacking cameras myself but the new Christmas release of the Magic Lantern hack for Canon 550D (t2i), 60D, 600D (t3i), 50D and 500D is certainly very enticing.

Magic Lantern offers a greatly improved feature set which makes Canon DSLRs into much more fully feature video cameras. You simply download the files to each memory card you use, pop it into the camera and load the new firmware. Then each time you start the camera it can automatically find the firmware on your memory card and reload it.

However, in my past experience I have found it to be less than 100% reliable in critical conditions, with the occasional lock up that require me to reboot the camera by reinserting the battery. For this reason I have stayed away from using it for news or documentary shoots where missing a key moment is not an option.

It is also technically going to void any warranty you have on the camera and there is always that slight chance that you could irreversibly turn it into a paperweight.

All that said it is amazing that a global team of hackers working together have added video features to existing Canon cameras that are not even to be found on the as yet unreleased C300 or 1D X.

The Magic Lantern Christmas edition running on a 60D

If you are willing to take the risk (and many users have without issue) then there are many benefits including the an expanded focus box during recording, audio monitoring, on-screen audio level meters, increased bitrate recording, false colour for setting correct exposure, peaking, custom aspect markers and much more.

This Christmas the newest features are the ability for these cameras to have enhanced frame rate control and the addition of a HDR video mode.

Instead of 25 frames per second (fps) you can now undercrank to as low as 4fps with a 1/4 of a second shutter speed – giving an motion blurred effect that is most useful in very low light. On the 60D you can also overcrank to 35fps in 1080p – not a major increase but useful for a slight slo motion effect when played back at 24 or 24 fps. The team has also hacked the older 50D to shoot HD video – it doesn’t even have a video function by default! Although there is still the drawback that it has no sound recording in camera.

The high dynamic range (HDR) mode seeks to allow the camera to capture greater shadow and highlight detail in scenes of high contrast. It is slightly complex to use but basically the camera takes consecutive frames at different exposures which you need to combine/interpolate afterwards in post-processing. Because of the way this is done it is only really suitable for slower moving subjects. It seems very experimental right now – there is more discussion of this here.

Magic Lantern HDR video workflow test from DavidJFulde on Vimeo.

The firmware is free to download from the Magic lantern site but for a small donation you can get a ready to run version of their HDR workflow as well as a preview version of their upcoming 5D mkII firmware improved hack. Full details here. Install hacked firmware at your own risk – don’t blame me if it kills your camera!

Below is a video from Andrew Reid at EOSHD.com showing the features of the upcoming 5D mkII Magic Lantern hack:

Meet the new 5D Mark II Magic Lantern Unified from Andrew Reid on Vimeo.

By Dan Chung

The new Kesslercrane Stealth slider

It’s no secret that I am a big fan of Eric Kessler’s dollies and sliders. I’ve been using them for a lot of my work and I’m one of the featured shooters on the Kessler Video University.

I have a big Kesslercrane Cineslider but I choose to use the smaller Pocketdolly V2 most of the time for my news and docu work because of it’s smaller size (the traveller version fits perfectly in my suitcase). Whilst the Pocketdolly is very good I do miss the silk smooth motion of the Cineslider when travelling around.

Enter the new Stealth hybrid slider which takes the Pocketdolly’s portability and combines it with drag control and a super smooth rolling precision stainless steel ball bearing wheel system on the carriage. It does not have the crank handle from the Pocketdolly and the overall design is more sleek than previous dollies. It can be used with DSLR as well as larger cameras like the Sony F3 or even some broadcast models.

Eric explained the reasoning behind the Stealth, as opposed to the Phil Bloom Signature dolly or Pocketdolly, in this way – “We had a number of requests from customers that said they liked the Bloom, but would prefer it in black. As well we had requests to have a slider with the belt drive and drag, but they did not need or want a crank handle. Like the Bloom is a hybrid between the Pocket Dolly and CineSlider, the Stealth is a hybrid between the Pocket Dolly and Bloom.”

Like the Pocketdolly V2 the Stealth can be fitted with the ElektraDRIVE motor system for motion control automation. Visit the ElektraDRIVE page for options.

The Stealth features a drag control

The Stealth is available in two lengths, the Standard 3′ version and the shorter 2′ Traveler size. They Kesslercrane webstore currently lists the Stealth at $799.95 for the standard length. Availability is slated for January 2012. I am hoping to test one very soon.

Technical Specs:

Standard size
- Length: 40.5″ (102.9cm)  

- Weight: 7 pounds (3.2kg)
- Travel: 31″ (78.7cm)




Traveler size
- Length: 28.5″  (72.4cm) 

- Weight: 6 pounds (2.7kg)
- Travel: 23″ (58.4cm)

A spirit level is a welcome addition to the Stealth

In the interests of full disclosure I am a Kessler shooter but this site is not a sales affiliate of Kesslercrane. Below is one of my videos shot using the Pocketdolly V2 with ElektraDRIVE system.

By Jonah Kessel

Word Crimes from Jonah Kessel on Vimeo.

Murong Xuecun is one of the least boring people I have ever met.

He is energetic. He is dynamic. He is impressively clever. And in the last year, he has emerged as one of the most outspoken critics of censorship in China.

However, he is a writer.

And when New York Times’ correspondent Edward Wong first mentioned he was writing an in depth feature on Murong, I initially doubted an accompanying video component would help add much value to the package. I did some background research and found articles with still pictures of the young writer. Nearly every single one showed the author looking at a computer in some form or another, 3 out of 4 being a silhouetted picture of the back of his head with the computer out of focus or him at an internet café.

The images I saw were far from inspiring. I imagined a video full of talking heads, with sequences of static imagery that would inevitably go on for too long and insight viewers to click away.

But right before I decided it wasn’t worth making the video, I read this speech Murong had recently given which discussed censorship of written work in China. Words started jumping off the page:

This is castrated writing. I am a proactive eunuch, I castrate myself even before the surgeon raises his scalpel. Our language has been cut into two parts: one safe, and the other risky. Some words are revolutionary, and others are reactionary; some words we may use, and others belong to our enemies.

And just like that, I was hooked. This person was clearly an outspoken agent calling for change and reform in Chinese society. All of a sudden Murong turned from a writer into an incendiary subject on a hot topic. I jumped on board and got to thinking — how do I make a person who is visually boring interesting? And my first inspiration came directly from the same speech. Toward the top of his speech Murong discusses words likely to be censored should he use them in his books:

From my many years’ experience in writing and publishing, I could compile a Sensitive Words Glossary, in which you would certainly find the words “system,” “law,” “government,” as well as a large number of other nouns, several verbs, quite a few adjectives, and even a few special numbers. The glossary would also include all names of religions, all names of important people, all countries, including of course China, and also the phrase “Chinese people.”

On the backend of the speech, the author continued:

If there really were a Sensitive Words Glossary, I hope that it could be published; in this way at least we could all save a lot of time, and reduce the possibility of unwittingly committing “word crimes.”

My idea for the video came to me while sitting in a small airport in Burlington, Vermont on my way back to China I thought — maybe I can help him publish this list of sensitive words. I dreamed up a bunch of scenarios of how I could visualize a list of words and eventually came to the conclusion that I should let this man say the words that ordinarily he can’t say.

This train of thought continued onto the topic of voiceovers vs subtitles. Most international broadcast news videos gets a voiceover treatment – I started thinking it would be completely ironic to mute the man, when he is in fact, talking about words which he cannot use. I decided subtitles were more appropriate – which then opened up more doors for cinematic storytelling and made it a little easier to justify adding music to a news piece. Although I was excited to make the piece I was still a bit worried about keeping it moving and wanted the music to help keep the piece from drying up.

Now, regardless of the man’s profession, I had a hot subject and an idea for a snappy intro. I had music to help move the piece in a rhythmic narrative and a logic behind how I would represent his opinions visually.

And while I knew I had to film him writing or at the computer, I also knew I wanted to get him out of the context where we are used to seeing writers. When you get stuck shooting a “boring” person (or one who doesn’t do anything visually exciting) I think its a great exercise to find a new physical environment. Simply get them out of the physical environment where we expect to see them. It doesn’t matter where — just someplace else. I wanted to see him interacting with people and when I found out he was going out to dinner with some journalists and human rights lawyers, I was ecstatic when I got the invite to tag along.

This was the trickiest part of the video — both visually and narratively. How to link the home interviews, the writing visuals and a bunch of guys at dinner. With some thinking, it was easy enough to have narration lead the story into the restaurant, but shooting this was much more tricky.

There’s a Zoom H1 hidden on the table near the bear drinking, cigarette smoking intellectuals. I have a Canon 60D switching between a Gorilla Pod, a tripod and the in-table lazy susan. In addition, I had a 5D mkII on a shoulder rig. And while I didn’t leave a camera rolling the entire time, I did leave the audio rolling. When I got back, I synched all of the audio with the video clips I had. Although I had tons of great dialogue in the end I just grabbed one meaty quote that allowed me to jump from frame to frame anachronistically. Had I used multiple quotes or too much back and forth dialogue, I would have been forced into using more real time footage. Using just one quote allowed me to use some of my favorite visuals from the entire night.

With the intro set and multiple environments in the bank, I just needed to shoot the interviews. Knowing that I was at risk of having a boring video, I kept two cameras rolling continually during the interviews so when it came time to cut, I could keep all my frames short and bounce between a Canon 50mm f1.2 and a Canon 24mm f1.4.

With the credit roll, intro and title sequence, the video came out at 4 minutes and 20 seconds. Keeping voiceover out, adding music, using multiple environments and multiple cameras rolling during interviews, I hope I succeeded in making a visually “boring person” interesting.

And while I can’t answer that question for you, I can say the greater lesson I took away from this project are the potential assets we gain from simply researching what our subjects. What they have to say, have said and what they might want to say.

MORE ON MURONG XUECUN:
• Read Edward Wong’s story “Pushing China’s Limits on Web, if Not on Paper”
• An Excerpt from ‘Leave Me Alone: A Novel of Chengdu’
• More on Murong: Words We Can Use, and Those We Can Not

– Jonah M. Kessel is a Beijing based freelance visual journalist working with the New York Times. See his web site here and follow him on Twitter here.

By Andy Portch

A full size HD broadcast camera is picture perfect and looks impressive. The large camera also screams “TV Crew” and too often gives a ‘warped’ view as people react to the big camera or simply turn it away. My previous experience shooting news with the Canon 5D mkII was a visual triumph, but the paraphernalia and workflow was overwhelming. I want to keep the big camera craft, but in compact form.  Twelve months ago the Micro four thirds (MFT) system caught my eye. The Panasonic AF101 and smaller GH2 stills/video hybrid cameras are cross compatible, sharing lenses and shooting the same AVCHD format. The AF101 is also significantly cheaper and smaller than the alternative Sony F3.

I went ahead and purchased the AF101 (AF100 in the USA) because it has all the video camera features: Neutral Density (ND) filter wheel, XLR audio inputs, Variable Frame Rate, SDI output and a dial in white balance. The AF101 ND filter wheel is the critical plus factor for me. I would not recommend any video camera without built in ND filters. I almost love the AF101 except for this – focus, focus and focus. Achieving critically sharp images is extremely difficult. I lobbied Panasonic hard for a better Electronic Viewfinder (EVF) and one-to-one pixel mapping magnification to no avail. I guess it will likely be in Panasonic’s next large sensor camera and I’ve now accepted the need for an external Zacuto EVF in my kit.

In the bureau with the Panasonic GH2

Working alongside my AF101 I have the GH2 which is small and discrete, with improved video functions over my old Canon 5D mkII. The GH2 has a crisp EVF with image magnification which means you don’t need an LCD loupe. Depth of field is shallow, but more manageable for video than a full frame sensor. I can still use manual full frame lenses with low cost adapters. In fact the beauty is I can carry the same creative stack of lenses for use with my GH2, GF2 or AF101 video camera.

My trusty Billingham bag (16inches/40cm long) was the defining maximum size for the AF101 rig. If the compact camera concept ended up the same size as my shoulder mounted P2HD ENG camera then I’d failed. It had to be ready to record straight from the Billingham bag in broadcast HD quality. Plus I wanted to be able to put it either on my shoulder, on a tripod or on a flat surface without it falling over or needing any further assembly.

I’ve used the combination of GH2 and AF101 extensively this year and to illustrate various points and lessons learned about the cameras’ use I’m going to refer to a portfolio of five news stories which I’ve done. Each is shot with Holly Williams, my correspondent in the Sky Beijing bureau. She has supported my tireless and sometimes tiresome quest for better imagery:-

Chinese Hackers: (Shot with AF101 and Zeiss/Contax CY prime lenses)

EXTRACT Sky News Chinese Hackers and Baby Buying stories from Andy Portch on Vimeo.

This was an alarming story given the ease this young computer hacker accessed our email and credit card passwords! I shot in a darkened room with a bit of Kessler Pocketdolly slider movement. I loved it. Despite recording in AVCHD I had comments from colleagues about how wonderfully sharp it was.

The Kesslercrane Pocketdolly/AF101 combo works well

Most manual focus stills full frame 35mm lenses are perfectly adaptable to MFT with a two times magnification factor (x1.86 with GH2). The Zeiss CY are easily cine modified, aperture de-clicked and damped. They have a comfortable focus throw and gorgeous Zeiss image quality.  The old Zeiss CY 50mm f1.4 is a gem. Canon FD is also a good manual lens option if you don’t have the budget for Zeiss. More expensive adapters now exist for Canon EF lenses with their electronic aperture. I haven’t personally used Nikon lenses because they focus in the opposite direction.

Low light shooting on the Chinese hacker story

Shooting in low light with raised ISO has not been a problem for me with the AF101. I did one shoot in a very dark whisky bar and was pleased how little video noise showed in the shadows. However the AF101 does not handle highlights well. In it’s Cine gamma modes camera knee is disabled. Unless blown highlights are out of focus they look awful. Underexpose a touch and the problem goes away. I’ve tweaked my Cine Gamma settings, and still have fairly vivid colour and contrast. I do grade, but if I like the ‘look’ straight from the camera I have the option not to grade for a rush news edit.

Ergonomically the camera had been proving hard for me to handhold but I had a ‘eureka’ moment when I started using a side support bracket and wooden handle/video trigger made by Olof Ekberg of Westside AV. The AF101 top and side handles unscrew to add accessories or brackets very easily. Not only was Olof’s side handle more comfortable, but at last I knew where the record start/stop button was. I’m also using a short padded tail plate to the side bracket that places the AF101 camera on my shoulder, but without moving the centre of gravity forward. It makes a real difference when trying to get stable handheld shots.  

Baby Buying: (AF101 and Nanoflash recorder)

The police arrive on the scene during our baby buying story

I shot sequences for a story about a Chinese baby buying scandal, mainly with a Voigtlander Nokton 25mm f0.95 and Zeiss primes. Again the Kessler Pocketdolly gave lots of positive feedback. The slider is a creative bonus, but when your interview subject is jumpy and really wants to head for the door, it takes nerve to create steady moves. There is a ‘should we use a slider for news’ debate (not least on this very blog). I use the slider with an awareness of when perhaps it is not appropriate as much as when it is physically possible. 

The twin sister of a girl who was taken

The compact system is extremely lightweight and my back loves it. Lighter cameras mean lighter accessories. Everything on my AF101 and GH2 has the same Manfrotto 394 quick release plates. I can move easily from one piece of kit to another. For a tripod I use a Miller DS10 head on Solo carbon fibre legs; lighter, higher and lower than my regular Sachtler Video18P. Along with it I carry the compact Kessler V2 Pockedolly that works a treat (especially now I have fitted the optional carriage brake).  If I’m in a controlled environment then I use the SmallHD DP6 which is a rugged and sharp field monitor. A single Canon LPE6 battery will last a morning on the DP6. The only downside to my dp6 is a yellow cast when you first switch on.

China Tibetan region: Self Immolating monks. (GH2 video DSLR)

A monk prays

I’m used to working as a journalist in China – being harassed and my work interfered with by police and plain clothes thugs. The GH2 has shown its value, getting quality video in sensitive locations. (Its baby brother the GF2 has also been used by out team, including for a Bangkok ‘Lady boys’ documentary). In Sichuan province the police were all over us. We did every dodge in the book and over a couple of days managed to get images of temples and monks to tell this story. We also shot material we could not broadcast for fear of what would happen to those we’d met. Security is so tight in the Tibetan areas of Sichuan province. Monasteries have police stations and the authorities knew exactly where we’d been. We were soon sent to the airport.

EXTRACT Sky News Stories Tibetan Monks and Boeing Dreamliner from Andy Portch on Vimeo.

For this story the GH2 did its job, but the lack of built in ND filters was a mess. I’d opted against the variable ND (which I’d found soft on my 5DmkII) in favour of screw in ND8 (3 stop) filters. I thought I’d be either outside or inside for lengths of time. In fact it turned into a real pain as we repeatedly sneaked quickly from indoors to outdoors and vice versa. This mean’t I had a lot of panicky filter changes. That said it wasn’t just my GH2 that had problems with the light. It is unbelievably bright in the mountains and I also had a tiny Sony AVCHD Handycam (with IR capability for night vision) with me. It couldn’t stop it’s aperture down enough to shoot outdoors at noon! I did use some shots from that camera and had a lot of work to match them to the superior GH2.

A monk demonstrates the extremes of light on the Tibetan region story

Another factor with the GH2 was that the small size made it hard to hold without vibration from the blood pumping through your hands. Admittedly I was a bit stressed, but these are visible bumps in the shot even with the wide angle lens fitted.

For this assignment I also used the Voightlander 25mm Nokton lens wide open at f0.95, at least two f-stops wider than I would normally do. It was late dusk and I was hand held. To find the narrow plain of focus l found I had to sway gently back and forth. The GH2 is a surprisingly good low light performer. You can crank up the ISO and use the ‘nostalgia’ film mode (which has nothing to do with nostalgia) but lifts the shadows considerably. Strangely I find the GH2 easier to focus than AF101. The one press EVF image magnification gives instant focus confidence and you can hit record.

The Voightlander 25mm f0.95 and Westside AV side handle

After the pain of 5D mkII audio I have largely stopped using a mini audio adapter with the GH2. I let the camera record with manual levels displayed in the viewfinder. Simultaneously I use a separate Olympus LS11 audio recorder with Tram lavaliere mic placed on my reporter or talent. It can record for eleven hours and it is easy to sync image and audio afterwards especially if you have Plural Eyes software.

Boeing Dreamliner Inaugural flight: (AF101 with Nanoflash)

My 7-14mm Lumix F4 got a good outing on this trip. The lens is lots of fun (as long as it’s bright) and it’s easy to get extraordinary images. Holly’s ‘piece to camera’ on the jet was centre frame, filmed from one metre away seated across the aisle. The shot was so wide it included two passengers seated either side! The only problem was choosing an angle not to make her look cross eyed! The opening sequence has banding from flash photography which the CMOS chip struggles with, but nowhere near as bad as the 5D mkII flash banding.

Holly shot with the 7-14mm lens on the Boeing Dreamliner

The Micro Four Thirds system is dominated by Panasonic and Olympus but other manufacturers have thankfully joined in and new lenses are popping up. I’ve ordered the new SLR Magic 12mm F1.6 with cine aperture ring (with no click stops). The Voigtlander Nokton 25mm F0.95 has already become one of my firm favourites. De-clicking is possible, but less straight forward as the aperture ring is at the front. I like the Nokton and it’s images sit well alongside the Zeiss.

The results from Lumix and Olympus lenses are mixed. They feature some if not all of these issues – clicking electronic apertures, twiddly control wheels, zooms that aren’t parfocal (even if they’re supposed to be), latency with focus by wire and focus rings that spin endlessly. I hope the promised 2012 Lumix X Pro 12-35mm and 35-100mm are fast and sharp zooms. For now beware lenses with a tiny focus throw.  The Olympus 12-60mm f2.8-4 for example has a great range, manual focus markings, but focuses from infinity down to one metre with just one centimetre throw. Compare that with a ten centimetre throw for the same focusing distance from my broadcast camera’s Canon HJ22 lens. I know some people use follow focus devices, but again that defeats my compact goal. 

The Dreamliner by the way turned out to be identical to any other plane. I called it the ‘Binliner’, with slightly larger overhead lockers. To think Boeing was aiming supersonic before 9/11.

Bangkok floods: (AF101 with Nanoflash)

Children playing on Bangkok flood water

This was a regular news scramble. I had to shoot, load, edit and transmit quality daily pieces by lunchtime every day. Following the packaged reports with hourly live crosses with Holly and then another shoot to update the package for later. The AF101 has analogue video out, HDMI and HDSDI output – but no firewire. The system we use for live satellite reports from a Mac needs a firewire input. Thankfully the Canopus ADVC-55 analogue to firewire box bridges the gap for streaming lives.   

EXTRACT Sky News Bangkok Floods stories from Andy Portch on Vimeo.

Lens juggling standing in flood water added a frisson to changing lenses.  I’ve adapted a small bum bag with padded compartments that holds three or four lenses and those are the ones I have on the go. Rubber lens hoods are fitted to all my lenses to speed up changes. In Bangkok I tried using the 14-140mm Lumix zoom with image stabilizing, but had trouble getting it sharp. Autofocus I haven’t really explored – I can’t bring myself to trust it. There is focus assist on the AF101, which puts a red fringe to whatever is sharp (or as I’ve found almost but not quite sharp). The AF101’s built in EVF and LCD ‘detail’ feature helps, but should not to be used at the same time as red focus assist.

A Canon HJ22 broadcast lens with an adapter for use in the AF101

The lens mount of AF101 is rated for 1kg. Fast and heavy Canon and Olympus telephoto zooms need supporting. As did my broadcast Canon HJ22 and HJ11 lenses I tried with an adapter. In reality I don’t want 15mm rails on my compact rig, so lens choice had to be sub 1kg. The Olympus Zuiko 50-200mm f2.8-3.5 is my heaviest lens and is sharp and good to focus, but lacks image stabilising and aperture ring.

I did get more daring shots with the lightweight AF101 than I would from my big news camera. Instead of a rig I used a Gorillapod with Manfrotto ball mount head as mini brace either on the shoulder or wrapped around things, even at water level.

So what can you do with the AF101 and GH2?

Both record to SDHC cards in AVCHD format up to 24Mbps. I conducted comparisons viewed on a 25 inch HD monitor with the same scene recorded with AVCHD and HD broadcast codecs. Most viewers could not tell the difference, some chose AVCHD over HD codecs and only a single video engineer spotted the higher bitrate HD codec footage.

AVCHD does not meet the minimum 50Mbps specified by most HD broadcasters – which is a pain! For me the answer has been the low power Convergent Nanoflash external recorder powered together with the SWIT S-8BG6 camera battery. The battery has an auxiliary socket and a single battery powers camera and Nano flash for hours. The Nano has power save mode, so you don’t have to keep plugging/unplugging. The resulting Nano flash XDCAM HD422 files are recorded to CF card in either MXF or .MOV. I did have a Nanoflash fail on location. A capacitor failed and was repaired by Convergent Design who said it was the first of four thousand units to fail this way. The Nanoflash is attached by locking arm to my AF101 side bracket and sits there perfectly out of the way.

Shooting a progressive image rather than interlaced looks less newsy. Some prefer this, but I think it makes the footage less ‘real’ for viewers watching our news broadcasts and so for now we have reverted to interlaced shooting. The compact AF101 camera is not suited to every shoot. Long lens stuff is most difficult. I wouldn’t choose it for a live press conference or a shoot over the North Korean border. Juggling lenses is troublesome. I started dreaming about an old cine camera revolving lens turret! I need to think clearly what shots I want and go after them with a specific focal length. I guess photographers coming to video would have two GH2 bodies with different lenses as they do for stills (I’m tempted!).

In conclusion with Micro four thirds I can do high quality work with a system that doesn’t cost very much. It is challenging for news, as is shooting anything with shallow depth of field. The beauty comes from the prime lenses, but for recording news ‘fast’ zooms are still required. I miss the ease of function and speed of a regular TV camera and broadcast zoom lenses. On the other hand there are creative benefits from that large MFT sensor. I hope it makes my pictures better and I love walking out the door with my Billingham bag. At least I don’t look like a TV cameraman.

Andy Portch is a senior cameraman for Sky News based in Beijing.
He is a broadcast pioneer helping to develop and shape camera and news gathering technology and has spent more than twenty years covering global news stories. A career Andy sums up as hard to beat – “It is a privilege to meet the people I’ve met, to travel to the places I’ve been and to see the extraordinary things I’ve seen.”