With the stylistic question settled, I moved on to contemplating the technical aspects of the shoot.
My camera is a Canon 600D. I’m using Magic Lantern and Tragic Lantern firmware to upgrade its capabilities and provide a lot more control over what I’m shooting.
This leads to some interesting choices: resolution, frame-rate, codec and colour depth.
The initial (and still the most likely) plan is that I shoot using Tragic Lantern in sRAW 4:4:4 at 24 fps and with a scaled up resolution of 720p.
This will give the greatest latitude for detail, colour correction, VFX and allow us to deliver a final short in HD format.
It’s not without its drawbacks though. The data rates from the 600D aren’t the greatest, even with fast cards, and the workflow is a lot more involved, including needing a lot more time, effort and processor power…
The alternatives including hiring an Atmos Ninja HD recorder or buying a Black Magic Design HD recorder. These would allow capture of the cameras HDMI output, but on the 600D this again would be 720p maximum, at a colour depth of 4:2:2 (good enough for our purposes). This route is obviously going to be an expense, but will be our main option if I can’t get tragic lantern to work.
Our closest rental house has the Atmos Ninja on hire, but for three days it costs the same as buying the Black Magic Design recorder, so that would be a tricky one. Ideally, though, we shoot in sRAW from tragic lantern.
As a few of the locations are quite intimate, I might hire a 10 – 55 mm lens from the rental house to allow a wider range of shots in a tight room. I noticed that 2001 has a lot of distortion on a lot of the “Discovery” footage, but the extremely wide angle does make the ship look at lot larger than it probably did on set, and the distortion heightens the feeling of looking from HAL’s viewpoint.
Also, the kit 18 – 55 mm lens is not a great lens. It’s hard to focus and feels quite plasticky and unsubstantial under my fingers. The rental lens is of much higher quality and will allow wider apertures and better zooming where necessary.
So that’s where we are today. More soon!
Next time: Final Draft
Are You There? A sci-fi Short Film 