Anamorphic Lenses

I've been brought in as the Gaffer* for a short film based on the DC character Static Shock. We're still in pre-production and look to be shooting in April. A few weeks ago the director and I started looking into the possibility of shooting this project in a cinemascope, 2.35:1, aspect ratio.

Most HD cameras record video in a 16:9 aspect ratio (as are most new TVs and monitors) such as this one:




An anamorphic lens uses optics to squeeze a wider-angle image onto a piece of film or a digital sensor. Once you have the image captured you can either stretch it in your editing software (like I did) or you can project it using another anamorphic lens - thus stretching it back out optically. Here is a test with the directors new Panasonic AG-LA7200 anamorphic lens:




As you can see we now get the wider 2.35:1 aspect ratio without losing any vertical resolution or cropping. We also get those mega-sweet anamorphic lens flares that shoot horizontally across the frame.

"But wait!" You say. "There are awesome horizontal lens flares in the "Pilot Light" video as well!"

Yes, but those were added in by our visual effects supervisor and took 48 hours of hand-tracking for that 3 minute video. Now we can just do them in camera!

*I'm also talking to the director about DP'ing - we'll see what happens.

Also: hey r/photography - mcarneybsa

NOT 48hours! lol

went shooting at night again... learned a few lessons, got myself a few mental projects, should be good to keep me busy for a while - oh and for those of you thinking of visiting CHCH - The locals always want you to take their picture and won't leave you alone until you do no matter how long you've been setting up your shot...

UC Climbing Bouldering Competition

These pictures are in reverse order of the competition - and i'm just too lazy right now to flip them










(Paddy demonstrates one of the two proper methods of Kiwi Spotting)

More from Lyttleton

Okay so here are the rest of the shots from sunset at the top of the Christchurch Gondola in Lyttelton.

Mint-Henge

yeah, I was bored and read a Flickr post in the Nikon Digital Learning Center - a challenge to find something in the room you are in make it look interesting. Here you go - total distance moved (including to and from the computer) 10 feet.

a la Vincent Laforet

So if you haven't checked out the other blogs listed on my site you should. Especially Vincent Laforet who is currently in Beijing shooting for Newsweek. Some of my favorite shots of his haven't been his closeups with super telephoto lenses, but rather his tilt/shift work with a 45mm t/s lens. inspired by these I headed to the vision 21 conference center and snapped some shots from on high with the lensbaby - the poor man's tilt/shift lens.

Tom and Jimi's take 2

I love the lensbaby, I really do, it gives a great atmosphere to party pictures...

bloomington, well at least a small part of it

yeah... I don't have any ground-breaking, heart-felt, or otherwise important thing to say at the moment, so here are some more shots with the lens baby and my new lens.

Re-post

So a few days ago I posted some pictures of Christmas ornaments hanging from my tree. I shot them in ambient light and used a tripod to get all of my pictures tack-sharp, (somewhat)well composed, yadda, yadda, yadda. Well yesterday for Christmas, Santa brought me an original lensbaby so without further adieu, here are some of the same Christmas ornaments, but this time with selective focus. At first I was put off by the softness of the images and some of the glare (most likely due to the uncoated optics) buy hey, for a ninety dollar special effects lens, what more can you ask (personally, the look is starting to grow on me). And of course, some glamor shots of Maggie, who was behaving so well today! (bark, woof, woof, good dog)


for those of you looking for more things to be done with a lensbaby, check out this article in this month's issue of Digital Photo Pro Magazine.