Film and Digital Times - March 2007 - (Page 12)

Tiffen Merlin & DFX Digital Dustbuster Merlin, Arm and Vest Named after the most famous wizard of all time, the Merlin from Tiffen looks like a Quidditch broomstick turned Calder mobile. Garrett Brown and Tiffen introduced the Steadicam Merlin at NAB two years ago. Its sculptural shape is worthy of permanent display in the MoMA design collection. Clever features transform almost anyone into a wizard of smooth camera moves. For cameras under 5 or 6 pounds, your arm becomes the shock absorber that smoothes out the bumps. Setting it up is no secret. The magically low price of the Merlin includes an instruction manual and DVD by Garrett. The workbook is like getting a graduate degree in the phyics of camera stabilization along with Steadicam theory and practice. For NAB 2007, Tiffen is conjuring up a Merlin Arm and Vest. It removes the weight of Merlin and camera from your arm, so if you haven’t been bulking your biceps, you’ll still be able to conjure up mystifyingly smooth and elegant shots worthy of the most celebrated and legendary Steadicam wizards. Andrew Laszlo, ASC was telling us all about the many things that can go wrong during film production, and his interview was no exception. Somehow, of 200,000 feet exposed, this was the only shot that was scratched and dusty. In fact, it looked like a Siberian snowstorm, even though it was shot in bright sunlight in the middle of summer on the Universal back lot. The picture at top is a frame-grab from the Avid, showing the dust, dirt and white scratches on the original negative. The bottom picture is a direct output from John Dowdell’s Quantel IQ at Goldcrest, after the 35mm negative was scanned with ARRISCAN and John spent about four hours manually Dustbusting this 3 second shot, frame by frame, digitally retouching. If Kodak’s DIGITAL ICE had been available, most of the Dustbusting would have been done automatically and instantly. In fact, DIGITAL ICE was released a few weeks later. Now, Kodak has just released Version 2.0 of its DIGITAL ICE software, designed to automatically detect and eliminate dust and scratches during scanning, with an option for providing “untouched” image data along with the output defect matte. In addition to its normal RGB illumination, the ARRISCAN uses infrared illumination to detect film defects. Because film dyes are nearly transparent to infrared light, and dust is seen as a “solid,” it is possible to produce a complete defect image of scratches, dust and other image artifacts. This defect image is used as the basis for sophisticated image correction algorithms implemented in DIGITAL ICE. This image can be embedded as a fourth channel in the scanned image file (DPX format) or stored as a separate file. KODAK DIGITAL ICE runs as embedded software in the ARRISCAN. DFX Digital Filter Suite Stop the Presses! We just tried a preproduction version of Tiffen’s stunningly well conceived DFX Digital Filter Suite. It simulates almost all of Tiffen’s glass filters, including the popular Pro-Mists, Double Fogs and Black Pro-Mists that have been elusive in previous software. DFX Digital Filters will be available as plug-ins for Photoshop, Avid and Final Cut Pro. Even better, it will come as a stand-alone package that should prove as essential a tool for cinematographers as a lightmeter. The next time your art director is horrified at your choice of Nude FX 2 filter for the priceless product shot, you’ll now be able to pre-viz how great it will look in dailies—instantly—on your laptop. This should be one of the stars of NAB. 12 Mar 2007

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Film and Digital Times - March 2007

New from Transvideo
Wizards of Wireless Focus and Remote Control
Cooke /i dataLink, Pixel Farm and Avid
Sony F23
Tiffen Steadicam Merlin and DFX Filters
Kodak Digital Ice and Arriscan
16x9 Inc 1.5x Tele Converter for HDV Camcorders
JVC PL Mount Adapter
Canon XHA1 and XHG1 Camcorders
Kata Camcorder Guards
Formatt Grads
ARRI at NAB
Lighting with Paint

Film and Digital Times - March 2007

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