Jim Malone

I found a fantastic website today. It has screenshots from a ton of wonderfuly shot films. Mostly academy award nominees and award winners (oh and The Spitfire Grill...??). Most of the screenshots are HD size. I find it to be a teriffic sort of overview of the cinematography of different movies to get a sense of how certain Cinematographers frame their shots, light scenes, how directors compose their reverses and two-shots, how films are colored, etc. Give it a look!! http://evanerichards.blogspot.com/

This is true. Still looks amazing though. I heard there are a couple bootleg copies of the film floating around that are in color. I would love to get my hands on those to see what they look like.

I think "The Man Who Wasn't There" shot by Roger Deakins is stunningly beautiful.

Maybe I miss the point of a light meter. If you aren't using it to help you properly expose your image, what are you using it for? I thought the point was to know what f-stop to park on. Please advise.

Unfortunately my camera does not have a waveform monitor, nor do I have an external waveform monitor to hook up to it. It does have zebra bars though, but I find their use in setting the exposure somewhat limited.

Can anyone tell me about using light meters for digital video? Would one be helpful? Has anyone ever used one before shooting digital video? What would the pros and cons be. Any information anyone could give me on this matter would be greatly appreciated. Cheers! Jim

Excellent. I knew it was shot on reversal stock, and I know what that looks like but I don't know enough about the chemical process to understand what the film/color are doing. I love the way it looks though. Tony Scotts style is unmistakable.

Keeping the shot locked off could save a lot of work in post, but it depends on what the shot requires. If you need a moving shot you would have to track it and stickers in the corners is not a bad idea. If it is a static shot though it should be pretty easy to throw something up on the screen without any tracking markers or special preparations.

Does anyone else see the red haze in either of these photos around the people and around the bridge? Is this some sort of color correction technique or a color bleeding or what? I can't begin to figure it out. I am very curious. Please advise.

Excellent. Thanks for the tip. I was watching "Domino" today and thought that the visuals were just amazing. I love that reversal stock look that Tony Scott seems to be so fond of. Here is another quick question then regarding chroma boost. In the past when I have tried to boost the chroma in an image I find it really brings out the artifacts. It seems to make them really apparent. Is there any way around that?

I would like to simulate the look of reversal stock in post production color correction. I know I could use a program like Magic Bullet or something similar, but how would I simulate something like that with just say, Final Cut and no extra plugins? Please advise.

Yes, I am very happy with all this information. Thanks a million! Incidently, I watched the directors commentary and I am pretty sure he did say they used an ENR process on the film.

Jeunet said in the commentary that they sent a version for release in the USA without the ENR process being done on it. I don't suppose anyone knows where I could get a copy of that?

I just watched Delicatessen. I was completely blown away by the cinematography. It really fits my aesthetic sensibilities. To me every frame was absolutely perfect. I love the color and composition. Can anyone tell me about the color on this film? The whole film was very warm and yellowish. The color blue did not appear in the film (that I saw) until the very last shot. How is this look achieved? I can't imagine that it is done in with color grading in post as I don't believe they were doing that so much back in 1991. Is it all about using lights with warm colored gels? Or is there a specific film stock that can be used to achieve this look? Please advise. Anything you can tell me, even just observations about how it was shot, lit, composed, would be great. Many thanks!!!!

I have a fogger, and that works well for an indoor setting. But for an outdoor setting, not so much. I don't have thousands (or even hundreds to work with) so I need a cheap alternative. I have been told burning beeswax works well. Is that true? Does it smell bad (I am anosmic so I would never know)? Is there anything else that could be used? Please advise.