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NZ television industry news
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MARCH 2014 Vol 200
Yes, it’s here, issue #200 and I wonder if anyone really
thought we’d make it. Just like we did for issue #100,
this is an opportunity for my trusty but ageing assistant
to put her tuppence worth into the mix.
Miss Hellfinger: Yes, you’ve
made it to 200 issues – did you
think this was possible when
you got to 100?
Ed: Well yes I did. The
feedback has been over-
whelmingly positive, both from
our readers and by the
advertising support from our
industry suppliers.
I think however, that 300
might be a bit of a peak too
far. I’ll be 70 by then, your
Barbie head-phones wil l
probably be no more and I
won’t be able to get tape I’m
sure. But we’ll give it a good
go.
Miss Hellfinger: What’s been
the biggest technology change
in the industry since issue 100?
Ed: Probably there’s actually
been three that I’d mention.
The first one would be high
definition. Now we think high definition is the norm but
nine years ago, we had standard definition in 4x3.
However, the adoption has been rather slow and there’s
been many instances when I’ve gone into studios
thinking “oh, this must be a full high definition studio”,
NZVN Issue #200
have hoped. It’s also not been well understood,
therefore possibly not well explained, because each
manufacturer has its own version and its own barrow to
push, so confusion out there as to what really is high
def but does it really matter? To know that at least one
but in fact there were some high def cameras but a fair
bit of standard def stuff such as monitors with tape on
them showing where the crop occurs … there’s your
16x9 frame and not your 4x3. The adoption of high def
was certainly a lot slower than the manufacturers would
Ed takes a selfie to include Miss Hellfinger.
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game changer. What’s been happening in the last
number of years has been the increasing power of the
computer, but the reducing cost of all the components.
So it seems as though every year you get a faster
computer at a slightly cheaper cost, and I think this will
continue.
But the third one, and one that sort of dragged me
kicking and screaming into this year, has been the web.
Certainly production wise, a lot in our industry are doing
web material. It’s not going onto a disc, it’s not going
broadcast, it’s straight to the web and that really has
been a major change in the industry. But again, it’s
understanding what’s required and doing it properly.
For my part, in my productions, I really don’t do web
stuff unless I have to, and then I ask the client “well,
what have you seen that you like?” and so I give them
that as well as something at higher res just to see if
that works better for them. There’s a lot of bad web
stuff out there, people using the wrong compression
and also shooting it the wrong way and probably using
the wrong technology to make it.
It shouldn’t be that difficult.
Miss Hellfinger: ... and?
Ed: ... and it’s this interview workflow. If we take an
NAB situation, when I’ve had to corner someone, lately
Stuart Barnaby but in the old days it was David
Colthorpe, and beg them to take the interview tapes
back to New Zealand with them, because they normally
went straight home while I went off to Europe for a bit
of a holiday, as you do. Their job was to get tapes to
Louise in as quick a time as possible, so then she could
start going through and transcribing them. Well this
was rather a nightmare for her, because everything
depended on getting up to ten hours’ worth of recorded
interviews done. The audio quality wasn’t great, there
was always a lot of background noise to mix in with the
various accents, so eventually we’ve gone digital. It’s
only been in the last year that we’ve actually got a very
good digital package with an Olympus digital recorder
and transcribing technology and the use of Google
Drive. So what I’m able to do now, at the end of a day
at the show, whether it be in Sydney, in Vegas, at IBC
or even just down the road, is that I can upload the files
to Google Drive, send Louise an email and she can
download them and transcribe them immediately.
When I go back to the newsroom the next morning,
there are the first couple of stories ready for me to do
my changes to and send to the authors. So for NZ
Video News this has been a huge, huge benefit, not only
in the speed of getting things done, but also (and I’m
sure Louise would agree) in the technical quality of the
voice recording. Is that true?
Miss Hellfinger: Yes. The clarity of the sound is
markedly improved and the background noise, while
P14 Quinto Pete shoots straight.
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Page 3
of our major broadcasters still has standard def in its
workflow for certain parts of its programming, is … well
it’s interesting.
The second big one is actually the improvements in
computer capability and at lower cost. In those early
days, the computer as a nonlinear editing machine
made huge inroads into the industry and it really was a
“Breaking Wind”
“Physics teacher goes overto the dark side and startsmonthly magazine for pro-fessionals using video. Setin a southern part of thecity of Auckland.
Main character spends muchtime overseas at largegatherings. Likes to bephotographed with women,prefers blondes and is notconcerned about being PC. Eats out especially ifother party is paying. Particularly fond ofdumplings or seafood.
Resemblance to persons living or dead is purelycoincidental.”
Congratulations from Sound Techniques toGrant, Louise, Copybook for 200 issues of NewZealand Video News
“It’s all lies – this really was free.”
still there, is definitely muted. However, I had to listen
to the snide comments you got about the fact that you
hadn’t adapted to modern technology. What’s even
worse is that you blamed me!
Ed: Well fair enough. Yes, I would come to the end of
a tape you see and I would hear it clunk and stop and I
would say oops, sorry, just hang on a moment, I have
to change tapes. And of course you’re at the cutting
edge of technology here in these halls, with some very
expensive equipment and here’s Muggins with a little
tape recorder, so I would get some funny looks, but it
was all explained when I said “well, I’m sorry, but it’s
my PA … she’s sort of old and doddery and I’ve tried
digital in the past but she doesn’t understand it, so I
had to go back to tape, and you know it keeps her
happy, and isn’t that important?” And they’d all nod
and agree and they’d be happy. So there you are … but
by the photograph in her leotards, she’s not old and
doddery is she?
Miss Hellfinger: What about the next 100 – have you
got any predictions?
Ed: I think computers are going to get even faster
and cheaper and there’s going to be faster data speeds
on the internet. That’s going to be a big change; that’s
going to help the production on the web improve,
certainly in the technical quality. We are now beginning
to see the increase in the number of video / cinema
cameras coming out with single large sensors. I am
sensing (excuse the pun) that this is going to become
more the norm; that 3 chip cameras are not going to be
made for much longer. Another prediction – 4K will be
the new standard. I think that’s a given. It has the
value of increased resolution in future productions but
also, it offers a sensible way of post zooming video
material, so that you can easily crop in a high def level
picture and it’s not going to suffer.
My last prediction is improved compression in
broadcast. I’ve seen a number of these, including
television sets with a potential Dolby feature which will
decode the signal and make it much sharper and
clearer. That of course is predicated on broadcast
continuing in a major form and not being overcome
totally by the net.
Miss Hellfinger: What was the technology that went
nowhere in the last 100 issues?
Ed: Well that’s an easy one – I think even you could
answer that …
Miss Hellfinger: ( after much prompting and prodding
from Ed ) 3D?
Ed: 3D, or we should say “stereo video” was where
the smart money stayed away from, that’s true.
3D for anything other than high frame rate cinema,
done carefully and competently with big budgets is a
dead dog. However, I have to put my hand up and say
that having seen The Hobbit in high frame rate 3D, I
thought “wow, that is clever, that is very good use of
the technology,” it was well done.
I have seen some very poor examples of 3D done on
inadequate cameras and done badly - that’s headache
material.
Miss Hellfinger: What about hot products over the
time?
Ed: Well I’m a bit coloured by what I’ve seen
recently, but I would say a lot of the lighting product,
and that’s not just LED, but in the fluorescent and the
incandescent options as well. There is a lot more
control and easier operation now. If you think back to
the old days, you had Blondes and Redheads and some
massive studio lights that were very large, heavy, not a
lot of control, and very hot.
In the camera range, I think Sony video cameras – I
can’t think of a bad one, they just get better and
cheaper and the Canon cameras have really shaken up
the market for cinema style and we can expect more to
come from them, I’m certain.
Miss Hellfinger: Any love / hate situations?
Ed: Many people say that they hate Vegas and they
hate NAB but, like me, they seem to keep going back. I
think this year is going to be my 20th visit to NAB. I
don’t think I’ll get any medal or a plaque to
Page 4
Gencom Congratulates New Zealand VideoNews on 200th Issue
“The magazine has come along way since the blackand white photocopiedadverts were faxed readyfor printing. Gencom hasbeen supporting this public-cation for over 20 years andsees value in the articlesand information that itpasses to the local industry.
As a truly dedicated NZmagazine it has given us the opportunity toshare our partners’ product updates andproduct technology through the extensiveinterviews carried out at the international tradeshows that many are unable to attend. Granthas worked on these tirelessly and with suchenthusiasm.
Well done Grant and your support team behindthe scene.”
Nicki Brierton
“Thank you for the supportof the video, broadcast andmotion picture industryover the past 200 issues.
It has taken muchencouragement, interestand urgent reminders toenable us to continue tosupport NZ Video News!
All the best to continue tobe the only local regular
publication for our industry.”
Tim Timlin
Panavision New Zealand.
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commemorate the occasion but every visit is an
experience. When you leave, you think “thank
goodness it’s another year over”, but getting closer to
it, the hype, just sheer over the top of Vegas and the
NAB show is hard to beat.
I’d say for any of us in this industry, if you’re making a
bucket list, No 1 should be go to an NAB show, because
you will never see anything like it anywhere else in the
world. It’s just totally worth it, not only for the
technology experience, but also the Vegas experience.
If you want to go further afield, of course there’s IBC
and I think, in the last six years that we’ve added IBC
to the circuit, you do see some different things.
European companies especially look upon IBC as their
launching pad and NAB is secondary, which is as it
should be, because they really are different markets,
America and Europe.
IBC is a much more cultured show, Amsterdam is a
more cultured city – it’s a lot more expensive however,
but there are entertainments there that add to the show
experience.
Miss Hellfinger: What really annoys you?
Ed: Well those who know me know that lots of things
make me grumpy ( not looking directly at Miss
Hellfinger – after all I do want her to type this up ) but
that’s age related I’m sure.
In the technology area, I think it’s the continued lack of
understanding of progressive versus interlace and when
they should be used and how they should be used. The
second one is using cinema cameras to make video …
and I don’t blame any manufacturer here, I have had
long discussions with a number of manufacturers and
they have the same view as I do.
They make the camera, they tell the people what it’s
for, but people think “oh, I can use this for something
else”, and it’s actually a disservice to those
manufacturers and to those fine products because then
these ill-users turn round and blame the camera, they
blame the technology; they don’t blame themselves as
the ones who don’t actually understand how the
cameras are supposed to be used and in what situations
they’re supposed to be used.
There are video cameras, there are cinema cameras,
and there’s very little crossover between the two and
how they should be used.
Miss Hellfinger: What about NZVN on the web? Why
did you do that?
Page 6
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Ed: It’s only been since 2011 that we started putting
NZ Video News on the web, thanks to Wayne Farran
from Syntec, now Sennheiser in Australia, who
suggested to me that we could put NZVN on the web as
a PDF at no cost and that’s how it began. Once I was
shown by my younger son – a computer engineer – how
this worked, we were able to upload an issue and there
it is in all its glory. The benefit of this is that everyone
can read it.
The question often put to me in those early years was
“how can you do this for nothing?”
Now, you can get the newspaper as a printed version,
or you can go on the web and you can read it at your
leisure in full colour – and it’s still at no cost. Well it’s
our lovely advertisers who make the whole thing
possible. It’s through them that I’m able to do the print
version and because the process is really quite simple of
just uploading a combined PDF to the web and not
doing anything to it other than what was done for the
print, it’s really not a major issue.
It takes me probably half an hour to upload it to the
web – as long as either Google of Issuu hasn’t changed
Page 8
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their protocols. That happened recently when I
followed the instructions my son had given me,
expecting it just to go straight there, but unfortunately
there had been some changes and things went wrong.
Luckily my son is only a phone call away and was able
to help me get it sorted. So we continue to provide
both services.
I suppose the extra benefit of the web one is that when
you go to a page and you see a link, even though it was
put up there as a PDF, you can actually click on that
link, and it will take you to the website that was in that
advertiser’s advertisement or within the story. So
Page 10
Well what a milestone thisis for you and the magazineGrant. Congratulations onyour wonderful achieve-ment.
Our industry has seenmany changes over theyears and the New ZealandVideo News, through itsadver-tising and articles,has done an excellent jobat providing us all with a local voice.
Well done and keep up the great work.
Stuart Barnaby – DVT
PS thanks for the stuff you chose not to publishabout me!
“The team at Now Sound Ltd would like tocongratulate you on your 200th publication of NZVideo News. It has been a pleasure workingwith you over the years as both an advertiserand content contributor for our Shure broadcastproducts we proudly represent in New Zealand.
We wish you all the best with the future of NZVideo News.”
Many thanks, Now Sound
Proud distributors of Shure, QSC, Cloud andWekawire in New Zealand
that’s a real benefit. And the number of hits that we’re
getting for the newspaper has gone from under 50 per
issue in that first year, to a peak of over 900 for one of
our recent issues, but currently tracking around the 600
mark. It’s nearly up to the level of the printed
newspaper and I’m sure this year we will exceed it, so
it’s got to be of benefit to the advertisers and expanding
the readership to have it on the web. Any suggestions
you might have that could improve that without adding
extra work for myself or Miss Hellfinger, please let us
know, but we don’t want to increase the cost. No cost
is always a good number.
Miss Hellfinger: Over the years ( you look upon it as
visits to NAB; I look upon it as visits to the
physiotherapist ) I have formed many “sight unseen”
Page 11
" Happy 200 Grant, youdon't look a day under 150!
Seriously though, thanks forall your work over theyears, NZVN is a greatavenue for us to promoteour products and educatethe readers and customers.
Keep up the good work.
Chris McKenzie & theTeam at PLS "
friendships with some of the folk you regularly interview
– some of them talk to me, some of them sympathise
with me, others simply seem perplexed.
I have my favourites. Anyone who spoke clearly, not
too fast, and made reasonable sense automaticallyqualified. Overseas presenters like Nigel Gardiner, Noel
Oakes, Cindy Zuelsdorf, Linda Swope, or the local lads,
Ray Sanders, Ken Brooke, Stephen Buckland, Chris
McKenzie and, of course, Stuart Barnaby – even though
he’s almost never on time as far as getting his stories
back before the deadline! Going even further back,
there were great moments in clarity with the likes of
Rick Haywood, Geoff Head, and not forgetting DavidColthorpe.
“First of all: Congratu-lations! What we need inthis industry is commit-ment, continuity anddedication … you havedefinitely had the longbreath and good qualityreporting of technologynews over the years –please keep going!”
Stefan Sedlmeier
Managing Director, ARRI Australia Pty Ltd
Ed: You miss him do you?
Miss Hellfinger: I do miss David even though I think
he was terrified the one and only time he was on tape
delivery duty having to venture into our low socio-
economic suburb in his Mercedes convertible.
Ed: What did you do to him?
Miss Hellfinger: I didn’t do anything.
Ed: Well what did you offer him?
Miss Hellfinger: No, no, it wasn’t like that at all …
from memory, some likely lads in hoodies went by
muttering about taking the wheels off his car and he
couldn’t wait to get out of there.
Ed: Do you ever feel sorry for the people I interview
Louise?
Miss Hellfinger: Only David Colthorpe. You used to
wind him up mercilessly until he would give up and talk
to me. No, your interview style is pretty good. You
don’t talk over people … I think that’s the worst
problem, trying to sort out two voices in my ears at the
same time – I get a bit tetchy.
But in all fairness, I have to say that I have found you
good to work for.
I have even been known to tell people that you are a
good boss, usually after I have received my Christmas
bonus.
Ed: Oh she’s loyal isn’t she people?
Miss Hellfinger: You pay me!
Ed: Well it is chequebook journalism after all Louise.
I suppose you see the photos of these gentlemen, but
it’s more their voices that do things for you isn’t it?
Miss Hellfinger: Ummm – sometimes the voices
sound really nice, but unfortunately the pictures do not
live up to expectation.
Ed: Oh look I’ve had that comment too. People think
I’m actually a nice person when they hear me.
Miss Hellfinger: Oh okay … yeah well, I could put
them right.
Ed: Give me back my recorder, that’s the last time
I’m interviewing you … haven’t you heard that “less is
more?” I think you should definitely stick to
transcribing. NZVN
Page 12
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Quinto PeteShoots Straight
We are at the offices of QuintoCommunications in Takapuna, Aucklandwith Pete Fullerton. I wanted to talk toPete off the NAB show floor toinvestigate the wide choices customershave in choosing products and wherethey get them from. I know Pete’s beenin the job now for just on a year so I waskeen to catch up with what Quinto hason offer for New Zealand customers.
Ed: Quinto’s been in New Zealand andAustralia for a long time and has built astrong reputation in the industry hasn’t itPete?
Pete: Quinto was originally startedin Australia in 1969 and expanded intoNew Zealand in the late 80’s – so there’sa lot of years’ worth of broadcastexperience from a well-established com-pany.
Ed: And the good thing is that the business is reallyseamless between the two countries – there’s nothingmajor that Australia has that New Zealand doesn’t, andvice versa, so you’re pretty much working together tosupply products and technical services?
Pete: One of the things that is really good aboutmodern times and where we are right now, is that thereis no big gap between Australia and New Zealand whenit comes to communication. That means that we canrely on the expertise in Australia to help us out withproducts here and that they can come back to us andask us about projects that we’ve done. So we sharebetween our offices a lot.
Ed: Now getting onto the product range, some of theones that we’ve covered at NAB in the past we’ll talkabout shortly, the products that Quinto has exclusively,but in the products that every man and his dog sells,we have AJA and Blackmagic, and Blackmagic is the onethat intrigues me the most. You can buy it anywhere,you can buy it on the web, you can buy it from almostany supplier and it’s all the same price. Why do youhave it in your range when you have exclusivity withsimilar products from Evertz?
Pete: Why do we sell Blackmagic? Yes, there’slots of different places that you can go to forBlackmagic. People will choose a particular supplierbecause they need other products as well – forexample, we’re the distributors for Autocue, andMarshall monitors. So they might come to us to get avariety of items from one place. Or they might have aparticular job that’s quite tricky that they need ourengineering expertise on. They may just prefer ourservice – the way we backup our products that we sell.It’s hard to get that sort of service over the internet.
Ed: Something I’ve raised before is that often, youcan get things cheaper on the web, but in this case youget it pretty much for the same price wherever you go,but the value in getting it from the local supplier is thatwarranty and that backup?
Pete: Yes, and we do need to put value on havingsomebody locally; we do need to put value on goinginto a company and asking somebody’s advice and thevalue of that advice. There are people who willapproach companies like Quinto, get a whole lot ofadvice on how to do their project and then wander offand buy directly from the internet. Ultimately that doesa huge disservice to the industry because people can’t
afford to keep giving away their expertise for no rewardat all. When you buy something from somebody locally,you get the backup and support from that person, so ifthe device doesn’t work, or if it doesn’t do what it’ssupposed to do, you can go back to that person and say“hey, why is this doing what it’s doing?”
Ed: Because there’s no Consumer Guarantees Act forprofessional product, so if you get it off the web thenyou have to go back to that web supplier and hopefullysome months down the track you might get areplacement?
Pete: Well I don’t doubt that dealing with acompany like Blackmagic, you will get support. It doesmean that you’re in the queue with every other webpurchaser … whereas, if you buy it from us, we take onthat responsibility.
If we have to keep hitting up Blackmagic, then we will.If we have to keep sending them daily emails, then wewill.
We recently had a good product that Blackmagic sell,but in the particular installation, it was not operating upto its full potential. We swapped it out with our demounit until Blackmagic could provide a software upgradefor the unit, to make the unit work properly again.
Ed: Yes, I’ve actually had that issue with an IntensityPro card that took some time for the Adobe andBlackmagic software to catch up with each other. Butyou have another solution don’t you, because one of theproducts that Quinto sells exclusively is Evertz andthere is a bit of crossover in the range of Blackmagicand Evertz isn’t there Pete?
Pete: Evertz are one of a number of high productranges we distribute exclusively in New Zealand ( seeour website for more info.) We are very proud to beable to offer solutions in a number of price ranges. Itmay be that you can’t afford an Evertz or a Snellsolution, in which case a Blackmagic or AJA solutionmight be suitable.
What we try and do is go over with our customer whatit is that they want to achieve. We’re a solutions basedcompany – so we will always try to come up with thebest combination of equipment that gets the end resultand still fits in with your budget.
There are times when you need a low budget solutionand we’re really good at that … coming up with a lowbudget option and saying “okay, well no, this is not
Page 14
going to do 100% of what you want, but it’ll cover 80%to 90% of what you want and still be affordable for yourprice range”. Then we can talk about how to get to100% from there.
Ed: So that’s it, you’re able to give your customers achoice and if they’re a heavy user you would suggestthe Evertz; if they’re a light user or on a limited budget,you have the Blackmagic option – or AJA?
Pete: Or AJA, and we also have Snell as well. Werepresent over 27 different manufacturers, so we havea number of options and a number of things we can puttogether. We just recently had a case where acustomer approached us and said that they wereinterested in a particular item but, when we startedasking questions about how they were going to use itand what they wanted to achieve, it became quite clearto us that that item would not work as they wanted itto. It wouldn’t do that job. So we were able to comeback and say “hey, that’s not going to do it, but thisitem over here will do exactly what you want it to doand it’s going to be at a good price as well.”
Ed: And really, to back that up, you’re not just asalesman, you have an engineering background?
Pete: Yes, I started off in transmission with BCLwhich is now Kordia back in 1994, so this year marksmy 20th year since I started working in the broadcastindustry in New Zealand. I am a broadcast engineer bytrade and having spent years doing engineering work, Ihave a good solid background, but also I’m good withthe … what’s the best way to phrase this …
Ed: Don’t blow too many trumpets Pete.
Pete: No, it’s also I like to spend time learningwhat my customers do and how they do it.
Ed: And because you’re an engineer, you understandit rather than sort of smiling and nodding “yeah, thatlooks great!”
Pete: Well there’s lots of times when gear comesout and somebody says oh it does this function, youknow it’s brilliant. And you look at it and you go butnobody ever does that, nobody ever uses that function,nobody will ever do that in the industry.
So there are times, certainly, when people say I wantthis bit of gear because it does this and you can saywell actually do you really want to do that, becausewhen you look at your workflow, you’ll never use thatfunctionality, it will cost you so much money.
Ed: It’s like digital zoom isn’t it?
Pete: Yes … digital zoom. Okay, that’s a classicexample. If you’re talking to somebody who’s makingdrama, then the digital zoom is something that theywould never use.
But if you’re talking to somebody who does livestreaming News and they suddenly find themselvesstanding at a police barrier and they want to get theshots and they can’t get close enough, then somedigital zoom may enable them to stay safe but still getimages that nobody else can.
Ed: Now Pete, you don’t have a showroom, you’re atraveller and you’re actually keen to go and visitfacilities to see what they’ve got and advise them onthe right bit of gear that might be required to improvewhat they’re doing?
Pete: The best part about sales is seeing people;and the best part about being in broadcast sales isbeing able to go out and have a look at other people’ssetups and see what they do. That’s the exciting partof the job.
Sitting in an office all day in front of a PC is not exciting– seriously. As an example, I recently went out to achurch and we got onto discussing their system. Theyhad a timing issue and the person who was in chargedidn’t have a lot of experience and that’s fine,experience comes in time. We’ve all started off brandnew and not knowing a lot, and sometimes I don’t thinkI know a lot … but, getting back to the point, thisparticular person was having timing issues and I said“well, have you got a signal generator?” And they said“yes, but it’s not connected up.”
So I put it in the chain and fixed a problem for themthat they didn’t originally consult us on. It didn’t costthem any money because we used their original gear.Now ideally I’d love to have sold them something …
Ed: Oh but you will Pete, you will.
Pete: Eventually I’ll sell them something.
Ed: That’s it, that’s what customer service is allabout. You don’t sell it today, you sell it for the rest ofyour life.
Pete: Well we’re in it for the long haul, andQuinto has always been in it for the long haul. We’rehere not just to make a cheap buck today, but to helpour customers achieve and make quality products.
Ed: And talking of quality products, it must be nice tohear the word “Autocue” every time anyone talks abouta prompter?
Pete: Yes. Autocue’s become the default namefor prompting …
Ed: And with good reason too?
Pete: Well yes, they’ve been doing it for many,many years. It’s interesting if you go to their website,you can see all the old advertisements for the black andwhite films and the like. But Autocue are more thanjust big camera prompters – they also do iPad andiPhone prompters, conference prompters and lighting.
Ed: And I’m sure we’ll see some new whizz-bang onesat NAB this year … I know in the past I was amazed
Page 16
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that they managed to have an iPad prompter up andrunning within two days of the iPad being released.That was pretty cool, they were the only ones therewith it. They also have some other gear.
Pete: We can talk about lighting. Autocue do LEDlighting, they also do soft lighting. They have a coupleof nice little tripods including a sub-$1,000 tripod forpeople who are using DSLRs to shoot with. They have anumber of other little nifty things.
Ed: And again, customers can go to the Quintowebsite, get the links they need to have a look and seewhat’s available?
Pete: Yes … but we are solutions based sales, sothe ideal situation for us is for somebody to approach usand say hey this is the problem that I’ve got, or this iswhat I’m trying to achieve, what can I throw in the mix,or what do I need to get from A to C? That’s what wespecialise in, knowing our gear and knowing what ourgear can and can’t do.
Ed: And I guess that brings us onto the Marshallmonitors, because I know I’ve asked various questionsof the Marshall people at NAB as to what theirdevelopments are going to be, and they’re a prettyconservative lot. Marshall is a good seller for you, yes?Obviously, people appreciate the quality, the reliability?
Pete: Marshall is a big name and they’ve beenaround for a good while. They make reliable,dependable, quality monitors. Marshall has a hugevariety of monitors, so you can pick and mix, dependingon what you need at the time. If you need just a lowcost SDI 17 inch, there’s some really good optionsthere; or if you need a high quality quad split monitor, agrade one monitor, there’s lots of options with Marshall.
Ed: I know at the last show I was intrigued by theirvideo transmitter.
Pete: Oh the little HDMI unit – plugs into theHDMI of your camera. I’ve sold the 7 inch monitor thatit goes with, but as yet we haven’t really pushed that. Ithink perhaps the next advert in the NZ Video Newsneeds to feature that particular monitor. The monitor,the receiver, the transmitter … it’s quite a neat littlepackage. It’s battery operated, so it’s just a matter ofplugging it straight into the HDMI output of yourcamera and then you’ve got a wireless monitor.
Ed: And there’s no problem with the digital bandsthat are available in New Zealand now?
Pete: They operate in the 5.23Ghz range – sothey are safe to use in New Zealand.
Ed: Speaking of band interference?
Pete: Yes, here’s a really good example of whyyou should go through a local distributor and somebodywith experience or a background in transmission likemyself. When I was working as a bench engineer, I hada company approach me because one of their wirelessmics wasn’t working. It had never worked since theyfirst bought it and when I did a little bit of investigation,I found out it was actually broadcasting on TV One’sanalogue audio channel, and the reason that it wouldn’twork is because they were being splattered by TV One’saudio channel. Now if the powers that be had found outthey were broadcasting on that channel, there couldhave been a heavy, heavy fine for them. So not onlydid they buy a piece of equipment that was no good andwouldn’t work in New Zealand, but they were also upfor a potentially heavy fine. When you come to us andyou buy something from us, we’ve already done theresearch to make sure that it will work in this country …
Ed: And you’ll pay the fine?
Pete: And it’s legal – otherwise we do pay thefine, that’s exactly right! But you import something
yourself, then you are responsible for that item andthere can be heavy fines for importing and using thewrong type of equipment. So that is a good example ofwhy a company like Quinto is important to deal with.We do keep an eye out for where the government isgoing, and what the government is going to do inregard to spectrum, so we can say hey this is the betterpiece of gear and stay away from these bits of gearuntil there’s certainty.
Ed: But one of the things I noted looking at your listhere of 27 products Quinto has, there are no camerasthere Pete. I know you’ve had a good history withcameras – I think I’ve got a photo somewhere of you atRocket behind a camera, and then of course there werethose Panasonic days. We might actually reprint theRocket picture; it’s a bit of a classic!
Pete: Oh that was an horrific photo – I justremember you being very bossy … “no, stand there!”
Ed: Bossy? Moi?
Pete: “No, stand there, you’re not standing in theright place, I want you here.” I’m sure many readersknow the interview experience you provide. Anyway,Blackmagic make some very nice cameras, their 4Kcamera has just been released. They have two, 2K cinecameras and the pocket cine camera, which is a microfour-thirds camera, is a beautiful little camera. The bignews is that we’ve just taken on JVC in New Zealandand Australia so there will be the full range of JVCcameras as well. So yes, for a while, especially when Iwas with Panasonic, it was all about the acquisition, butnow I’ve got this big product range which is acquisition,production, postproduction and broadcast – the wholeflow through. The only things that we don’t do are youractual broadcast transmitters.
Ed: But for anything else, come and see Pete.
Pete: Everything else, yes come and see me.
Pete’s on the road Allen.
NZVN
Page 18
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In the Shade of the Wind WandOn a recent visit to New Plymouth, I made a date with
Edward Aish from “Capture You” and “Pro-Vision.” Not
everyone has two jobs at the same time but it is a busy
town fuelled by the petrochemical industry, farming and
more.
Ed: Edward, you reckon you started doing this video
business at the age of 16?
Edward: Yes, I’ve always been a bit of an
entrepreneur. I had a little business of print and
graphic design when I was quite young. I used to do
the mailer for the local supermarkets and that kind of
thing – my dad had an offset press.
When I was about 16 the opportunity came up for some
video work. There was a company based in New
Plymouth that was doing composite commercials around
the country which meant that they went to an area and
they would get, say, the Horowhenua Rugby Club
onboard and they’d get 10 different businesses and I
subcontracted to them for a couple of years. Things
happened and that idea went under and I ended up
being owed a bit of money and left in a bit of a hole …
Ed: Oh it does happen in this industry doesn’t it?
Edward: It does … but I got alongside TVNZ, they
had some reps in the area who saw me. It was
obviously pretty early in the digital video days and they
saw that I had the ability to produce changeable
commercials at a price that really hadn’t been seen in
New Zealand – you know it used to be $10 grand for a
TV commercial, where we could come in and do a
commercial for a shoe shop or a furniture store that
could be changed for a lot less money.
So we got quite a bit of work with those sorts of
modular commercials coming through.
Ed: What were you shooting with in those days?
Edward: I actually didn’t have my own camera. I
got alongside some other people like Keith Finnerty who
is local here, and I’d get him to do the recording or I’d
hire his camera off of him – and I don’t even remember
what it was back then.
Ed: So you were more in the producer side of it than
the business side?
Edward: Yes I was, and as well, quite a few of my
commercials were graphic based.
Ed: What do you mainly do now – commercials?
Edward: Yes. Probably about 80-90% of what we
do is TV commercials – that’s “Pro-Vision.” The rest is
sort of a mixture of promotional films, corporate videos,
weddings. Obviously with the move to online, we’re
doing a lot more online promotional presentations and
that kind of thing.
Ed: Just take me through your workflow there, how
you’re doing that?
Edward: I shoot on a 5D Mark III as my main
camera. I’ve also got a GH3 and some other bits and
pieces that I use.
Ed: What’s a GH3?
Edward: A Panasonic GH3 … and then I use a Mac
with Final Cut Pro – I moved to 10, sort of held off for
quite a while.
I did the 48 Hour Film Competition two years ago and
decided that I’d use that as a test to see how it went
under pressure and I jumped onto 10 and I’ve never
looked back, I actually quite like it.
Ed: And that’s “X”?
Edward: X, yes.
Ed: And that does everything you need it to do?
Edward: Yes it does really. I use a bit of After
Effects and some other graphical based bits and pieces,
a bit of Motion, but there is the odd time I need to use
After Effects for stuff as well.
Ed: And then output – how do you choose the output?
One of the issues that a lot of people have is with the
bandwidth in New Zealand. How do you decide what
you’re going to put it out as?
Edward: Well, it’s pretty easy for me output wise,
because a lot of our work is TV commercials which go
out digitally to an MPEG2 which is then uploaded – I use
Dubsat or eBUS kind of thing to deliver it to stations.
Until recently, they didn’t even broadcast the
commercials in high definition, so that now we’re
outputting high def, but it’s not exactly pushing the
boundaries of data rates etc.
Ed: Okay, that’s the broadcast stuff, but what about
your web stuff?
Edward: Okay the web stuff … I normally go out to
an MPEG4 or … most of my stuff is just output and put
up on YouTube or Vimeo …
Ed: So you use their codec?
Edward: Yes, I use their codec.
Ed: Any particular one, or do you vary? Depending
on the client and what their server is capable of, do you
provide that format? Do you check with them first, or
how do you do it?
Page 20
Edward with part of his camera selection.
Edward: It depends. If the client is only going to be
running it on a small window embedded on the front of
their website or something like that, it will vary
depending on what they’re after.
Ed: But how many clients do you find know what they
want?
Edward: Very few. A lot of them are happy with
whatever you put out – to a point – as long as it looks
good at their end. They normally just leave it up to us
to make sure it looks good at the end of the day.
Ed: That to me has been the big issue – that you’d
love to put your programme out at the highest possible
resolution but you’re limited by what your client can
actually show?
Edward: Absolutely, but with Vimeo, the quality of a
video stream off there is much better although, and I
don’t know if it’s just an issue here, but the streaming
rate at high definition is a lot slower than YouTube, so
it’s kind of like “hey, sure it looks better, but if it’s not
going to play smoothly, what’s the point?”
Ed: Are you putting anything out on disc these days?
Edward: Very little. It’s almost all delivered
digitally.
I do some wedding work and we still create DVDs or Blu
-rays or a USB stick is sort of the way to go now and
they’ll stick it in the side of their TV. That can obviously
be a bit of a challenge making sure that you get the
compression and data rates right so it will work on most
TVs, but other than that, no it’s all files.
Ed: Well you mentioned the word “challenge” and one
of the challenges that I picked up in the years of
travelling around the country is that, if you’re outside
Auckland, or to a certain extent Christchurch or
Wellington, you’re a bit far away from the suppliers.
What’s your take on that?
Edward: It can be an issue, especially if you’re
wanting to look at new technologies and get some
hands on with them, but I travel round quite a bit with
my work.
I’m based here but our TV commercials
take us all over the place, so if I want to
look at something, I’ll make sure I head
up to Auckland, or find some other work
I have to do and head in that direction.
There’s so much information, whether
it’s your product review, stuff you can
find online now, which is quite detailed.
Ed: Or in certain publications?
Edward: Exactly, of course, yes –
fantastic little newsletter that comes out.
Ed: Oh thank you, I’m glad you
mentioned it. So how do you get your
support – do you need support, or do
you work it all out yourself?
Edward: I work it out a lot myself.
There are obviously times when
equipment fails which makes it harder,
you have to pack it up and send it off.
Ed: So have you had situations there
when something’s gone wrong and
you’ve had to send it off and wait a week
for it to come back?
Edward: Absolutely, I’ve even waited a lot longer.
On my 5D Mark III, I was shooting at a wedding, which
I don’t do many of, but the band had a green laser that
should have been pointed across the ceiling and it
happened to be pointing at the dance floor and I sort of
noticed it too late and had big burnt marks all across
my sensor. I sent it into Canon, it had to be an
insurance repair and I think it took about five weeks to
come back, which is a bit ridiculous.
With my particular setup, I wanted to be part of the
Canon repair service for professionals but you had to
have two 5D Mark III or better bodies and I had a 7D
and a 5D and you had to have so many L-series lenses
that were purchased from New Zealand companies to
qualify for that and they would have sent me a body to
replace it.
I didn’t qualify for that sadly – even though I’ve got all
the gear, but one of my L-series lenses I think I bought
offshore you see.
Ed: And that’s it, the downside of internet shopping,
but most of your gear you have bought from local
suppliers?
Edward: Yes most of it I do, especially the bodies
and that kind of thing, just purely for the support,
knowing I can take it back into a store or at least get it
back to Canon New Zealand and they will look after it
for me.
Ed: But it must be quite a conundrum for you really –
you’re here in New Plymouth and Auckland’s way up
there and that’s a long supply line – then you’ve got all
those overseas suppliers on the net. Sometimes the
difference must look not so much, that the overseas
option looks quite attractive?
Edward: Absolutely, especially when the price can
be quite disconcerting as to how much cheaper it is to
buy it in from overseas, and the turnaround of getting
stuff in from overseas can almost be as quick as getting
something down from Auckland.
There are times, with some equipment, that it’s just the
price – the risk outweighs the price in New Zealand and
Page 22
Edward’s slider rig.
Edward: That’s right – I do a bit of photography as
well, I’ve sort of had a history of that and the 5D Mark
III is fantastic for me. When I do weddings, I try not to
do both video and photography in one because I know
one or the other will suffer, but I do do some wedding
photography and, not having to have the investment in
a whole other camera is fantastic.
I think the 5D Mark III is probably a better stills camera
than it is a video camera, but it still does take really
nice pictures as well.
Ed: You’re not tempted to go to a 1D C
or a C300?
Edward: Oh absolutely – there’s a
little thing called budget!
I think eventually, I’ll probably step up
to something like that. But the pictures I
get out of what I have now satisfy my
customers and I’m happy with them, so
it’s a hard thing to justify the extra
spend when I’m supplying my customers’
needs at the moment.
Ed: So you actually treat what you do
as a business?
Edward: Definitely.
Ed: That’s quite refreshing.
Edward: Although there are parts of
it that become a bit more of a …
Ed: Sometimes you just have to buy
it?
Edward: Absolutely – justify it later,
that’s what I was doing just there you
see. NZVN
I do buy it in, but a lot of the time, if something goes
wrong, being able to get it sorted over here and looked
after, it is worth the extra money I think.
Ed: Now I see here on the table you’ve brought along
a little Blackmagic camera, but it’s not yours, you’ve
borrowed it for a bit of a test. What do you plan to do
with it?
Edward: I’ll just have a play and see what it’s like I
suppose. It’s the Blackmagic pocket cinema camera.
Ed: Is it not just a toy to make you feel better?
Edward: Probably at this stage, in my mind it’s a
“feel good” toy, but I think it’s got potential to work in
with my workflow.
I don’t think, personally, as a pocket camera, it
necessarily has a lot of use, but rigged up with some
lenses and extra accessories I think it could be a good
tool.
Ed: It always puzzles me that some people buy a tiny
little camera and then add all these bits onto it with a
rig and it ends up being quite a big camera. Well, you
could have bought a big camera with everything in it in
the first place?
Edward: Absolutely, I think that is part of the issue
with something like this and the form factor … yeah, I’ll
have to try, probably with the right lens it could be just
about pocketable and useable, I don’t know. The sound
in it is terrible, the batteries don’t last so yes, it’s
probably a bit of a toy.
Ed: But then, you know, if you use it the right way,
you’ll get good images out of it?
Edward: The bit of a play I have had with it, I
definitely think it has its own look, which is quite
different from the DSLR sort of look out there and, with
a few accessories attached to it and the right lens, you
get some impressive images.
Ed: It’s one of the things that I do try to point out to
the readers – one camera can’t do everything; you
choose a camera to do a particular job and it does that
well, but don’t expect it to do everything?
Page 24
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LightingAs promised in our Februaryissue, we are back at PLS inAuckland for a show of yetmore clever lighting tech-nology. From the other endof the world, we have JelleMoerman from Brother,Brother and Sons.
Ed: So obviously, thecompany started with twobrothers?
Jelle: No, not at allactually. We are all brotherstogether, meaning all peoplein the lighting industry;we’re all colleagues workingtogether on a fantasticproject. This is BB&S –Brother, Brother and Sons.So we have value strengthswe do together and we didbefore together.
Ed: And this is a Danishaccent we’re hearing?
Jelle: This is a Belgian accent, because I amactually Belgian but the company is Danish, based inCopenhagen.
Ed: Lovely country Belgium, I must say. I’ve visiteda number of times and I particularly like the Trappistbeer.
Jelle: Thank you. We even have two here if youwant to taste them.
Ed: Oh no, I’d better not – work to be done
coherently. Now, there are a number of products thatyou’ve got, but the one that has excited Chris McKenzie
and the team at PLS is this Area 48 Soft. Tell us what
you’ve done with your panel?
Jelle: We have made a clever light. In the past,
everyone made white LEDs by putting a phosphor
coating on a blue LED and then it becomes white. What
we have done is we have made a unit with remote
phosphor panels and those flat panels are energised by
the blue LEDs to emit a white light.
Ed: Now the benefit of this is, I guess, that you’re not
putting individual phosphor layers onto individual LEDs,
so if one fails you’ve got a problem. This is a much
more elegant solution?
Jelle: It’s a much more precise solution, meaning
that we know exactly what our panel can do; we know
exactly the light output that our blue LEDs will make
and therefore we will get a fantastic exact white light.
So we have a CRI of 96 for a cold white one, and we
have a CRI of 97 plus for a warm white one.
We’re actually near to perfection in lighting. Even
though that CRI doesn’t say a lot because it’s
measuring on 8 peaks, we are more on a “black body”
curve, meaning that we try to be exactly on it so that
every colour of skin tone reacts really well on it. If you
have normal daylight outside, you have a CRI of 100.
Ed: So for other manufacturers of LED panels like this
to have a range of lighting colour, they have to have
different LEDs with different phosphor coatings?
Page 26
Jelle: Exactly.
Ed: So they can’t light up all of the LEDs in their arrayat once?
Jelle: No exactly. So we have two things – inregard to our LEDs, we don’t really see them as a lightsource, but more as an energy source and the phosphorplate is actually the one which is receiving the energyand changing that into visible light.
Ed: So you can change your phosphor panel and Iguess the sky’s the limit – you could develop a wholerange of different colour phosphor panels?
Jelle: For the moment, we have five shades ofwhite that we can do – 2700, 3200, 4300, 5600 and6500 and then we have a chroma blue and a chromagreen. So we have actually seven different panelsavailable.
The chroma blue is the simplest because the light isblue to begin with and the chroma green is so good,you can even direct it onto a white background ifnecessary.
Now, why don’t we choose to have variable light whichsome other panels can do? The reason is that we wantto have an exact spot on a black body curve as I saidbefore. Second of all, if you make a panel with severallight sources, with several colours, if you look at theshades from close or from back, you will see severalshades on your hand.
So you will not have an even coloured surface. Here,because of the technology we are using, we have onlyone light source, so even though we have 48 LEDs –this model is called Area 48 because 48 is the numberof LEDs we are using – we have that panel taking onthe energy of the LEDs without being the source. Thisgives us a really nice source of light.
Something to be mindful of is that with cameras of 4Kresolution, you need even light otherwise you can seedots of the individual LEDs projected on your image.
Ed: Tell me, I’m sure you’ve done tests oncompetitors’ product – is there any spill from thoseindividual LEDs with their phosphor coatings, to the
Jelle holding a phosphor panel.
more on page 29
Phone: 09 302 4100 Email: [email protected] Website: www.kelpls.co.nz
Extremely High Light Output
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Chris: Yes, that’s right. We’ve been talking toBB&S for probably over three years and about a lot ofother products they make as well. As Jelle said, theyare very innovative in what they’re doing and they’vegone out on their own after many years of makingproducts for other people.
Ed: But it’s not “flaky” innovative is it … this looks likevery robust technology?
Chris: Yes, absolutely and it’s not somethingwe’ve leapt at and gone “oh new, new, new, musthave.” We’ve talked to them, we’ve worked with themand looked at the situation. They’ve been makingretrofit LED systems for studio Fresnels and ARRI ST1sand for some of the DeSisti Leonardo fixtures they haveLED replacements, take your tungsten bulb out, throw itin the bin and put the LED system in.
Unfortunately there’s not a lot of those units around,the appeal of those is for TV studios, and I must say,our initial approach with BB&S was to do it for theQuartz Colour equipment that we knew was in NewZealand. They are now moving into their own productsand so they’re doing less of the retrofit and more of thenew innovative kit. Some of the things that Jelle’s toldme that are coming down the track are very exciting.Their concept of battery powering is a winner becausemost of the guys out in the field have fallen in love withbeing able to run everything on batteries. So, if wecould deliver them a good lighting solution that theycan battery power as well, then it’s a good step. Youknow, the film guys and the tele guys are quite happyto have mains power there, they want mains power,they don’t want to mess around with battery, and so itwill run that as well.
Ed: Does this have a model number?
Chris: It’s called Area 48 and it is related to Area51, but it’s also related to the fact that it has 48 LEDs init. But, yes, a lot of their products, they’re having alittle Scandanavian yoke.
Ed: And the good thing is they’re available now – thisisn’t a future product, it’s shipping?
Chris: Absolutely it’s shipping. Jelle was saying tome they’ve got 200 sitting in the shop that they want tomove. Angela and I have been talking about the hireconcept, because we know full well that people get totry them out in hire, so we’re looking at 2 or 4 units
Page 29
others, because even though the other ones are not litup, surely there’s going to be some of the light passingthrough the sides of those LEDs and exciting thatphosphor and giving you a bit of a contamination?
Jelle: It’s possible that that happens and they litup a little bit, but you have different reactions ofphosphor.
Ed: So this is a one panel size – have you got biggerones?
Jelle: We have a bigger one which is four unitswhich we blocked together to give one big light. Wecome up to about a 6K soft light with those ones.That’s what’s coming up. Some other points are thatour panels are mains or battery powered. They draw140W on full so you need beefy batteries. You can havereflective barn doors to increase light output and thereare no fans. There is software inside the unit whichlowers the output if the internal heat gets too much.There is a strobe effect which is time and durationadjustable and, as a safety feature, the unit will notoperate unless there is a phosphor panel in place.Looking directly into blue LEDs will damage your eyes.
Ed: Okay, now I guess the big question is, with thissuper high technology, and obviously this is leadingedge, does it come with a leading edge price?
Jelle: No, the price is quite okay. We looked atother lights in the market – of course, we have nocomparable lights, but we think for value with what itcan do – you’re looking at a kit which is two panels, apower supply, the unit itself of course, a bag, you’relooking at a NZ$4,000 price tag for everything.
Ed: So it’s in the ballpark for that top end need?
Jelle: It is, but again, a lot of customers now uselights which they have only a limited use for, meaningas a spot or as a small light source. Here, with all itsaccessories, with one light, you can do a lot of thingstogether. I’m not saying that we can do everything, butwe can provide solutions where we only need two lightsinstead of four or five of the other ones. We are aboutthree times the output of our competitors, like Litepanel1x1, we have three times that output; even in onecoloured light, we are over three times stronger so thatmeans that we don’t need to put a lot of lights to havea nice result on camera. Another advantage is that weare completely flicker-free. We did tests on 20,000frames a second shoots and we arecompletely flicker-free, meaning that aswell as for phantom cameras, for evenhigh speeds like 240 …
Ed: And CMOS sensors with theirrolling shutters?
Jelle: Yes exactly. We can doanything we want because we have noflicker. So even still cameras which aretaking a picture, they don’t needsynchronising because they can justshoot the photo and see the image as itis on site.
Ed: And it’s dimmable and remotecontrollable?
Jelle: Remote controllable anddimmable, so we have an onboarddimmer and we have also a DMX consolewhich we can just dim it.
So what does Chris McKenzie think ofthe Area 48 Soft?
Ed: Chris, this really does look excitingand there’s already one chap thisevening who said he wants to hire oneand he’s taking it on Monday? Trust me, it’s very even light.
pretty swiftly. The thing that really appeals to me is thegreen screen capability because although it’s a $4,000unit, you can put one up and you can light a 3 metre by3 metre green screen and that’s easy. Talking to someof our resellers today, they are very keen about thatconcept as well.
Ed: Maybe some broadcasters could replace their TVpanels?
Chris: Well we were atTV3 this afternoon and I’mgoing to take a couple of blueones up there and replacetheir News chromakey area,because currently they’ve got6 kiloWatts of tungsten lightdoing a blue screen and I cando it with probably three 120Watt units.
One of the other things that’scome out of our conversa-tions is that the Danishgovernment – if you wantEURO100,000 worth ofequipment and you can provean energy saving component,they will arrange a .6% loanfor you, even in a foreigncountry, because of theconcept of saving energy. Soany big studios out there thatwant to spend a big wedge ofmoney, we’ve got a financedeal for you.
Ed: And it’s a good company to deal with?
Chris: Yes, they’re great.
The Danes have got a good sense of humour and we
like a good sense of humour, we like a chuckle, their
beer’s okay and the connection with Jelle of course,
we’ve got access to the best beer in the world out of
Belgium ... and Area 48 Soft at PLS. NZVN
Page 30
Some of the evening’s attendees.
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