Patrick Orban has (thanks to the negotiating skills of Sam Sam Yung) lent us several thousand dollars worth of Nikon 35mm prime lenses for the shoot. These lenses are considerably faster than the ones I had previously arranged, which means we should be able to shoot with less light. Which is good, because we still have no pro lights lined up.
My own travel arrangements are set: I will fly into LaGuardia on the Saturday 15th, pick up the lenses, meet Anna, take an afternoon train to Providence, and arrive around 7:00pm. Our all-hands meeting should be at Gerry's shortly after that, I propose 8:30pm.
Last night I assembled one of the four casters for a portable rollerblade-wheel/PVC track dolly, which came out quite nicely once I figured out how to drill out and cut the aluminum pieces. I still have a few days before I have to ship it off to Kas, so I'll see if some easy modifications will let me run it on 2x6s and ladder segments.
Vicki Boyer has promised me a custom camera beanbag by Friday, a documentary and news cameraman's trick, which should be useful for quick setups, car mounts, and the like. After I've had a look at the camera, I will probably assemble a static stabilizer for hand-held shooting in the usual way, out of bent aluminum or threaded pipe and small free weights.
Between these ghetto rigs and Ed Cattucci's beautiful pro gear, we are covered for grip equipment, with the notable exception of a good fluid head tripod.
I am tempted to shoot without one on principle...one of the worst pieces of advice offered to starting filmmakers is to always use a tripod to "get rid of that home-movie shaky look". The result is all too often--personal experience speaking here--a relentless series of dull static shots, or fifteen over-the-shoulder reverses in a single page of dialog.
I'm no fan of intentional documentary-style unsteadiness, in fact when I've shot documentary hand-held I've taken great pains (often physically) to be as smooth as possible. Perhaps the advice should be "always attach small cameras to something heavy but movable", be it a fifteen-pound stabilizer, a 40' jib, or a pickup truck. Or, in rare cases, a really good cameraman, but there's where you start to get into trouble.
But we still need to be able to pan on dolly moves, so the search continues for a fluid head tripod.
Posted by Steve at October 5, 2005 02:46 PM