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Paul Korver

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About Paul Korver

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  • Occupation
    Other
  • Location
    Los Angeles
  • Specialties
    Supporting Filmmakers, Acquisition (film/digital), Telecine, HD/2K Spirit Datacine, 4K DFT Scanity, DI, Atari 2600, PFClean, Film Restoration & Remastering, DaVinci 2K, Resolve, Baselight, 4K DLP, Raw Data, Color Science, Rubik's cube, Ultra 16mm, New Workflows.

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    http://www.cinelicious.tv

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  1. I enjoyed everyone's comments. David - I was never suggesting that the "tide would turn" back to film in terms of sheer volume (btw it's never left in terms of awards and festival wins). Yes indeed the volume ship has sailed... I was simply pointing out the some observations about seeming instabilities in the RED camera company... which I felt compelled to do because felt they mounted a fairly aggressive anti-film PR campaign. I also thought it was ironic considering what was going on in the film world (Kodak emerging from bankruptcy etc). It will be interesting to see what unfolds over the next few years. One thing is certain, if I were an investor in the company I'd be pretty concerned that the top 3 evangelists for the camera are hedging, leaving, or stepping away from the microphone. -Paul
  2. Over the past few years I've read countless posts by leaders and promoters of the RED camera questioning the Future of Film, saying Film is Dead, and the Red Camera being the Film killer, it's with a twinge irony that I bring up the following chain of events as food for thought: A few weeks ago Jim announces he's "taking a back seat" and handing the reigns to Jared Land: http://www.engadget.com/2013/08/19/jim-jannard-steps-down/ A week or so after that Ted Schilowitz resigns: http://www.ocbj.com/news/2013/aug/30/reds-employee-no-1-departs/ Today Cioni and LightIron distance themselves from the camera that put them on the map and touts their work with the Canon C500 and Alexa : http://lightiron.com/blog/did-you-think-we-were-just-red-post-house I'll be honest, I really respect what the Jim, Ted, Michael Cioni and the rest of the RED Camera Team did to push our industry forward. But am I crazy or it does seems like those responsible for creating and championing the technology are backing away en masse and in a time span of about 30 days? In that same 30-day time span Kodak announces it's emerged from bankruptcy and it's motion picture film commitment to producing motion picture film: http://motion.kodak.com/motion/About/The_Storyboard/4294971822/index.htm Five days ago 12-Years A Slave, shot on 35mm, wins the Toronto Film Festival: http://www.deadline.com/2013/09/toronto-12-years-a-slave-wins-peoples-choice-award/ And yesterday the Canon "Project Imagination" Film Contest with 99.9% of submissions shot on digital is won by a film shot on Super 16mm: http://variety.com/2013/film/news/canon-announces-winners-for-ron-howard-judged-short-film-contest-1200616869/ Maybe the RED camera will just be an 8-year blip on the the history of cinematography? A fire-starter that finally got the "big boys" to reach for better dynamic range and resolution? Maybe the Alexa is the RED Killer? Maybe Jared Land will shoulder the weight of this company by himself and release the Dragon to critical acclaim? And maybe film is still a relevant, and beautiful medium that will remain a creative choice for filmmakers for decades to come? I look forward to hearing your thoughts. Best, Paul Korver President http://cinelicious.tv #dontbelievethehype #vivacelluloid
  3. Good conversation here. Thanks John (or Jerry or Doug) for starting it. I applaud Spectra's hard work and all the money they spent creating a new gate for a Spirit Classic. I sincerely hope the machine holds up long enough for them to get their money back on the gate R&D. The reason we did not do that to our Spirit at Cinelicious is because we're already thinking beyond HD and wouldn't want to invest a ton of money in an HD only machine for Super 8mm / Reg 8mm because we want higher than HD resolution, and we realize we need more dynamic range than a Spirit sensor can provide. Also the Spirit (new gate or not) will never be a perfect machine for the tight tolerances of small gauge film and any company using one will struggle with "watering" in the image and overall image stability. A Super 8mm gate for the Scanity would be awesome but is not going to happen as that is not DFT's focus. However we are looking at some different, very exciting 2K and higher resolution small format scanners and are currently in testing an QC phase. When it comes to Super 8mm and Regular 8mm a few things are true... 1) HD is not enough resolution. Maybe for Tri-X, 500T or old Ektachrome but for old Kodachrome, Vision 3 200T or especially the new Vision 3 50D we need at least 2K resolution horizontally across the top of picture area. And since HD is 16x9 and not a 4x3 format like Super/Reg 8mm film negative it sucks to have to make a choice of either going pillar box and wasting data on black bars (and decreasing resolution) or punching in to 16x9 and getting more resolution but cutting off negative information. 2) We need more dynamic range. Reversal stocks are very very high density and require a scanner that is very high dynamic range in order to properly scan all the information on the negative...or more accurately "positive". 3) We need more stability. There have been huge improvements made in optical pin registration which can achieve perf-ect stability even on small guage film. Any new Small Guage film scanner we'll invest in at Cinelicious will have all 3 of these capabilities. Keep an eye out for an announcement in 2013. Best, Paul
  4. Matthew - we do high rez DI scanning and feature film tests with A LOT of S16mm from every stock imaginable and project on a 24' screen from Barco 4K projector so I am very familiar with film stocks, grain, emulsions etc. First of all congrats on shooting film. Once you go Kodak you may never go back. Second I'd say shoot 250D outdoors up to and including dusk (most DPs we've worked with like the look of 250D over 200T in daylight-lit side-by-sides. You might even want to try the new-ish V3 50D 7203 for well lit exteriors for the finest grain possible. Inside at night... unless you can afford a pretty heavy lighting package I'd go 500T over 200T. The best way to maximize Super 16mm resolution and get to 2.40 would be to get a set of S16mm 1.33 or 1.5x anamorphics. They are rare and the Hawk version is very expensive (I think Panavision Hollywood has some non-hawks kicking around). We did a film last year called "From The Head" that was shot S16mm anamorphic with the set from Panny and it looked great. If you're not going to go anamorphic and you're just working from a 2k scan from spherical lenses then the perceived graininess on screen depends on the native aspect ratio of the screen you're projecting on. If it's a 1.85 native screen then grain would be the same between 1.85 and 2.40 (just different cropping). If it's native 2.40 then then a 1.85 version would be perceived less grainy only because the picture would get smaller on the screen relative to the audience. Make sense? -Paul
  5. Sounds good Dave. Yeah... $.28/frame for a 2K super 8mm scan is pretty damn pricey. I'd love to fund the development of a Super 8mm gate for the Scanity however it would cost about $300K in R&D which would be very difficult to re-coup in the budget conscious small format crowd. There's just not a business case for it. We are, however, monitoring other 2K and higher Super 8mm / Reg 8mm scanning technology advancements and should have a solution within a year's time that will be much better than you can get with a Spirit (due to the Spirit's film density dynamic range limitations when scanning print/positive). Best, Paul
  6. Hi Dave, I know a lot about all of the scanners mentioned as I did a year long, worldwide evaluation of film scanning technology prior to our purchase of a Scanity. I had test charts made up that go from 0-4 film density for dynamic range (which is beyond the density of any motion picture film print or negative), special resolution test targets made in prague that go to 250 lp/mm (which could break a 12K scanner), and we shot registration targets at Panavision. This was mainly motivated by the fact that I wasn't spending some large corporations money on the technology... rather I was risking the financial well being of my family, small business etc. I was hoping the Golden Eye or an Arri would have won the test and I could have saved myself about $700K. Unfortunately they did not and because me and our clients are fairly obsessed with quality we ended up biting the bullet and going with the Scanity. The upside is we've never lost a scan test. And that includes one we won with Chris Nolan for the 4K scan of his first film "following" over the Spirit 4K at Tech, the Arri at Fotokem and the Northlight at Warner Bros. You said you're familiar with the Scanity. Have we ever worked with you before? Or did you test out the Scanity at another facility? Good luck with your quest. Nothing beats well scanned film with an inspired grade. Best, Paul
  7. Exactly. Camera Original Film will be around for a long time. I can't guarantee all formats but I'd guess at least 10 years for acquisition and also archival films. -Paul
  8. That's no at all what I got out of the whitepaper. Charles... it sounds like to debate resolution and optical theory in your spare time... something I'm fairly short on these days. I've already put in a over years worth of research into analyzing all these scanners in real world settings... the results of which led us to our purchase decision. And if we weren't super excited by the results we were seeing from the Scanity then we would just bought a used ARRISCANNER for 1/5 the price. I'd be happy to share test results with you sometime if you want to stop by our shop in LA. And when you make a movie by all means scan it at 11K at 4 seconds per frame if you want. But for now going to check out of this conversation and get back to work. Respectfully, Paul
  9. Film Fact# 1 - Kodak 35mm Vision 3 has around 85-100 lp/mm of resolution (depending on ASA) which is slightly less than 4K Film Fact# 2 - Vision 3 has around 3.1 film density of dynamic range which far exceeds the capabilities of most scanners It's true 8K from any scanner would resolve more lp/mm (around 220) than a 4K scan (around 110). But since there's less than 100 line pairs on 35mm negative I'd take 4K and 3.5 film density over 8K at 2.4 film density any day... it's the dynamic range that's being thrown away not the resolution. No I did not test the Imagica as it's not really thought of as a "gold standard" DI scanner. The goal of the tests were to compare the gold standard ARRI and Northlight pin-registered scanners to the new crop of optically/electronically pin-registered scanners (GoldenEye, P+S Technic Steady Frame, Scanity). As to the second part of the question about 10K 35mm scans I promise what you need when scanning 35mm... to quote John Galt's "truth about 4K" article is "better K, not more K". And if you can get better K (full dynamic range) and go fast that's a pretty compelling argument for a film scanning technology. No... but it does embed IR dirt mattes and with the new digital ice solutions it's very powerful restoration scanner as well.
  10. Hi Peter, I run Cinelicious and know quite a bit about the Ultra 16mm format. I agree with most of what everyone said here. Super 16mm is overall a better, more ubiquitous format to shoot a feature on. Ultra 16mm is great for converting R16mm cameras to a 1.85 image but is still less overall resolution that S16mm. And like David said with all the available S16mm gear on the market... if I was going to shoot a feature it would be Super 16mm hands down as most older R16mm cameras would be a nightmare as a reliable A-Cam on a feature. To me where Ultra 16mm shines is for MOS B-Cam music videos / fashion / skate films. We recently set DP Max Goldman and Director James Franco up with one of our Ultra 16mm Scoopics (and a super 8mm camera) and they shot some beautiful stuff for a 7 For All Mankind Jeans campaign. Here are some clips and a blurb on that: http://cinelicious.tv/work/7-for-all-mankind For technical reference the top video of Lily Donaldson starts mostly S16mm bolex (cleaner borders) the Super 8mm has the perf in the center of frame, and last shot of the model on the beach with is Ultra 16mm. These were all from 2K "overscans". One thing to clarify is that when calling Ultra 16mm a "transfer only" format what that means is you could not do an optical blow-up to 35mm... something that doesn't happen too frequently these days. But you most certainly could do a 2K or 4K DI scan and record back out to 35mm film for a theatrical release. Have fun! -Paul
  11. I'm assuming it's an SD transfer. I noticed on the vimeo page that the file was encoded MP4 and is only 100MB. You should easily be able to get a very high quality standard def full length version in 500MB. I would suggest using H.264 compression as it's a lot more efficient compression and will get you the best picture per data size. -Paul
  12. This piece off JJ Abrams' SUPER 8 Movie Blu-Ray highlights the magic of the beloved 8mm/Super 8mm film formats. It discusses the history of the format, how it impacted the lives of the filmmakers, and how it is still a thriving format today. Shot and directed by M. David Melvin. Telecine, edit, color and VFX by Cinelicious. Recommended for Super 8 beginners to enthusiasts! Featuring Interviews by: JJ Abrams (Writer / Director / Producer - SUPER 8) Steven Spielberg (Producer - SUPER 8) Brian Burk (Producer - SUPER 8) Larry Fong (DP - SUPER 8) Paul Korver (Principal - Cinelicious cinelicious.tv) Norwood Cheek (Founder - Flicker flickerla.com) Dennis Murren (VFX Supervisor - SUPER 8) Michael Giacchino (Composer - SUPER 8) Joel Courtney (Actor "Joe Lamb" - SUPER 8) Riley Griffiths (Actor "Charles Kaznyk" - SUPER 8) http://vimeo.com/36052990
  13. I am admittedly a film geek who has been annoyed by the fact that I live in Hollywood, 4K projection has been available for a few years now... and yet are no theaters in LA that are screening in 4K (everything is 2K which is basically HD and I see that at home all the time). For instance, the recent release of "Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" was as you all konw shot RED camera and finished at 4K resolution and was distributed as a 4K digital film print. You'd think you'd be able to find a theater in LA that would be showing it at 4K. Think again. The thing that's most frustrating is that there are a lot of 4K projectors out there (18,000 and counting according to Cioni). The problem is that if they were Sony SXRD 4K projectors which hit the market a few years back (but are sub-par to the new DLP 4K) then in order to do 3D they must be physically changed over to 3D mode. And theater owners / projectionists are too lazy to change them back to screen 4K content so they just keep them at 2K assuming the public won't care. This is the case with Pacific Theaters Culver City which boasts "Sony 4K Projection" but all they show is 2K content. I don't know about you guys but I'd rather see 4K than 2K 3D any day. I know that this bothers a lot of you guys too (see this recent RED USER thread: http://www.reduser.net/forum/archive/index.php/t-69351.html) If you'd like to see your movies in 4K then like this facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/TRUE.4K.CINEMA Let's get the word out and try to influence the commercial cinemas to show 4K... or at least be honest when they do. Best, Paul
  14. Hi Matt, If you can expose it on the negative (including most of the perf area)... we can frame for it in the transfer session and deliver it in the HD quicktime. 1.66 is just a rare request but we can do any framing including overscanning the neg. -Paul
  15. HI Matt, I've noticed you complaining about prices a lot. There's no problem with that of course... but just a suggestion that if there was a way that you can up-sell the value of film to your clients then they might happily pay for it. At Cinelicious we have a lot of clients that get paid great money to shoot weddings on film... some are shooting 100% film and charging in the 5-figures... others are shooting a mix. There are definitely clients out there that can afford and appreciate film. At Paper Tape Films which is fairly mid-range prices are set at around $500/roll for SD and $600/roll for HD (that's shot, transferred and edited). Paper Tape Films did about 30 weddings last year in various cities across the US at an average budget of around $7K per wedding (and shot an average of 15 rolls per wedding). Do the math. There's money to be made shooting film when you put out a quality product (which judging by the work you've shown I'm sure you're more than capable of), learn how to sell the idea of film to clients, and finding the right clientele. Will really makes a good point about the state of the industry. It's tough to support the high cost of high end equipment. Even with the cost of some telecine gear coming down the manufacturers still charge crazy money when something breaks. We recently paid $20K for when one board died on our Spirit... and that was a used part swap price. Food for thought. Best, Paul
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