8 Hours in Brooklyn w/ the Phantom Flex

Blog written by Jonathan Bregel.

A couple weeks ago, Producer James Douglas gave me a call to DP a spot for MMA clothing company, Cagehero , which would be directed by the super-talented collaborative, GrandArmy. In the early concept development process, James Douglas pitched the idea of shooting the spot primarily on Rule Boston Cameras Phantom Flex camera. Having just shot several days on the Phantom Flex for Taylor Swift, I was all for the idea since I was now very familiar with the workflow.  After the concept was developed, the Cagehero commercial was booked to shoot on a Saturday, which meant we would have the camera all day Sunday to shoot whatever we wanted. Being as big of a camera nerd that I am, there was no possible way I was going to let the Phantom Flex idle for a day. I immediately called the producer, James, and convinced him to let me take the camera out Sunday. (thanks for being cool James) Little did he know that I would be skateboarding with the Flex hours later..lol.

Anyway, the idea behind this video was to document whatever sort of culture we could find within an 8 hour span with literally no pre-production. I have honestly seen too many slow-motion explosions, face slaps, and popping water baloons, that I thought capturing real culture, and real emotion would be a cool change of pace. My goal was to successfully pull of a few of these shots with a small crew in order to be able to pitch the Phantom Flex for a lot of the documentary work we shoot/produce. A big misconception is that you need a massive crew and massive lights in order to use this camera...false. However, you do need to know how to use natural daylight to your advantage along with having a kick-ass core crew to support you.

The day started out with myself, good friend Dan Selby, and good friend Jesse Korman. Thank the Canadian God's that Chris Dowsett was in town to help us out later in the day (he was lost on the subway for about 2 hours). As the day went on, I got more and more ambitious and ended up riding a skateboard down the street with the Flex in order to get a shot of the skateboarders riding into the sunset. It was just one of those shots that I knew was really stupid to do, but I think it was worth it in the end...you guys can be the judge of that...One of things I am learning more and more is that you really have to do some stupid stuff in order to push the envelope (I think my buddy Tom Lowe can relate). By the end of the day, I was very excited because we had just pulled off a few cool shots with a really small crew. I feel that my goal was met in that we have proven the Phantom Flex can be used effectively for docu-style shooting. 

Below are some BTS pictures taken by Chris Dowsett

NLP Spring/Summer Quick Update

Hey Everyone, 

First off, we would like to apologize for the lack of attention to our blog/site over the past several months. The truth of the matter is that things decided to skyrocket for us and we have had very little time to update the site, let alone do anything other than shoot and produce. We just wrapped a few of our most exciting projects to date and cannot wait to blog about them! 

In other news, we have all been working tirelessly during jobs/travel on our company plans for the next year and cannot wait to share them with everyone. All we can say is that 2011-2012 will forever be known as the years of epic collaborations! 

Lastly, a huge thanks must go out to all of our sponsors and colleagues for supporting us through these past few crazy months. You know who you are. Without you guys, none of these projects would have been so incredibly successful. 

Cheers,

Next Level Pictures

NLP Shoots Music Videos for Rick Ross, Wale, and Jadakiss

Blog written by: Jonathan Bregel

Directors: Drefilms & SpiffTV, Producer: Sway Mendez, Director of Photography: Jonathan Bregel

This week has been pretty busy between everything going on between Khalid, myself, and Next Level Pictures. 

Last week I was contacted by producer Sway Mendez to DP some music videos for Rick Ross's new albim/mixtape entitled; "Self Made." NLP was contacted for this job based off of our past artist promo/docu/music video work. The directors called for a very raw/gritty approach to the visuals so I did my best to achieve that. Having Brooklyn and downtown Atlanta as our backdrop, I knew this look would be possible. All video work was shot on our new Sony F3 and Zeiss Compact Primes. I am really starting to fall in love with this setup because of it's lightweight and ease of use. We will be shooting a lot of documentary/commercial work with the F3 in the upcoming months. 

At the end of the day, it was a pleasure collaborating with Rick Ross as he is truly dedicated person. After I shot the video last week for "600 Benz", Rick Ross saw the footage and personally requested that I come back and shoot his 2nd video for "Pacman." I was stoked that he had noticed a quality boost from the videos previously shot for his "Self Made" album/mixtape. That being said, the Boss would occasionally come behind the camera to check on the shots and give me reasons for why he liked specific shots. It's always great to get an outside perspective on the things we are shooting. The guy knows how to hustle. (As seen below in a grab from the video I shot for "Pacman.")

Now that I am back and settled in NYC, I spent some of the day grading some of the screen-grabs. So far, the Rick Ross camp has been very happy with everything I have shot for them. There are a lot of projects on the horizon with this crew. Solid hustlers. Below are some more frame grabs from the video for "Pacman." Before viewing, I want to share a ridiculous story that happened on set:

I'll start it out by saying that we were shooting in a "Trap House." For those of you who don't know what a "Trap House" is, I'd suggest looking it up on Google. Below is a screen grab from Google Maps. You can see the dozen or so guys hanging around the Trap. #Sketchy.

Below is a picture of my good friend and 2nd AC, Jimmy Costigan and I relaxing on set before all hell broke loose. Don't judge me because of my epic Ken Griffey Jr. shades and Bob Marley Tank:

Needless to say, this wasn’t familiar territory for my crew and I. This was something that I most likely never would have gotten to experience if it wasn’t for this video, so I am thankful for that. For the video, we had 4 performance setups planned for the day at this location along with some cinematic storyline. When I saw the location on the morning of the shoot, my head was exploding with shot ideas. It is very rare that I see a location with such real, raw, and gritty character. This "Trap House" was every DP/Directors dream. That being said, by the time we got through the 1st performance scene, shit decided to hit the fan when one of the "tenants" of the "Trap House" decided to demand money from the production. As my crew and I were setting up an epic portrait shot of one of the tenants, we heard some yelling from inside the "Trap." I was so focused on getting this shot that I just played it off. I think Khalid and I share a very similar mindset when we are stoked on a shot...we basically forget about the world around us and zone in on nailing the shot. This is both very good, and very bad. Given the fact that we were shooting in the hoodest of hoods I have ever been in, this was very bad. Right as I had my shot lined up on the dolly, I hear one of the "tenants" yelling and come crashing through his front door. Before I even realize what was going on, this guy had kicked the dolly along with various gear cases and HMI ballasts. If my hand wasnt on the camera, it could have been a really, really bad day. While he's doing this, he is screaming "GET THE F&*K OUT OF HERE" along with other racist comments. My crew and I all look at each other as if this is something out of a movie. 6 film crew guys, in the middle of a "Trap House", surrounded by about 30 "Trap House Tenants." Not good. I immediately grabbed my camera and ran it to the truck as my gaffer, Boyd Hobbs, and his g&e wrapped faster then a posse of superheroes. Just as we got everything back to the truck and were waiting for the producer to get back on set, the 2nd AC, Jimmy Costigan, had reminded me that some of our camera gear was in fact, IN THE CRAZY GUYS TRAP! While I'm pondering if my life is worth a couple Anton Bauer batteries and a charger, the 1st AC, Ben McLeod, notices that his truck is being blocked in by one of the tenants cars. Ambition is completely worn off at this point and I am fully aware that we may actually be in a lot of trouble. Ben, not really knowing what to do at this point, approached the guy who blocked his car in and nicely asked him to move it. The guy’s response was; “give me $400 and the car is yours.” At this point, the producer/problem solver, Sway Mendez, was right around the corner. Keep in mind that all of this went down in the 5 minutes that the producer was taking out money from an ATM in order to get us lunch. This was probably one of the longer 5-minute spans in my life. I felt like I was waiting for superman to come and save us. When Sway got back, he quickly resolved the issue. Not sure how he did this but I’m pretty sure it had a lot to do with swag and money. Ben got his car back, and I got my Anton Bauer batteries and charger back.

We soon found out that this crazy guy who had flipped out was not an everyday member of the trap. I honestly felt very safe up until this guy decided to demand money from the director and kick our gear. The members of the "trap" community were all very respectable of our property and accually helped us carry a lot of our gear from spot to spot. I threw 1 guy $5 at the beginning of the day and I swear he was one of the most loyal PA's I have ever worked with. Good people, bad habits. 

At the end of the day, I was mostly disappointed that we only got to shoot in 1 of the 4 performance setups at this “trap house.” I think the average person would have just been happy to be alive…I was of course happy to be alive, but pretty bummed that we didn’t get to capture the character of this “trap house.” Definitely not an opportunity that pops up everyday. Enjoy!

 I wish I had a great story about the "600 Benz" shoot but the truth is that it went very flawlessly. However, it did rain the entire day but it accually played out very well for the look that the director wished to achieve. At one point, we had the F3 on a jimmy jib, wrapped up in a trash bag. This was my first time working with Mikey Jib's from NYC Jibs. The guy is simply a beast. Below is a shot of his setup along with some screen-grabs from the "600 Benz" video.

Check back soon for more updates!

-Jon

NLP Produces spots for revolutionary new product

Agency- Laforet Visuals, Production Company- Next Level Pictures, Executive Producer- Jeff Han, Producer- Brad Burke, Director- Vincent Laforet, Director(s) of Photography- Jonathan Bregel & Khalid Mohtaseb, Art Director- Joseph Sciacca, BTS photographer- Edward Chan

BLOG updated by- Khalid Mohtaseb

Can't talk much about this project as of right now but we had the opportunity to produce & shoot a commercial for director Vincent Laforet. Vince flew in from LA & we shot one day in Brooklyn studios.  We decided to go with our new Sony F3 & T-stop Cinema's Cooke Panchros. This was also the first shoot we were able to use our Ki-pro mini on and it worked out flawlessly. The Ki Pro Mini is a ProRes field recorder that supports all four types of Apple ProRes. This thing is awesome not only because its a simple way to shoot ProRes but it records to universal CF cards! For this spot we recorded to SxS cards & CF cards (using KPM) simultaneously. I love this workflow as its always nice to have a backup in case one of the two fails. To rig the KPMini to the rods, we used the Zacuto Zwiss plate, which also has an optional AB gold mount.

For anyone using an external recorder with the F3 PLEASE NOTE; I've heard talks prior to purchasing the Ki-pro mini about an issue with the F3 when outputting sdi or hdmi to an external recorder. A VERY visible fish scaling pattern appears on the image & WILL be recorded. (as you see in the photo below) 

To avoid this a friend mentioned to go into the "video set" menu & change the 23.98p output from 23.98PsF to 59.94i (2-3 pulldown). So I tried it & it still didn't solve the issue. After a few different tests I learned that if you go into the same menu & change "sdi/hdmi out display" to "off" you'll get a clean picture. Only issue when you turn this off is all camera display setting are no longer viewable on external monitors. 

We're told that Sony is aware of this & should have it fixed with the new firmware (within next couple of weeks or less) which will also activate simultaneous output (HD-SDI & HDMI). Below is the image with displays off. Be sure to toggle between the two images to check out how much cleaner the image is with displays off. 

For our first setup we used the J.L. Fisher 10 dolly & jib arm w the Kessler Revolution head. The revolution head & Oracle controller are great options for panning & tilting when using the fisher jib arm. 

We also used the Kessler Turntable to shoot a few of our product shots. Unfortunetly I can't go into too much detail on what we did but you'll see just how useful this piece of gear was when the spot is finished. 

Our Last Setup of the day was awesome!! It was one 15 second shot that consisted of a very precise & complicated camera movement. Luckily enough Bregel's a beast & he nailed it in a few takes. I gotta give a shout out to our dolly grip, John Moustakas. This guys is a gem when it comes to anything related to dolly! So glad he was part of our team! 

I also cant forget to mention that Vincent was also shooting products shots of every setup with his Hasselblad. Below is a photo of Vince shooting photos from the Fisher.

Overall this was an amazing opportunity for everyone involved & it was a pleasure collaborating with such a talented director like Vincent. We'll post an update once the spot is live. Check back soon for updates!

-Khalid

NLP shoots NY Ink intro for TLC

Network- TLC, Agency- Blue Room,  Production Company- MBS Productions,  Executive Producer- Joe DeVito Director(s)- Josh & Jason Diamond,  Diretor of photgraphy- Khalid Mohtaseb

BLOG updated by: Khalid Mohtaseb 

Im sure you guys are familiar with TLC's hit reality shows Miami Ink & LA Ink. Well TLC decided to do another one of these series only with a New York City back drop. A few weeks ago I was contacted by the Diamond brothers to shoot the intro to NY Ink that they were directing. This was my first time working with these guys and im sure it wont be the last. 

We were originally supposed to shoot with the Sony F3, but decided to go with the Red MX at 4K. The final product will consist of a ton of graphics & CG work so we figured we'd give them a little more room to play with. The Diamond brothers own the Red package & we used our Zacuto support gear to quickly change out to hand held. 

We shot the first day at Production Central Studio, all on greenscreen w T-Stop Cinemas Duclos 11-16. This lens is tack sharp all around. Duclos did an amazing Job rehousing the Tokina 11-16 and is well worth the money spent on it. As you can see from the BTS photos, we shot a ton of group shots so we stayed on a T5.6/8 the majority of the day.  

The Second day we shot the docu-style segment of the intro, also all on the 11-16. We walked around soho most of the day capturing handheld, lifestyle shots of each character in the show. By the end of the day I couldn't move from having the RED on my shoulders all day. I even had our 1st AC Tony Segrato operate a few takes :)

The Diamonds recently got their Epic & I cannot wait to use it on future shoots! I had the opportunity to test it the other night & was blown away at how barebones the package can be to function like a real camera. One improvement I noticed that really caught my attention was how rolling shutter barely existed. This is going to make it the perfect solution for bigger budget documentary. Its hard to believe that a 60K camera is going to be the new "go to" camera for high res run & gun shooting.

Overall this project was a blast to shoot & I can't wait to share the final product. 

-Khalid