UWOL 19-Feathery Physics

[Steve Siegel]

Even us old hands need a reminder of the rules once in a while.

[Steve Siegel]

Whoops, Sorry I though it was time to post, too. Back again later.

[Steve Siegel]

When Cat announced "motion" as the theme for the contest, I thought to myself how easy this would be...birds are always in motion. So I went to a couple of wildlife refuges upstate and shot away. The footage was really boring. So I fell back to Plan B and tried a new special effect. (Yes, I know, you shouldn't depend on special effects to keep an audience, but I was desperate.) The effect portrays everything in stark black and white, and I convinced myself that its minimalist nature would concentrate people's attention on the motion, not on the bird, as directed by the theme topic. Does it work?

Feathery Physics 021811 on Vimeo

[Trond Saetre]

Hey Steve,
The special effects was a success in my opinion. I really like how you focused on the motion itself and kinda explaining the motion by the Newton's laws.

The close up shots of the bird's head by the end was very nice!

Well done! Thank you for sharing.

[Mat Thompson]

Hey Steve
Excellent little piece, I smell a winner ! - I liked the idea and I think your graphics worked well in context and explained things well. Personally I think I'd have used more 'normal' footage and just transitioned into your effect when explaining the laws. I think this would have let the natural beauty come through and then looked at the science afterwards. I thought the closing was great and I loved the matrix of birds flying out of frame!

Mat

[Mick Jenner]

Hi Steve,

An interesting interpretation of the theme that kept the viewers interest. A very well written script coupled together with well edited clips along with some interesting effects, I very much enjoyed watching it.


Mick

[Mike Sims]

Hi Steve. You have an interesting take on the theme this time. Your bold experiment with the über crushed video is a success. I’m pleased you used the classical statement of the laws rather than the modernized language versions one encounters so much now. I enjoyed the close-ups though I can tell they suffered some from the compression. In the final heron shot the eye seems to be slightly out of the plane of critical focus. Have you ever tried putting on a matte and sharpening the daylights out of the eye? Sometime I can rescue a shot that way. The final shot was great fun! Did you composite in After Effects? It is perfectly timed to the audio but I wonder if the addition of some flapping wings and perhaps a splash sound FX might sell it even more. I have to agree with Mat (not that that is ever a difficulty!)- this video is a winner!

[Catherine Russell]

Hi Steve:

I'm starting to envy all of you guys being able to step out of the realm of neutral comments when in dialog about your films. I will say though, that when a film inspires you (the viewer) to want to sit down and work on their own creative piece and try new things... the film has done it's job. Nicely done!

Cat

[Steve Siegel]

Mike,
I knew someone would catch the out of focus eye on the heron. I tried sharpening it
with unsharap mask, but will go back and try your idea. This the biggest beef for users of
Canon's XLH series. They still are using a 200,000 pixel viewfinder from the SD days.
Focusing is very difficult. As for the final shot, After Effects was not needed. I just
resized each frame to 25% and positioned each one in an array 4 high and 4 wide, stacking each
clip one above the other in 16 timeline tracks. Synchronizing the flight to the crescendo
note in the music was easy.

Cat,
I don't think any of us want you to be neutral. Please criticize away.

[Mike Sims]

Yes! I agree, Steve. I’m having that problem much more now that I’m using an XL H1- hence my experimenting with trying to fix it. Try sharpening with the high-pass filter technique rather than an unsharp mask. That’s a clever way to composite from the editing timeline.

[Dale Guthormsen]

Good evening,

I think you pulled this off and have a real nice piece.

I personally felt that the b&w aspects were a bit long for me!!! I will say this, this is a clever idea when I get some footage that exposure is a problem!!!! A technique I will surely use in the future, so in that regard thank you for the effort!!!!

I really liked the concept of stating Newtons laws, but I am not sure Red would be the right choice of color!!!

In a slightly longer version you could explain exactly how these laws apply to the birds flight: example: velocity can only be attained by gravity, power (as in a motor), or pressure. the change in prressure is what gives lift to a birds wing. and, a falcons stoop is excellerated beyond terminal velocity by pressure racing over the foil shap of a stooping falcons body and therefore (like squeezing a bar of soap) excellerating the velocity of the falcon upwards of 280 miles per hours.

I think you have a great piece you could finish and make a fine half hour show for TV!!!!

Of course these are only my own opinion!

Oh yea, I shoot with a xlh1 as well. I highly recomend the FU 1000 monocrome viewfinder. It has peaking and has far better resolution!! But yes, focus is always tuffer in HD!!! this view finder will help you big time.

Great job, a winner to be sure.

[Steve Siegel]

Mike,
I'm familiar with audio highpass filters but what is the sort you refer to
in video? Does it have another name?

Dale,
I played around with other colors and several shades of
gray before settling on red as the only way to be able to read
the words on a rapidly changing background. I know that the FU1000
is a better viewfinder, but it was more money than I could afford
at the time. Perhaps that is why people call it the F... You 1000.
Maybe by NAB in April Canon will come up with something better,
or Sony. JVC already has a good replacement in it's gy hm750,
due out next month.
Very interesting about falcons exceeding terminal velocity in a stoop.
Flapping flight, in the way the wing twists, imparts a forward pointing vector
to the lift, allowing forward motion. I'm having trouble seeing how
that is done in flapless dive without drastically increasing wind
resistance.






changing background

[Mike Sims]

I’m sorry Steve. Highpass filter is what Photoshop calls it. In PP (and perhaps other editors?) it’s called Find Edges. You apply it to a second superimposed instance of the clip, drop the opacity a little and then choose the Blend with Original option. It produces extreme sharpening without the color noise that the unsharp mask can add at high amounts and low thresholds. If you’re more comfortable with the unsharp mask just apply as much sharpening as you can get away with and then add another unsharp mask to further sharpen.

Dale- I got a FU1000 a while back after Per Johan recommended it. I had a good deal of trouble getting used to it and wasn’t getting consistent results and when I got a project with a deadline I switched back to the original viewfinder. Now that you have also recommended it I need to get busy learning to use it properly!

[Marj Atkins]

Hi Steve - very nice concept - the editing could do with a little fine tuning but your film hits the theme on target!

Your ending was excellent- really made me smile - I think I have more footage of birds taking flight than any other bird behaviour (many times I don't even get that)! Just wondering if your intro couldn't have had the same teatment - just to tie it together (your opening thought about birds always moving comes to mind).

Well done for trying out something different and for getting this in.