XLH1 + Sameday Edit sample
 

Hey everyone,

I've just posted the wedding video I shot with the XL H1 in Washington last weekend. (it was really overcast and cloudy)

You can view it at http://www.ehansenproductions.com/Joel&Jill.mov

Tell me what you think..this is a same day edit (downconverted from HDV to SD) w/ music that the couple provided for me!

Thanks,

Lowell

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Canon XL H1 + G4 Power Book + Magiqcam/Glidecam 4000

Very nice picture and camera movements. A litle bit too long on posing images and a long pause before reception images.
I know that you probably just wanted to post something and by the time that you read this you had probably changed it. I do that every time I buy a new toy ;-)
Is it hard to use the glidecam 4000 with such a heavy camera? And How do you plan to deliver HD?
I have only 1 wedding booked for HD delivery, but the wedding is in July. I think that by that time HD DVD will be out.

I should have given a little more background on the video..it is a same-day edit, in fact I only had about 30-45 minutes to edit it after I captured everything I needed. The final version will be edited to a different song (thankfully)...The one I posted is just file I exported quickly to get some feedback, the extra clips at the end are just things I was playing with and didn't bother to cut off when I made the .mov file. So pay no attention to them, they are just clips I will be using in the reception segment I'm working on.

I only had about 30 mins to film the couple because the photographer was a real pain to work with, so I only got to film what we was setting up, and frankly I thought he had absolutely ZERO creativity..but I made do with what I had to work with.

I use a Magiqcam elite system with the Glidecam 4000 so it's very easy towork with and the shots are decently smooth. (however, I'll probably throw them through Shake before I finish the final version, just to make it smoother)

Right now I just deliver SD dvds, but I give them the option of buying a HD-DVD/Blueray in the future. It's so easy to film in HDV, capture to SD and edit as normal, then if they order the HD version I can just re-capture the tapes and sync the timecode and I'm ready to send out a HD version.

Guys like you who can do that in 45 minutes are awsome to me. I haven't botherd downloading the latest QT player for this computer so it doesn't play right. That is a concern when prepareing clips for the web. A lot of people are not going to have bothered keeping their players updated. when we use the QT 264 compression which is awesome the clips aren't going to play well on some peoples machines. Do you know if there is a way to make a pop up at the beginning of a clip before it streams that says you must have the most recent QT player? The clips do play on earlier players they just don't play right and we will look like the bums.

Mike

Lowell:

Simply beautiful. I thought the song was fine too. The bride was gorgeous, and that ALWAYS helps. Anytime you have a bride with big beautiful eyes like that you have to be a happy cameraman.

You should be very proud of that work.

Hi Lowell,
Realy nice camera work there.. and for an SDE, it cant be faulted.

IMO, the only thing i could find niggly about it was the use of the same type of tracking shot (camera motion up) . Thats no bad thing, but breaking THOSE shots up with some location shots would be nice and stop that element from being too noticable.
The brides a hotty, and playin with some shadows and backlighting in your compositins, i think would have given it a lil more latitude in the story telling. IE, giving those photoshoot location shots a purpose or a story.

Dont get me wrong, im not being critical, far from it, for an SDE, it kicks ass, but it felt that there wasnt much a story... does that make sense?? Maybe break the BG shots up a little with some scenery?? Or maybe flashbacks to the ceremony??? Maybe create a Dream Sequence?? That might give them purpose... I dunno...
I understand you had a dodgy photog (havent we all been there.. lol) and i totaly understand the limitations you had with regard to compositions and time and for what you have, its stunning and theyre going to love it.

Im just curoius about afew things though

i noticed ALOT of motion artefacts.. not these are the same artefacts ive seen with the Z1, however with this, they seemed ALOT mroe promiant.. especialy in high contrasted locations. This was also made prominant from the camera motion moving up. I dont know if this is a field order issue (Im watching this on a Mistubishi Diamond HD LCD Panel), codec issue with M2t, codec issue with h.264, or if its a camera thing....
I have only seen this on the rare occasion with the Z1's, but it just seemes so pronounced here... I thought id mention it..
Maybe try encode your web based material to progressive scan?? I dunno the details of your encode, so i can only make suggestions..

Apart from that, i thought the piece was tasteful, artistic and definately impressive... and definately something which would blow people away and bring on potential clients considering it was played at the reception.

Good luck with it, and keep up the good work!!

Wow Lowell!

I think you just sold me on that camera.

I appreciate the responses/compliments! The feedback and critiques are very helpful.

Peter, those artifacts came when I used the h.264 compressor. The full quality SD version is crisp and clean (not nearly as nice as the HDV version but still really good). I really liked your suggestions on making the video better, I don't have to have this done till wednesday so I'm going to take your advice and see what I can change.

Very Nice Lowell.

You edited it in a g4 powerbook, did it handle the HDV footage ok?
Did you use 2 XL H1s? have you tried mixing the Canon XL H1 footage with any SD footage?

Yes it was edited on a G4 powerbook, but in SD. I used the 'downconvert' feature on the XLH1 to capture SD.

I only had one camera at that shoot. We have a couple of GL2s, but I haven't tried combining the footage. Does anybody know a good way to do this? I would rather not switch the XLH1 to 4:3, and I hate to kill the resolution by using 16:9 on the GL2...I've heard of a 16:9 adapter for the GL2, but I'm not sure if I want to invest any more money in those cameras.

Lowell,

I also really enjoyed the clip. I think you did a great job of making an event of fairly little substance, such as the photo session (in terms of video, in most cases), into something very viewable and surprisingly a SDE.

I was curious how you handle focus on the XL with the Magiqcam setup. The footage looked very clean and you had a lot of movement, was that all manual, or auto focus?

I actually used auto focus, because this was my very first attempt at using the magiqcam and the xl h1 (i'd been using GL2s on it prior to this) so i was struggling to keep everything stable and didn't have any free hands to adjust the focus.

I'm not usually a fan of auto focus, but I have been very impressed with the h1's ability to switch between subjects when i use slow camera movements.

Continue watching after the music stops & screen goes black - then you'll see some left over edits that possibly didn't make the cut? Not sure what those are.

Anyway... I enjoyed it. Nice job.

To me that is a huge problem with the swirch to HDV. Who can afford to spring for 2 XL H1s? How do you offer an hd wedding with only 1 HD camera?

BTW Lowell have you tried panning around in the HDV footage on an SD timeline?

Craig,

Read the 1st paragraph in the 3rd post down . . . . d:-)