Byron Karl

John... Quick follow up question on 4K-Bayer... My understanding of bayer is that the RGB pixels are scattered across the chip and that between different blue pixels on the same line, the "gap" between them needs to be "filled in." Are you saying a 4K image is taken and it's just a color shift happening from line to line? Meaning that on a 4K chip, my understanding is that it's 1K blue, 1k red and 2k green that some how mathematically combines to 4K, despite 2K being the highest resolution? The reason I was suspecting it's more akin to a software "upconversion" is the render time involved. If it's just a color shift, then that doesn't account for why it needs a 15:1 ratio to debayer footage to 4K. Are you saying a full 4K image is captured line by line, but in alternating CbCr?

Question for fellow skeptics: How dissimilar is RED's full-debayering, from software "upconversion?" It seems like both are filling in the blanks between pixels. I obviously have an opinion, but I don't really know for sure.

I'm wondering what the proper workflow is for syncing audio to RED footage that is going through offline / online. The details are that the RED footage itself is mute and I have separate WAVs that can be synced up with the clapperboard. In FCP, I'm guessing I can either make new subclips of the synced footage, or use the merge clips feature to create new synced clips. However, I don't know if the online reconform later will be able to associate these new clips with the original RED footage. I figure most features use dual system and also offline / online. So why can't I find any info on a workflow that handles this?

I think you're confusing the film with a digital short done using the same lead actors. The short if viewable online, if you google around.

Great news that this film has the girl from Transformers (and every magazine cover at the moment). That should definitely build some traction. When I followed your notes about the production of this picture, I didn't have any idea it would be something this high profile. Congrats. The images from the trailer look great and I can't wait to experience it on the screen. As always, thanks for being so generous with information, tips and anecdotes.

Hi, I've run the gamut of tests on various FLV encoding variables. The one, weirdly enough, that doesn't increase file size but helps with quality is setting the keyframes to "0" or "key frame every frame." Normally, you'd think this goes against the very principle of encoding, but do a test and check your files sizes. It doesn't add anything. The real issue is your frame size. If you wanna do something at 640x480, you're using four times the screen size of 320x240. I know your dimensions are a little different, but if you shoot for a smaller screen size you can get away with a lower bit rate therefore. For professional projects at 640x480 (as an example) you have to use something like 1,200K as your bit rate. Whereas the same video scaled down to 320x240 can look just as high quality at around 500k or so.

Why is it that I am so unfamiliar with the DP of Alien (Derek Vanlint)? I've heard this movie being used as teaching example on cinematography... but I don't understand how the DP has only two credits listed on IMDB following Alien. One of them in 2000. Has he just been working on the agency side of things since then? What gives? I'm just assuming all the credit for the lighting and atmosphere on the film is perhaps more attributed to the production design and/or director.

I wonder where something like the Panasonic LH2600W fits into this debate. I mean, it's not a CRT monitor. It's a flat-screen LCD monitor. However it claims to be able to "match" the color of a CRT and does have a built in waveform and vectorscope, which I assume means that they intended for it to be used as a proper broadcast monitor. I used it recently on a music video and figured that, while not "professional," it was "good enough."

Unless you Region Code the DVD it will play fine in a standard DVD player. It doesn't really care if the DVD is NTSC or PAL. Meaning you can send your PAL DVD to someone in the US and it will play fine. If there are graphics then they will look distorted and you'll need to make a separate NTSC version.

If your concept of Malick can fit on a flashcard, "wheat fields at magic hour," then maybe there is some similarity. By that same account this movie should also be a lot like Gladiator... I never said anything about Malick being better, just that the styles are different. If you read Alemendros's book, you'll take note that there isn't a chapter on affecting the look... Quite frankly, the film's interior dialogue scenes have such a short lattitude and enhanced sharpness due to the added contrast that it looks vaguely video.

Got to say "I don't know." Just caught this on DVD and find it odd to see so many comparisons written between Malick and this movie. Not that I'm trying to judge which is the better, which'd be odd, rather it seems that they're going in two different directions. I think Malick is regarded as focusing on naturalism and this film is stylistically the opposite. The extreme contrast, where every black is an inky black and every white sky is blown out, is visually dramatic. However, it's a far cry from naturalism and more akin to the DI accentuated contrast you'd expect from a graphic novel film like 300. Similarly the constant orange tone to the film grew a bit long. Granted, when everything is lit by lamps and candles there is going to be a low color temp. But your eyes adapt, so it's not like you sitting in a room talking to someone and noticing the room's a pumpkin shade of orange. Stylistically, the movie is bold. But even the train scene everyone mentions is stylistically more akin to something out of Day of Locust rather than anything you can cite from Malick. If you really want to draw that comparison, please give specific examples. Maybe the DVD's blacks are a little more crunched looking than in theatres...

I have experience with the G-Drive being solid, it's the winner at its price point. Obviously avoid LaCie and most cheapo store brands as you're getting a bunch of parts from China tossed in there of dubious value. Of the store brands Western Digital is better, but it's not the league of G-Drive. If you can't write off the expense Glyph Drive is better than G-Drive.

Try Flip4Mac

To follow-up on this... I heard from the man himself that it was finished photo-chemically. He made a comment that only Zodiac used the DI process and that everything else he has done feature wise was finished photo-chemically. He added that he was concerned, because on American Gangster he noticed that the infrastructure has shifted to expect a DI, despite that fact he feels he gets the best result photo-chemically. My personal opinion on all this digital stuff is that I'm sick of hearing about how everything is switching to digital (and has been on the low-end moving up), despite it not being an improvement in quality. But I'm sure you're more interested in the opinion of Mr. Savides. He mentioned also that this switch to expecting a DI means that the personnel are not going to be there for photochemical finishing in the future. Prior to working on a DI he had heard of a bunch of possible ways to tweak a DI image, but when he worked on Zodiac he found out that they all looked "glossy" which I assume was his work for "fake."

I don't have any information about filteration, but I do seem to recall something about the printing of Deliverence. I don't know if it's common knowledge, so I'll repeat it briefly. Perhaps Mr. Mullen can correct me if has access to the original AC article on this one. Breifly, from what I recall they used a B&W print as a mask when printing so that they achieved something similiar to a present-day bleach bypass. So that the B&W print kept light from making the colors seem super saturated, by blocking the print negative frm getting dense. However, the B&W print mask would be clear where there was white light so maybe that was resulting in making the highlights bloom as in these shots.

Is anyone planning to go to this talk. It was annouced just a couple days ago, so I don't know how big the turnout will be. I'm sort of expecting that it won't be a hard to get into event in East Hampton (it's tied into their local film festival). The only problem is deciding between a $50 bus ticket there, or hours on the train... Five-time Academy Award®-nominated cinematographer Allen Daviau, ASC (E.T., The Color Purple, Bugy) will conduct a Cinematography Master Class on Saturday, October 20, at noon at the United Artists Theater in East Hampton (30 Main Street). David Schwartz, chief curator of the Museum of the Moving Image, will host the discussion, which will focus on the art of creating compelling images for the cinema. Clips from Daviau?s renowned body of work, including Empire of the Sun (1987), Avalon (1990) and Van Helsing (2004), will also be shown. The event is presented by Kodak in support of the art and craft of filmmaking. Admission is free, and open to the public.

I caught Paranoid Park last night and it was pretty awful. There was one amazing shot (in the shower), but the rest of the film was very flat and boring. It had nothing to do with Doyle's other work and it has a pretty routine, stock look about it. But not flat enough to be interesting in that regard. Along with the 1.38 aspect ratio, this movie imports the lesser aesthetics of TV. Even though it's most 35mm, it could have been shot on video. Similarly, the mixing of various formats fell flat. The only interesting mention about Doyle this time around is that he has a speaking cameo. I'd be cautious of anything complimentary people say of this effort, as it's probably based more on press than actually seeing the film.

It's not such an "us vs them" attitude in NYC, where being a pedestrian enviornment means you walk by and through working sets all the time. Most of the time, the huge condors and balloon lights don't really have any impact on you, because it's worlds away from anything that can be done on a small scale. However, seeing people light interiors of shops or rig outside of apartment windows is usually pretty illuminating. The street I live on has been in about 5 features over the last year or so and yesterday I passed by a block-long set for a TV show. I didn't pay it any mind, but later I looked it up on IMDB and it credits Stuart Dryburgh as the DP. Makes me think I probably should have stopped a little longer. However watching a set is crushingly boring. I can see the appeal of stopping by and seeing how a set-up is done, but the time between different set-ups is enormous and doesn't warrant lingering.

http://www.timeout.com/film/newyork/featur...don-willis.html

Hey Kirk, what settings did you use to capture the footage? You can find out, if you control click on one of the clips and then look at Item Properties, format. It looks like the easy fix would be to just save your edit and then using Media Manager to recapture the clips in your timeline at the new capture settings. As for being hung up on HD, what exactly is your release medium? As of right now no one has a HD-DVD or BluRay burner, so you can't release it on DVD in HD anyway. As for Cinema Tools, you should check first what the fps rate is on the footage on your DV tape.

Watch the end credits for the types of shows that you are interested in and you will see where the prod. companies are located. However for getting your foot in the door, it might be better to work an office job in programming for either A&E/History Channel (NYC) or Discovery/TLC (D.C.). Then move from being an assistant to a producer to getting involved as coordinator or producer. This is the route that will inform you as to how to have some autonomy in creating non-fiction content for television. And also, having some experience in this I can say that the faster track is more with Discovery Channel as they are much larger. From the production company side of things, you're mainly just pitching shows or being hired. The development of content is mainly up to the network. Also, I'd maybe try freelancing or temping for one of these networks first. You might find that your ambitions don't coincide with television, which is more about rehashing and repackaging the same content, rather than developing anything new.

In event this is posted in the wrong area, please feel free to move it. Does anyone in the NYC area have a spare ticket for either screening of Caravaggio this weekend? If so, please send me a message as I'm not counting on the stanby line for this one.

Well the difference between 720x576 and 768x576 is that one is a 4:3 DV ratio and the other is a broadcast ratio. If you really want to know the reason why it's that DV formats such as DVD's use MPEG-2 compression which requires values to be a multiple of 16. For something going to DigiBeta and hence broadcast use 768x576.

The trailer to Blueberry Nights is up now at http://www.cannes2007.com/bandes-annonces=73057.html Also found this shot in a seperate trailer.

It's simple, you just Ctrl-Click on the footage in FCP and select "Media Manager" then "Recompress." Use the OfflineRT settings and let it create a new project. Now edit your project. When you want to upres, ctrl click on your sequence now and select "Make Offline" and then ctrl click on the same sequence and select "Reconnect Media" and relink the clips in your sequence to their media files on your drive.