Paul Joy – Freelance Filmmaker

Learning to fly – The Inspire 1 arrives

I took delivery of my DJI inspire 1 this evening and thought I’d share a few pics and initial thoughts with you. Please bare in mind that this is my first Quadcopter, I can’t give comparisons to other models in the same price bracket other than the Phantom that I have looked at in the past. None the less..

The case
The first thing that greets you after removing the outer packaging is this rather nice looking case. It’s not a particularly tough case though, it’s fairly soft and has zip closures.

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Opening up the case reveals the Inspire 1 and and it’s associated accessories. Some of the accessories are supposed to be held in place by straps with velcro closures but even before touching these some of the velcro straps had fallen away from the case and were useless.

The case is really not very reassuring, the quality isn’t great and while it does work well as a basic container for the Inspire I can’t see it lasting very long with real use or at the mercy of baggage handlers. I’ll have to look for a more substantial alternative.

2015: 05/20
CATEGORY: CAMERA REVIEWS
Learning to fly
REVIEWS
TAGS: Inspire 1
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Learning to fly

I’ve been watching the whole aerial photography industry expanding over the last couple of years with great interest. The technology has moved forward so quickly and a lot of the imagery being produced is simply stunning.

Much like the rise of DSLR video, these devices have brought yet another area that was once reserved for high budget productions within reach of the everyday filmmaker. I haven’t been as excited about a camera technology since ordering my Brevis 35mm adapter in 2008!

I’ve been very tempted to grab one of DJI’s Phantom 2’s for nearly a year now but every time I got close to placing an order I was scared off by talk of changing regulations and unclear requirements involved in being able to use these tools commercially.

With each country around the globe struggling to find ways to regulate UAV’s there are a lot of grey areas for somebody stepping in to this field so I plan to try and demystify the process here in the UK. I’ll document my journey and share my discoveries as I go about both learning to fly, and from a regulatory point of view.

2015: 05/18
CATEGORY: Learning to fly
News
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Using markers as visual sync guides in FCPX

here’s a quick tutorial showing how I use markers in FCPX to give me a visual indicator in case any audio syncing issues crop up due to a mistake using the magnetic timeline.

Although the magnetic timeline offers many advantages when editing, I find that it’s very easy to inadvertently trim a clip without realising you’ve done it and as a result have all of the clips later in the timeline jump out of sync with a music track that is attached near the beginning of the project.

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As each section of my projects start to become tuned to the beats in the music I drop in pairs of markers so that any future changes in sync are more obvious. The markers are dropped in place by selecting the target clip, moving the pointer to the desired location and then pressing the ‘m’ key if using the standard keyboard commands.

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Quite often I notice these markers have moved out of alignment even before I notice any sync issues so it provides a good alert system as well as giving a visual clue as to where any unwanted changes have been made in the edit.

2015: 04/24
CATEGORY: TRICKS & TIPS
TUTORIALS
VIDEOS
TAGS: FCPX
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Canon announces the C300 Mark II

Click Here for Pre-order details from B&H

What the C300 Mark II means to me.

It’s great to see that Canon are continuing to innovate with this line of cameras and as expected the C300 Mark II now provides a 4K solution as well as higher bit rate recording and higher frame rate options. These are without doubt the areas that made the original C300 feel limited for me so let look closer at what’s improved.
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In many ways the C300 started it’s life at the back of the pack and was left for dust by the competition before taking it’s first breath. Although the original C300 introduced an amazing new sensor and a brand new style of camera to the industry the use of the companies existing Digic DV3 processor limited it’s capabilities. For many C300 users though, the lacklustre recording specs were less significant because the camera offered a beautiful image from a 4K sensor recorded to the well renowned Canon XF format.