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Liking the Epic, I must confess


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Having worked with this camera a few times now, I have to say it's pretty nice. I like the informative onboard monitor read-out. It's small and quiet, except when it's idle (no cutting early or rolling late on multiple cameras - which you can do on the Alexa). I've recorded in a small room with three of them, and didn't find it problematic.

I guess the Scarlet is same thing, except lower processing power, so fewer features. No concern of ours.

I haven't run into any TC issues, but the projects I've done would likely not have issue, or would not report issue to me.

The Alexa continues to be a camera department favorite. The Epic seems to be the nerd favorite (it's got 5k). I am ok with either.

Robert

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Do you feed it a scratch track? For this reason, I continue to loathe it. I think I'm going to start refusing to send any audio to it...

That and I've had camera guys have to continue to run the fan on it at a low percentage even when shooting because the damned thing otherwise overheats and cuts.

Give me an Alexa any day.

Edit: ok, loathe is a strong word...more like: continue to stare at it and wonder why the people who design it can't put a workable audio section in it. But then I remember I'm charging for a separate recording :)

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During both interviews this weekend, B Cam had to be shut off when the fan kicked in killing the sound. Their little frozen Red buddy bags didn't seem to help cool the cameras down enough to keep their fans off.

In both situations, the Producers were afraid that their already impatient talent would walk, so the interviews completed with just A Cam running. Therefore, their choice of the Red means they sacrifice significant editing flexibility when half their cameras go down. Is the picture really worth all that?

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...

That and I've had camera guys have to continue to run the fan on it at a low percentage even when shooting because the damned thing otherwise overheats and cuts.

...

Edit: ok, loathe is a strong word...more like: continue to stare at it and wonder why the people who design it can't put a workable audio section in it. But then I remember I'm charging for a separate recording :)

+1

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I don't run sound to camera. I don't offer it, and if asked I tell them it'll cost more and require me to attach gear to the camera. Both the UPM and DP hate those things. If they choose a camera for its visual capabilities, then they should expect that it'll come with limitations.

I have yet to deal with hot situations, so have not had "Epic fail" and fan at 25% seems pretty good. We did have a dropped clip on a take they loved.

Robert

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Doing a shoot this weekend with 2 Epics -- have been dreading it (a fair amount of quiet, low-level dialog in the script...) it'll be interesting to see what fan setting the Camera people will be willing to use. I'm like you Robert -- any more, I won't send a signal to camera unless they pay for it. That's what slates and SyncBoxes (and Editors) are for. In any case, if I don't report anything further by Monday or Tuesday, assume it went well -- otherwise, I'm sure I'll post my gripes if for no other reason than to commiserate with you all ;)

~tt

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We have to run some sort of audio to any camera, it's just part of the deal. We have yet to get clean audio into an Epic. The real audio is double system, but it still is kind of bad karma to have weird noisy audio (worse than 5D) recorded. I very much dislike how SLOW the camera is to use--so many fiddly parts, very nerdy for sure. But good pix and cheaper than Alexa, so the locals are buying in in a big way.

phil p

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I'm starting another 7 day commercial today, (this is rare as most shoots are 2 or 3 days) and we have 1 Alexa and I was requested not to send sound to camera by the DIT. He is using software from FotoKem that sync's the sound to picture using the timecode from my recording and the TC we jammed into the Alexa. Works great. Very fast. The only negative is I loose the camera hop rental.

CrewC

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Robert,

"We did have a dropped clip on a take they loved."

How did they find that out? Do they have to check each take to make sure it's there or was it found missing (!) later?

I don't know. I know the camera was rolling. I know it wasn't bad focus (using dropped clip as an excuse). But somehow they knew and we went again right away.

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Doing a shoot this weekend with 2 Epics -- have been dreading it (a fair amount of quiet, low-level dialog in the script...) it'll be interesting to see what fan setting the Camera people will be willing to use. I'm like you Robert -- any more, I won't send a signal to camera unless they pay for it. That's what slates and SyncBoxes (and Editors) are for. In any case, if I don't report anything further by Monday or Tuesday, assume it went well -- otherwise, I'm sure I'll post my gripes if for no other reason than to commiserate with you all ;)

~tt

I don't think it's a matter of "what they're willing to do". It's a sound issue. I "let" them keeps fans on when it doesn't matter. I insist on quiet settings when it does. If the camera starts to fail, we can discuss options like cutting between takes or trying different settings. But the default setting should be "silent" on the RED One, 25% on the Epic/Scarlet, Auto 1 on Genesis/F35 (and don't forget SSR deck has its own fan settings). Or just use an Alexa!!

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I don't think it's a matter of "what they're willing to do". It's a sound issue. I "let" them keeps fans on when it doesn't matter. I insist on quiet settings when it does. If the camera starts to fail, we can discuss options like cutting between takes or trying different settings. But the default setting should be "silent" on the RED One, 25% on the Epic/Scarlet, Auto 1 on Genesis/F35 (and don't forget SSR deck has its own fan settings). Or just use an Alexa!!

I wholeheartedly agree with you, but when it comes down to the whole "camera vs. sound" thing, the general attitude on most sets I've been on seems to be (why Soundies are always getting laid)... "F**K Sound"

When faced with this sort of adversity, it's often difficult to get anyone in a decision-making position to make a decision in favor of Sound, often downplaying the actual degree to which the camera noise will even show up in post. I usually resort to my "not my project" mantra at that point, because it's easier in the long run than trying to deal with an adversarial relationship with the Camera folks.

In any case, I still ask every time -- and sometimes they actually set the fans to "off when recording" but not always. Oh well, not my project, right?

~tt

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I worked with the Scarlet all last week in a very quiet indoor location. We were on a mountain top in the Berkshires of Western Massachusetts. Even with the fan on it's lowest setting I could still hear it. The only way we could shoot in the lowest fan setting was to use cold gel packs to keep it cool otherwise the fan would automatically kicked into it's highest setting to keep it from overheating. The fan noise ruined a few takes until we decided to use the gel packs. The indoor temp was around 70 degrees. The other annoying thing is the audio output on the Scarlet is crap. With the audio output on the camera set to 100% it has the lowest output of any camera I worked with. Even lower than the C300 which was the previous contender. One time I didn't get any audio return even though I saw the meters on the camera responding. Had to reboot the camera to get the return to work. One day we lost a master shot when the files that evening were found to be corrupted. It was a piano and vocal performance and that take happened to be the best performance of the whole day. Fortunately the talent was still around the next day and had enough time before her plane departure to do another take but it wasn't as good a performance. I was recording double system so we at least have the audio recording of her best take. It's a buggy camera that I will be happy never to work with again. Of course I won't turn down a Scarlet job if offered.

Andy

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With Scarlet and the like, I advocate triple system: Audio recorder, on-camera media, and PIX/KiPro recorder. Obviously, when I'm producer I get (and pay for) what I want. When I'm working with pals, I get to participate in the conversation. Sometimes, well...

Jim "bummed no one like my POX on RED joke in some other thread" Feeley

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Haven't worked with an Epic yet that hasn't ruined a few takes due to fan noise and either quiet location, or delivery by the actors. Had a few bathroom scenes that were a nightmare. Haven't tried the gel pack solution yet. Will line that up next time.

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Andy,

That really sucks. I have been lucky enough to work only on shoots where the potential for fail seemed strictly on me;) So is Scarlet return level (when you have level) worse than garden variety Sony cams?

Not sure which cameras you mean by "garden variety" but i can be more specific. Using my 442: I sent tone at 0dB to the camera and I set the level on the Scarlet to the first hash mark. I selected return on my 442 with the 442 return pot wide open. The most return I could get from the Scarlet as seen on my 442 meters was -20. This is with the Scarlet's audio output set to as high as it can go. As i mentioned previously this is the worse of any camera I've used including prosumer mini dv cams.

Andy

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Edit: ok, loathe is a strong word...more like: continue to stare at it and wonder why the people who design it can't put a workable audio section in it. But then I remember I'm charging for a separate recording :)

Personally, do we really WANT them to put a workable audio section in it? Not me... I like my double system autonomy, which is

essential in our evolving multi-track world. It's pretty easy to feed it a scratch track. Though the dinky connector is in the entirely wrong place, Arri sort of put theirs in the same general spot as well. Who was first?

(who authorized this?? :))

On my last little movie, the A-CAM died on Day One, take 5 !! B-CAM became A-CAM for the rest of the 20 days.

The fan setting was atrocious, and the AC couldn't manage to change this or wouldn't bother.

I had NO IDEA of the sound of the rooms / environment we were in until we were rolling - at least the director was well aware and accommodating for the next take... take one was always a rehearsal, and then a chance to clean up the ambiences when possible.

While in standby, it sounded like a jet in idle..... I mean ridiculously loud. Hard to have a conversation too close to it.

MF

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What Mike just said. I'd rather these new ultra-K cameras didn't have audio capabilities at all. Then I would never be in the position of having a producer look at me skeptically when I insist they need double-system because of how bad the on-board sound is.

That's one of the nicest things about shooting film -- we never need to have that discussion. I've never once had to say, "What? You're renting an Auricon so you can use in-camera sound?" That, and you hear the abusive, "Just let 'er roll" much less frequently.

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What I love is when they are shooting some promo pieces that are going to run in a 640x480 window on a flash website and they insist on shooting on an EPIC in 5K. Talk about overkill. The fans come on because of the Ultra Hi Res and Long takes. They could be shooting with a standard Def betacam video camera with zero problems and much faster post and you probably couldn't tell the difference in the final web based image.

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