Before regaling you with news from the world of Bourbon Street HD, the company's chief executive camera operator. John Bourbonais would like to mount the soapbox in the interest of constructive industry dialogue.

While it's impossible to argue that HD is anything but on the rise, experimenting with the format's visual possibilities is sorely lacking.

Nowhere is this more apparent, Bourbonais notes, than on recent covers of American Cinematographer and High Def magazines. The former features 24 star Kiefer Sutherland, shot in a "bleach bypass look" and the inherently small depth of field associated with 35mm. The High Def cover features Joan of Arcadia star Amber Tamblyn shot with the warm skin tones that have become emblematic of the HD look. To mimic the "drop-off" similar to 35mm, the HD shot pushes in to a medium shot where as the shot of Keifer is "head to toe."

"I keep seeing these orange skin tones over and over again in high def," Bourbonais says. "There aren't a lot of people going out on a limb to make HD look different."

Reigning wisdom in HD production can be summed up in the emerging maxim, "Shoot neutrally and fix it in post." However, Bourbonais notes that one can often create a look in the field that can't be recreated in post-production. Additionally, tweaking color saturation in post is often beyond the budgets of many HD productions.

As a counterpoint, Bourbonais mentions his experience shooting on the Disney film Oliver Beene, where cinematographer Victor Goss, ASC, made the decision to desaturate the image by 20 percent. While Goss and Bourbonais loved the look, during post-production the producers decided they wanted to add more color. "By trying to bring back color initially they came up with a whole other look for the show," says Bourbonais. "I just think there's so many possibilities with HD that people haven't really experimented with."

This concludes the soapbox portion of the HD newsletter.

In other news, Bourbon Street HD had the privilege of spending four February days at 11,000 feet shooting the US freestyle skiing championships for the Rush HD Network.

"It was very cold," says Bourbonais.

Currently, the man with the camera has found his way to warmer environs "downunda" on a three-week jaunt through Sydney, Melbourne and Perth. Known simply as "The Global Business Project," the shoot is part of a series of interviews with 100 leading CEOs.

The London-based Carnegie Productions found Bourbon Street through its website, www.bourbonhd.com. "They downloaded my reel, liked what they saw and that was it," Bourbonais says. "This proves the Internet works."

And so concludeth the March newsletter. As always, Bourbon Street is available for shoots, referrals, and camera workshops. Don't be a stranger: (323) 376-5707. We look forward to hearing from you.