MuskOx at Sunset

[Gabriel Yeager]

Beautiful footage Per! I always love your snowy mountains and MuskOx.

Thanks for sharing!
~Gabriel

[Peter Rhalter]

Per,

Wonderful images and atmosphere. I've watched it several times.

If I may ask, is there is any chance you could use a parabolic mic to capture some of the animal sounds, too? As long as they aren't moving around much this seems like a possibility if it interests you.

Again, thanks and congratulations - the footage is gorgeous.

Best wishes,
Peter
______________________
http://www.parkfilms.com

[Dale Guthormsen]

per Johan,

Always great stuff. keep it up as it is like watching Trailer or prequill to your discovery channel premier!!!

I am down loading the last one as I write this, can't wait.

[Tony Davies-Patrick]

Originally Posted by Peter Rhalter

Per,
...If I may ask, is there is any chance you could use a parabolic mic to capture some of the animal sounds, too? As long as they aren't moving around much this seems like a possibility if it interests you.

Peter brings up a question we asked Per last year when he was shooting with his XL2 set-up.

I feel the best way to gain extra sounds of the Musk Oxen would be to use something like a toy radio-controlled 4WD vehicle with battery pack and radio mic strapped on, and then guide this gently into position.

Or if the animals are regularly resting in particular spots, simply set-up your radio microphone equipment in one of those areas prior to their arrival (attached to a rock, or camouflaged and left in position).

You could also overdub some Musk Oxen natural sounds taken from a quality Royalty-free CD that someone else has recorded. You'll need to work with the 'lip-synch' of the animal to match the natural mouth movements with the recorded sounds, but it can be done.

[Rick A. Phillips]

I've been trying to download this for two days and all I ever get is "server not found". I've tried with both IE and Firefox. Any suggestions?

Rick

[Kevin Railsback]

Strange, I just right clicked and tried to download it and it's working just fine, no issues at all.

[Tony Davies-Patrick]

Originally Posted by Rick A. Phillips

I've been trying to download this for two days and all I ever get is "server not found". I've tried with both IE and Firefox. Any suggestions?

Rick

Do not directly open the file. Right click the heading until the box drops, and then click "Save Target as...". The file will begin to download to your chosen documents, and then open the file when complete.

I found that Per's clip would play without sound on Quicktime, but plays perfect with sound on VLC player (VLC plays most types of video clips without problems).

[Rick A. Phillips]

Don't know what's up. I figured it was at my end because no one else seems to be having any problems with it. I have been trying right-click save as and it just won't work. I can't even get to the web site...just says site not found. Just tried again from Firefox and IE...no go. Now that I think about it...I've never been able to even pull up Per's webpage because I remember trying a while ago. Guess Charter just doesn't want me to see the good stuff! Youtube I get...fantastic muskox footage...not for me. I'll keep fooling around and see if I can figure it out. Thanks for the info.

Rick

[Per Johan Naesje]

Sorry to hear that some have trouble to download the file! I have made a smaller one at my website:
http://video-film.no/snutter/muskox6.html

Hopefully this will play fine for you, if not please tell me and I will try to figure out sometining.

Regarding the sound of the muskox. In some of my clips it may look that they are shouting, but in fact they almost don't make any sound at all. If you go near enough you can hear the breath but they seldom make any sound.
In the rut season at autumn the male do some roaring.

I have been using Sennheiser shotgun mic. ME-67 in some instances just to capture nature sound, but even in short distance to the animal you seldom hear any but some low breathing mixed with the wind which almost constant blowing.

[Rick A. Phillips]

Thanks Per Johan but the problem is somewhere on my end of the connection. For some reason my network is not able to find the server on your end. The still photos look awesome.

Rick

[Per Johan Naesje]

Rick, I'v got some place in the DvInfo.net server, try to download this version. Remember to rightclick and download before viewing:

http://media.dvinfo.net/xlh1/pj/muskox-winter.mov

Hope this will help you out?

[Rick A. Phillips]

Ok. I got it with no problems. I'm watching it for the third time already. That is just outstanding. Congratulations on your fine work...hope it continues to go well for you. Thanks so much for taking time to help me out so I could see this. Looks like I could reach out and touch one thru the screen!

Rick

[Peter Rhalter]

Originally Posted by Tony Davies-Patrick

Peter brings up a question we asked Per last year when he was shooting with his XL2 set-up.

I feel the best way to gain extra sounds of the Musk Oxen would be to use something like a toy radio-controlled 4WD vehicle with battery pack and radio mic strapped on, and then guide this gently into position.

Or if the animals are regularly resting in particular spots, simply set-up your radio microphone equipment in one of those areas prior to their arrival (attached to a rock, or camouflaged and left in position).

Yes, these suggestions would work better for capturing low frequencies which is the parabolic's weakness. I wonder if a radio-controlled car could make it through deep snow - Tony, have you ever tried that? I don't have much chance to play in the snow where I live.

I don't wan't to detract in any way from Per's splendid accomplishment, but it would have even more impact with some natural sound.

Best wishes to all,
Peter
______________________
http://www.parkfilms.com

[Brendan Marnell]

[QUOTE=Peter Rhalter;

I don't wan't to detract in any way from Per's splendid accomplishment, but it would have even more impact with some natural sound.

[/QUOTE]

Thoroughly agree with you Peter. The visual impact of Per's videography is so powerful in a uniquely natural way that it deserves natural audio to go with it. It may be very difficult to do it but the end product would be an audio/visual model for us all, probably the best I will ever see and hear.

It's so easy for me to say "How about it, Per?" but we do hope you get around to it and sincerely wish you continuing success. From the comfort of our cosy corners we're yelling for more Per, more Per ...

[Tony Davies-Patrick]

Per - Is your shotgun camera mounted? I don't think you'll capture much at that distance anyway. Like you mentioned, they don't make much sound, so any sound-capture device - your mic - needs to be as close as possible to the subject, and this is why I said use the wireless microphone, or the shotgun with a radio/wireless connector.

Just the heavy breathing, the sound of its rough tongue licking its lips (where it shows it in the clip), snorts, the rubbing sound when one scratches it’s head on the rock, scuffling of hooves, etc, combined with some other nearby nature sounds; plus the clean sound of the wind blowing sometimes to add atmosphere, all blended in with the background music. I'm sure this would lift the visual sequence to a higher level.

On the cinematography level, that looks great with wonderful colours (although possibly slightly too rusty/red in some scenes that bleeds to the white snow). The deep blues were perfect (PL filter used?).
But…and this is minor but, Per, I still felt that there wasn’t enough happening. I know that these animals can spend a great deal of time not doing much, but I would have liked to have seen just a few moments where the Musk Oxen were doing something more interesting.