Kodak 2254 Digital Intermediate 35mm film stock

[Torstein Dyrting]

I shot a Feature on the RED called 'Blame' over here in Western Australia and we are going through the grade at the moment. We are using Kodaks new Digital Intermediate stock 2254 and printing out to Kodak 2383 print stock. The new 2254 is proving perfect for the RED and for the film.

We shot in a hot WA summer with temperatures in the high 30C. The skies were hot and the shadows were deep. With the interiors I always tried to have hot windows in frame and deep shadows in the interior. I wanted to push the RED to the edge of its contrast range and maintain as much detail as possible. The 2254 maintained the range of detail in the highlights and the shadowas giving strong blacks and many differnts shades of black as the light graduated in the image. I was also interested in keeping as much of the highlights as possible and they again had a range of white tones with detail. The other thing I noticed was the contrast and colour was very clean with no visisble cast. We havent finished the grade yet but will be interested to see the finished print

'BLAME' shot on RED

Torstein Dyrting ACS
Australia
www.torstein.com.au

 

[Dan Hudgins]

LUT?

LUT?

I would think some of those issues would have to do with the LUT or curves used in the film recorder.

I am using/working on multi-pass "gamma spread" with my film recorder program DANCINEL.EXE (tm) to expand the tonal range past what the film recorder screen can re-produce in a single pass and to expand the tonal range past what the DAC can provide in a single pass, my tests for three passes look MUCH better than what one can get in a single pass, the film integrates the tones from each pass.

The good thing about digital printing is that with the LUT programed right you can compensate for some of the issues with film's crossover and rounded sholder and foot in its curves.

Kodak has been reducing the amount of silver in its films, so maybe the new "digital" stock has thiner layers and less tendency to block up at the ends?

The same filmstock may not look the same exposed and processed at all labs, so it might be good to send some test frames to several labs to see how their LUT and your grade interact.