Facing blindness, metalsmith Andy Cooperman renews his commitment to making things worth seeing.
What would you do if you faced going blind?
This video is the second in our series about people who make things by hand in the Seattle area. Our next piece will profile a former college mate of mine who has chosen an unusual occupation: coffin maker.
A few people have asked me, so I thought I’d share a little, about how I lit this piece. Or rather, didn’t light. I achieved the dramatic, dark mood of this piece primarily by removing light.
I had intended to carefully light Andy with a couple of softboxes with egg crate. But after turning on one of our Arri 650s, it was clear that was going to way overdo it. I blocked off one of the windows entirely with black foam core, and partially blocked the studio’s skylight with a flag extended to the ceiling on a c-stand. I then closed all the partially opaque window shades. This had the effect of stopping down all the daylight two or three stops. I white balanced the camera for tungsten, which shifted the dim daylight entering the studio toward blue-green.
Then, depending on the angle of the shot in the studio, I selectively opened the shades for additional fill. The rest of the light, with a couple of exceptions (the shot of him hammering the molten metal and the shot of him walking under the cleaver), came from Andy’s practical lights in the studio. Those two exceptions actually feel overlit to me. That’s why I changed course and just went with available light.
Sometimes it’s really important to throw away your plan and do more with less.
Some BTS shots that my talented producer and sound recordist Lisa Cooper snapped with her iPhone show how much light we had to eliminate to get that mood:
Ever wonder how those simple looking iPhone ads are shot? We recently solved this puzzle to create an iPhone app commercial for a client. The challenge: make iphone screen/hand interaction look fantastic on camera. Let’s start with a look at the finished video, and then jump into how it was shot. Later this week, I’ll post a followup with information about how we cut it.
In preparation for this project, I did some Googling and found much disagreement in the pro video forums on how to approach shooting an iPhone screen. Some recommended filming the screen live, others suggested painting green paint over the phone face, and one person said it couldn’t be done without complicated compositing software like Mocha.
We spent a full day of pre-production testing different approaches, and hit on a relatively simple way to do the job, with post-production handled almost entirely within Final Cut Pro X. Here’s how it works.
First up: overall lighting. Our first pass at lighting the hand holding the phone was a little too dramatic – we discovered it’s important to fill at almost a 1:1 ratio, otherwise the shadows cast by the finger on the screen area will be way too dark to key easily, as will be seen later. I’ll cut to the chase and share our lighting diagram, as well as the fact that we ended up using two setups: a white background to capture the establishing shot with the hand and phone, and green screen for everything else.
First, let’s briefly look at what doesn’t work. We initially tried shooting the app off the phone itself, but I suspected it wouldn’t look good enough to stand up to close inspection. I was right. Not only was the screen subject to moire patterning, but it was difficult to get the color temperature of the screen’s LEDs to match with the lighting in our studio environment. It just didn’t look professional. So we knew we would need to do some kind of masking or keying to show a screen capture of the phone in the display area.
Next, we needed to determine whether the talent could hold the phone still enough. It’s unlikely that anyone has more steady hands than my partner Lisa, but close up with a 100mm lens, it wasn’t possible for her to hold the phone even close to steady. We next tried making a cradle for her hand. But within a few minutes of holding the phone, she was getting really tired and that translated to more shake. Scratch that idea.
A close screening of this Apple ad reveals that after the hand comes into the shot, it settles quickly into complete stillness. That is, a still photo. Or in our case, a freeze video frame The only hint of motion in the talent’s left hand during the remainder of the shoot is a shadow falling on his fingers caused by the movement of the right hand approaching the screen. So I thought: let’s just have the talent move the phone into the shot, freeze the frame, and use that for the duration. Then we’ll composite the right hand doing the manipulations.
We solved this problem by doing a frame grab, but we couldn’t get the hand to come to rest naturally. So we ended up introducing the hand and phone by using and using Apple’s Slide transition to slide it into the frame (slide-push, to be precise: you access these options by control-clicking on the transition in the timeline, and selecting from among the options in the Inspector). I go into more detail about how we cut the ad in Final Cut Pro X in part II of this post, coming later this week.
Ultimately what we realized is that it’s all about the app, not about the hand. On screen, anything that moves gets our attention. So the hand shouldn’t move after it’s introduced. Just doing a freeze frame accomplishes everything that needs to happen, and keeps the attention where it belongs. Left hand with phone, as shot and ready for luma key (discussed below in Editing):
Next problem: how to composite the right hand into the scene. The further problem, of course, is that the talent needs to hit very specific buttons and perform actions like pinching on precise points on the screen. It seemed we would need to keep the phone there for reference, but we weren’t sure how we’d key it out in that case.
We tried displaying a green screen on the phone. But that tended to illuminate the talent’s hand, making it harder to key. I hit on the idea of taking screen shots of the app, converting them to black and white, then colorizing them and shifting them all to green.
Recording screen captures: an app for that?
Around the middle of last year there was an app called Display Recorder available. However, it has been pulled from the App Store for some reason, so there’s currently no app that does this directly.
The good news is that there IS an app for capturing iPhone screens, indirectly, via Airplay on a Mac. You don’t even need an AppleTV to make it work: just a Mac and an iPhone 4s or newer (sorry, it won’t work with older iPhones). It’s called Reflector, and it costs just $15.
If you’re shooting an iPhone ad, you want this app. Not only does it allow you to mirror the contents of your phone’s screen, but it has a robust set of preferences that seem designed with filmmakers in mind.
First exhibit: Built-in video recording capabilities (no need to use Quicktime 8 or third-party screen capture tools) that allow you to record in the highest possible resolution supported by your hardware.
Next: the option to wrap the contents of the screen in an iPhone frame (you can choose white or black).
But wouldn’t be even cooler if you could have the video output against a green screen, so you could just drop a key on it and away you go? No problem. Just select this preference:
And tell it to output in full screen mode:
This will output a file that looks like this:
Armed with this tool, you’re able to capture a screen recording of all the on-screen action you will need for your final piece. But’s only half of the battle. We now need to turn our attention to figuring out how to add finger gestures into the mix.
For that, we need green screen. And a way to ensure that the talent’s fingers would be pointing to the precisely correct location on screen, so that when we composite everything in post, it lines up.
After a lot of testing, we hit on a way to do it. In Photoshop, we created a 2″x3″ file (the dimensions of an iPhone screen) which we filled with bright green (make sure it’s not a yellow-green, but rather pure green or slightly blue-green, because any yellow can start to overlap with skin color making it difficult to key).
We created a file for each set of actions (analogous to a “scene” in film terms). The idea is to create buttons using a darker shade of the same green color, to show the talent where the button is. Each button is then numbered in the order in which they are to be pressed, swiped, or pinched. We used stroked rectangles to indicate swipe regions. But how to know exactly where to create the buttons? We took screen shots of the iPhone app screen (by simultaneously pressing the phone’s home and on-off buttons), and copied these files into our green file, placing them on the bottom layer. We then made the green layer half transparent, so that we could see through it enough to trace the outline of each spot, and make precise marks.
Then, we printed out each screen on regular paper. The first time they came out way too dark, so we had to go back and choose an even lighter shade of green. Once we got the color looking something like a green screen, we cut each out of paper using a ruler and exacto knife, and taped it to a piece of piece of green foam core about 1.75″ wide by a few inches tall.
To put this together requires shooting in front of a green screen, and holding the cardboard screens suspended vertically on a clamp using a c-stand, so that they are positioned comfortably for the hand talent. Here’s how our setup looked:
Some gotchas to watch out for:
Reflections. Our hand talent had received a manicure the morning of the shoot, so his nails were nearly perfect – for reflecting light. This caused us a lot of grief.
We ended up scrubbing his nails with a kitchen sponge, the only thing we could find, until they were dulled down a bit. A good reason to have a makeup person on set!
Above: Fingernail with reflection reduced after roughing up surface of nail with kitchen sponge.
Shadows on the green card. As the talent’s hand comes into contact or near-contact for each button press, shadows will be cast. We had to set up a third fill light just behind and above camera to cut these down enough so that we could get a clean key. This caused the right hand to be lit a little brighter and more directly than the left hand had been, but we found a mid-point that we could live with.
Using this approach involves the following steps:
1. Script it. We created a storyboard for every screen. Know in advance exactly what the voiceover will be, and which graphic will be displayed on screen, and what gestures you will need.
2. Build green
Location
We rented studio space at The House Studios in Queen Anne for this shoot. Their rates are not prohibitive, and the place is spacious, clean, even a bit swanky.
There is a kitchen area, changing rooms, and comfortable waiting area with couches and tables. It’s no good for sound recording, with lots of HVAC white noise. But it’s great for MOS projects like this one. Having the extra space made everything go smoother and faster.
Equipment List
Here’s a list of all the equipment we used to pull off this shoot, starting with the pile my front porch on the morning of, ready to load:
24×36 silk, 24×36 flag, 4×4 foam core with roscoe reflector glued to one side.
5×8 sheet of bleached muslin
8×10 sheet of blackout cloth
Milk crate loaded with pair of 15lb Matthews sand bags; handful of 10lb shot bags for anchoring light stands.
Misc A clamps and background stand clamps.
Background stand.
15″ 2012 Macbook Pro
Lexar USB3 CF card reader
4TB Lacie 2big Thunderbolt hard drive for on-set data backup.
Studio supplied gear:
Traveling wall (for white background)
c-stands, a clamps, grip clamp, heavy duty extension cords
OK, so we’ve got all the footage dialed. How does this all come together in post? Join me later this week for part II of this post, where I’ll explore how to edit an iPhone app commercial.
We created a trailer for the fast-growing Seattle Tech Meetup, an event hosted by Red Russak and Brett Greene. The event is pushing 250 attendees, and is a great place to meet like-minded people in the tech and entrepreneur space. RSVP for the April meetup right away if you want to go – it’s guaranteed to be fully booked.
This was my first project using Davinci Resolve for the color grade. My experience: wow, it’s powerful, but it’s not trivial to learn. Favorite feature: power window tracking!
The dreamy shallow depth of field was accomplished with an old 35mm Nikkor f/1.4 thorium lens (everything shot at f/2.0 after much testing), which reaches is full-frame potential on my 5dmkiii.
Here’s the first in a new series of videos we’re making about local, handcrafted goods produced in the Seattle area. This one spotlights Project V, which began speakeasy style with a small still in Mo Heck’s garage. The code name for the project was “Project V”— for vodka. “It kinda got outta hand,” says Mo. “We would show up at parties and our booze would get there before us.” Two years ago they went legit and are now making some of the finest handcrafted vodka in the Seattle region.
Halfway through this shoot, I released my 5dmkiii from the tripod and gave it to Lisa, who has much more steady hands than I, so she could pick up a couple shots. Unfortunately, I failed to check my shutter speed after she gave it back, and the rest of the shoot was acquired at 160th/sec shutter. The upside: the droplets of water look great! The downside, of course, is that shots with motion are juddery and lack cinematic smoothness.
I lit this primarily with a couple of 650-watt Arri fresnels, with a 250-watt Lowel Pro-light for a kicker. I lit the walls with shop lights they had on location.
We teamed up with sound recordist Brian Olson for this shoot, and it was a pleasure to be able to just forget about sound and not even think about it, knowing that he was on it. We’re thrilled with the results can’t wait to work with Brian again.
Got a 60-second film in you? My friend Matt Lawrence has picked up some big sponsors for his Sixty Second Film Festival on Vashon Island, now in it’s second year.
Watching this video makes me want to grab my camera and shoot something!
I’m happy to announce that today we’re releasing the trailer for Beyond Naked. Lisa Cooper and I have been working on the film for the past two years. The trailer we’ve been working on for much less time! But we’re really proud of both.
In cutting this trailer Lisa and I have aimed to give you a taste of the story, and a glimpse at the four primary characters that we followed. We hope you enjoy it. We can’t wait to screen the film publicly in Seattle, where we know a lot of people are eager to see it.
The film has already been submitted to festivals, and we’re awaiting news of where it will screen. To stay informed about screening times and later, online options for watching it, join the film mailing list or like the film’s page on Facebook.
Our most recent commercial piece, for Seattle startup Decide.com, is live today. We created a white screen in a conference room at Decide’s Queen Anne office to create the just-the-facts vibe we were going for in this piece. Here’s some production snaps:
Our latest commercial piece, which I shot and helped edit, informs women about a little-known program run by Nordstrom. My partner LIsa Cooper directed this piece, and also did a lot of the editing as well as sound recording. Nice work Lisa!
We’re hoping this video gets shared a lot, because few women know about it, and it’s a fantastic program. Who wouldn’t want to wear any bra she chooses, rather than a surgical bra from a medical supply house? And, Nordstrom’s certified prosthesis fitters are specially trained to fit women for all intimate apparel following a mastectomy, lumpectomy or other reconstructive surgery.
For more information, please visit: http://shop.nordstrom.com/c/prosthesis-program.
Our latest piece, officially launched this morning, is a montage of “what if” questions posed by a few of the game-changing thinkers who will speak at this year’s Seattle Interactive Conference.
Our inspiration for this piece was Jason Silva, whose explosive films have amassed millions of views on the web. He’ll be one of the featured speakers at this year’s conference, and provides the lean-forward moment at the end of our conference teaser. Incidentally, we didn’t have the chance to film Jason ourselves, since he’s in New York and the project had no budget for travel. So we asked him to point a camera at himself and pose three what-if questions, followed by the question about Seattle Interactive Conference. Within 24 hours he replied with the footage we included in the piece. Thanks Jason – we can’t wait to see where your ideas take you!
The 2.3 release of Magic Lantern is full of surprises. My most recent discovery: beautiful 2 frames-per-second time lapses, no post-processing required. This is an otherwise impossible frame rate to obtain with my Canon 60D, because even with a fast card it’s impossible to sustain more than 1 frame of shooting per second for more than a few frames in burst mode. For relatively fast-moving action such as storm clouds, sailboats, or to moving cars, 2 frames per second is a sweet spot.
Yesterday morning I had to drive across town at 5:30am to scout a location for an upcoming shoot. To test out the 2fps feature, I sat the camera on the dash of my car on a coat, and let it run. The results were pretty shaky, but promising.
This morning I took a more polished stab at it. This time, I triangulated the camera to my car hood using MicroGrip heads with 3/8 rods, combined with parts from a MiniGrip mounting kit that I picked up at Glazers over the weekend.
The results are smoothest where the highway was smooth. Unfortunately the road is quite rough on the stretch of 99 going past the city skyline. The new tunnel will no doubt be smoother when it’s completed in a few years, and will an exciting (but claustrophobic) place to shoot this kind of footage.
The documentation for using the FPS Override on Magic Lantern is pretty good (see User Guide, page 2). I used the Optimize for Low Light setting, and I’m looking forward to trying out an even slower frame rate such as 1fps using ND filter during daylight driving.
