Production log: 3-23-2019 Photations

3-23-2019

            Starting filming for the second season of Sleeping Spring. Sleeping spring features nature scenes before everything begins to bloom a grow. The goal is to capture nature in this transitional period before full spring and summer arrives.

            I made a list of places I want to film and take photos at before we get too far into spring. I had two parks I wanted to shoot at for sure then I found an additional 3 to shoot at and a possible 2 others.

            I don’t know what I was thinking but I thought that I could shoot at 3 locations today and that was a huge mistake. I was only able to shoot at one park and that was at Genesee Recreational Area. It’s a long winding hike while taking photographs. The path isn’t that long but when you’re zig zagging between every tree and bush and stopping every 20 seconds, the hike is much longer.

            I started off at the parking lot and made my way on the dirt path. My plan was to take 35mm photos and 4K footage walking to the end of the trail, then turn back and shoot 3D photos for the Fixed View Edition while also recording nature sounds.

            Walking to the end of the trail took a lot longer then I thought. By the time I got there I wasn’t so much tired physically, mostly just mentally. I remember that once I put way my DLSR and YI (Action Cam) I thought, now I have to start taking photos all over again. My day job started up again and it’s a manually intensive work, which is why I was tired with this simple hike from the beginning.

            Taking the 3D Photographs on the way back I was very careful not to take the exact same photos as my photos from my DSLR. I was very conscious of taking photos that would look good in 3D and experimented with photos I would not ordinarily take.

            My method for recording sound was to set up my TESCAM on my small light tripod. Then I would start it recording sound and walk away. Once I was about 100 feet away from the audio recorder I would start to take photos. The 3D camera has no shutter and make no noise when taking photos. However, I wanted to be far way from the Microphone because my camera bag and jacket do make a lot of distracting noise. Once I was done taking photos of the section of park I was at I would return to the TESCAM and stop the audio recording. Each time I did this I would get about 7 minutes of audio. I’m sure it’s only 4 or 5 minutes of usable audio because the sound of me walking away from the microphone to a safe distance and the sound of me returning to the microphone to turn it would have to be edited out.

            I repeated this process maybe 8 times. I tried to get at least 5 minutes of audio at each section along my hike. Eventually I made it back to my car and was relieved. This hike took a lot out of me. More than I thought. I’ve been to this park several times and even carried drone equipment the same distance. This however was a lot more intensive. My plan was to do the same thing again but this time at Richfield County Park, which is less then 200 feet away from the entrance to the park I was at, but I didn’t have the energy. If I was going to only shoot 3D photos or only shoot 35mm photos, then yes. But I couldn’t juggle shooting 4K video, then Audio then 3D and finally 35mm. All in all, the day was still a success and I was very happy with the photographs I had taken.

            On my DSLR I used my 28-135mm lens which is one of my favorite lenses. It’s a good starting angle of 28mm with a nice depth of field and minimum focus distance, but the zoom to 135mm always seems to be the perfect amount telephoto for the majority of what I was taking photos of. I did bring my 70-300mm and 18-55mm but I never needed to use those lenses during this hike.

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