Philip Bloom

It’s the end of my Dubai shoot. We haven’t got everything in the bag so I will have to come back at some point to finish it off.

One of the best things I did whilst here was move hotels on my own money so I could have a killer view to do lots and lots of timelapses. I moved to the new Atlantis Hotel on the Palm Jumeirah in Dubai. Initially I was on the 4th floor and here is what I put together of some of my timelapse tests last week.

I showed them to my producer and he loved them, I said it would be much better if I could be higher in the hotel, so he made a couple of calls and I got moved to the 18th floor where the views were spectacular.

I also went out and did some other timelapses, from the ground looking at the same buildings as i could see from my room. Of the world’s most expensive hotel, also some of and from the world’s tallest building.

Both my 5DmkIIs and my 7D were used as was my Lumix GF1 which was used for a large number of the shots in this piece including the star timelapses.

I was mostly in aperture priority mode. The second shot was done over 24 hours from my balcony and the camera took a shot every 15 seconds. The others varied between 1 second and 4 seconds. Mostly AV mode but the shot of the Burj al Arab and the one from the top of the Burk Khalifa I had in manual so when it got dark it looked dark.

When shooting timelapses I find I tend to throw away about a third of them as they don’t quite work. But I am getting better, learning from my mistakes. After all it’s only by making mistakes do you improve! I am using a plug by CHV for FCP called Long Exposure which evens out some of the flickering. It’s very cheap. I also graded this strongly using Magic Bullet Looks. Don’t forget you get 20% off of MBL from Redgiantsoftware.com by using the code Bloom20

Lens wise I used the 70-200m F2.8 Canon. 16-35mm F2.8 Canon. 24mm F3.5 TS Canon, Tokina 11-16mm f2.8, Panasonic 20mm f1.7, Olympus 17mm f2.8, Canon 24mm F1.4, Sigma 10mm Fish Eye

I mostly shot aperture priority mode to cope with the light change Sometimes in manual. You don’t need expensive cameras to do this. The GF1 is a cheap camera and there are even cheaper ones out there like some of the powershot series with built in timelapse. It’s great fun, very boring to shoot but ultimately the most rewarding.

GF1 in action

Shooting on the world's tallest building

The world's most expensive hotel!

I must say that I really had a lovely time here. I enjoyed Dubai much more than last time. Big thanks to all the crew. To Arun, thanks mate despite the accident! Ryan, Elie. To Ian for hiring me again and to Graeme for being the jolliest man I have ever met.

I want to dedicate this film to Sky Vasser, daughter of my friend Vanessa Vasser whom I worked with on “Nightshift” who died at a tragically young age. I only met her a handful of times but she had enormous personality that I will never forget. My thoughts are with you Vanessa.

Sky from Philip Bloom on Vimeo.

Filmed in Dubai over 5 days and nights.

Shot on the Canon 7D, 2×5DmkII and one Panasonic GF1

Made in memory of Sky Vassar who died recently at a tragically young age.

Thanks to Media Prima and Talkabout Media

I have just got hold of 720p versions of the 3 spots of “Voices of Change”. The commercial I shot in India for Greenpeace using the Canon 5dmkII. Lucy Campbell-Jackson has also told me it will now be shown on more channels than originally planned reach an audience of 950 million. That’s pretty cool!

Thanks to Greenpeace for letting me show these. Here is link to blog with more info.

So here they are the 90,60 and 30 second spots.

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Now why on earth would I do that when I harp on about how much nicer 24p and 25p looks?

Well simply because this was filmed for a segment of my new “shooting video with the 7d” dvd that is coming out in a couple of weeks. It was about how to record sound separately using the Zoom H4n and a Sony wireless lav.

Graded with Magic Bullet Looks which you can get twenty percent off when using code BLOOM20 at checkout

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This is going out on MTV in the next few days. It’s the commercial I shot in Delhi on the Canon 5DmkII a couple of months back. Shot on monopod, Zacuto rig and Miller DS20 with a wide variety of lenses. 30p.

Check out my previous blog for more info.

http://philipbloom.co.uk/2009/07/21/greenpeace-90-second-commercial-in-delhi-india-on-the-canon-5dmkii/

http://philipbloom.co.uk/2009/07/26/tutorial-on-syncing-sound-with-the-5dmk2-and-pluraleyes-for-fcp/

http://philipbloom.co.uk/2009/07/23/the-canon-5dmkii-a-documentarians-video-camera/

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I want to do a favour for a friend and highlight his feature doc. It’s touching, moving, funny, painful. Everything that love is. If you have the time please check it out by clicking on either of the images.

Thanks!

Philip

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I have neglected my GH1 recently, mainly due to time as always. But I wanted to test out my 30mm Sigma f1.4 (35mm equivalent 60mm) on the GH1 for ages. You need a 4/3rd to micro 4/3rd to make it work but it does work a treat. Great to use a fast prime on it without a doubling of the focal length that you get when you put a 35mm lens on the camera.

I also used the Glidetrack Compact to give it a bit of movement. I mounted the camera directly onto the glidetrack. It works really well. Very light and does exactly what you need it to do.

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I went back to my day job and went out filming with my full EX3 rig. Letus Ultimate with 1/2″ Relay to the Queen’s  Bath in Princeville Kauai.

It was hard work carrying the gear down there but it was worth it…a really stunning place. 

I took the Lumix GH1 down as well, and my assistant Ryan did some behind the scenes filming that I will post soon. I used the miller Solo three stage carbon fibre legs which are a dream and I will be getting a set when I get home for my Vinten Vision 11 head. Perfect for awkward filming locations like this. Unfortunately the head was a cartoni focus which I still have one of at home. A bit of a spongy head but it was the best they had at the TV station here. 

I was hoping to use their Kessler Crane but it turned out it was a 12 foot one, so not ideal!!

Tomorrow I head out for some more filming…today was a washout as smoke from the big Island volcano covered our Island so the light was awful…at least it gave me a chance to edit this!

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Nice discovery…If you shoot in 720p mode, not full HD, with the Lumix you go into 50p mode. This is useful as it means you can record slow motion if you reconform to 25p in cinema tools. Click here for a short tutorial on how to do it.

I was out with my client, Jimit Mehta, taking a look around some spots for filming tomorrow with the Letus Ultimate and EX3 when we saw that the sunset was going to be beautiful…so we pulled over. All I had on me was the little red GH1 and an SLR Gorillapod. So not ideal. But I set it up on the sand, got myself covered in sand and filmed this beautiful sunset. All in 1280×720 mode…

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Last month I was hired by Director Mike Marriage of Lunarfilm.co.uk to DP a commercial for the big screen to be shown in movie theaters around the world. 

NT LIVE is a groundbreaking concept of putting on plays at the National Theatre in London and broadcasting them live to cinemas all over the world via Satellite. 

The first play is “Phedre” on the 25th June with Helen Mirren

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I was asked by Steve Weiss of Zacuto to shoot some footage of myself and of the gear in action. So I went out with my friend, Suresh Kara of Documovie.co.uk to London for the day last Tuesday to go to some familiar spots and do some nice filming.

I shot using the EX3 and Letus Ultimate with full Zacuto rig, including the flippable follow focus, whip, rails, universal base plate, zeddie wedgie, locking lens support and Zacuto Y-Fronts for ultimate support. 

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