Apps for Filmmakers Episode Summary

In this weeks episode of Film School Friday, Corey and Bill are talking about different useful apps for filmmakers.

Apps for Filmmakers Episode Notes

Apps for Filmmakers Transcript

Corey Allen  00:03

Welcome to film school Friday. I’m Corey,

Bill Cornelius  00:06

I’m Bill and

Corey Allen  00:07

together

Bill Cornelius  00:08

we house the infocus podcast.

Corey Allen  00:10

Film School Friday is our special weekly episode where we try to pass along just a little bit of knowledge, the nugget or maybe oodles of knowledge noodles, I guess it depends on the topic and your own experiences. But hopefully you can take at least something away from these little Friday bonus episodes.

Bill Cornelius  00:30

Yeah. So Corey, I’m a I’m more of an analog guy when it comes to planning and pre production and even production. I like to use paper and pencils, like an old man. Last. That’s how I learned blasphemy. But to my understanding, there are a lot of great apps and new tech out there to assist in pre production and production. And I believe you use quite a few of those.

Corey Allen  00:56

Yeah, I’m definitely not an analog individual. I mean, you know, maybe it’s for lighting control, pre production, like there are a lot different apps that exist to your point. You know, there are a few that I rely on almost every shoot, the situs link app from aperture is a big one. And I’ll run through all of these and maybe give some insight into each one.

Artemis Pro is another one that I’d absolutely love healios pros very similar, same company as Artemis Pro is great for lighting planning, things like that. tentacle sync is another great one for timecode and multi cam and audio synching stuff like that. And then full control is another one that when I’m on a shoot with my red, either the Komodo or the Gemini like I cannot live without.

Bill Cornelius  01:52

So what are these apps do? Let’s take artimus Pro, for example. What would you do with that app? And and how would you apply that in the real world.

Corey Allen  02:01

So Artemis Pro does an amazing job for DPS or camera operators, specifically, where you within the app, you can choose your camera and your lens set specifically, and then through the app, you can actually just hold up your phone and it will emulate exactly what that crop factor of the camera the focal length of the lens is exactly what it would look like in camera minus things like depth of field because you know that’s really difficult to emulate on a phone.

Yeah. But you can absolutely frame up composition field of view all of those things. So like for example, one of the bigger music videos I worked on recently, we shot on the red Gemini with Atlas Orion’s. And for pre production, we did a tech scout like two different days at the location and it just it did not make sense to like build a camera and Hall all of that gear around for pre production just to make sure framing and blocking and all of the things were right. All I needed was Artemis Pro that has my RED Gemini and three Orion lenses.

And I just hold up my phone and I can cycle through all three focal lengths of the lens set. we knew exactly where to set up on the day we know exactly what the framing would look like. And it’s within like inches field of view accurate. So it’s super fantastic. That’s awesome. Pre Pro, like really understand camera setups and make sure you can get the angle and the view that you want with the space that you have.

Bill Cornelius  03:40

It’s almost like like a director’s viewfinder.

Corey Allen  03:43

It is exactly attack.

Bill Cornelius  03:45

Yeah. Without

Corey Allen  03:46

having to haul lenses around

Bill Cornelius  03:48

100% have some glass on a lanyard around your neck.

Corey Allen  03:52

Yes,

Bill Cornelius  03:53

so the aperture one you mentioned, like control.

Corey Allen  03:56

Yeah, so situs link is probably my favorite currently for a lot of reasons. First, I use aperture lights almost exclusively whether it’s the the 120, the 300, the 600 I haven’t Nova, but a 412 pack of the MCs no big deal, no weird flex but okay. All of those things, including the older 120 with an accessory all of those can be controlled wirelessly from my phone or from my iPad. Several you can do wireless DMX as well, which is a whole different episode to talk about lighting control.

But you know, once you have all your lights set up on set, the last thing you want to do is for you if you’re like a solo shooter, or even for gaffer, if you can stand in one place, visualize the scene and make adjustments to lighting intensity, to color. Any of those things if you can do that while just staring at this That up versus go adjust the light and then go back and check it and then go just another light and go back and check it. It’s so much easier through situs link for all of their situs enabled apps to just quickly make those adjustments on the fly.

And then the other thing that’s built into situs, they’re actually quite a few tools. lighting controls, the big one that everybody that is familiar with the app knows that it can do. The other thing that it can do is diagramming. So when you think about pre production, and even if it’s a super basic setup, or maybe it’s the most complex lighting scenario you’ve ever lit in your entire professional life, you can diagram everything from talent to props, choose all of the lights that you’ll have on set. And essentially create a, an not an analog, but similar to if you were to draw out exactly what you want it to do on the day.

Bill Cornelius  05:59

So do what I do, basically, yes, digitally.

Corey Allen  06:02

Yeah, you can do all of that within the diagram master. So when you show up on set, not only are you like fully equipped to completely build out your setup, and look like you know exactly what you’re doing, because you’ve put all the pre production time and effort into thinking this through fully. Yeah. But through that diagram Master, you will also get like loadout, or check sheets.

So you know, based on the lighting setup that you’ve designed, here are all the things that you want to make sure you load out with. Yeah, so it’s like your kind of gear checklist based on the lighting design. So that’s really cool. And with the one of the latest updates, they even added action animations, so you can basically preview camera movements. And if you have dynamic lighting moves or talent moving through the scene, you can see all of that play back as an animation in the diagram master.

Bill Cornelius  07:00

I was really impressed with the diagram. Yeah, you showed me that. And I was like, wow, like, even I might use this.

Corey Allen  07:08

You don’t have to own any aperture lights at all to use the diagram master. But like it has area lights it has every manufacturer, major manufacturer, their style of lights are in there that you can include. As little icons, you can turn on light beam spreads, so you can emulate what the light spread will look like. You can choose the degree of the spread. If you have lights that are RGB, you can choose the color. Yeah, super versatile, in way better than pen and paper.

Bill Cornelius  07:45

Well, I noticed it’s funny because I I even my shot lists are a physical piece of paper that’s stapled together. And the first shoot I worked on were you directed you had your shot list on an iPad. So I knew you were going down this, this rabbit hole with the tech and me still with all my analog stuff. If you see any pictures of me on set, I’ve got a piece of paper rolled up in my pocket a lot of times and that is the shot list, which I don’t keep on an iPad. It’s totally okay. Yeah, totally.

Corey Allen  08:18

Yeah, the you know, the other one. Similar to Artemis Pro, maybe not similar in functionality, but from the same company is Helios Pro. And I’m sure there are a lot of shooters that have used apps like Sunseeker, where you can determine where the sun will be at a certain time of day. Helios Pro is just another version of that that in my opinion has a lot, a lot more options.

A lot, a lot of additional detail to help you really plan for the day, like Sunseeker, I feel like was designed largely for still photographers at the time. But it’s used by video shooters as well. Helios pro In my opinion, I feel like is really geared towards video versus still photography. So it’s the if you’re familiar with sun seeker or something similar, it is basically just another version of that. I like it in the Artemis in the healios ecosystem.

Bill Cornelius  09:18

Do these apps generally cost anything?

Corey Allen  09:21

Oh, yes. If it’s good, it’s not like if it’s if it’s great, it’s not free, right? There are definitely good options that are free like situs link. You absolutely can get and use for free. Especially if you have aperture lights, there’s no additional cost to you situs where the cost comes in is if you want like additional Yeah, they’re they’re additional functionality for like sharing across multiple users like if I have a shoot with in I’m gonna have a gaffer on set then I want to collaborate on the setup. Or if I want to store a large volume I have setups or different lighting configurations, you want that.

Bill Cornelius  10:06

So let’s talk about fool control. And if I’m understanding this right is that f o o l as in fool,

Corey Allen  10:13

it is fool control. There, this app developer actually has a few different versions. There’s red control. Specifically for Komodo cameras, there’s fool control. That is for the dsmc2 line up. And I believe there are, there’s at least one other version for non red ecosystems that the developers put together, I don’t, I only shoot red. So I don’t, I don’t know about that one.

But what fool control or red control allow me to do is I can monitor, I can control all camera settings, I can view playback. Depending on what type of lens is attached to the camera, I can pull focus from my phone or my iPad, I generally use it to just monitor and set camera settings, if the camera is in a weird position, maybe it’s in an overhead setup, or maybe it’s on a steady cam.

And he just you don’t want to mess with the physical setup, you can very quickly jump in and monitor and manage nearly everything for the cameras right through that app. So there’s a free version of full control for dsmc2 shooters that really just only gives you the ability to start and stop recording, and view settings. If you want like full all all in control. It is a little pricey. I think it’s like $129. But it’s essentially a full wireless AC camera users dream. So like if I’m an AC on another project that is also red. I just turn on Wi Fi of that camera, and I can do everything I need to from my AC station. Yeah, that’s great.

Bill Cornelius  11:59

That’s great. I mean, that’s even I would be down for something. There’s been shoots, where things are a little I’m thinking of shoots where we’re camera moves are more difficult. Or you happen to be in a position where the camera can go there. But you can’t go there as the operator. Yep. And that that type of automation. And being able to monitor from afar comes in handy in situations like that.

Corey Allen  12:25

Yeah. And you can you can monitor it with no additional like wireless video transmitters needed. That’s awesome. There is some delay, for like for the Comodo. You wouldn’t want to pull focus from that live stream. But you definitely don’t have to have additional accessories attached to throw that live stream video out.

So if you had a client that wanted to view while you film, you could set up an iPad and just let them watch that live feed. That’s awesome. That’s pretty cool. And then the last one is not really an app. So maybe this is just bonus content for anybody that’s still listening. knows it’s a website called a VA, and it’s a vv.com. It’s perfect for location scouting and securing commercial space.

By commercial I mean like paid shoot space, maybe it’s a studio, maybe it’s a house that is available for rent. It’s very different than like going through an Airbnb, which I know a lot of indie shooters do. Yeah, these places on eBay, they rent at an hourly rate. So that typically, you want to have a little bit of a budget, you want to plan for that. But these are spaces designed and intended for you to come in and shoot a project.

So if you’ve never heard of evey or if you’re still guerrilla shooter, like just showing up at places give it a shot. There’s a lot of cool places all over the country in major Metro cities that you can rent for your next shoot. And even my analog gases in evey that’s gone down with that, too. That’s right. That’s right. We did I turned you on to a vein for that teaser trailer.

Bill Cornelius  14:11

Yeah.

Corey Allen  14:11

Nice.

Bill Cornelius  14:13

Very good. I think I think I’m converted. I’m slowly converting, we’ll see over from analog faucet,

Corey Allen  14:20

I’ll send you some download links was Yeah,

Bill Cornelius  14:21

just just make sure I don’t have any paper in stock at my house. Right, any diagrams down or anything?

Corey Allen  14:27

All right. Awesome. Well, for our listeners, make sure you check us out on Instagram at infocus pod or online at infocus. podcast calm. And if you liked what you heard today, go ahead and subscribe. And if you’re on Apple podcast, please leave us a rating five stars if you feel so inclined.

Bill Cornelius  14:48

Or if you don’t feel inclined still give us five stars.

Corey Allen  14:50

Yeah, that would be cool too.

Bill Cornelius  14:51

Yeah, just five stars over it

Corey Allen  14:53

would help us out a ton and until next time,

Bill Cornelius  14:57

feature crew mates you Can’t do through an app. Well, maybe you could. Uber Eats UberEATS there you go grub hub, grub hub, whatever you want.