Shooting wiht reversal 5285

[Corey Jennings]

Im about to shoot a short and I am using 5285 for the dream sequences. Does anyone have experience with this stock and could you give me some advice?

[K Borowski]

Have you ever shot E6 film before? Or any type of slide or reversal process?

 

I'd recommend you get a 35mm SLR, buy a roll of E100VS, 5085 at the store (same exact stock for still use) and shoot people with it using similar lighting. This will give you a feel of the way that the highlights and shadows blow out and block up much more rapidly than on negative film. It's almost like bypassing the negative and having the same or even less latitude than print stock to work with up front.

 

So, in other words, if you don't meter right, and are off by any more than a stop, you can't "fix it in post".

 

At the same time, E6 films are great. The grain is finer and sharper for the given speed, and this particular stock has an incredibly high level of saturation (VS stands for "vivid saturation"), grainier than E100G, its neutral-colored cousin, but with much higher dynamic range & contrast than you'd get from any of the ECN-2 stocks.

 

In the future, questions of this type should probably be queried in the "Film Stocks & Processing" Subforum, not here. And please search first, as this is at least the fifth time I've answered this particular question :P

[Ira Ratner]

Karl, you made an interesting point which made me think of this question:

 

All color reversals typically have a one-stop tolerance at the MOST. And overexposure has always been worse than underexposure, because the over loses everything.

 

But nowadays, with digital post production, can't you DRAMATICALLY fix exposure problems--especially for a DREAM sequence? Hell, the screwed up initial exposure might ultimately yield the desired and perfect result.

 

Know what I mean? Just working with still images in Photoshop, it's amazing the data that's still there that only has to be brought out digitally. It's not like the old days where what you see is all you'll get.

 

Again--just asking. Film is film and digital is digital, but even with film, just because you don't initially see it with the naked eye, does that necessarily mean the data isn't still there to digitally bring out?

Edited August 1, 2008 by Ira Ratner

[Adrian Sierkowski]

Well, Ira, with neg film, sure, or with a RAW file. But, I too have experienced the problems of Reversal. Normally I give it a 3 stop range, about 2 stops under will still have some detail, and up to about a stop over. This is on the Kodak Elite Chrome 400 which I really love.

When I scan up one of these still slide on the Nikon scanner, there really isn't too much I can bring out (noting if over-exposed) and if under-exposed, I can maybe get a bit of something. . but normally it's just pure black. Or so has been my experience.

 

That being the case, I LOVE ELITE CHROME! I'm not sure, but is there a 16mm stock like it?

[XiaoSu Han]

as far as i know elite chrome is more or less the same as ektachrome, just not stored as well and kept refrigerated all the time, more the "consumer" variant of it.

 

as for motion picture stock like a 400 iso positive film? i don't think there is something like this

Edited August 2, 2008 by XiaoSu Han

[Adrian Sierkowski]

I didn't realize they were so similar. 400 asa I know I'm dreaming; but i"ll definitively have to check out ektachrome