dvDepot filmed the latest installment of Food For Thought, a BET television series, on May 27. This episode, “Food For Thought: Conversations with Ice Cube” aired in early July. As in previous episodes, three media personalities, the Media Assassin Harry Allen, Hot 97’s radio host Angie Martinez, and sports journalist Stephen A. Smith, conduct interviews with Ice Cube over lunch. Previous installments of the show featured musical celebrities Jay-Z and 50 Cent. Since this was the third time dvDepot has shot Food for Thought, members of the crew have become friendly with the interviewers, leading to what we in the industry call “water cooler conversations.”

Lots of Equipment; No Space

With this shoot, dvDepot continues to provide the BET series with both crews and equipment.

The crew used four HDX900 cameras to obtain top quality footage. Using the steadicam also contributed to a very smooth shoot. Due to multiple cameras, lots of lighting equipment, and many crew members, the set was chaotic, to say the least. In addition to all of this activity, the restaurant was open to the public; diners looking for a quiet meal certainly got an unexpected surprise!

The Location: Sylvia’s Restaurant

The interviews took place at Sylvia’s, the world famous soul food restaurant. Situated uptown in Harlem, the eatery is famed for providing great service and an array of Southern favorites. Sylvia actually came out from the kitchen to meet the crew and personally took their orders. Munching on delectable macaroni and
cheese, divine fried chicken and catfish, and delicious cornbread kept the entire group more than well fueled for a full ten hour day of filming.

Multitalented Crew

Each member of the nine person crew brought their unique talents to set. Alex Sierra resumed his position as DP for the third installment of the series. Ameer Grice exhibited enviable packing skills; the utility’s ability to stow so much gear into a relatively small van was nothing short of beautiful. dvDepot’s own Jose Caraballo along with freelancer Jack Hutson handled the audio with impressive skills. Most importantly, however, everyone displayed impressive eating skills that would have made anyone on the competitive eating circuit jealous.

Ice Cube

Working with Ice Cube was wonderful. The artist had a professional attitude that translated to a very functional, stress-free shoot. Ice Cube’s acting background became obvious as he handled the shoot like an experienced professional. The platinum artist had only one indisputable stipulation about the shoot; the day had to end early enough so he could watch the Lakers playoff game which, fortunately, they won.

Though the shoot was crowded and long, our crew maintained a cheerful attitude. With great food, better company, and completely functioning equipment, the day ended on a positive note. We look forward to working with BET on the next episode.

To see more pictures from this shoot, visit our Facebook page.

A series of Earthquakes absolutely devastated Haiti on Tuesday afternoon. On Tuesday night, BET called us to shoot a series of PSAs to help raise awareness, get people to contribute and to connect people with loved ones in Haiti.

We cannot imagine what the people of Haiti are undergoing, our thoughts and prayers are with all those suffering in Haiti. The outpouring of support over the last week has amazed everyone and we hope it continues.

dvDepot works a great deal with BET. In September, we worked on the pilot episode of the “Food for Thought” series, featuring Jay-Z. This month we were back for another episode: “Food for Thought: Conversations with 50 cent”. The series is a major event for BET and they pull out all stops in the production. We shot with four HDX900 cameras, including one on steadicam. The beautiful location required a full lighting package. BET’s production team and our crew worked together and created an exciting product to watch.

The show features three media personalities, sports journalist Stephen A. Smith, Harry Allen– the Media Assassin– and Hot 97’s Angie Martinez. They each bring their own perspective and style to the interviews. Smith is an expert on image and media. Martinez knows music and has an ability to get stars to answer personal questions. Harry Allen always asks the difficult questions and got some lively answers out of 50 Cent.

This episode was shot in Bobby Van’s Steakhouse (25 Broad St). Bobby Van’s is well worth a look for those of you who haven’t been there before. The restaurant has an upstairs formal dining room and another room in the basement, which used to be a bank vault. This gives the restaurant a luxurious and distinctive feel which made it an ideal location for 50 Cent’s interviews.

50 Cent was great to have on set and was a pleasure to work with. 50 is very busy at the moment with the release of his new album “Before I Self Destruct” which is available in all record stores now.

We had a great crew on this shoot. Alex Sierra was the DP again, Chris Piazza and Jeremy Leach were also camera operators with Jon Beattie operating the steadicam. Michael Correa was the Audio/Video tech. Audio was by Ethan Goldberger with Brett Hammond doing the breakaway audio. Jeff Clark was our utility and Chad Williams and Gabriel Cassia were our PAs. It was great to work with BET again and we’re already prepping the next episode of “Food for Thought.” The new episode, “Conversations with 50″ Cent premiers Thursday November 19th at 7:30pm on BET.

You can see all the photos from the shoot on our flickr site.

At this point, everybody’s loving Showtime’s new series Nurse Jackie. My aunt, a retired nurse, is a big fan. We were lucky enough to do all the behind the scenes work on the show. We shot interviews with the cast and crew and B roll as well. It was exciting to shoot most of the stuff onset, so we got to see the show in production. The promo below includes a lot or our work.

One day, we got to shoot real nurses telling us about actual on the job experiences. The stories are hilarious, shocking and squirm inducing. Especially The Testicle Story. I suggest you take a look below.

Our work for Showtime was shot by Matthew Kulvicki, Derek Edwards, Ira Brenner and Ron McCain. The audio was done by Diana Milani, Alex Sierra and Max Kalmanowicz. Anthony Barrese was a utility, Lauren Dale Weinstein handled makeup and Mariclare Rivera operated the teleprompter. Their hard work kept Showtime coming back to us for more work.

You can check out more of our behind the scenes work on Nurse Jackie over at their site.

“Pitchmen,” on the Discover Channel is a great show. It features informercial veterans Billy Mays and Anthony Sullivan searching for new products to sell. Rather than being a strict contest show, it is also a chance to spend time with the stars in their world as they shoot their commercials and run their business. It’s a project that we were proud to have worked on. Original Productions is a great company to work with and the cast were friendly and fun.

Unfortunately, one of the stars, Billy Mays, passed away recently. It was terrible circumstances to be involved in, but we were honored to be able to work on the memorial episode.

Matt Kulvicki (camera) and Ethan Goldberger (audio) worked on the show the most for us and spent the most time with Billy. Matt said, “Good man, small ego.” Ethan agreed he was “a great guy, and one of those rare celebrities you work with that leaves you with total admiration. A total gentleman and a complete professional, he always made sure everyone felt good around him, remembering the names of everyone on set (including the sound guy!).” Matt also assures us that “there is nothing like watching a soundman throw his headphones off in pain when Billy turned the volume up and made his pitch.” Billy’s pitches weren’t just loud, there were passionate and filled with joy. Billy always believed in his products and was his happiest telling the inventors on the show that they had a hit.

You can see a brief tribute to Billy Mays at the “Pitchmen” site as well other clips.

He believed in these products and took his greatest pleasure when telling the inventor they had a hit.

The camera ops on the show included Matthew Kulvicki, Alex Sierra and Andreas Wagner. Audio was done by Ethan Goldberger, Diana Milani, Alex Sierra and Stephen Collins.

R.I.P Billy.

Jay-Z’s new album, The Blueprint 3 drops on September 11th. As part of the publicity blitz, Jay agreed to be interviewed by other celebrities on BET. Jon Marc Sandifer, a producer we work with on “Rising Icons,” wanted to get the crew from dv Depot.

We sent five camera operators, two audio ops and our ace utility Derek Edwards. Our DP, Alex Sierra, set up two cameras to cover the interviews in close up. He shot the close ups of Jay-Z while Christine Ka’aloa covered the interviewers. Jeremy Leach worked on steadicam, getting two shots and tracking shots. Meanwhile, Daniel McKeown was put on a roving camera, getting a wide range of shots to make for a more exciting edit. Ethan Goldberger handled the audio. Another crew rode in the cab with the interviewers as they headed out to meet Jay-Z. Chris Piazza and Gabriel Cyr were on this crew.

The interviews were great to watch. All of the celebrities were friends with Jay-Z and this worked to create a casual, intimate atmosphere. They were able to ask real questions that required real answers.

The first interviewer was Angie Martinez of Hot 97, the highest rated DJ in New York. She and Jay discussed fame, among other things. She found that Jay had a remarkable ability to live his life naturally in front of dozens of cameras (including ours).

Stephen A. Smith interviewed next. He’s most famous for his show “Quite Frankly” on ESPN. He talked at length with Jay about his part ownership of the New Jersey Nets and his long friendship with LeBron James. They also discussed personal branding and imaging, something that both have mastered.

Hip hop journalist Harry Allen presented Jay with the hardest questions of the day, asking questions about music and black culture and Jay’s place in it. The two Brooklyn natives also had a chance to discuss their love of the borough in the shadow of the Brooklyn Bridge.

It was a challenging day. We shot on Panasonic HVX200 cameras and the utility Derek was kept busy dumping the cards and wiping them, trying to keep ahead of the cameras needs. P2 memory cards on a multicam shoot can be challenging, but the reward is that you can start editing the next day, with all your footage already

digitized.

We’re always excited to work with BET. Jay-Z and the interviewers were also nice people and easy to work with. At the end of the day, everybody went home exhausted, but proud of the work we did. As he was leaving, Jay complimented Jon Marc on how well everything went. Nothing could have pleased us more.

You can see all of the pictures from the day at our flickr site.

Watch for the special to air on BET on Monday, September 7th.

BET is launching a new series, (Rising Icons). The show focuses emerging talent, showcasing their music and their story.

Dv Depot sent out a crew to work on an episode with Hal Linton, an R&B/Soul artist. We followed him to recording sessions and concerts in New York for several days. Then we went to his hometown in Barbados to get a little of his history.

Luckily, we have lots of pictures from Barbados. Our camera operator, Alex Sierra, and our audio tech, Ethan Goldberger, trailed Hal for a few days and got to hang out with him at night. They had a great time. We love working with BET and hope to do more work on this exciting new show.

You can see more photos on dv Depot’s flickr page.

As we’ve previously posted about, we’ve been working on “Rising Icons” for BET. “Rising Icons” is a great new show promoting new artists. We’ve had the opportunity to work on a few episodes now. The first we worked on, featuring Hal Linton, has premiered on BET already.

Apparently, the show worked with at least one girl who became obsessed with Hal after seeing the episode. She’s says his music makes her melt.

“Rising Icons” is a great production to work with. Our crew, including camera op Alex Sierra and audio tech Ethan Goldberger, got to spend a lot of time hanging out with Hal on their trip to Barbados and had a great time with him. You can see more pictures of the trip on our Flickr site.

See Hal Linton’s episode of Rising Icons below.

Today, dv Depot is shooting with Lola Montenegro, an opera star from Spain. Ms. Montenegro is the soloist of the Monastery of San Lorenzo. She has studied singing, composition, harpsichord and organ at St. Jeanne d’Arc in Paris and the Conservatory of Madrid. If that weren’t enough, she is also well versed in Gregorian Chants.

Ms. Montenegro is performing an exciting original piece that has thrilled audiences in Europe, and this is the first time she’s performing it in America. The recital was conceived to celebrate the centenary of the poet Miguel Hernández. She has set his poems, as well as some of her own, to traditional Spanish music. She is accompanied by pianist Adrián Viudes and flamenco guitarist Manolus Marín.

Today she’s performing at the Hispanic Society of America in their main court. The Society is housed in a beautiful Beaux-Arts building on Audubon Terrace, a small street off Broadway in uptown Manhattan that is a treasure trove of classic architecture. The Hispanic Society of America’s museum features a main court that is stunning. Ms. Montenegro will be performing on the balcony to an audience below. The lovely setting and the excellent acoustics make for a great experience.

dv Depot camera operator Alex Sierra is shooting her performance. We always love being involved in exciting cultural events like this.