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  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

"Spiderhole" Feature Film Frame Grabs

They're in a spiderhole. What do you expect? :)

(Is this an issue of monitor calibration?) It probably looked lighter on his monitor.
 
Blocking, use more fill?

Blocking, use more fill?

bint2k said:
day1 and 2 of shooting - frame grabs with basic redcine grade:
Click to expand...

There is something on those frames, but you might get less blocking if you use more fill light? JPEG2000 like compression can do blocking in the shadow areas sometimes, maybe?
 
Maybe he used special filters?

(Joke of course, see "The making of... and God Spoke).
 
if your on a pc you're prolly looking at the wrong gamma. their supposed to be in a house with zero lights. the link should show you something better on a black bg. white bg will kill the dark pictures
 
Monitor Gamma, Do a filmout soon!

Monitor Gamma, Do a filmout soon!

bint2k said:
if your on a pc you're prolly looking at the wrong gamma. their supposed to be in a house with zero lights. the link should show you something better on a black bg. white bg will kill the dark pictures
Click to expand...

CRT TV sets have a gamma of about 2.4, and raw PC monitors have a gamma about 2.2 to 2.4, so 90% of people on the internet will be looking at photos with a monitor gamma of about 2.2 to 2.4.

A serious issue is the poor black on new color print stocks and with DLP projectors. When you have highlights rim lit your eye stops down and there seems to be some black in the frame, but if you have the whole frame black in the theatre your eyes adjust and the screen looks washed out, if you hold your hand up you can see a silhouette of your hand, which you would not if the black density of the film was high enough. Kodak makes two print stocks, a cheep one with weak black and a higher priced one with maybe not so weak blacks.

Since theatres do not turn the lights off any longer during the movie, your dark images will get washed out not only by the thin print stock, but by the house lights.

Also you need something with rim lighting and fill to play on the PMP/ipod in full sunlight. 20% of the frame should be under 0.3 density on the print in each frame to give form to the subject matter.

Also if you are in the bottom of the curve the D2A converter in the film recorder or DLP will only be giving your images a limited number of tones.

I would recomend that you splice a print from your film recorder negative to the end of 20 minutes of trailers so that you can see what it looks like in a Multiplex theater (not a screening room since their small screen may have a brighter image). Also you should make some DVD and view them on various TV sets in room lighting. The MPEG2 encoding will show blocking in deep shadows, I have just been going through this with some scanned 35mm film that was shot dark, the blocking on the DVD gets very bad so the contrast and gamma needed to lighten the mid tones to pull them up high enough to reduce the compression artifacts.

You may not have enough in your original files to get something that will look good on all output formats that will be required later, best to find out before hand. I had a friend that got some old 35mm film that said it was EI 3200 on the data sheet, so he shot it at EI 3200 even though it was years out of date, he shot without looking at a print of what he was doing until after he was finished shooting, nor did he process the footage until after shooting was finished. Much to his shock, none of the stuff turned out well enough to be the way he wanted it to be when printed and projected.
 
And it can be used, even after heavy JPG.
picture202copynj9.jpg
 
I think the idea is to actually shoot dark for dark, because RED ONE is so clean. I prefer this to a blue tinge... though it'll be a challenge for the flat-panels to display.
 
I think some digital DPs mistake "dark" for "no lighting". The impression of darkness is created with lowered contrast ratios and typically a lot of source lighting. Check out Escape from New York for awesome examples of well-lit "darkness."

You still have to get an ambient level that gives you something to work with in post. This stuff looks cool but I imagine it could be a bit of a nightmare to cc up to a projectable level without a lot of shadow noise and detail plugging. But then again perhaps it's just the gamma at which these stills were made.

Noah
 
Cinematography and sound are so overdone and so unnatural nowadays it's hard to watch a lot of new flicks. This one I'd like to see! Keep going with the feel, though that second shot's a bit on the edge, it should accomplish your aim. Hopefully the viewers are in a darkened room, too. That'll put them in the picture!
 
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