Help me decide!!!!!!!!

Stephen Perera · April 26, 2018

Hi all....finally sending out the Gibraltar Crystal project some of you are aware I've been shooting (some of you have been advising me all along) and the final footage is 700ft of Kodak Vision3 500T shot at standard 16mm

Cinelab London are processing and scanning it for me at 2k - they have been most welcoming and friendly to me plus logistically they were a great option as neighbour country Spain doesn't offer the services I need....not to mention no problems with currency.

Apart from the ECN-2 processing, I have two narrowed it down to TWO machines for the scanning:

1. SPIRIT

2. HDR Scanity

....both at 2k (remember its standard 16mm)

Things to consider:

a) The Spirit (£15 per foot) is 40% cheaper then the HDR Scanity (£25 per foot)

b) The largest the final, edited 'piece' will be viewed is on a TV screen at the factory where they blow glass for tourists to watch.....then of course online/social media etc for marketing purposes.

As a seasoned scanner of photographic film (I have a Scanmate 5000 drum scanner and now a Hasselblad/Imacon Flextight 646) and knowing what a good scan looks like and exactly when so operator has decided to bake in stuff like noise reduction etc......which option should I go for all things considered......

......my top priority is getting the dynamic range of the Vision3 500T as the footage shot is mostly high contrast scenes at the limits of exposures

Thanks for your advice and sorry for posting this in the general discussion as I really need good advice!!!!!

Mark Dunn · April 26, 2018

No idea, but I hope those prices are per minute or your client is going to have a stroke.

Tyler Purcell · April 26, 2018

I assume you mean .15/ft and .25/ft not 15 POUNDS a foot.

The Spirit is a telecine, so it's not worth using unless you have someone in the suit grading every shot and that's not happening for 15/ft. They're gonna set a base grade and run it off.

The Scanity is a scanner and it's going to give you an HDR flat look so you can grade it in post. This will give you the best image over-all but most importantly, it will allow you to make the changes later.