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Ed: So who’s doing the inspections? Chris: The Standard says “a qualified person.” Ed: Qualified in what? Chris: Basically qualified and trained. The way we do it is that we have a documented training process for our staff who are then deemed to be a qualified person to do the testing. The testing regime is quite specifically laid out and the Standard defines a set of results that you’ve got to achieve. Electrical safety is defined by the New Zealand ASNZ3760. Ed: But in reality, nothing’s going to happen to anybody unless something goes wrong, and then the inspectors will point the finger? Chris: Yes, and unfortunately the way New Zealand has gone in its compliance regime is that, yes,
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APRIL 2011 Vol 168
Are You Compliant? When I asked Chris McKenzie what he would like to talk about, I was expecting it to be about some new lighting product. Wrong! Chris: Electrical safety. I think it’s imperative that people are aware of electrical safety in their business and also their requirements for electrical safety around all of their equipment – hired, purchased and in use in their own kit. At the end of the day, make electricity your friend, not your enemy; it’s a silent killer. Ed: And this is it … this is not just for your safety or the safety of the people around you, but in fact it’s a legal requirement now for any kit that you have? Chris: Yes, there’s two main areas that people need to be aware of and one stems back to the Health and Safety Act, which has now been there for 10-12 years. It states that all portable appliances ( and the simplest description of a “portable appliance” is anything that has a lead on it and plugs in ) in a workplace have to be tested and tagged. There are various require-ments depending on the intensity of the use of those units. For example, if you have a computer that sits on your desk and is plugged into the wall and never comes out, then that needs to be tested and tagged every five years; if you have a kettle or a portable piece of kit, that should be tested at least every 12 months. A lot of institutions have picked up on it, but I think there’s a few that haven’t. In a hire situation ( which we are in ) every piece of equipment has to be tested and tagged on a three monthly basis, and it must be inspected and checked prior to every hire.
Chris’ man-bag has a purpose and what is in the left of photo is a small Seaward PAT tester which allows you to do simple tests. It’s a cheaper option than a fully
automated unit which will print labels and do all of the paperwork for you. This requires you to do paperwork externally, crayon and exercise book style.
it’s not picked up until either Occupational Safety and Health are involved in an accident, or the Energy Safety Service, who are part of the Ministry of Commerce who administer the Act and the Standards. They are the people who look to prosecute after the event. But, you know, with electricity “after the event” someone can be dead, or someone gets shocked and falls off a ladder, or whatever other accident you want to describe. So this is the thing that none of us want to be involved in, either as a contractor or as a supplier, or as a worker in the industry. People need to be aware of their responsibilities. Ed: Okay, that’s all well and good, but I mean, all of us have got some kit with at least a light that has got a plug on the end that we take out and use – where do we go to get this checked and tagged? Chris: There’s a number of ways you can go : 1) you can take it to your local family sparky and he can do it. Any electrician is deemed to be a qualified person; 2) there’s a number of services around in terms of franchise type places. I’ve seen one “Jim’s Test and Tag” and they obviously go after institutions, offices and places like that; or 3) we will do it for you as a service. If you’ve got a lot of kit that needs doing, there’s 2 or 3 guys around the film industry who do it on an ongoing basis, and they will set-up the test and tagging regime for you if you’ve got a truckload of lights or … Ed: But what about if you’ve just got one? Chris: Bring it to us, or take it to your local sparky, or if you’ve got a tool repair shop – those sorts of places are the guys who can do it, and who do it on a daily basis. Ed: If you take them a video light, any electrician will know what to do? Chris: Yes – and a video light is a very simple thing, provided it passes the first stage which is a physical inspection. What we’re looking for there is exposed wiring. Every cable must have two layers of insulation on it, so if you pull the end of the cable out of the plug and you’ve got primary insulation ( being the individual coloured wires going into the plug ), if that’s exposed, that fails. At the other end, if it’s exposed, if you’ve burned it or nicked it or whatever and you put a piece of tape over that nick thinking “Oh yeah, that’ll fix it” that’s a fail too. They will then do an insulation test and a leakage test on it, which basically tests that all of the electrical insulation within the system withstands the voltage that’s required to protect you, the user, and some unsuspecting talent or whoever you are working with. It could be in a place where you can’t see it, but there is still potential for the electricity to go somewhere it shouldn’t – i.e to the case of the fitting or to a stand or something else; someone can get electrocuted.
Fail!
Fail!
So those are the checks that are generally done and those are the checks that are required under the Standard.
Ed: Wouldn’t it be cheaper just to get insurance? Chris: You can’t insure against breaking the law. It’s the law of the land and you can’t trade out of it, you can’t contract out of it. It’s a law and it must be obeyed – it’s really fairly fundamental. It’s like speeding “I was rushing to the hospital officer” or “I was rushing to my wife’s funeral officer” – none of that stacks up as an excuse at the end of the day. Ed: Is the checking required a time consuming process? I mean, if you have just one light on a long lead, how long will it take for somebody to check that over? Could someone check it on the spot and you take it away with you? Chris: It should only be a five minute process for one fitting, but then you’ve got the power lead, and in
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your case you’ve got a bunch of IEC leads that are going into battery chargers. You know, if you actually look around at the appliances you have, you’ll probably find a whole lot more than one light; I mean, we’re talking about anything that plugs into the mains. A battery charger is a good example – it has an IEC lead on it, so that IEC lead has to be checked, then the battery charger itself has to be checked. They are two items and they have to both be tagged separately, unless you have some means of fixing the lead to that charger so it doesn’t come out, then it becomes one item. But let’s say a lamp, which has a fixed cable on it, that’s one item, but as soon as that cable becomes removable, that becomes two items. So, again, in our example, all the IEC leads that we have, that plug into all our various fittings, are tested as separate units, because they can be swapped around. In an individual situation, there is the necessity to test those things as a unit, so you may well find that rather than you thinking of one light, suddenly you’ve got a whole bunch of stuff that really does need testing. Ed: So in the case of purchasing a battery charger from a reputable manufacturer, through a supplier in New Zealand, that should have a current tag on it from the date of sale? Chris: No – because if you buy something new, that is deemed to be compliant when you buy it and that is another whole area which I’ll deal with further down the track. But when you buy something new, unless the unit has been modified – in other words, let’s say if it’s come in with a German plug on it, they’ve cut the German plug off and they’ve put a New Zealand plug on it, that then should be tested and tagged by the supplier. But if it comes from the supplier, with the correct plug, cabling, etc on it, then that is deemed to
be compliant at that point. Just a note here, plug adaptors on a foreign plug are not compliant, the appliance must be fitted with a permanent New Zealand standard plug. At the end of the 12 months from when you bought it, you need to get it tested and tagged, because then it’s outside its compliance period. If you are a hire operation, if you’re putting your gear out for hire, then you have to adhere to the three month rotation. And then there’s a bunch of other interpretations, none of which have yet been tested in court … and that’s the end of it, because it is the law of the land. You know, if Energy Safety decides to test a failure in court, they will. We’ve all made our stands about what we think are the Standards and how often we think we should do our testing. The simplest thing we came back to was the law says three months, so we do it for three months and we visually check prior to each hire. For an individual, it costs money; for an operation like ours it costs a lot of money. It cost us $50-60,000 to set it up; it costs us the labour of two people fulltime to do it, but we’ve had our processes tested once. We had a piece of kit that caught fire on a hire job; it was a five appliance callout resulting from that fire. When the Fire Service tracked back to us being the supplier of the equipment, they looked at our records and said “Oh yes, we can see when that piece of kit was tested, we can see the results of that test, it passed at the time of test, and yes it failed because shit happens” and they accepted that. But if we hadn’t had that paper trail, they probably would have said to us “Oh well, it was you who caused that fire, your cost for the five appliance callout” – suddenly you’re looking at a $500 job that’s cost you ten grand. So at the end of the day, it’s worthwhile financially, but more importantly for safety. Ed: So really, is the thrust of this that it’s directed mainly towards hire situations – that the individual
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owner of that single light is never really going to be taken to court for causing a fire from that light? Chris: If their fixture catches fire and it’s proven that it hasn’t been tested, or it was non-compliant at the time, I would imagine that your public liability insurance goes out the window, whatever production insurance you’ve got goes out the window, and suddenly you’ve got, you know, Fletchers Head Office building owner looking down the spout of you setting fire to the CEO’s office. Ed: Not a good look! Chris: Not a good look. It’s just a fact that things do get old, things do fail and, as I said before, the simple thing is, it is the law of the land and it’s in a commercial situation, so it all comes back to the Health & Safety Act requirement to protect your staff and customers. So if you’ve got an office, the kettle needs to be done, the toaster needs to be done if that’s where your people are working, and you know as a single person operator it’s probably not an issue, but if you’re a small production company, then suddenly you’re dealing with a workplace and you need to be aware of these requirements. Ed: Is it something that you could get yourself trained up in … that you don’t actually have to be a registered electrician, you just have to know the procedure and know what you’re testing? Chris: Absolutely, if you had a lot of stuff to do – that’s exactly what we’ve done. We have a couple of staff electricians who oversee what we do, but at the end of the day, the guys who are doing the testing are our general hire staff who are trained internally for testing and checking equipment. We have a written prescribed process and it is followed. You can simplify the process by having the test devices that you need – there are simple PAT testers ( Portable Appliance Testers ) that you can buy or there are sophisticated ones. We use three sophisticated ones because
we want to log the tests, we want to log the results of the tests, we want to print out a label at the end that goes onto the thing, but anyone with a Megger and a multimeter can do the test. Even if you write the results in an exercise book and everything’s got a plant label from 1-10, and you know item No 1 was tested on this date and the insulation test was this result, the visual test was okay, and you’re done. Ed: Are you running courses? Chris: No, because there are a lot better things to train people in, and there are other people out there who do it better. Ed: So there are courses available? Chris: I haven’t seen any, but after that question I might find out if there are. Ed: Well you can always ring
Chris anyway, just to check if he is going to run a course. I’m sure he’d love to hear from you! Chris: Yeah, no problem. Ed: So Chris, in the situation where you are hiring gear, because there’s a lot of hire places out there hiring all sorts of things, what do you need to look for on the appliances that you hire? Chris: Basically, you need to ensure that they are tagged with a legitimate tag that says when they were last tested, and that needs to be within three months of today’s date when you’re hiring the equipment. Ed: Or really the date that you intend to return it, surely? Chris: If you’re going to have a long-term hire … that raises another issue. If you are taking a long-term hire after the three month period, then it becomes incumbent on you as the user, to ensure that that equipment’s retested. Now whether you negotiate that with the hire company and take it back to them and get
Brendan does the business on the test bench.
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it done, or whether you get it done independently, you can do it, but the key thing is to make sure that it has some test period left on it, long enough for your duration of hire. Typically, what you’ll find with our hire equipment, is it may have been tested yesterday, it may have been tested two months ago, but if you’re taking something out for a day, we’ll ensure you’ve got something that has test left on it, but we will have logged that we have checked it prior to the hire. That won’t show up on the test tag; the electrical test tag shows its test validity, it doesn’t show the physical checking of the fitting, which is the other requirement under the Standards. You can always ask the hire company to show you the test log if you’re a bit dubious about what they’re offering, because there are some companies … a soon to be “ex”-Australian lighting company doesn’t tag their equipment, but they provide the hirer with a database of all of the tests done on the equipment. So you have a unique number on a piece of kit and you have a printout that shows all of those numbers and the test results. That’s another way of not having to put sticky labels onto every piece of kit. Ed: Okay, that’s for hire companies, but for the individual it sounds as if this is really a bridge too far. This is a major job that people are just going to put in the “too hard basket”. Is there anything that you, with your experience, can do to help the people out there? Chris: Well we’re certainly happy to have a look at processes and procedures, and there may be a possibility of turning out a quick checklist, but at the end of the day, you know like everything else that we get involved in, the government expects us to go out and read every issue of the New Zealand Gazette and every Standard that’s issued that relates to our business. If people are serious about it, and if you have a large batch of gear to look after ( be it your own gear or an institution’s equipment ) it’s the same as learning the policy of the institution or the other requirements of
your work environment. It’s just another requirement of doing the job, and that’s one of the reasons that we have done it, because we intend to stay in business. We don’t intend to have some stupid accident knock us out of business or, even worse, injure a customer or injure anybody. We do enough silly things in this business without people having bits of lethal gear that you don’t expect – we put ourselves in places where we do expect it to be hazardous, without someone sneaking up on you with a dodgy piece of electrical kit. The final comment would also relate to new equipment. The supplier of any electrical equipment in New Zealand is required to ensure that it complies with New Zealand electrical standards. There is a lot of kit around that is marked CE, but you have to bear in mind that this is a manufacturer self-certification and may not actually tell you if the gear complies in New Zealand. This compliance also comes into play when testing, because if you are aware that the gear is not compliant then you can't pass it as being safe for use. This is particularly applicable to self-imported equipment.
PS : The average number of tests per week at PLS is 2,000, but that doesn’t mean that over three months they would have 60,000 items, because every item when it comes back from a rental goes through the full testing procedure before it’s put back on the shelf or sent out to another customer. NZVN
I popped in to see Terry Sosich and the products at Lacklands that relate to our industry. There are many photographic products but some with a crossover – SanDisk being a good example. With cards becoming more and more important in our industry, have SanDisk taken the high ground? Terry: SanDisk are the world leader in Flash Memory. They invented it and they are still the biggest seller of Flash Memory. Ed: Am I right in saying it’s not only about size, it’s also about speed? Terry: Yes, exactly. It often surprises me to see people spending a lot of money on a still camera or a video camera, and then they go and put a “Yum Cha” card in it so they’re not getting the benefit of the camera technology they’re using. SanDisk make the fastest cards and the most durable – they guarantee their performance and the durability of the card, and that’s what you pay for. So they might be more expensive, but you pay for the assurance of speed and durability of that card. Ed: And this is not only in CF but also other formats? Terry: Yes, SanDisk have the SD range and Memory Stick PRO Duo as well. The extreme range is in the CF and SD cards. Ed: Now it’s one thing having a good card, but I guess the reader, the connection between the card and the computer, is another side that’s been neglected? Terry: Yes, you can spend money on the hardware; you can spend money on a decent card to go with it; but then transferring the information from the card to the computer, you can use a cheap card reader which isn’t going to match the speed capability of that card. So if you buy the right card readers, like a very good brand such as SanDisk, you’re going to maximise the speed that that card is capable of, and therefore reduce the times and the frustration of getting the information onto the computer. Ed: Okay, but even the top of the range card readers aren’t expensive? Terry: No, like the top of the range SanDisk at the moment is round about $89.99 including GST. I would say that they’ve had quite a significant upgrade in their cards to much faster speeds in the last three months; I would expect to see them bring out a faster card reader – probably mid this year. Ed: So it’s all well and good having the cards and having the card readers, but where are our readers going to find these products? Terry: Most good photographic stores ( which is our core business ) are stocking them – like Photo &
Video in Christchurch and Camera & Camera in Auckland; Riegers – if they don’t stock them, they would very easily get them from us; and Mike Symes in Christchurch – he stocks a lot of SanDisk as well. So any good photo or imaging store will stock them. Ed: Now I was actually in Riegers earlier on today and I noticed there was a tripod and David said that it came from Lacklands. Are you selling tripods suitable for video applications?
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Terry: Yes, everything we do is primarily centred around photographics, however obviously, the offshoot there is video. We’re the agents for Slik Tripods, which is our higher end tripod, but we also stock a range called Topman. They make a very good range at very, very good value for money, and the tripod that you saw is an excellent example of that. I think that you tried to put a price on it before and you were way out! The Topman tripod that you saw at Riegers, even though it was designed as a photographic head, they’re not full fluid heads – they’re fluid effect heads – but for the right situation, they are a fantastic tripod to use. For instance, travelling – you can easily fit them in your suitcase, they’re light and compact, so for that sort of thing, rather than carrying a heavy tripod around, they’ll do the job perfectly well, and the fluid effect head on most of them is quite substantial – it gives a good effect. Ed: And apart from a whole range of cleaning gear which one does tend to neglect when one has a video camera, certainly this is the place to come for quality still cameras – your Leica brand?
Terry: Yes, exactly, they’re the best brand in the world and that’s a huge growth area for us. Almost the whole Leica range is digital now. NZVN
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Terry in a forest of tripods in the Lacklands showroom.
Bargains For All! The NZCREWS Gearage Sale was a feast for all who made it with cash in hand. DVT had 3 tables of treasure for serious hunters. Ed: Stuart, you’ve had a hot purchaser today? Stuart: Absolutely, Garry French … he swept in and took just about everything on the table … fantastic! Ed: Did you have any matched pairs of three tube Plumbicons for him? Stuart: No, not today – but he’s taken everything else, discs, tapes, batteries, cables – you name it, great to see a man spending real money. Look! … he’s in hot negotiations with Chris as we speak! Ed: But he told me he only had $10 with him. Stuart: Yes, but there’s $10 on top of $10, on top of $10. On now to the owner of the establishment where this fantastic Gearage Sale is being held, Daryl Spooner. Ed: Daryl, you haven’t seen it as busy as this for a while I guess? Daryl: We often can be as busy as this, yes definitely, with shoots and stuff happening here we often end up with 40-odd people in the studio at one time. Ed: It’s a great location you’ve got here? Daryl: It’s a good studio and there’s heaps of room … it’s a nice central Auckland location. Ed: What street would that be? Daryl: Pollen Street, No 19. Ed: There you go … but it’s a very good thing that you’re doing here today? Daryl: It gets everyone out; it’s a good networking event for sure, yes definitely. So make sure you come to the next one.
Ed: What, there’s some more old stuff out there to sell? Daryl: There’s tons – we’re all hoarders. Meanwhile, the Master of Ceremonies for this day’s event is currently … he’s just made himself three hot dogs! Ed: Yves, are you going to eat all three? Yves: I’m certainly going to give it a try! I’ve been too busy talking and not eating, so I’m definitely a bit famished. Ed: But it’s been a good day all round? Yves: Yes it has been a good day. We’ve had so many exhibitors, so many people wanting to sell stuff. Ed: And buy stuff? Yves: And buy … there seems to be buying from the people who are selling!
Ed: And you’ve been ably assisted by this young lady here? Yves: That’s right, Michelle’s been wonderful. She’s taking care and organised the sound people who were running the BBQ … Ed: Oh, they needed organising did they? Isn’t that typical for soundies. Yves: Exactly right, and they’re doing a great job right where they’re supposed to be, behind the BBQ, in the kitchen. Ed: Away from the people? Yves: Best place for their sort … but, seriously, it’s been a good opportunity because, before getting their sausage, customers have been getting the full lowdown on WUNZ so no one can escape the debate. Ed: Yes, well if anyone by now is not up with the play as to what’s going on with our digital services, then they shouldn’t be allowed to operate a radio mic!
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Michelle and Yves catering to the shoppers.
Chris and Stuart couldn’t believe their luck when Garry turned up—he even brought his personal banker.
Yves: Well it’s actually quite complicated and yet, once you talk to the likes of Haresh and Peter, you get a real good sense of what’s really going on. I think it’s very important, because it affects every single person and no one truly has the full scope of that. Things are changing really fast, so I hope everyone keeps themselves up-dated with WUNZ news and helps where they can. Ed: And i t ’s been good for you
… f r o m a n NZCREWS point of view? Yves: We used to organise drinks nights in pubs as a way to network and socialise and I think we’re all a bit tired of that. It typically would attract people, but we’d only get together for an hour or two. This is so different, because we’re getting all walks of life, people with whom we wouldn’t necessarily be socialising, and it’s a great way to interact. The magic is that you get
rid of your stuff that’s sitting in your garage, because you know one man’s rubbish is definitely another man’s treasure, and there’s been a lot of “treasure” going around today!
Ed: Yeah, right – and so we’re going to see this again? Yves: Yes, we want to make it an annual thing.
Everybody keeps telling us that it’s a really good idea, so as long as people keep showing up the way they have today, then we’ll just keep putting it on.
So that’s pretty good. NZVN
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Aimé Simard was security on the day—
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In Action with the F3
We are with David Honare at Riegers and David has sold an F3 … well he’s sold a number of F3s, but he’s sold one particular F3 to a production duo, Bruce Polwart and Gavin Stroud of Eyemo Camera Rentals and Film Services. Ed: Bruce, you’ve pur-chased an F3 – one of the very first that came into the country – for your own pur-poses and for rental? Bruce: Absolutely, for rental and for our own purposes. It’s a great little camera and we’re very pleased that Sony have produced it. Ed: So you had an eye on the F3 during its gestation and had the forsight to get yourselves a lovely box of lenses ready for its arrival? Bruce: Well that’s the thing, we knew that the camera was arriving in February and we knew that the camera would be no good unless we had lenses to go with it, so all through December and January, we emailed round the world to get our Zeiss Compact Prime 2s. They’re beautiful lenses, a full set 18, 25, 35, 50 and 85mm – great PL mountable lenses. Ed: Now for those of the uninitiated out there, just tell us the difference between a prime lens and what would be on a normal television camera? Bruce: Well normal TV cameras are ENG cameras and they have a zoom lens on them, which means their focal length will change anywhere from a wide shot, maybe 8mm, and then zoom into 160mm. But with prime lenses, you can’t change your focal length. So if you put an 85mm lens on your camera, that’s it. You can zoom it in post, but it’s just 85mm. Ed: Or you get closer to the action? Bruce: Oh 85 does get you close, or get further away … you set your frames accordingly and you plan your shots around your frames. Gavin: The difference also is that, with a zoom lens, there’s usually a compromise in quality to achieve the zoom, so you’ve got more elements of glass in the way of the sensor. With a prime lens, you have a cleaner and a more pure picture gathering lens. Ed: But with a prime lens, of course, you can still adjust your focus and your iris, it’s just you can’t change your frame? Bruce: Absolutely, and the reason we went with the compact prime 2s is they are actually cine-style prime lenses, and so the follow focus, or the adjustments, are made to actually follow the action, whereas if you put on a set of Nikons or Canon ZFs or something, they aren’t actually designed to change focus during a shot. So you’ll
get image shifts with them but not with the primes that we have. Ed: But Bruce, along with your Zeiss kit, you’ve got another kit of lenses for rental? Bruce: Yes, we have an Nikon Adapter and a full range of Nikon AIS lenses to go with it, so they’re old manual focus lenses, they’re beautiful resolving glass, and we‘ve got a full set from I think it’s 18 all the way up to 105. They’re a great bunch of lenses. That’s for a cheaper option with which to use this camera. Ed: So why would you want to go with a camera like this? Gavin: Generally, the hype behind the F3 is the controllable depth of field. Depth of field can also be
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Gavin, David and Bruce.
more on page 20
called depth of focus, which means that you can separate the actors or the action from the background by clever use of picking out focus. So that sort of helps a lot in drama and such like, and also TV commercials where you want to, say, separate a pack shot or separate an actor from the background. Ed: But wouldn’t this make the actual production workflow a bit harder than with a standard ENG camera?
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Gavin: Yes, it’s a lot trickier as far as needing personnel. There’s really no way you could shoot this as a “one-man-band” unless you were actually very careful with the focus. It’s not going to make things cheaper by virtue of the fact that you can ditch people off a TV commercial, or anything like that – you still need the personnel … focus puller, grips and gaffers and such like. But we’re used to that sort of thing in TV commercials and TV drama. What this brings about, better than what’s been existing, is portability and workflow really. Ed: And you’ve had a recent experience on a shoot with a director who wanted you to do something that you couldn’t? Gavin: Yes – I guess they’re very used to ENG style cameras and so they wanted me to do a sudden pop zoom in, not something anyone can do with a prime.
Of course, you could always get a zoom lens in for that specific reason, but there needs to be some education to clients, because the lenses are more expensive than what they may be used to. Ed: That’s it, so if you do want to have a zoom lens put on this camera, you’re talking 30 grand? Bruce: Yes, possibly at the cheaper end really. They go up from there – they can start at 30 and some of the more expensive ones can be over 100K.
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Ed: Right, so for the uninitiated, it’s not something you can just really pick up out of the box and use … unless, I suppose, you’ve had a lot of experience in the film side of this industry? Gavin: Yes, I’ve been doing a lot of TV documentaries of late, and we’ve been using the EX3 with Letus which is a depth of field adapter. This essentially emulates what the F3 does now, but it has its limitations – quality is one of them. Bruce: Essentially it’s no different from a stills guy going out there shooting his own stills on his old SLR that they used to do ( well they still do ) … you could go out there and shoot a doco quite easily on this camera by yourself, you’d just have to plan what your shot’s going to be. Ed: So compared to a RED or a Canon 5D? Bruce: What!?! Gavin: I think if you were going to do a side-by-side comparison, not talking about picture, talking about portability, this is much easier to carry around than the RED. It’s much lighter – extremely light compared to the RED camera. It doesn’t take over a minute to boot up, it boots up almost instantly; the batteries are tiny and they last a lot longer than the RED batteries seem to; and really you can shoot a documentary quietly in the background without people actually noticing you so much. If you’re going to compare this to the 5D, I guess the 5D is quite tricky to shoot with sound, so sound sync can be an issue. With the 5D, you need to put some bulk on it to make it stable if you’re doing handheld, all that sort of thing. Also there are inherent issues such as aliasing and what have you with the 5D and 7D. Ed: Well that’s enough of that … to summarise, if you had the choice, you’d go with the F3? Gavin: Well, yes, if you had to choose between the three, the F3’s a nice compact package with higher quality than the 5D, definitely. Ed: Do you echo that Bruce? Bruce: Yes I agree with that. Each camera has its own strengths and the F3’s going to fit the market very, very well. Ed: So it’s probably got more strengths than the others? Bruce: On the whole, yes. The RED one’s going to be obsolete soon! Ed: Oooooh we’ll watch this space for that! Now you seem to have a few extras on your F3 already – including some rods I see? Bruce: Well we’ve got some Arri ( as in the Arri film camera manufacturers ) bits – one of their follow focuses and one of their matte boxes to complement our kit. So if you need to put a polariser in front of the lens, you can do that with our matte box; if you want to put some neutral density
filters in, you can do that with our matte box, and also keep glare off the front element of the lens; and obviously the follow focus to assist you with placing your focus where you want it. Ed: And these just clip on naturally because they were designed for PL mount lenses? Bruce: Yes they were – well they were designed mainly for the Arri Alexa and, according to Arri, they’re in bigger demand than they ever thought they were going to be as well, because they’re very good units. Ed: Now, just on the camera itself, it has the ability to record onto its own cards using the EX codec, but it also has external record capability. Have you tried both? Bruce: Yes we have. We’ve tried a nanoFlash through the HDSDI out, which will give you 422 8 bit recording, and we’ve recorded onboard with 420 and done a comparison and, yes, the 422 is better for pulling keys and stuff, but there’s quite often the case where you don’t need that … TVNZ don’t seem to agree with that, because they say it has to be 422 and 50 Megabits, the bit rate for TVNZ HD. Ed: Well we’ve heard stories about TVNZ and their HD “requirements” before, but anyway enough of that, we’re not slagging TVNZ today … Gavin? Gavin: I did a commercial that was shot for the Web with green screen and we recorded to the cards and to a nanoFlash iFrame codec and we still managed to pull a key with the 420 recording onboard. They didn’t even go to the nanoFlash recordings, because that was the workflow they were used to, and the green screen was perfectly fine, the keys were perfect. Bruce: The onboard codec that Sony have made is just very, very clever. It’s clean, it’s crisp and, yes, you get great pictures from it. Ed: So you see the situation where, even though it can record offboard to a higher spec – in fact, the onboard recording might be sufficient for most applications, just try it?
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more on page 26
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Bruce: For a lot of applications it would be sufficient, yes, but there will be times when true delivery requirements for a TV programme or whatever, means that you will have to record offboard to a nanoFlash or AJA Ki Pro Mini or something like that. Ed: Is there anything about the camera that surprised you, that once you got it out, put it on its tripod and the battery on it, you thought “Wow, that’s something I hadn’t expected”? Bruce: I haven’t really spent a lot of time with it – Gavin has – but I’ve got to say Sony have packed a lot into this camera. There are things that they haven’t done, but really, it’s a fantastic little camera. Ed: Gavin, is there anything that excites you particularly? Gavin: Oh absolutely – I mean just the size of the thing. It fits into the EX1 box with virtually the same dimensions, so just to be able to get all of that with such a large chip and the step-up in technology is pretty amazing. Ed: Now Bruce, I have to ask, this is a pretty high tech camera and squarely in the broadcast league and yet, here we are in Mt Eden at Riegers “Open All Hours” … you bought it from David? Bruce: For sure, I’ve had a working relationship with David for quite some time. I used to have a video monitoring equipment hire company called “Vidiot Proof” and I bought all my gear through David and he’s treated me very well over the years. Then when it came time to upgrade our camera to an F3, David was our first choice because he just does such good work for us. So, yes, I can’t recommend David highly enough, he’s fantastic. Ed: So what are the little extra bits he does for you – apart from giving you a sharp price? Bruce: He gives us a very sharp price. He keeps us informed with what’s going on – when the camera was coming in and there were rumours that it wasn’t going to be available, David was on the phone to Sony all the time checking to see that the camera was arriving and that it did get here. He advised us about accessories, what we should and shouldn’t get – it’s a total service; you can call him up and he’ll find stuff out for you, and it’s not a problem. I have tried to deal with other dealers, and you just get lost in amongst it – they might get back to you, they may not, but David always gets back to you. It’s that personal service, it’s fantastic. Ed: Well you can’t say better than that. Now Gavin’s going to tell us something about how critical it is to get the focus right, and we’re going to show you a photograph of the distance on this lens. Just explain what’s going on here Gavin? Gavin: With all lenses, they need to be calibrated together. Also, the back focus of the camera needs to be exactly the same, so that when you change lenses and you set the focus, where it says it is on the barrel of the lens is exactly where it is. If it’s slightly out and you’re doing tracking shots or pulling focus for someone, then it will be out of focus. With long lenses like the 85mm or 50mm, it doesn’t have to be out by
much … it could be out by a centimetre and the plane of focus won’t be where you want it to be. So it has to be exact. Ed: So we’re looking here at this lens, and it shows 4 foot 3 inches and 4 foot 6 inches and there’s a lot of movement between those two?
Gavin: Yes that’s right. If the focus was out in relation to the lens graduation markings, it could mean that in, say, a packet shot, the back of the packet will be in focus and the front of the packet will be out of focus.
Ed: So at 4 foot 6 inches, you have only one inch of depth that’s actually in focus?
Gavin: Yes, that’s right. Of course, with more light, you get a greater depth of field. Conversely, if you want to reduce your depth of field, add in a few neutral density filters to achieve the effect.
Ed: That’s a bit hard for a normal television cameraman to get his head around? Gavin: Yeah I guess because it’s two-thirds inch chip for normal TV cameras, they get a greater depth of field, but that’s the beauty of these cameras. I mean, that’s the whole reason why we’re all excited about these cameras being so cheap and also achieving the look that an expensive 35mm camera achieves.
Ed: So we can look forward to all our documentaries on television now having lots of out of focus backgrounds and arty bits like that?
Gavin: Yes absolutely, it’s an extremely good tool for hiding things that you don’t want to see in the background and that’s pretty much 90% of our job really! NZVN
Page 26
Now this isn’t actually the lens on the camera—but it’s similar. Note the distance between the graduations.
(I forgot to take the shot at the time—doh!)
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Rocket into the Future We are in Rocket Rentals in Auckland with Dave Morrison, National Manager, and Matthew Redmond, Auckland Manager. We last saw Dave in Wellington, along with a couple of others in the team who have moved on, and now Dave has taken charge. Ed: You’re in charge of the whole country now Dave? Dave: That’s right – it was handed over to me after Scott Webster left and those are big shoes to fill … but I’m finding my feet with it. There’s been a lot changes, as you know, with new cameras and formats available. So working through gear requirements, purchasing and Auckland’s large scale quotes are now part of my new role. But it’s really business as usual. Ed: That brings me to ask where Rocket is going because, yes, there have been changes in the industry, in terms of the camera technology especially. Cameras are becoming more affordable and higher quality, so more people could now manage to buy their own. How is Rocket managing that? Dave: That can be a problem for rental companies – people buying their own gear and flooding the market with the same camera, but the F3 is very exciting news for us. Yes, people will go out and buy the F3, but at that price range there’ll be a lot of people wanting to hire the camera. And then there’s all the accessories that you need to buy to get the kit up and running – it’s not as simple as just taking it out of the box from Sony and away you go. I've actually had clients say that they have decided not to buy their next camera and will hire instead. So maybe we are seeing a bit of a trend back to hiring – perhaps in response to the state of play surrounding all the different camera options plus the potential for more change. Ed: And that’s it. You’ve got a client base and there are certainly a big group of producers out there who really don’t want to get involved in the technical side of it, they don’t want to get involved in the capital side of it, so when they’re budgeting for a programme, a TV ad, whatever, they can budget in an exact cost for what the crew and the gear are going to cost, and therefore it’s sensible for them not to have their own? Dave: Yes, not dabble in that at all. From where I sit, it makes sense for production companies not to buy gear, because the scene, especially over the last few years, keeps changing – just look at all the new cameras and formats. I think it’s a bold call to invest in a camera when perhaps 6-12 months down the track, something new comes along that you never thought of. Also, equipment breakages and faults would make life difficult for productions. It’s easier to pick up the phone and let Rocket sort the problem out. Ed: For sure, the technology improves, the client wants a different look … and I guess, that’s where the new range of 35mm variants are filling a need? Dave: Yes, the F3 will be a great camera for Rocket to rent. For commercials, television drama, feature films … it will allow clients to get that 35mm film look with far less hassle, particularly for the operator. Ed: But will people still be hiring your REDs? Dave: Yes, absolutely – and we will have the Epic camera too. That’s the next step this year, to actually take possession of the Epic. Ed: Have you got the workflow sorted out for that yet?
Dave: Most of the workflow’s already been sorted out with RED. Ed: You could always talk to Scott about his battles with RED in the early days … I guess you know a few? Dave: Oh yes. Scott did really well – actually he was influential in the whole saga of getting RED going in New Zealand I’d say, and I take my hat off to him for the amount of effort he put in; and obviously Matthew Redmond in the Auckland Rocket Rentals department. They’ve both done very well. Matthew is eager to get cracking with the Epic when it arrives. Ed: So the people coming to Rocket have, at the moment, got the choice of the standard RED, the F3 …? Dave: ... and the RED MX, then the Epic. And now a Canon 5D kit. We will also be giving attention to kit accessories, such as new LED sunguns, monitors etc. All those smaller items that really make for a great kit. Ed: So what’s your key hiring camera at the moment? In the old days, it was pretty bog standard that everybody used the Sony Betacam rig, so that’s what you had, but nowadays there’s a lot more variety? Dave: There is. Obviously the F3’s come along because of the DSLR, the Canon 5D camera’s popularity, etc. We’ve been fielding a lot of calls for the F3. It’s going to be a busy rental camera and, with that in mind, Rocket will be looking to get a second camera later in the year. But so far, the workhorse cameras would have to be the Sony EX-1s and EX-3s. They’ve just been brilliant. We’ve had some issues, only recently with laser strike, with the CCD block needing to be replaced on one or perhaps two cameras, and I’ve
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Matthew and Dave.
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heard of other EX-1 cameras that have also been inflicted with the same injuries recently. But, yes, the EX range of cameras have been very good for rentals and for the clients. Ed: Just tell me about this laser strike – I haven’t heard about this. Laser strike from what? Dave: From lasers that you might find at a fashion shoot, or at any live event where there maybe lasers as part of the visual effects. Ed: It can actually burn an image onto the block? Dave: It would appear so. It looks like what I call a little “magenta worm.” Ed: Is this really just with the EX range, or have you seen this in some other CCD? Dave: I've only seen it personally with our EX-1 cameras. Ed: So it could be a CMOS thing? Dave: Possibly … I’ve asked Sony New Zealand to investigate the problem; I’m just waiting to hear the outcome of their investigations. Ed: Surely you’d see it in the CMOS still cameras as well? Dave: Yes that’s right. I thankfully haven’t come across that problem with the Canon 5D here at Rocket. I will be advising clients in future to be very careful about this. Ed: Since we are in the Auckland office, and we really should have Matthew here I guess … I understand that Matthew’s put his F3 on Facebook?
Dave: That’s right. I’ve seen those pictures on Facebook. I think he’s just so proud of the work he’s done to tell you the truth. He’s created the camera setup. It’s got parts from here and there to create a shoulder rig mount for the F3, so it’s quite an ingenious thing that he’s constructed. Ed: And the clients actually like it? Dave: The clients love it – and I think it looks very good. Ed: I guess that’s an example of what we’ve come to expect from Rocket over the years. You guys have got that broad knowledge of the industry, a variety of the cameras, and not just looking at the technicalities of the camera, but looking at the post workflow for the camera, you’re able to come up with some interesting solutions for clients? Dave: Yes, you just have to look at the RED camera – the sorting of the RED workflow, the rig that Scott and Matthew set up. After hires in Wellington, the comments from the crew are always “This is the best rig I've used." It has features such as the dual hot swappable battery system, so that the RED camera never has to actually be powered down, we can just keep it going. Linked with all the other improvements, aftermarket purchases, it’s become a great rig that the camera department love … well that’s what I’ve been told by Wellington camera folk! Rocket does have a lot of experience to call on; we’ve got cameramen and sound recordists with a wealth of experience; we’ve got people who have worked in rentals from the days of Film Facilities. We definitely take pride in being able to come up with solutions for clients.
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Ed: Now I guess the big question in the rental direction of Rocket is lenses. With the RED, you must have gone and got yourself an array of PL mount lenses; now you’ve added the F3 to the stable, you’re going to need more lenses, because that’s what people are going to want. Is that what you’re going to do? Dave: You’ve hit the nail on the head there – in terms of direction for Rocket and purchasing of equipment, that’s a priority number one for Rocket. We will be adding new cameras that require 35mm lenses, so it’s an absolute must that we add more lenses to our inventory list this year. We’ve got one set of Ultra Primes at the moment, which caters for a certain level of budget, but we want to cater for a wider range of budget. We did purchase the K series F3 which comes with the three Sony Prime lenses – the 35, 50 and 85 which will be priced nicely for that market. Ed: They’re still good lenses though, surely? Dave: Yes, for the price. There’s a wide range of lenses out there with a wide range of prices to match. Top glass always commands big dollars, and it’s difficult to decide on what to go with. One lens option may suit one DOP but not another, plus there’s also the budget to consider. So you need to be very careful in rentals when choosing in this area. But good glass will always outlive you. Ed: On the other side of Rocket – crew – and last time we spoke, you just had a crew in Wellington, you’d forsaken Auckland. Is that still the case? Dave: No we haven’t forsaken Auckland. If we have clients that require us to shoot in Auckland, then we will. We still shoot in Auckland on a regular basis. For some time now we've been sending a cameraman to Auckland to shoot commercials for a client with much success. But for a half day shoot here and there, then it makes it financially unviable for the client. Rocket crew have a wealth of experience and it’s always the easiest job I have in promoting them. They always exceed expectations and have an extensive list of credits to their names. 2011 has started off really well, with all Rocket crew involved in large projects with upcoming bookings also looking good. Ed: And they’ll look after your gear? Dave: Yes, they look after the gear. Ed: Now it’s Matthew’s turn. Your claim to fame at the moment is that everybody’s talking about your Facebook page? Matthew: Oh, the photos of the rig I made based on an old BVP70? Ed: People are intrigued about the passion which you attach to these photos Matthew? Matthew: I think my passion was just mainly due to the fact that nothing really exists to make this camera work the way most people want it to work like, which is an ENG camera. It’s this beautiful 35mm camera that
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Matthew’s ENG rig for the F3—world famous.
takes stunning pictures, but there is no way of actually putting it on your shoulder and running around with it, like you would do an ordinary ENG camera. This is understandable from Sony’s perspective, because they want to go and leave that in the realm of their existing ENG cameras. This rig allows an ENG type person to work with the F3 in that way. Ed: It’s not too heavy?
Matthew: It’s not too heavy, it’s not too heavy at all. Actually by the time you’ve put the rig all together, it’s about the same weight and size as a standard ENG camera. Ed: This is not an official Rocket page? Matthew: No, it’s actually my personal page. I sent it to Scott Webster at Sony New Zealand and he did the honours of Tweeting it to the world, so I have no idea how many people have seen it. Ed: Lots – lots Matthew! Matthew: They have?
Ed: You’re well known! Matthew: I honestly had no idea. All I was doing was trying to make something that would work. Ed: Has it got any friends, because on Facebook you can get friends can’t you? Matthew: You can … ummm, there’s a few people I know in the industry who have joined up since the post. Ed: Well there you are – if you’d like to become friends with Matthew’s F3, go to his Facebook page! NZVN
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I f you own or use radio mics, particularly within the 558MHz to 606MHz band, then the upcoming UHF spectrum changes will affect
you. On Wednesday 09 March 2011, The Ministry of Economic Development and Radio Spectrum Management announ-ced that they will be making changes within the UHF radio spectrum and this will impact radio mic users. The RSM will be rechannelling some Digital Terrestrial Television channels in
preparation for the Digital Switch Over. This rechannelling will commence within the next few months and continue through until June 2012, therefore radio mic users need to be aware of the upcoming changes. The story so far.
2008 - Digital Terrestrial Television starts and immediately affects radio mics users - WUNZ is formed to represent all radio mic users and raise awareness of the impact of DTT 2009 - WUNZ initiates constructive dialogue with the RSM and highlights radio mic users’ needs 2010 - The Government announces that the UHF spectrum between 694MHz and 806MHz will form the digital dividend and will be placed for auction after DSO - The Government announces that the DSO will commence in the Hawkes Bay from September 2012 and is expected to be completed by November 2013 2011 - The RSM release details of the rechanneling plan in preparation for DSO How will the upcoming changes affect you?
The spectrum, primarily between 558MHz and 606MHz, will be densely populated with DTT transmissions between now and DSO. If you currently use radio mics in this band, then you may not be able to use them reliably in the very near future. WUNZ recommends that all radio mics users avoid acquiring radio mics that operate within this band and consult with your dealers if you think your existing equipment will be affected by the planned changes. There is a chart on the WUNZ website which outlines the nationwide changes that will occur, some of which could happen as early as April 2011. WUNZ will continue communicating with the RSM and seek advance notification as to when the relevant changes are about to happen. Details will be emailed to members and notification will also be placed on our website www.wunz.co.nz To help, visit www.wunz.co.nz and click “Join In”
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