Comments

Brazilian wrote on 7/21/2003, 1:17 AM
"Format"? What exactly are you asking?
filmy wrote on 7/21/2003, 1:34 AM
If you mean shooting format - all kinds. A good friend of mine shoots commericals and he mainly shoots 35 mm but he has also shot Betacam and 16 mm. I am not sure is he has shot any with DVcam or HD, he hasn't metioned it and I haven't asked.

If you mean final format for air - mainly Betacam now although a lot of the 35 mm stuff was shoot for Mexico and they show the beer and cigarette commerials in the theatres as well so delevery format was, obviously, 35 MM answer print for those.

And having said that the obvious answer is: "Whatever format the client requests."
pedro333 wrote on 7/21/2003, 2:05 AM
SORRY A NEUBEEE... IS THAT TO SAY THAT 8MM IS NO GOOD FOR TV>>>
Grazie wrote on 7/21/2003, 3:05 AM
Filmy, take it easy ;-)

pedro333 - What are you after exactly? 8mm is 8mm. You can't change, mostly, what you've got. Do you mean 8mm chemical film, the type with sprockets on each side? if this is the type you speak of 8mm gives a particualr look and feel - very filmic - and CAN be very "effective". If you're after keeping that "look" you are on. If your are thinking you can change to a higher quality film, I reckon all bets are off!

I'm sure I've seen this type of quality "used" for a specific look 'n feel. It looks like pre-DV quality footage, BUT is used for that purpose. Mostly adverts are shot and processed utilizing very high quality methods - they aren't shot on 8mm using the 8mm cameras. They then do a lot of "post" production work to twist and tuen the footage into the look 'n feel that is being sought by the Director and the client - yeah? So, what exactly are you after?

Apologies if I've got my understanding of 8mm film, you speak of, incorrectly,

Hope this helps,

Grazie
filmy wrote on 7/21/2003, 3:26 AM
>>> Filmy, take it easy ;-)<<<

?? Did I miss something?
Grazie wrote on 7/21/2003, 3:34 AM
Then maybe I did - apologies!

Grazie
kameronj wrote on 7/21/2003, 8:23 AM
"Is that to say that 8MM is no good for TV?"

Well, it depends. I have shot some 8MM (digital) and the final product I selected was "broadcast" quality MPEG. Would they use it for a commercial....depends on who the "they" is.

When I say "broadcast", I mean full screen, good resolution...almost like I hooked the vidcam directly to the TV and played. But is it professional high quality stuff shot on a very expensive camera...no.

But could it be a vid captured for a local mom-n-pop store doing a local spot to be played at 3 am inbetween reruns of Howdy Doodie and The Great Space Coasters....yup!!

:-)

Check out my comic sendup of "X-Men" and see what I mean. Go to www.KJVPresents.com - and click on the X-Men link.
Randy Brown wrote on 7/21/2003, 8:49 AM
I think Filmy answered Pedro's question; ask the station, as some (even in my podunk little neck of the woods) will now accept mini dv and even DVD.
Randy
Trichome wrote on 7/21/2003, 12:38 PM
the po-dunk little station that I work at ships all final ready-for-broadcast tapes down on 3/4".
they go to a company called AdLink [www.adlink.com] who then re-encodes the spots into digital mpeg2 format and airs the spots.

We have tried getting the spots to them already encoded to avoid a generation loss, but AdLink told us they can not accept any other format than 3/4" from media companies.

Go figure...
TheHappyFriar wrote on 7/21/2003, 12:51 PM
I work for a little TV station and we accept DVCPro, Betacam SP, and SVHS. We DO NOT accept 3/4". All our 3/4" machines suck! We then convert everything to mpeg-2 to play over the air. Vegas is actuatly very nice for that:
capture all the commercials, bring into vegas, trim start/end, save file, open file in another instnce of vegas, then render away! :)
ArmyVideo wrote on 7/21/2003, 2:22 PM
I think your question might have already been answered, but I'll give my two cents as well. By the fact that you're asking, I'm asuming you may be interested in shooting something on either 8mm video, Hi8, or Digital8. I know of a lot of stations that will accept the old 3/4" stuff... I have a 3/4" machine of my own for just that reason. However, most want BetaSP, DVCpro, or DigiBeta. Your best to do two things. First, contact the people who will actually be airing the commercial. In most markets, the commercials are fed from a regional master control. Comcast does this in Michigan. Get a hold of an ad rep at the distributor station or office, and ask them what formats they accept, and what other item besides the commercial itself that they will need, such as bars/tone, coutdown, slate, etc.
Next, shoot some footage on your camera using the same lighting and audio equipment you'll be using to shoot the commercial, then using whatever recources you have at your disposal, get that footage onto the highest quality format they accept and that you can aford. Finally, take an honest look at the final result and see if it is of a quality you've seen broadcast before. My guess is that if you're using an older analog 8mm camcorder you more than likely will not get broadcast quality results. However, that doesn't stop a lot of places. If the client likes it enough to pay you... then by all means take the money!