Robert Houllahan

I am not sure I think you are more likely to get a bit of a circular bubble in the middle of the Super-16 frame. -Rob-

I was joking, really, I own an Aaton and will be wrapped shooting a feature that had gone through about 350 400' rolls of fuji. I suppose my co producer could have bought two red bodies for the price of all that fresh stock, but then where would we be? I think there is so much to be said for using traditional filmmaking tools, including not over paying for the "best" transfer for your offline, or as I like workprint you short and cut it for real. -Rob-

While I generally agree that display is much better than acquisition with digital the 2K projection I have seen has been lacking some of the things I like in a print, they do make perceptually sharp pics though. As to Imax digital projection I am very skeptical, most projectors do not scale well with resolution, 4K 3 device systems have severe registration issues and in comparison to 15perf 65mm to 70mm prints any scan/DI/Projector path seems compromised to me. I understand some of the economic arguments for digital projection but it barely seems ok for some 35mm release much less the pinnacle of film projection, If I walk into a Imax theater and see something I can get at home I won't be going back. -Rob-

My god man at around $4K you are a quarter of the way to red ownership! you must be crazy! What is this ancient format you are speaking of? 16mm without the wide screen enhancement? :lol: Seriously though if it were in B+W it would be less ;) , and I would suspect than any lab that does this work would be happy to work with you :rolleyes: , the prices quoted above seem good and no secret handshake would be needed to get them. The secret handshake gets you the direct lab connection to the underworld and with that a guarantee of great success in Hollywood :blink: You could workprint you negative and skip the damn computer entirely, I did that for a short that I am making on 16 in B+W which is around 8min and I can only say that cutting by hand is really enjoyable. I am skipping the negative cutter and doing that myself (now who is crazy?) but I do work in a lab every day so my splices are pretty good... So I think Tim is pretty down the middle with this, you could scrape it together for less or you could pay more but any way you put it a real 16mm print with sound is a thing of beauty.. -Rob-

There was a "how it's made" episode on History channel or Science Channel or somewhere that had how a IMAX projector is made as one of the segments... too Fu**king cool! I was all droolie by the end, glass vacuum plate gate and huge circular spinning movement and all.... -Rob-

As Dirk said the Spirit-1 is 1920 luminance and 960 for color, the Shadow has the same imager but only uses 1440 pixels of the luminance line. New Spirit Hd, 2K and 4K machines are all the same imager with 2K and 4K full bandwidth for each (2048 or 4096) luminance and color so Spirit-1 is sort of 4:2:2 at the imager and the new ones are all 4:4:4 at the imager..... resolution is limited by software license ;) Now back to the Weed vs. Whiskey debate that is so popular..... -Rob-

I think century had a 3.5mm which works as a fisheye for 16mm. They seems to pop up on ebay from time to time... -Rob-

Amazing, like a funny ghost, maybe that's why films like Metropolis keep coming back from the dead. ;) I suppose that puts to rest Xander's fuji vegan theory though. Rob "no partial bypasses this month Dominic" Houllahan

She really likes 7217/12 for her puppet animations, maybe that un vegan's her a bit....???? -Rob-

One of our part time employees at Cinelab is a vegan and she said that Fuji film's gelatin comes from seaweed, I have heard this rumor before anyone care to confirm? -Rob-

Whoops ! I always erase the drives before they go out, maybe Brad or Bob missed that one, sorry! -Rob-

Hey you all should come to the good old US of A where our supreme court has just confirmed that owning a bazooka is an individual right. Guns for everybody! Yeee Haaaa! -Rob-

Northlight-2 was the scanner used, 8Kscans happen in a about 1.5 sec and they probably paid around $1.00 / frame.. -Rob-

I second that, it's really not fair to post a title like "Coolest gadget" without a photo of the gadget in question.... ;) -Rob-

Yes our great American political system is a model of simplicity and free market efficiency. You may not know this (as the past seven years has been so smooth and trouble free) but we are currently being led by a monarchist. Thats right a just, wise and intelligent thinker who was sent by divine providence to rule over us with a noble hand. ;) My recommendation to you kanaideins is to find a suitable candidate, really any well dressed byproduct of a brother-sister union will do, and turn him loose with absolute power, no more problems with your ratings board(s) and a nice set of decorative heads on spikes at the gates to Toronto, perfect. -Rob-

I was at a small specialty Audio / Video store the other day a friend of mine manages, they sell allot of hi end HD sets. Stu said that they cannot even get Blu-Ray players from Sony as they have some kind of product "sell through" policy and have somewhat run out of players until new models come out. Ironic that they win the little skirmish of the consumer electronics world and then cannot come up with the goods.... :unsure: HD looks great when you are sitting in the DSX or Spirit room looking at the D32 and just seems to get ground into crap every step after that. Some Blu disks look ok to me if you don't look too hard and much of HD broadcast is just sad. I know allot of people who have no connection to the film business (other than watching them) who are really dissapointed with Hd for everything except for sports. -Rob-

Wasn't our current leader a cheerleader at Andover and Yale in the 1950's? that's not close enough to a queen? maybe you have to catch him in an airport bathroom. Heh Heh..... -Rob-

I have a 9min.16mm short I am cutting the negative on myself, building A and B rolls, so while I agree that you can do it yourself is is a laborious task, plus if done under the wrong conditions there is a very good possibility of introducing dust and other artifacts into the negative. When we assembled Mikes 2-perf film after processing we used a 4perf synchronizer, it has marks on it to distinguish individual perfs and a Maier&hancock hot splicer. It takes some work, I did some of it and Brad did the rest, to make sure the 2-perf frames are lined up right as you do not want to reframe in telecine and there were allot of short ends. Again I think it will be easiest to just bring all the negative to go through. My general understanding from working with several negative cutters is that $5 a cut is the general going rate but things like dissolves are more and there are usually handling and other fees... -Rob-

This is good, a Spirit transfer? I think that sitting with the colorist and going through the flats for selects is going to your best bet for price, building scan flats then transferring will probably be as expensive in the end as just sitting with the colorist. -Rob-

With 2-perf 35mm you want to just extend that to 10 frames or so as the frames are half as big. Also there is no really clean cut in 2-perf I believe the techniscope films made before digital were all A-B rolls and not single strand as there is no margin to make a clean single strand cut. This does not matter for a scan but if you were going to do an optical finish it would... -Rob-

Can't wait to see it in IMAX nothing can beat contact printed 70mm 15 perf.... -Rob-

One of the guys who used to work at Cinelab now lives in LA and cuts negative a Deluxe, he said almost all of his work is building scan flats, flash to flash, etc... Negative cutting ends up being about $5 a cut plus other expenses, this adds up quick and entails handling the negative, plus with your 2-perf negative Mike there is more work.. I'll try to email some more options for you tomorrow I have just been busy since we last spoke. -Rob-

I do not know, I would assume Imax only but you never know.. -Rob-

Saw that the Scope portions of "The Dark Knight" were scanned at 8K does anyone know which scanner? Northlight? The Arriscan is 6K max according to the brocure. Also the 15-perf Imax will be full app in Imax theatres and the Scope will be 2.39? so the aspect ratios will change if you watch it in the Imax theatre, I think this sounds cool but unusual how will general audience react? Was the film conformed at 8K for general theatres? I know the 15-perf was scanned to re position the shots for 2.39 and the Scope was 8K, I assume the 15perf was 8K and the DI 8K or 4K? -Rob-

sorry about the Ak folks... I am working on a picture with a Bosnian war scene... I hardly think "Jumper" or "Cloverfield" are good arguments for anything other than hoping these pictures are soon relegated to the circular file of movie history. They keep running spots for "Jumper" on comedy central and every time I see one it makes me want to watch that less and less, same goes for that new Angelina Jolie "Wanted" POS just so uninteresting like watching a McDonalds hamburger for 100 min. This only proves that a bad film can be made using just about any format, or combo of formats. I saw the trailer for "Benjamin button" when I went to see "Dr.Jones&the acrylic alien" thought it looked great, obviously allot of care went into shooting it and the story seems interesting. There is a thread going on down in the On Screen section and the Cinematographer himself is there contributing and sharing interesting technical knowledge about the process he went through to make the picture. I for one will go see it in the theater. I am also, like may people, very interested in going to see the new Batman picture and there is a great Imax cinema near to where I live. The thought of much of a high line action picture being shot partly in 15-perf is just great. In olden days some films were made on 35mm 4 perf and then some were made on Scope and then some were made in Vista-vision or 2.20 Todd-Ao and now we can mix 15-perf Imax with scope and Super-8 if need be, or Scope with Dalsa or Red... The endless circular argument about which is "best" is tired. last post on this one.. -Rob-