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A PUBLICATION OF THE CANADIAN SOCIETY OF CINEMATOGRAPHERS

ALSO IN THIS ISSUE ON CAMERA: The Primo Chol!e11Qe' IN FOCUS: Hot Docs! INDUSTRY NEWS: WFW Buys PRESIDENT'S REPORT: The Video Track

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September 2001 Volume 21, No. 1

SERGE DESROSIERS esc He Shoots ond Lance et compte -Scores in 24p La nouvene generation

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2 - President's Report The Video Track

4 - Talking Pictures Lance et fompte in 24P

8 - On Cam era The Primo Challenge

10- In Focus Hot Docs!

15 - Industry News WFW Buys Cinequip

19- Film Clips CSC Workshops

20 - CSC Calendar Action Production Notes

Visit: www.csc.ca

COVII PHOTO: 17obe1 Zimmer

An Interview with

SERGE DESROSIERS esc Shooting Shinny and Santa in 24P HD

"I could say I'm a fan of 24P, but every project has its own complexity."

the company now and she want· ed to come up with something new" for the series sequel, Desrosiers said. "Her father, Claude, didn't want to shoot HD. He was really relentless on new mediums and the complexity o f focus in UO."

Oi rector jea n-Ciaude Lord, who directed the original series, sided with Ca ro line and the director of photography. "He said," Desrosiers quoted: .... I know the j,'llys and I know they will manage to do it, and if they say it's not going to be a problem it won't be.' And that's what we basically told him, it's not going to be a problem. •

So. 241' won the day. In addi-tion, all 10 of the hour-long

... episodes were shot in 16:9 ratio • wUhout a battle" -and

S erge Desrosiers esc is a believer in two DOP Serge Desrosiers m (right) at camera will be broadcast in the letterbox great institutions - hockey and with ht AC Patrick Beaulac •• set of format on Quebec's TQS television Pere NoH Now the Montreal DOl' !once tl c...,,.. network.

that what the fastest game on earth and old Father Christmas really needed all was the 241' look of high-definition video.

It wasn't a sure thing in the beginning. Desrosiers told CSC News that 24P was not the unanimous choice for shooting La11ce er compte · La IIOIIvellc gi'rreration, the revival of the 1986 hit Quebec series Lance et compte (He Shoots! He Scores!). The original slam-barn hockey series, somewhat sexy and profane for its time, aired IS years ago and was, of course, shot on film.

It was C1roline Heroux of Communications Claude

Derosiers claimed Lance el compte was "the first TV series in Quebec to

be shot on 24P HO, in letterbox" (see eSC News, May/01), and Station nord, which wrapped in july, (;is the first Canadian feature shot in 241'."

Ue said he was the one who decided on 24P HO for Station nord, a Christmas movie to be released in December, after he went to the CSC meeting in Toronto last Jan. 22 and saw the test screenings by Panavision and Richard Stringer esc (sec eSC News, March/01). "I spoke to jean-Claude Lord, who was also directing the featwe, soon after

I left the meetin.g and told him the 24P lieroux Plus who pitched 241' as the acquisi-tion medium for the encore of Ltmce et compte, which wrapped May 30. "She is taking over By Don Angus looked really good." Producer Pierre

Gendron of Bloom Fi lms "was crazy

enough" to go along with the idea. "We ended shooting this feature,

that we were supposed to shoot in 3Smm, in 24P because we had a CG I (computer generated imaging) budget of S400,000 to SSOO,OOO, a lot for a feature. And one advantage of CGI in HD is that you don't have to scan the mm firs t.

"We took some shots from Lance et compte, I did a smaiJ editing, and sent that footage off toE-Film in Los Angeles. The result looked really beautiful. We then went to see Scott MacDonald and Stuart Hurst at l>anavlsion Canada and they came up with a nice package. They were really interested in doing the firs t Canadian feature in 24P. •

Desrosiers said Station nortl was shot in the l..aurentians north of Montreal, with principal fi lming starting in April during a three-week brea k in the production of La11ce et compte. "We needed snow - and we had snow.• Shooting on the feature resumed in June after the series wrapped at the end of May.

The Panavision lenses used on Station nord were Nreally beautiful," the DOP enthused. •we had the 6x27mm and a nice Smm prime, which in video is illmost a 2.5 ratio that equals a l4mm in 3Smm. We had the I I to 1, which is a 9.5 to IOSmm- a really big but really lens.

"I could say I'm a fan of but every project has its own complexity. If we were shooting a feature with nice, landscaped shots, then, sure, we would have shot il In 35mm. But since we were shooting a kids' Christmas movie with a lot of CGI effects - reindeers appearing and disap-pearing - we really needed the help for CGJ, and also for the budget, that shooting 24P can give. The CGI guys told us that if you're shooting 24P HD we can do this, but if you're shooting 3Smm we can't do this in the same bud-get."

Desrosiers said there was no CG I in Lance et compte. The action on the ice is all real, and the camera crew had to come up with some slippery moves to capture it all.

"We had seven days on hockey rinks, with dollies on icc and a lot of people. We had this big day in City with almost 13,000 spectators. They were there because of the Lance et compte reputation. There was nothing else going on in this arena except Lance et compte shooting, and 13,000 people came to see us."

The fictitious team in the series Is called Le Nationa le, but their sweaters are intentionally similar to those of the NHL Quebec Nordiques before they moved to Colorado in 1995-96 and promptly won the Stan ley Cup as the Avalanche. In the series, the 001' revealed, the team own-ers refuse to sell the franchise to Colorado and stay in Quebec. "People in City are going to be heartbro-ken with this series/'

For the hockey action, "we had five cameras and six operators,• Desrosiers laughed. "I had one operator with

PUNCH·UP: Sti-ge Desrosiers esc, with comero, gtll in dose lor o light scene in lmoce el compte. At righl ore 1st AC Patrkk Beaulac and grip Marc O.Ernsted, bath on skates.

PENAlTY SHOT: Dolly grip Marc O.Emsted pushes J>OP I operator Serge Desrosiers csc as a scene focuses on a penalty shot. following the action. from left, are boom operator Marco! Royer, 1st AC Patrick Beaulac. and 8· com operator Martin Pilon, who was dressed as a referee.

skates on- we put an AC with him- to go ahead and do some hand-held shots. Then when we had to do off-ice shots, what was he going to do? He couldn't just go into the crowd with his skates. So he passed the camera to another operator who was In running shoes and went into the crowd. The operator on skates was dressed in a referee's shirt. Sometimes- in a slow-motion shot or something -I'm sure we do see him. • sa page 6

CSC Neu•s' Sqx.omb<Y 1001 • 5

OIRISTMAS CREW: 11M c-a IHII ao Clorist010s Stotioo o«d lndoded, framlt ft to right, 2od Au Yeronique Poulin 011d Do•inique 14aola<, 3rd A( Sylvain Albert (video assist), DOP Serge Desrosiers csc, aod 1st AC Patrkk BHula<.

"I was on a dolly (fitted) with little skates. I would take the A<amera on to the rink and shoot a sequence with players shooting pucks into the net. Tilcn, when we needed to do off-ice shots of this sequence, I would nm with the ACs and the grips and the other ca rneras.

"Something really funny: When I was on the dolly I was going with the actors, but a puck goes where it's got to go. I would pan and follow the actors; I wou ld know that the 8-camera was o n my left, but I sllll go panning. The

and the camera operators are lying down In front of me so that I don't see them in the camera. I'm pan-ning and panning. and they lie down. Olen I get to the director and the script assistant. They are all falling down, boom, boom, boom.w

Desrosiers said the A- and B-eam-were Sony HDW-F900 24J>

(CineAita) and the o ther three were Sony's earlier HOW-700 models. "Wha t 1 decided to do on the hockey sequences was shoot at 30 frames per

6 • esc N"'' , Scpctrnh« 2001

'If we were shooting a feature with nice, landscaped shots, then, sure, we would have shot it in 35mm.'

'That's the advantage of 24P, the luminosity that you can get."

second with all five cameras, setting the 24J>s on what we call 60i. This is

the thermal video image which goes back to 30 frames per sec-ond. Then they put a film look on the images, because the images are really bare, a real video look. They would add motion blur in post.

"I saw the footage taken in the rink and everything looked really nice. With the 24P we did a lot or nice ligh ting effects not possible in regular video. The c lipping in the whites occur as much as in regular video. We had a lot of high-key situations 3nd even low-key situ-ations. I even had the director come up to me and say, 'You don't have any lighting in there, do you see that?' And I showed him the monitor, and he was really impressed with the luminosity or the image without any lighting.

•we did a lot of sequences lit with lust one c3ndle, and we did a lot of wide shots In restaurants at night where we didn't even put in a light. We did the wide shots with candles and the lillie practicals in the restau-rants, and then we went in and did the close-ups. That's the advantage or 241', the luminosity that you can get.•

The DOP said that "we were lucl..-y to get two 4K Mole Beams from Mole Richardson In Los Angeles for Lance tt

and they were really beauti-ful. They are 5mall beams, two feet In diameter. We had two of them in the hockey arena with two 12Ks and two 6K Pars for backlighting and fill-in where we had ou r actors. I had light-ning strikes c reat ing flash e ffec ts when a player got a goal. We d idn 't bring any lighting on to the ice, we wou ld lust go o ut there and shoot. No light on the came ra a t all.

•we also had six Xenon follow-spots already In the arena, so we used them. I had six follow-spot operators who, evcf)' time there was a goal, would follow the player. We e'•en fol-lowed him with the Mole Beams; they are really

•we were looking for a searchlight effect," Desrosiers conti nued. "What I would have liked is that when there was a goa l, you do a down light alo ng with the little follow-spots. But we couldn' t d o a down light in an arena.

5o whac we have done In post Is bring down the luminosity of the Image every lime a guy scores, and then what IMpJ>fnS h we see these search-lights following the plarer and the cffl'<t b as II we had a down light. It lool\ good"

Oc\10\ll'l\ !>aid most or his experi-ence ha\ with film, but he bas bl-..•n shooting \'Ideo for fi,•e years. He was 1>01' on the CBC series Dim ((.'01-rr (i/rl on the f ngllsh network) lor three year\, using the HDW-700

• I he only thing new about 241' Is the motion blur o r the film effe<t when we transfer the tapes. The onl) problem that occurs .. ;th 241' b the Oiderlng ellect in the vtcwhndcr; It lool..s lile an old ,;deo-aulsttd film .

•we didn't "orl woth a video engi· nwr (on I ,., cumpu or Station norJI for me It was useless because we I.. new we were gol ng to colour-time the show through a DaVind or 1>plrlt or something. We didn't need a guy sayi ng. 'Look you're 1/8 of a stop OVCrCXjXJ>ed.' What an 1/8 Of a slOt>? We Cllll wrrcct It by colour-tim-InK II. We were \hOOting two cameras hand-held all the time. We wuldn't .olw,oys have wires. The ACs calll-d the opening, the T-stop. Once I set mine, the othN camera set his and IOmcllml'S hl' \\Ould tell me It was a little bit darl. I \\Ould it up and \\e'll colour-time lt.'"

On rt •,.e shot with a Canon zoom lens on the 241' cameras, "hlch is a relatively small lens at about 30 to 35 pounds. On the other cameras, we had a basic Ill) lcm from <anon called an 18X.

"I \hoot Jt almost 600 ASA. I don't have any grain In the Image. The Image I\ llean. at night I go 10 almmt 900 \\A - 900 or 800

h vet) quill and dear. "l>.:pth of field -..111 always be a

problem In Ill), just because of the of the chip. The CCO chip resem-

bles a 8 negauve; really small for depth of field You have to work long foul lcnsc>. When you do work wlde-dfljCie you have to help

with the lighting. You have to crea te .m lighting In video, more tlun In fi lm. In film you wou ld never really cnrc about JD lighting. •

resco BACKDROPS

Digitally Painted Day/Night Backdrops

for Film & Video.