elkanah77

On 25.2.2017 at 2:20 PM, Justin Bacle said:

OMG this is awesome :D
Great and funny idea you had shooting it with toy cars  Plus I'm a huge fan of synthwave so I couldn't be happier. Please share the full clip when it's out !

Thanks man! Follow me on any of the social media links in the description and you'll get a head start!

Wanted to showcase my latest album with a song fitting the 80s and what better way than a slot car racing track. Doesn't get any more 80s than that. Looked up a guy with a Scalextric slot card track and brought over my A6000,the kit-lens, the 50mm 1.8m two cheap LED lights and some blue gels and got to work. Lit everything so it would look like moonshine on a clear night and just got the angles. Edited in PP and stabilized. Some grading needed but no noise reduction used. Everything is handheld including the POV, although that took some DIY to get right.

I liked this a lot!

Reaching out to the community here... in a way. Have this video out today showcasing synthwave type music and would have liked more "POV night driving" than I have found under CC terms. If anyone should have some unused footage or got ideas to enhance my vision please contact me. I'm unable to shoot footage myself at the moment. In return for favours I'm more than happy to provide sound or soundtrack if desired. Thanks! :-)

Shot vertically to capture more resolution during green screen work (in my living room with two LED panels of the cheapest kind). Main song hook recorded in one take although there's a cut-away in the edit during the bridge of the song. Sony A6000 with the 55mm 1.8. Tunnel shots done on Panasonic GH2 and severe editing in After Effects for the light beams with text.

4 hours ago, tellure said:

I've re-listened to it a few times now.. it's really quite catchy.  I used to listen to a ton of 80s synth-pop and when I first heard it I thought was it was some song I somehow missed or couldn't recognize because your cover sounded different enough from the original.  But in fact it was an original!  Congrats, you really did capture the 80s, and especially that melancholy touch you mentioned.  The production quality of the tune is also excellent.. sounds very professionally mixed.

My only suggestion would be to shoot a real music video that's less of a of a home studio performance.  Seems like it could be fun trying to re-interpret the 80s music video with modern gear. 

Thanks again. It's very uplifting to read such a good review when you've worked very hard to capture and revive a feeling brewing for a long time. I'm set to release a string of songs this year in the same spirit. Please subscribe to my Youtube channel to get some momentum going.

As for the music video, I agree completely and would love to have some VHS-retro-looking images rolling on this. However, at this point it's not really possible but if I get a lot of feedback on this and the couple of next, I'd might hire a crew to make such a video as I love it as well. Thanks again! :-)

6 hours ago, tellure said:

Did you write and perform the song too?  If so, really impressive!  The music is great.  Shooting was cool too, especially the snow shots.

Thanks. Glad you liked it. I did write, perform and record/produce this song, but it's not me singing. I don't have that singing power I'm afraid so someone else wrote the lyrics and performs the vocals. As for the snow, well, it's all gone now I'm sorry to tell. Will be back with some stills from the shoot later. Follow me on my Youtube channel for more to come... 

50 minutes ago, AaronChicago said:

Dude that's awesome. I love vintage synths. I never have the extra cash for them but I've downloaded the vintage Roland and Korg synths on my iPad to play with a MIDI keyboard.

Tears For Fears is one of my all time favorites.

Thanks! I know, I started out as a musician and will die a musician and I lived the era so now I only make what I love and I'm gonna stick with that. The old synths are getting increasingly more expensive and both buying and owning one can be a hard ride as they break down very often. Luckily I'm good with the soldering iron he-he. :-)

I hold Tears for Fears high on my list as well. I would have to go for The Pet Shop Boys if I was to pick out a single influence.

Tried to capture the essence of the fun, up-tempo and a bit melancholy synth-pop of the 80'ies. The decade I loved so much. I made this with a lot of old gear for the music. As for image I used only a Sony A6000 with the kit-lens and the 55mm 1.8. Some of the shots are also the iPhone 6 with a 4K hack. Most of the shots with that worked ok, but it's not 100% stable.

Very athmospheric and creepy. Right up my alley. As a sound-man I appreciate your sound design and attention to stereo. very effective. Thanks!

Tried to capture the spirit of my little, but beautifully Korg Poly-800 analog synth from 1983. Sony A6000 with the 50mm 1.8 along with the kit-lens for some wide shots.

I understand if money is tight and that means you have to let go of the 7d, but I love my 7d to bits and I use almost every day for stills and it has never failed me. I always get amazed by the Canon colors straight out of the camera.

I use no type of vari/grad ND's on the A7s just single Tiffen ND's of various strenghts. On the RX just the in-built ND. As for contrast, this is how I like it and punchy colors and contrast are what I was striving for and prefer. The +20 saturation or so in the s-log2 picture profile is part of what makes it happen.

The yellow color could be removed I guess with some work and time if so desired.

Appreciate feedback and always interesting to hear what others preferences are. :-) 

I've resisted the urge to upgrade yet again. I did some extensive shooting this weekend and put the RX100IV through its paces along with the A7s. The A7s had the Zeiss 55mm 1.8 and the RX has of course another Zeiss built in. I shot both a lot of 4K and 100 fps with the RX and it never got to warm. I had the same PP on both cameras. S-log2 with detail way down and saturation at +20. A giwaway is of course the DOF on many shots that is the A7s but the clips match very well I think. What do you think? If you love american cars this is for you...

Thanks! No secrets. I use a LUT from here : https://sellfy.com/p/qC1i/ on an adjustment layer. Then I go into each individual clip with these three "no-render" effects in PP: Fast Color corrector, Three way color corrector and the infamous Brightness/Contrast effect. Lastly I use a sharpness of +15-20. On top of all this I have one last adjustment layer with some filmgrain set at Overlay at 50%. After I went from Canon ML Raw to Sony A7s and now the RX100IV I've graded all my "holiday" shots like this if I use the s-log2. The night scenes in this is not shot with s-log2. It's shot with PP4 and heavy use of Neat Noise Remover.

Zach: This looks VERY nice! :-)

I use only manual mode with my 55mm 1.8 and it works like a charm. Never use autofocus except for stills. Extraordinary lens for stills as well btw. One of my newest videos on Vimeo features the 55mm on all the night scenes and the Rx100IV for day-scenes. Not a very interesting video but to showcase the lens, maybe. :-)

I have used this a lot during this summer for a music video coming out later. I don't use a lot of focus pulls, but I love this lens for video. I find it to be one of the most useful lenses i got in my arsenal for the A7s video-work.

As of now I'd rather hold on to my A7s and my newly aquired RX100IV and have TWO cameras that combined have all I need including a fabulous 1080p 120 fps. I'd admit the IBIS is nice but the 42mp still capability of the A7rII is something I'd happliy live without. For now...

Probably a bad batch or extremely unlucky. Mine is working flawlessly with near silent motor in every position. Regardless of motor speed.

Thanks, I think you will enjoy your rx10ii very much. As for the haunted house it is now sold. Not to me I'm sorry to say. I think the new owners already have experienced some nightly disturbances so maybe it'll come back on sale......

Trying out the 100/120 fps in real life, shots I'm interested in. Trying to find weakness in the image like aliasing etc.

Very impressed so far:

*SOLD*

​Thanks. Me too. The less gear I have to drag the better. Sometimes I have to take some gear, but I really like the possibilities the 4K - 1080p crop gives in post.

I often like to make slow zooms to have some dynamics in my shots, especially if it's static shots just to keep some interest going. That was also my main object going from 1080p to 4k when I got my GH4. I tested out a Nikon 28mm AIS some time ago and put that kind of fake dolly/slider into this little test: