RED - examples of natural, "filmic" color?

[Bruce Allen]

Dear EVERYONE

What is your favorite RED-shot stuff in terms of natural, beautiful, "filmic" color? Especially skin tones.

Examples of color I like include The Thin Red Line (Blu-Ray looks awesome) and There Will Be Blood (looked fantastic in the theater). I'm not so big on the teal and yellow thing but I have to admit that even horribly teal and yellow stuff shot on film (Transformers) looks... not bad!

I'm making look books and collecting references for some short films I want to make (hopefully shooting on RED)... and I realized that I actually don't particularly like the colors in any RED movies I can think of. That is a little bit worrying to me.

Now, some movies kinda took the "RED look" and ran with it and made it work - eg Social Network, District 9... but those colors are not appropriate for the stuff I want to do. So, which RED films just have natural "filmic" colors?

The one example I can think of would be Super 8 - since nobody can tell which shots were RED... right?

I know a lot of people who "don't like RED color" or say "Alexa rocks" to which I respond...
1. You're an idiot
2. You just don't like RedColor or RedColor2 or whatever default processing they used for the dailies.
3. Wait till they grade it
4. RED does seem to be trickiest when working with the red tones though. Trick is not to clip anything. Expose to the left. And give the poor ol' blue channel a chance. Shoot daylight or try a blue filter on the camera if you shoot tungsten.

...but I'm surprised that so many films end up having that "RED color look".

Mike Most said in another thread that "Grading is often influenced by the natural tendencies of the camera and its color processing" and I'm beginning to wonder if this is the case.

If so... should I profile the RED camera against some kind of crazy wide-gamut set of 1000 color swatches with different spectral characteristics and come up with a LUT to give it a more filmic look by default or something?

I do admit that sometimes on RED projects, I feel like the red tones quickly go towards either magenta or brick color... it is difficult for me at least to have really pure saturated reds. I don't know if it is a result of the nature of the R, G and B color filters that are in front of the individual sensor sites on the Red... or it it's a processing thing... or if the red channel is clipping... or trying to hit 709 whose reds suck anyway... or what. Maybe I'm an idiot.

Sooooo... please prove me wrong with some links to beautiful natural skin tones. Would love to hear what white balance they were shot under as well if you know that info.

Otherwise, I'll try to post some of my own stuff here when I have a chance. Main computer system is going down for the weekend though...

Bruce Allen
www.boacinema.com

 

[Julio Quintana]

I am also very interested in this question.

 

[Alexander Ibrahim]

I have no idea what you are talking about.

The Lovely Bones doesn't look very much like Book of Eli, and that doesn't look much like Angels & Demons or Amazing Spider Man or The Hobbit.

You can sort of tell that something was shot on Red ... but then you can sort of tell that something was shot on Vision 3 5219 or Eterna 500. That doesn't mean that every film shot with 5219 has the same look now does it?

If you really really want it to look like film ... well grab a 435 and some 5219 already. Only film looks exactly like film.

 

[Julio Quintana]

I have no idea what you are talking about.

The Lovely Bones doesn't look very much like Book of Eli, and that doesn't look much like Angels & Demons or Amazing Spider Man or The Hobbit.

You can sort of tell that something was shot on Red ... but then you can sort of tell that something was shot on Vision 3 5219 or Eterna 500. That doesn't mean that every film shot with 5219 has the same look now does it?

If you really really want it to look like film ... well grab a 435 and some 5219 already. Only film looks exactly like film.

Alexander,
I feel like you're purposely not trying to understand Bruce's question. He's not necessarily trying to make the RED look like film. He's asking for specific examples of RED movies with NATURAL color reproduction, as in, replicating what we see with our eyes.

"The Book of Eli" is anything but natural. "Angels & Demons" used the camera for green screen shots. "Spider Man" and "The Hobbit" have not been released, so they aren't helpful in the discussion.

I understand your point that there isn't a "RED look" if the same camera can produce a wide range of looks, but the question still stands: What are examples of natural color and skin tones in a major RED production? I know they're out there, I just can't think of one right now. Maybe I'm biased from watching "Contagion" last night...

 

[M Most]

I have no idea what you are talking about.

The Lovely Bones doesn't look very much like Book of Eli, and that doesn't look much like Angels & Demons or Amazing Spider Man or The Hobbit.

You can sort of tell that something was shot on Red ... but then you can sort of tell that something was shot on Vision 3 5219 or Eterna 500. That doesn't mean that every film shot with 5219 has the same look now does it?

If you really really want it to look like film ... well grab a 435 and some 5219 already. Only film looks exactly like film.

Well, Lovely Bones and Angels and Demons were film shows. There were some individual shots or scenes done with Red (largely green screen elements in both cases), but they were essentially film shoots. Besides, I think what Bruce is really asking about is not necessarily "looking like film," but conventionally beautiful images, rather than DI distressed "looks." And on that, to tell you the truth, I'm kind of hard pressed to think of a good example. And I think that's partly due to digital cameras being chosen primarily on either 3D productions, or low budget productions to this point. 3D and conventionally beautiful cinematography don't typically go together, and things like District 9, or The Informant, or Book of Eli are heavily distressed in post in order to achieve a "look." Conventionally beautiful images (think Conrad Hall here, or Gordon Willis, or Caleb Deschanel, or Vittorio Storaro, for starters) seem to sometimes be at odds with the reasons some productions choose to shoot on digital cameras in the first place. If I'm to come up with examples of the best "conventionally beautiful" shows I've seen that were shot on Red specifically, I'd probably suggest the TV show "Undercovers," or perhaps "Rizzoli and Isles." I do think Bruce has a point, and I further think that it's related to the statement I made that he quoted. Camera choices are made for lots of reasons, but in terms of aesthetics, it does seem that the "natural" tendencies of the camera can and do influence what they're used for, and how the grading is done. That's not good or bad. It just is.

 

[Subhadip Sen]

I don't really understand what you mean, but you might want to look at Certified Copy. Till date the most gorgeous (and also the very best) film Shot on RED. Since it is a realist film much of the image is natural-looking too.

 

[Alexander Ibrahim]

I knew Angels was just for some VFX stuff ... Green Lantern used R1MX for VFX for that matter.

I really thought Lovely was all R1MX ... sorry about that.

And I'm not sure what Bruce meant ... but he did mention making the images more "filmic" twice in his post. That has to mean something.

Back to my original point ... I think that you guys are saying that Red produces un-natural skin tones, and I sort of disagree. By sort of I mean totally.

I do think a lot of films are graded in all sorts of ways that I wouldn't grade them. Then again, I just created a plastic green duo-tone skin tone for a picture I'm grading that frankly I hate but I feel works for the scene. I think this is a great part of your concern.

For the rest .. there may be some bias inherent in the color science and how it is presented in the various r3d debayer software (RCX, PP5, Resolve, etc. ) I certainly noticed that my grading style changed slightly when I started shifting from Color to Resolve ... and its a reflection of the different toolset. There could be some of that ... but that is ultimately a human problem.

So ... I really don't see what you guys are complaining about.

 

[Julio Quintana]

... I really don't see what you guys are complaining about.

Alexander, I don't see anybody complaining. Bruce, Mike and I all asked a straight forward question. What are some examples of major RED productions with natural color reproduction? We can't think of any. Can you?

 

[Julio Quintana]

I don't really understand what you mean, but you might want to look at Certified Copy. Till date the most gorgeous (and also the very best) film Shot on RED. Since it is a realist film much of the image is natural-looking too.

I haven't seen "Certified Copy", but based on this trailer, it seems to be an example of the muted, coppery skin tones that Bruce is referring to:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nM_8TPLMCOU

I personally don't believe this is a camera issue. Just look at some of the past RED Reels and you'll see some gorgeous colors. I'm just wondering why realistic color reproduction doesn't seem to be the norm for major RED productions. Is it stylistic choice? Is it an attempt to limit blue channel noise? I really don't get it.

 

[Subhadip Sen]

I haven't seen "Certified Copy", but based on this trailer, it seems to be an example of the muted, coppery skin tones that Bruce is referring to:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nM_8TPLMCOU

I personally don't believe this is a camera issue. Just look at some of the past RED Reels and you'll see some gorgeous colors. I'm just wondering why realistic color reproduction doesn't seem to be the norm for major RED productions. Is it stylistic choice? Is it an attempt to limit blue channel noise? I really don't get it.

It is not just RED - it is a general trend in many, many commercial Hollywood films. And it is not just color. Right from the plot to acting to editing style to camera movements to etc. etc. - everything is over the top and have very little to do with realism. Talking of color particularly, the teal and orange combo seems to appear in every second Hollywood film I watch. Either it's that or it's a desaturated, quasi bleach bypass green. As always, there are also many exceptions. Not surprisingly, the films that have more natural color tones are also realist films in narrative content, such as Certified Copy. Unfortunately, such realist films are become increasingly rare, especially in Hollywood.

There's the age old argument for escapist films and against realist films - "Why, after a long day's work, would I want to watch something that reflects real life? I just want to escape and have fun. Be shown things I never get to see for myself." I wonder if that applies to color as well.

 

[Sanjin Jukic]

Bruce is right here.

RED M and RED MX have both but on a different way sort of "skipping colors" issue that is now finally fixed with Epic that makes such a great colors, pretty good skin-tones, portraits, landscapes, tungsten, etc,...

I think Epic has a better D/A board than and also giving more pixels to algorithms in de-bayer process.

Btw, I have a big collection of movies on DVD/Blu Ray shot on RED staring from Che, Discreet 9, Gamer, Informant, Certified Copy, etc,... to the latest releases and all of them have a sort of color issue that Bruce just started to talk about here.

But with Epic all that should be gone.

What Epic would needs promptly is the new sensor with native 14 stops of DR and a rotary shutter module that can be additionally installed in the front of sensor.

That's all.

 

[Erich Ocean]

Skin is extremely complex to capture, and the 12-bit AD converters on the RED One, coupled with the wavelet compression (which "compresses" partially by throwing away fine detail) isn't helping any.

The skin tones from the Epic are so far beyond RED One MX that it's hard to imagine any production with access to an Epic not using it at this point. Night and day.

 

[Kemalettin Sert]

Harjunpää ja pahan pappi

 

[Nigel Stanford]

If you want your Red footage to look like film, it's just a case of applying a LUT that matches the red sensor to a films stock. We have done this to within 2% accuracy. It's not rocket science...

Actually, I didn't write the code to do it, it kind of is rocket science.

 

[Francesco Bonomo]

Interesting thread, though I fear it's going to turn into one of those Red vs. Arri/Sony things, or digital vs. film. Still, very interested in reading replies to the original question.

What Epic would needs promptly is the new sensor with native 14 stops of DR and a rotary shutter module that can be additionally installed in the front of sensor.

Sanjin, we have disagreed in the past on a few things, but please don't take it personally: the rotary shutter module has been dismissed many many times by RED, and I don't think writing about that over and over and over again will change their plans. Obviously, Red doesn't believe that a film camera style shutter and ovf make sense for them, other companies disagree and believe there's a market for those features (and frankly, from what I'm seeing, there's a lot of people who can't wait to put their hand on those cameras, at least here). Thank goodness we have different cameras, lenses, systems, options to choose from, just like, for instance, we (still) have different film stocks.

 

[Ryan De Franco]

The most naturalistic color in a major Red production? Winter's Bone.

Beautiful skin tones, striking landscapes and neutral tonality--seeing it printed and projected, I didn't even know the origination format was Red. Others might say it was desaturated, but the DP has expressly stated otherwise.Down in the hollers and valleys of the Appalichian region, muted light looks just like Winter's Bone.

And that was Red MX.

 

[Graeme Nattress]

Sanjin, you're wrong: "RED M and RED MX have both but on a different way sort of "skipping colors" issue that is now finally fixed with Epic" - there are no "skipping colours" - the colorimetry is matched between all three cameras and all three are capable of producing the same great skin tones. Epic is the least noisy of the three, but that won't get in the way of great colour on a well exposed shot. The colour "issue" you're talking about is purely a stylistic fashion that is very popular and coincides with RED camera popularity and is visible in film shots and shots with other digital cameras. In other words if you think the issue is "fixed" in Epic, then it never actually existed in the first place...

Graeme

 

[David Rasberry]

The TV series Burn Notice is a good example of rich saturated natural color balance from RED 1 MX. You can compare previous season reruns shot on Sony F900 vs RED MX this season. The look is the same.

Footage corrected with early RED software did have that slight brownish cast that Mike Most mentions, but since the color science changes with RCX that has disappeared.

 

[Graeme Nattress]

Insecurity on CBC has great colour from M-X.

Graeme

 

[David Mullen ASC]

The TV series Burn Notice is a good example of rich saturated natural color balance from RED 1 MX. You can compare previous season reruns shot on Sony F900 vs RED MX this season. The look is the same.

Footage corrected with early RED software did have that slight brownish cast that Mike Most mentions, but since the color science changes with RCX that has disappeared.

I think previous seasons were shot in Super-16.