"Magic Hour" in the mountains

[skinnyboy]

This clip is from a camping trip to New River Gorge in West Virginia last weekend.

http://hv20.info/yopu/magicmountain.mov

It's all handheld, and pretty shaky a couple times - sorry about that. Uneven ground. Plus Scotch.

All 24p, Cine mode. Captured in FCP, deinterlaced using JES_Deinterlacer, exported using Compressor (not very happy with the quality of what I'm posting - I still need to find an optimal setting for small size yet good picture). No color correction done.

Also - I kept auto focus on. It's pretty quick once it gets its bearings. The first shot of the fire demonstrates this pretty nicely.

I labeled my f-stops, and did a bit of bracketing so you can see how the camera reacts to the same light with aperture changes.

Yeah - and the zooms remind me of 70's kung fu movies for some reason.

I have some more footage of daytime on a nearby lake that I'll get up soon.

Finally (is anyone still reading?) the music is just something I whipped up.

Jason

[johnbatista]

Some really nice shots going on there :hv20-smilie77:
I'm actually planning on making a short film in the nearby woods when i get my hv20, good to get some idea of what it might look like. Of course most of my shots will be on a tripod.
Nice one

[Mal]

Looking mighty nice! :hv20-smilie77:

[jaelupo]

Nice footage! I like the shot through the fire and smoke.

[skinnyboy]

Thanks, all.
Gotta love smoke - it makes any shot look good.
:-)

[Critters]

Very nice footage, if it is shot in 24p, why did you deinterlace after you captured?

[skinnyboy]

Gotta remove the extra frames. 24p records in a cadence that goes iiPPPiiPPP
interlaced vs. progressive. Editing programs can't cope with that. Other cameras put flags in that allow the extra interlaced frames to be pulled out when importing, but the HV20 doesn't have that (there is a petition to Canon to get it added via a firmware update, though). So, you have to do it manually or use a program like JES to do it for you.

Did that make sense?

[Critters]

Nope :) Does the PAL model do this?

[DSleep]

cool stuff and helpful to see those aperture changes.
thanks Skinny!

[bluegrass]

beautiful man. how close were you to the fire when you shot that sequence? did you back away from the fire as you were shooting or just start zoomed in and slowly zoom out.

i have found and i don't know exactly what it is but it's magical in real life as it is on film, and that's early morning when the dew is on the ground, the mist is on the meadow, fog drifting on the river or in the evening when the sun is setting, the frogs are starting to croak and the whipoorwills soon to follow. yes, i call it magic time. colors become richer and everything seems vivid.

yes, there must have been a lot of thought put into the "plan" we see, hear, feel, and smell the results of, if we open our minds to it - this planet we live on.

since i have a great love for the outoors and camping, your clip was dear to my heart. i thought you did an excellent job and i only hope i can do half as good as you did. i might get my chance this week down at a cabin in the ozarks.

i highly recommend, if you haven't tried it, find some friends and do what it shows in this clip - campout. and if you haven't done it before, do it the first time with and experienced camper.

[skinnyboy]

Critters - the PAL model doesn't do this. 25p is simple and easy to work with, so I hear.
Are you in PAL-land?

[skinnyboy]

Bluegrass - I was cold when I shot that stuff, so I tried to stay close to the fire. But I also used zoom quite a bit.

I was glad I decided to take the camera along to do some tests. The light was pretty amazing.

Now - broad daylight is another matter entirely, which you will see when I post the other footage.

[CrEsT]

Beautiful footage skinnyboy...

I will go for vacations in a couple days to Alaska, still not sure if I should record everything in i60 or 24P... yours looks amazing.

[skinnyboy]

I plan to use the HV20 for making narrative films (shorts, and maybe not-so-shorts). 24p works best for that, in my view, so that's why I am testing the 24p now.
The 60i looks amazing, too, it's a question of what you plan to use the camera for. If you aren't sure, shoot the same footage both ways and compare.

[crobs808]

for small size good picture use Photo JPEG or H264

[skinnyboy]

Thanks, crobs,

I did use h264, it's a question of finding the best settings for a managable file size that still looks good. The data rate in particular makes the file bigger, and better looking.