70 Billion Pixels Budapest: 360 degree panorama image
"The observation tower of János-hegy [the Elizabeth Lookout on János Hill is], the highest vantage point of Budapest with a 360 degree panorama, was an obvious location. It also allowed us to take on previous world records in both the 'highest definition image' and the 'largest spherical panorama' category. When contacted, the Council of District XII informed us on the upcoming anniversary of the tower. We agreed to cooperate in commemorating the September 2010 event by setting up new world records-give them our best shot if you please. ."
(360systems Ltd., 360world.eu)
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
SMS Sugar Man: the first feature film shot entirely on a cell phone
"Aryan Kaganof's SMS Sugar Man has either the dubious or celebratory distinction - depending on your point of view of these kinds of things - of being the first feature film shot entirely on a cell phone, specifically the Sony Ericsson W900i. Given the film's strong sexual content, Sony probably won't be championing the film any time soon. But, in their absence, I will.
To Kaganof's grand credit, the technique in which the film was shot never comes across as being gimmicky. The majority of the movie is shot as any traditional movie is shot despite the unique camera being used. Every once in awhile we do get a direct POV shot from one of the characters holding his or her own camera, but this is used very sparingly and is thus unobtrusive.
Scenes are mostly lit and executed as if filmed with a traditional camera. What's most surprising about the movie is that one might presuppose - or, at least I did - that it would be comprised of mostly quick cuts. I don't own a cell phone with a camera, but I had assumed one of them could only hold small files for short scenes. Against expectation, Kaganof comprises SMS Sugar Man with fairly longish shots and gives the film a very lyrical tempo."
(Mike Everleth, 17 November 2008)
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
Chobi Mini Digital Camera
"Ultra compact, multifunctional Pocket sized Chobi Mini Digital Camera is one of the most compact digital camera's ever! Yet it takes incredible digital photos. Chobi Mini Digital Camera can Video at 1280 x 960 pix 30 fps AVI movies and take 2048 x 1536 pix pictures."
(Geek Stuff 4 U)
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
Dirkon: innovative paper cut-out camera
"During the 1970s, magazines published in Communist Czechoslovakia were controlled by the state, like the majority of other enterprises. Very few good magazines were available and were difficult to get hold of, so people would borrow and exchange them when given the opportunity. This also applied to magazines aimed at young people, which was probably one of the reasons why almost everyone from my generation, when we get on to the subject of pinhole cameras, has fond memories of the cut-out paper camera known as Dirkon*, published in 1979 in the magazine ABC mladých techniků a přírodovědců [An ABC of Young Technicians and Natural Scientists].
Its creators, Martin Pilný, Mirek Kolář and Richard Vyškovský, came up with a functional pinhole camera made of stiff paper, designed for 35 mm film, which resembles a real camera. It may not be the most practical of devices, but it works!
My first attempt at putting together a paper Dirkon a few years after it came out fell victim to a total lack of patience on my part. Today, twenty years later, I decided that I had to include this unusual pinhole camera in my collection. So I got hold of an old copy of ABC and set to work....
* The name Dirkon is a play on words based on the combination of the parts of two words: Dirk- is the beginning of the Czech word dírka – pinhole, and -kon is the end of the name of a well-known Japanese camera which needs no introduction.
A few notes about the original instructions
For the patient among you, here are the instructions for making the Dirkon camera which you can download in Adobe PDF format. But first a few notes which I've jotted down after my experience with making it, which you might find useful.
The camera must be cut out of stiffer paper than ordinary office paper (or thin card). If the paper isn't entirely opaque, you need to stick very thin black paper underneath the important sections so that no light gets into the camera. This is particularly important for sections 1, 2, 3, 10 and 23.
It is very important to print the cut-out to the correct size, i.e. 1 : 1. When you are printing from the Acrobat Reader, the option "Fit to page" MUST NOT be selected, otherwise the pages might come out smaller and the film won't fit into the Dirkon camera. I've added a ruler on each page so that you can check that the size is correct.
The instructions recommend using Foma 21° DIN film. This was film made back in former Czechoslovakia but it's similar, for example, to today's Ilford PAN 100. You can of course use any 35 mm film, even colour.
I discovered from the makers of Dirkon that, even when it was published, people often came up with improvements on their model. The design was significantly improved by sticking on a thin piece of metal with a hole, rather than making the hole in the paper, as described in the instructions. I didn't follow this suggestion, however, since I wanted to experience the real magic of Dirkon photography."
(David Balihar)
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
Avatar: selective rather than deep focus stereoscopic cinematography
James Cameron: "I think it's a myth that you want deep focus in 3-D shots. I find the opposite is true. Selective focus, created by working at low f-stops with longer lenses, evolved as a cinematic technique to direct the audience's attention to the character of greatest narrative importance at a given moment. With 3-D, the director needs to lead the audience's eye, not let it roam around the screen to areas which are not converged. So all the usual cinematic techniques of selective focus, separation lighting, composition, etc., that one would use in a 2-D film to direct the eye to the subject of interest, still apply, and are perhaps even more important. We all see the world in 3-D. The difference between really being witness to an event vs. seeing it as a stereo image is that when you're really there, your eye can adjust its convergence as it roves over subjects at different distances. Convergence is the natural toe-in that the eye does to align the left and right eye images of objects at specific planes of depth. In a filmed image, the convergence was baked in at the moment of photography, so you can't adjust it. In order to cut naturally and rapidly from one subject to another, it's necessary for the filmmaker (actually his/her camera team) to put the convergence at the place in the shot where the audience is most likely to look. This sounds complicated but in fact we do it all the time, in every shot, and have since the beginning of cinema. It's called focus. We focus where we think people are most likely to look. So I've found that just slaving the convergence function to the focus works exceedingly well, and makes good stereo a no-brainer on the set."
(David S. Cohen, 10 April 2008, Variety Magazine)
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
