85 Needed?

[Jon Rosenbloom]

For a super-16mm short, I'm thinking about shooting a 90% daylight script on 200T, skipping the 85 filter on the camera, and just "fixing" the blue on the spirit in post. I'm guessing that the 200t has slightly finer grain than 250d, but it's still just fast enough for me to feel secure near the end of the day. An ASC member suggested this approach to me, and I really like the idea, but I still have a nagging worry about sacrificing some bit of exposure perfection if I don't use the 85. Any thoughts?

[John Pytlak RIP]

For a super-16mm short, I'm thinking about shooting a 90% daylight script on 200T, skipping the 85 filter on the camera, and just "fixing" the blue on the spirit in post. I'm guessing that the 200t has slightly finer grain than 250d, but it's still just fast enough for me to feel secure near the end of the day. An ASC member suggested this approach to me, and I really like the idea, but I still have a nagging worry about sacrificing some bit of exposure perfection if I don't use the 85. Any thoughts?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Always better to shoot with the recommended filtration, unless you want the "look" of not having used the filter. It's a subtle change, unless you significantly underexpose, which can result in colored shadows. Using the correct filtration keeps the entire tone scale neutral. It's when you underexpose or overexpose and place scene information off the "straight line" of the film's characteristic that the mismatch in color will really start to show if you don't filter correctly.

 

The Kodak VISION2 250D Color Negative Film 7205 has very fine grain structure, and actually would be a much better choice than using 200T with no filtration. Remember, a tungsten balance film needs to have a relatively fast blue sensitive emulsion, with larger grains than the equivalent daylight balance film.

[Robert Hughes]

I understand that the problem you would run into, if any, is that the blue layer would be overexposed relative to the other layers and you would lose sensitivity in the blue highlights or red shadows.

 

Try it on a sunny day and let us know how it turns out.

[David Mullen ASC]

I'd say that the grain structure between '17 200T and '05 250T is so close as to be a non-issue, so if you want a daylight-balanced image and have no need for a tungsten-balanced stock as well, why not use Vision-2 250D instead?

 

But if you need to use the same stock for both daylight and tungsten-balance, then you can shoot with the 200T with no 85B and get decent results, although since it's non-standard, you may find some small side-effects (less color in faces, perhaps more blue-ish UV haze, etc.) I've done it myself and certainly you can usually correct the image without worry. If you don't mind some glass, however, I'd at least recommend the LLD filter instead of using nothing, since it has a UV component and you don't have to adjust for any filter factor.