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

[Pietro Impagliazzo]

I wouldn't say shallow DOF is a false perception. As an exercise, grab something at your desk... bottle, phone, ipod... while looking at the object hold it up at arms length and close one eye. What happens to the background? Looks like 50mm at 1.8 if you ask me. Shallow DOF is natural, especially in close to medium shots...

As far as 3D goes... hold up the same object. Look at it with both eyes open... then with only one eye... Is it any less 3D? Nope. 3D in the natural world is something that is PERCEIVED and not SEEN. Which means that current stereoscopic production IS a false perception. Until there is a method of natural stereo presentation... (retaining the 3D image with only one eye open) then I'm not really interested any "forced 3D" films. Unfortunately, we'll never get there unless we dump money on current 3D tech...

I'd have to disagree.

At bright day light it looks like f/5.6 to me. At night, yeah, we're getting into sub-f/2.0 territory.

As a matter of fact, the eye f-stop varies between f/8.3 and f/2.1. Source: http://www.jdvandenberghe.com/?p=6.

Bryce, this type of 3D would require maybe 10x the processing, it would need to have information of ALL angles. Displays that are polarized and show a different image each angle. And there would be no pop-out effect without stereo-cheating again, only if the projection would actually pop-out and well, I think we're still a bit away from that. Let's focus on mastering stereo first, eh?

 

[Scott Crawley]

Nothing attracts attention more than a pile of manure in a flower garden.

I'm going to use this one.

If he wanted more eyeballs on his blog he might have created images of indie filmmakers dying in a bloody mess while trying to achieve their narrow DOF... Maybe an exploding mini 35 or similar. Include video of AC's with shards of ground glass stuck in their eye falling on the ground, screaming. Yea, that's the ticket!

For every fad there is a crowd of effete elite to cry "(Insert fad here) is so passé... Marvel at my magnificence." It reminds me of my love/hate relationship with fashion. I love the designs and the images, hate the attitude when it becomes value judgement.

 

[Michael Olsen]

What interests me about his piece is that he rails against the use of a "banal" technique - shallow depth of field and the ensuring rack focus - in favor of a technique he obviously considers superior. And this, in reference to a medium which is full of artistic periods prompted, in part, by technological advances. Seems more to me like he is calling the status quo - whatever that may be - "banal" in favor of what once was. Maybe it's just nostalgia, or maybe that's just his aesthetic. I don't know, but when I think about it, it doesn't make much sense.

Orson Welles' Citizen Kane, and the superb camera work of Gregg Toland, stands as a penultimate example of the power of deep-focus and spawned the host of new thinking about cinema aesthetics that was embodied by the French New Wave and scholarly journals such as Cahiers du Cinema.

Boy, it sounds like Mr. Welles and Mr. Toland should have won a Nobel Peace Prize or something for that.

But, interestingly enough, up until the last few years, indie filmmakers (and really, everyone with less than $10,000 to spend on a camera) have been primarily using deep focus almost exclusively as a result of technological limitation. You can't really get much shallow DOF out of a 1/3-inch camera, after all.

He explains in the blog how the development of fast film stocks allowed Directors and DPs to use a new device - Deep-Focus. And use it they did! In fact, they even further developed additional tools to help them (split field diopters come to mind). Just as fast film stocks enabled Orson Welles and his compatriots to experiment profusely with Deep-Focus, the newer crop of large sensored inexpensive cameras and 35mm adapters allow budget-minded DPs to experiment with Shallow-Focus.

Faster film stock : Period of experimentation with Deep Focus :: Large sensors : Period of experimentation with Shallow Focus

I am confident that, like other periods before it, the current phase of extreme shallow focus in independent productions will fade. The technique will then have been adequately experimented upon and knowledge rightfully gleaned which can then be intelligently applied for the benefit of creative and artistic direction. In fact, I believe it's already started to happen.

 

[Thor Melsted]

As far as 3D goes... hold up the same object. Look at it with both eyes open... then with only one eye... Is it any less 3D? Nope. 3D in the natural world is something that is PERCEIVED and not SEEN. Which means that current stereoscopic production IS a false perception. Until there is a method of natural stereo presentation... (retaining the 3D image with only one eye open)

I think this shows a fundamental lack of understanding of how 3D works, whether it's in film or in real life. You cannot see 3D with one eye.
You can perceive depth to a limited degree, but you cannot see or accurately perceive 3D with only one viewing angle. It just doesn't work that way. Depth perception is based on multiple factors including focus and size comparison, but without the disparity provided by having two different angles of the same subject, that perception is subject to mistakes:

This is of course something we use to our advantage when shooting forced perspective. Indeed, this lack of true depth perception is the primary evolutionary reason why predators like humans have two eyes in the front of the head.

Yes, the object I hold in front of me IS less 3D when I close one eye. Why? Because one eye cannot see 3D. Its depth perception is so inaccurate it can be easily fooled. The reason you can "retain" 3D information when you close one eye, is because you had two eyes to "gain" that information in the first place. Closing one eye then relies on memory to understand the spatial relationship between the things you're seeing.

Why do pigeons snap their heads back and forth when they walk? It's because their two eyes point to the sides and thus provide no depth perception. Snapping the head back and forth like that (technically side to side as their eyes point sideways) gives them that depth perception through each eye by quickly seeing different angles, something like this:

Make no mistake, depth perception is more than just depth of focus. You cannot accurately perceive depth without seeing the subject from two angles, whether that means having two lenses pointed at it from slightly different angles, like humans and other predators, or by moving the lens and analyzing the disparity, like a pigeon.

Of course current stereo production is a false perception. You're tricking the brain into seeing depth even though the eyes are focused on a single plane - which is the primary reason people get headaches or their eyes get tired. Even getting rid of the glasses won't change that. 3D movies will always be like that - until we can use holographic projections and no screen.

 

[Uli Plank]

Is Depth of Field going to be dead anyway with 3D ???

Isn't 3D dead anyway with more people wanting to see the 2D than the 3D version of Toystory 3 ?

 

[I Bloom]

About 80% of this article is a crock. It sounds like the rantings of a writer that needed a controversial subject to publish this week and the dart landed on “shallow focus.”
......
......
The author of this article is a flowery writer, but I prefer Yates.:001_tt2:

Nice post.

IBloom

 

[Bryce O]

Bryce, this type of 3D would require maybe 10x the processing, it would need to have information of ALL angles.

We're getting close... http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090628171949.htm :wink5:

Yes, the object I hold in front of me IS less 3D when I close one eye. Why? Because one eye cannot see 3D. Its depth perception is so inaccurate it can be easily fooled. The reason you can "retain" 3D information when you close one eye, is because you had two eyes to "gain" that information in the first place. Closing one eye then relies on memory to understand the spatial relationship between the things you're seeing.

I guess that was kind of a bad example... I was just trying to make the point that the world doesn't suddenly go flat the moment you close one eye, like stereo projection does.

 

[Neil B Smith]

The problems with Depth of Field is if you've created too much DOF when shooting its impossible to resharpen out of focus background or foreground objects. Take also for example a cameraman who has filmed a person slightly out of focus (which happens in corporate and even broadcast, I've seen it). What about having the ability of correcting that focus with a selective brush (like as shown in the video link)? I think the video of Adobe's new lens gives an interesting glimpse in to the future of video production.

Also as a passing thought...

With this technology you could in theory composite objects in shot without creating mattes as the software knows the depth of objects. You could use After Effects to slot in to the scene any other object and the correct focus would be applied to that element as the depth is know. Also software could create a 3d model in animation software, fully textured... The possibilities of this are endless... So for SFX artists this technology would be amazing to use. I believe the lens will get smaller and would begin to look like an insects eye!! How much these lenses will cost is another matter.

@RED DIGITAL CINEMA - I would like RED to get in to bed with Adobe on this technology and work on this technology for video and not just photography. Jim???

The future is single camera 3D with this type of tech. Not RED's dual camera setup.

I can't really get over how I can see this as the future. And it will be. Computational video capture!!! Jim????

 

[Neil B Smith]

...I'm beginning to become a right chatter box for new tech.

Sony has released a new 3d holographic display.

http://www.zath.co.uk/sony-create-star-wars-esque-360°-3d-holographic-display-prototype/

3D is the future and better displays showing 3D, without glasses, are being worked on.

Treating video as 3D instead of flat 2D with a DOF is the future. The worlds of 3D virtualisation, like animation and video, will blend in to each other. You will be able to work in 3d animation and 3d video within the same software packages. True 3d compositing. The CG with real life. At present CG and video are 2d composites. Not in the future.

"I have a dream today...."

@Thor Melsted - I like your wobbly photo!!! Thats using 2 camera views, the adobe lens uses 16 different radial views!!

 

[Joe G.]

"The problems with Depth of Field is if you've created too much DOF when shooting its(sic) impossible to resharpen out of focus background or foreground objects."

I think you mean the opposite.

Depth of Field is what's in focus, not what's blurred.

 

[andrewhake]

Opinions get thrown around like facts far too often when discussing film-making. . .

 

[Neil B Smith]

"The problems with Depth of Field is if you've created too much DOF when shooting its(sic) impossible to resharpen out of focus background or foreground objects."

I think you mean the opposite.

Depth of Field is what's in focus, not what's blurred.

Yup the opposite (DOF is roughly taken as in-focus) silly me.

Depth of Field relates to the focal point (mid-point), but the "Depth" from the point of focus to where it blurs out changes (this is called the DOF). Higher the F-stop value the greater the DOF and less blurred the background & foreground is.

I've been discussing the future of being able to change this in post-production taking a look at the developments which Adobe are working on for still photography, which will eventually work its way in to video & film.

Everything that has come in to video & film have come from developments in still photography and thats where we need to look for the future of video & film.

With the new technology you will be able to change the Focal Position/point, the F value, the DOF, etc.... all in post.

Once you've filmed using a minimal DOF then in post the client doesn't like it... or even worse your cameraman was sloppy and, lets say, the talking head shot was out of focus... well your in trouble. With this new Adobe tech this will be a thing of the past. Un-sharp mask can only do so much.

Thanks for correcting me. :gnorsi:

 

[Erich Ocean]

Depth of Field relates to the focal point (mid-point)

The "mid-point", aka "plane where the circle of confusion is the smallest", aka "most in focus" is actually not in the middle. Rather, it's closer to the film plane, roughly 1/3 back from the "front" of the depth-of-field.

It also varies somewhat from lens to lens.

 

[Neil B Smith]

@Erich Ocean - Thanks for the info

Found some more great info on Depth of Field.

http://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tutorials/depth-of-field.htm

Even with a DOF calculator.