Gadgets we want: The Holophone H4 SuperMINI

So this is another little gadget for our wish list. You might think it looks a little odd, but this little gem actually records true "expansive 5.1 channel audio" and best of all, it is mountable on most video cameras. Some of it's features:

- World's only portable discrete 5.1 channel camera-mountable surround microphone. Adds Instant, professional-quality 3-Dimensional 5.1 channel surround sound to any video camera with stereo inputs.
- Compatible with existing broadcast infrastructure for capture and transmission.
- Works with any stereo recording device, such as the Zoom H4 and Sony PCM-D1
- On-board multi-channel Pre-Amplifier
- Virtual Surround Headphone Monitor

Hopefully soon, we'll get a chance to pick one up

Zylight - Amazing on and off camera LED lighting system

www.zylight.com

Long story short: This amazing LED light can be mounted on your camera or on a knuckle/light-stand. It draws a fraction of the power compared to current tungsten lighting systems. The color temperature is also programable via the digital readout on the back without needing gels! You can switch to daylight or tungsten with the press of a button. It even has wireless capability so you can remotely program lighting temperature on one or many z90's on your set. Pretty incredible!

Check out Steve Cahill's blog for a cool video about the Zylight:

http://web.mac.com/stevecahill/Steve_Cahills_Blog/Blog/Entries/2008/2/7_Zylight.html

From the manufacturer website: 

"The award-winning intelligent Z90 LED light is by far the brightest compact LED light for film and video production. At over four times brighter than our Z50, the Z90 is only slightly larger and draws the same power.

The palm-sized Z90 gives you the flexibility of variable color temperature and access to any color of the rainbow at the touch of a button - all without gels or filters! Lighting professionals will love the Z90's ability to instantly switch between fully calibrated Daylight and Tungsten, with no color shift while dimming.

Tricky on-location lighting situations are quickly mastered with the Z90's adjustable 2500K-9000K color temperature and variable ±GREEN color correction. The easy to use built-in controls and digital display make set-up fast, with user-defined presets for storing your favorite settings.

The Z90's cutting-edge HD-led™ module is by far the brightest available anywhere. And the Z90's wide 130° spread means one Z90 will easily do the job of two or more inferior bulb-type LED lights.

Plus ZyLink™ technology allows you to wirelessly link together multiple Zylights to create a soft LED source as large as you need. Zylights that are linked together act in concert as if they were one unified LED source, with adjustments made on one light changing all lights in the group. Now that's cool.

You can easily control the Z90's output by snapping on the Accessory Adapter, allowing you to easily mount any standard 3-inch lighting accessory you may already have, such as barndoors or a snoot."

The Flip - compact video recorder

www.theflip.com

Our friend and talented country singer Rockie Lynne (http://rockielynne.com/) was nice enough to give us a Flip Video Ultra Player on a recent trip to Nashville (thanks Rockie!). This cool little device (sells for about $150) takes an hour worth of video in the form of an mpeg4 avi file.

The model we were given has 2 gigs of memory, takes up to 60 minutes of video, has a 1.5" lcd screen (528x132 pixels), captures video at 640x480 at 30 frames per second, has a microphone and speaker for audio capture and playback, works on 2 AA batteries, and has a built-in pop-up USB plug (means no card readers or cables :) ). Doug plans on keeping this baby in his camera bag to document photoshoots on the road. It is so compact! 

Creating the "Pleasantville effect"

Here's a cool effect that is explained how to perform in Final Cut Pro. The ability to create a black and white scene, but only highlight one specific color has been something that certain Hollywood movies have taken advantage of. It was made famous in movies such as "Pleasantville", hence the name, but has also been featured in other movies such as "Schindler's List". We are thinking of using the effect in an up and coming music video. Click on the link above to check out a step by step guide as to how to perform this in the edit room.

Before:



After:

Amazing Lamborghini Gallardo ad

This goes in the section: "Jobs We Wish We Did"

This Lamborghini ad is just brilliant and fun. Amazing visuals and fun concept. Enjoy!

Awesome Battery Charger!

This is the battery charger we want really bad! Designed for Sony EX-1 batteries (BP-U30 & BP-U60), the features include:

- Fast, safe simultaneous charge; high capacity BP-U60 battery packs are ready in about 4 hours. As a battery being charged, charge status is displayed in Volts, mAh (as counted by the charger fuel gauge)

- Digital LCD display indicates the battery pack capacity, if fully discharged before insertion.

- Each of the 4 channels is fully independent of the others, batteries can be inserted/removed at any time.

- Worldwide 100-240V AC

- Small lightweight package

It ships this summer!

Websites we are checking out: Video Static

So, we'd like to expand our music video reel, and while cruising the net, we came upon "Video Static" which specializes in music video news. It's a great resource for people in the film and music industry, but even if you are just a fan, you could possibly find out about how your favorite artist shot their video, and find insider news. Check it out!

B.A.B.E Rally Footage!

We finally got around to putting together some video clips from our B.A.B.E Rally experience from last summer. For those of you who are unaware of what the B.A.B.E. Rally is, it is a rally from the Big Apple (New York) to the Big Easy (New Orleans), in which contestants must purchase a car for under $250. The team that makes it to New Orleans first but with completing all the challenges along the way wins! Check out a short trailer from the trip:

Commercials we wish we could have shot

So word from New York is that Apple is currently shooting their next commercial for the upcoming 3G iphone, which we will most likely all be purchasing the day it comes out. iphone aside, we had to link some of the other bloggers that are covering the ongoing production outside the 5th Avenue Apple store. It seems that the production is pretty large. Now only if we could have been the production team behind it....oh well, maybe next year

another ex-1 video we like

We love the Sony EX-1 so much and it is great to see that others are really using it to the full potential. Vimeo is a great site to see some examples of other people's work with the EX-1. One of them is this clip by Philip Bloom. Although we can't embed this in HD, head on over to the site and see it in HD there...


Love from Southend... HD from Philip Bloom on Vimeo.

Future Tools

We have a project we are currently developing which would require less conspicuous cameras than our workhorses the EX1. So we are looking for something small- real small. We found Sony's HDR-TG1. It records 1920 x 1080 Full HD resolution to memory sticks. This is the smallest we've seen at this quality. ....We'll take 4 thankyou. :)

New music video coming soon!

Just wrapped production on a new music video yesterday. The band is called No Compromises and the song is "Love, Myself."

check em out at www.nocorock.com