(Duarte Studios’ Sony Venice Rig // Photo Credit: Duarte Studios)
Whether you’re a fan of the blockbuster, Top Gun Maverick, Best Picture of the Year winner, CODA, or AppleTV’s hit show, Severence, its almost a guarantee that at least a few of your favorite movies or shows have been shot on Sony’s flagship cinema camera, the Sony Venice.
The Venice’s overwhelming success in Hollywood has quickly caught the attention of the high-end advertising and marketing industries, making it one of the top camera systems for broadcast commercials, brand videos, and premiere online content. Duarte Studios acquired its very own Venice earlier this year to round out the upper end of its in-house arsenal of Sony Cinema cameras.
A Beautiful Image.
During our initial tests with the camera, the Venice quickly proved why its “color science” — or its interpretation of the colors it captures — is so coveted. Natural hues, specular highlights and skin tones are all extremely cinematic and aesthetically pleasing, while the underlying data is faithful and expansive. This gives our pixel-peeping colorists a wonderful image to start with and the maximum amount of data to manipulate during grading.
• Why Our Clients Love It: The captured footage — due to its beautiful out-of-the-box color —can be turned around quickly for projects with tight schedules, or finely tuned when precise color grades are required.
All the Lenses.
The lens in which a camera views the world, can make an enormous difference on the overall look of the captured image. DPs and directors will often select specific sets of lenses to create or enhance the look of their project. Whether it be a vintage-look, a warm filmic quality, or a buttery soft bokeh, lens selection is a key aspect in achieving the right aesthetic. Unfortunately, different lens manufacturers build lenses in a variety of mounts and sensor coverage sizes. This makes pairing the desired lens with the right camera platform a little tricky at times — especially when it comes to more obscure lenses like a probe lens (used to get extreme macro / “larger than life” shots). Fortunately for the Venice, the camera incorporates an extremely universal mount — exclusive to Sony cameras — that can adapt to almost any type of lens mount due to its very short flange focal depth.
• Why Our Clients Love It: Compatibility issues are almost non-existent which allows creatives to be creative with fewer technical hurdles to overcome.
Versatility is King.
Whether you’re shooting a :30 spot or brand video, different scenes will often place different physical demands on the camera. For instance, in one scene the camera may be rigged for a studio-type setup allowing the crew to take advantage of all the necessary accessories, while in another scene the camera may need to as compact as possible to allow for gimbal and crane mounting, or even the interior scene of car. The Venice addresses all of these scenarios brilliantly with a modular construction that allows our camera crew to build rigs in almost endless configurations to match the needs of the scene. In extreme cases, the Venice sensor can even be detached from the body to allow for the most compact configuration out of any professional cinema camera system.
The Sony Venice also matches its physical versatility with its image format versatility. As a full-frame 6K platform, the Venice can shoot in full-frame modes, Super 35, and anamorphic modes allowing directors to choose the most suitable format. High speed modes also allow the Venice to shoot smooth slow motion shots without sacrificing image quality.
• Why Our Clients Love It: Ultimate freedom on-set with regards to camera placement, movement and recording formats.
All in the Family.
Duarte Studios will often shoot a variety of content for its clients — from premier commercial spots, all the way down to quick-turnaround (or light-production) social media content. Despite the inherent variations in production costs between the videos, it’s still important to maintain visual consistency within a brand’s content insofar as the overall look.
• Why Our Clients Love It: Having the Sony Venice for high-end productions and other Sony Cinema line cameras such as the FX9, FX6, and FX3 all at our disposal, means that we can color match each of the videos perfectly while still meeting the financial needs of each production.
(Duarte Studios’ Sony Cinema Line Arsenal // Photo Credit: Duarte Studios)
