Matthew Hartman

I work in tech, its common even in companies like Microsoft to bring in outside talent for a specific project. I know this because I contracted with Microsoft several times in my career as a UX Designer. Notable projects: Xbox One Windows Hello HoloLens This is standard stuff, no one should be interpreting this as something suspicious or nafarious. Whats the latest on this project? All my research leads to their KS campaign which has been well closed by now. Is it for sale, and if so where?

BTW, did you shoot this anamorphic? If so, what is your setup? I'd say you've definitely taken a marketing angle with a smaller production. Good for you man. In the spirit of sharing, below are some frame grabs for a pilot project in Seattle. (Currently being cut)

Ha! Limitations? Looks more like strengths looking at the video above. ? The diffused lighting is really helping to tone down the aggressive detail of the NX1 sensor and help rolloff gradients a bit smoother. It's a good look in my opinion, 8bit or otherwise. This could definitely hit a distribution channel like Netflix. You've definitely earned a new fan. ? It also looks like there's some attention given to wardrobe/set color coordination? I've always had a propensity towards pulling the most out of less and challenging conventional wisdom where I feel it's misplaced or dogmatic. Not to dismiss the obvious lush and creamy images of say a RED EPIC or Arri Alexa. But as much as they are awesome, they're equally uninteresting, if that makes sense? There's a certain, "Go big or go home mentality" I'd like to see get challenged because I personally feel filmmaking should be accessible to anyone who has a passion for it but may not neccsarily have the funds to match. I really get annoyed at those filmmakers who use top gear as a barrier to entry and job security. Even if they're very skilled, I feel they have lost their way. I remember starting my interest in filmmaking as a young kid shooting with VHS camcorders. I didn't think at that time that my little films didn't look like what I saw in the movie theater (not even close) but I do remember learning about other things like creative lighting, and fun and interesting ways to frame the world I see. And having fun with friends creating scenes. I was focused on improving my craft with each time I picked up my camera. I actually took my camcorder to bed with me. I was totally hooked. I'm sure I wasn't alone. (Before the interwebs) Maybe it's me but I don't see a lot of articles talking about those magical formative years. I do see tons of articles professing over this camera, or that camera and their respective specs. There is a forum for that, don't get me wrong. But it's a bit less magical and relies heavily on convention, which sometimes comes off as arrogant and a bit jaded. I can't imagine a young child just getting into this field and reading, "No kid, you're nothing without an Arri Alexa". That's a horrible message. There's a handful of children's filmmaking workshops that teach aspiring young minds the art of filmmaking using smartphones and simple household tools I couldn't be supportive enough of this movement. Sorry guys, I know I ramble a bit. Hey, I'm a 44 year old single father of adult children and get a bit lonely at times, especially during time off from work. I'm surrounded by professionals who work with million dollar budgets and get whatever equipment they request. It gets boring always talking about how this gear allowed this or that. I'm done now.

I think this is a wise approach. I always favor caution over expediency when it comes to technology, because I work in the tech industry. Unfortunately, a lot of half baked technology is pushed on consumers as selling point marketing, which is usually decided on by someone in a high position in a given company that doesn't necessarily care about the quality of the product, the hard work team's invest in it, nor of consumers outside the realm of their pocket books. I speak from direct experience of the countless times various teams and I worked months, sometimes years to develop something innovative, all to be squashed within two seconds time by a higher up whom is completely out of touch with their demographic, and interjects way too much personal preference, often uninspired and outdated. Layoffs usually follow.

Does this then make it difficult to frame your shot, say using the golden ratio or rule of thirds? Are there any third party attachable viewfinder's that could offer desqueezing?

Great tips! I can see the logic behind all of them. I actually have the same settings, except Ive enable Smart Range + (in the movie tab) which gives you a little more DR. Are you using the birate hack by chance? Also, I'm curious, how do your clients perceive the quality of the work you're giving them? Are they mentioning the flaws you address personally here? What's driving you to feel the need to move on to other systems? I'm very curious. I'm going through similar thoughts myself. Although, I won't be getting a GH5. But I'm interested to hear your experience with it coming from an NX1. I feel like 8bit is suddenly becoming demonized now that manufactures are promising 10bit under $3000. All major distribution channels are still 8bit so it will be interesting to weigh the perceived value of having a 10bit system against real world application. Just looking at the thumbnail of the video you posted, I seriously doubt any general audience is going to perceive that as anything but professional quality, or what we're all used to seeing on screen. When I was watching your video I got into the woman and her raping and started to identify and relate to her, forgetting about the technicalities. THAT is exactly what you want.

Maybe I wasn't clear. What I mean is while you're shooting. Isn't your image on the camera's screen "squeezed" ?

You're my newest best friend here. ? I was looking at the Rokinon XEEN series but at that point as might as well just buy an Alexa and sell the blood of my first born child. ? I've done a general search for anamorphic on a PL mount online, but since I have little experience with anamorphic I really have no idea what qualities to look for. I'm finding a lot of affordable anamorphic projector lens, but I'm assuming that won't work? I really like the look and quality you got with your Bolex, but I don't know if thats unique to the wider format or the properties and characteristics of that particular lens? You definitely have the most experience with this that I've come across online. I'd love if you could share some of your knowledge, like requirements to get the NX1 to conform with anamorphic, what systems are valued as the gems, what systems are considered acceptable, which ones to avoid. I wish we lived near eachother, I'd love to talk shop and explore NX1/anamorphic setups with you, because above anything else I've seen in terms of making the NX1 produce a more filmic quality, I think you are onto something with the biggest potential. I'd like to see some results with some diffusion filters on the end of your Bolex lens, as well as shooting faces with diffused lighting. I think this trifecta is the 3 combo power punch into filmic quality on the NX1. And then there's this photo: And a recent shoot using faux cinescope in Premeire:

Ah yes, directors. I generally don't like working with directors who have little working knowledge of camera operating and grading/color theory. The last one I worked with was completely clueless of these things and I felt like I was constantly pushing back on ideas that I knew would destroy the image or make for a less than ideal shot. I approached it lightly, with a lot of patience, and good faith for future partnership. Then after the second day of the edit, she was absolutely destroying the image in grade and reframing every shot out of any acceptable realm of composition. I spoke up to explain the merritts of exposure values and the rule of thirds, and then I was told, "Don't tell me about when I'm breaking cinematography principles anymore, it's ruining my flow". Nope...I'm out. Aint nobody got time for that. Quit right there and then. Get a friend to hit the record button for you next time. The sadest part is I cant use her cut for my demoreel, it's that horrible and makes me look like I don't know what the hell I'm doing as a DP/Cinematographer. She literally selected the worst shots, even setup shots out of the tons of great footage I captured for her. Disaster. You live, you learn.

Thanks. I actually agree with your school of thought but we seem to be surrounded by many that do not agree and are heavily pushing a 10bit workflow as if this has suddenly been the standard for decades. Although, if you look at Netflix's content requirements they do not accept anything in 8bit (as far as shooting anything for their own productions) and as an aquisition format. Also, their list of approved cameras is pretty short, the GH5 not being on that list. All Canon C"000" are on the list as well as the Ursa line. Of course, you have your usual suspects, Arri, RED, (even the RED ONE) the Sony production cams, Vericam and I'm sure the EVA 1 is coming in an update soon. There are no DSLR/DSLMs on the list. Interesting enough, no Kinefinity products either. That's not to say however they won't accept mastered 8bit content from outside their own productions. Anyone who streams Netflix knows not everything has pristine IQ. As far as I know they don't stream/distribute anything in 10bit. Why would they when we still don't have wide adoption of consumer UHD 4k in 8bit? I use the example of Netflix assuming other streaming productions, i.e. Hulu, HBO, Amazon would be similar in requirements. I also like to reference real world world stats as opposed to camera manufacturer's marketing material. And honestly, how many general audiences are really going to care anyway whether there's some slight banding in the sky or not? I believe if they're noticing those details then they're not properly engaged in the actual story or subject matter. I know I don't spend $20 at the theater, or $20/mo for online streaming to pixel peep. Thanks for the sanity check. I'm sure a rash of GH5 owners are going to troll you for posting this bit depth comparison video. And for what I do I would never grade that aggressively. In fact, I lean more on the flatter side of things aesthetically speaking. I like the take away from the video which to me is work with what you have instead of always jumping to the next best thing. Some of us cant afford to be jumping from one product to another and its nice to get some type of validation that it's okay if you can't, you still have options.

Well sob! Ive been lied to! ? Yes, and it's still not working for me. I tried it a few weeks ago, so I'll try again. I really want it to work.

God, anamorphic and the NX1 looks so damn filmic and very complementary. I want! I can't believe you guys have access to such awesome pricey glass. But it goes to show you what good glass does for an image. I'd rather drop 2k on a good vintage anamorphic lens than 2k on the next camera with incremental improvement. It's funny, this place looks a lot like where I live in Western WA state. We even have a Braverian village too. So how do you "desqueeze" your image during production?

Fair enough friend. I've seen some of your anamorphic tests and they're great. There's one with a small dog in it and I love it. Wish I could afford anamorphic glass, the stuff is ridiculously expensive.

The green cast is more prominent than I imagined. But it is apparently pretty notorious on some of Tiffen's diffusion sets. You were able to grade it out pretty well though, so kudos on that. Was it difficult to tell if you had a good exposure using it? That issue aside, look how many stops you gained, I would at least say 1-3 easily. You were able to retain all the details in the shadows without any crushing, and your specular highlights particularly on his cheeks are not clipping. The rolloff seems pretty smooth too, but I'm not sure if this particular filter is attributing to that aspect. Diffused lighting will cause the same effect, its hard to tell. Cast shadows on the face seem pretty widely dispersed. Overall, I'd say the filter is a success. Would you agree? As far as a matte box. I've gone through a few, including a cheap plastic one, and I would only reccomend one that swings away. Otherwise the effort of having to move it off the rail supports is probably just as involved as screwing off a round filter every time you want to switch a lens. Also worth considering is your overall weight and footprint a matte box adds to your rig. It looks pretty damn cool and really helps cut out flaring, (with flags) but not the best solution when you want to be a bit more inconspicuous and nimble. I have both systems for various situations, which works out great, but it can get pretty costly. You don't want to cheap out in this area because you definitely get what you pay for. Here's the matte box I have which is on the cheaper end of the spectrum but not exactly cheap as in build and feature set: https://www.googleadservices.com/pagead/aclk?sa=L&ai=DChcSEwju2t-k8qnYAhVFuMAKHeQOAc4YABAOGgJpbQ&ohost=www.google.com&cid=CAESEeD2UOS6SdwHGsCvTgYEXVax&sig=AOD64_0QpK1xICus5qTNgEKgBJHmElAslQ&ctype=5&q=&ved=0ahUKEwjS7tek8qnYAhXE5IMKHTZSBlQQwg8IOg&adurl= (I paid about $50 more for mine so the above is actually a pretty good deal) Again, you'll need a rail/rod system, but that is fairly inexpensive and it gives you the option of also rigging up a shoulder mount/handle bar. There are cheaper options out there but you'll take a serious hit on quality and features. In my opinion that would end up being more cumbersome than helpful. There's also this, which would be a mix between round and square filter methods that attaches to the end of your lens: https://www.google.com/search?q=tiffen+square+filter+lens+mount&sa=X&biw=412&bih=652&tbs=vw:l,ss:44&tbm=shop&prmd=sivn&srpd=7818347533224399528&prds=epd:1216066361220322567,paur:ClkAsKraX6_JxfmyXzAm_-A-FWEAvnkAYuT-Ts4kJdyU_GKHh8IKH8pS-PrNPUGfelZpdsqXxB6VEFlrX6LYdlfhZqivLv4tesWVhblTYZOuPMg33QElBaaNuxIZAFPVH71dIZ_GVDBOHebJKXEVdXGc5F_PNg,cdl:1,cid:2490656465789744560&ved=0ahUKEwiB16qq9KnYAhUTwGMKHWz_B8UQgTYIwQU

ARGH, you totally blew out your sky! That's the number one complaint I see online from ppl that shoot with high end production cams about DSLMs, and we prove them right constantly. A graduated ND could have totally helped this shot. Other than no sky, I like the colors, texture and comp.

Nice buddy.

It's so nice to see NX1 footage without a blown out sky.

I work around devs all day long and for a long time in my career as a UX Designer. Where there is a will there is a way. But brininging a dev to the will part is uniquely challenging to that personality type. Many, many devs will say, "No, it can't be done". But in my experience the true translation is all too often, "No, I can't or dont want to do it, but maybe another dev can". You know the best way to fix that problem? Throw $$ at it and watch how all these "impossible" things suddenly become possible. Personally, I think it can be done and the internal processor is pretty powerful to boot. I wouldn't be surprised if some of those features were in the backlog and going to be rolled out in time. And I think that would have been enabled in the HDMI clean out channel because SD cards are just too slow. I think the biggest issue will be heat dissipation. The existing hardware structure could be limited and never built to handle extreme overclocking, and if thats the case there's a huge chance that people will be cooking their cameras in no time.

I seriously doubt it. I think 1.4 was the last firmware we're going to see from Samsung. They had a proggresive firmware release schedule which has been frozen since late 2015 I believe. During that time there were still active devs transitioning to other divisions. We're better off getting the hack boys back on the hacks, even crowdsource them if nessecary. THIS ^

THIS! This is exactly the avenue I'm researching. Just look how much smoother the highlights are rolling off with the filter applied? You're not getting that harsh/high specular. Very creamy, and filmic. Now try to diffuse your light sources and watch what happens. RED territory baby! ? I'm looking at a Soft FX 1/2 / Black Mist Pro 1/4 combo right now. Amazon has the Soft FX in 76mm for $27 right now. I'm so happy you posted this.

NX1 only accepts up to 64GB cards.

220Mbps 4k 400Mbps 1080 all frame rates (hack won't go higher) Card: https://www.adorama.com/idsdxpu264.html Everything manual and no sound. I functionally use 180Mbps so I can keep files manageable in size and not tax the camera too hard and also use features and sound. Pleased with the results. I don't know about macroblocking, but it definitely feels like I can push black levels in lumentri a bit more before they break. That alone is enough for me to accept the extra file size of 180Mbps. (And it's a huge difference vs. 80Mbps native) One caveat, I had to update my computer system (Nvidia 1080 ti) to play the clips in Premeire on full preview. Before I did this, I couldn't even get smooth playback on 1/4. HEVEC is a beast codec to decode, but packs the same quality as Prores 444 HQ and 1/2 the size. Still haven't gotten Divinci Resolve to play nicely with HEVEC. All I ever get is just sound, which tells me it's corrupting the decoding process.

Luca is correct.

How would that run into the mixpre? Via hdmi?

Tell me more. Because as someone who is stuck with an NX1 right now I really need a sanity check here. Everyone is raving and ranting about 10bit this and 10bit that and it all sounds really legit and makes me feel like I'm way behind the curve, no pun intended. I'm not going to denie that if I push my NX1 4.2.0 grade too far all sorts of artifcating and banding happens. The NX1 uses a distribution codec, although its HEVEC @180-200 Mpbs so it's holds up reasonably well as long as I don't get too extreme, which I don't really need to as I'm not creating the next Batman blockbuster. And I do have a 2.5k 10bit 27" Benq monitor, so I can actually see where 8bit breaks down. I'm actually looking for reasons to stay with the NX1 instead of getting caught up in gear aquisition syndrome. The ergonomics and ease of use for the camera is exceptional and it's native S-Line glass as good as any Sigma Art series lens I've ever seen. It has a 6.5k sensor that produces some pretty detailed full readout 4k and below, 120fps@1080. It has some redeeming factors that make it hard to give up. But everyone is jumping on 10bit/HDR, I'm feeling a bit left behind and anxious. Also, some third-party manufactures have dropped the brand for obvious reasons. Thank you Fotodix and Rokinon for not! But then part of me feels like my efforts and resources would be better spent in trying to find external ways to produce better highlight rolloff with my existing kit, because I'm starting to understand what makes up a "creamy image". I'm looking at some Tiffen diffusion filters right now. Possible future contenders for me: Ursa Mini 4.6k Kinfinity Terra 5k Used RED of some variety. Possibly the latest Sony mirrorless However, going with most of these options I'm looking at upgrades to a lot of my current accessories, which are rated for a much lighter rig. Not going with the GH5. I do not want a micro 4/3 sensor at the end of the day. I'm fine with super35 and full frame and I don't want to have to rely on speedboosters to get better shallow DOF and ISO performance. I feel like Panasonic should focus on releasing a bigger sensor than doing tricks to improve ISO on a smaller one.