Joshua Robert Dy

I wonder why I had not thought of this before, but I wonder how Cinefade would work alongside a dolly zoom? The former effect might not even be very noticeable because the dynamic dollying and zooming are usually just overwhelmingly felt more than the oculomotor aperture change, however it may be worth looking at. 

Greetings everyone! I've been using the Canon C300 Mark 1 as my weapon of choice and have been using its Canon Cinema Log picture profile for basically all my projects in film school. With this particular log, middle grey is at 32.8; 0% reflectance at 7.3; and 90% reflectance at 62.7. After a bit more diving into this camera, I've just learned that the Cinema Log has black and white levels set to 10-110 IRE by default. However, In this upcoming project I will be working on, I will be shooting under much dimmer light conditions; so then I have been contemplating on using a picture profile that is an exact copy of this log, but instead has shifted black and white levels to 0-100 IRE. With these, I would like to ask two questions:

1. Would shifting the black and white levels actually help when shooting under low light conditions?
2. Would the middle grey, 0% reflectance, and 90% reflectance numbers change because of the shifted the black and white levels?

These two questions have remained at the back of my mind unanswered for so long, but I probably would never have posed these questions until I rewatched this absolutely informative video on color correction. Thank you and I look forward to reading your guys' answers!

That's so cool; thanks for that!

Good day everyone, I hope you're all doing well!

I wonder if this method has been tried: while changing the aperture mid-shot, the strength of the N.D. filter is also being changed the same amount. I haven't tested this out myself, but theoretically in doing so, the result would yield in an in-camera effect of changing depth of field.

Thanks!

Yep Karim, photographing two dimensional mediums is probably where this works best!

I just had a realization that in a way this method kind of works like a scanner except that in the way I used the method I was trying to capture the 3d world instead of paper. The photo I took has its flaws, but I personally think that this is still worth a look into!

I was browsing through a wikipedia page, doing research for a homework, when it showed me a panorama picture; this immediately reminded of that Apple iPhone 5 panorama ad.

What impressed me the most about these two pictures were their relatively flat perspective distortions as in the panorama of the giant Buddhist sculptures, the flatness is very much due to distance. It was very different for the iPhone ad because it shows the kids neatly lined up in a straight line in the final photo; there are two ways they could have achieved this:

1. Kids were on a straight line
2. Kids were in a semi-circular formation around the camera

Based on feeling, the ad likely went with option 2 because I could feel a circular movement of the camera. Option 2 would also make more sense for the ad because it advertises the panorama to be done handheld in one smooth motion.

I however found the possibility of option 1 to be interesting and so I looked for online materials, but I could not find any methodologies about trucking or dollying to do a panorama shot; so then that is what I set out to do.

I took a panorama photo on the 52mm of the iPhone 11 Pro on a gimbal and had my mom pull my chair. There are two things in this picture to notice especially:

• minimal perspective distortion (at least to me personally)
• the appliances and furniture in the background are very elongated

Both the jagged and elongated parts of the image may be attributed to the inconsistent speed at which the dolly was being pulled, however it is also very likely that the camera's processing had trouble dealing with motion parallax.

Discussion

I wonder if there is a speed that is just right to get the proportions of the background corrected or if this method just wouldn't work. My image clocks in at 10860x3960, but had the method been executed flawlessly, the height of the image could go up to 4032 and the width at 15 or 16k. Personally, the most interesting thing about this to me is that it makes me feel like I am working in medium format, but on the cheap.

I have the iPhone 11 with the 52mm 'telephoto' lens, but I'm confused why it's advertised as telephoto when 52mm lens is considered just standard lens. Does the iPhone have like a sensor or smth that turns the 52mm into an 85mm equivalent? Or maybe is the term telephoto just an umbrella term for lens of focal length 50mm and up.

Also, the iPhone lens are primes right because it seems to just crop in rather than zoom in?

On 9/2/2022 at 1:23 AM, David Sekanina said:

it's so so cute omgggg thank you for this David

In stop motion, it actually does look like the Vertigo effect and it is fairly convincing! The downside I see to this is that there is a lack of movement of the background, which is what the Vertigo effect stands for; the watcher feels the Vertigo effect because the watcher feels like he is moving because of the moving background, but in this case, the background only zooms out rather than 'moves'.

I personally think that it is still a very very cool effect (in stop motion it looks extremely convincing and it might be a way to cut costs), but I wonder how it would look on 24 fps. I'll keep you posted on what I find!

10 hours ago, David Sekanina said:

the video was shot with my cellphone, so the zoom is not a zoom but a crop-in - which is not the same like a zoom in.

Hi David! Isn’t a zoom basically a crop while maintaining the same resolution? Also, the way I found it easiest to understand is when I remembered that lens does not compress/expand space. The common misconception is that telephoto is what makes space look closer or that wide is what makes space looks big, however this is not entirely true; if you truly want to compress space, you grab the camera and its telephoto lens and move far far back, while if you want to expand space, you take your camera and wide lens and move much closer. That is the essence of the Vertigo effect. Hope this helps!

39 minutes ago, David Sekanina said:

If your actor moves away from the camera you change the distance to the camera - you compensate him getting smaller by zooming in. This changes the field of view, hence you have the background warp around an actor that keeps his size.

Hi David! When you zoom in or out on a background, the background does not warp; the background simply only becomes smaller or bigger in the frame. Only when you move, does warping happen.

If you notice in the video you shot, it only zooms in on the background, but in the Vertigo effect, the background 'moves'!

I reread my lecturer's message (attached and quoted w permission) and I realized that it is still possible to get the Dolly zoom effect with a stationary camera: one just needs to somehow move both the subject and the background (in this way, it is still all in accordance with the three points of interest)!

Quote

Hi Josh

Your reasoning does have a degree of logic but the answer is no 

Consider this, There are 3 points of (lets say) interest in a Dolly  Zoom shot 

1 -Zoom focal Length

2-Camera distance to subject

3 -Camera distance to background  

The Dolly Zoom effect works because all three of the above change in-shot

While changing the zoom size will alter the size of the subject in Frame, as too will the subject themselves by moving closer or further away, but the background will remain at the same distance, as the zoom becomes a longer lens(higher mm) the background will change the degree of focus, but it will not physically move and that is key to the whole illusion of a Dolly Zoom shot 

Trust this is of some help

In response, my lecturer said of this about my insistence that dollyless dolly zoom still being possible despite its impracticality:

Quote

In theory yes but that would depend on the background being of a size to move, and if you can move a background.....why no track the camera ???

God bless my teacher for his patience with my tomfoolery.

I was mistaken in this statement:

19 hours ago, Joshua Robert Dy said:

I found that really interesting! One could keep the camera stationary, but still be able to get the vertigo effect (that said, it probably would be way more difficult to execute). Thanks David!

As kindly pointed out to me by my lecturer, what gives the dolly zoom its effect is the dynamic monocular cue of optic flow; as the monocular cue is dynamic rather than static, it is NOT possible to recreate the vertigo effect without camera movement.

Despite this error, I STILL take refuge in the fact that I think I found a novel technique that might be worth looking into; thank you so much for everyone's inputs!

Just now, David Sekanina said:

you would get a warping 'vertigo' effect of the background with both approaches - moving the actor, or moving the camera and maintaining the size of the actor with the zoom.

I found that really interesting! One could keep the camera stationary, but still be able to get the vertigo effect (that said, it probably would be way more difficult to execute). Thanks David!

18 minutes ago, David Sekanina said:

You can see this in the stair fall scene in "Psycho", where the actor is stumbling down the stairs (away from the camera) after being stabbed with a knife, while the camera zooms in, so the face of the actor is always the same size. In "Vertigo"  it was the camera that was moving.

Hi David! I believe this is the scene you are referring to:

Please correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the camera only tracking the actor here instead of zooming in (the actor seems to be standing/harnessed to the camera dolly to me)?

Edit: Yes, the shot is that of a dolly track instead of the zoom since you could observe the accretion of the table's feet on the upper left corner.

7 minutes ago, Mark Dunn said:

That would be called..........let me think about it......a "zoom"?

Yes Mark, it is indeed a zoom, but would it not yield an effect if one attempted to meticulously maintain the moving subject's size while zooming?

I'm sorry if this sounds and comes out like a shower thought, but is there an inverse of the dolly zoom, where instead of the camera body moving, it is the subject that is moving (the lens would also adjust by going wider if the subject moves nearer or tighter if it moves farther)?

In my quest to get as small an aperture as I can go, is it worth slowing down the shutter speed?

Hi! I'm planning on shooting a day-for-night scene in a bedroom with a static camera on a tripod. This bedroom has glass windoors (covering the entire wall) where sunlight comes in, but I'm blocking all this sunlight off with green fabric or green screen ovals; the reflectiveness of this green (splashes of green on actor's skin and other objects) is actually advantageous for me because the film will be B&W; I theorize that these green splashes should be similar to the soft diffused light of moonlight. As much as possible, I would also like to limit the lighting plan to outside these glass windoors to really simulate a night scene in a bedroom where there are no other lights except the moonlight and, I forgot to mention, lightning.

As I will be blocking off the light coming through the bedroom, I'm now sort of doing exposure calculations. The native ISO of the Sony F5 is about 1000 (and I would love to stick with this) and for this film, I would love to keep the aperture as small as lets me (f/5.6 max if it allows); as it is a day-for-night scene, there is also merit to underexposing the image so this and my quest are sort of in harmony with each other.

I watched a couple of videos showing 1/24, but they didn't look too bad in my eyes. Moreover, the direction to the actors will be that they'd be slow-moving/static for the majority of the scene, however question still remains: is the motion blur of a 1/24 video bothering/unbearable to you guys (scene runs about 2-3 mins)?

Thank you Tyler and Robert for your answers! I frankly do not know how to respond because I have zero (0) knowledge on this topic, therefore I shall read up on these as soon as possible; it's actually really cool to know that it's possible so now it's imperative for me to learn them! Thank you again Tyler and Robert!!!

Below is an illustration of a rough estimate of the resolutions of Super 8 and 16 mm Perforated One Edge films.

I would like to ask: does the Super 8 film take on the aspect ratio of the blow-up or like does its ratio remain the same just that the resolution is higher? Sorry I'm confused, but what is also the aspect ratio of 16 mm Perforated One Edge film (Kodak Print Film 3383/3302)? 1.37, 1.66, 1.85?

And then...here's a very dumb question:

Is there a way to print four Super 8 films onto the 16mm print film? If I had to guess, it should be done digitally with Avid, but is there possibly a way to make this happen manually/physically using the more traditional/old equipments? I'm really sorry if this question does not make any sense.

Good morning, afternoon, or evening cinematography.com!

I am currently reading a book about color in cinema and stumbled upon the Ds and the Ts. The color temperature of interior lights like tungsten is 2800K (yellow) while natural light has one of 5000-6500K (white/slightly blue), which is kinda mindblowing to think about because I have always perceived the lights at my home or stores or any interior lightings as white light. The book states that the human eye kind of tricks itself into seeing these 2800k tungsten yellow light as white, however cameras are not as advanced and should be balanced to keep with what human eyes see.

My question therefore is, as I haven't seen this asked anywhere, what would it look like if you shot D film under interior lighting and T film under daylight? I could only theorize that with the D film under interior, it would be able to capture the true 2800k tungsten yellow color of the light while the T film would show daylit stuff as more blue than they should be.

Cheers!

9 hours ago, Tyler Purcell said:

If I were you, I'd do a camera test. Do reversal, B&W negative and color negative. 

bro Tyler, I think I can speak on behalf of cinematography.com in thanking you for all of the knowledge you've shared on this forum for years. I'm a scrubnoobbeginner when it comes to cinematography but everyone is so patient, supportive, and encouraging while we, the zoomies gen, are going through these learning periods. I will have a test go at all of them before ultimately deciding what is best for my film; to see if I can take up the challenge of Tri-X or maybe dial down and work with Double-X or 500T. Tyler, you da frickin bomb my guy

6 minutes ago, Matthew W. Phillips said:

It may be that your film can utilize both stocks depending on the moods and whatnot. 

oooohh Matthew thanks for your anecdotes; it seems more practical this way! I've been looking at the Sensitometry, Modulation Transfer, Spectral Sensitivity curves and stuff so I could make sense of what's going on between reversal and negative films, but your anecdotal evidences are really what's helping my decision making much simpler! Thank you so much for this Matthew!

I've been making a bit of a decision for my super 16 movie: Tri-X reversal film or Double-X negative film.

I believe my questions would be best summed up in these bullet points:

• How much does the 50 ISO matter between the 200 ISO Tri-X and the 250 ISO Double-X?
• Does the Double-X's more forgiving range actually affect your decision to take it over Tri-X?
• Can you tangibly tell if a place/spot wouldn't work on a Tri-X, but would work on a Double-X?
  • Is it just more convenient then to use Double-X?

Apologies if the questions were repetitive; I am fanboying rn on Tri-X because it's reversal (and I find reversal cool), but maybe I should open my eyes and convert to the negative film masterrace.

edit: upon a quick lookie, it seems that maybe it's not to do with the ISO, but rather with the nature of reversal and negative film themselves (?)

6 hours ago, Daniel D. Teoli Jr. said:

Better have a 'plan B' so you don't end up homeless.

Thanks for the heads up Daniel; I'm preparing my tent in advance!

I'm just kidding; thanks Daniel I am now strongly leaning towards taking this Australia route because it really is the safer option than the omegadirehopeless situation here in the Philippines.

2 hours ago, Max Field said:

There is no point in adding on further weight to the burden.

Brother Max, the profundity of this analogy shook me. Also, yeah it's just kinda sad there is not much equality of opportunity especially in this garbageheap of a country, but that's life for ya. I had thought that I would be able to cultivate from said hardships, but there is no need nor point to do that because in reality it would just hamper with my progress. I guess I just feel obliged now to give back because I've been so blessed man.

Thank you brother Max again for sharing a nugget of your galaxybrain knowledge and thank you everyone for your cool insights!