Upcoming Showtime Sports Six-Part Digital Documentary, Legacy: Bob Hurley, Shot with Panasonic VariCam LT 4K Cinema Camcorders
Content studio Malka Media (Hoboken, NJ) is currently shooting an episodic digital series about Jersey City’s St. Anthony High School and its legendary basketball coach, Bob Hurley with Vari-Cam LT 4K cinema camcorders.
SHOWTIME will debut Legacy: Bob Hurley in six weekly installments exclusively on SHO.com and the SHOWTIME Sports YouTube channel (@shosports) beginning Monday, Feb. 20. The 2016-17 season marks Bob Hurley’s 45th year of coaching at the school, and potentially the final season of St. Anthony basketball, which has won 28 state championships (nine consecutive-ly), more than any other high school team. If ambitious fundraising efforts fall short, the school will shut its doors and retire the most successful high school basketball program in history.
With more than 1000 wins and as one of only a handful of high school coaches in the Basketball Hall of Fame, Hurley is considered by many to be the greatest coach ever on the secondary school level. The inherent drama of a flailing school with an uber-talented inner-city squadron is com-pounded by the fact that Coach Hurley is also the president of St. Anthony’s, whose deteriorating school building doesn’t even have a gym--the team practices and plays off-site.
According to Louis Krubich, Malka Media CEO and series director, when longtime client Showtime approached him about the St. Anthony story, he and his staff directors of photography concurred that the VariCam LT would be a great choice for this sports documentary, largely because of its 4K acquisition and dual-native 800/5000s.
“We’re shooting in 4K even though the series will initially air in HD,” Krubich said, “not only for the incredible image quality, but also because we envision putting together a subsequent documentary that we’d be in a position to merchandise to a network that would stipulate 4K.”
Krubich said that the series, though comprised of six webisodes of only 10-12 minutes each, tells many narratives, following Coach Hurley off the court at home with his wife, documenting the com-plicated life situations of several of the players, capturing practices and home games, all under the shadow of St. Anthony’s possible closure.
“This is the most versatile camera for documentary shooting on the market,” said Mark Cambria, one of two series’ DPs. “It’s 4K, and produces a beautiful, near RAW image. I am mostly ‘run and gun,’ so my subjects move in and out of dark places often. Because there are two native sensors, I never have to worry if my image will lose quality when bumping up ISO. I just switch to the 5000 native and that covers me in low light.”
“I can plug my mics and reference audio receivers directly into the XLR ports, and the sound is great. Switching back and forth from slow to fast motion requires me to change codecs, so to cut down that switch time I was able to set up Scene Files that let me to move back and forth with ease,” Cambria continued. “I am also editing this project (in Premiere Pro), so my favorite feature has got be the dual recording. I am able to record my full-res footage on the Panasonic P2 card, while simultaneously recording low-res proxies on the SD card in the second slot.”
“The LT is a camera that can adapt,” added Derek Brown, second series’ DP. “Whether you’re fol-lowing a documentary subject outside at night or on set shooting a commercial, you can capture great images with it.”
For more information about Malka Media, visit www.malkamediagroup.com. For more information about Showtime Sports, visit http://www.sho.com/sports.
About the VariCam LT
The VariCam LT camcorder inherits the same super 35mm sensor and superb imaging capabilities that distinguish the award-winning VariCam 35, but with significant reductions in size, weight and price. Incorporating this identical imaging “DNA” in a more compact rendition, the VariCam LT de-livers 14+ stops of dynamic range with V-Log, and the esteemed cinematic VariCam image quality and color science, as well as the VariCam 35's breakout innovation, dual native ISOs of 800/5000. Weighing just under six pounds and having superior capability to similar sized cameras, the Vari-Cam LT is the ideal camera for handheld, SteadiCam, jib, crane, drone, gimbal and overall cinema verité work. The VariCam LT offers a host of new features including an EF lens mount, hot swappable batteries, IR shooting capability, a 23.98 PsF output, cinema style file nam-ing, and image presets such as scene files.
For more information about Panasonic VariCam cinema and high-speed cameras, visit us.panasonic.com/varicam, or contact Panasonic at 877-803-8492.
About Panasonic Broadcast, Cinema and Professional Video Systems
Panasonic offers leading products to acquire, transmit and view high-quality video, over both video and IP networks. Professional products include VariCam cinema cameras, P2 HD camcorders, 4K and HD handheld cameras, Pan/Tilt/Zoom cameras, studio and box cameras, switchers and moni-tors. These products serve customers in cinema, broadcast, professional sports, higher education, enterprise and other markets.
About Panasonic Corporation of North America
Newark, NJ-based Panasonic Corporation of North America is a leading technology partner and in-tegrator to businesses, government agencies and consumers across the region. The company is the principal North American subsidiary of Osaka, Japan-based Panasonic Corporation and the hub of Panasonic’s U.S. branding, marketing, sales, service and R&D operations. Panasonic was featured in Fortune Magazine’s 2016 ranking of 50 companies that are changing the world and do-ing well by doing good. Specifically cited were its smart and sustainable technologies, including its contributions to smart cities and the electric vehicle revolution.
Learn more about Panasonic at us.panasonic.com/news.
Contact:
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Neil Matsumoto +1 323-217-5618 [email protected]