Panasonic recently announced a new 8K sensor that offers high-resolution (36-megapixels) imagery and up to 60fps. With the groundbreaking sensor, it is possible to capture images at 8K resolution, even in high contrast scenes, such as a basketball court under strong house lights and the shaded spectator seats that are unlit. We will be showcasing the technology with our 8K ROI prototype camera that recently captured a Duke vs. Syracuse college basketball game.

Other new products that will be showcased in the booth include the new AK-UC4000 4K/HD high-speed studio camera, Ver. 6.0 firmware upgrade for the VariCam LT 4K camera, Ver. 2.0 firmware upgrade for the AU-EVA1, and our line-up of PTZ cameras with built-in Network Device Interface (NDI) support. 
Designed for live sports production and high-end event broadcast with high-speed 240fps capability, the AK-UC4000 raises the bar for 4K HDR performance. The all-in-one UC4000 employs a new, larger, advanced 4.4K Super 35mm sensor to improve resolution while maintaining the same broadcast lens compatibility and operation, as well as keeping the same camera form factor – potentially the best overall performing 4K HDR camera utilizing 2/3” lenses available.

The VariCam LT’s Ver. 6.0 firmware upgrade, which has been dubbed CineLive, sets the cinema camera up for live and “near live” multi-cam uses for events, concerts, television shows and corporate productions. “Everyone marvels at the VariCam LT’s beautiful cinematic look,” said Mitch Gross, PMEC Cinema Product Manager. “Now with the Version 6 firmware, the Super-35, wide dynamic range, high sensitivity image with those great VariCam colors can be seamlessly brought to live and near-live multi camera applications. The VariCam LT’s imaging capabilities can improve the look of any multi camera shoot while lowering costs.”

We recently released a free firmware upgrade for the compact 5.7K AU-EVA1 cinema camera that enhances the camera’s recording capabilities, including ALL-Intra frame recording formats, RAW data output, time-lapse recording, HD 4:2:2 interlaced formats and more. The additions expand the camera’s abilities so greatly that we are referring to the upgrade as “EVA 2.0.”

Also on display will be Panasonic's entire NDI PTZ camera line-up – the AW-HN38, AW-HN40, AW-UN70 and AW-HN130 – that can be connected to an NDI network. And stop by to view the AV-HLC100 Live Production Center, also with NDI, that combines a 1 ME switcher, remote camera controller and audio mixer functions to enable easy live streaming with one-person operation.

Learn more about cinematographers, broadcast specialists, technologists, filmmakers and business leaders sharing their insights from the Panasonic Presentation Stage at NAB 2018.
 

Swica shot Birdland in 2K ProRes (23.98fps) because the production couldn’t afford the added workflow costs of 4K capture. “I'm actually happy with the decision,” says Swica. “Resolution is important for different reasons but I have no real problem with the lower resolution, and I know 2K can up res to 4K really well.” He captured in V-Log and monitored in Rec.709 on set. Swica shot the film with Zeiss Super Speed primes, which he uses for all his projects because they’re fast with low contrast.

Director Lynch described the look of Birdland as “neo-noir” but according to Swica, the overall look came from music videos, which Swica used to shoot 30 years ago. There was no high-key lighting or heavy blacks but more of a clean mannered look throughout the movie. “There's a sequence that you can see in the movie that's a bondage sequence where the character ties herself up on a rig,” explains Swica. “That was inspired from a J. Lo video, which probably had a half a million-dollar budget. We covered the scene in a different way, but used the same colors.”

Since the lighting budget was already slashed, Swica knew he would have to rely on the VariCam 35’s native 5,000 ISO, which he used for interior or exterior night sequences. “I would say 90% of the film was lit with five [Rosco] 1x1 LED pads and a couple of small Tungsten lights,” explains Swica. “A lot of times, we had our lighting department simply hold the lamps so if somebody was walking, we were walking with them with the lamps on battery power. We didn’t have a fixture that was larger than a 2K, and that 2K was used maybe once.

“I’d rather have a fatter stop at night,” continues Swica, on shooting at native 5,000 ISO. “The fact that I could be shooting at night between a T-3.2 and 5.6, depending on the location, and still see everything was amazing. I've done a lot of lighting where you have a big lamp and then you have to create an entire environment because you have to touch everything from that point. Shooting at 5,000 ISO is almost the inverse of that. It looks like a real street that's happening all the way down the street. There are street lights so you have to bow down to what's happening naturally.”

Swica also mixed natural lighting and different color temperatures into his visuals. Driving shots at night were lit entirely with ambient street lamps streaming through windows. “It has a spectacular reality to them because nothing ever repeats and colors constantly change,” says Swica. “There's one section where we travel under a bridge at night that's lit brightly with mercury vapor lamps. We were going from warm sodium vapor lights to this greenish mercury vapor color and then back again.”

For a dinner party scene, the location was set in a condo on the 14th floor overlooking the city. Instead of lighting the interior, Swica let the ambient light coming from outside the windows light the scene. “It was a little weird for the actors because they thought they were shooting in the dark,” explains Swica. We constantly had to show them what we were seeing after takes.”

Because they could not afford a D.I.T., the production created a workflow that was more like a film shoot. Because they were shooting in Toronto, they would shoot the first half of the day, and then send the P2 cards to The Rolling Picture Company, who would turn them around for dailies. “I’ve done more films than electronic work and because of the nature of a negative, which is low contrast, I still shoot digital that way and build the contrast in post,” says Swica. “It’s one of the reasons I don’t really create my own LUTs. I just use standard Rec.709 and then build my lighting from there. Although it has that 'neo-noir' look, I didn't want it to look bombastic. It's a slow-moving story and very mannered.”

At The Rolling Picture Company, Swica worked with colorist Drake Conrad, whom he had collaborated with on several films. Both Swica and Conrad were really surprised at how the native 5,000 ISO performed. According to Swica, Conrad was expecting there was going to be a lot of cleanup, but they didn't need to. “Because this was set in an urban environment, most of the light is motivated. It was more about fine tuning skin tones. We didn’t do a lot of power windows, which I usually have to do.

“As much as he is a tech geek, Drake has a spectacular sensibility when it comes to grading,” continues Swica. “Also, when your eight pictures down the road, Drake already gets it and gets what I need. Birdland was an easy grade and it was a short two weeks.”

For more information about Birdland, click through to the film’s official website.

Click through for more information on Adam Swica, CSC.

When he first read the script, Sedillo was excited that the series would be shot Atlanta for Atlanta. According to the DP, Atlanta sunlight has a special quality to it. “Los Angeles has such a heavyness to the air so it makes the light feel more blue gray. Atlanta doesn’t really have that. I think it has more of a golden quality and strangely, maybe a green essence due to the gorgeous greenery throughout the city. Aside from the aesthetics of the city, I also enjoy the people in Atlanta – so polite, kind, and helpful. It’s a very centering place to work.”

For Step Up: High Water, Sedillo wanted to create a single source, or single essence light where the shot does not look lit and he wanted the show to feel real and organic.

His A-camera operator, Spencer Hutchins, helped convince Sedillo to try out the VariCam since Hutchins had shot previously with the camera as a DP. Sedillo shot the entire series with VariCam 35 cinema cameras that were rented out of Panavision Atlanta. He shot the series in UHD (3840x2160) in AVC Intra 12-bit 4:4:4 at 23.98-fps in V-Log. His dailies timer from 16:9 Post, Pat Shewmaker, created proxy files for dailes and his D.I.T., Mark Gilmer, created viewing LUTs. Mark created specific day and night looks for the High Water dance studios, home sets and office spaces. “Mark is so knowledgeable – he came in knowing he was just going to do one episode and he was all in. He’s an artist and has such a well-rounded knowledge,” says Sedillo.

For low light locations or high-speed sequences for dance scenes, Sedillo used the native 5,000 ISO setting but usually brought it down to 1,280 from 5,000. “I’m still old-school,” explains Sedillo, “and I still use my meter. In fact, when I pulled my meter out on Step Up: High Water, a couple of crewmembers walked up and asked, ‘What the hell is that?’ I'd like to think or hope they were joking. I don’t light to the monitors, I light to my eye. I key based on my meter and I can choose to go above or below that.

“A huge part of what we do as cinematographers is light,” continues Sedillo. “We pick and choose where to place the camera, light sources, and how to treat those sources, and to me that’s important. I have sort of an OCD in that things have to be just right. When I’m placing a light with my gaffer, Shawn Shemanski, he knows when I say I want a 10K light and I point to a specific spot. He eyeballs it, puts down a piece of tape, and puts it exactly where I want it. With daylight work, I usually don’t alter the ISO. I’ll use IR ND filters instead and I get the exposure down to my shooting stop. I try and shoot generally – all the way back to Veronica Mars, at a 2.8 and 2/3s. Occasionally at night when I have to go to the 1,280, I’ll crack open to a 2.8.”

One of producer Adam Shankman’s mandates was the use of handheld camera, which is the main form of camera movement on the series. “As a viewer/DP, I personally find handheld distracting,” says Sedillo. “To me, it calls attention to itself, but I’m happy that Adam pushed me. In this case, it worked because of the way the stories were told and the expertise of my operators, Spencer Hutchins and Brett Mayfield – both great artists in their own right. Spencer can watch a scene unfold in rehearsal and will go and tag details to tell a story, often without instruction from me, or the director. He’ll go to the back of someone’s head, wrap around and see a bit of one person’s eye, and not go back until the next person starts their dialogue.”

For lensing, Sedillo shot primarily with zooms, including two 11-1s, a 17.5-75 Primo zoom, a 28 - 76mm and 45 – 120mm Angenieux Optimo zooms. He only carried one prime – a 10mm Primo. “I also experimented with something new that Guy McVicker over at Panavision Hollywood came up with,” explains Sedillo. “It was an idea of optimizing their lenses by degrading the image a bit. They take the lenses apart and coat the inner elements with diffusion. It creates this beautiful effect where, when the lens is flared, the flare itself steps in slightly varied colors and shapes, which to me mimics how flares appeared on film as the light passed through layers of emulsion.”

For instance, in the rehearsal space, we could blast this intense but soft light (12 light fixtures through sheers) while we were shooting dance numbers, often we’d shoot people in gorgeous silhouette. I have to give a shout out to the Step Up editors. A lot of people tend to be more conventional and think, ‘Oh there’s a flare, we’ll cut around it,’ or ‘Oh, there’s a silhouette, we’ll cut around that.’ So much of the beauty of what we’re doing on purpose has been used in the cuts. They’ll go through a flare immediately right on a cut, or during somebody’s speech, a flare with go through with pools of purple and turquoise and this beautiful candy apple red. It’s just the way these lenses react with this optimizing from Panavision that looks really cool.”

Step Up: High Water is posted at The Foundation in Burbank, CA with colorist Gareth Cook performing the grade. According to Sedillo, the grade remained very close to the LUTs that Mark Gilmer created. “Gareth has been with me since day one,” says Sedillo. “He knows that I like rich colors. I don’t like things to pop. I like things that are rich and lush. I tend to stay on warmer skin tones. Speaking back to the heat and humidity of Atlanta and that warm golden light, he knows where how I like to place daylight – morning compared to evening light. He knows the combinations of colors – half blue, quarter green, as my night colors. I tend to use chrome orange for streetlights. He basically knows all of my tricks - for lack of a better word.”

Overall, Sedillo describes the look of Step Up: High Water as indie and artistic, “which I think is the point of the series. The kids want to be artists and want to express themselves. I think the creators of the show, YouTube Red, and Lionsgate allowed us to do that. To have fun and make this feel like an artsy movie. It was a blast!”

Click through for more information on cinematographer Joaquin Sedillo.

Watch the trailer for Step Up: High Water. (You will need a YouTube Red account to view entire series.)