The Dark Knight

[Jason Debus]

Aaron Eckhart was by far the best thing about the movie

 

Except that I don't think Nolan has seen An American Werewolf in London, Harvey looked a little too much like Jack tword the end!

[Peter Moretti]

I am almost afraid to say this, but I really believe the focus was significantly off in a few scenes. And I'm surprised this hasn't been brought up.

 

The shooting of the Joker, both when he crashes the gala fundraiser and when he's being interrogated in the police station, goes out of focus often and considerably, IMHO.

 

I don't see how this could have been a projector problem. It looked like the focus puller had a hard time keeping up with the movement; perhaps marks weren't really followed in the takes that worked best.

 

I very much liked the movie and felt almost empty afterwards because of the sorrow in its theme and the passing of Heath Ledger.

[Scott Fritzshall]

I was impressed in that I didn't notice ANY CGI, save in the spot where the hospital burns down and collapses with the fire.

That wasn't CG, they actually blew up a whole building for that.

 

[georg lamshöft]

I'm really excited! Fortunately, Dark Knight comes to IMAX before IMAX becomes "2k is enough because it's new cool digital-stuff"...

 

Wasn't "2001" a great commercial success, too? But they killed 65/70mm anyway, because it's success had nothing to do with spectacular pictures/effects? :blink:

 

@Paul Bruening

Off-Topci:

I've spoken with an Imacon-technician about their scanners, he scanned slides for me and showed me how the Imacon looks from the inside... It has very little to do with all this chinese HP/EPSON-"throw me away"-crap... The mechanical parts have to be very rigid/stiff and precise and he also told me that the custom Rodenstock-lens costs about 1000€ alone... Cheap electronics have never been the problem...

I'm really happy with the performance of the Kodak CCDs, my little M8 with it's tiny 10MP-files blows every 12MP-full-frame-combination with three times the size out of the water (although that's mostly the job of the lenses)...

Edited July 24, 2008 by georg lamshöft

[K Borowski]

That wasn't CG, they actually blew up a whole building for that.

 

 

Really? I thought it was a model. Sorry, what I was referring to was the CG fire that was added to that shot as looking digital and kinda fake. Still, for an entire movie to only have one kind of hokie FX shot is pretty impressive.

[Paul Bruening]

I'm really happy with the performance of the Kodak CCDs, my little M8 with it's tiny 10MP-files blows every 12MP-full-frame-combination with three times the size out of the water (although that's mostly the job of the lenses)...

 

Yea, there are so many factors in getting a good image. It makes comparing systems complicated. Resolution is only a starting point. Do I understand that you have a Kodak unit? What's the model? Is this the Leica M8?

 

While looking up your M8 reference, I came across this:

 

http://www.dpreview.com/news/0807/08070902kodaksensor.asp

[Ruairi Robinson]

Here's some articles on the vfx:

 

http://www.fxguide.com/article487.html

 

http://vfxworld.com/index.php?atype=articles&id=3705

http://vfxworld.com/?atype=articles&id=3707

 

http://www.studiodaily.com/main/news/9703.html

[K Borowski]

Thanks Ruairi, those articles are very interesting reading!

 

I'd like to think that this film has done a service to the industry as a whole by making 35mm to 4K scanning possible, now that they've gotten several post facilities used to working with even larger resolutions, 5.6K and 8K.

 

This answers all of the silly debates about the scanned resolutions too. From what I've gleaned, IMAX was scanned at 8K and then 5.6K depending on the detail needed in the shot, and 35mm was scanned at 5.6K and 4K, again depending on detail, mostly 4K though.

 

The 35mm prints were output at 4K, although they considered just doing it at the standard 2K at the start. However, since all of the scans were done at at least 4K, they decided they might as well let the audience take advantage of the higher-resolution scans.

 

I think it is disappointing they shot some of the background plates with an EOS DSLR though. Working with 64-bit files, they should know that color depth on this film is important, and that that is the weakness of digital systems, not resolution, color rendition, and bit-depth & latitude. Maybe they felt they could get away with it because they were shooting at night. And, they did get away with it I guess, because I didn't notice it! I just am kind of surprised they wouldn't' shoot all of their plates in IMAX or at the very least Vistavision. I remember for the last Matrix movie, the ASC article said they had shot Vision Stocks in a still camera for plates of some of the cityscapes, and scanned at 4K, IIRC, citing these same objections I have for not shooting digital (although they did use DSLRs for some things).

 

It is also interesting to read that they had to do film-outs on IMAX to actually EVALUATE the work they were doing because the resolution of most monitors wouldn't support anything over 2- or 3K unless they used multiple monitors in tandem. I'm surprised that they went with a London post house that made it necessary to wait 10 days for the IMAX film-outs to get there. Not that I am knocking the British, but to me it would have made sense to go with a primary post house that was in LA, just like the lab. Or perhaps they could have convinced a British film lab to do a special run of IMAX processing/FX for this movie.

 

 

 

Back to the topic of focus, it seems from the articles that the delayed focus pulling and the extremely shallow depth of field was indeed a stylistic decision, so I guess it is unfair to criticize the focus puller for doing his job, even if we don't particularly like the outcome. As long as the focus in the movie was *intentionally* done that way, and not an error, we can criticize the outcome, but not the poor puller ;)

[Max Jacoby]

Today at HMV I saw the beginning of the film on an HD screen and I did notice a big drawback to the 65mm Imax scenes: the Hasselblad lenses have a horrible 5 iris-bladed bokeh! Really does not look sexy at all, don't know who had the good idea to pack only 5 iris blades into these lenses. Arri used 7 for their rehoused 65mm Hasselblad lenses, that's much nicer already.

[K Borowski]

Today at HMV I saw the beginning of the film on an HD screen and I did notice a big drawback to the 65mm Imax scenes: the Hasselblad lenses have a horrible 5 iris-bladed bokeh! Really does not look sexy at all, don't know who had the good idea to pack only 5 iris blades into these lenses. Arri used 7 for their rehoused 65mm Hasselblad lenses, that's much nicer already.

 

I'm surprised that Hasselblad would make 5-bladed lenses. They're known for their high-quality glass.

 

Of course Max, you should be looking more at the areas that are in-focus, even if that is only the actor's left eye or their noses! ;)

 

How did you feel about the extremely shallow DOF in the IMAX shots?

 

I'm starting to think that the small maximum F/stops on my Mamiya RB lenses are a blessing rather than a curse, because I feel there is such a thing as too shallow DOF. I tend to be a Citizen Kane type myself. I life shooting at F/8-11 range for good DOF, wish I could afford to stop down to F/22-32, although I worry about distortion problems from stoping down that far.

[Max Jacoby]

I'm surprised that Hasselblad would make 5-bladed lenses. They're known for their high-quality glass.

Most of this glass has been around for a while and is from older lenses.

 

Of course Max, you should be looking more at the areas that are in-focus, even if that is only the actor's left eye or their noses! ;)

I know, talk about professional deformation! Can't help but count the edges on the out-of-focus highlights to find out which lenses they've used.

[K Borowski]

Most of this glass has been around for a while and is from older lenses.

 

 

I know, talk about professional deformation! Can't help but count the edges on the out-of-focus highlights to find out which lenses they've used.

 

Lol. Doing it in the first ten seconds of the movie is one thing, staring at OOF highlights the whole movie is another.

 

In any case, I didn't mind the bokeh at all, just the fact that the depth of field was too shallow, and it was rather jarring when they cut from 35mm DOF to IMAX and they mad such a huge difference in stop, even moreso than you'd see cutting from a normal to a zoom closeup.

[Max Jacoby]

In any case, I didn't mind the bokeh at all, just the fact that the depth of field was too shallow, and it was rather jarring when they cut from 35mm DOF to IMAX and they mad such a huge difference in stop, even moreso than you'd see cutting from a normal to a zoom closeup.

I'm surprised that people notice such a huge depth-of-field difference, 65mm and 35mm anamorphic are not that far apart. Certainly there is a bigger difference between anamorphic and spherical. But probably the increased resolution makes the depth-of-field more pronounced and the fall-off is likely faster too.

[Peter Moretti]

...

Back to the topic of focus, it seems from the articles that the delayed focus pulling and the extremely shallow depth of field was indeed a stylistic decision, so I guess it is unfair to criticize the focus puller for doing his job, even if we don't particularly like the outcome. As long as the focus in the movie was *intentionally* done that way, and not an error, we can criticize the outcome, but not the poor puller ;)

 

Hi Karl,

 

I read the articles and didn't catch the part about delaying the focus pulls, but I could have easily missed it ;). I'm not saying it wasn't a stylistic choice, I just found it odd it happened in only two scenes--for no clear (pun maybe intended) reason, IMHO.

 

... Well, I guess you could say it helped to convey the chaotic and mecurial nature of the Joker. I can buy that.

Edited July 25, 2008 by Peter Moretti

[John Holland]

Max 35mm anamorphic and 5 perf 65mm are very close but this is Imax 15perf so maybe people can see the difference ? . I havent seen it .

[K Borowski]

Hi Karl,

 

I read the articles and didn't catch the part about delaying the focus pulls, but I could have easily missed it ;). I'm not saying it wasn't a stylistic choice, I just found it odd it happened in only two scenes--for no clear (pun maybe intended) reason, IMHO.

 

... Well, I guess you could say it helped to convey the chaotic and mecurial nature of the Joker. I can buy that.

 

Peter: The article didn't say they delayed focus pulls; that was a speculation on my part as to why it happened, because I remember the shot where The Joker and his minions break into the party and it look like the focusing rack was done very slowly, deliberately.

 

 

 

@Max: I agree with John. 5-perf 65mm / 2 1/4 x 1 3/4"-sized negatives are much more similar in DOF characteristics to anamorphic than 15-perf. 65mm / 2 1/4 x 2 3/4" negatives, which are three times the size. Even shooting 35mm-stills, double the size of 4-perf, the difference between that and 2 1/4 x 2 3/4" negatives are pronounced. Also, I'd say that the increased negative size makes this DOF issue *more*, noticeable, because of the sharpness, rather than less-so.

 

Honestly, some of the shots looked like the F/0.7 stuff from the Barry Lyndon candlelight scenes they were so jarringly shallow.

[Scott Fritzshall]

I just am kind of surprised they wouldn't' shoot all of their plates in IMAX or at the very least Vistavision. I remember for the last Matrix movie, the ASC article said they had shot Vision Stocks in a still camera for plates of some of the cityscapes, and scanned at 4K, IIRC, citing these same objections I have for not shooting digital (although they did use DSLRs for some things).

We actually did use VistaVision; we spent about a month on rooftops shooting panoramic tiles. The VistaVision was then scanned at 6k and then assembled and chopped up.

 

For the still photos, what do you expect them to do? I believe they took several million photographs. I'm very much a proponent of film but when you're doing photography on that scale it's as much of a workflow issue as anything. They shot pretty much everything as HDR as well.

[K Borowski]

We actually did use VistaVision; we spent about a month on rooftops shooting panoramic tiles. The VistaVision was then scanned at 6k and then assembled and chopped up.

 

For the still photos, what do you expect them to do? I believe they took several million photographs. I'm very much a proponent of film but when you're doing photography on that scale it's as much of a workflow issue as anything. They shot pretty much everything as HDR as well.

 

So you were actually on the crew for "Dark Knight"? Pretty cool.

 

I expected they would use film for everything. Even HDR isn't as good. BTW, you can do HDR from film too, from a single frame, with 5 passes on the scanner with the analog gain set at different EVs for each pass.

[K Borowski]

I believe they took several million photographs.

 

This bothered me when I read it before, but I didn't give it any further though. Keep in mind that you can still take eight-thousand Vistavision-sized photographs from a thousand-foot roll of 35mm, or sixteen-thousand 4-perf frames. So that is 250 or 125 thousand-foot rolls, respectively, to generate two million photographs. That's a lot of film, to be sure, but it is certainly not beyond the film's budget to think that they could buy all of that film, and it's dwarfed by the amount of stock they must have used for IMAX and 35mm-movie photography.

 

IIRC, the last "Matrix" film had an article in ASC Magazine where the DP commented that the Kodak guy showed up with champaigne on the set after they hit a "million-foot" marker they were shooting so much slo-mo footage with multiple cameras for their bullet sequences, and I don't think it was one million feet, either.

Edited July 26, 2008 by Karl Borowski

[Tom Lowe]

I saw this for the 2nd time today, this time on a normal movie screen. To say that the movie "does not lose anything" going from IMAX to regular projection is not something I can agree with. The IMAX experience blew away the traditional screen experience, in my opinion.

 

I did not notice the massive DOF shifts from 35mm to 15/65 as much when I saw this on IMAX. But on a regular screen, with the aspect ratio cropped on the IMAX sequences, somehow I noticed the super-shallow DOF in the IMAX shots much more, and actually some of them even looked "soft," which is obviously a result of missed focus. You could see the focus puller trying to keep the action in focus during the IMAX sequences. For example, when the Joker takes over the mac truck, he leans around the driver and blows away a guy with a shotgun. Right in the middle of the take you could see a rack focus on the Joker. It was definitely interesting to try to pay attention to all these details!

 

Wonderful movie! And I stand by my assertion that what is very special about this movie was a GOOD VILLAIN, something Hollywood pictures have been sorely lacking.

[Chris Keth]

Wonderful movie! And I stand by my assertion that what is very special about this movie was a GOOD VILLAIN, something Hollywood pictures have been sorely lacking.

 

Better yet, TWO good villains! Two-Face was pretty wonderfully realized and I hope he's not dead.

[K Borowski]

Better yet, TWO good villains! Two-Face was pretty wonderfully realized and I hope he's not dead.

 

Talk about creepy makeup/CGI too! That effect of simulating 3rd degree burns down to the bone was utterly real-looking to me, and it was such good work that it was almost uncomfortable to watch him on screen.

 

If it weren't for the cheesy-looking CGI fire when the hospital got blown up that would have been the first movie I'd ever seen that had totally seamless CG.

[Scott Fritzshall]

This bothered me when I read it before, but I didn't give it any further though. Keep in mind that you can still take eight-thousand Vistavision-sized photographs from a thousand-foot roll of 35mm, or sixteen-thousand 4-perf frames. So that is 250 or 125 thousand-foot rolls, respectively, to generate two million photographs. That's a lot of film, to be sure, but it is certainly not beyond the film's budget to think that they could buy all of that film, and it's dwarfed by the amount of stock they must have used for IMAX and 35mm-movie photography.

 

IIRC, the last "Matrix" film had an article in ASC Magazine where the DP commented that the Kodak guy showed up with champaigne on the set after they hit a "million-foot" marker they were shooting so much slo-mo footage with multiple cameras for their bullet sequences, and I don't think it was one million feet, either.

Again, it's a workflow issue. You're technically correct that one could shoot millions of individual frames on VistaVision, but the on-set workflow would be extremely clumsy, especially when you've only got a 5-10 minute window in many cases to get the proper light. And the post workflow would be absurd and painful. It's very easy for you to say "well they've got the budget to do it all on film" but when you're actually doing it and you start putting all of the pieces together it's a different story. It's not only the costs of the film, it's also the costs of a slower on-set and post workflow. If they had skipped the dSLRs and just shot everything on VistaVision, our unit would probably have had to double or triple our shooting schedule, even with multiple cameras. And in post, DNeg has tools that can auto-stitch HDR panoramas. The time to scan millions of frames and tag them individually with their required metadata would add up there as well.

 

Yeah, film is still better, I know. As I said, I'm as much of a proponent of shooting film as anyone, but at this point with high-end dSLRs you're getting to the point where the difference is increasingly marginal. Combine this with the fact that they are so much quicker to work with, and you've got a very compelling argument. It's faster, it's cheaper, and you can argue that it's not as good but ultimately no one, including yourself, noticed which elements where shot on which format, so clearly it delivers in the quality department as well.

Edited July 28, 2008 by Scott Fritzshall

[K Borowski]

It's faster, it's cheaper, and you can argue that it's not as good but ultimately no one, including yourself, noticed which elements where shot on which format, so clearly it delivers in the quality department as well.

 

Sure it is, but we're talking about backround plates in front of which there was a very intense action scene taking place. I didn't notice it, but I wasn't *looking for it* either. It's just like Max's bokeh observations. Most of us don't notice because we are looking at what is *in* focus, not out-of-focus.

 

And with keycodes and slates, why is it so hard to keep track of frame information? They have data-backs for film cameras that record between the frames, you know. I'm sure there's even a scanner system that can read the information.

 

Just the way that I would do it. Doesn't make sense to me to shot 30 min. in IMAX and not even rise to the same level that a 5-y.o. Matrix movie did and shoot the background plates on film too.

Edited July 28, 2008 by Karl Borowski

[Ruairi Robinson]

Sure it is, but we're talking about backround plates in front of which there was a very intense action scene taking place. I didn't notice it, but I wasn't *looking for it* either. It's just like Max's bokeh observations. Most of us don't notice because we are looking at what is *in* focus, not out-of-focus.

 

And with keycodes and slates, why is it so hard to keep track of frame information? They have data-backs for film cameras that record between the frames, you know. I'm sure there's even a scanner system that can read the information.

 

Just the way that I would do it. Doesn't make sense to me to shot 30 min. in IMAX and not even rise to the same level that a 5-y.o. Matrix movie did and shoot the background plates on film too.

 

 

So you are suggesting they trade a semi-automated workflow for one that requires scanning and manual data entry across MILLIONS of images, even though you couldn't spot the difference in the end result?