NZVN February2015

JANUARY 2015 Vol 210

Technologies SoftwareDefined Video Network-ing (SDVN) solutions.Evertz SDVN provides IPworkflows which are formatagnostic, easily supportingSD/HD/3G/4K and 8K videoformats, and provideunprecedented scalabilityand reduction in operationalcosts.

Evertz will continue toexpand on this range in2015 and have recentlyannounced they areCollaborating with Sony onIP Interoperability

Elemental Technologieshave produced Elemen-tal® Delta which is a video delivery platform designedto optimise the monetisation, management anddistribution of multiscreen video across internal andexternal IP networks.

“Through just-in-time (JIT) video packaging andintelligent caching, Elemental® Delta enables acomplete solution for time-shifted TV and real-timecontent delivery with advanced levels of customizationand control, including network bandwidth optimization,profile manipulation and highly targeted ad insertion.”

Wohler Technologies continue to expand their award-winning MPEG Series monitors which decode and provideconvenient at-a glance monitoring of programme contentfrom MPEG-2/4 ASI and Ethernet IP streams as well as3G/HD-SDI inputs. Wohler are also rolling out asignificant new version of their Tachyon® Wormhole™

Holidays are a time for reflection and forward planningwhich is where the excitement is. Here are somethoughts and news items I picked up between lying onthe beach, golf and sleeping.

In the sound area, there has been a foray into hi-resaudio. This is in response to music artists complainingabout their high quality original recordings being dumbeddown to MP3 files to play on iPhone speakers. Soundfamiliar? The new file is a “flac” file and is much biggerthan a CD quality wav file. Unfortunately for themanufacturers pushing this particular technology, thelistening experience is apparently not appreciably betterthan wav in most situations and it’s not going to interestthose who want all their music on one cheap card. Alsosound familiar? More info at the “whathifi” site –

http://www.whathifi.com/news/high-resolution-audio-everything-you-need-to-know

In the television market, CES ( Consumer ElectronicsShow ) unveiled “quantum dots” as a cheaper option tothe beautiful but expensive OLED technology. Therewere also releases of yet more streaming devices thatare not compatible with competing brands of TV –another workflow issue.

My belief is that internet TV is going to become the majormeans of video content viewing but that it’s going to be along journey punctuated by promising but flawedofferings. Just like paper is to stress free reading,broadcast is to relaxed viewing.

What do others think?

Quinto Communications

Our prediction for 2015 is that it will be a big year for IPTV.

In 2014 we saw broadcasters begin to transition awayfrom baseband/SDI workflows with Evertz

What we can look forward to in 2015 and beyond.

Pete Fullerton fromQuinto Communications.

media retiming solution. Tachyon® Wormhole™enables the imperceptible re-timing of media by plus orminus 10% without having to go back to the edit suiteand is designed to be used by Broadcasters and ContentCreators.

New Gear for 2015

In 2015 JVC are releasing their four new 4k camerasgiving some awesome new low cost options for the indiedoco/film maker. Of the four cameras, one the GY-LS300, has a Super 35mm sensor with MFT mount,making it one of the most versatile 4k 35mm camerason the market.

Quinto are now the agents for Craltech. Craltech area Spanish company offering attractive low-costmultiview solutions, video processors and broadcastmonitors. For example Craltech’sQu4tre Mini Quad-Split turns any monitor into a quad split monitor with16 characters UMD per each input, 4K Format support,Aspect Ratio Selection, Markers, Real time colourWaveform and Vectorscope, 16 Channel Audio LevelMeters and Timecode display.

Professional Lighting Services Ltd

I see 2015 as a year ofexpanding LED technol-ogy. We will hopefullysee the "Trademe" qualityequipment drop off asusers start finding thetruth to the old adage"You get what you payfor."

Hopefully end users willbe able to see throughthe "snake oil" peddled bysome LED suppliers.

This won't see a drop inthe use of fluorescentfixtures for higher outputsoftlighting applications.LEDs will remain the go to

for battery operation and up to 1kW studio typereplacements.

HMI will remain the best available daylight replacementlighting for the foreseeable future, especially in theARRI M series type fixtures which deliver the extra Fstop of light that we need for our sun here in NZ.

The large budget productions seem to have started witha hiss and a roar this year, and will hopefully carry oninto the future. Hopefully some of this will rub off intothe TV arena and also into local production to keep usall busy.

Our only concern is how the Chinese co-productiondeals will pan out, if we suddenly become a venue forChinese crew and equipment to follow with productionsinto New Zealand.

All in all, 2015 is looking a whole lot more positive thanlast year.

Protel

“As you are all aware ourindustry and the pro-ducts Protel supply andyou use are being rapidlytransformed.

Performance of storageand processing powerimproves by a factor of 2every 18 months, and asa result there areimportant long-term con-sequences to theindustry. A factor of 2every 18 months isequivalent to:

A factor of 10 every 5 years or;

A factor of 100 every 10 years.

These sustained long-term trends are responsible

for transforming the computer industry andindirectly also transforming the Post Productionand Broadcasting industries.

Remember when you first purchased your first videoediting system, how much it cost you for unreliable lowcapacity storage SCSI drives all raided together? Itcost a small fortune. Consider what you can purchasenow for the same money and the raw processing powerand huge amount of storage available today. The sametechnology and processing power is also being appliedto every component in the Post Production andBroadcasting array of products we offer.

Many of the products Protel offer incorporate the use ofcomputer processors as well as high speed storageofferings; check out our product range and you will seewhat I mean.

Just to start the year off, here are some of the newproducts employing processors and storage.

Sony FS7 4K camera which is upgraded using softwareupload; the camera also uses high speed media storagecards.

Atomos Shogun the latest 4k recorder using high speedstorage.

Livestream the software application, in addition tooffering unlimited GFX now also offers Chroma Keying.

The list goes on. Have a great 2015 using your hightech products and don’t hesitate to call us to discussyour future technology options.” NZVN

P4 How Green is my Green Screen?

P13 Tim’s got more than C-stands.

P14 It’s nearly D-day for Radio mic

Change.

P19 Filmmaking at SAE Institute.

DISPLAY & CLASSIFIED ADVERTBOOKINGS BY WED 25 FEB

ADVERT COPY BY FRI 27 FEBUP ON THE WEB BY FRI 6 MAR

Go www.finnzed.co.nz and follow the link to NZVN for more news.

Chris McKenzie from PLS.

Ken Brooke from Protel.

Readers help please.

NZVN would like to share techniques of makingvideo clips for the internet with all our readers, so ifyou are near Auckland and do a lot of this, pleasecontact Grant on 09-527 6154 ASAP. Ed

How Green is myGreen Screen?

We are here in Auckland at LumiereMedia Studio with Karen and PeterBardach. It’s a bit hard to find so we’regoing to put a little map in to show youwhere they are because it’s well worthcoming for a tour. The first thing youare faced with when you walk in theroller door is a medium sized white CYC.It’s a bit noisy here but as you walkdown the corridor, you’re into a verysilent area with a very large green screenCYC.

Ed: Karen, I guess this is the key partof what Lumiere offers isn’t it, the greenscreen?

Karen: It is. The vision of thestudio was always about the greenscreen. We believed in the beginning wecould only have one, because we looked at a lot ofspaces. Ceiling height mattered, so it was hard to findthe right space. This studio came up and provided theopportunity to also have a white screen. So we canoffer space to the advertising industry and themarketing people … it could be for digital still primarily,because it’s not a sound stage on the white screen, butour focus was always about the green. We were justreally lucky that this space came up all ready partly setup, including being sound insulated by the ShoppingChannel.

Ed: Okay, so basically, you’ve taken over a facilitythat was set up by the Shopping Channel, but you’veadded a lot to it and what you’ve added has come fromyour knowledge of similar set ups in Canada, Iunderstand?

Karen: That’s right. When we came in and lookedat it, we loved what the Shopping Channel had donewith it – the sound insulation, the carpeting – the coreof a good studio was here, but it wasn’t a green studio,it was a television studio. So what we had to do wasconvert it to something that we believed people wouldenjoy shooting in, not just that it is soundproof, itneeded to be comfortable, it needed to be decorated, itneeded to have the facilities, it needed to have what Iwould want if I was shooting something.

Ed: But it also has to have a very high quality greenscreen. What are the features that youput into it that make it high quality?

Karen: Well I guess the size is oneof the biggest factors, and the fact thatit’s three-sided. You know, there arepeople who will do a single wall and thatworks, as long as you’re not turning thecamera too much. We decided to gowith three-sided and make it as big asthe room would fit. So we made it eightmetres wide which is great and we havea proportionally decent ceiling height.

The big choice was whether to gochroma key green or digital green, and Iread a lot about the two. The chromakey paint is fast and easy to use, thepaint is cheaper, the key is easier to pull.Digital green paint is really difficult towork with. We had some problems whenwe were painting the screen and we hadto bring in a couple of people to makesure the screen paint became as even as

possible. That’s to do with the paint, and because it’ssuch difficult paint, you have to handle it really well. Itmakes it easier to pull a good key and when you getyour key it looks way better, so people need to knowthe difference.

Chroma key is designed to be used for newscasters forweather broadcast, so for example, when you go to theAuckland Zoo, they have that and you stand in front ofit and they put you in front of the elephant on a digitalstill. It’s very fast, very easy. That’s chroma key; butthe digital green is meant for professional production.So we went with the difficult one, which is the digitalgreen.

Ed: Okay, so you’re saying, the difference between achroma key and digital green is that the chroma keypaint has a more forgiving response of green, asopposed to a digital green, which is one frequencyresponse. It’s a little bit harder to handle, but a lotsharper in terms of setting your computer compositingto eliminate that particular frequency and nothing else?

Karen: I think the difference is that the digitalgreen paint is designed to work with the popularsoftware programmes that are available now for doingyour compositing and so they work well together. Thisis designed to do in postproduction; it is designed towork with the high end software to get a very precisekey.

Karen at the Lumiere editing facility.

Karen, Peter and Levi on green.

Ed: And just in terms of the screen again, there areboards that extend the stage out the front, so you couldactually put quite a number of people on here, or quitea big scene and have them all standing around and stillkey the whole scene?

Karen: My vision of it was that, if we had theboards in the front, and people stood on them, it’seasier to replace a board than the whole floor of thescreen, because you can take those boards out andreplace them. But it turned out that by extending thefloor outwards towards the camera, you can havesomebody walk towards the camera, or you can havesomebody walk a very long way, whereas because thescreen is only three metres deep, they can’t walk veryfar and they’re off-screen. But this way, they can walktowards the camera and in addition, by extending thefloor outwards, and we can go nearly full width, you canput more people on it.

Ed: I can assure you that the lighting here is veryeven. They’ve got a very high quality range of fluorosthat are lighting up the CYC and a fluoro backlight. Soeverything’s covered, with extra lights of course to lightup the runway if you’re wanting to move in and out.Now you have said that it is a work in progress isn’t itKaren – you are adding to this as you go and certainlytaking feedback from your customers. What have youheard so far … I know you recently had a film school inhere and they were very positive about what they coulddo?

Karen: Yes, the first two customers did TVCs – onedid a television commercial on the white screen; theother did a television commercial on the green screen,and the feedback from them was minimal, but verypositive. It was just basically “yeah, we like the studio,definitely we’ll be back.” When the film school came in,they had a fairly large crew, so they had a lot ofstudents and they had some instructors. They had a lotof equipment – it surprised me that they had so muchequipment. Even though they had so many people andso much equipment, it was a very workable space withthat number of people in it, and the feedback from twoof the instructors was “this is a really nice studio –you’re going to be really busy.” Opening at Christmaswasn’t the ideal time, but February’s coming and I’massuming people are going to get back to work andonce we’re on the map, we will tweak things. As clientscome in, we’re finding out what they need. We’rewatching them to see what is it that they would wantthat they’re not asking for, and that’s an intuitive thing,knowing whether it’s to do with the kitchen or themakeup room, we’re constantly going to be improvingthe studio.

Ed: That’s the thing, that’s why it’s important to comeand have a look at the studio, have a tour, talk to Karenand Peter and Levi about what you might want, and

certainly what’s available here. Now, you’re not onlyusing this as a hire studio, you’re potentially doingsome of your own work here and for that, you’ve goneand got yourself a Sony FS7, a Blackmagic ProductionStudio, a 4K monitor and an editing suite, is that right?

Karen: That’s right. We bought one of the newMacs for editing. It looks like a garbage can, so it’s theCylinder Mac and I believe we probably got one of thefirst ones that came into the country. My opinion ofthat is it’s good for learning but I think, if we want to doserious editing, we need to upgrade to somethingbetter. But that’s fine, we can go to Protel or somebodyelse and start looking at what the next editing suitemight be, because Protel is great to work with and theyseem to always have what we want. We have a goodworking relationship with them. We tend to buyingcutting edge stuff, so we’re always on a learning curve.

Ed: And you have a good relationship with Tim Timlinat Panavision I understand?

Karen: Oh Tim’s great. He’s one of the first peoplewho really helped us out a lot, because we went to himwith a lot of questions. He didn’t always have what wewanted to buy, but he would always redirect us towhere we could buy whatever it was and we did buy afew things from him – small stuff mostly – a couple of C-stands. He refers to his Australian counterpart wherehe can get us stuff and thus far, he’s helped out in thesense of problem solving. So when we had a problemwith connecting our lights to the ceiling and we didn’tknow how, because it needed to be retrofitted withsomething, he designed that for us. So he would makea part that would make our lights work with the ceilingrack that we’d put up. Tim’s been like a mentor; he’svery calm, he’s always very helpful and friendly and heseems quite open to helping other people like ourselves,at our level, knowing that we’re new to the country.

Ed: Well I’ve actually heard that about Tim, so I canthoroughly concur with that. Now Peter, your part inthis I understand is as backer and muscle – oh, andhusband?

Peter: Yes that’s right, I take direction from Karenbecause she knows more about this stuff than I do, butI built the ceiling racks, I put the rails up, I had to learnhow to use a hammer drill to use the DynaBolts to affixit to the concrete. It worked out pretty good. And I’mup and down on the scaffolding to put lights up andmove things around, so to that end I’ve been able tohelp.

Ed: Somebody’s got to do it?

Peter: Yes, somebody’s got to do it. I don’t knowall the technical stuff that Karen knows, but I’m learningand I was able to help out at the Weetbix KidsTriathlon, being a camera operator and helping to carrystuff around.

Ed: But you also enjoy the lifestyle?

Peter: Yes, it’s a lot more laidbackhere than it was in Canada, so it’s nice.

Ed: Oh, what part of Canada – I thoughtCanada was pretty laidback, so what partwere you in?

Peter: We were in Vancouver.

Ed: So you’re used to the rain?

Peter: I’m not used to the rain now.We went back for a holiday to see ourdaughter who still lives in Canada and I’dforgotten just how much rain Vancouvergets.

Ed: I was there for 3 weeks and it rainedmost days!

Peter: Yeah, well you have to get there in thesummertime. They have a great summer, but 8months out of the year it does rain a lot.

Ed: Now Levi, you’ve been sitting there very quietlyand patiently … as business development manager,where do you see the business going?

Levi: Hopefully, over the coming year, we can get afew more clients through the door, as people start torealise that we’re here, and what we do, and we get alot of those repeat customers as well. We also want tosupport the up and coming generation, which is why wewant to work with the film schools because they are thepeople of tomorrow for the industry. Ifwe help them out now, when they’re injobs in 12 or 24 months’ time, perhapsthey’ll remember our studio and thinkwell let’s go there, because it was agreat space to use.

Ed: So you have a special offer for filmschools?

Levi: Yes we do – they get up to 40%off our normal rates, which is prettygood.

Ed: Wow, that’s very good. But youwouldn’t give them that for a month’shire would you?

Levi: No …

Ed: It’s a tester?

Levi: Well there is a limit of four daysout of a year but then they still get verygood rates even after that, we cannegotiate with them. But it’s just an

offer to help them get going with their projects andthings like that.

Ed: Right, and have you had a look at any otherstudios available to confirm “we’re doing it better”?

Levi: I personally haven’t but Karen has told me a lot.I know a bit about the other studios – the main onesand what they offer.

Ed: In terms of location, you’re just a short step downfrom TV3. Is that because the Shopping Channel had aneed to be close to TV3 and you just took it over, or doyou see this as a positive? Is this something that TV3should be interested in?

Karen: MediaWorks have shot in here already, sothey found us. I was aware of a lot of places, but thething is that there are so many places to approach andit comes down to how do you go about approachingthem. MediaWorks shot something in December andthey were very happy with what they got, and so I’msure they’ll be back, because we’re going to try to buildthe business on repeat business. It’s much easier tobuild it that way, but we are open to music videos –high end music videos that would have productioninsurance, because that’s the key to everything –you’ve got to be at a level where you’ve got the moneyto have the insurance, to have the proper crew,because it is a very high end studio. You’re not goingto be disappointed in what you get when you comehere. I believe the reason the studio is here is becausethis is where the best spaces are. I think it’s more todo with the space, because we looked for 9 months …we had to look for a really long time to find the rightplace and we were in the right place at the right time topick up the Shopping Channel facility because they hadalready done a lot of work to the studio. They hadprobably half converted it to what we wanted it to be tobegin with, otherwise we would have had to spend a lotof money on the floor and on the walls, and we didn’thave to do that. The location is great, because Ibelieve this particular area we’re in has the best spacesfor this type of work, and I think that’s why people arehere.

Ed: In terms of parking, how many vehicles can youaccommodate?

Karen: We can park up to 6. We can park 2 infront of the roller door; you can actually drive a vehiclein if you really need to, if you have a lot of equipmentor heavy equipment you can back in the roller door,unload your stuff, you can park in front of the rollerdoor so you can keep all your equipment close to whereyou are if you need to. We have 1 space across fromthat and 3 underground.

Ed: And Ruru Street’s a bit quiet, so you might findsome outside parking as well?

Karen: I think that you can, but it’s a quite a busyarea. I’m not sure if it’s because it’s partly residential,but there is some street parking.

Ed: Now in terms of production insurance, this issomething that I’m sure many smaller operators don’thave themselves. I know I’ve looked at it and it’s justan horrendous cost. But for large operators, that’s nota problem, they probably have their own insurancecompany, but you do have a solution Karen?

Karen: We do. Larger production companies havethe annual policy and it’s never been a problem with

somebody who’s quite big. With the smaller people,they have small budgets, insurance is actuallypercentage wise, huge, so if you’ve got a $10,000budget, it might be 5% of your budget; but if you havea huge budget it might be a half a percent. Thesolution is we talked to Apex Insurance; they came in,they listened to what problems we have when we wantto bring in a small production. Their solution was “wecan offer you a 1 day.” Yes it’s very expensive, but astime goes by they can drop their rate, once they haveexperience with our clients. This would not be ourpolicy, it would be the client’s policy; they would beresponsible for it. We can arrange that for them, butit’s an independent thing from us and it would work forany small production.

Ed: And that’s it, these lights are expensive,somebody jumps up or a boom operator bangs a bulb,bang there’s the hire cost of the studio for the day gone– and more?

Karen: Yes, because we went high end with thelights, if just one single light got broken, it wouldexceed the cost of what they might pay for one day.

Ed: And also damaging the floor – that’s got to be amajor expense, not only in repainting it, but also thedowntime?

Karen: Exactly, because it could take a week ortwo to get the floor or the wall fixed. It depends,because you can’t walk on the curves; they look likeyou can walk on them, but you really can’t. You caneasily crack the curve of the green screens because wechose to not go with fibreglass. Our experience with itis that it’s shiny and we just decided that we’ll deal withdamage as it comes up. Thus far, even with 12-15people in here the other day, there was not a problemat all. People know not to walk on the curve.

Ed: Well you’ve obviously done your research and youreckon you’ve come up with the most cost-effectivesolution for people who might want to use a greenscreen in terms of what you offer versus the cost of adaily hire?

Karen: Yes, we looked at all angles and there areactually 2 great efficiencies with this studio … becauseit’s fluorescent, you know Kino Flo’s are fluorescent, theenergy use is like $7. Someone came in and used it,we looked at the meter and it was under $10 to lightthis. So we don’t charge for energy, because it’s soenergy efficient that I just can’t be bothered to billsomeone $5. Now, if they switch to tungsten, it couldget more expensive, but it’s not as expensive becausewe are using mostly fluoros and the whole studio is litwith fluoros. The other efficiency is this – myexperience with other studios in Canada is that you get

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the screen, you don’t get any lights, you have to lightthe screen yourself. So we came here and decidedwe’re going to offer a pre-lit screen, otherwise we haveto deal with people coming in and putting their ownlights up and that’s time consuming for us, it’s timeconsuming for them. So what happened with our firstclient was they came in, it was the white screen, it waspre-lit, they rented two Kino Flo’s for the side, we setthem up for them before they got here … they wereable to start shooting very quickly and they don’t haveto do strip down. So you save, say, an hour at thebeginning; you save an hour at the end, therefore youcan go a half a day. Yes, we’re hurting ourselves bydoing that, but we’re not totally profit oriented.It’s about introducing the new technology andgiving people the ability to afford it, andmaking it so that we’re working on a volume,as opposed to trying to hit everybody with afull day; you can come in and get in a half aday what you want, or go to another studioand shoot for a full day.

Ed: That’s got to be a no brainer?

Karen: Well you would think – I wasshocked, because the first client booked thefull day. They booked the day, but they camein and got their shots in 3 hours. A half a dayis 5 hours.

Ed: So you charged them for …?

Karen: A half a day.

Ed: Oh, aren’t they wonderful.

Karen: Well they said “no, no, that’s okay”and I’m thinking I can’t charge you for 10

hours when you were here for 3. The whole point isefficiency and to get people looking at what you can dowith what we put in front of you. It’s about youimproving your projects by having something that willwork better for you in a shorter amount of time, andyou’re paying less for your crew.

Ed: But we’re not going to suggest that people book aweek and then use half a day?

Karen: No, it doesn’t work like that!

To find out how it works for yourself, arrange your ownviewing of perhaps the best green screen studio inAuckland by giving Lumiere a call on 09 377 6699. NZVN

Tim’s got more than C-standsWe are at Panavision with Tim Timlin because Karen atLumiere waxed lyrically about Tim and how helpful hewas, so we’re here with Tim to pat him on the back forproviding such great service to our industry.

Tim: It was very kind of them to say that. They’renew to the New Zealand situation and needed help withsuppliers. They were having difficulty finding thingsand installing the gear that they’d obtained and I wasable to sort out connections and accessories and bitsand pieces for them, for which, obviously, they’ve beenquite grateful. It’s generally in our interest atPanavision to try and support all our customers as bestwe can, even if we’re not necessarily going to make ahuge sale. It’s the whole view of keeping the industrygoing and customer service is what we aim at. So wehave many customers come in looking for solutions,who we will attempt to help with advice and supply,service, repairs … whatever it might be, because webelieve in building a long-term customer relationshiprather than just an instant quick sale.

Ed: You can also comment on the subject of greenscreens in general, because I understand that you wereinvolved years ago in one very, very large greenscreen?

Tim: Yes … the whole issue of chroma green screens isa very interesting one. I would hesitate to call myselfan expert, but we did supply a very large screen forSpartacus which involved something like seven linearkilometres of material – and that was very successful.

On a smaller scale, we also supply a paper backgroundmade by Colorama which is a chroma green colour. It’s

a different green for the fabric, but they all seem towork well. It’s not clear which one is better becausethey both seem to work for the situations required, butit looks like a lot more research could be exploredregarding the best features of the colour green to beused. There must be a paint pigment or paint – weknow there’s a manufacturer that makes it, but wehaven’t had any requirements to supply it in NewZealand yet, but I suspect that probably, as long as it’sa similar green to the fabric or the paper, it’s going towork effectively as a green key. As you said to mebefore, from your experience, different colourbackgrounds, as long as they are plain, are probablygoing to work adequately in many different situationswhere a quick and simple solution is required.

Ed: Obviously, it does come down to the productionthat you’re doing and the production values but, I wouldimagine however, when you’re going 4K, you’ve gotthat little bit of extra detail that perhaps the digitalgreen would help with?

Tim: Well again, I guess you need input from somecolour expert on this. It might be something to do withthe frequencies, but I suspect with 64 bit colour and 10bit monitors, they can do millions of colours and I’msure a skilled post operator will be able to match greenswhere necessary. I have seen post houses with sceneswith multiple different coloured green screens in them,and that didn’t seem to give them any problem at all.So I’m not sure how critical that actually is. But as yousay, if post work is critical, then maybe it suits to get amore even green screen colour for shooting certainthings.

more on page 16

It’s nearly D-day for Radio mic Change

fines) and, in seriousc a s e s , i n i t i a t eprosecution. If radiomicrophones arecausing interferenceto the licensed usersof the band, thoseusers will notify usand a Radio In-spector will inves-tigate.

but our general sense is that the transition isgoing well. While no-one welcomes having tomove before they are ready, most peopleunderstand the need for the change and aregetting on with it. We’ve been pleased to seethat suppliers are getting on board, offeringtrade-ins and other specials to assist users inmaking the move.

Q2. Will anyone using a radio microphone in the700 MHz band interfere with the new users of theband ( 4G cell phones?) And, if so, how wouldthis be manifested?

Yes. If radio microphones continued to operatein the band, there would be increasing problemsas the new 700 MHz 4G networks are built andthe numbers of 4G cell phones increase.

The way the problem manifests would depend onthe frequency the radio microphone is using. Ifin the upper part of the band, radio microphoneswill likely cause localised interference to cellphones and the microphones themselves are alsolikely to fail due to relatively high powerinterfering signals coming from the cell towers.In the lower part of the band, the radiomicrophones will experience intermittentinterference from cell phones and may also blocksignals from cell phones to the towers,decreasing the effective coverage of the cellularnetwork.

Q3. In your June 14 article, you say thatcompliance action may be taken against the userif they continue in the forbidden zone after 11March. How will you detect misuse? Are youbuilding detector vans like they had for peoplewithout television licences?

Radio Spectrum Management already has a teamof Radio Inspectors stationed throughout NewZealand. These Radio Inspectors deal with avariety of interference issues using specialistequipment and vehicles that can quickly findinterference sources and illegal transmitters.Radio Inspectors can remove interferingequipment, issue infringement notices (with

Cell phone networks have very sensitive receiversthat operate close to the noise floor and aretherefore very susceptible to interference fromany other transmissions at the same frequency.700 MHz cellular services will soon becomeubiquitous and cannot co-exist with radiomicrophones.

Q5. Do you expect any more digital televisionchannels to be used and, if so, when?

Radio microphone users need to be aware thatnew television broadcasts could be established inthe “available” frequencies at any time.

We recommend that purchasers of new radiomicrophones choose models that have a widetuning range within the available frequencies, sothey can be retuned if a new television service isestablished in their area. A chart showing digitalchannel usage can be found here:

http://www.rsm.govt.nz/cms/pdf-library/resource-library/publications/table-of-digital-television-channel-useage-pdf

Q6. How long will the frequency ranges marked“available” ( 502-606 and 622-698 MHz ) remainfreely available to radio microphone users?

The Government has no current plans to changethe frequency ranges available, or the “free tothe user” policy, for radio microphones.

Q7. How does New Zealand compareinternationally for radio spectrum available forradio microphones?

New Zealand is a “technology taker” and dependson equipment being available in internationalmarkets. New Zealand seeks to align itself withinternational spectrum bands as much aspossible.

The current UHF Digital Television Band ( 502–606 MHz and 622–698 MHz for New Zealand ) iswidely used for radio microphones internationallyand there is a large variety of equipmentavailable. This band provides ample freespectrum for the time being. The Ministry is

Well, you can’t say you haven’t had enough warnings

that the spectrum for radio microphone use is about to

change. Some questions have emerged since our initial

article in June 2014 so I followed up with Len Starling

from Radio Spectrum Management.

Q1. Radio microphones need to move from the 700

MHz band by 11 March 2015. How is the transition

going?

As individual radio microphones aren’t licensed, it’s a bithard for us to tell how many users have yet to move,

Some targeted monitoring of spectrum is also done toproactively manage risks.

Q4. Would it not be allowable to use individual radio

microphones indoors at close range? Would there really

be any interference to official users of the spectrum

other than to nearby receivers of video signals on

smartphones?

Unfortunately, even at close range or indoors, radiomicrophone use may cause interference to, and willreceive interference from, new 700 MHz 4G services.

closely following international developments and, if newspectrum bands are opened up for radio microphones,we will assess if these can be used in New Zealand.

Q8. What’s in the frequency bands below 502 andabove 806? Could these be used for RF microphones?

No. Unfortunately the bands below 502 MHz and above806 MHz cannot be used by radio microphones in NewZealand. Immediately below 502 MHz is an emergencyservices band used for mobile radio. The servicesimmediately above 806 MHz are microwave backhaulfor power companies,railways and air trafficcontrol. Both frequencyranges are used for criticalradio systems and bothtypes of services would bevery susceptible to inter-ference from radio micro-phones.

Len Starling | Manager |Policy & Planning | RadioSpectrum ManagementMinistry of Business,Innovation &Employment15 Stout St | PO Box 2847 |Wellington 6140, NZDDI +64 4 462 4221 |

Fax +64 4 499 0969Email:[email protected]: www.rsm.govt.nz

So, there you go.

If you have any questions of your own, my best advice

is to firstly contact your chosen audio supplier before

trying the Ministry people in RSM.

Having said that, Len has been particularly forthcoming

with information ( and we thank him and his team for

that ) so I have included his contact details above.

We look forward to any new information from RSM on

this topic and we will bring it to you ASAP.

NZVN

Ed: Right, so for yourgreen screen you cancertainly come to Tim, butalso what I always find whenI come here is the range oflittle bits and pieces that youhave; the connectors andsupport materials that youhave for the industry?

Tim: Yes, we try very hardto keep spigots, adapters,clamps, all those lock-offs,all those sorts of things instock as much as possible.I’m always on the lookoutfor similar sorts of thingsthat are likely to be of useto camera operators andpeople in the industry.Chrosziel make stuff as wellas Manfrotto, and anyoneelse of course that we dealwith, anything that theyhave we’ll generally try andget it in and have it in stock,because it’s usually a thingthat someone will browse,look at the rack with a particular problem in mind, andthey might then sight the solution – and that’s part ofour belief in being there to support the customers.

Ed: Now also in that support basis, Sachtler … youare certainly the place to come to for Sachtler in New

Zealand, but it’s not only selling the tripods, you alsoprovide an official service repair facility?

Tim: Yes – besides being Sachtler agents, we are theauthorised repair site in New Zealand and we are ableto repair any Sachtler head and tripod.

Garry and Tim in the maintenance bay at Panavision.

We look after MediaWorks tripods, TVNZ, and any otherowner/operator who has Sachtler systems. Usually wesell the kit and then don’t see the customer for another15 years, which is not great for sales, but it’s atestament to the quality that Sachtler provide in thegear. Of course, any working professional knows thatsomething might be expensive up front, but in the long-term, if you get the right gear, it’s going to give yougood service.

Not much goes wrong with the Sachtler heads, but weare generally able to turn around in pretty short time,especially for someone who is based in Auckland,usually within half a day we will get them out again –providing of course we have stock and spares. We dokeep a large amount of Sachtler spares in hand, andGarry Oliver, our technician, is extremely familiar withand qualified to work on Sachtler and certainly knowswhat’s going on.

Ed: So it’s really not a case of repairing things thathave failed; most of the time it’s fixing breakages?

Tim: Yes. Breakages and I suppose eventually certainthings wear out. There are spring balances in the heads

which might wear out 10 years later, after a lot of use.Otherwise things get dropped. We’ve had things likecarbon fibre legs being left in an extremely salty watersolution, which has swollen the carbon fibre rods andwe managed to get that right. So there’s some oddthings that happen, but again the issues that forexample if the heads or whatever get into saltwater andthey’re left, the tripod will be ruined, it won’t berecovered. So we’ve had everything from disaster tothings that Garry has managed to pull back from thegrave.

We also do the servicing for O’Connor and supply spare

parts and new product as people require. But similarly

with O’Connor, they have a long life and usually not

much goes wrong with them, they’re pretty solid, so itwould only be breakages and that sort of thing. But we

do offer a very competitive pricing on O’Connor to

anyone else. It is the most popular head amongst the

filmmakers at the moment on the big sets, big

productions.

Ed: So, if any of those take your interest, come andtalk to Tim. NZVN

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Filmmaking atSAE Institute

We are here at the SAE Institute with DrJohn Reynolds, academic co-ordinator,and Sam Kiwan, Head of Department –Film. This story has a connection to theinterview at Lumiere with Karen andPeter Badach because, at the time I wentin to see them, they had just had theSAE film school group in there doing aproject with the green screen.

Ed: Sam, how did the studentsappreciate the facilities at Lumiere?

Sam: Well, we’ve been shootingon a green screen for a while now …

Ed: This is your own green screen Iguess, that you’ve set up here? What’sthe difference to what Lumiere offer?

Sam: The difference is the sizeand the space. We couldn’t achieveeverything that the students’ script wanted without thebigger space. So by going to Lumiere, we realised thatwe could add more actors, more depth and rather thankeep it to mid or close-ups, we could use wide shots atthe same time. It has improved our production valuegreatly and has given the students more opportunity inpostproduction to work with different variations,something that we are not used to in our ownenvironment. So their facility is a great improvement tothe local filmmaking community and we surely lookforward to going down the road a lot more often.

Ed: Can you “mix and match” your students’ materialthat they shoot here on the smaller green screen withthe larger shots?

Sam: Yes absolutely. We try to save bigger shotsfor Lumiere only doing the close-ups and cut-aways oncampus. We do call upon them when we need thoselarger shots and their extra services. They lend outsome of the gear, the cranes, grips mainly, lightingperhaps. I wouldn’t say that we can rely on it entirelybecause the film is a large element and it’s been dividedinto different shots, so whenever we need to shoot a sci-fi with alien invasions and so forth, then we need alarger screen for that.

Ed: Now Karen made a big thing of the Lumierestudios having a true digital green as opposed to just achroma key green. What do you have here?

Sam: Chroma green – it’s a clothbasically. Whenever you’re working withmaterial like fabric, you do have to keepit maintained, clean, no wrinkles orimperfections on the actual screen.Whereas if you paint the wall,maintenance is a lot easier and reflec-tions are not as prominent.

Ed: Any comments on the differencebetween chroma key green and digitalgreen?

Sam: Well on paper there’s a lot ofdifference. However, with the evolutionof the software capabilities that we haveand the hardware that we use it on, ithas proven to be much easier tosuperimpose the digital images on anytype of green. In the past, it was a lotmore unforgiving; you had to really get itright and with this large range offrequencies and of pigments it made it

difficult for people wearing different shades of green tobe superimposed on the background. But luckily ourteam at the postproduction facility, they basically said“don’t worry about a thing, we’ll fix it in post.”

So yes, it does make a big difference for a beginner, butwith the advancement of technology and the staff, notreally.

Ed: I also imagine it would make a differencedepending on the technology you were using – whetheryou were using true film stock or the format that youmight be recording in?

Sam: Absolutely. We only use digital nowadaysand it has come a long way since, say, 2002, 2003where you really had to be very careful when workingwith the green screen. It had to be digital green if it’sfor feature films it couldn’t be anything else. But like Isaid earlier, nowadays it really doesn’t make adifference.

We’ve come a long way so these things are now trivialand we tend to overlook them. Luckily I’m surroundedby experts in post, so they make it easier forcinematographers to capture with freedom.

Ed: Do you think, now that your students have tasteda big green screen, they’re going to write all of theirstories based around “we have a cast of 50” or do theypay for it if they want it?

John and Sam.

Sam: Yes – now that they’ve had a taste of it,they only ever want to go to that facility down atLumiere studios. It’s a double edged sword.

Ed: Now John, is SAE Institute purely a film andtelevision school?

John: No, SAE was originally the School of AudioEngineering, so our big thrust here was originally audioengineering.

Ed: So you’ve let a few film and video people in justto be nice to them?

John: Well part of my role when I first got herewas to set up a film diploma and that’s why we broughtSam on board.

The film diploma is a one year course, 48 weeks, andit’s been running since 2006. We’ve put quite a fewstudents through that programme and many are doingwell in the industry or working independently and we’reon the point now of offering a three year degree –Bachelor of Film Arts. We’ve had preliminary approvaland we’re confident that we’ll get approval for thisdegree at some stage during this year, which will be awonderful opportunity for the students to do a full threeyear study in film. But it needs to be emphasised thatit’s not about understanding film, it’s not aboutanalysing film, we’re not trying to turn out film …

Ed: This is not media studies?

John: This is not media studies.

Ed: Oh, I’m so pleased.

John: I’ve done media studies and I share yourconcern … there’s a place for media studies, but these

kids will go out of here, with the ability to analyse afilm. They’ll know about the history of film and all thosethings, but they’ll be able to light a set, they’ll be ableto write a screenplay, they’ll be able to direct, they’ll beable to post-produce in a whole range of areas, they’llunderstand the role of music in film and everything else… and apply all that knowledge to filmmaking, so thatthey will be filmmakers, they won’t be film critics.There are not a lot of jobs for film critics.

Now when we say “film”, that’s an interesting point aswell, because “film” is a general term. We’re notshooting in celluloid at 24 frames a second; we’reshooting digitally. We call it digital film, and we’vetalked about this quite a lot, but when we’readvertising, people still understand what we mean by afilmmaker. A filmmaker is a person who goes out andmakes a film. The format is really irrelevant.

Ed: There’s quite a bit of use of the term “cinematic”in the industry when you’re talking about thedifferences between a video camera, a film camera or acinema camera?

John: Well they would know the difference, butwe would teach primarily with digital cinema stylecameras.

Ed: So you say you want to teach them all about film.Are you wanting to make feature film makers, or areyou wanting to make commercial videographers, orsomewhere in between?

John: Within a one year course, obviously youcan’t turn out Peter Jacksons or some of the topcinematographers in the country …

more on page 23

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Ed: Do you tell them thatwhen they sign up?

John: Pretty much.

We say to them “we’re goingto give you an overview,you’re going to learn all thebasic skills and all thestages – pre-production,production and post-production” because most ofthem arrive and you saywhat do you want to do? “Iwant to be a director”. Theyhave no idea of what beinga director involves, butsome of them get turned onby scriptwriting, some ofthem start getting quiteexcited about sound andpost-production sound,some of them aboutlighting, camera, othersmight move into thebusiness side and becomeproducers rather thandirectors. What we try anddo is give them thatoverview, so that at the end of it, they’ve got a prettygood idea of what the key roles in the film industry areand then they can direct their expertise accordingly. Soin their final film that they make – what we call their“definitive film” – they can highlight the expertise thatthey’ve developed. If they want to go and do a greenscreen and have vast numbers of aliens invading, that’sfine; if they want to make a love story, that’s fine; ifthey want to write the music for it, they can show offtheir newly acquired skills and so on. So it gives theman opportunity to explore what they think they’re goodat and hopefully discover other areas they didn’t evenknow they were good at.

Ed: Do you give them any limitations of genre whenthey’re allowed to make their final film – they canpretty much do what they like, “x” rated and all?

John: Well no, we wouldn’t go quite that far, thisis a family show after all, although some of them get abit raunchy at times. I do point out that there are otherwords than the “f” word for expressing anger in theEnglish language. But no, the final film, or any of thefilms are done with our approval, but not as a censoredapproval. We’ll sit down and go through theirscreenplay with them and say “well, fine, okay you’vegot this love scene on the top of Mt Ruapehu, thisprobably isn’t practical …”

Ed: ... and you don’t need six women?

John: Yes that’s right, so unless your dad owns ahelicopter company, this could be a problem. So wewould monitor them, but it’s more a case of mentoringand guiding them, because the last thing we want to dois say you will make a film about this, here is the script,now you go and shoot it. We say, “okay, now write ascript” – and that’s quite hard for some of them, they’venever written a film script, a screenplay before, butthey do come up with some really interesting angles onthings.

Ed: So actually they learn about content?

John: Yes, and they also learn how to worktogether …

Sam: As well as form …

John: Form and content – and they learn how towork together, because they all have to help each

other. Filmmaking is not a solo activity, and sosomeone would help someone with a camera, someoneelse will do the lighting for them, someone else will helpwith directing or whatever … they’ve got to get actorsfrom various places, they’ve got to audition them andhave run through them and dry runs and all that sort ofthing. It’s very much a team effort among the studentsthemselves and many of them go off and work witheach other in independent ways and so on as well.

Ed: What sort of range of technologies are theyexposed to and allowed to work with. Let’s start withthe cameras, what sort of camera choices do theyhave?

Sam: At the moment we’re using the PanasonicAG-AF100s with interchangeable lens capability. Ourlenses range from the conventional zoom lenses –something like 14 to 100 – to prime lenses with largeapertures

Ed: So these are single chip, cinema style cameras?

Sam: Yes, probably intermediate cinemacameras. Have you seen it … it looks like Da Vinci’skettle perhaps, it’s not the prettiest thing …

Ed: Right, so the main part of the course, as it’s afilm course, you’re teaching them on a cinema stylecamera and this is a single chip, short depth of field,with interchangeable lenses, correct?

Sam: Correct, absolutely. Examples of assign-ments that they use this camera with would be a musicvideo, television commercial, short dramas,documentaries, various other short films here andthere, and the final definitive film which is a 12 minuteshort film fit for film festivals and competitions.

Ed: And there’s no handheld involved?

Sam: Oh, there’s a lot of handheld. We’ve got afew Steadicams that some students enjoy using, butthey take a while to get used to. It’s not the same ashand holding, it’s a whole new technique.

Ed: So when you teach them about hand holding acinema camera, what do you explain to them?

John: Well there’s hand holding for people whocan’t be bothered rigging up a tripod and that will giveyou camera shake; and then there’s hand holding for

One of the audio classes in action.

the people who want to simulate the documentary look,and that’s a dramatic technique, but you can’t overdo it.Some of them aren’t even aware of it until you showthem a film and say “do you notice anything about thiscamera?” One or two of them might say “oh, isn’t itmoving a wee bit?” Yes, it’s hand holding, to give thatsimulated documentary or simulate the fact that we’repart of it, rather than rock steady.

Ed: But you’re not doing The Amazing Race with acinema camera are you?

Sam: No, certainly not.

Ed: So what would you use then?

Sam: A Steadicam?

Ed: No, no – so in your school also you teachtelevision?

Sam: For the television module, we go into thestudio and there are two shows that we have toproduce. The cameras are on tripods, it’s a multi-camera environment, there’s a vision switcher, sohardly any handheld shots unless the script intendsotherwise.

For the majority of TV based modules, it’s basically thetripod, because it’s not about the camera per se, it’sabout how we can collectively produce a show. We’vegot a music video-jockey style show, three cameras, apresenter and a few guests. Some students choose toshoot some background footage with a green screen orany pre-recorded material that happens outside of thestudio; that would require some handheld shots.

The students have already been instructed a fewmonths earlier on techniques on holding the camera,purpose, where and when and how to basically try andchoose a handheld shot versus a tripod. We even havea few monopods for any quick News style shots.

We’ve got an assignment that is a News item and wetry to make it as real as possible, although some ofthem are mock stories and something like a volcanoerupted in Auckland, so we have to put the camera onour shoulders or handhold it to give us that naturalshake of a reporter. So it’s really about the purpose. Icouldn’t really define it into one particular thing. Some

students may go through the course and choose not todo handheld shots – I’ve seen that happen before.

Ed: What about delivery. Do you teach them thedifferent delivery methods of their final production andhow they have to shape their production to suit thedelivery method that they choose?

Sam: That’s more for the degree. The diploma isa one year course and it’s more about the practicalapplication of filmmaking. In the degree we’ve got afew modules that would tackle this.

John: We do it in much more depth, becauseyou’ve got two more years, so we would look at variousdelivery methods. They look at a whole range of areas.

In the diploma, they can come upon the problem of theright method of delivery. Some students may choose toput up their music video online and they immediatelyface this problem – “why doesn’t it look good?” Thenthe postproduction lecturer would explain to them thatthis is not the right way because this has a few thingsthat the web may not accept in terms of speed andbandwidth, so then they are told about it. However,later in the degree they would need to get a taste of itall and find out the different ways, different platforms,different methodology of how to do it, and even how toplan it in the first place, rather than shoot it and thenhope to upload it in the best way, which tends tohappen a lot in the diploma.

Ed: You mean fix it in post?

Sam: Yes. I’m trying to avoid that term becauseI don’t want to repeat myself.

Ed: This is one of the bad phrases in the school is it?

Sam: Yes.

John: We won’t fix it in post; we’ll get it right thefirst time. Post is not about fixing stuff; post is the nextlevel up in which you put it all together.

Sam: But yes, we do encounter this problem a lotof the time and like I said, it’s the lecturer who sitsdown and says “well, this hasn’t been shot in the rightway to begin with, therefore you can’t really optimise itin post. So here are the few steps you could takebefore you do it next time.”

Ed: Do you teach themhow to use DSLRs properly?

Sam: No, we’re antiDSLR.

There’s a huge argumentand almost a showdownbetween staff about this, butmanagement and us, thefilm department, haveagreed that no, they’re notthe future, and time hasproven us right. Five yearsago we were so reluctant –should we, should we not,should we get them; butwith research and experi-mentation and coming fromcinema myself, I found themoiré effect just completelyunacceptable, aliasing, andyou could even hear the lensfocusing – it’s just a big no-no. However, I saw a lot of18 year old filmmakersrunning around town withtheir DSLRs, thinking thatthey could produce amasterpiece – and I’mpurely talking about form,

In the television studio setting.

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Ed: Well that’s good to hear. Now John, you said at

the start, that SAE stands for School of Audio

Engineering, so audio is a big part of what you do here?

John: Yes, there’s a degree in audio engineeringand there’s also a diploma in audio engineering as well.We stress of course that audio is a big part of our filmcourse. There are other film courses that emphasisethe video, the visual side, and they largely ignore thesoundtrack. In my view, the soundtrack is crucial inshaping the video, shaping the pictures on the screenand that sort of thing. We spend quite a lot of time onaudio within our film course and our audio students alsolearn about filmmaking.

Ed: I know my old friend Gerard Smith used toalways say that if you close your eyes in front of TV andlisten to it, you still get a sense of what’s going on, butif you just look at the pictures, you miss the thread ofthe story.

John: That could be right – certainly when it’s adrama, because you’re picking up all the screenplay,even if you’ve got your eyes closed, you’re still hearingthe interactions from the characters. And screenplaywriting is one of the theories that I teach and it’s quitehard to do, to do a good screenplay. This is not a playfor stage, it’s a play for screen, so it’s a differentapproach, but it’s a fascinating area to teach and a lotof students get quite turned on by it once they get thehang of it.

Ed: So it’s still a very popular course, the audio side?

John: Yes, we never have any trouble gettingstudents and particularly our degree – we’ve really hadto filter students out. They’ve all had to apply and thenwe’ve gone through the whole process of just who dowe put in and who do we leave out, which is quite hardbecause there’s some very good people offering, butthanks to government policy ( we get to do a bit ofpolitics here ) we have a cap on the number of studentswe can take, which I think is very short-sighted but sobe it. But there’s a lot of interest in this whole area ofcreative arts … I mean the film industry’s worth what –3 billion dollars to the country, and the music industryand all the other related areas are all doing very well inNew Zealand, and you need good, high quality trainingand education. And that’s what we offer.

Ed: And you’re happy with the quality of studentsthat you’re getting out of secondary schools in NZ?

John: Basically yes. We getstudents who have done very well atsecondary school, and we also getstudents who didn’t do well at secondaryschool, but they are motivated by film ormusic or audio and for some of them,they suddenly realise they actually canachieve. Others who have done well,they’ll achieve anyway, so we get a veryinteresting mixture.

Ed: Do their media study grades inNCEA have anything to do with theirsuccess at getting into this course?

John: I haven’t seen a directcorrelation – I mean it helps becausethey’ve got a better idea of what it’s allabout, but a student can walk in herewith no media studies background, and ifthey’re motivated, if they’re enthusiastic,then they’ll succeed.

Ed: That’s pretty much the same inany industry though isn’t it?

John: Absolutely. I did badly atsecondary school; I was a second year fifth who missedUE twice.

That’s what I tell my students … but I’ve now got a PhDbecause I was motivated, so there you go.

Ed: There’s hope?

John: There’s always hope, and you put them inan environment where they want to succeed and they’llsucceed. And that’s what we’ve got here I believe. NZVN

The students at Lumiere on the green.

NZVN February2015

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