A battery of flatpanel TVs, looking very much the same, at J&R in lower Manhattan.
Photo by D.W. Leitner

In Cinematography Corner #4, “Screens large and small,� I wrote about the centrality of scale to classic Cinema and, conversely, the recent adoption of the A/153 ATSC Mobile DTV Standard, poised to usher in an era of wallet-sized TVs.

Similar thoughts regarding screen size and digital wizardry filled my head as I helped a close friend shop for a large flat-screen TV in the run-up to Christmas.

In a basement showroom at J&R, a large electronics emporium in lower Manhattan, we stood mesmerized in the glow of dozens and dozens of large fluorescing LCDs, tiled across walls, along aisles, in every visible direction.

All the usual Japanese and Korean suspects were there: Sony, Panasonic, Sharp, JVC, Toshiba, Coby, Vizio, LG, and Samsung. more

Leitner and Coyula on the set of Memories of Overdevelopment, the cover photo from the May 2006 debut issue of Digital Content Producer.

The May 2006 debut issue of millimeter’s sister publication Digital Content Producer featured a cover story entitled “First-hand HDV: A Year in the Life of an HDV Producer/DP,� written by yours truly.

I still don’t know what an “HDV Producer/DPâ€? is—I’ve directed, produced, and photographed in 35mm, 16mm, and nearly every video format—but it is true that by 2006 I had grown terribly impressed by professional HDV camcorders starting with Sony’s original HVR-Z1U.

They were far better than they had any right to be at their price point; they were strikingly compact; and, hand-in-hand with Apple’s popular Final Cut Pro, they were toppling barriers to low-budget production in high definition.

HDV, you’ll recall, is a marketing brand for HD captured as either 1440×1080 at 25Mbps or 1280×720 at 19.7Mbps using MPEG-2 long-GOP compression. Recording media is the same 1/4in. metal evaporated MiniDV tape cassette used by consumer DV. more

Tim Burton’s The Corpse Bride (2005) was “filmedâ€? with Canon EOS 1D Mark II DSLRs adapted to Nikon lenses, and edited on Final Cut Pro.

If you’re anywhere near New York City between November 22 and April 26, 2010, you’ll want to drop by the Museum of Modern Art and visit the marvelous Tim Burton exhibition opening next week. I attended the press preview, with Burton in attendance, in advance of the madding crowds.

It’s rare, if ever, that MoMA hosts a potential blockbuster of a show about a filmmaker, but Burton’s 27-year career spans fourteen live-action and animated films as director/producer and concept artist—and often illustrator, writer, and photographer too. more