Digital vs Film as it stands right now

[Tom Lowe]

I don't know, I still see the flames coming from one direction. Tom, you still haven't responded to direct comments at you above, yet you keep spitting out newer comments to try and support your position. So, please, respond to them else be listed as a troll and ignored.

 

What haven't I responded to? And I don't think you need to be threatening to label me a troll. :rolleyes:

[Jason Anderson]

...as if automobiles are simply evaluated by MPG figures and 0-60mph data...

 

I think we both agree at this point that this topic cannot be decided, but for ones self, and each individuals purposes, whether that be financially, or a directors vision that can only be rendered on film. Like one person said its like watching paint dry I now understand what he means.

 

Jason

[Paul Bruening]

Annie, honey, I wanna' get hammered with you!

[Annie Wengenroth]

Let's go! LET'S JUST SETTLE THIS RIGHT NOW...YOU TAKE AN HVX AND I'LL TAKE AN ARRIFLEX 16S AND WE'LL WAIT 5 YEARS AND SEE WHICH CAMERA IS STILL THE MOST AWESOME!11!

[Nate Downes]

Let's go! LET'S JUST SETTLE THIS RIGHT NOW...YOU TAKE AN HVX AND I'LL TAKE AN ARRIFLEX 16S AND WE'LL WAIT 5 YEARS AND SEE WHICH CAMERA IS STILL THE MOST AWESOME!11!

I'll one up you with a 1929 DeVry 35mm hand-cranked....

[Michael Lehnert]

I think we both agree at this point that this topic cannot be decided, but for ones self, and each individuals purposes, whether that be financially, or a directors vision that can only be rendered on film. Like one person said its like watching paint dry I now understand what he means.

 

Jason, it's even worse - it's like an avoidable car crash shot with 500fps...

 

I don't know if you ever actually bothered reading my posts (all here know that Tom did but he just seems to not being bothered, which I think is fair enough). If you did, however, you would have realised by now that I am not arguing for cine-film over video or video over cine-film!!!

I got sick and tired of these film vs video debates before you were born, and had vodka shoot-outs before Annie was able to spell ARRIFLEX ;) .

 

If you had made an effort to comprehend my points, then you would have understood that I am arguing about along which lines a debate on the pro and cons of cine-film and video as both a technical medium and an aesthetics medium can and should be made in a meaningful way - which is very much a reasonable thing to reflect on for everyone working behind or with a camera.

I try to move beyond the marketing blurbs that are increasingly governing the discourse unquestioned and unreflected by an increasingly easy-to-influence user group that either don't want to or are no longer able to question and critically reflect on what is presented to them.

 

Your attempt at coming to a conclusion based on "quantifiable and scientific" aspects, as you put it, by which you mean reducing the debate to latitude and resolution - incidentally the two aspects used to primarily define the technological advancement and ultimately superiority of digital video over cine-film - are valid, but not particularly revealing. That other aspects that are equally valid and not statistically or numerically quantifiable but are actually qualitative (i.e. artistic) parameters for deciding for a medium, are left out of consideration generally and here particularly, is both unreflected, and in the end unprofessional. That is what I argue for, and I did so by deconstructing the nonsensicality of the "quantifiable aspects" debate that you want to pursue from a historic angle - because I heard all those arguments about latitude and resolution years before, just on other levels, i.e. lower levels of resolution and latitude "beating" cine-film (as if "beating" is the issue at hand here?!)

 

So from your subtitle asking for assistance from the forum to figure out "as it stands now", I think your suggested methodology will only show you "how it stood over and over again", while I hoped to show you that there are means to access cinematographic decisionmakers that are, well, frankly, unscientific but artistic. And hell, I really can't remeber Erich von Stroheim or Stanley Kubrick talk linepairs per mm - yet both are the epitome of tech-savvy cinematographers - an approach I am very much a part of myself because there was once a time where you could talk techy-stuff without feeling like reading out spec sheets...

 

I am off now for Friday night. Best wishes,

 

-Michael

[Ruairi Robinson]

Here's a pretty good argument in favour of shooting digitally...

 

http://www.apple.com/trailers/paramount/th...benjaminbutton/

[Robert Houllahan]

Here's a pretty good argument in favour of shooting digitally...

 

 

Very Viper looking film, I personally like the viper and think it has nice color, they also shot some 35... There was a good article on studio daily (I think) about this picture and how with the viper they shot down and printed up where with film you would shoot up and print down... There are allot of ways to get somewhere and I don't think there is an argument here just a method..

 

-Rob-

[Jason Anderson]

I don't know if you ever actually bothered reading my posts

 

-Michael

 

Michael,

 

It would be rude not to, I even read a few twice and a couple three times. What you just stated below is what I wished you would have posted on your very first post. You certainly came off as cine-film nut who would not be moved, many refuse to even consider digital as movie making technology. I was short sighted to wish the forum would debate only in scientific quantities. I wanted to discuss scientific advances in both mediums, vision3 certainly is an amazing product, I have had the pleasure to shoot a couple of roles. The RED is the highest end digital I have come into contact with and thus, you can understand it has set the bar for what I know digital to be capable of. I wanted a scope of experience outside of the technology available to myself.

 

a debate on the pro and cons of cine-film and video as both a technical medium and an aesthetics medium can and should be made in a meaningful way - which is very much a reasonable thing to reflect on for everyone working behind or with a camera.

 

Jason

[Matthew W. Phillips]

Here's a pretty good argument in favour of shooting digitally...

 

http://www.apple.com/trailers/paramount/th...benjaminbutton/

 

The footage looks nice for digital acquisition. I personally find this to look better than any RED one footage I've seen, despite the RED having higher resolution.

 

I don't think this is a camera that many could afford to shoot on. I looked for rental rates and the lowest I found was $2000/day without glass and $3500/day with Digi-primes like what was used in your aforementioned example. At $3500/day, it is very feasible to shoot on 35mm instead. If this camera were more cost effective, I would defintely consider shooting on it.

[Tom Lowe]

The footage looks nice for digital acquisition. I personally find this to look better than any RED one footage I've seen, despite the RED having higher resolution.

 

I agree that this looks nice, and very clean, but wait until there are some major features shot on RED to make any comparisons.

 

The fact that Malick and Lubezki have been shooting at least some scenes for The Tree of Life on RED should be a wakeup call for the industry.

[Keith Walters]

Damnit Michael, I was going to say something along those lines!

 

Might I also add that there was a time when ALL of the scientists thought the Earth was flat. So much for authority, eh?

FACTOID ALERT!!!

That handy and often-quoted statement is unfortunately, complete bollocks. It appears to have originated in the largely fictionalized account of the voyages of Christopher Columbus, published by Washington Irving in 1829.

 

Most educated people in ancient times did not believe the Earth was flat.

 

The Greek Polymath Eratosthenes not only believed the earth was spherical, in about 250BC he was able to calculate its diameter (believed to be accurate to within 5%)! He did this by having simple measurements taken of the angles cast by shadows at midday on the same day at two points, one directly south of the other, several hundred miles apart. He realized that the distance between the two points would be like the crust on a slice of an Earth-sized pizza, with its pointed part cut to the difference between the two angles. All he needed to do then was calculate how many slices there could be in a circular Earth, and multiply that by the "crust" distance.

 

(We can't be absolutely sure of his exact result because he used an ancient unit of length called the "Stadium", and we only know it was about 1/10th of a mile). But there was nothing wrong with his reasoning.

 

This ranks up there with the old Betamax vs VHS "marketing triumphing over superior design" throwaway line, which remains one of the most refractory Urban Myths. The reality was that Betamax was a bastardized format developed from a earlier failed "Industrial" format. It barely worked (at least with videotapes available in the early 1970s) and VHS was simply designed to overcome its limitations. As the tapes improved, Betamax became more workable, unfortunately so did VHS.

[Keith Walters]

Okay, I couldn't resist...

 

The Film Vs. Digital Drinking Game:

 

Take a drink...

 

1. Every time somebody mentions resolution and how a "x"k scan "holds up just as well as film". Because, you know, you might as well "prove" that the sky is blue.

 

2. Any mention of the Red, Genesis, or HVX w/ 35mm adapter. If in conjunction with David Lynch or other "experimental" directors/projects, take two drinks.

 

3. Bonus shot if the phrase "apples and oranges" is used more than once.

 

4. If debating this with a first-year film student (no offense, guys, you know I love ya!) who just took Intro to Video, it's time to line up 3 Jager Bombs and knock em back while loudly proclaiming, "16MM WILL NEVER DIE! GOD BLESS THE BOLEX!" Then set a camcorder on fire!

 

5. If debating this with someone who works in a film processing/transfer lab, offer to buy the whole round because hey, in another 5 years, they might not have a job, right? I mean, if this is the way things are going? :P

 

6. And if you're talking to me, take a drink every time I either say the f-word or make some sort of grandiose statement about how when I have kids, I Want Them To Know What Film IS, Dammit!

 

7. For every citation of 1) the latest American Cinematographer article, 2) a brochure you saw at NAB, 3) that guy you talked to in the sales department of Panasonic.

 

8. Bonus rounds if the following artists are mentioned: Monet, Cezanne, Seurat, Jasper Johns.

 

....That's really all I have to say about this... ;)

For every spelling mistake that a 3rd grader should be ashamed of: "Gimme a Scotch, I'm starving!"

(Not you Annie, your English skills are beyond reproach:-)

[Matthew W. Phillips]

FACTOID ALERT!!!

That handy and often-quoted statement is unfortunately, complete bollocks. It appears to have originated in the largely fictionalized account of the voyages of Christopher Columbus, published by Washington Irving in 1829.

 

Most educated people in ancient times did not believe the Earth was flat.

 

The Greek Polymath Eratosthenes not only believed the earth was spherical, in about 250BC he was able to calculate its diameter (believed to be accurate to within 5%)! He did this by having simple measurements taken of the angles cast by shadows at midday on the same day at two points, one directly south of the other, several hundred miles apart. He realized that the distance between the two points would be like the crust on a slice of an Earth-sized pizza, with its pointed part cut to the difference between the two angles. All he needed to do then was calculate how many slices there could be in a circular Earth, and multiply that by the "crust" distance.

 

(We can't be absolutely sure of his exact result because he used an ancient unit of length called the "Stadium", and we only know it was about 1/10th of a mile). But there was nothing wrong with his reasoning.

 

This ranks up there with the old Betamax vs VHS "marketing triumphing over superior design" throwaway line, which remains one of the most refractory Urban Myths. The reality was that Betamax was a bastardized format developed from a earlier failed "Industrial" format. It barely worked (at least with videotapes available in the early 1970s) and VHS was simply designed to overcome its limitations. As the tapes improved, Betamax became more workable, unfortunately so did VHS.

 

Keith, did you even read my post??? I said "there was a time when..." Where do you get that I said any particular time? If you study it, you will find that prior to the Golden Age, it was commonly believed that the Earth was flat. I don't recall saying that people thought the Earth was flat after the Golden Age...if I said that, please quote me.

 

Keith, sometimes I think you get ahead of yourself. ;)

[Max Jacoby]

The fact that Malick and Lubezki have been shooting at least some scenes for The Tree of Life on RED should be a wakeup call for the industry.

Let's first see how much of the footage ends up in the actual film. With Malick you never know, just ask Lukas Haas, Viggo Mortensen, Jason Patric, Bill Pullman, Mickey Rourke, Martin Sheen, Billy Bob Thornton et al.

 

I agree with DJ Joffa, as much as I love Days of Heaven and The Thin Red Line, The New World was nothing to write home about. Unfortunately Malick doesn't get it right all the time, but then again, who does?

[Robert Houllahan]

The fact that Malick and Lubezki have been shooting at least some scenes for The Tree of Life on RED should be a wakeup call for the industry.

 

 

Iron Man:

 

From the numbers:

 

Theatrical Performance

Total US Gross $300,785,869

International Gross $250,200,000

Worldwide Gross $550,985,869

 

Production Budget $186,000,000

 

 

Who said the "industry" wanted to wake up?

 

4-perf, 3-perf and 2-perf/Super16 are the most dumbed down, lowest quality forms of film origination and all d-cine camera systems struggle to technically match that weak target.

 

The Viper is drastically inferior to todd-ao why would you want to use that? and with the disk recorder it's as heavy or heavier than a 765? what a drag. Instant playback on set? or it's own look? can you point me to the specs that describe how the camera makes that look? should be identical to the 950 according to the specs...

 

 

Vista-Vision, oh that is for plates and special shots... except when Hitch has it for every shot in a brilliant show. Good thing he is dead and there is nobody to replace him.

 

Todd-Ao 2.20 65mm well nobody is crazy enough to use that, that is for Dinosaurs like Lean and Kubrick, how could you even consider the costs of that. Or even worse using 15 perf Imax for a film like the new Batman.

 

Just remember that the economics of the origination medium are completely insignificant on a big show and film is a cloth and all you have to do is cut more of it, http://www.gigapxl.org/ 44K x 88K so what?

 

Oh Taxi driver 125iso(?) pushed 2 or 3 with crap cameras, technically junk by todays standards in every way, except everyone will remember it and it will live on for at least hundreds of years and resonate.

 

Why are Imax shots scanned at "only" 8K ? because scanning has limits and it's own noise problems plus data grows exponentially maxing out computer infrastructure.

 

Face it there are allot of ways to skin a cat, and make it into Gen. Tso's cat.. Pissing wars just get everybody covered in piss Is the fu*k*ng paint dry yet? really is it?

 

-Rob-

[Peter Moretti]

The main arguement for digital is that you are going to make a 4K DI scan anyway, so why not just eliminate the telecine machine and go straight to the ones and zeros.

 

The chink in this arguement is that film does things a sensor can't. Digital's retort is all that can be added in post. Film's repsonse is not yet. Digital's reponse is close enough. Film's response is not really. Digital's repsonse is the public doesn't notice the difference. Film's reponse is they can, and even if they can't, I don't just work for the public, I work for the art. Digital's response is we're artists too. To which film says:

 

Film

You're an artist? What's your name?

 

Digital

Henry. I just moved to LA from Chicago to become a DP.

 

Film

Good for you. I have a meeting to go to now.

 

 

ALTERNATE SCENE

Film

You're an artist? What's your name?

 

Digital

Hillary, I just moved from Ireland and I love Kurosawa and Greg Toland.

 

Film

So, do you want to be a DP?

 

Digital

Well my friends say I'm so pretty I should be an actress, but I really want to be a cinematographer. I really like the Red, it's so awesome.

 

Film

(Swallowing hard.)

Um, there may be an application for that camera in my next project. Mainly the effects work, but we'll see. Shall we try matching formats?

 

Digital

(Smiles with delight.)

I'd love too. Thanks so much!

Edited June 21, 2008 by Peter Moretti

[Keith Walters]

If you study it, you will find that prior to the Golden Age, it was commonly believed that the Earth was flat.

Study what? There was never any such time.

 

It's obvious to anybody with 25% of a brain and not living in an Amazonian rain forest that the Earth is not flat, how else would you explain the fact that as things move further away, they drop out of sight, only to reappear as they get closer again. Or the fact that if you climb a tall tree or a hill, you can see them again.

 

People may not have known that the Earth was a sphere but they would have no reason to think it was flat. However because the sun and moon are both round, it would have been a fair bet that the Earth was too.

[David Rakoczy]

He sits enthroned above the [circle of the earth], and its people are like grasshoppers. He stretches out the heavens like a canopy, and spreads them out like a tent to live in. - Isaiah 40:22

[Tom Lowe]

Let's first see how much of the footage ends up in the actual film. With Malick you never know, just ask Lukas Haas, Viggo Mortensen, Jason Patric, Bill Pullman, Mickey Rourke, Martin Sheen, Billy Bob Thornton et al.

 

Of course.

 

I agree with DJ Joffa, as much as I love Days of Heaven and The Thin Red Line, The New World was nothing to write home about. Unfortunately Malick doesn't get it right all the time, but then again, who does?

 

Blasphemy! :o

 

Back to the OP...

 

Film's final stand will be fought with its dynamic range.

 

One thing that sort of baffles me is this love of grain. If grain is so important to people, why not just use an algorithm to add random grain noise that would be indistinguishable from actual grain? Grain is, in fact, random.

[John Holland]

Grain adds to [ sharpness] which we arnt getting from Kodaks new stocks and of course any sort of Video ,HD DI's etc .

[David Mullen ASC]

Grain in the origination process has the advantage of being a random collection of photosites that are in different positions for each frame, thus there is no aliasing issue as with a sensor with a fixed pattern of photosites.

 

That's a different issue of course than the texture of grain.

[Dan Goulder]

The fact that Malick and Lubezki have been shooting at least some scenes for The Tree of Life on RED should be a wakeup call for the industry.

Wakeup call? They'll be hitting the snooze button, instead. A 35mm film with a few digital inserts hardly qualifies as a "wakeup call".

[Tom Lowe]

Wakeup call? They'll be hitting the snooze button, instead. A 35mm film with a few digital inserts hardly qualifies as a "wakeup call".

 

It's the people involved, baby. :D Malick and Lubezki are high priests of film, and Malick is as close to a purest as you are going to get. They have to point a gun at his head to get him to even use artificial electric lighting.

Edited June 21, 2008 by Tom Lowe

[Michael Lehnert]

One thing that sort of baffles me is this love of grain. If grain is so important to people, why not just use an algorithm to add random grain noise that would be indistinguishable from actual grain? Grain is, in fact, random.

 

:blink:

 

---Hmm, John and David were quicker here... ah well---

 

:mellow:

 

Sometimes I really wonder...

 

It's not the film v video debate itself, which is as old as video, and really hasn't moved on over a quarter of a century, apart from the hardware specs and names upgraded...

 

?? my film group heavily invested into video in the 1990s and almost trashed all cine-tools. Luckily, we didn't as all the extremely expensive video equipment then deemed to replace cine-film once and for all is totally obsolete now and really can't be used for any project, while the dusted-off cine-gear propulsed us with one new piece of glass and software (i.e. film stock) and advances in scanning technology (which of course defines the frontiers of the current digital debate - but for people to comprehend that, it would take many more moments of enlightment, I fear) into the "high definition and beyond" age (whatever that means) ??

 

...it's precisely this odd mixture one can find in Tom's reasoning above...

 

...featuring a technocratic verve to pin down all aspects deemed relevant for image acquisistion in a "scientific quantifiable" spec-sheet-reader way all the while being blatantly oblivious to how the organic, qualitative elements are actually underpinning the entire cinematographic origination and creation process...

 

...that really starts to get to me...

 

...these constituents of many a pointless 'cause dim-witted and half-educated exchanges one can mostly find in the RED user subforum here that end with debating Ultra-High-Definition 3D E-Cinema as currently planned in some ultra-secret NHK tech think-tank which will finally push IMAX out of old-fashioned 65mm origination and adopting "digital" (as if "digital" is a medium by itself ... it's a process!).

 

THIS, dear Jason, was the reason why I argued from my post one (which, I must stress, was as clearly stating that as my last one) and not just from my very last post (as you suggested, despite kindly reading through my scribble repeatedly) that people should now really start to think first about the lines along which they argue, critically reflect on and technically comprehend what statements they actually put forward and not just buy into -yes, it's a cliche but cannot the stressed enough today- the digital-video-manufacturers' marketing-driven and sales-oriented definers of the argumentative framework of today.

 

Well, so much for arguing qualitatively. Let's return to counting linepairs per mm and f-stop ranges, while texture, tonality, layering, gamut, structuration, the principle of capturing light and mechanic aspects of capturing motion remain left out, let alone thinking from an realistic economic point of view of film production. Kodak really has to start arguing pro-actively for its products and not remain defensive in merely reacting to argumentative parameters brought forward by its competition. Otherwise, what I said in my first post here will indeed become true.

 

At least we have Keith here who entertains us with his quick-search wikipedia knowledge - even though he believes Oscar Wilde was a pedophile :rolleyes: .

 

A nice week-end to all,

 

-Michael