Mission Shoots 'New York Stories', Short Film for Donna Karan, with Panasonic VariCam

[Gregg Lengling]

HD Footage Is Source for Worldwide Print, Web,
                      Outdoor, In-Store Campaigns
Mission (New York, NY), a full-service commercial production company that brings high-concept fashion and luxury branding sensibilities to TV advertising, has produced an 18-minute narrative short film, "New York Stories," that showcases designer Donna Karan's 2003 Fall collection.

The film, a collaboration with ad agency Laird and Partners, was shot on Panasonic's AJ-HDC27 VariCam(TM) HD Cinema camera and directed by Mission's Seven Sebring, the celebrated fashion photographer. Director of photography on the assignment was Toshiaki Ozawa.

In an innovative endeavor in combining media, still frames have been lifted from the HD source footage for DKNY's worldwide print campaign and are being seen on billboards, in fashion magazines and on DKNY.com. The short film is also being screened at DKNY shops and department store boutiques and is available for viewing at //www.dkny.com.

In "New York Stories," captured in and around Manhattan's Chelsea Hotel over the course of four days, supermodels Angela Lindvall, Sophie Dahl and Michele Hicks play young artists who--while fabulously outfitted--are struggling to eke out a living in New York.

Mission owner Scott Vogel, who executive produced the DKNY shoot, said, "This project pushed the boundaries of digital production and post-production beyond the capabilities of many of the country's top post facilities, yet it has all been done in-house at Mission. The Panasonic VariCam was instrumental as the source of beautiful images that are as persuasive as stills as they are in motion. Essentially, this approach can give clients two shoots--television and print--for the price of one." Mission rented the VariCam for the DKNY shoot from Bexel (New York, NY).

Panasonic's AJ-HDC27 VariCam replicates many of the key features of film-based image acquisition, including 24-frame progressive scan images, time lapse recording, and a wide range of variable frame rates (4-fps to 60-fps in single-frame increments) for "overcranked" and "undercranked" off-speed in-camera effects. The AJ-HDC27 VariCam also features CineGamma(TM) software that permits Panasonic's HD Cinema camera systems to more closely match the latitude of film stocks.

Vogel said that while he hadn't worked in HD previously, he had seen samples of commercial spots shot in HD video and had confidence in the format. "We did up-front tests with HD cameras to see how we could manipulate scene grabs from RGB to CMYK and effectively deal with digital grain," he explained. "The VariCam grain held up remarkably well. Essentially, HD became a means to an end--if we could achieve a quality image in a still, we'd feel comfortable with shooting high-end video. Ultimately, we chose VariCam vs. alternatives because of its variable-speed capabilities, as our DP wanted to shoot slow motion effects. And we were satisfied that we could extract 300+ dpi prints from the 720p resolution VariCam footage."

Mission's Ravi Subramanian was the technical supervisor on the shoot, handling color correction on-set and the subsequent "double" edit for live action and still frames for print. For the assignment, he developed "work in progress" software dubbed "ICE" (for Image Capture Enhancement), running with Final Cut Pro 3 and Pinnacle's CineWave.

Subramanian said, "As someone who deals with moving images, I was completely excited to work with the VariCam material, which has a definite cinematic feel. I was highly impressed with how tightly integrated Panasonic is with Final Cut Pro and CineWave--the process was easy and open, without artificial barriers."

As a cinematographer for many New York-based independent films ("The Brown Bunny" and "On Line," among others), DP Ozawa has considerable experience in shooting both high definition and digital video. His added background in commercial cinematography in the fashion and beauty realms made him an ideal fit for the DKNY shoot.

"I've been shooting digital video for more than five years, and I've seen improvements on many fronts--video quality, resolution, color--but the ultimately I'm looking for an aesthetic quality," Ozawa said. "If beauty is the final parameter, the VariCam passes that test handily.

He added, "We were able to achieve a subtle color palette--pastels, browns and ochres--without the earth tones going muddy. I saw subtle gradations in color--for instance, the different greens in a tree--that represented a remarkable improvement over past generations of video.

For more information on Panasonic's complete HD Cinema product lineup, visit //www.panasonic.com/hdworld

Panasonic Broadcast & Television Systems Co. is a leading supplier of broadcast, professional video and presentation products and systems. Panasonic Broadcast is a unit company of Matsushita Electric Corporation of America, the principal North America subsidiary of Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd. (NYSE: MC), one of the world's leading producers of electronic and electric products for consumer, business and industrial use. For more information on Panasonic Broadcast products, visit //www.panasonic.com/broadcast.


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