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Shooting with HD cameras

Jan 1, 2007 12:00 PM, BY ADRIAN PENNINGTON

High definition is now in daily use for production across a range of programming, including dramas, documentaries, features and corporate projects. Let's look at some examples of its practical use in the field, with feedback from cinematographers and directors who have pioneered the move away from 16mm and DV.

Maintaining a consistent picture

For the 10th series of the drama “Where the Heart Is,” the UK's ITV Productions had no international sales consideration and needed SD-only delivery. The decision to select HD over film was partly to act as a test run for the future HD transfer of flagship dramas such as Agatha Christie's “Miss Marple” and “Poirot.”

The show is produced using two Sony HDW-750s with an SD down-converter and picture cache boards along with 9in SD and 14in HD Sony monitors.

For director of photography Russell Glavin, it was his first experience with HD. He approached the shoot as he would for any DigiBeta or film production. By maintaining the same disciplines of lighting and filtering, he was able to retain the established look for the series. To match the 200ASA film stock used previously, he took meter readings and judged stops without referring to the monitor. Instead, he adjusted the gamma patterns in the camera's menu.

Some directors of photography prefer to categorize high-end HD as digital filmmaking. Such digital filmmaking should use the same level and type of crew as for film: first and second assistant director, director of photography and director.

Most directors of photography have used DigiBetas, so they already understand video. From then on it's a case of trusting the camera to work just as for film. There should be no difference, for example, in the way a director of photography would approach lighting. He needs to meter, although most experts advise against reading from the monitor.

Lenses matter

Glavin used two zooms (Canon HJ11 and HJ18) and a full set of five primes for “Where the Heart Is.” With some zoom shots, there's an occasional barreling of the image, for example, quickly pulling between background and foreground in a dialogue sequence. Glavin said primes tend to shift the image less.

Freelance owner and operator Dan Mulligan agrees that it is important to choose the right lens. He recommends Zeiss Digi Primes, which, while expensive, can pay dividends in production. If a producer isn't technically aware, he won't realize that cheaper lenses lack the contrast ratio, lens breathing and barreling ability of film lenses — all functions that affect the quality of the image.

Glavin deploys a 1/8 black Tiffen Pro-Mist filter to take the edge off the image sharpness, with 1/4 or 1/2 filters used on occasional close-ups to soften the shot and lighten the shadows.

Director of photography John Rhodes said the HDCAM's image needs a little softening, especially if used straight out of the box. For features that need the detail in projection, it wouldn't be so appropriate, but for television, it's good to soften the sharpness a touch, he said.

Rhodes has shot several HD features (“The Purifiers” and “Feedback”) and HD dramas (“Rockface,” “Only Fools” and “Horses”). For Rollem Productions' eight-hour BBC1 drama “The Chase,” he used two Sony HDW-750s supplied with the standard cine-style kit, including two HD lenses (Canon HJ21×8 and HJ11×4.7), a range of Neutral Density and Pro-Mist filters and a Sony color viewfinder, which he describes as essential.

Rhodes' main task was to establish a look for what is hoped to be the first run of a returning series. As a contemporary drama, the aim was not to make it look studio bound but to keep the lighting natural.

Storing camera setups

Rhodes set both Sony 750s with his personal memory card. He doesn't believe in meddling with the in-camera matrixes and said that if directors of photography do alter the settings too much, it can make problems harder to fix in the grade.

Rhodes shot “The Chase” much as he would a straightforward film drama. His main concern was balancing interiors with exteriors while keeping an eye on overexposure. HD cameras don't carry the same dynamic range as film and are more likely to reveal under or overexposure. You can overexpose a huge amount on film and still retain the detail but that latitude doesn't extend to HD. Allowances can be made by setting the camera with the right dynamic contrast and checking the zebra (a viewfinder function that indicates overexposed areas of the image). Some directors of photography dislike HD cameras that allow the tweak of gamma range in-camera and out of the hands of the operator. For Mulligan, the only difference between film and digital film is that you can dial in the film stock in post.