New Episode online!

[Paolo Ciccone]

After quite some time we have a new episode of 2nd Unit focused, no pun intended, on adjusting back focus for you camera.
This is a topic that comes up in the forums very often so I decided to address it and to show how you adjust backfocus for your HD camera.
The video is, as always, available from the "2nd Unit" WebSite, http://www.2nd-unit.tv, click on the "Current Episode" link.

[Joe Bowey]

Excellent. I must get that fiddle chart. How far were you from the chart when you did the back focus?
And will it work well outside?
Anyways you could not have explained backfocus any better than that. Thou I did here some weird sound from the video every once in a while.

P.S. I need a WIRED lav for a shoot coming up and want to keep it around $300
so my choices are sony ecm77b, sanken cos11, audiotech at899, or tram50.

Thanks Joe Bowey

[Paolo Ciccone]

Thanks Joe.
I was at about 8 feet from the chart. About the sound, are you sure that they were not caused by playback issues? If so could you give me a time marker so that I can check and fix them?

[Glenn Davidson]

Joe may be refering to the stinger type music effect that comes up a couple of times during the video. I thought effect's placement was kind of odd, but I learned a lot from the video. Good job. The audio is also kinda clippy in places, but no big deal. The video looks great and is very informative. Thanks for posting it.

[Paolo Ciccone]

Hmmm, I wonder if something happened during the compression. I'll take a look at possibly re-render it. Thanks.

[Joe Bowey]

Yea it was some special effect. Very odd indeed. other wise great job.
Did the bigger fiddle chart have the color chart on the backside also?

[Paolo Ciccone]

No, it's just the backfocus chart. At that size the DSC charts come one-sided with a aluminum backing for strength.

[Warren Shultz]

How much do those charts run? They're quite expensive if I recall. By the way, Paolo, did you shoot that with the HD100 or the XDCAM? You guys are getting the looks down pretty well.

[Paolo Ciccone]

Hi Warren.
You can find pricing information at http://www.dsclabs.com, also, several resellers offer DSC charts at discounted prices. While we didn't negotiate any kind of special deal with DSC I would encourage you to contact them and tell them that you just saw the "2nd Unit" deal and ask if they have any promotion. They are very keen on education and they might give you a "2nd unit special".

The video was shot with my HD100.

[Chris Hurd]

DSC Labs is a DV Info Net sponsor.

[Paolo Ciccone]

OK, I managed to recompress the video and adjusted the clipped audio at the beginning. I also "trimmed" some fat, in the 25MB range, the video is now just a 86MB. Should play faster and smoother.

[Mark Utley]

Great info, Paolo.

I'm not sure if you guys are taking episode suggestions but I'm very interested to learn about encoding Flash video integrated with other Flash content on a page (the example Adobe had on the CS3 promo video showed a video of a bike race with a map of the track on the right, highlighting what section of the race they were on). I see so much potential for this integration.

[Paolo Ciccone]

Mark, that is an excellent topic and in fact it was demoed by Adobe at NAB. That is one feature that they are planning on integrating in the Adobe Media Player, which Yours Truly is currently beta-testing :)

[Cole McDonald]

hey! late to the party...I'm not getting any audio with that video (assuming it's the one with Paolo in front of a big monitor talking...can't tell with no audio). Audio makes sound in the props episode - quicktime.

PowerBook G4, 1.25 Ghz G4, 1Gb RAM, Leopard 10.5.1

[Jonathan Ames]

Hey Joe. This is an interesting question because it is as much about the mic as it is the sending and the receiving unit. Lower end products like Sennheisers have been a staple for 2nd Unit for a long time but times change. More productions, more wireless laptops, just more of everything electronic crowd frequencies so we now use Lectrosonics. It's a jump from $500 to $3000 per set but well worth it if you're shooting serious stuff. So why do I bring this up when you said your needs are "wider". Simple. To get the most out of your lavs, they need to be pigtailed to whatever wireless devices you're using. Sennheisers and Lectrosonics are 2 different pigtails so start with which wireless units your're using and go from there. As to the mics themselves, we;ve used just about everything there is and have settled on the Countryman. Two are now in our arsenal; the EMW and the B3. Both are omnidirectional and have excellent pickup while being rugged, water resistant (sweat) all while producing excellent , broad spectrum. Believe me, as Paolo and Scott will tell you, we bput our lavs through Hell and they came out shining every time. Much of El papel was shot with the lavs hardwired directly to the preamp/mixer and then to the camera which gave us the ability to shoot without boompole which was a God-send in much of the environments we were shooting in. We have a great relationship with a couple of sound houses out here so when you're ready, let me know and we'll arrange something for you. Hope all is wel with you. 2nd Unit has had some tough personal times but hopefully we'll be back on track now helping as much as we can. Any other questions, post 'em here or give me a call or e-mail me. Runnin' short on coffee though!!!