NBC Uses Canon HDSLRs for SNL Production

11.13.2009

NBC premiered its latest Saturday Night Live season with the help of Canon SLR technology. The show’s opening montage was shot with Canon’s EOS 7D and EOS 5D Mark II digital cameras.

Canon explained that the show’s production team wanted to capture city nightlife with a natural “look and setting” and to aid those being recorded in “acting naturally.” To achieve this, lighting also had to be kept to a minimum. The small form factor and high sensitivity of Canon’s SLRs handily met these requirements.

The SNL opening sequence video was shot at night in various parts of New York City, ranging from the Brooklyn Bridge to the interior of a dimly lightly lighted bar. For most of the interior shots, the only supplemental lighting fixtures used were camera-mounted Litepanels MiniPlus units. A couple of Kino Flo lights were added for one of the interiors that required a bit more illumination. The small equipment package allowed the crew to move about with ease in tight spaces and also let them shoot without attracting a lot of attention.

“We have seen a shift in HD video capture toward a simpler and easier HDSLR workflow, and now with the EOS 7D shooting in standard NTSC and PAL frame rates, customers are realizing an even easier HD video workflow, using some of the largest HD video image sensors on the market at a fraction of the cost of competitive equipment,” stated Yuichi Ishizuka, senior vice president and general manager of Canon U.S.A.’s consumer imaging group.