Manu Delpech

Very surprised that there's no thread about the film so far. It's available today on Netflix and is also showing in 600 locations across the world (the film was released two weeks earlier in theaters exclusively), they're actually pushing this very hard in Mexico (there are even mobile cinemas ! that go around to show the film in certain locations), domestically as well, it's already been sweeping many awards, many for best picture, best director and best cinematography. Chivo was supposed to shoot the film, they prepped and he had to drop out. Cuaron then took over and shot the film himself (Galo Olivares rumored to be the co-DP at some point, has a credit as cinematography collaborator (never saw that before) and camera operator). Here's the second trailer: I'd advise of course to watch this on Netflix to get a better quality. Chivo & Cuaron discussed the film at a panel: https://variety.com/2018/artisans/in-contention/alfonso-cuaron-details-roma-cinematography-with-gravity-dp-emmanuel-lubezki-1203085424/ The film has insanely great reviews and it's all deserved honestly. I couldn't get into it at first, it felt like I feel watching Children Of Men or Gravity which is to say, I admire and respect those films more than I like them. I LOVE A Little Princess and Harry Potter & The Prisoner Of Azkaban though, Great Expectations is quite good too and Y Tu Mama Tambien is strong. But then something clicked about halfway through the film and I was in completely. The film is completely immersive, there is no score but the sound design is very strong, I felt like I was witnessing this slice of life in person. Cuaron takes his style one step further by adopting a very minimalistic approach. The camera often pans across the scene, left to right, right to left, observing. At times, it's simply static and lingers. Other times, there are hypnotizing tracking shots (one just following characters walking across a dirt road, with a gorgeous vista and the mountains in the background, the camera is higher up on a hill. Another one on the beach, so simple and yet so powerful). The B&W is also gorgeous, absolutely gorgeous, so pure. Cuaron explained why he shot this on the Alexa 65 and not on film and he wanted it, those memories of his, to be pristine. Anyway, Cuaron has apparently pushed for theaters in the US to show the film either on 70mm or Dolby Atmos, but considering it's playing in many places that have none of those things, I guess he loosened up. Do try to watch it on the BIG screen with quality sound, it is worth it, I didn't think so at first but it is. A funny tidbit: the ending credits state the film was shot entirely on 65mm which is obviously not true as it's not film, but for some reason, Netflix and Cuaron have been pushing that narrative a lot :D

Mother looked kinda crappy imo. It depends really. Steve Jobs for example, the super 16 first act looks gorgeous, surprisingly "sharp". The Newsroom (Aaron Sorkin): Pilot on super 16, looks gorgeous. Jonah Hill's Mid90s looks beautiful too, etc. The Kodak site is where it's at usually, sometimes, I just search all over the internet if I can find any kind of information on what format was used for said film or sometimes, you can just tell from the trailer. I'm surprised by Mark saying the Vision 3 stocks are so "clean" he had trouble telling Fallout was film. Fallout looks dirty as hell in IMAX, way dirtier than anamorphic 35mm looks like at its best (Ready Player One is a great example lately). I've seen some other DPs say this and I'm not seeing it. There are some rare films, especially lately, that look quite clean but overall, you can always tell when a film is shot on film unless you're sitting way back in the room. Then yeah, if you sit way back, you're not going to be able to perceive any kind of texture anyway. But sitting reasonably close, that's where it shines imo. About Westworld, are you watching it on TV? Because on cases like this, I think the compression via broadcast is just so strong that the texture is messed with, it becomes quite clean although 50D was used a lot on the first season and that's 3 perf. I personally love it when the stock is push processed, and they get that grain to pop. Linus Sandgren is a great example of a DP who shoots mostly on film between O.Russell and Chazelle and there's no way you'll mistake that for digital. I had some test invoices done for a project of mine, to see the comparative costs between super 16 and 2 perf, and there's like a 2K difference in my case. 2 perf is the way to go, there's a major leap between 16 and 2 perf, and 2 perf has a lovely texture (Silver Linings Playbook, The Fighter, On The Road, most of First Man, American Hustle, I Tonya, etc)

Congrats David, excellent work

Considering Succession, A Quiet Place, The Post and The Irishman (among others) have used the NYC lab, i'm pretty sure the quality is top notch :D

I have no idea how Fukunaga (on Beasts Of No Nation and he also had malaria for a good chunk of it, shooting in Africa) and Cuaron (Roma) did it. I can't imagine how you can be truly at 100% on either level but then again, it worked superbly for them

Reviving this thread :D Ended up seeing it in 4K 60fps on the UHD BR version. Personally love the film, very experimental, different, restrained, and I love how Lee pushes himself. I do wish he'd go back to film to be honest but I guess he maybe wants to keep pushing as he explained it. I prefer the 24fps version (only available on the BR), just feels better to me BUT I found that the 4K 60fps not only is astoundingly clear, it's also emotionally more overwhelming. The half time show which is a glorious scene, intercutting with moments of Billy's heroism, has far more impact in HFR, it's also more stimulating. It doesn't really feel cheap, it just has this inherent super realism that is so out there and different from what we perceive and accept as cinematic. And that's a bad trip for some folks. I wonder how different the 120fps is, but it's a very intriguing technology. Lee went all out on his next one Gemini Man, shot on 4K 120fps once again. Confirmed to me by Dion Beebe. Might be even more suited to the story considering it's about an elite assassin played by Will Smith who ends up facing a younger him.

Just for you guys: "Joe Anderson: I wanted the cinematography to be fun in “The Old Man & The Gun.” I wanted the camera to be light on its feet and unselfconscious. Curious and expressive enough to whip and zoom around spontaneously. We chose to shoot on Super 16 because the film is set in the early 80s and Super 16 is the best time machine. But you have to be careful because sometimes the format can come off looking like your grandparents’ home movies. We wanted the movie to stand up well on the big screen, so I choose to shoot with a slower film stock. I shot with 200 speed film which I underexposed a bit. This created a lovely amount of grain while still having a solid high definition image. The slower film stock and the story itself inspired a different lighting approach than we are accustomed to using today. Film seems to like having a little bit softer contrast than digital cameras do so I lit scenes more flatly and used more light than I typically do. This approach really made our cast look great and also served as a bit of a nod to the lighting style typical of the time when our movie was set. I don’t necessarily love relying on crazy old lenses to create a look. I shot with Cooke S4s which are my favorite lenses. A lot of newer lenses use aspherical elements to cancel out distortion, but this creates unnaturally flat images. A big part of the cinematographer’s job is to create dimension and because of 16mm’s smaller field of view, separating a subject from the background can be difficult. The Cookes did a great job of helping to make our characters stand out and be larger than life." I really like super 16 by the way, but it doesn't come close to 35mm for me imo and it can look too soft at times. 2 perf & anamorphic 35mm are really the gold standards I believe.

Makes sense, although the Marvel films aside from BP look so poor visually, no amount of extra resolution and quality will make that much of a difference there. I think Darius Khondji and others have spoken of the images being more three dimensional, I don't know about that, it's hard to tell, it just feels different.

Regarding what David said about there not being a big difference between the Alexa & A65, I thought so at first but between War For The Planet Of The Apes, Live By Night, Okja, Roma, Fallen Kingdom, Dumbo (from the trailers) and especially Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes Of Grindelwald (gorgeously shot), I find there's more density to the Alexa 65 image and more texture. Dunno how to explain it, it feels more pleasant to my eye as well. There's some great looking stuff on the Alexa here and there but not as striking imo. It's not a quantifiable thing and I've seen a few DPs say a similar thing. What I find interesting is seeing Bong Joon-Ho using it again on his new film when him and Khondji wanted to shoot Okja on 35mm film but couldn't. Janusz Kaminski is also surprisingly shooting Call Of The Wild on it, that should be super intriguing ! I remain a 35mm film snob but yeah, I dont know what it is about the Alexa 65. And I think it's even more potent on a giant IMAX screen, it sings in a very different way (Fallen Kingdom or The Crimes Of Grindelwald especially for example or seeing various trailers here and there)

6.5K yes. If we're talking Netflix, that's a different story. I guess it's mostly about VFX, and all those sorts of practical considerations

Thanks for all the answers. I was just curious, I don't know why one would choose to shoot on the Alexa 65 when they can afford anamorphic 35mm instead ^^ Roma & Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes Of Grindelwald look pretty stunning though.

Amazing

Ah ah ah ! Jesus, this is weird considering it seems to be the same rate as it was back when it debuted. If Beale Street Could Talk shooting on the Alexa 65 (a $12 million film) makes even less sense now. Thanks for the answers guys. I found this rental website yesterday that supposedly had the body only at 3.5 K/daily, 10 K for the week, but figure it's not legit since you're only supposed to be able to rent it through Arri Rental.

Hey there, I was wondering if anyone here has any idea as to how much the Alexa 65 (not just the body, a ready to shoot package) goes for on a weekly rental rate? Considering it's been around for a few years now, that there a lot more bodies, etc, I figure the numbers have gone down substantially. Saw numbers here and there between 5 & 10K a while back which I guess made sense at the time. Seeing as it's being used now on several TV series (lately The Haunting Of Hill House on Netflix), and on more indie minded films, I figure it must be somewhat affordable. What's confusing to me is those smaller productions being able to afford this when, from what I've seen, it'd be much cheaper to shoot on 35mm film for example. Hell, I'm guessing the post prod and data rate alone must be insane. I figured I'd ask the question directly to Arri Rental but they don't seem to have any email contact options, so I figured some folks would know here. Cheers

Pretty much every review out there has praised the cinematography, I don't know what some of you want. It's the best looking SW film so far imo, next to TFA & ESB, they took some pointers from ESB but ultimately Rian wanted to make what he felt was Star Wars-y to him. Production design is fantastic as well. So many memorable moments, compositions & scenery, whether on Ahch-To (Skellig Island), Crait (shot in Bolivia), etc. To qualify this as run of the mill ordinary stuff is mindblowing.

Ok, Tyler, once again, you're off the mark. Rian Johnson has said the film is 80-85 % shot on 35mm film anamorphic, 10-15 % is Alexa for specialty shots, some low light situations, an elaborate Steadicam shot, a bit of Alexa 65 probably for aerials. THAT'S IT. Film was the default as Yedlin & Johnson said. Also, there's a cool ICG article where Yedlin explains his process to match the Alexa with 35mm with his special secret sauce, it was visible on Canto Bight imo, grain wasn't natural film grain, on the big IMAX screen, it's visible but overall, it worked very well. Also, yes, some spherical lenses were used from time to time like David said. The grain was very visible on the IMAX screen, very cool, also, Rian said in an interview there were just a few IMAX shots for some isolated scenery shots, but the ratio doesn't open up in IMAX, so they might have left those on the cutting room floor. http://www.icgmagazine.com/web/in-the-name-of-the-father/ "While the movie was primarily shot in anamorphic, using Panavision G-Series (full set), C-Series Close Focus 50 mm, the AWZ (40-80 zoom) and some other anamorphics, Yedlin and Johnson also mixed in spherical lenses (a 19-90-mm Primo Compact Zoom and an assortment of Primo primes). “We wanted the idiosyncrasies of anamorphic – oblong bokeh, curved distortion, its characteristic flares, and the anamorphic ‘egg’ [the lenses’ inability to focus at the top and bottom of the frame],” Yedlin details. “But there were times that we either didn’t want those idiosyncrasies – like if an actor’s face was going to be in the blurry part of the ‘egg’ – or when we needed to do a rack focus to closer than an anamorphic can focus. We also sometimes used spherical simply because VFX requested it: either because they wanted the extra image padding outside the framing area or because they wanted a more technically pristine lens.” An AC article is coming in February as well

By the way, here's a QT 1080p quality screencap of what OP used, something else than a blurry, crappy screencap. https://ibb.co/nNxFjm (image extensions dont work)

Gorgeously shot & incredible film

Tyler should say that to all big time directors who shoot on film, even the masters like Scorsese who only do a DI, gosh, such noobs, I guess they aren't aware. The Yedlin test makes me shake my head, I'd argue the Alexa still looks videoey, I don't know, his tests are interesting, but he keeps touting his digital LUT that closely mimicks a film response or something, he's used it on San Andreas, Danny Collins, and those films just look like regular digital, it's just not working. If there's this little of a difference for him, I wonder why he didn't ask to switch to Alexa for The Last Jedi :D (and yes, there are a handful of Alexa shots in it for specific situations). I think if you cut really quickly from film to digital for example, and you match them well, it "can" be indistinguishable but films such as Argo (film for 90 % of the film, mix of super 16, 2 perf, 4 perf, Alexa for some low light situations, and the whole section in Turkey I think where Affleck meets a contact), The Wolf Of Wall Street, Silence that have a clear separation where low light is strictly digital (or some VFX shots), I find it really sticks out like a sore thumb, not that it looks bad, but Wolf & Silence in particular don't seem to have any grain added to the footage. Comparison tests in bleh conditions, carefully prepared, and the digital footage made to look as close to film is just a test, Carl said it best. It'd be fun to see Yedlin pull a Tommy Wiseau and shoot a film on film and digital at the same time, where they'll end up not looking the same at all. Stuff like LiveGrain does wonders (and it's 5 grand on a low budget project just to install the plugin), but it's still a trick. Why spend hours in the DI suite, and money to make digital look like film? Just shoot the real thing (if possible obviously). Ultimately, it blows my mind when great DPs such as Linus Sandgren, or Rodrigo Prieto keep saying how film is just so different, praising it, and a few others (a minority) insist they see little to no difference. Obviously though, if you sit really far away in the theater, you won't see the texture, it's also shocking to see how compression on TV absolutely annihilates the grain and makes almost everything feel like it's been shot digitally.

Love the 2.00:1 AR, especially for ST, 1.78 reminds me too much of TV (duh), 1.85 same thing, strikes a nice balance btw 1.78, or 1.85 & 2.35. Tim Ives said they liked the feel with the slight letterbox, makes it feel more cinematic. Don't know why I find even slight letterboxing more appealing to the eye than something full frame.

Well, I guess Joon-Ho & Khondji don't have the necessary clout, Netflix is sure letting Scorsese shoot on film for The Irishman like I said (Kodak NY lab handling the dailies), so it's possible with the right people :D

Film or not (and yes, it would have looked better on film, bla bla, also, Scorsese is shooting on film for The Irishman), it looks absolutely fantastic, they switched to the Red Helium, and the extra resolution doesn't feel harsh, the added grain helps a lot as well, the combination with the Summilux is fantastic. Production values are off the charts (20 % budget increase on the sequel), the season/sequel is fantastic, crushes the excellent first one.

I don't think we should pay too much attention to fatih. Not being mean, but everything he says is patently untrue. And I'm one of those who thinks Deakins' work on digital doesn't touch his best work on film, I still think so, but BR 2049 is definitely one of his best, and I'm by no means favorable to digital in any way. Also, "digital grading?", I've got news for you pal, 99 % of the motion pictures out there go through a DI, even those shot on film, a photochemical finish is a luxury.

Too early to tell but it does feel, not weaker because every film has a particular look obviously, less distinctive visually than his other films?

I think "grainy" skin looks great, I found super 16 on stuff like the first act in Steve Jobs, or One Tree Hill, or The Newsroom's pilot to be surprisingly sharp on close ups, but 2 perf is quite obviously higher quality, higher resolution, lesser grain, I mean, it's obvious but I think it bears remembering what 2 perf can look like, and it looks tremendous when done right. With good lenses, I feel it's not that far off from 3 perf. Download the QT 1080p files from here to get an idea, and even that is highly compressed: http://www.hd-trailers.net/movie/silver-linings-playbook/ http://www.hd-trailers.net/movie/the-place-beyond-the-pines/