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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 :)

OBLIVION starring Tom Cruise and Morgan Freeman. Shot on F65 and EPIC.

Vadim Bobkovsky

Vadim Bobkovsky

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Futuristic / post-apocalypse sci-fi action "Oblivion". Directed by Joseph Kosinski ("Tron Legacy"). Shot on Sony F65 (Raw 4K) and Red Epic (Raw 5K).
Starring Tom Cruise, Morgan Freeman, Olga Kurylenko

Youtube 1080p trailer:

Apple Trailer 1080p:
 
My kind of movie!
 
Tom Cruise and Morgan Freeman are excellent in this film, It's going to be great! Now Don't you forget Claudio Miranda - Cinematographer!!!. Sony F65 was used for 90% of the film, Epic was used for Steadicam, handheld, mini-heleicopter, and vehicle mount shots. We had to depend on Sony and their updates, but they listened to us and gave us new features almost every month. As soon as there was any problem, Sony was on Set the next day to solve any mystery that came up. Otherwise, The entire crew of this project was absolutely amazing...!!! Keslow Camera worked around the clock to finish the modifications to the Sony, They even improved the camera as we were shooting!! They deserve a lot of credit here, Micheal Kramer and Andre Wright! They have given us unprecedented support for the Red Epic an SonyF65. All I can say is 'We were well prepared after leaving LA'.
 
That is actually slighly depressing, I heard epic was used on this film...

I watched the preview at the cinema the other day and went wow.... someone did a great job with the epic, suffering zero of the hazy anemic face tones i'm used to on a lot of movies shot on red.

The drama shots in this film look incredible, his face is so rich and beautiful.

Heres to hoping the new Dragon sensor can deliver richness like the f65 :yesnod:
 
Prahlad Strickland said:
That is actually slighly depressing, I heard epic was used on this film...

I watched the preview at the cinema the other day and went wow.... someone did a great job with the epic, suffering zero of the hazy anemic face tones i'm used to on a lot of movies shot on red.

The drama shots in this film look incredible, his face is so rich and beautiful.

Heres to hoping the new Dragon sensor can deliver richness like the f65 :yesnod:
Click to expand...

I don't get this. Epic shoots RAW. You can make the skintone whatever you WANT. We shot this 6 weeks ago, hurried, and I think the skintones look awesome (and this is on a SCARLET):

8239389226_653e39ddf7_b.jpg
 
Red is a more demanding camera then for example Alexa. Alexa's skin tones or color overall is much better balanced out of the box. There's also the confusion about RAW. The r3d files are not meant to work out of the box, RAW is "undeveloped film", it demands someone who understands it to work with it. It's like throwing in an intern into the film lab and hope that the resulting colors of the 35mm print will come out perfect.

My experience is that there are too many amateurs that think digital technology works by itself. You still need both the craft and knowledge of colors and perception to understand how to handle an image. Alexa works good out of the box because it's a balanced codec from the start. It's calibrated when creating the camera and it's not meant to be changed.
What Red and r3d is, is a codec that demands that YOU know the science behind it, you have to understand how it works and how to decode it into a great image.

But yeah, there are some things with the sensor, Red is pushing technology and there is little time to balance the quality of everything in that time frame, but then again, Alexa takes so long to keep the pace that they are always outdated on other specs. Pick your choice.
 
Christoffer Glans said:
Red is a more demanding camera then for example Alexa. Alexa's skin tones or color overall is much better balanced out of the box. There's also the confusion about RAW. The r3d files are not meant to work out of the box, RAW is "undeveloped film", it demands someone who understands it to work with it. It's like throwing in an intern into the film lab and hope that the resulting colors of the 35mm print will come out perfect.

My experience is that there are too many amateurs that think digital technology works by itself. You still need both the craft and knowledge of colors and perception to understand how to handle an image. Alexa works good out of the box because it's a balanced codec from the start. It's calibrated when creating the camera and it's not meant to be changed.
What Red and r3d is, is a codec that demands that YOU know the science behind it, you have to understand how it works and how to decode it into a great image.

But yeah, there are some things with the sensor, Red is pushing technology and there is little time to balance the quality of everything in that time frame, but then again, Alexa takes so long to keep the pace that they are always outdated on other specs. Pick your choice.
Click to expand...

I don't fully agree with you. I work at a cable network and they shoot Alexa LOG all the time. You think that milky stuff is any easier to work with than R3Ds? I've seen entire campaigns cut from badly graded Alexa footage because the post people didn't know how to handle it properly. Sound familiar?

To me the Alexa LOG workflow is the same as Red R3D. Both...to be done properly...require someone (DP/DIT/COLORIST) to ideally GRADE the footage before it's delivered to client.

The problem is, in my experience, ALEXA shoots are higher budget and come with a DIT. SCARLET shoots are often lower budget/owner operator and...as you say...are more likely to encounter user error.

It's the people, not the camera, that are making the mistakes.
 
Prahlad Strickland said:
Heres to hoping the new Dragon sensor can deliver richness like the f65 :yesnod:
Click to expand...

This one settles it all for me:
http://trailers.apple.com/trailers/sony/rustandbone/ (watch it in 1080p)

Digital versus film. Or Epic versus Alexa or any other format. It's okay now. This picture was shot on Epic, I don't think you'll miss 35mm, even for it's skin tones. We are there. Epic MX is one damn beautiful camera. I think more and more DoP's especially in Europe will settle, stop the silly arguments and start to explore what the camera can do after they've seen this film.
 
Jon MIchael Puntervold said:
This one settles it all for me:
http://trailers.apple.com/trailers/sony/rustandbone/ (watch it in 1080p)

Digital versus film. Or Epic versus Alexa or any other format. It's okay now. This picture was shot on Epic, I don't think you'll miss 35mm, even for it's skin tones. We are there. Epic MX is one damn beautiful camera. I think more and more DoP's especially in Europe will settle, stop the silly arguments and start to explore what the camera can do after they've seen this film.
Click to expand...

We're going to see it this weekend. Excited!
 
If the real world tests confirm Dragon's superior latitude and tonality, you'll probably not miss 35mil at least in terms of Dynamic Range. Sony F65 footage from Oblivion and After Earth look great anyway. Now, it seems, with the very latest modern digital sensors you can actually expose it like film and not worry too much about clipping in highlights and such things. With 18 stops maybe you'll even be able to strongly overexpose Dragon, like you'd do with film sometimes, and know you will get that sweet sweet filmic rolloff. I for one enjoyed the hell out of Django Unchained, which was shot mainly on Kodak V3 film stock with anamorphilc Panavision Primo E lenses. Thanks to QT for reminding me why I dig that look.
 
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Nick Morrison said:
I don't get this. Epic shoots RAW. You can make the skintone whatever you WANT. We shot this 6 weeks ago, hurried, and I think the skintones look awesome (and this is on a SCARLET):




8239389226_653e39ddf7_b.jpg
Click to expand...


The face tones on the Red Epic unfortunately for us just don't have what the F65 and Arri deliver on what seems to be a consistant basis.

Life of Pi, Game of Thrones, Oblivion, Zero Dark Thirty,

The hobbit is the best to date on the epic side, but still to me, there is something 'anemic' in the face tones.
Bad examples on the epic side are...
Pirates of the Carribean and Spiderman.


Maybe it's just that ARri has been making movies for 90 years, again, hoping the Dragon sensor can improve this for us in our Epic's...

We may just opt to own both, no disrespect meant to anyone or the red cameras, we use them, they are great. The best???, so far with the examples we can pull from hollywood, IMHO no... F65 and Arri take the face tone cherry on the Lemon cake.
 
Jon MIchael Puntervold said:
This one settles it all for me:
http://trailers.apple.com/trailers/sony/rustandbone/ (watch it in 1080p)

Digital versus film. Or Epic versus Alexa or any other format. It's okay now. This picture was shot on Epic, I don't think you'll miss 35mm, even for it's skin tones. We are there. Epic MX is one damn beautiful camera. I think more and more DoP's especially in Europe will settle, stop the silly arguments and start to explore what the camera can do after they've seen this film.
Click to expand...

Looks 'good' , even great, but not to the same face richness as oblivion or Life of Pi.
 
Prahlad Strickland said:
Looks 'good' , even great, but not to the same face richness as oblivion or Life of Pi.
Click to expand...

Hi Prahlad,

Have you done any side by side tests of F65, Alexa, and Epic, shot under the same conditions and finished optimally? Or are you just comparing movies, shot and finished by different teams and displayed in different venues under different conditions? Because comparing movies is apples and oranges, extremely subjective. Since you can't know all the parameters if you weren't there, you can't really know how the cameras would perform under the same conditions. Pretty dicey comparison.

Tim Eaton
 
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