The Artisans - NYC

We just wrapped up shooting for my new video in New York, and I had a blast. The locations were Acme Smoked Fish in Greenpoint, and Black Seed Bagels in Little Italy. The crew consisted of myself directing and shooting B camera, a producer, a second operator working the A camera, our talent, and a sound guy. Everything went well and I think the decision to use my new vintage lenses paid off. I wanted to give the show a unique look, and after a lot of research I picked up a Helios 44-2 58mm f2 and a Helios 135mm 2.8 lens. From my quick reviewing of the footage i've seen some really fantastic shots, my job now is to edit several hours worth of video into a 6-7 minute episode. Stay tuned for updates on the show's progress!

The Artisans - Shoot Day #1

I just finished the first day shooting for my Fusion pilot with Zak the Baker. It has been in pre production for a few months so I was really excited to get started. I'm planning to share my experiences and workflow throughout the process of producing so that you can see what goes into making it happen. The show is focused on two locations that we are going to film in New York next week, but I needed to have b-roll of Zak at his bakery as well. Since there was no sound, I chose to shoot this part on my own to minimize cost. The two shoot days in NY will have a second camera person and an audio guy, as well as more rental gear so that is where I am choosing to use the majority of my budget. I did rent a Red Scarlet which you can see in the photos, since I was focusing on the baking, mixing, and shaping I wanted to have the ability to shoot slow motion at a high resolution. My C100 was b-camera which I used for some shots walking in the street and on my dinky slider since the Red was too heavy. I didn't use any lights because the bakery has amazing natural light, and because I didn't rent any or have someone to help set them up. The next step is to go through this footage and prepare for the New York shoots. Stay tuned!

On editing / My new video!

Jeff Rogers Pottery from Matt Degreff on Vimeo.

The last week has been a busy one here at Footlong Films. I drove 1,000 miles in 4 days taking a Cineflex camera to mount on various helicopters around the state, from Apopka to Marathon Key. I have also been finishing the post production on my latest video for Jeff the Potter, as well as wrapping up pre production for my upcoming pilot for Fusion. This has meant only sporadic blogging, and no time to develop any negatives (I have two rolls in two cameras that are almost at the end!). Steffy got this great shot of me in my editing element so I thought I would share a little about what I use to edit and why. I usually edit from home but our power was out so we were at a local coffee shop this day. Read about my setup after the photos. 

1. Computer - 15" Retina Macbook Pro. Most of my videos are shot with my Canon C100 and 7D, so this computer is plenty powerful for editing those relatively small files. It also does a decent job transcoding Red footage, and my pilot will be 50% shot on Red so it is going to be put to the test soon. While I would love to have a killer Mac Pro setup with a 27" Apple monitor for working from home, I cant afford it and need the ability to be mobile. Half of Jeff's video was edited on airplanes or in airports.

2. Software - Final Cut X. This program got a bad rap from the start, since initial versions weren't so powerful and people felt like it was "dumbed down". It's come a long way and now up to version 10.1, and I think the criticism is unfair. I don't come from an editing background, I really picked it up as a necessity so i'm probably the perfect target market. I need a program that can handle all different codecs and has all the basic editing functions in a simple layout. Adobe Premiere and After Effects are overwhelming to me, when it gets to the point where I need more in depth editing I hope to have the budget to hire a professional. 

3. Plugins & additional software - LUT Utility, Magic Bullet Looks, Davinci Resolve 11. I have used Davinci which is an amazing free color grading program, but always had difficulty importing mixed frame rate clips. I'm sure thats just operator error, but it never felt really intuitive to me (again, a non editor). I recently bought the FCX LUT utility, which is an amazing plugin that gives you a great place to start your color correction and has LUTs for Canon log (C100) and cinestyle (7D). The magic bullet looks are cool as well, but I haven't had a project recently that called for such strong visual effects. 

4. Additional things - I keep my backups stored on 2TB USB3 G-Drives, and have a small 500gb bus powered one for editing on the fly. I've found that most of the time I can edit off of the drives pretty speedily. I have various USB3 and Thunderbolt readers for different types of cards, and an Anker USB3 splitter which just died on me after only a few months. I'm thinking about getting a Caldigit Thunderbolt station and upgrading my cheap 23" external monitor before I start editing the pilot. 

That's pretty much it, I know I have a long way to go in improving my editing but I learned everything from google and youtube so I'm proud of my progress so far. Feel free to share your setup or advice!

Nicaragua, Part 1

Nicaragua has been very interesting so far. Some highlights of the trip - 

* Being stuck in a hotel room for 3 days waiting for the helicopter to clear customs

* Taking a ride in the most destroyed taxi i've ever seen. It had 240,000 KM and looked like it had been in 240 accidents

* Surfing and being in the ocean through a massive rainstorm until getting chased out by very close lightning

* Driving my tiny car through back country muddy roads

* My friend stepping on a stingray (that was a lowlight actually)

I've been shooting some film and have a lot to develop when I get home, I cant wait to share!

Oaxaca, Mexico

My last proper surfing trip was to southern Mexico last year in April. We spent a week and a half road tripping around, getting our little car stuck in the sand, eating a dozen tacos in one sitting, and of course surfing. I brought my 7D and gopro and made a short film that I called "Mexican Sojourn", and when I wasn't filming I shot some film photos on my Minolta. I have yet to take a surf trip this year, but I always have something in the works. Hopefully late May or June I can go get lost somewhere new! 

The Fare Field

I decided to start a blog. It took me a while to warm up to the idea, but it makes sense to share behind-the-scenes photos of all of the amazing opportunities and projects i've been working on. I am based out of Miami (for now!) but i'm lucky enough to get to travel all over, so ill share my experiences here!

A recent project I have been working on, The Fare Field, is an online cooking series that I shoot and direct which takes place in and around Little Haiti, Miami. The Miami chef being filmed picks produce from Little River Market Garden, a farm run by Muriel Olivares. The chef then takes those ingredients and creates recipes using their own unique style. It's a real grassroots thing that lets me be super creative and has taught me a lot about documentary work and introduced me to some amazing chefs. The most interesting thing that comes across to me is how different people see similar things in such diverse ways. Watching and tasting the results inspires me to search for new perspectives in my own work as well. 

You can check out the episodes here.