Learning to See » Assignment

In Amongst the Reeds and Rushes

Jon Roemer — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 16:41:57 +0000

Photographed this past fall wall while working with a team from Brown and Caldwell. Their goal – environmental remediation of a brownfield site located near Raritan Bay.

Brown and Caldwell engineers, Fords, NJ. October, 2011. Click to enlarge.

The photos were featured in their magazine…

and in a promotional video (0:00 – 1:05):

Having to work quickly and travel light (OSHA rules limited movement, equipment, and access on the site) most of the portraits were shot available light though a bit of reflector fill was added on some. Lenses used ran the gamut from the 16-35 II (top portrait with the reeds), 24 TSE II (magazine spread = composite of three 24 TSE images) to the 70-200 II for some of the photos seen in the video.

RRBB Accountants + Advisors | Stills + Motion

Jon Roemer — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 18:15:22 +0000

This past fall I helped with the re-launch of the RRBB Accountants + Advisors web site. First doing portraits of the partners and then, having established a rapport with everyone, being asked to come in and create a short video overview of the firm.

Some of RRBB's partners. August, 2011. Click to enlarge.

Portraits were shot against white seamless. Video was a mix of ambient plus 1×1 LED Litepanels for the interviews and available light for the b-roll. To further differentiate the interview vs. b-roll feel, interviews where shot locked down on a tripod and b-roll was shot using a monopod. The latter introduced a bit of movement and helped enhance a documentary feel.

The Burgermeister Meisterburger

Jon Roemer — Sat, 07 Jan 2012 19:58:45 +0000

Max Berger of Bernstein Litowitz Berger & Grossman LLP photographed this past summer for a magazine profile:

Max Berger, BLB&G, New York, NY, July, 2011.

FU Got Game

Jon Roemer — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 19:43:03 +0000

Just before the holidays I premiered a time-lapse video created for Fordham University. It announced Fordham as the home of College Basketball – New York Style. While that was an ad and, as we know, ads can say almost anything… this tag line is turning out to be true. Earlier this week Fordham defeated No. 22 ranked Harvard, their first victory over a ranked opponent in more than a decade.

I was up at the Rams’ “old bronx gym” in early December to photograph ESPN & ABC sportscaster Mike Breen for a magazine story. Additionally, I captured some of the game on my iPhone resulting in my first published Hipstamatic image.

ESPN & ABC sportscaster Mike Breen, Fordham Gym, NY, NY, Nov. 29, 2011.

Fordham vs. Colgate, Fordham Gym, NY, NY, Nov. 29, 2011.

I’ve always joked that someday I’ll shoot a job on my iPhone…

B-ball B-board

Jon Roemer — Wed, 21 Dec 2011 21:42:47 +0000

Rubber baby buggy bumpers. Basketball billboard, basketball billboard, basketball billboard.

Hot off the non-linear editor – Fordham University’s “College Basketball – New York Style!” billboard rises on Manhattan’s west side, overlooking Riverside Drive and the West Side Highway.

Fordham is featuring it on their YouTube Channel, two of their FaceBook pages, FordhamSports.com and it will be used for promotion this season and next.

In a prior post, Down by the River, Up by the Tomb, I gave some background. Three cameras used in two locations. Each filming for a few hours. Over 2600 stills used to create the three time lapse clips which were then edited into the piece above.

Produced, shot and edited by me.

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Update 01/06/11 – related post: FU Got Game.

Thinking, Fast and Slow

Jon Roemer — Sun, 11 Dec 2011 16:12:27 +0000

Today’s New York Times Sunday Book Review includes Daniel Kahneman’s Thinking, Fast and Slow in its 10 Best Books of 2011, calling Kahneman the “world’s most influential psychologist.”

I don’t have a best selling book or any where near that degree of influence but I can claim one degree of separation. I took the author photo:

Daniel Kahneman, 2002 Nobel Prize Winner, Author, "Thinking, Fast and Slow." Princeton, NJ, May, 2004.

I photographed Daniel in 2004 as part of what I call my academic trading cards – a series of portraits shot for Princeton’s Woodrow Wilson School. The photo is being used for the book and its promotion.

The Crane Life

Jon Roemer — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 14:45:08 +0000

A month ago in The Cranes and Me I posted stills from my work documenting a construction project in Manhattan. Here is a short video made from the time lapses produced that day:

I set up two cameras to shoot the time lapse sequences and they were used in two different locations. This created four sequences.

The cameras fired at five seconds intervals which was determined based on their needing to run for an hour, the image file size and the size of the compact flash cards. Due to the contrast of the scene (deep shadows, bright highlights, and white tents) the images were recorded as raw files.

In terms of post workflow – the raw files are optimized in Aperture and exported out as full res jpegs. The jpegs are then brought into Quicktime to create a 24 fps sequence and then sent to FCP X for editing.

Psst, Psst… HISP

Jon Roemer — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 17:49:19 +0000

In early November I spent the day with Taiye Lambo of eFortresses, a data and information security training and certification company. To a non-corporate person like myself that’s a mouthful but if you live in the corporate world and your job intersects with data then you are likely to know and call on someone like Taiye.

eFortresses is partnering with Marlabs of Piscataway, NJ, to bring Taiye’s HISP program (Holistic Information Security Practitioner) to the northeast. My job was to create a video announcing the program, emphasize eFortresses holistic approach, and keep it interesting so that it is not just a one-shot of a talking head.

This was done on a tight budget with a limited crew (myself & one assistant.) Since it was a one-camera setup we filmed Taiye’s primary script with additional takes from a second angle. This gave us footage to cut to to keep it interesting visually.

Taiye’s diagram work at the board meshed beautifully with his voiceover helping to support the words with images. These latter clips were filmed with the camera on a monopod to introduce a bit of movement and to counter the locked-down-on-a-tripod interview segments.

Other b-roll includes the course materials. These are shot with a Kessler 3′ slider – the motion helps give a sense of the breadth of the course materials, their organization, and overall quality. The slider move, like the monopod for the diagrams, adds some visual variety to the piece.

The last b-roll comes from working in Marlabs’ server room. When brainstorming about potential b-roll and how to efficiently show data on the move, the server room was a perfect fit.

In terms of lighting I have three 1×1 Litepanels in my kit along with two Lowel Omni lights. We took the existing tungsten light in the boardroom as a given. Its color temperature was read via a color meter and the 1×1′s filtered to match. They provided the key, fill, and rim light on Taiye. The rim light also help spark up the row of chairs behind Taiye.

The two Omni lights did not need filtration since they are already tungsten. One provided fill in the back and the other was blasting the chair on the far right. That chair, for whatever reason, sucked up light like a black hole and needed anything I could throw at it.

Most of the b-roll was shot available light except for the course materials. They were shot with one 1×1.

Down by the River, Up by the Tomb

Jon Roemer — Wed, 07 Dec 2011 20:37:35 +0000

On location yesterday in NYC to shoot time lapse segments for a short video. Out the door at 5:15am and at the site by 6:30am. Set up location #1 in West Harlem Piers Park, on a pier in the Hudson right by 125th St and the West Side Highway. Fortunately, Fairway’s parking lot is open and affords us a staging area.

The weather is rainy and windy. The goal is to time lapse the installation of a billboard from three vantage points via three cameras, all with different lenses. The billboard company says they cannot install the new board if it is rainy or windy but they will not make the call until 7am (with the installation at 8am.) So, we have to be ready regardless.

Camera #1, on the river, gets setup with a 70-200mm and weatherproofed. Two assistants are left to run it, watch it, and have each other’s back.

View from camera #1. The top most billboard will be replaced. 6:50am, NY, NY, Dec. 6, 2011.

I head up to the grassy knoll on the north side of Grant’s Tomb, out of view of the river site and about five stories higher in elevation. Alternate side of the street parking means no go on street parking so I end up in a lot at 134th St. I meet assistant #3 there and we begin the long wet march back to the grassy knoll, across the famous elevated portion of Riverside Drive which seems to be a resting place for all of the dog poop in the city. Watch where you walk and what you drag the bags through or fail to do so at your own risk.

We set up on the knoll, locations #2 and #3, one camera with a 300mm for the tight shot and the other with a 90mm for the wide shot. We weatherproof them and the client joins us.

Assistant #3 = Jon, I = Jon, and the client = John. Three Jo(h)ns on a grassy knoll in a New York City park. Sounds like trouble.

Camera #2, Canon 1D Mark IV with a 300mm lens. NY, NY, Dec. 6, 2011.

A time lapse is math. How long is the action you’re recording to take place? What size is the memory card in your camera? How much space does each image take up? And in this case, the billboard company has told us that the installation could take 4-6 hours, so add in camera battery life as another factor. Run the numbers, do the math. Worst case scenario we need about 10 seconds between images if we shoot jpeg. Raw files are too big and not doable if we have any hope of catching the raising of the new billboard and also being prepared for a potential 6 hour time-frame.

Camera #3, Canon 1Ds Mark III with a 90mm TSE lens. NY, NY, Dec. 6, 2011.

Fortunately, the weather cleared just enough for the billboard installation. The crew did a super fast job, taking only one hour. We stay on site another couple of hours to get enough tail end footage. When all is said and done, each camera yields a 35 second clip (one frame every 9-12 sec. depending upon the camera, each running for about three hours, images funneled into a 24 fps video.)

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Update – 12/21/11: B-ball B-board <- video created.

Web Site Updates

Jon Roemer — Thu, 17 Nov 2011 20:31:00 +0000

Portraits - Recent Gallery - thumbnail view.

Updates today to the Portraits – Recent gallery on my main web site. Plus some tidying up to the splash page slideshow, currently showing 2011 portraits.

More to come…