I am a tripod snob and I am very picky with fluid pan heads.

The tripod pan and tilt head is the most important part of the camera chain, in my opinion. If I put it all together in order of importance I would say, one tripod, two camera, three lens, and four viewfinder. Of course you can shoot all hand held, but for what I do and my style of shooting, the camera support is extremely important. The point I am trying to make is the fact that even if you have the best HD camera and biggest lens, you cant hold or compose a shot with a bad fluid head. The pan and tilt head then extends to slider, crane and dolly use as well.

When operating a television camera covering sports, the pivot point is most vital part. I need to know exactly what is going to happen when applying force to a pan arm. The pan head must be perfectly balanced and super smooth in tilting and panning, especially when doing both at the same time. The sum of these parts equals predictable and repeatable movement and the end result is exactly what I want.

The pan head I use to cover Boston professional sports is the Vinten Vector 70. I have been using the same Vector 70 for over ten years and it still performs like the day it left the factory. It is the secret to my signature shot, following the baseball super tight as it leaves the yard. The 70 model has been updated by the 700 and 750, but until the Vector 70 is taken away from me in Boston, it will be my personal favorite. (I actually wish Vinten re-releases the Vector 70TG …the “TG” stands for “Totally Great”, not what you may think…)

So…… there’s a brief glimpse into my tripod insanity. Until you understand the “feel” of the perfect pan head, you will continue to think I am crazy. Please read the rest of my blog before you watch the video blog review below.

I have said many times before that I feel the tripod is the one television tool that I could not live without. I use a tripod as much as I use a camera and I use both almost everyday to earn a living.

If I am going to carry around all the extra weight that a tripod creates, it is going to be the best. And simply put, Vinten is the best.

Over the years, I have used many brands. Cartoni, Miller, Manfrotto (Bogen), Satchler, O’Connor, and Libec. The only head the comes close to the “Vinten feel” is the Satchler. The Vinten Vector series for large studio cameras and Vision series for ENG cameras are as good as it gets. The UK based company knows what they are doing and best of all, they are listening to crazy people like me!

In addition to the perfect balance and buttery action of the Vinten is the fact that the company makes a very durable product. When taken care of, a good Vinten will be the last pan head you ever buy.

I was discovered by Vinten a few years ago because of this website and since that day, Vinten has sponsored and invited me to NAB twice. I have spent time with people who work for Vinten and now I consider them my friends.

I asked the Vinten team last year if they were thinking about making a pan head for DSLRs. I was not totally happy with the feel of the Vinten ProTouch range they were marketing for light weight cameras. The ProTouch heads, in my opinion, were similar in design and feel to the Manfrotto 501 and 503 heads. I did not like the stick and slip feel of the ProTouch range when using cameras like the Sony EX1 and Canon 5dmk2. But, these heads were priced very low, so you get what you pay for even if there is a Vinten logo stamped on the front.

Avoiding the ProTouch range, I was using my expensive Vinten Vision 3 with the smallest user-changeable spring available to make it work with a DSLR. It did the job, had the “Vision Feel” I was after, but was not the solution for light weight cameras. Don’t get me wrong, I love my Vision 3!

I wanted a Vision range pan head that worked with lighter payloads, but could still be adjusted using the perfect balance knob (when the camera got heavier with accessories) and perhaps, was a bit cheaper. The HDSLR market may not widely adopt a pan head over $1000, no matter how perfect it was. But, the demands for a nicely balanced and professional level tripod head were present since the Canon 5dmk2 DSLR was being used in high end production. These DSLRs weigh in at about a pound when not loaded with accessories. So what tripod can perfectly balance such a light weight?

Vinten answered with the Vision Blue. This head is affordable and just under $700. You get a lot for your money here. This inexpensive Vision Blue model functions with a DSLR like a $5000 Vision head functions with a Sony F900 HDCAM! This opens the market to lower budget professionals who can finally spring for a professional tripod.

You can go to Walmart and see just how hard it is to pan and tilt a non-fluid head. If you are just using the tripod as a locked off shot, fine. But you can also use a rock or tree stump for that.

The next step up is to spend a few hundred bucks and get a fluid head that is not really that “fluid”! If you have been using an inferior tripod fluid head for years and you get on location with a Vinten Vision, you will finally understand the point I am trying to make. Once dialed in, It will change the way you use a tripod and the words “finesse” and “silky” will come to mind.

If you are a Kessler CineSlider or Pocket Dolly user, you will have a blast preforming pans and tilts as you dolly left and right. One of my favorite shots in television and film is when you focus on a subject, move the camera down dolly track and pan with the subject keeping it centered in the frame. It is possible to do this with the Vision Blue because of the perfect control you get. There is no sticking or slipping in this head and as you apply pressure, the move remains consistent all the way through the tilt or pan. The weight of the camera as it moves on the head is canceled out by the inner spring in the Vision head.

I have been using a Vinten Vision Blue prototype with my Canon 5dmk2 DSLR for about a month on various shoots. I am very impressed by the Vision Blue and I am happy Vinten is offering it at a lower price. I am also using a Petrol PCBP-1 hikers backpack to get the gear in and out of locations. For the first time, I used a magnifying eyepiece on my Canon 5dmk2 made by Letus called the Letus Hawk.

At the time of this blog review, the price at BH Photo and Video New York for just the Blue head is $697. The cost of the head and the 75mm tripod, floor or mid-level spreader and soft bag is $1199.95. This is much cheaper than the $2,300 I spent seven years ago on my Vision 3! And… I had to change my own springs inside the head when using different cameras!

I tested the head with very little weight, just a bare 5dmk2 with battery and small prime lens. The Vision Blue’s perfect balance knob was set to its lowest point and just managed to balance the less than one pound camera. The only way you could find a problem with this is if you had a camera that weighed half a pound. The Vision Blue would still work, but you would feel the spring push back a bit. Not a big deal, but this tripod system was not built for the iPhone!

The tilt friction control was a bit tough to roll into when I got up around seven, eight or nine. This is also a problem with other Vision heads I have used. You can still get up there, it just takes a little more force to roll the dial. This has never been a deal breaker for me and part of the internal design of the head.

It is not necessary to buy the legs if you already own a set. The Vinten Vision Blue head is the most important part. You could use any 75mm sticks made of aluminum or carbon fiber from another company. I really like the Manfrotto telescopic carbon tripod legs. You can find them by clicking here.

When I tested the Blue with a matte box, monitor, Letus Hawk viewfinder and larger lens, I had plenty of spring left to match the added weight. The head counterbalance system canceled out the change in center of gravity when tilted up and down. The force I applied to the pan bar was equal though out the tilting action and it was very smooth.

This is all a big deal because until now, there was no Vinten Vision range pan head that could handle a tiny camera and still have the perfect balance. This is the first time the internal spring works with you and does not fight back.

Post any questions you may have to the comment section of this blog.

Back by popular demand… I talk to a camera, introduce a cool TV subject, shrink myself down into a little box in the lower right corner of the screen and explain what is going on.

I work in sports television using sick equipment. Using the insane television gear is often the best part of my job!

I hop on camera at Fenway a few minutes early to make sure all my gear is working properly before the game. I am paid to follow the action and I need help to do it. The equipment must be dialed in and balanced correctly so I can lock onto fast moving objects. Most importantly, the video engineers in the truck must properly control the camera. I can’t do it by myself!

I met a bunch of people whom I had only known using social media like Twitter or my website. I was happy to place the @twitterID with a face. Many great individuals around the world and I found this NAB to be very valuable to build up relationships with people in the trade.

I still have one day left to chat tripods and television (Wednesday), so if you are in Vegas, please swing by the Vinten booth in the Central Hall for a quick hello. If you are interested in a new tripod, I would love to demonstrate the perfect balance feature on the Vision series pan head.

I edited a real rough video blog of my experience around the NAB event and tried to highlight equipment that I was interested in learning more about. I used my Sony SR11 with the Sony V1 wireless lav mic system. You will notice that I lost the mic clip early on, so I had to get creative attaching the thing! I will shoot Wednesday as well speaking with the Letus guys and a few other companies making excellent equipment for television and filmmakers. Special thanks to my buddy TJ for his help the first day.

Video blog sponsored by Vinten.

Philip Bloom is not in this video because he became very ill whilst in Vegas. Hope you feel better Mr. Bloom!

First of all, sorry for the quality of the blog pictures! I had to use my Blackberry. I was not ready to take photos for my website at the Bruins a few days ago. I was also not ready for the news that I would be experimenting with a $400,000.00 camera system!

I thought I was just covering a hockey game with a normal HDTV camera like I have hundreds of times. But this was not a normal day…

I have been shooting Bruins hockey for network television for over ten years. I am a hand held cameraman for hockey and I specialize following the puck with an ENG style camera on my right shoulder. I do not record to the camera, the camera is connected to a cable that runs down to a television truck. I am one of eight cameras inside the Boston Garden that bring the hockey game into your living room in high definition.

The last few seasons I have operated the only super motion camera in the building, the 90 frame per second Sony HDC-3300. I wrote a blog on this camera last year. Take a look at the video I shot talking about this high speed technology by clicking here. This year, the super motion camera was too expensive to rent, so I went back to the old Sony HDC-930 1080i 30 FPS camera. Nice camera, but not high speed!

But when I showed up for work a few days ago, I was asked if I would operate a “Hyper Motion” camera. Of course, I said yes!

The NAC Memrecam hi-motion camera technology is about four years old. The camera is made by a company called NAC, but it uses Panasonic technology to make it more “broadcast sports cameraman friendly”. In other words, the camera looks like a Panasonic VariCam on steroids. It uses the same CRT B/W viewfinder, the AG-HVF21G as found on the high end VariCams.

My biggest fear when asked to follow the puck and “shoot tighter than usual” was that the viewfinder would be muddy, delayed or blurry. I was pleasantly surprised to find out that the AG-HVF21G was sharp and clear. In fact, the shuttery look inside the high speed helps me to follow the action. I always ask for 1/120 shutter when working the game shooting with a normal camera.

Another worry for me was that the camera would be hard to operate, unbalanced and heavy. This was also not the case. The NAC Memrecam may have been slightly heavier than a normal HDC-930, but it was nicely balanced and the shoulder pad was very comfortable.

This camera used SMPTE fiber to send pictures back to the truck, or in this case data files. The high speed was recorded on solid state “cinemags” inside the camera body. The tape operator (down at the truck) controlling the replays from this camera had full control of the files (to be rendered) off the camera’s internal memory.

The files were rendered to a separate HD EVS tapeless replay server and the resulting 300 FPS footage was played back using this standard EVS. Bit complicated and that is why I’m not a tape guy, or is it a hard drive guy?

I had intercom communications with program sound back to me as well. Another bonus was the high definition return video (two feeds) back to me. I was able to see program in return one and watch my high speed footy get rendered to an EVS in return two. I should note that the camera only records for 22 seconds in an infinite loop until the tape guy back at the truck breaks the stream to render. When the stream is broken, I was still able to see pictures and returns in my viewfinder… but my camera images was not being recorded until the render was done!

I was told that the camera could record at 600 FPS and it was tested at that speed before I arrived, but the light inside the Boston Garden where not bright enough to expose a picture. The camera was set at 300 FPS and I had a heck of a time focusing the Canon HJ21×7.8 lens since it was wide open. I was asked not to shoot the crowd because there was not enough light.

The Canon 2/3 inch lens was mounted to the Memrecam using a special step ring. I found the crop factor to be about the same in the viewfinder as if this 21x lens was mounted to a 2/3 inch camera body. One thing I noticed was that the lens lost two stops of light sensitivity at the very end (telephoto) part of the zoom range. This is because the sensors are so very light hungry at the 300 FPS.

The Memrecam has three mono-chrome CMOS sensors. Each almost an inch in size. The sensors each pick up one color, red, blue and green. The larger sensor means shallower depth of field. Trust me, when covering a flying puck moving towards you at great speed, you want deep depth of field! I had to follow and pull focus as the puck got closer and closer! I would say fifty percent of my attention was on my focus using this system. I usually only apply twenty percent of my attention to focus on a normal tv camera! Focus for me “just happens”!

A prism sends light to each sensor and the camera has a fan inside to keep it cool running at the higher frame rates. I could hear the fan kick in occasionally, but it was not distracting.

When shooting action sports at high frame rates you start to see some really cool stuff. Take a look at the screen grab above. Look at the bend in the composite hockey stick as the player slaps the puck across the rink. Pretty cool eh?

The novelty of high speed digital capture in sports is gaining momentum. You see the technology at big events like the Masters, hockey and baseball Playoffs and at the Super Bowl. The buzz word has been “1000 FPS”. All the sports production people want 1000 frames per second. They change their tune when they see just how slow the action has become at the high frame rate. You simply cannot get a replay into the broadcast when shooting that speed. There is just not enough time.

So the key to high FPS use in sports is this: You need just one more frame past the point where you no longer have motion blur in the high speed action. So, in other words, hockey would be perfect at 400 FPS. At the rate I was shooting, 300 FPS, the blade and shaft of the stick was slightly blurred on a slap shot. 400 FPS would have been perfect, but then there is the light issue and the flicker!

I did see a problem with rolling flicker from the mercury vapor lights inside the Garden. It did not really show up when I watched highlights on ESPN SportsCenter, but you can defiantly see the flicker in the clips I posted here. This will all improve as these cameras evolve. In fact, the newest generation of Phantom cameras work great in low light, fight flicker and they shoot more frames in a second!

I loved running this camera. It was easy to follow the action and I hope to get to try it again in the future. Take a look at the video below to see some demo footage from the NAC Memrecam.

This video is not to be copied or displayed on another website.

Feel free to look for a de-flicker filter to remove the annoying rolling effect in the 1080p video file above. If you remove it, post the file and send me the link, I would love to see it.

I am gearing up for a big job this weekend. Take a look at the gear I will be using!

I know I have the RED ONE, new Gamecreek MSG New York TV truck, Letus Mini and ContourHD video blogs to finish, but check out this one shot a few minutes ago!

Take a look at the new Letus Light Weight Support Rods! (LWS) I will be using.

I have been looking for a high definition point of view “mini-cam” to cover action sports. My buddy Aaron, sent me a link to a new product made by Twenty20 that appears to fill a void to help cover action from the athletes point of view. And it is very inexpensive bit of gear!

I had been following my mate from the UK, Den Lennie at Tapeless Made Easy and he recently tested out a Sony HD mini-cam. You can find his video blog here. The new Sony HXR-MC1 records 1080i in AVCHD format on memory stick duo cards. This camera even has a little LCD screen to view the video and the recorded files. Nice, but it costs $2700! It is a high end Sony product, but do you really need to spend that for a “crash” camera? You can find it at B&H Video here.

Now there is a cheap alternative for extreme action sports fans. And the guys who try to capture all the sick action.

I found some interesting information on how this camera came about and the guys who created it.

The story about the Twenty20 company began in 2003, when two undergrads from the University of Washington, Marc Barros and Jason Green, put together a simple helmet camera to record their skiing adventures. They won third place in a U of Washington business model competition and took the award money to rent a place to start making the Twenty20 Helmet Camera full time.

They went through a bunch of camera designs since 2003 and they are finally offering an affordable, wearable and decent quality HD mini-cam POV camera. And best of all, the camera only costs $279.99!

I have not used this camera yet, and it is not due to ship until the end of July, but I am planning on contacting Twenty20 to see if I can try out a demo. I want to use it on a project that I will be working on with a bunch of talented mountain bikers from New England later this summer. The video will chronicle the riders as they rip down a remote and non-lift assisted single track line in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. I will be shooting the entire video with the Canon 5dmk2 Digital SLR and I want to mix in ContourHD camera content throughout the short MTB documentary.

Another interesting twist to this camera is the fact that the website where it can be found, http://www.vholdr.com, offers a video showcase of POV action films. The Twenty20 company obviously wanted “community” to be part of their business model. I am looking forward to watching how this idea takes off and I feel that these guys are on the right track.

A few things to mention about this camera, that I have found by researching it. First of all, it is tiny! Look at the picture above to get the measurements. This camera will not weigh you down and when mounted to a helmet or bike frame, the athlete will not even know it is there.

The ContourHD does not have a viewfinder. You simply must point the thing and hope the framing is correct. Not really a big deal, since this exclusion makes for a cheaper price tag and one less thing to get busted during that inevitable, ugly crash.

This camera also only records HD at 720p not 1080. But… you can record in 60fps at standard def, so it is possible to record high speed at a lower resolution. Nice option, for a cheap POV.

The camera records onto inexpensive microSD memory cards and even includes a 2gb card that gives you about an hour of HD and 2 hrs of SD video.

The HD lens is nice and wide, at 135 degrees with no zoom and the body is water resistant made of aluminum and fiberglass. I will need to get my hands on this camera to verify a good build, but again, for the price this thing is disposable.

The ContourHD is powered by a removable and replaceable Li-ion battery and you can record up to 2hrs in SD mode. I am not sure how long you can record in HD with the battery, it is not stated on the website. You charge the camera to full in about 3hrs using USB to computer like an iPod. You can buy an optional a/c plug in battery charger as well.

The camera comes with “Easy Edit” software and works with the PC and the Mac. You use the USB 2 cable to download the h.264 .mov files to the computer. Like the Canon 5dmk2, you will probably want to convert these files to ProRes 422 before you edit with the current version of Final Cut Pro. Editing native h.264 files are very clunky and like to beat up FCP!

In the box you get the camera, the 2gb microSD card, a goggle mount, a flat surface mount, a rechargeable battery and the USB cable. Again, all this for $279.99. That is pretty reasonable for the quality that this little versatile camera can put out. You can find this camera (currently pre-order only) at B&H Video by clicking here.

You can also see a bunch of other videos on the vholdr website by clicking here.

I hope to get my hands on one of these cameras very soon. When I do, I will post another blog with video to show you how the world’s first wearable high definition camera stacks up.

Looking for the “New Hampshire Falls” Film? Click here to watch it.

I love the White Mountains of New Hampshire. I enjoy hiking in the remote wilderness of the northeastern part of the United States. I push my mountain bike into the hills and ride the single track to the base of the mountains in the summer time. I am use to lugging heavy bikes and gear into the wild. So why not TV cameras? The hike is fine, I enjoy pushing myself. I would have to make a few trips because I was alone. One thing I always under estimate are the bugs. I have plenty of blood. If a blackfly wants some, he can have it. But why does the thing have to leave behind a big itchy welt? And why do they fly right into the eyes?

A few days ago, I hauled heavy television and grip equipment into the wilderness because I wanted to bring back pretty pictures from some of my favorite places. The light was ok. Mostly cloudy, so I was dealing with dark, flat conditions.

I really enjoy pointing a camera at water. I find it memorizing, relaxing, and as I stare at it, I notice that patterns in the fluid movement are never the same, the water is constantly changing. I find myself searching for color, composition and reflection in every drop. I love the sound of falling water, the white noise settles the soul and clears the mind. I could spend 8 hours at a place like this, and I did! I had my ipod, so that I could listen to the original score that was created by Tom Salta and Alec Harrison for this film. Beautiful soundtrack.

I own a Sony PMW-EX1 XDCAM camcorder and I have a Letus Ultimate 35mm lens adapter. I set the camera to record 720p at 30p with overcranking. This allows me to record 60 frames per second and get fluid slow motion as the water moves down the ravine. I ran the Letus Ultimate at “99″ the entire time I shot at the locations. I had a Zoom H4 stereo solid state recorder to get all the wild sound for the film. I logged each audio clip so that I would know where the falling water and babble brook sounds came from.

I lugged a Vinten Vision 3 on single stage carbon fiber sticks into the mountains. This tripod is lightweight, strong and the Vision 3 head is super smooth and balances perfectly. I removed the ground spreader so that I could extend the legs to get the camera in precarious positions to shoot the waterfalls. I was close by, just in case the legs slipped and the camera took a dive into the drink.

I had a large KATA backpack with all my lenses, wipes, batteries, memory sticks, rain gear, Letus tools, and beef jerkey. The bag is lined with a soft, yellow material. I hiked in every lens I owned, but I only ended up using two. The Nikon 200mm f4 tele and the Nikon 24mm f2.8 wide angle. Next time I will pack lighter and only carry four lenses (adding a macro and the fisheye to the lot).

I found a few potholes where the water was trapped from a downpour the previous day. This water was very still as there was little wind. The sky was overcast with some spotty sunshine and in the calm mirror pool, I could see a pretty sweet reflection. I set up the EX1 to record one frame every one second. I added motion blur by setting the “EX slow shutter” to 16 frames. This flooded the cmos sensors with light so I had to stop down the film lens to f3.5 and add a little ND.

One of my favorite bits of gear is my home made skateboard wheel dolly. I mount the dolly on 1 1/4inch PVC pipe and I have two pieces that are 10 feet long. The thing is build very solid and it is heavy. This is a must for any dolly as I have found that the lightweight version tend to be much less smooth and forgiving!

So how did I get it into the deep forest up the side of the mountain? I hiked the dolly in first, leaving my camera and the rest of my kit locked in the Jeep at the trail head. I taped the two pipes together with hockey tape so that they would be easier to negotiate down the over grown trail and rough terrain. I had the dolly platform in my other hand. Once at the shooting location, I tossed the dolly and track in some brush and ran back down the trail to my car. I then gathered the rest of my equipment and hiked back to the waterfalls.

It is very important that you level out the dolly track the best that you can. If you do not, your shot will not be level throughout the dolly move. I found sticks and rocks are much easier to use and find on location rather than packing wooded wedges. I just lay the pipe in a semi-level location and stick objects under the track to get it close to straight. Just eyeball this, it does not have to be totally perfect.

Sometimes, I find a location that I really want to run track through, but it is simply to hard to level and support the track. The dolly tends to de-rail and you will waste time and energy on a shot that you will never be able to preform in a smooth and usable fashion. In the picture above I failed to get the track in place! After about five minutes, I gave up on a dolly shot at this rugged location. Also, be aware that these pipes must stay protected. If you toss them around and bang up the plastic, these imperfections will show up as bumps in the dolly shot.

The secret to a good dolly move is to have clean wheels and a clean track. Just one blade of grass or a single pine needle will make for a bumpy ride. I also find that by adding moisture to the track can help and hurt you. It can help because it removes static electricity that builds up and attracts debris like a magnet. It can hurt you because if you use too much water on the track, more stuff will stick to it and it is hard to keep dry. So if you are using a pvc pipe dolly, a damp cloth goes a long way when wiping the pipes and wheels clean.

I also use just my finger tips operate the dolly, especially when the camera is sitting directly on the plywood platform. This method gives you excellent control of the ramping starts and stops for usable footage. If on a tripod, I operate the camera at the tripod panhead. I sometimes add pans, tilts, zooms, and rack focuses to the mix. This all takes practice. I try a few takes before I hit the record button.

If you ever leave the tripod unattended and it is on the pvc track, keep in mind that your track is probably not level. You will want to add an object (in this photo above I use my backpack) to stop the dolly from running off the track and dumping the camera. When using this type of Vinten tripod, I remove the ground spreader and the sharp metal spikes at the feet of the sticks bury themselves into the carpeted plywood.

I finished off the short film with a beautiful sunset. I used a 24 mm f2.8 and I slowly panned the camera on the Vinten head right to left. I then hiked my camera out of the mountains, locked it in my Jeep and went back in to retrieve the dolly and pvc pipe. I hiked down the trail for the sixth and last time and tossed the rest of my equipment into the vehicle.

I want to thank Tom Salta and Alec Harrison for the original score on this short film.

You can see the video by clicking here.

VIDEO BLOG: CLICK HERE to watch the video.

I am having some fun playing with a great bit of kit. As a professional television freelancer, I get to use different broadcast cameras almost every day. I have always wanted to mount prime 35mm lenses to the front of these very expensive 2/3 inch chip cameras, and now I can.

I have a Letus B4 Pro Relay, Letus Ultimate and a set of stainless steel Letus version 2 support rods. With this gear, I have all the tools to mount a 35mm lens adapter on the front of the high-end video cameras. The elusive “organic film look” has now infiltrated the television broadcast industry!

I started with the Panasonic AG-SPX800p camera. This is a standard definition news gathering workhorse. The camera records 16:9 SD pictures using DVCPRO 50. All I have to do is take off that lens and mount some support rods to the Vinten Vision 11.

I had to do some adjustments to the Letus stainless steel version 2 rods to make this all work. It just took me a few minutes and I had the camera plate mounted to the support system and I was ready to go.

This is the Letus relay. I was surprised at how heavy it was!

Before you mount the Letus Ultimate to the Letus relay, you must remove the acromat glass lens from the 35mm lens adapter. This is done with a few twists. Just be very careful with this piece of glass. If you want to use this Ultimate on your EX1, you are gonna need to put it back and keep it clean!

With the Ultimate connected to the relay, now all you must do is attach the contraption to the camera body as if it were a proper television zoom lens. Just be certain it is locked in and that the Letus Ultimate is supported by the bracket that is connected to the rod system.

I use all Nikon Nikkor 35mm SLR lenses. I used an allen key to attach the Nikon mount to the front of the Letus Ultimate.

Finally, add the lens of your choice to the front of the Letus and you are ready to go. Just before you shoot anything, it is important to adjust and lock the focus on the relay. Also, set the iris on the relay to work with your lighting conditions…lock that as well. Next, adjust the back focus on the Ultimate so that your film lens can reach infinity. Open the lens wide and you now have super shallow depth of field using a proper shoulder mounted broadcast camera!

The way that I set this up is made for tripod use only. It is possible, with third party accessories like Zacuto, to run this franken-cam off the shoulder. Today, I will be using a Vinten Vision 11 tripod and shooting some test video in a Rhode Island city park. This thing is almost 50 pounds!

I shot a quick test short with this camera system. You can find it here.

During lunch, I was able to dump the MXF files from the P2 cards over to my MBP computer. I had trouble getting the camera to show up as a deck, but after sending a message to my friends on Twitter, Scott Karlins came up with the solution. Scott told me that in order to get the USB2 interface to talk to the Panasonic P2 management software that I had on my Mac, I had to flip the “write protect” tabs on all the P2 cards in the camera. This actually worked and I was able to get the files to my hard drive. Thank you Scott, Eric P. and the others on Twitter who helped me.

I was hired to shoot wireless RF at a Rhode Island marathon for network television. I managed to squeeze in an hour to play with the new Letus Relay and Ultimate. The camera I actually operated was this Panasonic AG-SPX700 with a 2Ghz video transmitter mounted to the Anton Bauer gold mount. This camera was very heavy and I lugged it around the city for a few hours. I was camera number six and the director cut me in live as I covered the race. I had a Motorola walkie with a headset to get my direction and tally cues.

Special thanks to Joe Doris for his help with the gear.

VIDEO BLOG:
POST NAB NO BLOG EXCUSES: Post NAB Blog 2009
starring some English guy.

I was so busy at NAB that I was unable to open my laptop and write a few words about just how great the show was. I actually was so busy talking about Vinten products, Letus adapters and my experience with both, I never really walked around at all! The picture above was taken the last day, and toward the end, it was a ghost town.

I never got to the NHK 8k super high definition setup, with fibre optics running down the Vegas strip connecting the convention centre to the 8k camera. I did not get to see anything RED, except my eye balls when looking at myself in a mirror. I missed out on some of the 3DTV displays projecting objects on the screen outside it’s boundaries, without 3D glasses!

But I am very happy with how everything went and I am glad I stayed where I was most of the time.

I worked with the Vitec group and Camera Dynamics out of the UK on the Vinten stand for a bunch of my time at the show. I had the honour of testing a few of the new AS series pan head’s this past winter. I shot a few projects on the Vision AS 3 and Vision AS 10 prototype with beautiful results and that experience proved to be invaluable on the stand when talking (as a cameraman) to potential buyers, dealers and media. I must also add that the people who work for the Vitec Group and Vinten are very kind and passionate individuals. This company really does care about what the end-users are saying.

Vinten will be celebrating its 100 year anniversary next year and they have built their business on customer satisfaction. Vinten have created a strong bond with their clients by continuing to improve their products based on user feedback. Thank you Peter, Ruth, Len and everyone else over at the stand for making me feel so comfortable.

I also spent time working with Aaron over at Letus. The booth was part of the BH Photo Video stand and during my time with the two cameras on display, I met many users of the Letus products. I also met many people with great questions and a few of those people knew me because of my website! One of the guys who spoke to me said that he really enjoyed my work. I mentioned “Philip Bloom” as my internet webpage/35mm lens adapter mentor and the guy said, “Who is Philip Bloom?” Thank you Aaron, Ryan, Steven and the others who helped out in the Letus booth to help educate people out there that the adapters have a certain “letus look” that no other adapter can archive.

I did not shoot too many minutes of video for a daily blog. I realized right away that I was at the event to work. This was a paid job and I wanted to fulfill my responsibilities to Vinten and Letus. Also, had I shot video, I would have never had any time to cut it! When away from the booth after hours, I was running around with my new friend Hani and riding front row on the Manhattan Express roller coaster at New York New York!

The following night I was picked up by Limo and taken hostage by the Zacuto group, with Phil being the ring-leader. Zacuto picked up a great steak dinner with other items not advertised on the menu!

I must also mention a young man named, Joe Stunzi. Great guy, loads of passion and talent and he reminds me of myself at that young age. Tons of potential.

So since I did not post any video blogs or any type of blog for that matter, I will simply add a link to Phil’s second video blog entry. After you watch the first few minutes, you will see why I like it so much!

I posted a short video in return to let people know that I did record some content at NAB. When I get a few minutes (and sleep for an entire day), I will cut and upload the Vinten prototype test in Boston and a few Vinten NAB videos from the booth to my website. These videos will also appear on Vinten dot TV. Stay tuned to my main page for more.

One last thing, I had a huge surge in web traffic on this site practically overnight. If anyone out there can figure out why that is, please let me know. I might need to upgrade to a different server…

…remember that site is www.tomguilmette.com.

I am a television guy. But ever since I purchased the Letus Extreme, I have wanted to experiment with old film equipment. Specifically, old lenses designed for photography. All the videos shot on my page to date, were “filmed” though Nikon prime lenses. No zooming allowed.

Now, I am interested in using true 35mm cinema film camera lenses on my Sony PMW-EX1 high definition television camera.

This morning, I met up with my friend TJ (from Comcast Sport Network) and we walked though the doors of “Boston Camera” in Brighton, Massachusetts. I had used stuff from them in the past and they had merged with a big rental house in Boston, called Rule Broadcast. They will soon be moving in with Rule, but for now, they are manning a small shop in the basement of an old apartment building.

I just received my “PL” mount from Letus Direct a few days ago and I really wanted to try out a proper 35mm film camera zoom lens on my Extreme adapter. The PL mount is solid, but it will be very important to get a cinema camera rod system that could work with my new Letus V2 rod system. It must support the 12 pounds of French glass!

The lens has a 25-250mm focal length with a 3.5 f-stop. It is fairly fast, but not as fast as the f2.8 24mm-290mm Angenieux Optimo lens that they had in the back room. That expensive lens weighs nearly 40 pounds! Maybe I will rent that someday and have my camera assistant carry the rig.

A young and knowledgeable fellow named, Adam from Boston Camera, helped TJ and I get the camera fitted with an Arri rod system designed to hold the weight of the cinema lens. It took us about 30 minutes to get the Letus V2 rod system dialed in to accept the solid steel Arri rod and tripod mounting plates. Once, everything was in place, we mounted the lens and tested it all out.

The lens is great. We pointed it to a focus chart and did a few tests. Nice zoom, super smooth and fast enough for what I was going to be shooting…a documentary on the Boston Celtics in a brightly lit Boston Garden. The fact that I can change the focal length without changing my prime lenses will save me time and I will be able to shoot more footage.

I expected the back focus to be out and it was. Unfortunately, I did not want to go back inside the Letus and pull on the ground glass element to try to get the film plane correct. I had done this before and it was a bit fiddly (thanks for that Phil). Plus I added a small finger print to the corner of the frosted rectangular glass…that I cannot fix! So I told the guys at Boston Camera that I would purchase the Letus Elite retro-kit from Letus Direct later that afternoon and have the back focus adjusting block Fed Ex’ed to my house overnight. This will give me the super slight adjustment I need to back focus the lens and allow me to maintain focus all the way through the zoom range.

I am renting this lens Friday morning and will use it at the Celtics game on Friday night with my Sony PMW-EX1, Letus Extreme, and a Vinten Vision 10 LF tripod. I will bring a few primes just in case the lens proves to be just a bit to heavy to cart around!

I will post another blog and let you know what problems I ran into. I will try to get permission to post some of the footage to this website for you to evaluate.

Check out this video to see how this setup looks! CLICK HERE.