Rick Delgado on Filming Analog Made with RED (214)

Artful Camera

Cinematographer Rick Delgado has worked for a broad range of commercial clients and is in high demand as he jumps around from his home base in Miami to LA, NY, and all over the globe. Rick is a talented, sensitive, thoughtful story teller who I previously featured in episode 188 of the Artful Camera (previously known as the Digital Convergence Podcast). When I spoke to Rick in that episode, I knew I wanted to have the chance to speak with him again. As it turned out, we were able to collaborate work together for a few days shooting a mini-documentary called Analog Made.

It was a delight to work with Rick, and get hands-on experience with his RED Weapon fitted with the superb 8K Helium sensor. With a Super35 sensor, the Helium features much improved low light performance with less noise and breathtaking dynamic range. Working with the RED was a considerable step up in quality and technology for me. This camera capable of capturing gorgeous massive 8K RAW video at up to 60 fps. Drop down to 4K, and the slow-mo capability increases to 120 fps. Go down to 2K, and an impressively liquid 240 fps is achievable–which we took advantage of in a number of closeups.

Impressive as the RED Weapon is, of even greater value to me was the chance to work closely with Rick and benefit from his extensive experience as a highly sought after director of photography. Of note, too, is that Rick is a hybrid shooter and is often called upon to shoot both still photos and video at the same time. His tool of choice for shooting stills is the Canon EOS 5D Mark IV.

This episode of the Artful Camera was recorded in my home after wrapping up two full days shooting together. This is the first time I’ve recorded a podcast episode live in my office with another guest in the studio. Having Rick in the studio certainly changed up the dynamics of recording a conversation. It was such a delight that I’m going to have to find a way to live in-house recordings like this again if future episodes of the podcast.

In the conversation we recorded together, Rick and I talk about what it was like to shoot the Analog Made documentary with wood turner Danny McCravy. Rick delves into the differences of shooting commercial work and documentaries and the process of extracting a story. Rick walks us through how you go through the interview process with the person talking about their life and then from there begin to piece things together: Where does the story begin? What is the crescendo of the story? What is the main take-away? What do you leave with when the filming is done? It isn’t always possible to know what the story is or know where the story leads to when you begin filming a documentary–but one this is certain: the story will reveal itself.

Now that shooting has wrapped for this installment of Analog Made, next begins the process of putting the story together from the beautiful footage that DP Rick Delgado masterfully captured. I’ll be using REDCINE-X Pro and FCP X together to edit the piece. I’ll save that experience for a future episode.

This episode is sponsored by:

CrumplePop - Premiere Pro and Final Cut Pro X Plugins: http://crumplepop.com

Mentioned in the show:

Fragile, by Nilo Batle (17 years old, Young Arts Gold Winner): https://vimeo.com/181053540

RED Weapon Helium 8K: http://www.red.com/products/weapon-8k

Visionsmith ReLamp for Arri: http://visionsmith.com/?v=7516fd43adaa

Get 10% off a subscription to Soundstripe.com (use code ARTFULCAMERA when you check out): https://artfulcamera.com/soundstripe

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