Telecine Basics

[Sivanesan]

Hi,

Can somebody help in giving some basic tips for telecine...... i jus need some intro...... all i know about telecine is "conversion of film to Video" i need to know more..... pls help.

 

Thnx in Advance

Sivanesan

[Phil Rhodes]

Hi,

 

Could you be any less specific? It's a huge, gigantic topic, and I only have cybercafe internet access at the moment!

 

Also, I think most here would prefer if you refrain from using horrible contracted English - it's no problem if English is not your first language, it's just very annoying if people don't even bother to type all the letters of words they do know, capitalise, punctuate, etc. And yes, we can normally tell the difference.

 

Phil

[David Mullen ASC]

A projector pointing into a video camera could be labelled a "telecine" (although I usually call them "film chains.")

 

Most modern telecines are either "flying spot scanners (CRT technology)" or "line array CCD's". Meaning that the film frame (negative or positive) is scanned one line at a time to build a complete image, but in the case of a CCD telecine like a Thomson Spirit, the film is moved past a slit in front of a CCD (I think) as opposed to a scanning electron beam. There is a CCD telecine called the Sony Vialta which uses the whole CCD at once with the frame pin-registered in front of it (so an intermittent movement has to be used for the film -- i.e. start and stop -- as opposed to the continuous movement of the other types of telecine.)

[John Pytlak RIP]

Here are some links to Kodak tools to aid telecine transfer:

 

http://www.kodak.com/US/en/motion/products/tools/

 

http://www.kodak.com/country/US/en/motion/...ecine2003.shtml

 

Kodak also designed and makes the scanner systems for the Thomson "Spirit" telecines / datacines:

 

http://www.kodak.com/country/US/en/motion/.../sehlin04.shtml

 

http://www.kodak.com/country/US/en/motion/.../sehlin02.shtml

[Marc Wielage]

Can somebody help in giving some basic tips for telecine...... i jus need some intro...

That's a huge topic! Without inflating the role of the colorist too much, it's almost like saying, "I need some basic tips on lighting and shooting film to get the best results." :rolleyes:

 

But I can refer you to some good books on the subject:

 

Film Into Video: A Guide to Merging the Technologies

by Stuart Blake Jones, Richard H. Kallenberger, and George D. Cvjetnicanin

Published by Focal Press (ISBN #0240804112)

 

Color Correction for Digital Video: Using Desktop Tools to Perfect Your Image

by Steve Hullfish, Jaime Fowler, & Steve Hullish

Published by CMP Books (ISBN #1578202019)

 

Video Color Correction for Non-Linear Editors: A Step-by-Step Guide

by Stuart Blake Jones

Published by Focal Press (ISBN #0240805151)

 

Some of these are a little dry, plus they're all a little outdated (because of the quickly-changing nature of the video post business). But there's still some good overall information here and there in them.

 

Probably a better ploy would be to ask a fellow cinematographer who has experience in supervising telecine sessions to let you come along and observe what goes on. I don't think it takes long to pick up on the basics: how far exposure can be pushed in video, how to translate video terms into photographic terms, what compromises you will encounter in video (vs. film printing), and so on. This can quickly show you when a good colorist can help photographic problems, when they can't, and what the limits are in terms of correction range. (A colorist friend of mine's joke is, "we can always make it different, but not necessarily better.")

 

There are also many differences in color-corrector technology out there, ranging from units made by daVinci, Pandora, Digital Vision, and many others, as well as workstation-based systems from discreet, Filmlight, and Quantel. Each of these has strengths and weaknesses, but all are capable of making good pictures (or bad ones, depending on who's running them). Ask the colorist at the session to give you a demo as to what they can do in terms of color saturation, density, white adjustment, black adjustment, unusual looks (like bleach-bypass, vignetting, defocus, etc.). Also note how the image can be changed in terms of framing, doing digital blow-ups or repositions if necessary. And pay close atttention to what happens with black detail and white detail in over- and under-exposed situations.

 

And don't worry about the technology. I generally tell my clients to ignore the scopes, knobs and dials; 90% of what we're concerned about is what we see with our eyes on the monitor. Like a race car driver, the scopes just tell us when we're about to drive off the road -- or in the case of video, when we're about to get into distortion or other problems that may not look good on broadcast TV or DVD.

 

Finally, before you begin a major project, ask the facility if they'd be willing to give you a short session for tests -- an hour or less just to try out different looks, based on a test exposure roll you've shot beforehand. That way, when the project begins, you'll have a good idea in advance what will work and what won't. I usually tell DP's, when in doubt, over-expose at least 1/3 of a stop to give us as thick a negative as possible. Underexposure can be a problem, unless that's a look that you specifically want. Film stock, too, is a major factor in the look of the finished product; I really like the new Vision2 stocks, and have been impressed with how well they hold up for both video and DI projects.

 

--Marc Wielage

colorist

[Wendell_Greene]

Award Winning Colorist Dave Hussey of Company 3 is answering Telecine related questions on the bulletin board of Music Video Wire now through April 26th.

 

http://www.mvwire.com/bb/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi