DEBS

Mark Allen · April 3, 2005

Our much revered David Mullen shot this movie and has indicated that the lighting choices were not his inclination, but rather the directorial decision - so I don't really want to talk about that aspect.

i would, however, like to address the HD to 35mm issue from a technical evaluation (or more accurately an aesthetic evaluation).

These were my impressions. There were shots and maybe even scenes where if you told me it was 35mm, I wouldn't have questioned you because it had a nice wide dynamic range. There were also shots where the skin looked very blotchy and the range looked absent. In particular I'm thinking about the first time the star DEBS drive to the school. It looked like it was a really bad key - but I don't think it was a key.

Now - I'm wondering if this happened during post production or was it a limitation of the exterior environment?

I have to say the keying work was just awful. I'm not sure what the cause of this was. I did note some very amateur give aways (like the complete abuse of lightwraping in one scene) - if the same people did the color correcting, the skin tones would make sense.

I do notice also that I sort of like the lack of grain (other than the grain from the release print).

I also noticed that when characters were more distant from the camera, they seemed a little be out of focus. Up close, there was a sharpness - but further away they seemed - NOT out of focus - but just hard to focus on.

Those were my thoughts.

I'd love to hear some insights from David in particular - but would be interested in other people's perceptions as well.

David Mullen ASC · April 3, 2005

There was one scene in the classroom where a decision was made on the spot (when seeing the final set) to erase the set and replace it in post, so almost every shot is rotoscoped by hand to remove the background.

I also had one scene in a big school lobby where I had to balance with a bright sunny background just when the generator died, so it was quickly re-lit with a handheld HMI spotted on the actress as we steadicamed through the lobby. Not a great solution but the alternative was to let the background blow-out severely.

As for the rest of the keying, I think it's partly just the problem of using HDCAM as a recording format for keys, but also the problem of using high-key glamor lighting that doesn't allow you to realistically match the people to the lighting in the background (although many times the background was CGI.)

I also think the high-key artificial lighting when combined with a high-contrast color-saturated correction creates that unrealistic impression regarding fleshtones, but in some ways, the plasticy, shiney, colorful HD look was what was desired.

Mark Allen · April 3, 2005

Well, you nailed the classroom scene. I figured something had to be wrong there because that was bad. Knowing now that it was rotoscoped, I understand. Being a guy with a visfx background I shutter to think of seeing that come to my company.

Here would be my question for you, David. Northfork seems to be the movie that you've done which really catches people's attention for lighting. How do you think the HD would have responded had this been the lighting style? And I mean once it hits the projection screen more than just on HD monitors.

Rik Andino · April 3, 2005

Hey Mark, did you like the movie?

Or did you only go to see it to see the how HD looked projected on 35mm?

Mark Allen · April 3, 2005

Hey Mark, did you like the movie?
Or did you only go to see it to see the how HD looked projected on 35mm?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I only went to see the movie to see how it looked. I am a pretty harsh critic on movies, my producer always asks me "Seen any movies you hated lately?" And I expected this movie to be near the bottom of the barrel especially since I don't think I'm the demographic it's intended for.

That said, it actually had a lot more charm than I was expecting and the experience was not painful. It was very silly, very playful, never took itself seriously and had enough "saturday night live" style sense of humor gags which made me smirk. I think from a technical stand point it was a little sloppy. I don't agree with the director's use of camera and lighting, I think the sound mix was a little whacked with the songs getting way too loud over the rest of the movie, the effects and compositing seemed a little weak, the editing was often overactive (cuttinng back and forth needlessly). The best thing the movie has going for it is cute, charming girls, a great male lead performance by Jimmi Simpson (watch for him in the future), and mostly just a silly, stupid, irreverent sense of goofey humor sort of like Napoleon Dynamite meets a saturday morning cartoon which is definitely coming from the writing/directing.

Would I recommend it? No, but I'm sure it has it's audience and I do understand why this director was picked for Herbie.

David Mullen ASC · April 4, 2005

It's a good question -- what would "Northfork" had looked like if shot in HD? -- that I can't answer. Certainly it would have looked DIFFERENT, even if I went for the same desatured widescreen look.

It would be nice to shoot more dramatic HD features where the care into production design, moody lighting, locations, etc. matched "Northfork" so I could find out... On the other hand, perhaps HD is better reserved for those dialogue-heavy comedies where I need to burn a lot of footage to cover the scenes and it all plays out in close-up mostly, I don't know.

I'm currently doing this 4:4:4 HD digital intermediate for "Shadowboxer" using the Spirit as the scanner and a tricked-out DaVinci for color-correction, and other than the unfortunate resolution hit from downrezzing 35mm anamorphic to 1920 x 1080 pixels (we're using the whole 16x9 frame for the 2.35 image, by the way), all I can say is that shooting 35mm color negative and transferring to HD seems even better than shooting HD to begin with. An HD scan can't really resolve the grain differences between the fast and slow stocks I used so everything looks clean and fine-grained (of course, it would be better to be working at a resolution that could resolve those differences...) But the main advantage is the tremendous exposure range on color negative combined with working with a full range of colors in HD, compared to the more limited exposure latitude, subsampled colors, and compression of shooting in HDCAM.

But truthfully, the thing is that I really enjoy shooting in HD and hopefully will find the right projects for that format, whatever that is. Or be shooting in better HD formats and cameras someday...

As for the technical sloppiness of "D.E.B.S.", it is partly just the result of trying to do a big-budget action-comedy movie without enough of a budget, so you are rushed everyday on the set trying to cram in all those scenes. It was a very ambitious film in a different way than "Northfork" was. The surreal, open-ended nature of the "Northfork" story lent itself to taking advantage of the difficult weather conditions in Montana, and it was not a film that needed a heavy shot count at the end of each day. Plus it was a "photographic" subject.

Originally when I signed on to shoot "D.E.B.S." I thought the idea was to make it more like a slick Jerry Bruckheimer macho action film but with young girls in short skirts instead of Bruce Willis (maybe that was my male prejudice at work); but ultimately the director saw it more as a cheerful, pop-art romantic comedy with attractive people who happened to be doing action scenes. So ultimately I found myself doing this old-fashioned high-key comedy-romance lighting style, which in itself was not a bad idea in terms of making women look good, but it puts tremendous pressure on the art direction if that much light is going to be shown at it. So if the colorful art direction is not better, the look becomes tacky rather than pop-arty if you're not careful. Plus I sort of felt that we should be alternating between these two lighting styles more (moody Bruckheimer action versus high-key romantic comedy) but ultimately we veered very little from the high-key look. I did my best with the time we had, considering we still had a lot of action to shoot, but considering bright lighting is not my cup-of-tea, unless I am emulating some classic studio-era movie, perhaps I wasn't the right DP for this project. I don't know -- I still am trying to figure out in my head how one can light in that style and make it look attractive and not tacky and overlit. This is one reason I think art direction plays such a vital factor, not that I want to disparage the production designer on "D.E.B.S." who also had a lot to deliver for very little money.

Mark Allen · April 4, 2005

But truthfully, the thing is that I really enjoy shooting in HD and hopefully will find the right projects for that format, whatever that is. Or be shooting in better HD formats and cameras someday...

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Perhaps suggesting the Genesis for your next project?

I've got two movies this year. One as director and one as co-producer and at the moment it looks like both are going to be shot 35mm and finished HD.

The last time I did this method, we did the telecine such that we kept all the information from the negative onto the HD - eventhough it wasn't the look I was going for - I just did a batch adjustment once captured.

How is the process you are using different than this? Are you actually scanning to digital files in HD res or are you telecine'ing to a d5 format? Is the scanning real time? Is the cost in the same range?

David Mullen ASC · April 4, 2005

We did a flat transfer from film to 4:4:4 HDCAM-SR and that's what we are grading. The only twist is that they applied some sort of LUT to the HD monitor to simulate something of the look it will have on film in terms of contrast, so the monitor image has an automatic contrast boost to the flat scan. Not sure of the point (except to keep me from making the grade too contrasty) but I'll be taking the corrected tapes to Technique in NYC soon to look at it there. And we'll do some film-out tests.

The trick is that the director wants me to match the overly contrasty and over-saturated, chroma-clipped look of the original NTSC DVD dailies and his reaction to earlier tests that I was not involved with is that the HD and film-outs don't look like the DVD's, and that disappointed him. So on the one hand, I'm trying to goose-up the image a little to create that saturated look, but I'm also trying to get him used to the idea that colors just look differently on film compared to a CRT monitor with the color cranked up.

Eric Steelberg ASC · April 4, 2005

It's certainly nice of you, David, to come home from a long day of shooting to sit on the computer and share your experiences, good and bad. I think set stories and issues you run into and the solutions you come up with provide an incredibly valuable learning tool for the members and guests of this site.

Edited April 4, 2005 by Eric Steelberg

David Mullen ASC · April 4, 2005

I also want to add that my working relationship with the director of "D.E.B.S." was one of the most pleasant ones I have ever had. A good person to be in the trenches with, so to speak.

April 4, 2005

I'd be most interested to learn whether Angela Robinson and yourself viewed the original short DEBS made a year prior for inspiration- or was this feature remake all from scratch? Did you convserse with the DP Kristian Bernier of the original short to learn from his experiences and approaches to making the film? Why didn't Bernier shoot the feature remake? From what I've seen, his work on the original was competent enough and he's an accomplished DP in his own right. What was it like filling his shoes and how did Robinson feel?

It's interesting but from the images I have seen of both the short and the feature, it appears that the feature was shot with a very rugged, naturalisitic lighting style on the finer detailed 35mm, while the remake feature went for a more overtly constructed aesthetic, and on HD too! What were Robinson's reasons for such a clearly marked out visual betrayal of the original short? Did this reflect in the comparitive directorial styles of both pictures?

Interesting to see the composer, Steven Stern, remained present on both projects.

I am definitely going to check this movie out, not just because David shot it and it's pushing the HD envelope, but also because of the approach to the apparent gay and lesbian commentary it and the original short are getting praised for (even if the trailers suggest it's pushing the movment back by 50 years via the repulsive Powerpuff Girls brand of post modern kitsch- foolish fetishised little doll-like airheads for a very straight demograph). The fact that after completing this Angela Robinson signed her soul to a desperate Disney reinvention sequel leaves me rightfully with a huge amount of pessimism.

On a crowd-pleasing note to forum regulars, Roger Ebert observes an apparent Toland homage! :) My first guess is it's David's influence:

I note in passing that the movie quotes accurately from the famous shot in "Citizen Kane" where the camera moves straight up past the catwalks, drops, ropes and pulleys above a stage. For me, that shot was like the toy in a box of Cracker-Jack: Not worth much, but you're glad they put it in there.

Ebert's Review

Edited April 4, 2005 by fstop

David Mullen ASC · April 5, 2005

Both the short and the feature were shot in HDCAM. The main difference was that I pushed for the feature to be framed for 2.35.

Kristian Bernier wasn't available for the feature which is why I got called -- I had shot the short film "Stuck" (in 35mm anamorphic) for the same producer, different director. Plus I had HD experience.

The short film was shot in softer lighting with some mild ProMist diffusion, but when I did these same things in the lighting & make-up tests (some filmed out), the determination was that the unfiltered image looked sharper on the big screen (of course) and they (producers and director) preferred it, so I only rarely snuck in a light Soft-FX for a few of the most romantic moments. As for lighting, I did my best beauty soft-lighting, but the response to the test was that it looked too naturalistic. So I tested an old-fashioned over-the-lens Obie-light key with unmotivated hot backlights and that's the only thing that got a positive response. I was just surprised to find out as we made the movie that the entire feature was going to be lit that way, not just selected moments. And as you noticed, the short was not shot in that style, but more realistically. Maybe my high-key glamour lighting was more what she always wanted even for the short, or maybe her tastes changed since the short was made, I don't know. I know that the concept of the short was to parody an action TV show while the concept of the feature was to parody an action movie, which is why initially I thought I'd be doing a moodier version of the short, not a brighter, poppier version. But it all comes down to priorities and glamorizing the leads was the main one.

I remember one discussion I had was about how my shots were turning out darker than the short film's scenes, and I kept getting requests to throw more light on everything -- but I pointed out that almost every scene in the short is set during the daytime and almost every scene in the feature script was set at night for some reason. Perhaps that was a budgetary reason in the short but the net result was that I was always explaining why it was hard to make the giant warehouse at night look as lit-up as the same location did in the short film shot in daylight with big skylights... I sort of had to abandon my notions of motivated light sources at night, which was hard. It even extended to scenes set in a bedroom at night with all the lights turned out and scenes described in the script as "shadowy" or that the villian was "silhouette" -- when I came to shooting those scenes, again the request from the HD video village was for more light, more exposure, frontal key lighting, etc. and me trying to maintain some feeling for night.