Pro Moviemaker Spring 2020

SPRING 2020

The ultimate magazine for next generation filmmakers

Editor in chief Adam Duckworth Staff writer Chelsea Fearnley Contributing editor Kingsley Singleton Chief sub editor Beth Fletcher Senior sub editor Siobhan Godwood Sub editor Felicity Evans Junior sub editor Elisha Young EDITORIAL ADVERTISING Group ad manager Sam Scott-Smith 01223 499457 samscott-smith@bright-publishing.com Senior sales executive Jemma Farrell-Shaw 01223 492240 jemmafarrell-shaw@bright-publishing.com DESIGN Design director Andy Jennings Design manager Alan Gray Designers Lucy Woolcomb, Man-Wai Wong, Bruce Richardson, Laura Bryant & Emma Di’Iuorio PUBLISHING Managing directors Andy Brogden & Matt Pluck MEDIA SUPPORTERS AND PARTNERS OF:

If you ask me, there’s one major improvement that pretty much every new video camera is screaming out for. It’s not more resolution, bigger sensors, faster frame rates, or any of the other good stuff that comes on just about every new launch nowadays. Cameras are currently all so good that any improvement is icing on the cake. What really makes me frustrated is the overcomplicated menus that assume an astrophysicist’s level of expertise. I’m not the only person that yearns for menus you can easily understand, that are logical and easy to use in a hurry. Of course, some cameras are better than others and some menus need to be deep and complicated. Ask anyone who has to regularly adjust knee – or even really understands what that means – then I’ll show you someone with a better grasp of the technical than 95% of filmmakers. The rest of us just want simplicity, with obvious settings that you don’t have to commit to memory. For example, howmany times have you gone to set a certain frame rate, only to see it not listed or greyed out in a menu, even though you’re sure your camera can handle it? Why do we have to commit to memory all the available frame rates and crop factors for each individual codec we can use? Surely a system can be worked out to show a representation of what you can and can’t set, rather than everything being a memory test that leads to trial-and-error menu changing. It’s a bit like those signs on smart motorways that advise things like ‘Congestion between A456 and M32 junction with B7689’. In the days when we used maps and made a note of road names and junctions, this may have been useful. But led by my satnav or smartphone’s mapping app, I certainly don’t feel the need to have an encyclopaedic knowledge of all major roads and traffic junctions for every journey. The world is full of cheap apps and smart devices that are easy to use, or else people wouldn’t use them. Even massive websites can take a wild guess at what you might want. Buying a new hammer? Perhaps you should have some nails, too? Changing your camera resolution to 4K? Here are the frame rates you can use, all listed for you. Or perhaps the option to select a frame rate with the resolutions that can handle it, so you can make a decision. Not that hard, is it? Yes, some things need detailed menus. But surely changing frame rates for some slow-motion might be something a filmmaker wants to do pretty often. Ditto changing white-balance, or altering audio levels. Yet often these things are buried beneath a matrix of settings that seem to have little bearing on where they are. Let’s hope the ease-of-use revolution is the next big thing in video cameras.

Bright Publishing Ltd, Bright House, 82 High Street, Sawston, Cambridgeshire CB22 3HJ

Pro Moviemaker is published quarterly by Bright Publishing Ltd, Bright House, 82 High Street, Sawston, Cambridge CB22 3HJ. No part of this magazine can be used without prior written permission of Bright Publishing Ltd. ISSN number: 2045-3892. Pro Moviemaker is a registered trademark of Bright Publishing Ltd. The advertisements published in Pro Moviemaker that have been written, designed or produced by employees of Bright Publishing Ltd remain the copyright of Bright Publishing Ltd and may not be reproduced without the written consent of the publisher. The content of this publication does not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher. Prices quoted are street prices. In sterling they include VAT but US dollar prices are without local sales taxes. Prices are where available or converted using the exchange rate on the day the magazine went to press.

ADAM DUCKWORTH, EDITOR IN CHIEF

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SPRING 2020 PRO MOVIEMAKER

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