< Back to all posts

NYC PR Firm Uses Sony PMWF55

Posted by Rebekah Toth Burns on July 24, 2014

A New York City public relations firm, Finn Partners, captured a new public school initiative with the Sony PMW F55. This required going into the classroom to record interviews and B-roll. Crews Control represented DP and contributing blogger Adam Shanker says this about his camera for this project. “Setting the F55 in HD in the MPEG 2 XDCAM mode we can have manageable file sizes while achieving high quality. The record format is 1920x1080P, frame rate of 29.97, with an angle shutter at 180 degrees. The HG gamma setting is set at number 3. The detail level is brought down to -7, and the aperture level to -10. I’ve got an OLED viewfinder and Arri bracket support for the viewfinder cable, an Arri top plate for mounting attachments, like the Sony DVF-L700 fly away Progressive LCD monitor. A Switchtronix JetPack allows use of Anton Bauer batteries, and the base rig is Element Technica’s Micron with an Arri follow focus.” If there is one thing that Adam loves to talk about more than his cameras, it is his glass. For this project he is using a set of Leica R primes for the interviews and a Fuji Cabrio 19-90mm for B-roll. To complete the refined look of this project a iadds movement to keep the viewer engaged.

The footage is recorded on 128GB SxS cards then transferred to a hard drive by Adam’s trusted soundman, Barry Weisblat, who is also the media manager on-site. He uses Sony’s Content Browser to view clips and verify the data transfer. Finn Partners will cut the project in-house on a Mac 10.6.8 with 2 x 2.4 GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon processors using FCP 7.0.3.

Adam sees himself as a quality ambassador while keeping an eye on the bottom line. “Much of my work is for high end corporate clients. Budgets are almost always a factor. One of my jobs is to show my clients how we can improve the production value on their projects, while keeping the budgets in line. With the F55, even in the MPEG 2 HD mode, the quality is so much better than what they would expect from a more traditional HD camera. Often we use the Sony F800’s as second and third unit cameras, as they have the same file structure as the F55 in MPEG 2 HD mode. That can offer us the best of both worlds, a shallow focus look cine camera, along with a full size HD camera.”

How are you using large sensor cameras on your recent video productions? In what locations are you shooting your film with large sensors? Please share the types of video production clients who are using the Sony PMW F55 or cameras like it on our blog, Facebook page, Twitter account, or LinkedIn page.