Saturday, January 16, 2010

SEACAM on Location - David Ellis Shoots for Medtronic










This was a big week for our SEACAM rental housings to be out on location. We had rented a housing for a Canon 5DMKII to a Hollywood feature film crew shooting a movie about Navy Seals, actually with Navy Seals. The photo team had to rendezvous with a submarine off Key West. Interestingly, given all to action sequences necessary, the mobility and video image quality of the 5DMKII is sufficient to shoot a feature film. Incredible really.

At the same time, lifestyle shooter David Ellis had booked our SEACAM housing for the Canon 1DsMKIII for an ad campaign he was shooting in a pool in Miami Beach for medical equipment manufacturer Medtronic. David is a very experienced topside shooter, but when the job called for over/unders in the pool, he knew he had to rent the gear and figured he might as well rent some equipment expertise as well. So I went on location with him to make sure everything was set up properly and operating with precision. After all, once the talent and assistants and wardrobe and location are all booked, and the clients and art director flies in from out of town; shoot day is not the time to to suffer any distractions or impediments to success!

David did a great job, and have no doubt this will be a very strong ad campaign. The swivel 45-degree viewfinder allowed him to keep his head out of the water and better communicate with his models, and the variable power and quick recycle of the SEAFLASH 150 made for a very useful fill light as the models were shaded by the scrim.

BTW ... I shot all these production stills with my newest camera, a Canon EOS 1DMKIV. Beautiful camera, with incredible color rendition. This is the first time I never played with the color sliders in Lightroom at all. Normally I make tweaks to every file every time. This was auto-white balance and really pretty amazing. None of these shots are adjusted for color.

I'll have to do a lot more testing with various subjects before the MKIV becomes as second nature as some of my other Canon bodies, but as the ergonomics are so similar to my MKIII bodies, I'm sure the migration will be quick and painless.

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