BBC TopGear Film Look

[Jose di Cani]

They show the program too on DUtch television. The program is funny (a little bit on the English side; they hate all non-english cars besides the mercedes, BMW and toyota), but the footage is AMAZING. I was watching the show the other day and it really has this quality film look. I don't think they have shot it with 33 mm, cause if you watch closely, including the detailed zoom ins and outs and images while driving the car and the changing persepctions, evrything that is shot has that film look which show that it is IMPOSIBLE they have shot on film. It sooo llooks like it. I am jalous. I am googlin on it right now. I hope they shot it with a gl2 or dvx or something.

[Simon Wyndham]

As far as I know they shoot with XDCAMs. I'm trying to contact the people who make it to find out once and for all.

Regarding their hate of cars, I think you'll find that they also love Ferrari's, Porsche's, that new Holden etc. :-)) In fact it would be very hard for them not to like non English cars because there is now only one totally English car maker left! For the record they hate Rover's.

[Miguel Lopez]

Hello everyone.

Those screen caps where done by me. I am long trying to get this amazing video quality.

Now, for all i know, the shoot in Betacam digital, in 16.9 and then deinterlace the images.


Now, they use polarazing filters (you can notice this sometimes in pans...) , BUT, i am almost sure that gradients are done in post.


Now since all i have is a dvx100 and vegas, i can get "similar" results in terms of color correction and gradients. However, even recording in progressive mode, their images look a LOT better, without noise, and amazing definition. After all, they are working with around 20 times more buget than any of us can do.

I think Top Gear is by far the best that TV is doing now with images.

Here i give you images of my personal tv show:

www.macgregorcorp.com/testdrive/td.htm

Any comments will be nice!

[Miguel Lopez]

Also, i think when they record the interiors, ie; jeremy clarkson driven a car, they used to shot with sony pd150. i do not know what they are doing this year.

[Simon Wyndham]

Those are some pretty good shots you have been getting. As far as Top Gear goes, I'm pretty sure, given the press releases from Sony, that they use the PDW-530P camera. This camera has exceptionally high signal to noise ratio.

[Miguel Lopez]

Umm, but, if that camera records at 25p, why do they deinterlace footage?

[Richard Lewis]

I can definitely confirm that they have been using the Sony PDW-530P XD cams. It has been heavily documented in "The Producer"

Miguel, they aren’t using 150's anymore for interiors, they seem to be using smaller 3 chip cameras, like the DXC-C33/C33P that can actually produce over 850 TV lines!!

BTW, and Top Gear starts on BBC2 in about 15 mins :P

Keep those ideas coming. Simon, I’m eagerly awaiting any news.

[Miguel Lopez]

Check this new images. These are captured images from one dvd, just as they come, in true 16:9.

On the first one (inside tv studio) they use interlaced video. Look at the girl´s face.

Now, the 2nd one, since the logo is CGI, it is true progresive.

But now, the 3rd and 4th screen caps, you can see perfectly that they have been under a deinterlaced software inorder to get progresive images. Why would they do that since the sony records on 25p?

http://www.macgregorcorp.com/try/try.htm

[Steve Wardale]

Miguel, those look really good! Is this your own footage? It looks really promising, and I'd love to see a clip of it, and hear more about how you did it.

[Miguel Lopez]

Well, i don´t know if i can post movies in this forum.

Anyway, this is what i am doing right now in this moment, so it is not over at all.

(very small quicktimes)

www.macgregorcorp.com/dvinfo/in.mov
www.macgregorcorp.com/dvinfo/regalito.mov
www.macgregorcorp.com/dvinfo/buenatoma.mov
www.macgregorcorp.com/dvinfo/nino.mov

All shot two days ago with dvx100e. Not very proud because it has a lot noise when watching in the tv.

[Steve Wardale]

Amazing stuff!! Those clips really do look like Top Gear. Have you posted these here before and am I just finding these for the first time, cause I love em. I'd say you were on the right track with the filming style, and the low contrast worked very well. Have you tried secondary color correction on the sky?

[Simon Wyndham]

Miguel, what kind of camera mount are you using to shoot the cars when moving along the road?

[Miguel Lopez]

Hello, here is my desktop right now.
www.macgregorcorp.com/dvinfo/clipboard01.jpg

As you see, the first 3 layers of vegas are for the gradients. It takes very long time to render but they need to be there.

One problem that i encount is that i cannot color correct the gradients and the image at the same time, so every level adjust must be done on each layer, and i would get different restults if i worked with the whole resulting image.

To shot this clips i just put a manfrotto 501 tripod on the trunk of a car, and i use sony glasstron to see what i am recording. It is very simple but very efficient.

Soon i will be making a camara car with an old renault fuego. ;-D

Here, an example of a finished video:
www.macgregorcorp.com/dvinfo/x5.mov

Bye!

[Simon Wyndham]

Miguel, that was excellent!

How long do the shoots take you to complete? I noticed that you even had the shutter speed the same as the top gear guys too. Which speed were you using? 1/60?

Have you got a website with an index to all your clips and stills?

[Miguel Lopez]

Same shutter speed? ummmmm, as long as cars move fast, i try to use a fast shutter speed, ie: 250 or 500