I just got back from shooting a documentary in India and Nepal. Basically the camera lived on my back for a month, including Trekking up to Everest Base Camp.
Shot about 36 hours of footage 24p 16x9, and the camera never skipped a beat. Worked perfectly the whole way, even in 0° at 18,500 feet.

I have compiled a 4 minute video from footage I took off 8 random tapes I picked up the other night. It is for the most part, not color corrected or edited other then fades or speed changes here or there. And I did it before I knew how to capture 24pA, so pulldown has not been removed, but if you are interested...

The Blog: http://www.lostsummitfilms.com/blog/
The Video: http://dl.lostsummitfilms.com/gentlewalk-sample.mov

Brandon

Amazing. That was ABSOLUTELY amazing!! Best XL2 footage I've ever seen!!

Wow.. sounds like you had an amazing adventure, and thanks for sharing this awesome footage! Seriously.. excellant!

Keep it up man!

Colin

Wow, great stuff. I look forward to seeing more of your footage.

Brandon,


Is there any chance of a smaller version (you tube) ?

From : low and very expensive bandwith of the third world.

Sincerely.

Herman

I agree...impressive footage!

Outstanding, I especially liked the stuff from Nepal. Good job!

Really nice video.

Best. Footage. Ever.

Thank you for all the comments. I will see what I can do about a smaller version. It may take me a couple days.

One question about my footage that has been bothering me. I'm getting significant distortions (artifacting, banding) on the reds in my raw footage. You can see it on the sun in the first shot and the slow zoom back with the gate and the hikers near the end.

I know digital video always has a hard time with reds, but does anyone have any good methods of getting rid of that in post?

Thanks,
Brandon

really nice vivid colours. it looks like it was shot with a dvx or hvx.
which custom preset did you use?

I used for the most part, a slightly tweaked documentary preset (reduced the red levels on the nepal portion) coupled with a circular polarizer (gradual ND on sunrise/sunsets)

Brandon

All that footage looks good. Was it shot in full manual mode? Tv mode? The exposure all looks good. Nice smooth zooms. Nice DOF too. I know how hard that is to do with that crummy LCD on the XL2.

Can you give us some idea on how you made such good images? I have never seen any such quality come from my XL2. It renews faith in my XL2.

I agree with Adam, definitely renewed my faith as well. Beautiful footage. What lens did you use?

I shot everything full manual on the 20x lens.

Some background. I picked up the XL2 for this project. The XL series have always been dreams beyond reach. Before that my personal camera was a Sony Handycam ($1000). I have come from a background with 16mm (Narrative Shorts) and DVCAM (Wedding Videography). So I have been used to shooting everything full manual. I can't stand using anything automatic, mostly for two reasons: Settings changing in the middle of a shot, and not having complete control at every instant. I wish I could have gotten ahold of the Manual 16x, but the camera set me back enough, couldn't afford it for this project.

For the zooms, I used the 20x's built in rack zoom feature. I used it a lot during shooting, because you can keep your hands completely off the camera. For the film, I wanted to slowly reveal objects or landscapes, and this feature worked perfectly for it. I only wish you could set the rack focus to be slower. It is kind of worthless right now.

As far as DOF, I definately took advantage of the 20x. I often step back another 5-10-15 feet to get a smaller DOF.

I always tried to keep the exposure/aperature in the middle of the range if I could, seems to me that it gives the best color/light range and keeps a slightly smaller DOF. Could be crazy though.

For outdoor lighting, I often kept the white balance on the outdoor preset, it seemed to do fine.

I usually had a circular polarizer on when outside. I adjusted it with every single shot.

The LCD is not easy, but you really get used to it. As far as manual focusing. I zoom in-focus-zoom out. What works best for me is after zooming in, I quickly spin the ring back and forth a couple times, past the focused point. This way, with a couple back and forth racks, I can quickly dial into the right focus. This is my first documentary, and I noticed that the speed in which you can focus makes or breaks a shot.

I used a slightly tweaked documentary preset, crushed the black a little more, and took some red out in the second half of the trip. For night shots I crushed the blacks a lot, gives the lights much more presence. I used Cinegamma.

I also raised the shutter speed often. I love the look of water and fast movement at about 1/420.

A few of the shots I mildly corrected in post. Basically, I just darkened the low end slightly, making colors more vibrant.

The most helpful thing I could say perhaps after doing this project is never set down the camera, for two reasons.
1) The moment you turn your head, you're gonna miss something.
2) After pretty much shooting straight for a month, I know the camera so much better now. The faster you get, the more time you have to try the same shot with a little higher or lower exposure, or a slightly tweaked polarizer, gives you so much more to work with later. When I had a good source to charge my batteries (1st half of trip), I often left the camera on all day.

Brandon

Brandon,

Great work. All I can say is it makes me want to go to nepal!! Were I younger and still capable of climbing i would be on a mission!! But, I would have my camera with me!!

Hi Brandon,

Awesome job - I loved it all (video, composition, pacing, music). Any of us who do "regular" shoots certainly appreciate the logistics of slepping all the gear up Everest... I can imagine the thought process:

Pack a gallizion batteries and tapes, Pelican case on the plane - Portacase on trek, 3X stay with the Pelican at the bottom of the hill, pack the fisheye or a wide-angle bayonet, remember filters, 2 Sennheiser systems (in case one fails), tripod and glidecam stay behind, don't forget rain protection gear, lens cleaning... OMG - will I every make it?

You da' man!

Michael

Wow man that was excellent.

That was amazing! The best shot comes at 3:23 in my opinion, with the guy looking out at the mountain range...

What one earth were those people doing with the tree in Nepal? And did you colour correct for the roof of that red hut? It really jumped out from the rest of the scene.

Michael-
Yeah, it was pretty much like that. I had 7 of the BP945 batteries ($10 each on ebay, worked really well), 60 tapes, wireless and shotgun mics, a tripod and a backup camera (Small sony). I had it all in a KATA 502 Backpack (not the tripod). Was gonna bring a full boom setup too, but decided against it last minute.

Kyle-
I like to call it the Trojan Christmas tree. It's a festival they have in Kathmandu where they drag this huge thing a couple miles through the city. Not sure why. I just happened to come across it roaming the city. As far as the red hut, I believe I just darkened the shot slightly, no color corrections. The documentary preset does bring up the reds a little bit.

Which brings me back to a question. Does anybody have any suggestions on how to lessen or get rid of the jagged edges and bleeding in reds and pinks? It is noticable in the first shot and the shot with the red building in the hiker's backpacks. It's a problem I have been seeing in a lot of the footage.

Thanks,
Brandon

Brandon,

Checkout the Natress Big Box of Filter plugin's for FCP, they are definetly worth the money and seem to be able to do most things

Bob

Amazing! i need to get myself to India! Even Nepal!

Really liked it! :)

Brandon, You really made the XL-2 sing. Fantastic job. I will be trying those settings. I watched it several times and love the crisp clean shots of the mountains. You really had yourself an adventure. Good for you. Bob ps, what rain cover did you use? I am heading for Brazil in June and need to get a good, light weight rain cover. Thanks.

sweet footage, brandon! which everyone has commented on...but where you really shined was the edit. the locked-down trekking shots of the mountains got a little slow towards the end, but this starts out so strong and is sustained for the most part. you put it together so nicely.

really enjoyed this...looking forward to reading the blog.

what are you going to do with this project? or should i read the blog to find out???!

Thanks for the replys.

Bob - I used the Kata Rain Cover on the camera. It is good. A little tight around the microphone, which makes it tough to get on quickly, but it was able to cover the camera as well as the Dual Battery Setup on the back. Worked great in rain and snow. There is a full list of the equipment I used on the blog (http://www.lostsummitfilms.com, click on equipment link).

Meryem - I am still figuring out what I want to do with it. Depending on the footage I am still going through, ideally I would like to make a doc/video diary focusing on my attempt to film a catholic zen monk trekking across India and Nepal while at the same time trying to find my own "spiritualiy" (ability to relax) while making a film. During the trek I filmed about 15 journals with myself and my frustrations with being able to get something out of the trip with my head in a camera the entire time. If that doesn't work, maybe a travelogue, or even trying to simply sell some of the footage. I am expecting at least 6 months until I have a full rough cut.

I will be posting updates as well as short videos and screen captures on the blog as often as possible.

Thanks,
Brandon

i'm right there with you. i just got back from bhutan, where i shot a commercial video and a doc for two separate parties, but of course, i shot a lot of footage and am free to use what i don't use in their videos in any way i choose. but i'm not sure which of the many directions i should take it for my personal projects...i have a few ideas.

i could certainly relate to the entire village turning out to mug for the camera.