Slightly OT - Shooting in China

Sorry to stray from our core subject. But, does anyone have any experience shooting in China? Specifically, in regards to getting equipment through customs?

I am producing a industrial piece there next month - and at this point plan to take all of my acquisition equipment with me to eliminate the foreign rental maze. (not to mention format incompatibility)

All the best,
Adam Duplay

ive found that if you tell them youre on vacation (not on a professional job) that its much speedier.

of course that gets tougher to sell if your lugging tons of gear ; )

Hi Adam:

If you are bringing a professional type camera (anything bigger than a Handicam), you will need a Carnet. I just returned from a big shoot in Scotland and England last week and got one for the trip. Carnets are a PITA and it cost me about $400.00 for about $15,000.00 worth of gear that I brought. But you need one because you can get fined if you travel with professional camera gear without one.

You might get lucky and not have U.S. Customs want to see your stuff when you come back or you might get lucky and NOT have the Chinese Customs care about what you are bringing into their country.

But if you want to do it "right", get a Carnet. As a rule of thumb, generally, if it's just you alone with your camera in your backpack, you probably could get away without one as a tourist, but if you are bringing lights, tripod, grip, audio gear, you will probably get stung and possibly hassled by either Chinese or U.S. Customs.

I got mine with Roanoake Traders at [www.roanoketrade.com] You can deal with Kathleen Garza.

My advice would be to spend the money. You will have to get it signed at your point of departure (U.S.), then get it signed as you enter China at your first point of entry, then get it signed in China at your point of departure, then get U.S. Customs to sign it, then turn it in. The fines, if you are caught without one are higher than the Carnet, plus the hassle is immense.

All the best,

Dan

I second getting the carnet. If you are caught lying to customs agents, you could be in for world of hurt at either end.

I had a client just last year that had his equipment impounded by customs officials in China.

He had a Carnet. He had paperwork. He had the Chinese business that he was working for write letters describing what the nature of the video shoot was and why this company was coming in to shoot. They made sure they had multiple levels of CYA so as to avoid any issues with customs.

It didn't matter. In order to keep his tight schedule, he ended up having to rent gear locally, leaving his equipment in lockup at the airport.

He claimed it four days later when he left the country.

deb

Thanks for the great advice guys. A carnet was definitely in the plans... the the last post by debe, confirms my suspicion. I too will have letters of invitation by my company - but, I guess we'll see how it goes.

If anyone is interesed, I will let you know what happens.

Thanks again,

Adam

Adam,
I lived for about 6 months in Kunming. Left the XL1S at home and took a ZR40 and bought a monopod in Kunming. My comment is regarding a surprise while shooting in a factory and in a hotel in Dong Guan (Guangdong Province). The footage has a strong, steady flicker -- seemingly from the fluorescent lighting. It is the only occurrence in over three hours of SD-NTSC shooting.

I'm not sure of the cause -- and I have yet to figure a cure in post.

re: customs -- I toted the cameras and the Powerbook as carry-on for all flights to/from China and all flights within China (Dong Guan, Xi'an, Lijiang).

Dave

Hi Dave:

The flicker was from the 50hz 220V AC used in China. You were shooting with a 60hz camera. I was just in Scotland shooting with an NTSC HVX-200, same deal. I shot numerous monuments and statues that were lit by discharge lamps of various flavors and most of it had a noticeable flicker. I tried even using a 1/50th of a second shutter, but to no avail, still had the flicker because I was shooting 24fps, not 25 fps.

Dan

As Dave said, you should rent a PAL camcorder for (or in) China (or any other country using 50 Hz). With FCP you can edit in PAL - most of the broadcast control monitors support both standards - and convert the final product to NTSC if needed.
Also your customer in China might be happy to get both a PAL and NTSC version. If you shoot progressive PAL to NTSC is quite easy and fast if you interpret the 25 fps footage as 24 fps and do a pull to 30 fps (though the play length is 4 per cent higher and you need to adjust the audio).
This sounds like a lot of hassle, but it's much less than getting rid of the flicker which in most cases is impossible without degrading the quality.

Andreas

I am worried about the 50hz flicker. I wonder if the effect would probably be mitigated in larger more ambiently lit rooms. And how bad/noticable is this flicker anyway?

Are there solutions other than shooting PAL?


Adam

If you use a camera that has a "clear scan" shutter, you can sometimes match the timing of the flicker. It will be around 1/50 but probably not exactly. The clear scan goes in incriments of 1/10,000 sec. I think. So you're shutter setting will say something like 50.23 which you'd read as 1/50.23 of a second.

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Adam Duplay
I am worried about the 50hz flicker. I wonder if the effect would probably be mitigated in larger more ambiently lit rooms.

It will. The more ambient the less flicker - normally. But if you zoom to a detail which is lit by bulbs or neon tubes this part of the picture will flicker.

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Adam Duplay
And how bad/noticable is this flicker anyway?

It depends and is not predictable.
Two years ago we had some some odd situation where some neon tubes where phase shifted and even though everything seemed running at the same frequency we had a bad flicker.

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Adam Duplay
Are there solutions other than shooting PAL?

As TimJBD said try to use a camera with "clear scan" shutter.

Andreas