AfterMath (Nikon D300s for news footage)

After a long tragic series of car fires in the outskirts of Gothenburg, and a temporary ceasefire, another one occured last night in Biskopsgården, 5th of December '09.

I compiled this short film as an afterthought, a contemplation of what these occurences cost the society. At the same time it was meant as a tribute to all the brave firefighters whom has endured a lot of hatred and meaningless violence during visits in troubled areas. This time at least there was no violence at the scene. Two cars were totally damaged and a third partially damaged in the fire, the adjacent garagebuilding could be saved but filled with smoke. An eyewitness saw the culprit setting one of the cars on fire and ran off without a trace. The police didn't find him of course. Another unsolved case of worthless vandalism.

On a higher note, the new Nikon D300s is absolutely fantastic for news coverage for both stills and motion pictures, it's even useful handheld in situations like these when you want to be quick and shoot stills around the spot but also capture some footage in case the local news TV-channel is interested. I always conform to 25p with Cinema Tools before editing the clips in iMovie for news broadcasting, to be fully compatible with the PAL-system.

Category:

News & Politics

Tags:

• Nikon
• D300s
• news
• coverage
• HD
• film
• D-movie
• Nikkor 70-200 VR
• fire
• firefighter
• car
• garage
• burn
• vandalism
• Biskopsgården
• Vårvädersgatan
• Snövädersgatan
• bilbrand
• handheld
• skadegörelse
• ungdomar
• youth
• problem
• video
• journalism
• press
• pressfoto
• editing
• redigering
• iMovie
• Cinema Tools
• telecine
• conform
• delivery
• TV
• nyheter
• gear
• kamerautrustning
• review
• rescension
• test

[EaguruGuru]

this is probably a dumb question.

but how can I get the avi files from my d300s to play? they won't open in Premier Pro, iMoive '09 or in Quicktime.

I already downloaded the 5.6 Camera Raw update to fix the problem with the photos not being recognized.

Thanks.

[cablefreak76]

The avi files from the D300s should play just fine in either QuickTime or preview (just hit spacebar at one of the files and it should play directly in a popup window). I haven't used Premiere Pro with the avi files, but iMovie does import the files beautifully and does an internal conversion to Apple Intermediate Codec if you want it to... just choose "optimize - full size" in the import movie dialogue and you're set. Good luck! Cheers, Martin

[cablefreak76]

In case you still have problems opening the files, try using the MPEG Streamclip software (available on the net) to convert the files to MOV and Apple ProRes or AIC prior to importing in your video editing software. But for me it just works in FCP, iMovie and QT. :)

[valonqe1]

Martin !

THe problem with D300s and D90 is that in D-MOVE, ISO and shutter is automatic. That's why camera chooses highest ISO resulting grainy footage and horizontal lines running accross.

IT is only a firmware fix nothing wrong with you're camera as I have the same problem with my D300s. IT is a way around it but is anoying ot do that every time.

[cablefreak76]

It would be great to have manual controls, but it's not bothering me too much. I use AE-L and tricking the D300s into lower gain when needed, but since I often shoot in very low light I need the highest gain, and I feel like the grain is very flimic, minus the vertical banding! :) Since I'm also a technician, I've filed a very thorough report on the issue to Nikon, waiting patiently for a response... You can see it if you look really close in this vid, but compression makes it very hard to see.

[cablefreak76]

I had another look here and the vertical banding is completely killed by the compression added by Youtube in the conversion. You would have to look at an original H.264 file to see the issue. Have you noticed anything like vertical banding (looks like irregularities in the image sensor's vertical matrix readouts, i.e. some rows appear lighter or darker than the adjacent rows) it's a permanent issue in my D300s and it shows in shadow areas at high ISO gain in D-movie mode. Thanks for ur comments!

[TheFragiled]

Excellent work :-)

[filiwian]

Does anyone know how good the mic is as well the battery span ?

[valonqe1]

If you want to shoot at low light just for testing you can place a strong light in front of the lens whiles you are in Live view mode. You can see the camera lowering the ISO to compensate and then hit the AFEFlock button to lock the exposure then you can compensate with the Fstop on the lens for more light. But you have to use manual lenses and not the VR because it doesn't have the fstop on the lens.

Regards

[valonqe1]

Canon 7D has sort it out that problem very easily. They have add it full manual control over video + it can shoot Full HD and slow motion in Quictime Movie H.264 which is native in CS4 and FCP.

Other wise D300s is a grate camera especially if you have manual lenses like I do. Shooting video with manual lenses you won't believe what kind of results you would have. If you had manual lenses like 50mm f1.4 and setting ISO at 100 it would look amassing. Professional movie making

regards

[valonqe1]

I only get the banding with my camera when i shoot under florescent lighting, which is caused i think because of the rolling shutter. Because we cant dial in the ISO and the Shutter camera behaves like that. I shot stuff under controlled lighting when we shot on RED and to tell you the truth you can't tell the difference. I have been contacting Nikon ever since I bought the camera to find out when is the Firmware coming out but nothing yet so far. Lets wait and see.

Regards