The impossible task

Last few days I've finally got some time to go through the footage I brought home from Kenya last month. First I calculated that there should be about 6 hours of mostly slow motion footage, but I was wrong. The reality is that there was almost 9 hours of footage in 490 clips :) Because 98% of the footage is shot in 10x slow motion, the clips are usually few seconds over minute(FS700 has 8secs real time buffer for 240fps).

It's quite easy to go through the footage in Prelude, but the 490 clips won't make it a fast job :)

So I made some investigation what would be the smartest way to get this project running. I wanted to be prepared, ready and able to start the logging for the clips. I have used Adobe Premiere Pro for quite long time, but I'm not too excited to handle this amount of clips in Premiere. I needed a Lightroom for video. Enter Adobe Prelude. It was just right time to attend the Adobe Create Now World Tour in Helsinki. Got some great tips and tricks from +Jason Levine about Prelude, Speedgrade and Premiere. Only problem was that I needed to re-wrap the .mts files to .mp4 in order to work properly in Prelude. Now it seems that sub clipping and logging descriptions is gonna take a while to finish, but once it's done I have only the good clips and the best parts of them to work with. Then I'll do a rough cut and figure out how I'm going to make the slomo interesting enough to watch for few minutes :)
If you got some questions about my workflow with video/photo, go on and comment of send email.

First part of the trip

OK, I just returned from the southeastern part of Kenya back to Nairobi. We(me and Mike) visited 4 different parks in 8 days: Tsavo East and West, Amboseli and Chyulu Hills. These parks were all new to me and we also scouted different accommodation options. My first priority on this trip is to try(and learn :) the Sony NEX FS700 camera in wildlife filming. So I decided early on the trip that I would concentrate to shoot mainly highspeed framerate stuff(usually 240fps). It's important to have some sort of "story" or guideline in a documentary/feature film so when I'll be doing some super slomo ether way(cos it's THE freaking FS700 :) why not all the way? So expect to see some slow motion African wildlife montage when I'm done with editing.

Afterwards I found leopard sitting across the walley. Tsavo West. 

I'll get back to you once I return to Nairobi and have time(and networks) to write more. Remember to follow the photostream above, FB and G+ pages for more frequent updates.

What's in your bags?

I got the last items for the trip Friday and tested them yesterday, so now it was time to see how they fit in my bags. I have a Lowepro Pro Roller Lite 250 AW as my carry-on camera bag and a Peli case as my luggage. All the tech gear fits in my Lowepro and the tripod, monopod, slider and 2 fluidheads takes a half of my Peli leaving just enough room for my cloths etc.

Here's the list:

Cameras:

• Sony NEX-FS700
• Sony NEX-6

Lenses:

• Sony 18-200mm
• Sony 10-18mm
• Sony 16-50mm
• Nikkor AI-S 24mm f/2.8
• Nikkor AI-S 50mm f/1.8
• Nikkor AF 80-200mm f/2.8
• Nikkor AI-S 300mm f/2.8
• Nikkor TC-14B

With these shall I capture the beasts!

Sony FS700 will be mounted on a rig that has a follow focus for some lenses and a support for the bigger lenses. I'll try to demonstrate the usage of the rig with video once I get to the savanna.

Next post from Kenya...

Cameras don't take pictures.

I know it's the people behind the cameras who take the pictures, but sometimes it's just fun to have many toys. I've had some monster cameras with me before, like the Hasselblad H4D-40, but last year I managed just with my cellphone and binoculars. So I've tried the both ends of the scale. But I think this is going to be the most extreme-camera-equipment-trip ever!
About 2 weeks to D-day and I have still 3-4 orders to pick up: New videohead, hard drive and memory cards, camera rig parts etc. etc. I'll do a complete gear sum up post before the trip. Now I'm still testing and building different solutions so this is what my studio looks like. My NEX-6 is in the corner on a new monopod and controlled via my android smartphone. It does feel like a christmas... ;)

A new view

I coming back to the topic I wrote last time: taking a different picture of the well known subject. In wildlife photography it's harder to take a new "angle" to things because the models are... well... how do I put it.. wild? :) But every now and then something new emerges. Here are two great examples:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1253935/Photographer-captures-amazing-images-lions-watering-hole-submerging-months.html

http://blog.pocketwizard.com/?p=4968

It takes an innovative attitude or a hell lot of courage to pull off there kind of photos. But the thing that these photographers have is passion. Passion to see your objects differently.

My goal has always been to do or use something new on my next trip to Kenya. 2011 I shot with Hasselblad H4D-40 and this year I used my cellphone with binoculars :) Next year it will be Sony NEX FS700 vs GoPro. I've also thought about using the the AR.Drone 2.0

But now that I have the Sony NEX-6 I'm thinking the possibilities to use the build-in WiFi control feature. This would allow me to lower or stick up the camera and simultaneously see the viewfinder on my phone and trigger the shutter. Imagine a giraffe photographed at eye level with a wideangle lens. Or grass level shots of the small animals. Just put the camera on a monopod and compose using your smatphone. Simple but effective.

Here's in pictures what I'm talking about:

Sony NEX-6 triggered via WiFi by Samsung Galaxy Note II

Here is the same view behind both devices

The first one is a mind-bottling, right? :D

I'm gonna take some time off from my studio work now when the holidays are almost here, but I keep testing my NEX-6 and the new wideangle Sony 10-18mm f/4 (here's a good review) so I'll keep posting here...

My thoughts on Sony NEX FS700 and NEX-6

This year I started to rethinking my photo gear. I've been a Nikon shooter all my life. I had a Panasonic GF1 for a year 'cos I needed a pocket camera to capture some of the changes I had in my life at that point. I use my Nikon D3 for most of my studio portraits and it's been a true reliable workhorse for 4 years now and still keeps clicking with no service needed :)
I think Sony as a new kid on the block. They came into the DSLR markets late, just few years ago, but they have done some good to all camera consumers. Sony have shook the industry with a new perspective to making cameras. The STL cameras allow better frame rates and constant autofocus. The NEX lineup seems to be the most sold mirrorless system today and I think in a few years the mirror flapping is going to be a distant sound from the past.
My eye was first in the NEX-7 which would be very nice combination of highres photo and quality video. But then came the FS700 with its highspeed frame rates. I tried to loan the camera for my trip this summer, but Sony wasn't interested. Finnish representatives didn't have a demo and the international PR-people from Sony didn't even bother to answer.
So I bought one. And a full bag of old MF Nikkors to fit the FS700.
This week I got the brand new NEX-6 so my gear for Kenya 2013 is shaping up. I can use the same lenses(or adapter) in both cameras. The sensor in NEX-6 is better than my D3 in every way, so I just might end up selling my Nikon gear in the near future.
Here's some snapshots I took the first night out with NEX-6. No post processing, straight out of camera.

And here's my first test footage with FS700.

...more to come with some pic of different lens setups for the cameras.