VETERAN DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY’S INVESTMENT IN PANASONIC VARICAM® CAMERA RESULTS IN “REJUVENATED CREATIVITY” FOR PROGRAMMING AND COMMERICAL ASSIGNMENTS

SECAUCUS, NJ (January 30, 2004) – EFP Video Productions, Inc. (Franklin Lakes, NJ), a full-service video production company serving international broadcast and cable networks, is utilizing Panasonic’s AJ-HDC27 VariCam® HD Cinema™ camera for assignments ranging from ESPN sports specials to national commercials.

EFP is headed by Gene Samuels, an Emmy Award-winning Director of Photography whose clients include ESPN, CBS, FOX, SHOWTIME, MTV, and numerous television production companies. EFP recently completed the second season of ESPN’s The Season, and last season handled acquisition for the network’s Focus Group.

Panasonic’s AJ-HDC27 VariCam replicates many of the key features of film-based image acquisition, including 24-frame progressive scan images, time lapse recording, and a wide range of variable frame rates (4-fps to 60-fps in single-frame increments) for “overcranked” and “undercranked” off-speed in-camera effects. The AJ-HDC27 VariCam also features CineGamma™ software that permits Panasonic’s HD Cinema camera systems to more closely match the latitude of film stocks.

Since purchasing his VariCam last spring, Samuels, who has also served as DP for various travel shows for PBS, the Food Network and numerous music and entertainment specials, has used the camera on three major commercial shoots (Continental Airlines, Honda Automobile and Sharpie Pens), as well as for “Training Camp,” a 10-episode series featuring major collegiate programs that is currently airing on College Sports Television (CSTV). (These VariCam projects were all produced by Paragon Marketing Group of Skokie, IL.)

For Major League Baseball Productions, Samuels shot a feature on Roger Clemens’ 300th victory, which aired on ESPN. EFP also rents out the VariCam; rental assignments have included the WNBA All-Star Game promotions (ESPN) and NBA semi-finals/finals (ESPN/ABC).

Samuels had been reviewing his HD options for the past two years. “For years my Ikegami (Betacam) had given me a competitive edge, but DV began to chew into my business,” he said. “When ESPN decided to commit to 720p, I felt I needed to take a serious look at the VariCam. I demo-ed the product, and found it perfectly balanced and weighted. The price point was appealing, and among my regular clients, there was a growing acceptance of both 720p and letterboxing.”

CSTV’s “Training Camp” has proved to be Samuels’ training ground with the VariCam. Shooting began last fall and is ongoing. Each 30-minute episode entails a two-day shoot on campuses, where the nitty-gritty of coaches’ work with their players is explored in a cinema verite mode. Programs profiled to date have included University of North Carolina women’s soccer, Stanford University women’s volleyball, University of Miami football and University of Cincinnati men’s basketball.

"These shoots have presented me with every conceivable production environment—sunlight, heat, rain, low light. The VariCam is a really tough camera, with a strong body—it certainly travels well. I treat it like all my cameras, and don’t think twice when I run-and-gun, work up in towers and so on. I really like the gain controls, and I’ve pushed it up to 18dB with virtually no grain. The camera’s clarity and depth of field are amazing."

"Ninety percent of my work on the series is handheld, and the VariCam fits me like a glove. I have the camera outfitted with a Fujinon HD lens, Panavision matte box, and the larger-sized Anton Bauer battery pack—I can shoot for hours with this configuration.”

Training Camp is being mastered on an HD editing system, and is airing in HD. The 30-second spots Samuels shot for Honda and Continental have aired nationally; the Sharpie spot was carried throughout the South and Southwest. The Continental spots, currently seen during every New York Knicks game on Madison Square Garden (MSG), feature Knicks players (an earlier spot was shot with New York Yankees players). The Sharpie spot was shot on location at the NASCAR Sharpie 500 in Bristol, TN, and featured driver Kurt Busch.

"VariCam meets the ‘perfection’ criteria that commercials demand. We’ve achieved phenomenal savings in terms of crew size and processing costs. And to my eye, the footage looks exactly like film for half the price,” Samuels said.

The Honda assignment entailed a one-day shoot on a farm in southern Illinois. “We had six hours of daylight, and we had to shoot two 30-second spots,” he recalled. “As it turned out, when you need to do high-end work in the least amount of time, it’s ideal to use a piece of equipment like the VariCam. It’s portable and lightweight. You turn it on, and you see a picture. On location, the instant playback of color HD is one of the best things about the camera. You can run 2 or 3 monitors off it—as we did for Honda—and instantly see and hear the results. It’s very ‘client-friendly’ in that regard.”

Samuels continued, “For Continental, we shot the Yankees at spring training. But we didn’t have access to the team’s Tampa stadium. Instead, we had to rent out a nearby pro football field. We had one day to make it look like the Bronx home stadium, set up and light, and shoot. We never had more than 30 minutes with an athlete.

"Similarly, with the Knicks we didn’t shoot at Madison Square Garden the first day, but rather at their training facility in Westchester. We had less than two hours to make the practice gym look like the Garden and set up seven locations on the premises. We walked in with the camera, and within an hour had perfectly matched all the locations. Again, we had the VariCam set up with an HD monitor, and could immediately see what we were getting. We had a maximum of ten minutes to work with a player. I don’t think we could have done a shoot on film under these conditions."

"The next day, we shot a second spot at Madison Square Garden itself, where we had three hours to set-up, shoot and strike. Again, the camera excelled under pressure.”

In general, the commercial footage was downconverted, then edited on an Avid and mastered to component digital and analog video.

Samuels noted that he is beginning to shoot off-speed more frequently, and has shot some 60-fps material for the “Training Camp” series, as well as 40-fps game footage for the Clemens special.
"The VariCam is generating money for the business, and my clients have been thrilled with the results, but the overwhelming benefit of having the VariCam is that I feel rejuvenated creatively,” the DP said. "Shooting video had begun to feel very routine to me, but now that I’m shooting HD my feelings about work have changed. It’s so much fun to shoot sports and action in HD that assignments are suddenly a challenge again.”