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Our first ARRI Camera Experience




Filming on Arri cameras is something that every filmmaker dreams about. They are the go to choice in the world of high-end cinematography and the Arri Alexa Mini in a particular has become a real powerhouse of the film industry. For our latest production, we decided to rent in an Alexa Mini, and see how it compared to shooting on our RED and Sony Cinema camera ranges.



The team line up the first shot of the day.



Arri cameras are famed for their signature look and it's one you can notice across lots of high-end productions and commercials and something we particularly wanted for this particular project. The Arri colour science really is distinctive and the look they give can only really be achieved by shooting on Arri cameras and not something you can create in the colour grading suite later.


A big factor behind the decision to rent in an Arri camera for this shoot was the fact we knew we would be shooting in the midday window on a sunny day. It's widely acknowledged that this is one of the most challenging situations for cinematography as the bright sunlight leaves harsh shadows and creates an incredible amount of contrast between the highlights and shadows, meaning a large part of your image will either be far too bright or far too dark.


Arri's are famed for their ability to handle this difficult lighting situations better than any other camera brand and we were instantly impressed as we began to set up the first shot. Although we'd prepared and planned the shots so we could bring in diffusion and bounce lighting to create a more flattering image, the image out of camera was pleasing even without this extra lighting control.


Ben putting the Arri through it's paces on the shoot.


The camera's performance in this midday window was an absolute gamechanger. Working heavily in sports we're no strangers to having to film during this window and although we'd planned our shots deliberately to be tightly framed and allow us to incorporate lots of lighting control, we quickly decided that we didn't need to bring in extra equipment and the camera could create really pleasing shots without it.


This opened up a huge range of extra possibilities for us on the day, meaning we had free reign to utilise all the players and improvise lots of additional wide shots which really added to the overall piece.


This wide low angle shot really brought a sense of realism to the piece seeing the whole team in the background of the shot.



For that factor alone the Arri rental for this project was definitely worth the cost. We were both suprised at the ease of use for such a high end camera, intuitive menus combined with a simple design made it a real pleasure to operate and although it's not specifically designed for 'run and gun' style shooting, there were moments in this production where we let the players run through their normal warm up routines and just rolled camera to capture it, in a very fly-on-the-wall documentary style manner and this garnered some of the best shots from the whole day's filming.


Ben setting up the shot at Location 2, a classroom interior.



Later in the day we moved inside to film several classroom interior scenes and unsuprisingly the camera really shone in this environment too. Being indoors we were able to bring more lighting control, diffusing and controlling the naturual light coming through the windows and introducing negative fill to bring in some heavy contrast on the shadow side.


To see how the camera performed in a well-lit environment was incredible, although we didn't introduce any artificial lighting in these later scenes, the high-end look the Arri was able to deliver in natural lighting perfectly fit what we had envisioned when planning this production.


Checking through the final shots of the storyboard!


Perhaps like many other filmmakers we'd held off shooting Arri for a multitude of reasons. When you've already got high-end cameras sitting on your shelf it's a hard investment to justify renting one in especially. We'd also falsely assumed they would be challenging to use and ultimately slow down the production, two things we quickly learned weren't the case.


After we'd wrapped on this produciton the conversation quickly turned to when we would use one next. We're fortunate to have a range of RED and Sony Cinema cameras in house and on reflection either of those systems would have produced great results for this project, but the Arri just brought that extra something that created a high-end feel to this commercial piece.


Although it's definitely not a camera system ideally suited to all of our productions, we're very glad to have got to grips with the system and have it as an option to incorporate into future productions. When will be using one again next? Hopefully very soon!


You can see more about our first experience with Arri in our latest YouTube video here...






Much love, Ben&Jack





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