Francesco Bonomo

Steven, the "Film. No compromise" campaign is not really new, it's been going on for a while. If you take any piece of marketing saying "my product is better than yours" as a sign that a given company is desperate, then Kodak is definitely not alone and doesn't even have the most aggressive campaign. I know the interview has a strong bias, and I would have been surprised if it didn't, but there are a few things in there that make a lot of sense, at least to me (and I guess a few others). Besides, it's just his point of view: some people agree, others don't. What is obvious, IMHO, is that even with lots of 2K and 4K cameras available, there are still LOTS of people shooting film, especially for theatrical distribution.

...and another one, posted today on Kodak website for their "Film. No compromise" series: http://motion.kodak.com/US/en/motion/Products/Customer_Testimonials/Wally_Pfister/index.htm

Thanks for your reply, David, it does indeed make a lot of sense. I guess the biggest fear for a lot of people is to be exactly in the situation you're describing, i.e. where producers/directors or other entities pick the camera and then just say "it's either this or nothing", which seems to be happening more often these days.

That's very true, but have you ever been in a situation where a director or a producer have imposed a certain film stock, a set of lenses or a specific kind of film camera?

I don't know about the Florida Workshop, but since it's the same number of days of the Maine Workshop (and same sponsors), I'd assume it's going to be pretty similar. The only difference could be the location: the school in Rockport is amazing, and although you spend most of the time inside and outside the soundstage-barn working on cameras, it's great to be in such an amazing place. Also, a good thing about the Maine Workshop is that it's followed by the camera operator course, which is very interesting and useful for assistants too. Doug is an amazing teacher and a great person, you'll have a great time and learn a lot no matter what level of experience you already have.

a very good and pretty long recent interview with Wally Pfister, ASC

this is from the ASC website: “To me, Alexa is the first [digital] camera that succeeds in getting an image that is not exactly film, but does something that film cannot do,” he says. “It has better color space than film, more latitude, and basically, it’s faster and incredible in low light. This film [Now] has lots of night exterior work, low light levels, a low budget, and we are working fast and furious on it, and [Alexa] is holding up fantastically well.” On his website he wrote that he doesn't really care about "numbers" and admits that most people who post there know more about the technical aspects of digital than him, but he adds he trusts his eyes, and even though Alexa has less resolution than other cameras or 35mm film, he believes it holds incredibly well when projected at 2K, 4K and on 35mm. He also added he'd love to see a 4K camera from Arri, though, but if he had to choose one thing to add to the camera it would be the optical viewfinder.

That's exactly it, and I've seen a lot of CVs where they put "dailies" and not "day player". I didn't know what that was until I moved to Ireland, because back in Italy you put the projects you've worked on on your resume, whether it was for the whole show or for only a day or two, but apparently here (and in the UK as well) it's not uncommon to specify. I had someone ask me why would anyone put on their resume the fact they were going to see dailies :-) p.s. Hey Darren, nice to see you around here, welcome to cinematography.com!

True, but only if you know what RED actually is...I doubt the thieves have any idea of what they put their hands on...

Tim, it wasn't Pelican cases, it was just a black oakley bag...

Yet you wouldn't believe how many times I've seen even good camera assistants here in Europe removing the gate (and less frequently the mag) or pulling film out of it to check for hair. It's never made sense to me, the other methods may take a longer time (speaking of seconds, really) and they are WAY more effective and fail-proof.

Thanks for the pics, Gunleik. And finally I get a look at RedMote working, it's something I've been looking forward to see for a long time... Wish we could see a more complete configuration of the camera, with modules and whatnot attached, but I guess those will come soon. Thanks again F.

Absolutely, that's why I joined this forum years ago, and that's why i learned (and keep learning) so much, from you and from so many others. Every time I realize I'm losing perspective by being too "partisan" (I hope i'm using the term correctly) I remind myself of what my brother does (he's a doctor and cures cancer patients), and it immediately makes every argument looks pretty silly in comparison. Yes, that's what I was saying, I don't see anything wrong with that, I was only trying to point out that you cannot have both, or at least it's not very easy: you cannot rely on thousands of fans on a forum for your validation/adoration/etc and then pretend that the perception that a lot of people have of you isn't influenced by that. I know cinematographers who were seriously interested in Red and ran away, so to speak, because of the answers given to them on RedUser by people who don't work for the company and don't own the camera. and that's why every time JJ announces a new project shot on Epic over at RedUser, I always hope we can get more information about specific technical things, not just names of cinematographers or directors. I know a quote from Wolski is great for marketing and validation, but I'd love to know more about setting up the camera and something about using RedMote, because from my very personal (and limited) perspective that's what I'm probably going to deal with the most once Epic is released. I'd love what Arri has done with the Alexa simulator and the Arridigital website, I hope Red does something like that for Epic.

David, I do agree with you on your last statement, but I also think that there's an inherent problem the way the "red controlled internet chat" is actually controlled. For instance, there is a post today up at RedUser where a member of the red team posted an image that doesn't do anything but fuel the stupid fanboyism seen there (in this specific case, Epic vs Alexa), or complaining about the article in Variety. Do the company have the right to complain about that article? Yes, indeed. But why are they complaining to an audience which is composed by a lot of people who cannot wait to bash every other camera, or the "studio system" (unless it's using red), or the "haters"? To me it's pretty childish, and it's such a shame because I don't have ANY problem with Red (the company, of course..as an assistant I have a few complaints about the camera, but that's another matter), I am not interested in buying any camera equipment, but the more I know about any given camera system, the better I can do my job. I've found loads of interesting and useful information on RedUser when I needed it, but 9 times out of 10 it was buried under tons of misinformation, Arri/Panavision/Sony/Panasonic/Film bashing, red-worshipping, and that world-domination attitude that is quite frankly pathetic. I know how to use Panavision, Arri and Moviecam, there are some things I like about each one of those systems, but I don't go saying Panavision sucks, Arri is better, soon there will be no more -insert camera brand-, or post a drawing of an engineer of the supposed competition shooting himself. Unfortunately that adds to the perception some people have of the company, and reflects badly on the camera even now that it's not the same Red it was 2 years ago (actually I pointed this out a while ago on reduser, and the thread was closed and removed). It looks like Red has a winner with Epic, and we all should be happy about it or at least be able to talk about it without falling in the old "star trek vs. star wars" attitude of internet forums, but I think it would take a change of attitude from the way the reduser forums are run at the moment, and I'm not sure Red is willing to do that.

fantastic reply, Phil :D (and great thread, Richard!)

Yes. The Alexa comes with a set of standard framelines, including 2.35 (in the menu click on "Monitoring", then "Framelines"). You can also design your own framelines here and then upload them to the camera via a SD card.

I can only speak for myself, Dustin, but frankly, I don't see "hate" towards Red around here, what I've seen since its introduction is something more like scepticism by many people who were trying to understand what was behind the triumphant claims that Red (the company) came up with as part of its aggressive marketing campaign (for instance, the Red in-house re-definition of "raw"). Personally, as a camera assistant and as someone who'll never buy a motion picture camera, I can only say a few things I don't like about it: the long boot time, the ergonomics, the menu, the fact that it seems like no two Red One cameras are alike (in terms of "behaviour"), and more generally the fact that it feels like it wasn't designed by listening to cinematographers, operators and assistants. I'm really glad when I read about established, good, professional cinematographers testing the new camera, I hope Red has listened to professionals more this time around, and I truly hope Epic is very different from Red One. I would have absolutely no problem with that, I can't wait to see the Hobbit or the new Pirates movie (though I'll see them in 2D), and I don't have any problem saying that "The Social Network" was one of the movies I liked the most this year.

While I do agree with you, I remember what happened when I moved from shooting stills on film to digital, 5 years ago. My first digital camera was a D70s, 6 megapixels and a lousy dynamic range compared to what I could get from shooting my old F3 and F100 and some Fuji or Kodak film. That camera was then used by many professional photographers, and I clearly remember David Alan Harvey shooting reportages for National Geographic on it. It's almost ridicoulous how much better the new cameras are, and only 5 years have passed. Someone thought that level of technology was good enough and appropriate to replace 35mm film, there was a huge marketing campaign by Nikon and Canon (with the Rebel), and while some photographers were saying that it was not nearly good enough to be a valid alternative to film, those two cameras were sold in huge numbers and most professionals started to use them. I think we might see something like that in the movie world as well, and to a certain extent, it's already happening: is the technology as good as the "old" one? According to many and looking at the numbers, no. Is it good enough, i.e. can you shoot a movie digitally and project it on a big theater screen without people complaining about the low quality of the images? Yes, and that's not big news at all. All I'm saying is that probably we'll see digital cameras becoming the main medium for aquisition long before the technology is more than "good enough". I'd like to think that if the quality of the images was truly bad and light-years away from what they could get by shooting 35mm film, Andrew Lesnie would have pushed for something else. He didn't, so probably he's happy with what he can get from the Epics. Same thing for Schwartzman on Spider-man, Wolski on Pirates 4, Cronenweth on the Social Network, and whoever gets to shoot the Alien prequels. At the same time, Deschanel, Deakins, Richardson, Khondji and others are more or less crazy about the Alexa, or at least it's good enough for them. On the other hand, Pfister is probably going to shoot the new Batman on anamorphic 35mm and on 65mm, so you could say he's waiting for the technology to advance some more.

There was a great post by David Mullen around here about the compromises that the adoption of new technologies usually brings to the game. I'm not sure you can ask technology to wait, it'd be great to tell everyone "don't drive until all cars are electric" but that's never going to happen. I'm sure watching 4k footage projected at 4k is beautiful, but it's going to take a while before that happens for the majority of people.

Me too. Some pretty good directors shoot their first movies on what you would consider "lower" media, but what puts them on the map, amongst other things, is the quality of their stories and their skills as storytellers, not the tools they use. Can you please point me to that magical place where a director is almost guaranteed an audition or a meeting with a producer solely based on the fact that he shot a trailer digitally? I have a couple of friends that would be greatly interested in that....

I can understand that, but have you honestly seen an increase of quality in indipendent movies since Red (or any "affordable" digital camera) came out? According to them, they've sold almost 10000 cameras: assuming only a tenth of those have been used only once for a narrative project, have you seen a thousand movies shot on red in the last 2 years reaching your movie theater? Have you seen the new Kubricks coming out of their parents' basements because of the digital evolution? I think it's great that the quality of the images coming out of digital cameras is approaching the quality of the "big boys", and since it's reasonable to think that digital will become the medium of choice in the future, the better it gets the best it is for everyone, but that has almost nothing to do with the ability to tell a story. Yes, but we go back to the point I was trying to make earlier: if there's no talent, technology will do very little. If, on the other hand, there's talent and hard work, then technology can help, but at the same time it becomes what it's exactly supposed to be, a tool in the right hands. Was - insert title - a great movie because it was shot on - insert medium - or because the story was great and well told?

Tom, it looks like we crossed posts with Reduser :-) Hopefully, yes. The way I see it, It shouldn't be "VS", it should be "AND/OR". I respectfully disagree with this. First of all, as I wrote elsewhere, I cannot understand why this whole thing has to be about "victory of digital", "death of film", or tanks on the horizon. I think the freedom to choose between different media should be something to be happy about. When film eventually goes away (i.e. when it won't be used for the majority of feature film productions) the choices will be fewer than the ones available today: hopefully we won't lose anything during the "transition", but i wouldn't be surprised if there were some compromises we'll have to deal with. And the tanks may be visible, but frankly the "future" is not here yet: probably the United States industry will be first in this evolution, but here in Europe we still see LOTS of film being shot (not to mention the fact that most movie theaters are still using film projectors). I don't know what's the situation like in other countries, but in Italy there's almost no digital in television series (yet), it's all mostly still filmed on 16mm (and occasionally on 35mm); commercials are still shot on 35mm (though I heard digital is being used increasingly and it's now almost 40-50% of the market, up a good 10% from 2 years ago). Where you really see a huge impact of digital is in short films and no/low budget projects, but those are mostly moving from miniDV up to DSLR. On the other hand, from what I've seen, Ireland is mostly using digital. Just two examples to say that the perception of digital replacing film is not the same as the reality of film still being used for a lot of stuff. Maybe 1, 2 or 5 years from now things will be different, maybe not. I just don't understand why people are so eager to proclaim the death of film. Totally agree with Richard on this. It'd be great, wouldn't it? Unfortunately, I don't think that's the case. Talent is one thing, technology is another. A talented filmmaker with an old miniDV camera could do something incredibly better than a talentless one who's using an Epic (or a Genesis, an Alexa, 65mm, etc), The camera is just a tool.. just my humble 2€c :)

Sounds pretty good to me. Still no comment about ease of use, ergonomics and workflow, but I'm sure those will come. It looks like Red has a winner.

looks like this time they're at least giving the camera to established cinematographers to test (there's also a reference about Andrew Lesnie in the post you linked), and that's a good thing. In the same thread they say there's going to be an article on American Cinematographer about it (I think a comparison between different digital camera systems and anamorphic film), I look forward to reading it. As I wrote elsewhere, I'd love to hear more from assistants and camera operators who've tested/used the camera, but I'm sure that's going to change once the cameras hit the rental houses sometimes next year.

Vincent, fascination with new technology and new tools is what pushes the boundaries of storytelling forward, it's always been like that. This is nothing new and nothing to worry about. Actually, I think it's great that there are so many different tools filmmakers and cinematographers can choose from these days. But if you mean that many people choose the tools just because they're the "next big thing", then I totally agree with you. (Disclaimer: I'm definitely NOT a fan of 3D). Yes, marketing is bad, especially when it comes first and when no useful "real" information is provided (actually I like what Arri is doing on their website by interviewing cinematographers and assistants regarding the Alexa). I think RedUser and the Red website are the worst marketing tools we've seen in a long time (I mean, they're probably great for marketing, but completely useless for people who want to know more about the cameras and who probably are going to use them in the field). If it wasn't for a dozen "serious" people on RedUser, the real information there would be close to zero. I can understand why red "fans" are excited because of the Hobbit news, but frankly I'd be more interested to read more about what cinematographers, operators and assistants think about the new epic cameras, rather than having to browse through hundreds of way-over-the-top, cult-like messages written by people who sound like they're 12 years old. That'd be great, but I doubt it's gonna happen.