I wanted to give a quick shout out to Tim Conway and Del DePierro over at The Integration Company. These guys are top notch on set Supervisors and Integration specialists. They offer a wide variety of services ranging from on set supervision, data acquisition, HDRI, camera tracking, scene layout and more. Swing by their site to see some of the great work they've done.
If your looking to outsource some integration work, I wouldn't hesitate to use these guys. In fact pick up the phone and call them now!
I'll be sitting down with these guys in the coming weeks to squeeze some good tips from them, and it would be "terrible" if this all happend over a pint of beer or two!
until then!
Andy
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
HD Lens to 35 mm equivalents
While on a shoot with an HD camera you will almost definetly here the question
"What is the 35mm equivalent of this lens?" Well you can do some fancy math... or use a handy cheat sheet from Panavision. Of course it's only accurate for Panavision lens but it give you a pretty good idea of what your seeing in a 35mm equivalent across the board.
You can down load the full PDF and a simular one here from Panavision's website. This was another gem from Les. He has a photo copy of a photo copy of this document and I did some digging with the help of Johnny B at work and found this on the web.
Enjoy!
"What is the 35mm equivalent of this lens?" Well you can do some fancy math... or use a handy cheat sheet from Panavision. Of course it's only accurate for Panavision lens but it give you a pretty good idea of what your seeing in a 35mm equivalent across the board.
You can down load the full PDF and a simular one here from Panavision's website. This was another gem from Les. He has a photo copy of a photo copy of this document and I did some digging with the help of Johnny B at work and found this on the web.
Enjoy!
The perfect tracking marker
Hey everyone,
Are you ever stuck with the problem of choosing the right tracker size for the shot? This tiny formula is useful since it works for every scenario. It takes into account the different parameters that can effect the camera angle and the number of pixels in the image.
This tracking marker tip comes from Francois Lord. Francois has been tracking since the 3d equalizer days and has spent a lot of time on set. He has devised a very creative and exact solution on how to calculate the perfect tracking marker size. This formula has been refined over the years by Francois and he was kind enough to share it with us. And now here is ....
The Flord Formula
Where :
T = Tracker size (in same units as D)
P = Prefered tracker size on screen (in pixels) between 5 and 10 pixels depending on the software you will use for tracking
B = Filmback (in millimeters) see table below for reference
D = Distance from camera (in units of your choice)
F = Focal length (in millimeters)
R = Horizontal Resolution (in pixels)
So... If you are shooting a scene with a 35mm camera and a 18mm lens, transferred to NTSC, and the background is at 3 meters from the camera... you can use the following formula...
...to find out that you need to put trackers that are 5 centimeters in diameter on the background to have them appear as 8 pixels big on screen.
Here is a list of different filmbacks that are often used in production. Please let me know if any of this information is inaccurate and I will update it.
Again, thanks to the Francois. And if anyone is savvy enough... I smell a really good iphone app or java application.
until next time.
Andy
Are you ever stuck with the problem of choosing the right tracker size for the shot? This tiny formula is useful since it works for every scenario. It takes into account the different parameters that can effect the camera angle and the number of pixels in the image.
This tracking marker tip comes from Francois Lord. Francois has been tracking since the 3d equalizer days and has spent a lot of time on set. He has devised a very creative and exact solution on how to calculate the perfect tracking marker size. This formula has been refined over the years by Francois and he was kind enough to share it with us. And now here is ....
The Flord Formula
Where :
T = Tracker size (in same units as D)
P = Prefered tracker size on screen (in pixels) between 5 and 10 pixels depending on the software you will use for tracking
B = Filmback (in millimeters) see table below for reference
D = Distance from camera (in units of your choice)
F = Focal length (in millimeters)
R = Horizontal Resolution (in pixels)
So... If you are shooting a scene with a 35mm camera and a 18mm lens, transferred to NTSC, and the background is at 3 meters from the camera... you can use the following formula...
...to find out that you need to put trackers that are 5 centimeters in diameter on the background to have them appear as 8 pixels big on screen.
Here is a list of different filmbacks that are often used in production. Please let me know if any of this information is inaccurate and I will update it.
| Format Name | x size (mm) | y size (mm) |
|---|---|---|
| 35mm (Super 35) - Full Aperture | 24.89 | 18.67 |
| 35mm (Super 35) - 3-Perf | 24.89 | 14.20 |
| 35mm (Super 35) - Transfered to HDTV | 24.89 | 14.00 |
| 35mm - Academy | 21.95 | 16.00 |
| 35mm - Slide | 36.00 | 24.00 |
| 16mm - Standard | 10.26 | 7.49 |
| 16mm - Super 16 | 12.52 | 7.42 |
| 70mm - IMAX | 70.39 | 52.62 |
| Video HDTV - 2/3" 16:9 sensor | 9.59 | 5.39 |
| Video HDTV - 1/3" 16:9 sensor | 5.23* | 2.94* |
| Video NTSC - 1/2" 4:3 sensor | 6.40 | 4.80 |
| Video NTSC - 1/3" 4:3 sensor | 4.80 | 3.60 |
| Video NTSC - 2/3" 4:3 sensor | 8.80 | 6.60 |
* I'm not 100% sure about this one yet.
Again, thanks to the Francois. And if anyone is savvy enough... I smell a really good iphone app or java application.
until next time.
Andy
Monday, February 2, 2009
Good Iphone apps for VFX from VFXHack.com
In my daily search for the end of the internet I swung by one of my favorite sites to see what is new. And vfxhack.com had a great little blog entry about good iPhone apps for on set VFX guys.
They are Clinometer, HDRhelper, Jott, Dropbox, and Google apps. To see how he uses them... cruz on by www.vfxhack.com.
They are Clinometer, HDRhelper, Jott, Dropbox, and Google apps. To see how he uses them... cruz on by www.vfxhack.com.
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