CANON HD-EC LENSES HELP MAKE INDIE MOVIE THE ROUGH CUT A SMOOTH 24P PRODUCTION

Full Set of Canon High Definition Electronic Cinematography (HD-EC) Prime Lenses Opens up New Visual Avenues to Director, Crew

LAKE SUCCESS, N.Y., August 1, 2006 – The spirit of indie cinema is a sense of adventure that drives moviemakers as much as it does audiences. Case in point is The Rough Cut, a new 24p indie production that served as the directorial debut for Walter Biscardi, Jr, who shot the tense drama with a full set of Canon High Definition Electronic Cinematography (HD-EC) FJs Prime lenses.

“I’m a video editor and producer by trade, so I didn’t really realize what a big part of the equation the lens was until I became a director,” says Biscardi, who doubles as founder of the successful digital media production house Biscardi Creative, in Atlanta. “If you don’t put the right glass in front of the camera, you’re simply missing out.”

“With the Canon HD-EC lenses on hand, we did not compromise on a single shot. People tell me, ‘The camera did a great job,’ and I say, ‘The camera’s beautiful, but the lenses are what gave me the look that I have.’ There’s definitely a cinematic quality to it.”

Throughout The Rough Cut’s breakneck five-day shooting schedule on location around the Atlanta area, Biscardi and DP Clay Walker took full advantage of the rich imagery, expansive focal length range, and film-style ergonomics of their Canon HD-EC FJs5mm, FJs9mm, FJs14mm, FJs24mm, FJs35mm, and FJs55mm prime lenses.

“Shooting with the Canon lenses on The Rough Cut allowed me to experience that creative excellence of telling this story visually,” Walker says. “I was able to work in a technically uninhibited way that I had not felt since shooting on a 16 or 35mm format. Since our film largely takes place in the dead of night, we needed to create a visual look that was somewhat bleak from a lighting standpoint. We relied heavily upon the ability and quality of the Canon HD-EC prime lenses to shoot under these low lighting conditions, and the shallow depth of field created by the lenses played a very important role in depicting our main character’s state of mind. Looking back, I do not know how we would have achieved the look of the film without these Canon lenses.”

The core of the Canon FJs Prime Lens series are Power Optics that come from the combination of High Index, Ultra Low Dispersion glass and multilayer coatings that produce the superb Canon X-element imagery. The lenses feature optimization of MTF at the wide aperture settings and a very short MOD. Canon’s innovative Internal Focus employs a two-group floating optical system for highest performance. Traditional film-style lens feel and operation make the Canon FJs Prime Lens series instantly familiar to the most experienced users. The Canon FJs Prime Lens series is the perfect complement to Canon’s three cine-style HD-EC zoom lenses, which include the HJ21x7.5 KLL-SC, HJ11x4.7B KLL-SC, and HJ8x5.5B KLL-SC lenses.

Shooting with Panasonic’s Varicam, Biscardi and Walker relied on Canon’s low-profile design – the most compact size of all presently available 2/3-inch prime lenses – and smooth operation of the HD-EC FJs series to move quickly from one focal length to another, providing both the crew and the actors with increased creative freedom in the process.

“When you have that range of depth and space at your disposal, you don’t hesitate to switch out lenses,” Biscardi explains. “We did 15 shots on location in a house, and obviously we couldn’t move the walls, so the ability to pull out the four shortest lenses really made the shot. The image quality was so good that there was never a reason to cut away: The actors were able to act, and it totally came out in the movie.”

The Canon HD-EC lenses feature strong attention to detail in their operation, with their traditional film-style feel, gear rings compatible with external standard motorized control systems used for film lenses, and dual large and luminous scales for focus and iris that facilitate precision control in low light shooting. “The barrels felt great for hands-on use, with very, smooth, clean and sweet operational qualities,” says Biscardi. “We were doing jibs, dolleys, pulling focus, and we never had a hiccup.”

The Rough Cut, which is currently in the process of lining up U.S. and international distribution, may have been Walter Biscardi’s maiden voyage with HD moviemaking, but he’s already looking forward to his next directorial experience with Canon HD-EC lenses.

“I would definitely recommend shooting in HD to other indie productions – the image quality is undeniably superior to SD and you have much greater flexibility in post production,” Biscardi says. “The positive impact of the Canon HD-EC FJs primes is easy to see, even if it’s tough to describe. Whether you’re talking about color, image quality or beyond, everything changes when you put these lenses on.”

About Canon U.S.A., Inc.
Canon U.S.A., Inc. delivers consumer, business-to-business, and industrial imaging solutions. The Company is listed as one of Fortune's Most Admired Companies in America and is rated #35 on the BusinessWeek list of "Top 100 Brands." Its parent company Canon Inc. (NYSE:CAJ) is a top patent holder of technology, ranking second overall in the U.S. in 2005, with global revenues of $31.8 billion. For more information, visit www.usa.canon.com.

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