Film and Digital

[Bill Pierce]

Here's Part 1 of an intelligent piece comparing film to digital. It's looking at the low contrast negative materials used in movie work and comparing the results to digital still/motion cameras like the 5D MKII. The main topic of Part I is exposure latitude.

These are the viewpoints of motion picture DP's, cameraman and technicians. They have no axe to grind. And, in general, are more knowledgable about the craft than most still photographers. They are not interested in a contest where what they use is judged "best." They want to know what they can do with both materials.

http://www.zacuto.com/shootout

 

[Morca007]

I've read some decent pieces in American Cinematographer about film vs. digital, and while interesting, it's quite divorced from anything most photographers here experience.

Thanks for the link, watching it now.

 

[Pickett Wilson]

That was amazing. Wow.

 

[aizan]

so, where can i get some kodak 5217?

 

[40oz]

My question is why they viewed everything through a digital projector?

That's just..... dumb. The film is scanned before the comparison, so what we are really comparing is how scanned film compares to essentially as-shot digital. I know the industry scans the film for non-linear editing, but if a filmmaker wants to, they can edit without a scanning intermediate step. The same way a filmmaker can output to a hard drive instead of putting to film for distribution. Nobody using a DSLR for video is shooting a feature film, and likely not many people are using non-linear editing for art film super-8.

And to my eyes, none of the digital was really close to the films. The digital was passable only if, as was repeatedly mentioned, you shoot to its abilities.

As "fair and inpartial" as everyone claimed to be, the digital shots easily are technically and aesthetically inferior to the digital sequences but nobody wants to say that very loud. The discussion rotates around how awesome the digital is compared to each other, after the two second obvious "Well, the film is clearly superior in this shot." In other words, we take away how awesome the DSLR's are for video (not as good as film, though). Kind of seems like every one of these people wanted to talk up how great their own cameras are rather than face the fact that they pale in comparison to film.

Didn't we already know, and isn't it a given, that anything can look good if you play to it's strengths and keep the parameters within the range that performs best? You have to shoot to film's ability just the same, it just happens to be more able.

But it was interesting and pretty well done. But almost unwatchable on my cable connection. A big chunk of that is Flash and the player they are using. Did anyone else see a slideshow rather than a video?

 

[maddoc]

But almost unwatchable on my cable connection. A big chunk of that is Flash and the player they are using. Did anyone else see a slideshow rather than a video?

Same here. I tried to watch it but gave up after few minutes watching a slide-show .... 🙁

 

[rodt16s]

Digital show's a capable effort for <$10k of camera equipment and only a few years evolution, let's have the same shootout in another 10 years and compare.

 

[Pickett Wilson]

What I got from their discussion is that shooting movies is all about the lighting, and if you light specifically for digital, as you light specifically for film, that both are completely viable for movie production.

 

[40oz]

Digital show's a capable effort for <$10k of camera equipment and only a few years evolution, let's have the same shootout in another 10 years and compare.

You said that ten years ago :/

Let's not forget that these are pretty much the cream of the crop as far as DSLR's go. The video is funded by people who sell accessories for using DSLR's for "film making." I think they really wanted to know the state of the art and where they stood with respect to film camera users. And now we know.

I think it's relevant to acknowledge that while one can light to the range of the equipment, when one is trying to shoot outdoors or in situations where lighting cannot be controlled, the shortcomings of the digital equipment will be apparent.

 

[Harry Lime]

I think part 2 will be more illuminating.

A few points:

- All of these DSLR cameras suffer from the rolling shutter problem. It appears during certain camera / object movement and manifests itself as a skewing of the image. All of these cameras use a CMOS sensor, which dumps the image row by row. If there is too much change in the camera or subject position before the sensor dumps the last row you get a skewing effect. CCD sensors do not suffer from this problem, because they dump the data from all receptors simultaneously. Someone needs to make a CMOS sensor with a global shutter, that acts like a CCD.

- While the DSLR cameras produce impressive images, they are only skin deep. They are stored as highly compressed files and there is little latitude in them for post processing. It's the difference between shooting JPEG and RAW, slide-film and negative.

That said I think these cameras are the biggest threat to pro level HD cameras, although none of these DSLR shoot 4:4:4 or 4:2:2 color (uncompressed or slightly compressed), unlike high end video cameras.


The real threat to film are the new breed of digital cine cameras. These are cameras like the RED One, Sony F23 and F35, Arri-D21/22, DALSA, Panavision etc.

These cameras shoot at 4k and dump out an uncompressed 10bit log or 4:4:4 signal. Basically true RAW files at a minimum of 24fps.

Something like the RED One can capture about 8 stops of useable range, but more expensive models like the Sony F35 can hit a solid 10-11 stops. The newest generation from Arri and Red shoots noise free at 800asa with 10-12 stops of range.

Keep in mind that these cameras are putting out a RAW stream at 4k, while running at 24fps and higher. That is a massive amount of data.

The best of them can hit about 10 stops of useable DR. That's not as good as something like Kodak Vision3 film (min 13 stops), but totally useable, if you are careful with your lighting. And they obviously are less grainy, when pushed to a higher ISO.

Some of these digital cine cameras also suffer from the rolling shutter problem (RED), because they use a CMOS sensor and do not incorporate a mechanical shutter (rotating butterfly type). The Arri uses a mechanical shutter. Basically it's constructed like an analog movie camera, except there is a sensor behind the gate, instead of film. But the Arri is also a lot more expensive.

I love film, but these digital cine cameras are getting to be awfully good. I saw some footage from a F35 recently and it was truly impressive. Very, very film like in a lot of ways. The new ARRI and Red Millennium promise to raise the bar even higher. I fear that film doesn't have more than 10, maybe 15 years left, as the capture media of choice for film production. It will be a shame when it goes. The whole business will change, a lot how digital has changed the photo business.

 

[photogdave]

Something like the RED One can capture about 8 stops of useable range, but more expensive models like the Sony F35 can hit a solid 10-11 stops. The newest generation from Arri and Red shoots noise free at 800asa with 10-12 stops of range.

I'm sure you read the American Cinematographer article in which, was it John Bailey?, pretty much slammed the Red One after using it on many, many productions.

I love film, but these digital cine cameras are getting to be awfully good. I saw some footage from a F35 recently and it was truly impressive. Very, very film like in a lot of ways. The new ARRI and Red Millennium promise to raise the bar even higher. I fear that film doesn't have more than 10, maybe 15 years left, as the capture media of choice for film production. It will be a shame when it goes. The whole business will change, a lot how digital has changed the photo business.

Will the bean counters let this happen? Isn't it actually more expensive to capture digitally because of the post production hours and the transferring of the whole movie to film for archiving?

 

[Harry Lime]

I'm sure you read the American Cinematographer article in which, was it John Bailey?, pretty much slammed the Red One after using it on many, many productions.

The RED One is far from perfect and I certainly don't buy in to the RED hype machine who's fanboys have elevated the camera to the second coming. But at $30,000 for a functional kit it is relatively cheap...

The new RED Millennium uses a new sensor that is supposed to be much improved.

Personally I'm putting my money on the new Arri or the Sony F35, but they are not cheap (especially the SONY).

Will the bean counters let this happen? Isn't it actually more expensive to capture digitally because of the post production hours and the transferring of the whole movie to film for archiving?

Actually not having to scan film is a huge time and money saver.

Negative is run though a dedicated film scanner or something like a Spirit telecine, which runs in realtime or close to it. The scanner will get you better quality, but is more expensive. Last time I checked a Spirit ran something like $700/hour, which should be more than enough time to transfer a few rolls. Scanning is priced per frame, but depending on how much material you have you can do some negotiating.

Shooting back out to film is not exactly cheap, but in the big picture one of the cheapest items on a movie production, unless it's an indie. Studios may spend more money on the 'honeywagon' over the course of a shoot, then on recording to film.

Here are some numbers:

1000ft roll of Kodak Vison3 (circa 9min) $500
Development $200

Add to that scanning or a telecine, which would run several hundred or a thousand dollars for the roll. Obviously you are only going to scan the takes you need and not the entire 1000ft roll, unless it's a 9 min shot.

The rental costs for a digital kit are higher (not counting the RED), but in some cases you get a storage array that can hold about 5 hours at a time. There are no scanning or developing costs and obviously you are not paying for raw film. You can delete takes you don't need to free up space and optimize your storage. So, in the long run shooting digital may be cheaper, depending on how much footage you shoot per day. You just need to do the math and see what works. After that it's an artistic decision, depending on what look you are after.

Personally I like film, but I'm trying to stay open minded about the whole thing, because regardless of what my preferences are I can't stop the march of time...

 

[40oz]

Just a few questions:

Don't people curently choose which film they use based on the look they want and the amount of light that will be available? Is there any reason to think that will change? In other words, is there any reason not to think that as good as digital video might ever get, it will just simply be another option, akin to choosing which film to use?

The cost differences don't really seem to be a hugely relevant part of the decision-making process. I mean, if a company is going to spend $100M on a feature movie with worldwide distribution, is it really all going to come down to transfer costs? I can't remember the last time I read a director talking about filming a movie based on the cheapest expired stock they could locate. But what do I know?

Now I'm thinking that if you are considering using a DSLR to shoot your TV commercial, isn't the other option for that use generally tape, not film of any kind anyway? Again, I have no idea, and I don't even know where to look. I've heard of people shooting commercials on 8mm & 16mm film, but I don't know how accurate or popular that is.

I can't imagine strapping cameras to a boat in the Bering Sea and changing rolls every 9 minutes, but I also can't imagine a cinematographer choosing to use a DSLR for the next Peter Jackson epic.

 

[remegius]

Personally I like film, but I'm trying to stay open minded about the whole thing, because regardless of what my preferences are I can't stop the march of time...

A cogent point. The comparisons were made at a single point in time. Soon the "march of time" will render all of these considerations moot.

Cheers...

Rem

 

[Pickett Wilson]

There are many folks on RFF that believe they CAN stop the march of time and worry about whether their film cameras will last another 50 years.

 

[Bill Pierce]

I think the replacement of film by digital in the majority of applications is inevitable, not immediate, but inevitable.

However, right now, there is digital and there is digital in the motion picture end of things. The digitals from folks like Arri, Panasonic and even the affordable Red line capture raw files. Canons, Nikons, e.t.c. capture the movie equivalent of a jpeg. If you don’t have to do a lot of work to the file, that full “35mm” still frame capture looks absolutely beautiful. But I think many film makers are going to want the ability to manipulate a raw file. To have both isn’t impossible, just incredibly difficult. But probably someday we will have both.

 

[Bill Pierce]

Well, according to Phil Bloom, it looks like Canon is going to give us that raw file.

http://philipbloom.co.uk/2010/04/01/canonraw/

 

[Bill Pierce]

Ooops!! It's Bloom's day and April Fool's all in one.

 

[Harry Lime]

Just a few questions:

Don't people curently choose which film they use based on the look they want and the amount of light that will be available? Is there any reason to think that will change? In other words, is there any reason not to think that as good as digital video might ever get, it will just simply be another option, akin to choosing which film to use?

i think it's a myth that digital needs less light. You still need a full lighting package to shoot a movie, regardless if it's digital or film. The RED for example works best with good light levels. Noise starts to creep in pretty fast otherwise.

I think you are right that for a long time to come people will choose film
vs digital depending on what look you want.

The cost differences don't really seem to be a hugely relevant part of the decision-making process. I mean, if a company is going to spend $100M on a feature movie with worldwide distribution, is it really all going to come down to transfer costs?

THe problem is that film is not in a union. THe DP may belong to the ASC, but that's a little different. If you try to cut the crew you will have to deal with some serious push back from the unions, but the bean counters go after things like film expendables and post production, that are not organized and therefore can't fight back as well.

I can't remember the last time I read a director talking about filming a movie based on the cheapest expired stock they could locate. But what do I know?

It happens all the time on independent films. THey are the most excited about digital. A RED makes a lot of things possible...

Now I'm thinking that if you are considering using a DSLR to shoot your TV commercial, isn't the other option for that use generally tape, not film of any kind anyway? Again, I have no idea, and I don't even know where to look. I've heard of people shooting commercials on 8mm & 16mm film, but I don't know how accurate or popular that is.

Commercials and music videos are a lot more flexible when it comes to capture media. Pretty much anything goes.

I can't imagine strapping cameras to a boat in the Bering Sea and changing rolls every 9 minutes, but I also can't imagine a cinematographer choosing to use a DSLR for the next Peter Jackson epic.

Exactly. No studio is going to put $100 million in to a picture and shoot it on a $2500 DSLR. THe IQ is impressive, but as I mentioned earlier skin deep. It's motion JPEG and there are problems with artifacts bla bla bla...

 

[user237428934]

Will the bean counters let this happen? Isn't it actually more expensive to capture digitally because of the post production hours and the transferring of the whole movie to film for archiving?

I don't think that most cinema films are filmed digital today. But a lot of cinema films don't come on rolls but they deliver a hard drive with the film on it protected with digital rights management to the cinema. So I think that a lot of film is scanned and then digitally processed.