The 'film look' is a Crock, Shallow depth-of-field is Banal and Rack focus is Lazy.

[Pietro Impagliazzo]

LOL! Where did that come from?

I actuality liked it in the theater. But then again I was probably 20 and still a virgin :001_tongue:

Meaning that virgins are fond of retarded movies?

:huh:

 

[hans de vries]

Sorry, I hope I haven't offended anyone; it's just my frustration that movies I found really stupid get huge audiences and movies I think are excellent are usually liked by a few artists and a few intellectuals that I never get to talk to (I know it sounds arrogant, it's not my intention to be a snob, but it isn't any other way)

 

[Ivan G]

Meaning that virgins are fond of retarded movies?

:huh:

No not at all! I enjoyed the sex scene!

It was joke dude!

Ok I lied I wasn't a virgin...

 

[Tyler Black]

You have to understand the context the original article comes from. Its writer is a film school teacher, and just imagine the kind of effort he must see wasted every year by students who worry about achieving good DOF instead of good story, direction, acting, etc. They were his article's main target (I believe), to help them see that "cinema" does not necessarily equal shallow focus, and indeed some of the best movies in history go actively against it. It's a matter of history and current trends.

When you start speaking in absolutes in a creative industry, you're just begging for an ass-whooping. This guy did everything but drop his pants, bend over the desk and hand us a paddle.

 

[Gavin Greenwalt]

When you start speaking in absolutes in a creative industry, you're just begging for an ass-whooping. This guy did everything but drop his pants, bend over the desk and hand us a paddle.

Doubly so when your criticism is framed as an underhanded insult.

RED sucks and everybody who uses it is lazy and stupid. :Angel_anim:

 

[Tim Hole]

Sorry, I hope I haven't offended anyone; it's just my frustration that movies I found really stupid get huge audiences and movies I think are excellent are usually liked by a few artists and a few intellectuals that I never get to talk to (I know it sounds arrogant, it's not my intention to be a snob, but it isn't any other way)

Welcome to the world of entertainment...but i presume you know this...

There is four main sides to the visual medium: Education, Entertainment, Advertising and Art. Very rarely do even two of these work successfully. Advertising has manipulated art for many years and an interestingly ironic example was/is the use/misuse of surrealist and DADA principles.

Entertainment and Art is the one we try with all our might to integrate successfully.

The woes of being a visual storyteller.

 

[Zack Birlew]

The article makes sense and it is true for a lot of people out there. How many times have you looked at the new camera tests on Vimeo or Youtube and seen that it's just a constant rack focus video set to music? I've seen a good deal of shorts that do the same thing just because someone got a 35mm adapter for their [insert 1/3" or 1/2" or 2/3" sensor camera]. Look at a lot of the Canon 5D Mark II videos and you'll see that it's like everybody switches down to f/1.2 or f/1.4 for everything and just goes wild.

Now, I haven't personally seen a lot of RED videos that have done that, save for some camera tests here and there, but I think that's because a lot of the people buying or renting RED's have at least some grasp of what they're doing.

Me? Well, I've had an interesting time with shallow depth of field. At first I tried to emulate it with my Canon GL1 and that never worked, then I tried with my HV20 and that didn't work so much either, but my D90 came at a time when I couldn't get lights for a lot of reasons and I ended up using my 50mm 1.2 a lot. But even so, I pretty much treated it as my do-it-all lens and I knew when to go step back and go wide to take it all in and when to move the camera closer for a closeup. Essentially I was playing with image subjectivity; which part of the image was I going to focus on? Foreground, middle, or background? It was a great learning experience working at f/1.2 like that and even though shallow depth of field was there in some form or another, none of my images looked like anything like the in-your-face blurry shallow depth of field videos scattered across the net.

 

[Felix K.]

No not at all! I enjoyed the sex scene!

It was joke dude!

Ok I lied I wasn't a virgin...

I thought it was because of scoring with the girls. I went to see it three times. Different girl each time. How did the movie end?

 

[Pietro Impagliazzo]

No not at all! I enjoyed the sex scene!

It was joke dude!

Ok I lied I wasn't a virgin...

I was joking too

I thought it was because of scoring with the girls. I went to see it three times. Different girl each time. How did the movie end?

Same happened with Batman Begins with me... :001_tt2:

 

[Felix K.]

Same happened with Batman Begins with me... :001_tt2:

Dude, you took a chick to THAT movie??



Sorry for hijacking the thread!

But on a more useable note: I think one of the seldomly discussed reasons why amateur videographer do not like the deep focus they are forced to use by the small sensor size is that the backgrounds look crappy. The backgroud is the place where (when in focus) you should see the most detail. But the resolution of the videocameras (and the codecs) that amateurs could afford was never high enough to preserve the details well.

 

[hans de vries]

I thought it was because of scoring with the girls. I went to see it three times. Different girl each time. How did the movie end?

Unfortunately I was with a girl but she was my best friend's girlfriend and he was there as well; fortunately, we were unanymous in our need to leave the cinema halfway the movie; unfortunately, that didn't result in anything exciting:emote_rainshower:

 

[hans de vries]

Doubly so when your criticism is framed as an underhanded insult.

RED sucks and everybody who uses it is lazy and stupid. :Angel_anim:

I disagree with you; he said he was going to be provocative, so you know he was going to be over the top; the absolutes were in the presentation, not, as far as I could see, in his actual opinion; I never read the article as a rant against shallow dof, but as a rant against the obsession with a tool (if that is the right word) used at times when it was uncalled for in order to hide the medium, because you want the medium to look like a medium it isn't. It's a bit like a sculptor who uses clay but wants it to look like bronze and so apllies paint to make it look like bronze. This is about artistic integrity. Artistically the ideal way to go is: choose your medium and make as much of the specific characteristics of that medium as you can, instead of trying to make it look like something it isn't. Ofcourse, obviously, video didn't look as nice as film so film was always there as a reference; and that is one of the reasons why red is so exciting: something digital that doesn't look as bad as video has become affordable; let's make the best, and hopefully something really new, of digital

 

[Peter Hodgins]

Ofcourse, obviously, video didn't look as nice as film so film was always there as a reference; and that is one of the reasons why red is so exciting: something digital that doesn't look as bad as video has become affordable; let's make the best, and hopefully something really new, of digital

Words like "nice" and "bad" have no real meanings, their definitions are too "fuzzy". We know video is "sharper" and not as "jerky" as film, and that scenes can be depicted more accurately and truthfully with video than with film. Film is dead, perhaps it's proponents are lobbying for some life extension for the "film look" ... i.e "fuzzy", "jerky", "out of focus". Eventually we'll see RDC cameras with 16X9 1080p 60p at 4K ... when the technology allows it. (Scarlet 2/3" perhaps). There'll always be times when it will be necessary to throw a disagreeable background "out of focus", but the tools available will make that a Cinematographers decision rather than a byproduct of the tools at hand. I don't mind the "film look", but I would never use a 35mm adapter on an HPX170 for instance ... never, never. I think the DoF discussions on www.dvxuser.com border on the insane. Some still photographers (a certain school) when printing a candid street scene would absolutely refuse to crop a scene, they would print "full frame" if someones' foot, or better yet a horses' tail intruded onto the edge of the print, all the better, another school would crop the photo artistically. There is a school of filmmaking that says the video look is "better" than the "film" look. Those who resent video, are usually in the "film look is better" school. A lot of these "DoF is better" kiddies, also like to shake their cameras so it looks "hand held", as if we didn't know .... Personally I see nothing inherently "wrong" with the "video look". I predict it will become the new standard. And when it is the "new standard", Cinematographers will still be able to use shallow Dof to their hearts content. If a viewer is watching a movie and he says ... "Oh, that's shallow depth of field", does the Cinematographer really want that reaction? Maybe then we have gone to far. If the viewer says, "Oh, this camera is hand held", maybe it's time to buy a steadycam ...

 

[hans de vries]

If a viewer is watching a movie and he says ... "Oh, that's shallow depth of field", does the Cinematographer really want that reaction? Maybe then we have gone to far. If the viewer says, "Oh, this camera is hand held", maybe it's time to buy a steadycam ...

And that is ofcourse what the article was arguing, and what I would agree with

 

[Zakaree Sandberg]

And that is ofcourse what the article was arguing, and what I would agree with

If people notice your cinematography in a movie.. then you have done a terrible job. You dont want the cinematography to be the thing that pops out. you want the story to pop out..

where am I going with this?

 

[Gavin Greenwalt]

It's a bit like a sculptor who uses clay but wants it to look like bronze and so apllies paint to make it look like bronze. This is about artistic integrity. Artistically the ideal way to go is: choose your medium and make as much of the specific characteristics of that medium as you can, instead of trying to make it look like something it isn't.

But that's being judgemental of the artist. Which is why I said he was being insulting. What he's saying is.

"Listen up noobs, it's class time! What you're all doing is wrong. You're wasting your time and you aren't being good artists. If you want to be good artists you shouldn't worry about the tool."

It's condescending to say that an aesthetic style that someone likes is "lazy and banal". It's like saying using acrylics is lazy and banal. "Real painters use oil paints!" or that using Corel Painter is lazy and banal. "Real painters don't use a computer to attempt to emulate the paint look. They just paint." There are writers who are obsessed with typewriters. There are athletes and their little rituals.

Everybody has little crazy obsessions which don't really mean anything. The hip thing right now seem to be unique scrims and old lenses. Is it trendy? Sure. That doesn't make it banal.

By and large movies shot with 35mm adapters look better than those shot without. Regardless of lighting and production design. If you don't care what the movie looks like then you aren't a DP so the discussion would be meaningless to you anyway.

 

[hans de vries]

It's like saying using acrylics is lazy and banal. "Real painters use oil paints!"

Nono, it's saying "if you're using acrylics don't be so obsessed with making it look like oil paint." Choose your medium, make the best out of it's own characteristics, and use those characteristics appropriately and not obsessively (or that's what I want it to say)

 

[Greg Ephraim]

if all these people hate shallow depth and camera movement, then sell your red, and lock down a handycam on a tripod. the article and thread is rubbish, shoot however the hell you want to shoot.

 

[Chris Bhurrut]

"Listen up noobs, it's class time! What you're all doing is wrong. You're wasting your time and you aren't being good artists. If you want to be good artists you shouldn't worry about the tool." It's condescending to say that an aesthetic style that someone likes is "lazy and banal".

That's not how I read the piece. I read it as this...

The choice of shallow DOF, without even considering other aspects like setting and spatial arrangement, is lazy and banal. If that's what he meant, and I think he did, then I agree.

If a film maker automatically plumps for shallow DOF by default - and I suspect a lot do - then where is the consideration of visual effect on the audience, emphasis of story elements and the like? Where is the craft? Where is the art?

 

[Joe G.]

There's a huge distinction between some shallow dof sequences in a film and an entire production shot that way because the amateur director is obsessed.

The article was rude and arrogant in trying to lump everyone who uses the technique together and dismissing them as "banal." So, the author was being cheap and banal, and trying to present himself as the arbiter of film style. Way too full of himself for my taste.

Some interesting tangents have come up however. Additionally I read one of the linked articles about deep focus, and it seems Citizen Kane actually resorted to double exposure to get some of that "deep focus", particularly a shot where the foreground is sharp, the middle ground blurry, and then the far background sharp again. The shot was impossible optically.

Now, it seems to me we're still doing apples and oranges comparing black and white films of old with color films now. You don't need so much distracting, colorful background. It can overwhelm the senses. It is often necessary to limit the view in some ways, or at least desirable. That's not the call of a stodgy old film professor. That's the call of the people in the trenches putting together a new movie.

His dictates are irrelevant.

I think a lot of this comes down to: It's all been shot before. New people are trying like hell to put their own style on shooting the real world, but it's been done. Millions of cameras are out there doing what you're doing. How to set yourself apart?

One way is it focus on the talent (literally!), the actor in close up, their particular face, look, mannerisms. The background is devalued, and the foreground banked on to make the images more worthy. If your actor has star quality, and you focus on them, then you have star quality. This could be a subconscious force at work.

Of course there's just the reality of not looking like a Handycam, as the audience will perceive it as cheap and not so special. That's a serious concern, and seemingly driving the business forward to the tune of billions.

Lot's of cinematographers like to say how the camera doesn't matter, and it's all them (ego). That's why they have $100,000 rigs? That's why they spend their days on the highest resolution video camera forum?

Personally: still want to shoot some film. I love it.