sharpening in 2k DI?

[Bruce Greene]

For years I've shot still photographs on film and scanned them with a film scanner and have almost always added "unsharp mask" to images to add some punch to the images. Not to the point where it looks electronic, but it seems to compensate for the film scanner even though I scan at 4000 ppi for 6x9cm negatives.

 

This week I've been supervising a DI and keep feeling like the image is a little lifeless, lacking in resolution. This feeling is compounded by the process of color correcting on a 1k proxy, but I still get the feeling when looking at the frames in 2k on a fairly large projection.

 

So my question: Has anyone had experience adding "detailing" or "sharpening" to a film DI as a routine step?

 

I'm only interested in adding a tiny bit, but am nervous about getting a surprise when the movie is output to film and printed and shown on a big screen.

[michael brierley]

I have just finished grading a film and some of the B camera footage was slightly off/out of focus. I asked the colourist to electronically sharpen one of the shots and it looked slightly better, ie it bought the shot slightly back into focus (had to do it. it was a key moment in the film, and it was no good soft).

We are printing out on Premier and projected, the images have a nice shine to them, but I have to agree that images look slightly lifeless on 2k DI.

Cant help thinking that a traditional photochemical finnish would have looked better.

 

Michael Brierley

DP