Indie Film & Documentary Tutorials

Check out These Great Articles!

Dylan Reeve ~ Under the Gun with RED One
Stephen Smith ~ How to Add Video, Photo and Audio Assets to your Digital Toolbox
Jeremy Garchow ~ The Sonnet D800 RAID: Speed and Safety
Shane Ross ~ Making History with Panasonic P2 and the HVX200
Steven Galvano ~ The Making of Kenya, the documentary film
John David Hutton ~ Evoluent Vertical Mouse
Mike Gondek ~ Dean Collins On Lighting
Jim Harvey ~ Andrew Kramer's Riot Gear
Bill O'Neil ~ Professional Emitter Libraries: Pyro and Hearts
Tim Kolb ~ Demystifying HDV Workflows

	Gary Belcher view bio Indie Film & Documentary No-Budget Digital Filmmaking: How to Create Professional-Looking Video for Little or No Cash Gary Belcher takes a look at No-Budget Digital Filmmaking: How to Create Professional-Looking Video for Little or No Cash published by McGraw Hill. Gary concludes his review with ''the greater value of this book is as a general instruction guide and how to (or not to) tutorial..'' Review back to top

	Walter Biscardi view bio HDV Format High Definition for the Road Thanks to formats like DVCPro HD and HDV, High Definition can now be edited pretty much anywhere on just about any computer. Yeah, this is cool and you can really make your friends jealous just cutting away with your super slick laptop. But you know what's really slick? Editing Uncompressed High Definition anywhere. How about an Uncompressed editing workstation in a 25'' square box? No way? Way! Read on to find out about Wally's Traveling Box of Mystery and Intrigue... Tutorial, Feature Cinematography First Look: AspectCorrect(TM) We've all done this at least once in our careers. You're shooting with a standard camera but you know you're going to letterbox later so you tape two pieces of paper to 'crop' the field monitor. Or you're trying to make sure an element in the shot is in safe title, so you use a grease pencil and approximate where safe title will be. You do what you have to do when you're out in the field, but of course you're never quite sure if it's accurate until you get back into the edit suite. In this article, Creativecow leader Walter Biscardi takes a first look at a handy 'widget' developed by Cinematographer and fellow COW leader, Clay Walker called AspectCorrect and determines that ''...This is just one of those cool little things that should make camera operators lives easier.'' Review back to top

	Steven Galvano view bio Indie Film & Documentary The Making of Kenya, the documentary film In 2000, a team from Steven Galvano's organization (RCCM) traveled to Zambia and the over 20 hours of video he captured there turned into a short documentary film. Now, 6 years and three documentary films later, documenting these trips have become a central part of what he does. In this article, Steven describes his recent documentary: Kenya, The Documentary Film. Tutorial, Feature back to top

	Jeremy Garchow view bio Art of the Edit The Sonnet D800 RAID: Speed and Safety Jeremy Garchow's business is growing. So was his storage, and the potential for disaster. SATA array are less expensive, but were they safe, even with redundancy? With the Sonnet D800 he's got a terabyte of uncompressed HD, with full protection, for a great price. Read on to see the details of his set-up, and see if SATA and the Sonnet D800 will work as well for you as it has for Jeremy. Review, Feature back to top

	Joaquin Gil view bio Ciprico storage solutions Joaquin Gil reviews the Huge-4110 CreativeCOW.net contributing editor Joaquin Gil shares his experience with storage needs during the creation of his last feature film. In this article, Kino discusses his success with the MediaVault 4110 from HUGE-Ciprico. He concludes with...''With the 4110, HUGE Ciprico addresses a market segment that needs large dataspaces in minimum physical space. A natural for the IT data center, the eCommerce nests, banking and legal data repositories and in general any data intensive application where reliability and speed are a must. This makes it very suitable also for animation and effects houses, middle sized to large editing and sound studios and the semi-nomad setups typical of reality shows, because of its sturdiness, practicality of the connectors and being a standard 19'' rack-mountable device.'' Review Adobe ULTRA Serious Magic's Ultra2 CreativeCOW.net contributing editor Joaquin 'Kino' Gil writes a review on Serious Magic's ULTRA 2 Professional Keying Software with Vector Keying Technology and tells readers, ''[Before ULTRA2] each matte had to be calibrated separately and the values adjusted almost on a frame by frame basis in order to get details like loose strands of hair, bluish shadows and reflections, grains of sand and other minutiae. Yes, it took forever [and] no motion tracking software, either. All of that effort, [and hours of work] very seriously done, is made moot today with this software tool from Serious Magic. ... The key is perfect to the extreme of perfectly keyed fine strands of hair, transparency and translucency.'' Review Indie Film & Documentary Dramatica: Software for Dramatic Fiction Writing CreativeCOW.net contributing editor Joaquin Gil writes, ''Dramatica is a computer tool for something nobody realized you could do, computer or not. ... it is one of the most powerful tools available today for the serious fiction writer.'' Read on to see Kino's further insights into this amazing program. Review back to top

	Mike Gondek view bio Digital Photography Dean Collins On Lighting CreativeCOW leader, Mike Gondek examines Dean Collins On Lighting: Live at Brooks Institute of Photography 1991 and published by Software Cinema. Although, this was presented in 1991, Mike believes the content is timeless material. Review back to top

	Rob Gregory-Browne view bio Indie Film & Documentary Building Your House: A lesson in building a script Noted screenwriter, Rob Gregory-Browne compares writing a screenplay to building a house. ''You can't build a house without a solid foundation and you can't build a solid foundation without a foolproof set of plans.'' In this article, Rob gives CreativeCOW members tips on building your screenplay. Tutorial Indie Film & Documentary Anatomy of a Logline Noted screenwriter, Rob Gregory-Browne gives CreativeCOW members tips for creating a logline for your freshly written script. Learn how to 'sell' that script and how to submit it. This is the second in a Screenwriters series here at the Cow and is offered as part of our new Screenwriters forum here at the COW. Tutorial Indie Film & Documentary Creating Characters that Jump off the Page Noted screenwriter, Rob Gregory-Browne gives CreativeCOW members tips for creating characters that live to an audience. Rob discusses ways to make your characters believable. This is the first in a Screenwriters series here at the Cow and is offered as part of our new Screenwriters forum here at the COW. Tutorial back to top

	Jim Harvey view bio Adobe After Effects Andrew Kramer's Riot Gear In this article, CreativeCOW.net contributing editor Jim Harvey takes a look at Andrew Kramer's latest offering: Riot Gear. Riot Gear is a collection of 150+ visual elements including paint, ink, grunge , tv noise, and much more. Review Cinematography The Easy Slate System In this article, CreativeCOW.net contributing editor Jim Harvey takes a look at the Easy Slate Professional Slating System. Jim likes the way it looks, and thinks that it makes him more attentive to the small details that he used to let slip past. It's a simple idea with a clever implementation. Review back to top

	John David Hutton view bio Windows Hardware & Software Evoluent Vertical Mouse It starts as a slight twinge in the shoulder, or a prickle in the wrist, a dime-sized knot in the forearm or a tingling somewhere up and down the arm. Whatever the symptoms, the cause is usually the same - RSI or repetitive strain injury or its widely publicized brother, carpal tunnel syndrome. In this article, John David Hutton takes a look at the new Evoluent Vertical Mouse. It could be the answer to protecting yourself from carpal tunnel and other strains. Review back to top

	Noah Kadner view bio Indie Film & Documentary INDY FILMMAKER, Noah Kadner SHOOTS FORMOSA, VINTAGE 1950 Director Noah Kadner recently shot his debut feature, Formosa, a period comedy about a hapless group of social guidance filmmakers, with Panasonic's AJ-SDX900 DVCPRO Cinema camcorder. An independent project from High Road Productions (Los Angeles, CA), with Anita M. Cal producer, Formosa will go out to potential distributors and have a limited festival run beginning later this year. People / Interview back to top

	James Kelty view bio Indie Film & Documentary James Kelty: Indie & Documentary Filmmaker James Kelty has always considered himself more of a writer-director than an editor. But in today's ever changing production world, Jim recently found himself without the editor with whom he'd worked for years. It was at this point that he began calling longtime friend and Creative Cow co-founder, Ron Lindeboom, asking which way should he go to remain competitive. Ron encouraged Jim that he was a great storyteller and that editing would come natural to him using today's tools. Jim, as a writer-director whose past projects have included "mega-wall" three big-screen spreads for the California State Museum in Sacramento and whose recent projects have included documentaries with Danny Glover narrating, found that editing has come naturally thanks to his friends at the Cow. Today, Jim participates in a wide range of Cow forums and helps lead in our Indie Film & Documentaries forum. Here is his story... Interview back to top

	Tim Kolb view bio HDV Format Demystifying HDV Workflows Creative COW Leader Tim Kolb uses his HDV expertise to explore the technology behind HDV, and show how it applies inside Final Cut Pro and other NLEs, with a special focus on longer projects. As Tim notes, this is a modified version of a post he made in the HDV forum responding to a question about FCP, but anyone who wants to know about editing HDV needs to check this out. Tutorial, Feature HDV Format HDV vs HD: A Primer Emmy Award winner, Tim Kolb discusses HDV and its place in the greater scope of HD production formats. Since the inception of the HDV format, we have seen many responces regarding the HDV format and how it fits alongside HDCam, DVCProHD, XDCam and other formats in the greater scope of the HD picture. In this article (which is taken from an HDV Format forum responce), Creative Cow's Tim Kolb gives what we feel is an exemplary job of dissecting the subject and clarifying the many components of the HD universe, HDV being one of those parts.... Tutorial, Feature back to top

	Ron Lindeboom view bio Indie Film & Documentary Formats, Color Bit-Depths, Data Rates and Storage Requirements In this article, Creative Cows Ron Lindeboom examines how much hard drive space is needed when using the most commonly used formats, data rates, color bit-depths and formats. Tutorial back to top

	Bill O'Neil view bio particle Illusion Professional Emitter Libraries: Pyro and Hearts In this article, CreativeCOW's Bill O'Neil takes a look at the new wondertouch Professional Emitter Libraries. In this set are two Pyro libraries and one Heart set which is a collection of beautiful heart themed designs and backgrounds. Review back to top

	Des Owen view bio Indie Film & Documentary Des Owen reviews: Practical DV Filmmaking by Russell Evans Des Owen takes a thorough look at a new book called, Practical DV Filmmaking by Russell Evans and published by Focal Press and determines that this is the sort of book you want to read from cover to cover and then dip into from time to time for reference. Review back to top

	Aharon Rabinowitz view bio Adobe After Effects NAB Post Plus NY Review In this combination podcast and video report, Aharon Rabinowitz takes Creativecow members on a tour of last week's NAB Post + Show in New York City, where he presents both an inside look at the latest industry technologies and in-depth interviews with 2 of the experts featured at the show. Download the podcast and listen to his report, then watch the movies and take note of the show notes if you want to follow up on anything he said. back to top

	Dylan Reeve view bio RED Camera Under the Gun with RED One Dylan Reeve and a small team of New Zealand filmmakers had 48 hours to get their assignment, write a script, direct, shoot and post their film, then hand in the finished show...oh yeah, and refine their RED shooting and editing skills under the gun while trying to beat out 230 other teams! Sound wild? You have no idea.... Feature back to top

	Shane Ross view bio Panasonic HVX - HPX (P2) Making History with Panasonic P2 and the HVX200 In this reprint from Creative COW Magazine, Creative Cow leader and broadcast editor Shane Ross uses his work for The History Channel to illustrate end-to-end workflow using P2 media and the Panasonic HVX200: from a multi-camera shoot in the middle of blazing gunfire, all the way to your living room. Feature back to top

	Aanarav Sareen view bio Corporate Video MediaFiler 2.0 MediaFiler 2.0 is a professional database software designed for the video production industry. It's an easy way to catalog, track, label, and organize your whole library of tapes and disks. In this article, Creative Cow Leader Aanarav Sareen takes a look at the software for use in his own production environment and determines that it is everything they say it is. Review back to top

	Stephen Smith view bio Event Videographers How to Add Video, Photo and Audio Assets to your Digital Toolbox Who doesnt love high quality free stuff? Let Creative Cow Contributing Editor Stephen Smith be your maitre D. Hell provide a menu that will show you some of the best places to get free video, photo and audio assets that will benefit every media professional. Feature back to top

	Bob Zelin view bio Apple Final Cut Pro SAS RAID from Dulce Systems Creative COW Contributing Editor Bob Zelin talks about the latest step in the Serial Attached Storage revolution: full RAID 5 protection with read speeds over 350 mb/sec. from Dulce Systems. At least that's what Dulce claimed. When he heard the rest of what Dulce had to say, Bob simply didn't believe them. When he put those claims to the test, he got a lot more than he bargained for. Will you? Review AJA Kona Cal Digit S2VRHD CreativeCOW's Bob Zelin tests a Cal Digit S2VRHD with a host card for a PCI-X computer, and a PCI-E computer. He used the incredible AJA Kona System Test, to evaluate the drive speeds. He was determined to 'break it.' Did he? No. He determined that...''If you want to do uncompressed HD, for a fraction of the price of an Apple Xserve RAID, or other hi end SCSI or Fibre Channel drive arrays, THIS IS YOUR BOX.'' Read the rest to find out why. Review AJA Kona AJA HD10AVA Converter CreativeCOW's Bob Zelin discusses how to turn your HDV VTR into a professional product using the amazing AJA HD10AVA converter. It takes the analog component HD signal from your Sony or JVC HDV VTR, and converts it to an HD-SDI signal that can go right into the HD-SDI input of your capture card. Review