Jump to content

Jon O'Brien

Basic Member
 View Profile  See their activity

  • Content Count

    807

  • Joined

  • Last visited

  • Days Won

    5

Jon O'Brien last won the day on April 7

Jon O'Brien had the most liked content!

Community Reputation

84 Excellent

About Jon O'Brien

  • Rank

Profile Information

  • Occupation
    Other
  • Location
    Brisbane
  • My Gear
    2 perf 35-3 and 2C, Nikon lenses, Ronford-Baker support, S16 Rex-5
  • Specialties
    cinematographer specialising in analogue film

Recent Profile Visitors

19533 profile views
  1. Jon O'Brien
    There is Neglab in Sydney. Werner Winkelmann is the manager.
  2. Jon O'Brien
    I must say though, I'm over my objections with digital cameras, and I concede that they are great. But for my own films, short and insignificant as they turn out to be (possibly), I will be shooting on film because it's part of the fibre of my being. It's my choice. I've got 600 ft of 50D in the fridge, so what do you expect. Film to me is the future, and I know a lot of others feel the same way. Currently scouting for locations.
  3. Jon O'Brien
    Where I live there are a lot of people who love movies and like seeing them on the big screen. It's true, most don't even know about the digital/film thing but they like discussing beauty of image and cinematography after the show. I think it's great that we have digital and film because it provides variety - subtle, but it's there. To my eye, the new phones and tablets are perfect for exhibiting film movies on. Sure they might be compressed making it impossible to see even a hint of grain but the image quality is good enough on a good phone to see subtle but important differences between digital and film. That's my view and I' sticking with it 🙂 Anyway, it always comes back to: what does the filmmaker care about?
  4. Jon O'Brien
    A subtle comment, cleverly done, though strictly speaking not quite true. Everyone outside of cinematography does care - they just don't know why they care. As was said above, they expect the maker to care, so they can sit back and enjoy. How can those who don't know much about art and the creative process care about these things? It's not a strong argument to take.
  5. Jon O'Brien started following The Cinema Experience
  6. Jon O'Brien
    The thing is, the whole point really of the cinema theatre is a social experience and it retains very high value in that one thing that it's got. Even if you go to the movies alone which is totally fine it is still a social experience. I enjoy it - unless it's a crummy audience or too many rude slobs there that day etc. Went to see 'Swimming with men' (great movie!!!) the other day with friends and we had a really nice time. It's still a lot of fun to go to the movies. We were probably the youngest ones in the cinema but if you watch a good movie with a good fellow audience it's much better than sitting at home. But agreed, it is good to be able to adjust the look of the image at home.
  7. Jon O'Brien
    This is what I was thinking too. I don't know much about Hitchcock's knowledge of photography, but if he did a bit of still 35mm photography he might simply have meant his "natural" or normal focal length lens transferred to motion picture and his cinematographers of course knew what he meant by that.
  8. Jon O'Brien
    I can't figure out why, at my local cinema, movies shot on digital camera look brighter than (some) movies that were shot on film. This observation doesn't apply to the recent Star Wars movies shot on 35mm but mainly to lower-budget film-shot movies. Does the movie need to be visually checked by the projectionist and brightness levels manually adjusted or is it all programmed into the DCP? One movie I saw, the Ext daytime scenes - many of them - looked atrociously dim in my opinion.
  9. Jon O'Brien
    I love the black bars top and bottom. But that's just me.
  10. Jon O'Brien
    What if you are editing/grading scanned film only? Is Davinci, a pretty advanced set up, still the best? I'm wondering if it might not be best just to pay someone to do my grading/editing - with me looking over their shoulder - rather than pay for all the high power computer hardware. I'm not making a lot of films at the moment so perhaps that's the most cost effective solution for now.
  11. Jon O'Brien
    I suppose come to think of it you could easily fake Super 8, if you wanted that look, by cropping 16mm closely. Not if you are projecting though. And the image would't be exactly the same because of the different pressure plate and other factors.
  12. Jon O'Brien
    I was 100% happy with the look of the digitally-projected 'The Force Awakens' and 'The Last Jedi', both largely shot on 35mm film. No complaints at all. For a couple of lower-budget pictures I've seen in the cinema lately I wasn't completely happy with the digital projection as the picture was sometimes too dim. Maybe the projectionist didn't bother to turn up the lamp. But I happen to think, on the whole, that digital projection of real film is great. I saw '2001: A Space Odyssey' in 70mm recently and it looked great but, to me, it wasn't necessarily better than the look of the two recent Star Wars films digitally projected. So there's hope! - as Princess Leia would say.
  13. Jon O'Brien
    Sure, but read again what David posted, a few posts back. He and Manu nailed it on this thread. George Lucas (yep, sure, it was he that did so much to push for full digital process) used to just make the movies he wanted to make. He didn't care about the audience. Yes they pay the money and it's wonderful to hear their applause if applaud they do. But no one at the very top cares too much about audience, in any creative field. I'm not saying that that's an outlook that is necessarily a wise one to take for anyone (Mel Brooks was literally penniless at one stage) - but it is, nevertheless, a defining characteristic of movers and shakers.
  14. Jon O'Brien
    Yeah, it's really interesting once you start looking into the economics of specific pathways in cinematography. 35mm, 16mm, 8mm, digital. I think you would choose Super 8 because you are after that specific look. It might not be much difference in price though. The equipment costs less.
  15. Jon O'Brien
    Of course, content is the most important ... but it matters what you play it on!! I like Mozart on violin, piano, things like that. Bach was of the opinion that the type of instrument was critically important to the musician/the artist. Good heavens, people, film and digital can co-exist in the world of cinematography! Film doesn't have to be done in like some sort of failing dinosaur. Because it's not a failing dinosaur. It's vibrant, young, and hip, and its prospects are on the rise. So is digital's. It's a myth that medium isn't relevant to content - just ask any musician. What's up with the cinematography world that there are these curmudgeonly firebrand defenders of digital? The two can happily co-exist. Calm down, all ye, I pray.
  16. Jon O'Brien
    Manu, man of the thread!
×
×
  • Create New...