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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 :)

Opinions on idea to add real film grain to MX footage.

Andrew Rieger

Andrew Rieger

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I will start by admitting that in some respects, the Red One MX and it's raw footage is superior to film. However, there are some of us that want to mimic film and it's grain as closely as possible. The MX sensor produces a very clean, almost sterile image that is very flexible in terms to coloring but producing the grain structure of film is still hard to mimic digitally (sure you can get close but it is never quite there.)

I was discussing the matter with a friend of mine who is shooting a 15 min short for a festival. He is a stills shooter and has always used film. For this short he wanted to go with film but shooting the whole thing in 35mm out of his budget. He has decided to go with the MX because he has a friend who owns one and will let him use it for the shoot but he still wants the short to look like it was shot on film. He is going for a very gritty Children of Men look with pronounced grain.

A while back, someone posted a thread talking about how the discovery channel was using a Red to telecine old WW2 footage by projecting the 35mm film on a screen and then recording the projected image with the Red.

This got him thinking, what if you did the reverse with Red MX footage? Shoot in the max resolution (I believe 4.5K) and then do you edit and color correction normally in the computer. Project the completed color corrected sequences through a 4K projector (which he tells me he can get access to) and then record that image with a traditional 35mm motion camera (He told me he could get an Arri or Aaton 35 for two or three days free of charge). Yes, you read that correctly, he wants to project 4k footage in a dark room, on a cinema screen and then point a Super 35 camera at that screen. Realistically, he would need only 20-30 min worth of stock to safely re-record his completed short. He would then 4K scan the film and regrade. What he hopes to end up with is Red MX footage with REAL film grain.

I know this sounds crazy and impractical but this guy is a real perfectionist and he is willing to put in the extra effort to get the look.

My question is, is this even possible or will the footage turn out looking like crap? If it can be done, what would be a good stock to use? I would think 500 or 800 would do the trick since grain is what he is after. How would you meter for something like this? Any help would be greatly appreciated. I know there will be a drop in image quality but 2K will be the final format and we figure that if this works, it will have more resolution than Super 16.
 
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Well that's silly, and expensive.

I'd advise shooting with RED and posting as normal.

Then at the end of the process, after picture lock and coloring, you can add film grain digitally.

Compositors have to do this all the time in order to better marry together pristine CG elements with photographic elements. Most reasonable compositing tools (Shake, Nuke) have the tools for this built in to them already.

The composite apps have some "stock" grain samples you can apply if you like, but most often you just sample grain from the photographic portions of the image you are comping into.

If you really want a heavily grainy look, You may need to go out and shoot a few hundred feet exposed to deliver the grain structure you want so you can sample it.

There is another option... you could do a film out.

However depending on a film out has a weakness in common with the "film the finished show" approach... the grain is likely to be too even/consistent. One of the characterful things about grain is how it changes during a film. Even when you are going for a high grain look you still have variations depending on the setting, lighting and mood of the scene.

So, myself, I'd shoot a few hundred feet pushing the stock a stop or two under some different circumstances, then I'd put the stock through a couple of different development paths. End result is grain you can sample and manipulate to your hearts content in the compositor or finishing suite.

Yes, you can hire me to do this for you if you like.
 
There is an easier and better way of doing this... You do not want to project the 4k onto a large screen, you loose quality and light. Through a system of lenses the 4k projector needs to be hooked up with the 35mm film camera lens in front of the projector lens.

Not going into too much detail, you are basically putting film camera and projector "lens to lens" so to speak. You will need some special optics to reduce the size properly, and then all you have to do is stop down the 35mm lens aperture to expose the film properly (most likely very close to t22 considering how powerful the output of the 4k projectors are, if thats still not enough you'll have to implement some ND filters until your exposure is correct.

This is a much smaller and easier setup than projecting onto a large screen and then filming that screen. You will not have to worry about loss of detail or light. Also no having to worry about renting a huge space.
 
I go with Alexander - adding grain digitally, after of course grading the final to the desired look.

The re-photographing a projected image whether through optics or projected on a screen is too unpredictable in terms of what amount of grain you will get, and would need extensive testing, and you will also be degrading the image and picking up contrast in the copying procedure.
 
Unless, of course, you're looking for a kinescope kind of look with all of its weird characteristics. Then have at it.
 
Someone will publish some algorithmic filters that will mimic this, if they haven't already. The Grindhouse movie had some great fake grain. Maybe the Hipstamatic folks will help.
 
If you have Apple Color, the film grain effect in that program is decent.
 
This is the stupidest post I've ever read on this forum. Is there a smiley for 'palmface' on here somewhere...

Just waiting for a post that does the reverse now, 'I shot on film, how can I make it look like Red footage?' :rolleyes:
 
mike ogden said:
This is the stupidest post I've ever read on this forum. Is there a smiley for 'palmface' on here somewhere...

Just waiting for a post that does the reverse now, 'I shot on film, how can I make it look like Red footage?' :rolleyes:
Click to expand...
Harsh?
 
mike ogden said:
This is the stupidest post I've ever read on this forum. Is there a smiley for 'palmface' on here somewhere...

Just waiting for a post that does the reverse now, 'I shot on film, how can I make it look like Red footage?' :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

Hey bud I never said it was my idea. I was stating my friends idea and since he is not a Reduser member, I told him I would ask for him. If you have nothing positive to post, don't post at all. You can only discover new things if you experiment.
 
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Wow Andrew, get a sense of humor will you and grow a thicker skin? :rolleyes:

Maybe Graeme can put in an 'add grain' option on the next build? :rofl:
 
Zakaree Sandberg said:
just print to film direct from your digital edit.. that film will have grain built in..
then re-scan the film back to DI
Click to expand...

He thought about that as well but I believe that film-out uses special super low-noise film with ASA rating around 25 to 50. Also, according to the Kodak page, print film is not really designed to re-scan. I am sure you can do it but you would need to look into how the scanned footage would come out.

I am not saying that this is ideal. I know it is impractical and as others have said "stupid" but I believe in experimentation. Hell, the majority of cinema innovation came from someone trying something new.

Some important points,

1. The guy does not mind if there is a drop in image quality. 2K is the output. I know that there will be a bump in contrast but he is considering bleach bypass so I think that a contrast increase is not that much of a concern.

2. The History channel used a red one to do a ghetto telecine of vintage 35mm and 16mm stock. Im sure people told them that that was a stupid idea as well but it worked. It kept costs down since they did not have the time to do a proper scan of all the stock. If you have seen WW2 in HD, then you know that the results look great.

It never hurts to try something new, but yes I know that there are easier and more efficient ways to do this. I personally think that digital grain is good enough. Also, I have heard of more bizarre things that have been done to get a certain look.
 
mike ogden said:
Wow Andrew, get a sense of humor will you and grow a thicker skin? :rolleyes:

Maybe Graeme can put in an 'add grain' option on the next build? :rofl:
Click to expand...

Believe me, I have thick skin. I just don't like how people go out of their way to say how stupid they think something is. If you think something is stupid, that's great but at least take the time to post your reasons or possible alternatives.

In retrospect, my post was a little harsh as well. No hard feelings.
 
Update: I have heard great things about Alien Skin exposure 3 which is a photoshop plugin that most accurately mimics film grain amongst the digital film grain reproduction software offerings.

Here is more info:http://www.alienskin.com/exposure/index.aspx

I have never shot film for motion (only stills) so I assume that the grain structure is produced randomly for each frame. Could batch processing the individual frames produce effective grain for footage? Or would you get flicker and other strange artifacts?
 
Andrew Rieger said:
Update: I have heard great things about Alien Skin exposure 3 which is a photoshop plugin that most accurately mimics film grain amongst the digital film grain reproduction software offerings.

Here is more info:http://www.alienskin.com/exposure/index.aspx

I have never shot film for motion (only stills) so I assume that the grain structure is produced randomly for each frame. Could batch processing the individual frames produce effective grain for footage? Or would you get flicker and other strange artifacts?
Click to expand...

I actually learned about Alien Exposure on another thread here a couple weeks ago. The poster mentioned using ASE on a few second clip and being satisfied with the results. I also tried it out on some of my photos and was very impressed with the results in how close it came to mimicing the real thing.

And while it's a good idea in theory, the problem is that the time it takes to render and export the individual frames. I don't know how long your piece is, but be prepared wait multiple days, perchance even weeks.
 
Hi,

there's a lot of packages that allow you to do film grain in post production.
I personally like the froundry's built in regrain in nuke and their furnace f_regrain!

Don't know what package you will be using, but for AE there's some pretty decent ones also...


Hope this helps
 
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