Tyler Purcell

Yep, I absolutely saw it in 2k. Very few theaters have 4k projectors.

I assume the issues are related to post processing and converting a 4k master to 2k. I saw similar problems with Ex Machina using the same camera. Both movies I saw in 2k, so it's most likely not the camera. I wonder if Claudio Miranda uses a similar shutter angle because Oblivion had similar motion blur issues. Hmm… it's interesting for sure. That's just how nit picky I am! LOL :D

Saw Tomorrowland last night, they had the screen setup for 1:85 and simply showed a matted image on the screen with black bars at the top and bottom. A bit disappointing for Arclight, the premiere theater chain in So Cal. However, the projector looked pretty good and the movie looked even better. A side note, Claudio Miranda did a stellar job. It's unfortunate the film has so much SFX because I really just wanted to see more of his live action stuff. Stephen Nakamura color'd it and as always, he did a great job, I mean stellar work. I was so depressed when they went to the CG world of Tomorrowland because those were the only scenes that looked totally different then the live action stuff. Gotta admit, there were some aliasing issues, especially around patterns of clothing. Claudio did a great job evening out the light so the dynamic range issues these cameras have, wasn't so obvious. Then Nakamura brought in some blacks and accentuated the highlights. It's the first film I've seen in a while where the digital photography didn't bother me too much. I wasn't constantly pulled out of the movie nit picking on stuff. Sure, you could tell it was digital right away, first shot of the film. However, they did so much work to cover it up, it worked OK and didn't take me away from the story.

Not to add another option, but why not just shoot Pro Res in "Film" mode? I don't ever use the raw mode because of these problems AND Avid/FCP can't accept the Raw files anyway.

No film prints for tomorrowland. :(

I had some long/extensive conversations about these projection systems and IMAX has zero intentions on setting up anything else but 4k distribution. The current workflow is 6k, but distribution is only 4k. I was told the projectors are 1.5 million dollars.

2.20:1 is perfect. Just wide enough! :)

Ok gents… spent a week working on this one. Take a gander see what ya think! http://tye1138.com/stuff/fullerguitar16mm.mov

I have similar experiences. We have Arclight Cinema's here in So Cal and they're the best theater chain around. Every time I go, the image and sound are perfect, whether it's film or digital projection. It really shows that BOTH technologies work fine, if the theater owners cared. It's made things worse because now there are no options. The cost to shoot and project theatrical films hasn't decreased one bit. Theater chain's have spent millions upgrading to now-antique digital projection systems. So there is A LOT of money still being spent, just by different people. Also, studio films spend more money in post production because there are more options, more time is spent cleaning up movies now then ever, down to practically air-brushing actors faces in each shot. With photochemical finish, there wasn't any need for that crap. :sigh: it's kinda useless talking about this anyway. Nothing is going to change.

They could have fixed film projection. IMAX did with their rolling loop projection system, which could have easily been adapted to work with 35mm. The industry continued to use vertical projectors for ease of use and cost savings. To me, that was part of the downfall, nobody bothered making any major changes. In fact, outside of stocks themselves and digital audio, not much has changed with 35mm projection since the Academy format was introduced. Other systems like VistaVision and 70mm came and went, mostly due to cost and improved stocks. In my eyes, there is no reason projectors couldn't have been fixed, the industry simply didn't think it was necessary.

Well, for me it's not about the negatives of film; grain, the dots/scratches, gate weave, splices, flicker and print color shifts. These elements could be considered the "look" of film. These are dead giveaway's of film, but for anyone who shoot's film, these are things we don't like. All of us film guys, do our best to make sure the audience never see's these things. We live in an analog world. Speakers vibrate a specific frequencies to make sound waves which our ears pickup. If you turn that technology around, microphones do the same thing. They take sound waves, turn them into analog signals which can then be recorded. The moment you try to convert analog to digital, you have a whole host of issues. What can the human ear actually hear? If it can't hear certain frequencies, then simply omit those. However, those frequencies bounce off other frequencies to create an entirely different sound when reproduced. The music industry has spent BILLIONS developing digital recorders which mimmic analog and over the last 10 years or so, people have been steadily moving BACK to 24 track analog recorders and vinyl distribution. This technology has been out of date for decades, but if you accept the background noise, it actually DOES sound considerably better then 24bit digital recordings. They're simply more organic/realistic sounding with less potential for peaking. It's the same with film in a lot of ways, only with visual medium it's much more complex. Digital pixels are square, they actually have define edges, otherwise they wouldn't be digital. Film doesn't have pixels, so there aren't any defined edges within the frame. When you convert film to digital, the film grain is far more apparent because of these pixel blocks. As finishing artists, we run the scanned images through layers of de-noising and de-grain, manually removing dots/scratches and other problems. Then we compress the living poop out of the image, taking the lovely 12 bit 444 uncompressed RGB signal and compressing the crap out of it for 8 bit 4:2:0 Rec709 distribution for BluRay or VOD. These steps soften the image, they reduce the dynamic range substantially and compress color space into the smallest form possible. What comes out is an entirely different looking image then the source. If you were to play them both back to back in a theater, the original film print and the BluRay, you'd swear they were two different movies. Yes DCP's look a lot better then BluRay's, but they're still very flat in their dynamic range, almost milky looking. So in reality, you aren't seeing "film" at home or in digital cinema's. You're seeing an interpretation of film. We fake the genuine article because it's cheaper and most people could care less. Just look at the crap our industry produces today and that will show you how much they care. :)

When you see the 2nd or 3rd run with a modern 5/70mm print, it blows your mind away. No gate weave, no cigarette burns, no noticeable grain or dirt/scratches. The format is quite amazing and it doesn't cost a big movie ANYTHING to strike a hand-full of those prints for BIG movies in the major cities around the world. Scanners are 6k making the print theoretically higher resolution then any known digital projection OR digital delivery format. So the audience is actually getting a better quality image on film in the long run. Like all "technology", 4k laser projectors will be in the house for consumer use in a year or two. Christie and Kodak already make smaller versions of the same technology IMAX is using. Once it's available at home, people will again have no reason to visit the theater. Those who invested will get maybe a year or two of "hype" out of it, but in reality it's not the answer. This has always been my point… 35mm and 70mm projection doesn't exist at home, it never has and it never will. When you see a film at the theater, you are watching something you absolutely can't watch at home. It has nothing to do with quality, it has everything to do with being different and unique to the home-theater experience. In the industries haste to "save money" they've single handedly killed the only thing that made going to the cinemas worth while.

Right, but the actual source is 4k. So even if it's 8k projection, it's still a 4k source. :(

Interesting, though I would argue 4k source digital cinema is nowhere near the resolution of 15/70. If IMAX figures out a way to finish and distribute in 8k, then we'll start talking. The system is ready for it, but the sources are still 4k. I haven't seen the laser projection yet, it's extremely expensive, so very few theater owners have installed it. I'm personally a bit upset IMAX has made this decision because they will force theaters to upgrade eventually, which will mark the end of standard theatrical film projection.

Projectors are cheap now a days. I prefer DLP greatly over LCD or DILA. My projector is an Optoma HD25, which is 2700 lumens in cinema mode, which is outstanding. Most projectors in cinema mode are around 1500 lumens. It doesn't look awesome, but it looks OK, it's satisfactory. The projector needs to be directly in front of the screen, or it will have focus issues. So I'm not in love with the projector, I got it cheap and it does the job satisfactory. If I had more money, I'd absolutely get something better. My normal home theater setup is slightly different, this was only for a one-off event. My normal screen is 6 feet wide and the projector works much better in that smaller environment. Still, 6 feet is a lot! I don't have TV, so my sources are my computer and an optical disk reader of whatever kind I have that day. 99.9% of the time I use my computer because I download or stream everything off the internet. If you wanna watch TV, it may not work well. It's not great for evening news or simple things because it drains your lamp. But for a movie watching experience, it's far superior to anything else I've ever had at home and for a filmmaker, it's a must have in my book. Remember, we don't watch TV's at the theaters, we watch projectors! :) Hope that helps!

Thanks Ronaldo! Check out some new stuff: I'm really having fun with the camera.

I did some recent tests with my pocket camera in B&W. Didn't add grain… but it shows what digital B&W can look like in the S16 format. http://tye1138.com/stuff/fullerguitartest.mov

Yep. It's so sad watching dailies for modern narrative features. They roll the camera for everything and MOST of it's totally unusable. Because I grew up shooting film, I only start capturing when there is something worth capturing! I hate watching dailies, I wanna sit down and start editing when the shoot is done, not spend weeks logging the footage. Sometimes even on bigger shoots, I'll edit right on set the night after photography is done. This way I understand what I've got and know where to go the next day. This is the ONE big advantage with shooting digitally, but it's only good if you have very little material to go through.

I personally would transcode because there isn't a 5k standard presentation system on the market today. Editing in 2k 12 bit 4:4:4 will be easier for the software AND most importantly, perfect quality for any delivery format as most digital presentation systems are 2k OR LESS. Then, if someday in the future you wish to go back and finish in 4k, it will be an easy process.

Yep, that's kinda what I thought. FCPX should translate the flags if they were written properly. Good to know it works! :)

Some people consider the director of photography, more like a lighting cameraman. Someone to operate the camera AND deal with lighting challenges when they come up. More of a liaison between the director and the gaffer. I'm the opposite, I mix the job of director and cinematographer into one position. I bring in a decent gaffer, someone I can give lighting directions to. I will also bring in one or two assistant's to work with the gaffer in order to achieve my vision. In my view, those are the two most critical positions because a cinematographer shouldn't be climbing ladders, adjusting lights. They should be on the ground working with the director to achieve their vision. This is why mixing the two roles into one person, makes a lot of sense. On smaller shows where I can't afford an AC, I've still brought in a gaffer and loaded the film can's myself. I've handed the gaffer a light meter and given him the role of AC. A lot of gaffers like that because they can touch the camera and sometimes run it, depending on how busy I get as a director. I have many fond memories being on commercial shoots loading film can's and talking with the actors or crew about the next shot. The camera is everything in my view as this is a visual medium. If the shot isn't interesting, then people will turn off. Simply capturing a scene, isn't really interesting in my view. I'm sometimes forced to use that methodology on documentaries because there isn't time to get something interesting. However, on narratives, I tend to focus on more creative looks. It's the directors role to guide the look of the film, so in a lot of ways, they're the real cinematographer. However, on bigger shows, you can afford a cinematographer and I will admit, being a director working with cinematographers is great because you get a lot of input/feedback from them, sometimes invaluable ideas come from that simple exchange. Due to this modern technical age we live in, I direct, shoot and edit. However, most of the time I don't do all three on one show, I'm hired to do ONE of those three. Because I know how to do all three, I generally can fill in some gaps where roles are left out. As a director, I can help the cinematographer understand my vision better. As a cinematographer, I can help the director understand what works and what doesn't. As an editor, I can help the director understand how certain scenes will play out in post. Unfortunately, most shows today are made in post production. The editor winds up being the real story teller and the director only add's their vision to the mix. I have been very bossy as a cinematographer on shows, even left a few because the director had no vision. The relationship between the director and cinematographer needs to be strong in my opinion. With the advent of the video village, directors can now sit and watch their shots from a distance, making sure it's in the can. So the trust doesn't need to be nearly as strong as the film days, where you really didn't know if you got the shot or not. With digital, the role of the cinematographer has been diluted slightly as a consequence. It's easy to fix mistakes operators/DP's make and it's very easy to light very even/flat and fix it all in post. So yes, I've seen DP's call the shots on set, with not very strong visionary directors. Generally the cream rises to the top and ya know, that's OK. If I went to direct a narrative feature and hired Roger Deakins to shoot it, I would listen to everything he said. He has more experience then I will ever have and ya know what, just that experience would be worth it's weight in gold for ANY would be filmmaker. Edit: I've never worked on a shoot for 9hrs, most of my shoots are 12 - 16. So you're damn lucky!

I don't think the computer analogy works because it's a high technology market and cinema isn't. Filmmaking is an art form, like painting, still photography or theater. Technology doesn't belong mucking around in those fields, but unfortunately in the last 15 years, we've seen the lines blurred. Now everything is controlled by computers and some pretty powerful one's at that. As a consequence, all this modern digital technology is out of date, sometimes before it's available to the public and if not, only a year or two later. Just look at the AJA Cion, who would buy that thing when the Blackmagic Ursa Mini exists? Before AJA could even release their camera, Blackmagic stepped all over them and made something better for essential the same price. It's harder now to break into the industry then it's ever been. Technology has set new precedence for labor rates and there are now more people capable of doing the same job. It's also dumbed down much of the work, anyone can push a start/stop button on a digital camera, anyone can upload a file from a drive into a digital cinema projector. Over 100,000 jobs were lost in the switch from film to digital projection, another 50,000 were lost during the lab/theater closures. So in our precipitous leap towards the future, we put over 150,000 people out of work. People with families, most of who worked their asses off to get those jobs years ago and now are probably working at some low-end position outside of the industry. All of this push for new technology which has no standardization, which doesn't look any better and puts people out of work?!?! Does any of this make any sense to anyone? Yea, I love having a digital cinema camera at my beckon call, but I'd gladly give it up for film to come back. Why? Because it required real talent to shoot with that magic black box and as archaic as that system was, it worked for over 100 years flawlessly. In contrast, everything we make today, everything we invest in, is just a disposable toy.

Landon, think of it a different way. Once everyone can do something, the value of doing that thing diminishes. For instance, when Apple introduced Final Cut Pro in the late 90's, it was revolutionary because prior to that, everyone had to use expensive NLE systems. Now anyone could buy the software and learn how to edit at home. Over the years, companies looking for cheap labor, bought FCP systems and paid peanuts for those editors. Since FCP's introduction, the price for an editor has decreased steadily year after year. Today, it's hard to get ANY editing work, but not because it doesn't exist, but because there is so much free/cheap labor out there, it's set a new precedence and now it's nearly impossible to make a living at editing. Now it's even harder to get on bigger, long-term shows then ever before. You either make your own shows, or you work for someone else as an employee, unable to do your own creative work because you're worked to death. If you don't take the work, someone else will fill in right away for less money. It's a dog-eat-dog world out there and it really sucks. Digital technology has played a huge role because it allows people to experiment risk free. It really has nothing to do with your product getting seen, it has to do with precedence. Now that digital is here to stay, people simply expect to pay less for someone shooting digitally and it's ruined any chance of making good money.

Yep, but in the history of cinema, we've used stock as our defining color pallet with lenses and filtration to help generate a specific look. Only in the last decade have things been so limited with film production. Camera A Alexa, Pro Res files 2k source (6000k) Camera B RED Epix, .3rd files 5k source (3400k) Camera C Canon C300, MPEG 2 files 1920x1080 source (5800k) Camera D/F GoPro, MPEG 2 files 1920x1080 source (5600k) This is the kind of stuff I see all the time in the post production world. Match those 4 cameras, when they aren't even the same spectral color space, let alone set the same color range. On this example, it was a night shoot outdoors and one of the operators set to tungsten, everyone else set to daylight. They had no reason to use different cameras on this shoot. They could have shot the entire thing with the Red or Canon C300, but the director wanted an Alexa, which drained the budget since the DP already owned the Red and C300. So they couldn't afford a rent more then 1 Alexa at any given time, so they were forced to mix and match. The film came out good, we had a great colorist clean most of it up, but editing/post production was horrible. It took 4 weeks to fix the cut after I was done. FOUR WEEKS! I didn't care, I needed the work, but dude how ridiculous is that! All because the Director didn't like the look of the Red on a super low budge film. My problem is there are NO standards with digital and as a consequence, everyone just does whatever they want. With film, if you didn't follow the procedures, follow the standards, you were screwed. It made better cinematographers because they were limited. Today directors can do anything, so they DO anything they want. It makes for shitty films, it makes for angry crew and it makes for horrible post production. The whole point of film was restriction and firmly set standards. It's what makes our "classic" films so damn good, they used the standards to their fullest. Heck even modern films like Interstellar, you didn't see him resort to gimmicks like Go Pro's. They built a mount and put an Imax camera on the actors. If you wanna do it right, that's the way to do it. What's even sadder for me is our youth will never know anything about standards. They will have cameras in every part of their life which shoot better quality then cinema cameras from a few years ago. They will go on through school shooting digital and only learn about history, never able to touch the image, never be able to hold it up to light and physically see what you captured. They will graduate and start shooting their own projects, but without fully understanding guidelines because you can make huge mistakes in digital and get away with them. We're ushering in generations of filmmakers who can do anything they want, with limitless ability. Nobody has limitless ability in life, we can't fly. So why do we have limitless ability in cinema? Same goes for still images… the "photoshopped" world we currently live in, it's absolutely atrocious and disgusting. People take a poop image, something taken with zero talent, manipulate the crap out of it and get something decent on the back end and somehow people find that acceptable? Anyway… it hurts seeing what I love so much fall apart because people are all about "new and shiny". What they don't realize is technology doesn't make art.

Yep and that's my point. The media makes the look not the camera body. So if you want a different look, you simply change the recording media, instead of selling all your camera gear and buying new gear for a different look. If a filmmaker want's a certain look, you don't need to rent different equipment, you simply do some tests on different stocks and lighting, find what you like and go with it, using standard camera bodies and "cinema" workflow. Today, digital cinema has turned everything upside down. If you're just a cinematographer, then who cares, but when you work in post all day long like I do, you see how absolutely atrocious image digital capture is. There are zero standards, everyone shoots however they want, which means the post people have little to know understanding of what it's suppose to look like. In the film days, I could edit with a one light on my steenbeck and know what it's going to look like. But today, just making simple shot decisions is nearly impossible because even if you apply a LUT to all the material before editing, you can't tell if they will match well with other clips in the final. It requires serious talent to make even two of the same camera match because the cameras are so highly technical today, one little setting throws everything off. Plus, it's now a race to make these cameras cheaper and easier to access for the public. In a few years when anyone can shoot a 4k for cheap money, it will dilute the whole profession like digital still photography has already. The truly talented people have simply retired and the replacements are fighting over the few jobs available. Anyway, this is why I see digital technology as the demise of everything we love about cinema.