K Borowski

Calling a lens a "4K lens" is kind of silly if you understand the way an imaging *system* works. Each part of the system (filters, each lens element, film/sensor - assuming everything is in focus taking into account DOF, COC) resolves a certain number of line pairs per millimeter (this is usually measured at contrasts of 1000:1 and I think 1.6:1). A lense's resolving power isn't like a hole in the bottom of a bucket where 4K either "fits" through the hole or not. To determine the resolving power of the system, you multiply the inverse of each part of the system in LP/mm and then the product of this equation is the resolution, in LP/mm, of the system. Saying a lens is 4K is treating a consumer as being ignorant and thinking that the sharpest part of the system is going to be the system resolution, like adding the numbers together or taking the largest number of the system and applying it to the whole system. It's like saying the F/11 is the next smallest stop from F/5.6, not F/8. Another thing to be considered with system resolving power is the aperture of the lens, which is affected by two factors that both cut down on resolving power either being bounced around in the lens when shot wide open or fringe off the aperture blades when stopped down all the way. If a lens is not used at 2-1/2 to 3 stops (depending on lens design) down from "wide open" its resolution in LP/mm is further reduced. Anyway, digital is generally a lot pickier than 35mm film when it comes to light being perfectly perpendicular to the chip when it hits it. That doesn't mean film-optimized glass is "worse" merely that the sensor behaves differently. I'd say calling a lens a "4K" lens is a blatant marketing move, taking advantage of customer ignorance as well as hype surrounding the number "4,096." Optimizing a lens for the peculiarities of a CMOS or CCD sensor is one thing. Optimizing for a "4K" chip is bogus. The SYSTEM is a product of each element; either film or digital can benefit from a sharper lens, regardless of resolution all the way down to a VHS-C camera.

Now it's on in standard def. only - Starz CN and it's 2.40 ???? I think there is a position at this station whose sole job is to toy with the compositions of movies. Must have dropped out of film school or failed classes to qualify ;-) Might be softer than VHS EP, but nice to finally, kinda see it as it was intended for a theatrical run.

Phil, you can coat color film and sell it for half or third what it costs and still make a killing at it. Kodak and Fuji aren't the only manufacturers. There are several other small-time operations that could make motion picture film if the market lost a certain key player. As far as a processing machine, there were some very small machines that were made at one time. You need some 35- or 16mm rollers, a pulley, and some tanks, the first two in the dark, water. No "toxic chemistry" (you didn't say it but someone else uttered that line of garbage on here - the heavy metals behind your monitor are far worse, taht's if you don't chuck your computer out the window into the dumpster and dispose of it properly), no massive undertaking. I think you need to process 1,000 feet a week to keep an average size cine processor in control. So you don't need to ruin clothes and dump chemistry all the time, the way some people THINK it is done. Plus, you have the advantage of not having to scrap all of your equipment every three four years, like some other industries. I'm sure color film will die out before B&W does (we'll probably have the latter 100 years hence), but there's no shortage of silver, and the technology for making it is now almost 70 years old. You're coating ten to twelve layers of dye and silver onto plastic, not building a computer in your parents' garage :P If anything, the most endangered component is SCANNING technology. Camera construction is irrelevant. Once telecine, datacine, film recording technology is dropped from manufacture, there is the real danger of a bottleneck if equipment gets thrown out, breaks down, parts get discontinued. Fortunately, there are some excellent companies out there that have diversified into many other fields that cary on the tradition more as a point of honor than relying on it to hold the rest of the company up and drive their investments elsewhere (the Eastman Kodak model). I was very impressed with RFI's portfolio, as well as FujiFilms. There are some serious pieces of infrastructure you guys are going to have to overcome before you start checking our pulse. As long as there is a 10% profit to be made on what is sold, the equipoment is there, it is paid for, it doesn't really need to be improved upon too much more, and it's been maturing and improving now for almost 125 years, so the kinks have really been worked out of the workflow.

Don't count the lab industry out yet, thank you very much. . . As for all of this doom and gloom (the big release printing labs do such a poop job with color consistency it's like they want their business to die, the rest of us just try to eek by and do a quality job every time without 100 personnel and 25 machines and three shifts), I think I either need to take a break from this site or we need to bring back the film versus digital drinking game for threads like these. Can anyone find me that thread, with the rules for the game? I think dearly departed Annie Wengenroth came up with this gem. In seriousness, I find it really annoying that people who have never dunked a roll of film in a tank in high school are on here preaching this and that. Can we please cut out the anecdotal information and third-hand accounts? If you don't work in a lab, or heard it while you were dropping off 8,000 feet of 16 or 35 AT the lab where you heard something, you're certainly not helping us out by spreading a bunch of anecdotal misinformation. Yes volume is dropping, but there is plenty of work out there, enough for labs to specialize in soundtracks, release printing, student films, archiving etc. There are still labs running VNF occasionally, and it was discontinued 7 years ago. . . I'd be happy to bet a thousand dollars that we will be happily churning out Eastman Color Print ten years from now, let alone four. (though it may have a Japanese replacement name and not be coming from Rochester if a certain company their can't balance its budget and quit hemorrhaging money on failed digital ventures). It will probably go the way of vinyl and arthouses, but color film has got a good ten years left in the mainstream, at the least. Alexa this, Red epic that, I'm sorry a lot of the people here are working for peanuts and in low-end markets. If they can shoot 35mm on television and shoot images of friggin' pizzas on 16mm film all day every day, I think we'll hold on just fine. If you're in a podunk, 2nd or 3rd class city without an international airport let alone an arts and media infrastructure, no you probably won't be working with film. Film gets more and more specialized and localized as it consolidates, but there is a very solid base out there.

All camera film requires processing. And, yes, there is a different process for color negative (ECN-2), color reversal (E-6), B&W negative, and B&W reversal. B&W negative or color negative you would need to make a print to play on your projector. The lab would have to do that for you. Prints are contact exposed to the negatives, then processed in their own special chemistries.

Just like camera stills film. If it is negative it needs a print as well. Only reversal film can be played directly from the camera original after processing.

Freya: What do you think percentage-wise that would be though? I can't believe it'd be anything more than 1-2% of the profits that Kodak is getting from S8 in its film Entertainment Imaging division.

Hand rem-jet removal is NOT fun, easy, or consistent. I'd recommend you save the hand processing for E-6 or B&W.

That DP costume is spot-on to what David Mullen, ASC would wear to work. In fact I think I saw him in the exact thing in some behind the scenes footage! Think the "Editor" outfit is more appropriate for the talent though, especially former leading male 35mm sitcom members ;-) -Anyone know if that show is still 35 BTW?

Maybe he wants to redigitally replace guns with wallkie-talkies? :unsure:

Rich: David took your sarcasm seriously! It's interesting you talk about "cheap" as a bad thing when it comes to price spent on camera, but then argue that film is too expensive. It's interesting the projects I've been on where equipment rental with digital has actually ended up costing MORE (though admittedly not usually case, people don't bother to do a budget comparison. . . I have). Don't be so hard on the 25-30s Rich. Some are film diehards, just like us, in SPITE of the massive barage of digiital revolution garbage they've been bombareded with since early childhood. My favorite? "OF COURSE IT"S BETTER IT'S DIGITAL"

Far be it for anyone to even consider working with 16- or 35mm, but I think I have a camera lying in the garage that a friend lent me that goes that high. Used to shoot missile launches? A fellow enthusiast was given I think a 35mm model, Wollensak (sp?) that similarly lies around doing nothing. There's a huge stockpile of old surplus scientific cameras that you can probably HAVE if you find them, and of course you'll want to test them thoroughly; I guess it depends how much footage you're going to shoot though. There are severe problems that can pop up when sand, 35mm film, heat, dust, dirt, and 1000 FPS (film is moving at 40MPH/65km/h) occur in tandem. At the same time, the cost of film, process, scan, would probably be miniscule if it's just a few inserts and you get the camera for free.

Charles: To my knowledge, FOMA is the only stock currently manufactured at present that will not form a negative (this includes, Fuji, ORWO/Fimotech, and Tasma, & Gigabit not just Kodak). I'm not familiar with teh D-76 situation, but there probably are alternatives out there that are more readily obtained in a replenisher/starter configuration. I forget what I have a big 5 U.S. gal jug of, I think an old concentrate of a machine-optimized solution. I'll have to check for sure, although one shot is probably better with anything critical in anything sub-1 U.S. Gal (3-4 liters). Another issue is the amoutn of surface area, agitation, oxidation. The rewind tanks are notoriously bad for replenishment due to these factors as per Martin Baumgarten's advice. Spiral tanks might be barely big enough to consider it, in the 100-foot (30m) varieties

Right, so you lose a real company and you don't gain any competition. That leaves a monopoly. Do you see where, fan of either company, that could stifle development of product improvements, allow prices to rise far more rapidly, and diminish selection of film speeds? Agfa makes a fine product, as far as print stock is concerned, but they don't even want to send me a sample. Hardly an entity interested in promoting and maintaining any sort of marketplace presence, just milking the dying cow. . .

Briefly resurrected then shut down (scrapped?) I think it was used, over there around the same time IB tech was briefly revived in the late '90s, early 2000s. I think I am quoting someone quoting an article of ASC :-) Second time today I've witnessed the fora re-teaching themselves information :-)

Is "2 1/2 Men" still rolling 35? If it went digital, blame Charlie Sheen! Any other recent ones? That's all I can think of. Plenty of 35mm still on TV though. I think HBO and AMC both are "film only (Eastman only?)" although the latest new AMC series (western?) might be digital. "The Closer" - 35mm Don't watch much current crime drama mush. Why watch that when you can watch the real bad guys now on "The First 48?"

Umm, all of them? There isn't a rule. The Domino's Commercials are 16mm Fuji I think Reala 500D (although standard definition :-( ) Plenty of 35mm car commercials too.

Regardless of what "line" it was, taht was a real attempt to make a digital-compatible film stock that takes full advantage of film to file. For some strange reason, cinematographers simply wanted nothing to do with it, even though practically every television show and movie is finished digitally, and the stock supposedly had some real latitude advantages over the standard orange mask. But if no one buys it, Kodak has to stop making it. This was their second attempt. There was a Primetime 640T (which was supposedly far grainier and maybe tarnished '99's chances), so Kodak very much wanted it to catch on, that they tried unsuccessfully to introduce it twice. As far as having to use a special box, I think that was more a Kodak attempt to sell their proprietary software and device to post houses. From the ASC articles I read on '99, it was fairly simple (in some ways simpler than with standard ECN) to invert and balance the colors. Basically, what they are/were trying to do was increase latitude by lowering the gamma of the film even further. So, yes, from John's perspective, it was the most "flat digital looking" of them all. I know Kodak made some very successful low contrast films, and John is a big fan of the Agfa, the first innovator of that type of look in movie film. Keith: As far as your woodpile joke (aren't they African Islanders or something outside of America?) I don't think it is such a good idea. Kodak pulled the plug on their cooperation with China Lucky for employing the old Chinese standby tactic of stealing technology and not honoring its agreements. They are/were making print stock, maybe some archaic ECN-2 compatible neg. stock or C-41 (which would run fine through an ECN process but far from ideal even in correct chemistry compared with modern films). Agfa Geveart makes print stock. Neither of them is going to come in and pick up slack. They've already largely gotten out of the business. Patrick: Your hopes are almost silly. The only thing loss of competition is going to do is bring up prices and stifle innovation, selection. I reall;y don't want to see the days of one stock only. . . Seems like some of you are almost eager for it though! It really helps to learn even a modicum of economics before making such tall, silly statements about business. Supply and Demand? Economy of Scale? Diseconomy of Scale? Monopsony vs. Monopoly? Anyone?

I could've sworn I'd heard that Bolexes that were "new" were just assembled from surplus parts; there wasn't any real production going on there, it was new-old stock. Sorry to be the party pooper (again).

Adrian: This is one of trhe rare occasions I wish the "Like" button weren't disabled on these fora :-D You got me cracking up with that. Seriously, there is probably going to be something even better. Ever wonder what would happen if someone came up with a way to store and transmit memory engrams, visual stimuli? It would obsolete all of this stuff. . . I guess that would have to be a fundamentally electronic system though :-(

While it is admirable to make some attempt to pay SOMETHING to a DP for work, that's less than a stagehand gets paid to push a box around all day, than a postman gets deliver the mail. I've seen posts on the Steadicam Forum where they were FURIOUS at operators for going out for less than $500 per day, before equipment. Tell me that the choice of camera isn't influenced by the DP having to have the camera because you can't afford rental. . . Is there a crew, or is the DP expected to backup, operate, pull focus, and slate as well? Is there anyone in electric, a decent lighting package? Dolly, tripod?

This is the first mainstream release I've seen that has employed this strategy in the United States. Wonder if they'll even have film prints available or this is some sort of video preview garbage, like they did with "Wizard of Oz" (quietly withdrawing prints that represented the pinnacle of a $6 million restoration shortly beforehand). . .

EDIT: "Trespass" not on disk "On Demand" will get a simultaneous release, first one I've heard of with any prominence, the 14th of October in the U.S. I wonder if it is the first print-less first run movie too, which would qualify it for another dubious honor. I'm surprised theatres would want to even run this film.

50% of screens will supposedly be digital in the U.S. by year end. I am going to start another topic about this, but it's interesting to see if theatres are going to survive in any form with simultaneous release of movies on iTunes?!, theatres, and disk. The latest Kidman, Cage movie, startts with a T, can't believe I just forgot the name is getting one of the first such releases tomorrow.

Matt: That was too much to spend almost ten years ago. I spent far too much on 16mm - $400 back then. I'm amazed (though personally happy) to see 16mm packages going for $10K today. It's easy to see the cycle that devastated every other silver halide market but ours repeating itself. Owning film equipment is an even more surefire way to lose money than a new car. And, sorry, I may be from the East Coast for a 24-year chunk that only briefly ended in June, but who the hell is Birns and Sawyer Co.? I've heard of ARRI, I've heard of Panavision, and I've heard of Otto Nemenz. . . Not that the sky ISN'T falling for us at this point, but who CARES what Wallstreet bankers who don't know that silver halide is still one of Kodak's biggest sectors, or reporters who say that Kodak has stopped making film cameras in 2004 (plastic point and shoots; it hadn't made a PROFESSIONAL model in probably at least 30 or 40 years prior) have to say? THe half-informed speculation is for the ignorant masses. Not to come off as arrogant or snide, but who the hell cares what sh** is being shoveled to sell newspapers - or kindles - at this point? Our industry has kept silver halide industry alive, when almost every single market besides ours has told it to bend over and get f*&%ed. If any industry can save it, ours can. We are one of the few industries that values a superior looking product. Doctors have sacrificed imagery for ease of access at the cost of patients' lives. Still photographers have looked at profit margins. We've kept our eyes on the sparkles of silver that have been dancing around on the screen since the beginning. There'll be a bitter end here too I'm sure, but we aren't going to sell our beautiful beginnings out for a 10% margin, I'm sure. We'll sell them out when they lose the race for the best quality finish. I'm comfortable with Phil's number: As they say in Star Trek, a lot can happen in 10 years.