Soderbergh shoots feature with XL1S
 

No kidding. The working title is "The Art of Negotiating a Turn" and it stars David Duchovney and Julia Roberts, among some other big names. It's a follow-up to his 1988 film "Sex, Lies & VideoTape" and is a film-within-a-film, as I understand about 80% of it will be shot on DV with the XL1S, entirely hand held. The rest of the film will be shot on 35mm. Production begins Nov. 5th for eight weeks, with a release to theaters nationwide in March. I should be able to get some behind-the-scenes info for y'all. My source for this is Canon USA; they'll have a press release available soon. Keep an eye on the Watchdog,

This will probably be a heavily modified Canon XL1s I assume? Cause the resolution, DV bandwidth and optics don't quite cut
it for film use... right? Very interested to hear some more on
this Chris! Thanks!

No -- he is using two unmodified XL1S's, right out of the box. As I understand, after being shown the new manual lens, he opted for the standard 16x full auto lens because it has optical image stabilization (this is a completely handheld shoot).

More details as they come in,

Cinematographer.com
 

I just found this on cinematographer.com relating to the movie

http://www.cinematographer.com/brief/mainv/0,7220,31275,00.html

Soderbergh Shooting DV Project With 'Full Frontal'
By Staff
November 14, 2001 11:43 AM PST

Steven Soderbergh ("Traffic") started production on the comedy "Full Frontal" on Nov. 4, his first movie for Miramax in 12 years (since "sex, lies, and videotapes"). Like on his last two features, Soderbergh will serve as cinematographer and director. The 18-day production in Los Angeles, which is being shot on digital video, includes stars Julia Roberts, Catherine Keener and David Duchovny. The working title of the project was "How To Survive a Hotel Room Fire." Miramax plans to distribute the film on Mar. 8, 2002.

The Academy Award-winning director will see his latest film, "Ocean's Eleven," released by Warner Bros. on Dec. 7.

Hey Chris,

Is it true that Steven is shooting that feature film with a XL1S Pal format, or is it NTSC. I have heard arguments about the technology getting to the point where there is no real difference between the two formats for conversions sake (to 35mm).
I have an XL1S and am wondering about the limitations.

EG

He shot on PAL, and I assume the reason he did so is because the 35mm transfer house he's using advised him to do so. Some film transfer houses prefer NTSC, some prefer PAL. Depends on the process they use.

Soderbergh with XL-1 in hand
 

For those of you who've been wanting to know more about Steven Soderbergh's new film shot on the XL-1, "Full Frontal" (originally "The Art of Negotiating a Turn), there's now an official web site that is giving weekly updates on production.

Click the "Production Week 1" link and you'll see additional links under "Media" where you can watch a QuickTime segment showing behind the scenes footage of him shooting (handheld, no steadicam), and also some photos.

http://www.fullfrontal.com/main.html

Looks like he is shooting with some sort of adaptor
on his XL1?? Probably an anamorphic adaptor?

I'm wondering how he plans to stabalise that
footage that we see him shooting in that movie.
Or perhaps it is meant to be shaky... hehehe...

Great link though! Thanks

16x9
 

can anyone confirm if thats an Anamorphic Adapter on the front of steven's canon XL1s.? it looks like it may be just like a .7x wide adapter...?

follow up
 

I just spoke with Century Precision. The only 16x9 anamorphic adapter they have for the canon XL1s is actually made by a company named Optics, and is actually the adapter that is made for the PD150, not the canon XL1s. Since this is basically just a rehousing of a lens to fit the canon XL1s there are extreme limitations of your focal lengths, Century told me that it is something like. 28mm-38mm.. which is insane. Basically you cant go wide. vignetting, cant go telephoto, focusing problems... So, I highly doubt steven has an anamorphic adapter on there, for this is the only one that is made that can be used on the canon XL1s.

Century Wide-Angle
 

Just to update...

turns out he's shooting with a "bare-bones" XL-1s with a Century wide-angle attachment from Birns & Sawyer. The editing for the movie is being done on Final Cut Pro 3.0.

(info from the "Full Frontal" web site)

Indeed it's a C.O. wide-angle. By the way he shot all of the XL1S stuff (about 85% of the movie) completely handheld, all in existing light, mostly with the stock 16x lens.

the movie shot on xl1
 

what is it going to be? a bit like the "dogma" style or is he going to make it look like something not typical dv? I mean i love my camera but your never going to beat 35mm.