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Strange flare effect


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Dir: Chris Cunningham

dp: James Hawkinson

grup:Aphex Twin

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Squarepsuher

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Alex Barber

 

 

this two videoclips have same (or close) effects. it's like horizontal line with colors of flare....

Im interested how they made it. With filters or just using close focus optics with counter lighting?

 

or or, just computer?

Edited by 435
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Guest Kai.w
Dir: Chris Cunningham

dp: James Hawkinson

grup:Aphex Twin

Windowlciker

 

Squarepsuher

Come on my selector

Alex Barber

this two videoclips have same (or close) effects. it's like horizontal line with colors of flare....

Im interested how they made it. With filters or just using close focus optics with counter lighting?

 

or or, just computer?

 

Some of it looks like real flares but comped over the footage in a computer...

 

I once shot some flares on black and still have it as my personal library, which I use everynow and then... though I do need some more <_<

 

 

-k

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Dir: Chris Cunningham

dp: James Hawkinson

grup:Aphex Twin

Windowlciker

 

Squarepsuher

Come on my selector

Alex Barber

this two videoclips have same (or close) effects. it's like horizontal line with colors of flare....

Im interested how they made it. With filters or just using close focus optics with counter lighting?

 

or or, just computer?

Sounds like you're describing anamorphic lens flare, although it would be easier to identify if you post a link.

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I can't see the clip but it too sounds anamorphic. I have noticed with MINIDV a whole new set of lens flares occur that are not present with 35 or 16mm films.

 

Lens flares are usefull for they give us a kind of reflective point that takes us back into ourselves. I would theorize the following. In Photoshop you alter the flares of one or 3 images and process it with a distortion filter. Use this as a enhancing agent

over the original footage, streched to fit the clip.Today I believe you can run that clip through a special effect generator that makes an altered still image live for placing where ever you want it. LiveType is the one program I have but there are others.

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Primo anamorphics flare, don't they? The Life Aquatic had some pretty nice flares, and it was shot on Primos at T8 most of the time, I believe.

 

The strong flare on music videos is usually from shooting wide open or thereabouts, no?

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Primo anamorphics flare, don't they?  The Life Aquatic had some pretty nice flares, and it was shot on Primos at T8 most of the time, I believe.

 

The strong flare on music videos is usually from shooting wide open or thereabouts, no?

 

Sure, Primo anamorphics get a blue horizontal flare like all front-anamorphic primes (some like the C-series have a less blue tint to the line) -- the f-stop doesn't really affect it, only how bright the light is that shines into the lens.

 

What the f-stop affects is depth of field -- at very wide apertures, more of the image is out-of-focus and takes on that vertically-stretchy distorted look.

 

I was on rec.arts.movies.tech and someone was claiming that the old Todd-AO anamorphics didn't have any of those distortions, but I found these examples from "Logan's Run" that show them:

 

logansrun1.jpg

 

logansrun2.jpg

 

logansrun4.jpg

 

With newer anamorphics, you don't get the red oval ring in addition to the blue horizontal line. The horizontal one comes from light spreading across the surface of the cylindrical anamorphic lens element, and I assume the blue tint comes from the coating. The red ring is actually a circular ring from an uncoated spherical element over the squeezed image coming from the anamorphic element -- when the image is stretched to look normal, the red ring on the film looks like a flattened oval.

 

This is what the image looks like on film:

 

logansrun7.jpg

 

You can see that the spherical flares are circular. It's only because the projector lens stretches this out by twice horizontally that the rings become ovals.

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The f-stop could affect flares in that it makes the light shining into the lens brighter, though, right? I mean, a practical at T2 would register signifcantly brighter than at T8. Or does the fact that the anamorphic element is before the iris make the flare the same no matter what?

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David's example frame grabs made me curious if I could produce something even remotely similar using the Century Optics anamorphic lens adaptor I have for my Sony DSR-250 camcorder.

 

The image named "16_9_ana_blue_grab_5.jpg" was created using a small flashlight aimed into the anamorphic adapter.

 

 

Just for fun, the image named "16_9_ana_blue_red_grab_8.jpg" was created using a red laser pointer in addition to the small flashlight aimed into the anamorphic adapter.

 

 

This last image named "4_3_grab_9.jpg" was created using the small flashlight alone aimed into the lens of the camera _without_ the anamorphic adapter attached.

 

 

When the anamorphic adapter was removed from the camera (as in the 3rd image) I wasn't able to produce the blue streaks no matter how I positioned the flashlight. I didn't do an exhaustive test, but for what it's worth, it was easy to make the blue streaks with the anamorphic adapter and I wasn't able to do it without.

 

I assume the vertical streaks are the smear characteristics of the CCDs in this particular camcorder.

 

Anyway, I don't have any idea if these images are useful, but they were fun to make.

 

All the best,

 

- Peter DeCrescenzo

Edited by Peter DeCrescenzo
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The f-stop could affect flares in that it makes the light shining into the lens brighter, though, right?  I mean, a practical at T2 would register signifcantly brighter than at T8.  Or does the fact that the anamorphic element is before the iris make the flare the same no matter what?

 

Sure, shooting at a wider aperture can make a light look brighter and flare more. But if the light is bright even when stopped down, like sunlight glinting off of a car, then you'll get the blue horizontal flare still, so the effect itself really not caused by the iris but by the anamorphic element and the intensity of the point source hitting it. But yes, the iris can affect the intensity of the light to some degree.

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