Latest from Kube...

Apr 11
0
iPhone photo with Zeiss ExoLens Wide of the Bristol Cabot Circus apple store

Testing the Zeiss ExoLens on the iPhone 6

By | Camera Reviews | No Comments

Yesterday, we bought an iPad for the company, from the Bristol Cabot Circus store. We bought the iPad so that we had something to take with us for proposal meetings. We opted for the iPad Pro (the 12 inch version obviously, the smaller 9 inch is tiny, looks like an iPad mini). Anyway, on the way out, I had a quick play with the Zeiss ExoLens’, and at £200 a lens (they’re prime lenses, so that’s £200 for a telephoto, then an extra £200 for a wide angle), I was hoping for some great results.

Ofcourse the iPhone and it’s internal lens is still taking the photograph too, so we can’t expect a huge increase in quality, more just the angle.

I’m using the iPhone 6 here, and stood in the same place on all of the shots.

This video shows the difference between the normal iPhone camera, the Zeiss telephoto, and the Zeiss wide angle – all within video mode in the iPhone 6. Ofcourse in video mode it’s much more cropped than it is in photo mode.

The weight is noticeable when holding it in your palm, but really not a problem when comparing it to a larger camera. The lenses are small and easy to carry. Although I had no problem screwing the lens onto the mount, I think it’s a shame there’s no easier “one click” system (similar to how DSLR lenses attach), or some sort of easy release. The threaded screw ons might be a bit difficult when you’re out and about – especially if you’re at a concert or a festival or something.

When taking pictures, it’s difficult to say if there’s been any image deterioration. It really doesn’t look like there is, and why should there be?! These are reasonably pricey Zeiss lenses, and definitely not your “£15 clip on lenses” you get on eBay. I’ve uploaded them in a high resolution if you’d like to take a look (note these are straight off the iPhone with no image control on them at all).

Note on the wide angle shot below, can’t see any barrel distortion, which is very nice to see!

All images taken from the same spot.

Normal – (no Zeiss lens)

With Zeiss Telephoto

With Zeiss Wide Angle

Also, just so you know what they look like…

 

Apr 11
0

Moving to Spike Island, Bristol

By | Office | No Comments

For those that don’t know, our video company, Kube Productions has moved from its birthplace of Bournemouth, to Bristol. We still work in Bournemouth a lot, with a great deal of our clients and friends down there (and oh how we miss the gorgeous seaside). But luckily, the nature of our work allows for us to be quite portable.

Earlier this year, we started working from a creative co-working space called Spike Design (which is in a building called ‘Spike Island’, which coincidently, is also on an island just south of Central Bristol, called Spike Island – Spike everything I know!). The space we work from is full of designers (graphic, product, digital etc), illustrators, photographers. All very exciting, and great to be meeting so many talented people.

There’s also a facility here called “Spike Film & Video” where we have access to a range of film equipment including edit suites, film lighting, and cameras too.

We can’t wait to see how our film and animation business grows over the next chapter in Bristol.

Sep 20
0
C100 Mkii Cover

5 things we love about our Canon C100 MKii

By | Camera Reviews | No Comments

After 4 Months of using a Blackmagic 4K Cinema camera, we upgraded to a Canon C100 MKii. You might be thinking why?

The 4K BMPC records beautiful ProRes and also 4K raw images……… for a total, of about 15 minutes. As soon as the camera gets a little warm, fixed pattern noise begins to take over the image; to the point where the footage becomes unusable. I had tried everything to keep the camera temperature down, I had even got to the point of turning the camera off between shots. In the end I couldn’t trust it to perform, so when our project with AIM Altitude came in, we had to get something to replace it.

After much weighing up between cameras, I eventually went for the C100 Mkii. I have now been using it for 4 weeks, and these were the key things I got to love about the C100 Mkii.

1. Form Factor and Inputs

One reason I went for the C100 Mkii – is that it’s a perfect hybrid between a DSLR and a production camera. After using smaller setups like the A7s Mkii w/Movi M5, I realised the shots you can get out of a small form factor camera. However without a lot of rigging, they don’t have professional inputs and controls such as XLRs and built in ND’s.

We are all about creative shots. Either a camera is awkwardly attached to something, or inside of something to get a unique perspective. These are shots where a small form factor and low weight camera is essential.

2. Wireless Control

Wireless control was something that we thought we would only use when the camera was on a overhead slider or jib, but it has so many other uses. For example when we were setting up lighting, and had a 5K tungsten coming through a window. The wireless viewer allowed our gaffer to take his phone and see the cameras view. He could then make changes to lighting without having to go outside and back multiple times.

We also mounted the camera inside a 5-axis cutting machine. With the wireless control, we were able to quickly adjust aperture, focus and ISO without having to stop the machine. Anything that saves time on a shoot day is a massive bonus!

3. Continuos AF

We know that autofocus is generally frowned upon but it really has its uses! We had multiple shots where the camera would be on a 3-axis Kessler Cine-slider, and we would want the focus to follow the movement. The continuous AF makes this possible. We didn’t have to use any wireless follow focus systems, saving time and money.

4. Low Light

Good low light is essential for us. Having a camera that can be usable at high ISO allows us to achieve much more without having to hire in. We were using up to ISO 20,000 on scenes where we wanted to use only the ambient lighting from the machine. We found it was crucial to do a full black balance when using high ISO’s to get the cleanest possible image out of the camera.

5. Professionalism

This is a bit of an odd one. But there is an element of professionalism associated with the kit you use. A client wants to see equipment that looks impressive, it’s just a reinforcing trust thing. They want to see where their money is going. When you turn up with a DSLR, and the client says “oh I have one of those”. No matter how good the results on the final film are, it just doesn’t have the same presence when on set.

All in all…. our in-house camera, the C100 Mii is one helluva camera for the price!

 

 

 

 

Jul 21
1
Zenmuse X5 Osmo 2

DJI Osmo – Zenmuse X5 – Mini Review

By | Camera Reviews | No Comments

Last week, Andy Cahill who runs Pro Studio Hire, asked us to produce a short video for the homepage of his website. He wanted a fly-through of the reception and his studio space to show off the facilities.

We needed a small and cost effective gimbal stabiliser that would allow us to achieve the fluid motion Andy required, through narrow corridors, and tight doorways. After reading a few positive reviews on the DJI Osmo, we thought we should give it a try and see how it handles.

Zenmuse X5 Osmo 2

Mounted to the Osmo, we had the Zenmuse X5 paired with the Lumix 15mm G Leica F/1.7. After some quick tests, we found that the lens performed nicely at f/3.5, delivering sharp images with little to no purple fringing.

Shooting at f/3.5 and 1/100 did mean that we didn’t have enough light to operate at the native iso of 200. We had no choice but to push the iso to 800 which really is the usable limit, before seeing significant grain on the image. We combated some of the noise using a plugin by ‘Neat video’ called Noise Reducer for After Effects, which cleared up the worse noise and blockiness.

When we shot the clip, we removed as much of the baked in data as possible, but noticed that there was still a significant amount of in-camera sharpening. It’s a real shame there isn’t an option to have this turned off, as I know the footage would have graded much nicer without it.

Without Neat

100{406cf2d6e97c9552f499eb11238a7f965db58e99176ada7eef0f3049e30bbd76} Crop on the graded shot without Noise Reduction – notice how the internal sharpening has degraded the image.

To get the most out of the footage, we shot the film in D-log colour space, which overall delivered a usable dynamic range. I noticed that bright reds were rendered incorrectly as purple, even when conforming with the Zenmuse rec.709 LUT.

The footage isn’t designed for a heavy grade, as the data rate is too low at 60/mbps. When lifting the shadows or crushing highlights, the footage deteriorates quickly, the only way to get around this was to make sure we maintained a nearly perfect look/exposure in each area we passed through.

Pre Grade DJI Osmo

Pre Grade Image

Post Grade DJI Osmo

Post Grade Image

The stabilisation on the Osmo is generally very impressive for such a small device. Something you quickly notice as an operator is that the motion becomes bouncy if you’re not flowing your movement. It’s a lot less forgiving in this respect than the Movi when it comes to pulling off sharp and quick movements.

Behind The Shot

Overall, we were amazed by the performance of the Osmo, and are now thinking in hindsight that the opening hanger shots in our promotional film with AIM Altitude, could have been pulled off with the Osmo and delivered a similar quality of motion. Knowing how impressive it is, it’s definitely a tool we will be using again.

Jul 21
0
Audi-R8-Cover-Wide

R8 Teaser Advert | Audi Poole

By | Automotive | 3 Comments

Working with Double Exposure on their shoot with Audi Poole, we captured all of the behind the scenes content and a promotional teaser video for the newly stocked Audi R8.

Audi Poole – Shoot 4

We wanted to capture the R8’s raw lines and to have it lurking in the darkness. We achieved the look by lighting the top of the R8, with a Bowens CREO SL130 Strip Light. We then used the R8’s bright L.E.D headlights and brake lights to light the rest of the scene, to bring down the exposure of the headlights we used an inverted graded ND.

C100 Mkii Audi R8
Audi Poole – iPhone 2

Using the Canon C100 MkII Paired with Zeiss Planar’s we managed to achieve beautiful low-light colour reproduction.

Audi Poole – Shoot

Because of the busy shooting day we only had 45 minutes to set up and shoot the promo shot.

Apr 05
5
OHS Cover

Overhead Slider Rig

By | Rigs | No Comments

For our latest project with Aim Altitude, we had the idea of capturing a number of overhead shots to gain a birds-eye perspective. We thought about how we could achieve a slider movement from the same overhead perspective. We quickly realised that there are no ‘off the shelf’ overhead slider solutions available. So, to build our own we must!

The Build

We needed the rig to be compact enough that it could be carried in the back of a van, and simple enough to be fully assembled in under half an hour.

This was the MKi build, using a 2m Digislider. There was a fair bit of wobble on the first run through, so we used this right angle camera handle grip (not sure of the name, I think it’s designed to be used with flashes) to balance the camera more centrally to the base of the slider.

E7AD3895-C7A3-456A-8B4B-E53CB53981C5
5EEE70B0-E6A4-46CF-83A9-4F927F20F2AB
02EB75BA-3655-4E3D-913D-72E79D6D4E49

List of equipment used

  • 5ft Kessler CineSlider
  • 4 Metre Scaffold Pole
  • Big Ben clamps x 2
  • Manfrotto Super Clamps x 4
  • Spigot to 1/4 thread x 4
  • Right Angle camera Handle
  • 3 metre studio risers x 2
  • Bungie Cord

Slider

We opted for the Kessler CineSlider because of the inverted wheels on the carriage. When it’s upside down, it functions identically to when it’s the normal way up. We also used the Kessler 3 axis Second Shooter (without the head) which allowed us to keyframe the movement and have it repeatable.

Battery Power

We had planned to have a direct power line but the Mag Charge batteries were amazing –  just one of them lasting for the entirety of the shoot day.

Studio Double Risers

The 3 metre studio risers allowed us to be able to move the rig around quickly. The wheels could also be locked, and 2 people could raise and lower the rig quickly. They gave us the height we needed to have for wider shots while keeping our camera at around 35mm to avoid lens barreling. The stands are also very heavy duty, giving us zero worries regarding weight.

2

The rig was so stable that we could use a 100mm macro with no noticeable shake on the final footage.

1

Lens adjustments had to be made by hand but focusing was all done remotely using the built-in wireless on the Canon C100 MKii – A very handy feature.

3

We were recording to an Atomos Shogun. To get the video signal out of the MKii we used a 5 metre HDMI and had our Atomos Shogun on a tripod just out of frame. We also had this plugged up to a 27” monitor, which helps massively in clearly viewing the focus and detail.

Jan 12
1
Oculus Rift and 360 degree video

Virtual Reality – The future of video?

By | VR | No Comments

Sam Dawson offered to show me an interesting video he found this morning. It’s a fairly regular event and believe me you never know what to expect..

The ‘Weeknds’ new music video is a video with a difference. The YouTube window displays the hand tool allowing you to move the camera in any direction on a 360-degree axis, all whilst the video is playing.

The technicalities behind this aren’t as complicated as you might think, you could say it’s really just an over engineered ‘selfie stick’. A ball of GoPro’s mounted on a pole covers a 360-degree view. Software is then used to ‘stitch’ the individual pieces of footage together.

The up and coming Oculus Rift should be domesticated in 2016, the idea being, you’ll be able to move your head around and view the entire scene. Expect more content like this to come over the next few months. We may even have a go ourselves!

Written by Sam Perkins

Jan 02
5
Inspiration Fridays at Kube Productions

Inspiration Fridays

By | Office | No Comments

This is one of our favourite slots in our calendar.

As you may have guessed, the premise is to look at video content that has inspired us – it’s something we’ve been doing for a long time, but thought we’d share it.

We sit down as a team every Friday afternoon and each show a video of our choice. There is no restriction on the size or budget, it could be a students final year piece, or the latest advert from Honda – the point is to keep the material diverse.

We then discuss each one, focusing on the following significant points:

  • What’s the idea and story behind the piece?
  • How does the idea relate to the purpose.
  • What are the technical elements of the production? and how have they gone about producing it?
  • How does the video assist the beneficiary/client?
  • Does it do the job i.e. sell the product/service?
  • Our emotive responses.

If you’re thinking of doing some video work, you might want to consider these points : )
kubeproductions.co.uk