Harry Lime
Practitioner
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The future of film
- Thread starter Bill Pierce
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Harry Lime
Practitioner
Release prints are expensive. A big block buster will open on several thousand screens in the USA. And then there is the rest of the world. Each print costs a few thousand dollars and it takes a few weeks to make all of them. Also producing several hundred or thousand perfectly identical prints is not a trivial task. Prints may also have to be replaced, if they become excessively scratched or damaged.
Interestingly this is the phase that sinks most indie films. It is hideously expensive to scan your footage, do a digital color timing and then put the whole movie back out to film. Even doing the color timing in the lab by traditional means is obscenely expensive and the level of control is very primitive. I dream of the day when there will be digital distribution of feature films through something like the Apple Store, where independent film makers can sell their movies. Right now the studios, distributors and theaters have a strangle hold on the market and are in no hurry to democratize the business any time soon.
A feature film is comprised of several cans of prints the diameter of a personal pizza and weighs a ton, so shipping costs are not trivial.
On the creative end film makers are frustrated by the lack of consistency of theater projection. Standards have been tightened in recent years, but that doesn't stop theater owners from turning down the projection bulb 10%-20%, to extend it's lifespan (these suckers are really expensive and short lived.) Projectors also vary from theater to theater. Some are state of the art, others relics with tons of gate-weave that makes the picture go soft.
Digital projection hopes to solve these problems. Distribution would be via a secure internet connection. Projectors can be electronically calibrated and even be made to calibrate themselves to a certain extend, so the movie really ends up looking like it's creators intended.
The biggest challenge in projection has been achieving deep blacks, high resolution, sufficient brightness and temporal artifacts like smearing etc.
We also needed a playback system that could pump out the massive amount of data the is required for a full length feature film at resolutions as high or higher than HDTV.
But the industry is making serious progress. The latest generation of Christies Projectors (out by the Burbank Airport) are absolutely stunning. I was not impressed by digital projection, until we got one of the Christie units at work and it was a borderline religious experience for a die hard film guy like me. There are also several 4k projectors on the way that will replace the current crop which clocks in around 2048x1556.
Personally I still think that film is far superior as a capture medium, but I am starting to be sold on digital projection.
I know what you mean. I saw 'Apocalyto', which was shot and projected digital and while the photography was stunning, the projection felt a little like watching a giant TV. That's a temporal problem.
A film that was originated on film and is digitally projected looks quite impressive, especially if it is mastered at 4k, instead of 2k.
But I have seen Technicolor prints of 'The Red Shoes' and 'Gone with the Wind. This is something I will never forget. It was like watching a movie that was shot on Kodachome on steroids. Just amazing. Even the rerelease of 'Vertigo' on 70mm Technicolor IB was jaw dropping...
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mh2000
Well-known
hmmm... this is what I always thought about LF Zone System shooters while gingerly and creatively shooting my way through rolls of 35mm Tri-X. I think it comes more down to how complicated it is for the *user*, not the technology that it is based on... and face it, the technology behind manufacturing film is way beyond any of us here as individuals... so we are just ignoring the underlying complexity of film... since it has been around for so long we just take it for granted... at some point, digital will reach that transparent level for people just concentrate on taking beautiful photos.
I shoot film mainly because I like old cameras, some of the look from older lenses... but mainly just because I feel a romantic attraction to film... no justifications, I just love it more than digital...
>>The more complicated things get, the less "beautiful" they tend to be when it comes to photography.
I shoot film mainly because I like old cameras, some of the look from older lenses... but mainly just because I feel a romantic attraction to film... no justifications, I just love it more than digital...
>>The more complicated things get, the less "beautiful" they tend to be when it comes to photography.
photogdave
Shops local
Canon Elans and Rebels have been out of production for more than a year. The EOS 1V is not available in Canada since the summer.
I DID forget the Zeiss SW so let's call it 10 rangefinders!
Bill Pierce
Well-known
Can you imagine the size of the cameras - shooting R, G and B negatives at the same time? Sort of the dye transfer of the movie business if you go back so far that still photographers were actually shooting three separation negatives.
Harry Lime
Practitioner
You should head over to Technicolor by Universal. They have a few examples sprinkled around the facility. If I remember correctly there is one in the lobby.
Big, blue piece of cast iron. Beautifully made piece of machinery. I was surprised the first time I saw one, because it was smaller than I had expected. But with the sound blimp, they are the size of a small refrigerator.
Here's is a picture of Jack Cardff, who was the director of photography on 'The Red Shoes', with a blimped Technicolor camera.
http://www.filmreference.com/images/sjff_04_img1451.jpg
Here is a picture of the un-blimped camera (from the rear)
http://www.cinematographers.nl/Cameras/Technicolor2.jpg
On a tripod:
http://blogs.nypost.com/movies/photos/technicolor.jpg
DelDavis
.
Wow! That looks like something out of a fairy tale.
shadowfox
Darkroom printing lives
As long as the film manufacturers keep making films, people *will* find a way to fix, maintain, and build cameras. Now that I've tried LF photography, I just realize how simple it is to make a camera from scratch.
No, a camera built by barely-opposable thumbs like mine won't look and feel like a Sinar, but by golly it will produce pictures. 🙂
The end of cameras is not the problem, the end of film manufacturing, is.
For me personally, I hope that the film manufacturing industry will shrink into a stable niche that can sustain itself and I'll sure be a part of it.
Digital is cool, but film is too precious to die off.
sjones
Established
I cannot speak for the rest of the world, but here in Tokyo, film cameras are a common sight; I see lots of kids (late teens to mid-twenties) using Nikon FM's and even a couple Mamiya 7II's. In West Shinjuku, Yodabashi (http://www.yodobashi.com/enjoy/more/index/index.html) has four or five different outlets, one of which is dedicated to selling film.
When I got into photography three years ago, I started with a DSLR, but now I only shoot film. The number of folks like me appears to be growing; after all, there is something to be said about the process irrespective of all other factors. Even on the Canon POTN site, film-based inquiries have seemingly increased in just the past few months.
Perhaps analogously off track, the following Wire article (October 2007) regarding the resurgence of vinyl a quarter of a century after the release of the CD might augur well for film's future:
http://www.wired.com/entertainment/music/commentary/listeningpost/2007/10/listeningpost_1029
When I got into photography three years ago, I started with a DSLR, but now I only shoot film. The number of folks like me appears to be growing; after all, there is something to be said about the process irrespective of all other factors. Even on the Canon POTN site, film-based inquiries have seemingly increased in just the past few months.
Perhaps analogously off track, the following Wire article (October 2007) regarding the resurgence of vinyl a quarter of a century after the release of the CD might augur well for film's future:
http://www.wired.com/entertainment/music/commentary/listeningpost/2007/10/listeningpost_1029
Fred Burton
Well-known
It seems like using now very cheap old film cameras is something of a fad among teenagers and young adults who like be "different." The problem though is that the film industry wasn't supported by a relatively few people who wanted to be different. It was supported by millions and millions of people buying and using film cameras. As film gets harder to have processed at the corner store (as is rapidly happening), the young folks will get bored and move on. Very few of these young adults are going to build darkrooms and process their own photos.
The other thing I wonder about is how much film are these young people with film cameras actually shooting and having processed?
The other thing I wonder about is how much film are these young people with film cameras actually shooting and having processed?
arturo
Member
As others said, it is all a question of demand and supply. If there are customers ready to buy film, someone will produce and sell it. At a market price. Demand is shrinking and will shrink even more, but film will never completely disappear if there is someone ready to pay for it.
An aspect unexploited in this (kind of) discussion is the *advantage* of 'digital', or more precisely of new technologies, for niche groups like this one (no offense to anyone, but let's be realistic about it). 15 or 20 years ago a forum like RFF would had been impossible, unthinkable. Nowadays I can share my love for RF cameras and film with a bunch of other people scattered all around the globe. It is a fine example of very few customers, hardly a few tens thousands which is close to nothing in a global market, organised around a common intererst. Internet is an advantage for those photographers which do not want to abandone film.
I'm pretty sure that, if the moment comes that film demand is not big enough for manufacters to keep in business, internet and forums like this one wil allow customers to organise themselves to streamline their film demand, their demand of camera repaires and new camera models. As for new cameras and camera repairs, this is already happening, didn't you notice?
Arturo
An aspect unexploited in this (kind of) discussion is the *advantage* of 'digital', or more precisely of new technologies, for niche groups like this one (no offense to anyone, but let's be realistic about it). 15 or 20 years ago a forum like RFF would had been impossible, unthinkable. Nowadays I can share my love for RF cameras and film with a bunch of other people scattered all around the globe. It is a fine example of very few customers, hardly a few tens thousands which is close to nothing in a global market, organised around a common intererst. Internet is an advantage for those photographers which do not want to abandone film.
I'm pretty sure that, if the moment comes that film demand is not big enough for manufacters to keep in business, internet and forums like this one wil allow customers to organise themselves to streamline their film demand, their demand of camera repaires and new camera models. As for new cameras and camera repairs, this is already happening, didn't you notice?
Arturo
kevin m
Veteran
No kiddin'. It's the reason I've largely stopped going to the movies. Good projection of a clean copy of a well-shot film can be a religious experience, but more often than not it's just cr*p. Criterion DVD's on a Plasma TV are my new substitute. 🙂
Al Kaplan
Veteran
How much film does it take to keep the industry viable? Back in the forties and fifties there were erhaps half as many people in the USA and just about every family had either a box camera or a simple folder. It wasn't uncommon to take a picture or two at Christmas, a couple more at Easter, perhaps a graduation photo, and finish the 8 exposure roll on summer vacation. The corner drugstore carried Kodak (yellow box) and Ansco (red box). They had to stock 35mm plus roll films in 828, 127, 120, 620, 116, 616, 118, and 122 sizes. The camera store also carried DuPont 35mm plus a selection of imports by Ilford, Gavaert, Agfa, Ferrania, Adox, Perutz...did I miss some sizes and brands? Oh yeah! Then there were film packs ~ some drugstores even carried them ~ and both inch and metric sizes of sheet film.
Now we're pretty much doiwn to 35mm and 120 plus a few sizes of sheet film. Ansco is dead meat, Agfa merged with Gavaert, DuPont pulled out but Fuji became a player, several Eastern European companies expanded out of the old Soviet Bloc countries, and China jumped into the fray. Kodak and Fuji are spending untold millions on research and development, coming out with new films in an endless game of one upmanship.
I guess the only answer to the "film is dead" fear mongers is that the sensitized products industry is in the midst of an economic bubble due to Republican inspired free market notions that people longing for The Good Old Days will keep driving prices ever higher.
The reality is that historic prices of both silver and film show that compared to overall inflation silver is cheap and film is a bargain today. Back about 1980 the Hunt brothers looked at the amount of silver used by the ever growing printing industry and started buying up silver and silver futures contracts. This drove up the price of silver very rapidly. I remember chatting with some other photographers about the possibility that a dye based B&W film using color film technology would allow all the silver to be reclaimed in processing leaving just a black dye image. Soon Ilford introduced XP-1 for C-22 chemistry, ollowed by XP-2 for C41.
This was also the big impetus for developing digital technology. In the beginning it wasn't the convenience, it was the price of silver. It was also the reason for coming up with tabular grain films. They use less siver. Now film is too cheap to dissapear.
Now we're pretty much doiwn to 35mm and 120 plus a few sizes of sheet film. Ansco is dead meat, Agfa merged with Gavaert, DuPont pulled out but Fuji became a player, several Eastern European companies expanded out of the old Soviet Bloc countries, and China jumped into the fray. Kodak and Fuji are spending untold millions on research and development, coming out with new films in an endless game of one upmanship.
I guess the only answer to the "film is dead" fear mongers is that the sensitized products industry is in the midst of an economic bubble due to Republican inspired free market notions that people longing for The Good Old Days will keep driving prices ever higher.
The reality is that historic prices of both silver and film show that compared to overall inflation silver is cheap and film is a bargain today. Back about 1980 the Hunt brothers looked at the amount of silver used by the ever growing printing industry and started buying up silver and silver futures contracts. This drove up the price of silver very rapidly. I remember chatting with some other photographers about the possibility that a dye based B&W film using color film technology would allow all the silver to be reclaimed in processing leaving just a black dye image. Soon Ilford introduced XP-1 for C-22 chemistry, ollowed by XP-2 for C41.
This was also the big impetus for developing digital technology. In the beginning it wasn't the convenience, it was the price of silver. It was also the reason for coming up with tabular grain films. They use less siver. Now film is too cheap to dissapear.
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amateriat
We're all light!
Salient points all, Al.
Also, let's remember another phenomenon: as point-'n-shoot camera technology was reaching something of a foolproof zenith (between about 1990-1998), there was a sizable uptick in camera sales, then film sales, and finally the proliferation of one-hour photo labs. This was a huge "film bubble" (oh, what a pun) where Kodak, Fuji and Agfa were running up ridiculous sales numbers compared to the previous decade ("We're so happy we can hardly count", to quote Pink Floyd's "Welcome To the Machine"). The advent and popularity of digital meant the film biz couldn't help but take a huge hit. But does that mean the market isn't sustainable at, say, pre-1990s sales levels? Hard to say, but I hardly think it's impossible.
In a slow or bad year, I still go through more film in a week than my entire family went through in several years (and my family was a bit more photography-conscious than average on my block, methinks). How many people like me (us?) it would require to float an entire industry is something to ponder.
- Barrett
Also, let's remember another phenomenon: as point-'n-shoot camera technology was reaching something of a foolproof zenith (between about 1990-1998), there was a sizable uptick in camera sales, then film sales, and finally the proliferation of one-hour photo labs. This was a huge "film bubble" (oh, what a pun) where Kodak, Fuji and Agfa were running up ridiculous sales numbers compared to the previous decade ("We're so happy we can hardly count", to quote Pink Floyd's "Welcome To the Machine"). The advent and popularity of digital meant the film biz couldn't help but take a huge hit. But does that mean the market isn't sustainable at, say, pre-1990s sales levels? Hard to say, but I hardly think it's impossible.
In a slow or bad year, I still go through more film in a week than my entire family went through in several years (and my family was a bit more photography-conscious than average on my block, methinks). How many people like me (us?) it would require to float an entire industry is something to ponder.
- Barrett
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LADP
living 24fps
Plenty of TV shows are still shot on film. I shot Entourage (Season 4) in 35mm, and I'm shooting a new show for TNT called "Trust Me" in 35mm. The irony is that the last three movies I have shot for theatrical distribution were shot on HD!
amateriat
We're all light!
Yeah..now, what's that all about?
I ran out to see Sidney Lumet's Before the Devil Knows You're Dead, a great-but-depressing film shot in dreary Panavision HD, followed by the Coen Bros. No Country For Old Men, shot beautifully on film (and edited via Final Cut Pro). No comparison at all, technically speaking. Most recently saw Mike Leigh's Happy Go Lucky, also a great film, and shot on film (Fuji), as Leigh tends to do. I'm trying to like HD on the big screen, and understand the reasons why its shot, but my eyes, they're not liking it so much.
You'd think the smaller screen would be less of a stretch for HD, but I still see the difference (and I don't watch TV too much). Am I simply being stubborn, or what?
- Barrett
LADP
living 24fps
Well, to be fair, one of the films was a documentary called, "Religulous." It's still in theaters in major cities BTW. The other two movies were documentary style movies, one being "Borat," and the other being untitled and in post production. The reason for shooting HD in those types of scenarios is clear. On this last film, we shot about 705 hours of footage for a whopping shooting ratio of 470:1 (assuming the final cut ends up being 90 minutes long).
If we had shot 35mm, that would equate to roughly 3.7 million feet of film. I can't even do the math on what the raw stock, processing, and telecine costs would be. We also would have probably driven at least one loader to suicide on such a shoot.
As for film stocks, I shot Kodak on Entourage, and we're shooting Fuji for Trust Me.
I did shoot a TV series last year, which I won't name, with Panavision Genesis HD cameras. I was overall pretty happy with the performance and look of those cameras despite some workflow issues. The thing that annoyed me was I spent 3 full days of my time (unpaid) supervising the final color correct sessions for 5 episodes, only to have all the work I did reversed a few days later by execs. They retimed everything incredibly bright and flattened it out. It was a single camera style show, but it looked like a multi camera sitcom when they were done with it.
I'd work with that camera system again, but I'd rather not do another show for that network antime soon.
amateriat
We're all light!
LADP: Interesting how you fly between mediums in your production work, which obviously keeps you on your toes, technically speaking. What fascinated me is that, in the TV world (broadcast and cable), where the bottom line is always scrutinized more than the big-screen guys do (though I could be wrong, from your description of some films), a good deal of stuff is still (happily, IMO) shot on film. How does this play out, assuming you have an inside line on this decision-making?
- Barrett
- Barrett
LADP
living 24fps
Well, motion picture technology is rapidly changing, as is the still photography market. All cinematographers must learn how to deal with digital/HD origination if they want to continue working consistently in this industry. Certain projects simply demand a digital platform due to the financial realities of the film vs. digital cost analysis. Documentary films are a prime example.
On a documentary, you often shoot lengthy interviews as well as significant periods of verite coverage. In this day and age, it is the rare documentary film that shoots on 16mm or Super 16mm. When I started shooting in the early 90's, all of the documentary films and many of the commercials I shot were shot on either 16mm or Super 16mm film. I owned 2 state of the art Aaton camera packages over the course of that decade, and they were constantly working.
In the early part of this decade, all of that genre of work began to shift towards digital origination, first to standard def, and then to HD. Now with HD formats recording to hard drives and P2 cards (and other similar card systems), even the tape stock cost has been eliminated. Now with just a revolving set of cards and hard drives one can shoot a whole movie, clone the original files for redundancy (safety) and load the files directly into the editing system. No lab, no raw stock or tape stock, no tele-cine, and no wait time.
If you aren't willing to keep abreast of emerging technologies, and further more embrace them, you are going to get left behind.
Am I happy about this? Well, sort of. At the moment, I prefer to shoot film over HD for a whole long list of reasons for most of the types of projects I shoot. There are a few projects that I do prefer to shoot in HD, but for the most part, the benefits of film (ignoring the cost factor) outweigh the benefits of HD for me... from a stylistic and esthetic point of view. Digital/HD formats are getting better rapidly, and I do think it is inevitable that the day will come during my career when film no longer has a discernible difference from the best (as yet not developed) digital/HD format. Indeed digital/HD will surpass film in that realm one day in the future. When that day comes, I will not look back.
I will have some nostalgia for film, for I did come up learning and shooting film from the beginning of my film school days. To help satisfy that nostalgia, I will still shoot still film in my Leica M film cameras until the day I die or film is no longer available (which I don't think will happen for many, many years - if at all). I have old classic guitars, vintage tube guitar and stereo amplifiers, an old classic typewriter, and lots of old classic vinyl LP's. They don't make stuff like they used to.
As for having an inside line on the decision making, it varies. On many projects I do have quite a bit of influence on the format we'll shoot, and whether or not it will be film or digital. I certainly have a lot of influence on the equipment choices (and film stock choices on film originated projects).
The bottom line always affects all of these decisions, and in my experience, producers of both theatrical feature films and TV shows scrutinize the bottom line equally. The trend has always been that everyone wants it done cheaper and faster than in years past, without sacrificing the quality if possible. They do call it "Show Business" after all.
Sorry for rambling on so much. I got carried away!
On a documentary, you often shoot lengthy interviews as well as significant periods of verite coverage. In this day and age, it is the rare documentary film that shoots on 16mm or Super 16mm. When I started shooting in the early 90's, all of the documentary films and many of the commercials I shot were shot on either 16mm or Super 16mm film. I owned 2 state of the art Aaton camera packages over the course of that decade, and they were constantly working.
In the early part of this decade, all of that genre of work began to shift towards digital origination, first to standard def, and then to HD. Now with HD formats recording to hard drives and P2 cards (and other similar card systems), even the tape stock cost has been eliminated. Now with just a revolving set of cards and hard drives one can shoot a whole movie, clone the original files for redundancy (safety) and load the files directly into the editing system. No lab, no raw stock or tape stock, no tele-cine, and no wait time.
If you aren't willing to keep abreast of emerging technologies, and further more embrace them, you are going to get left behind.
Am I happy about this? Well, sort of. At the moment, I prefer to shoot film over HD for a whole long list of reasons for most of the types of projects I shoot. There are a few projects that I do prefer to shoot in HD, but for the most part, the benefits of film (ignoring the cost factor) outweigh the benefits of HD for me... from a stylistic and esthetic point of view. Digital/HD formats are getting better rapidly, and I do think it is inevitable that the day will come during my career when film no longer has a discernible difference from the best (as yet not developed) digital/HD format. Indeed digital/HD will surpass film in that realm one day in the future. When that day comes, I will not look back.
I will have some nostalgia for film, for I did come up learning and shooting film from the beginning of my film school days. To help satisfy that nostalgia, I will still shoot still film in my Leica M film cameras until the day I die or film is no longer available (which I don't think will happen for many, many years - if at all). I have old classic guitars, vintage tube guitar and stereo amplifiers, an old classic typewriter, and lots of old classic vinyl LP's. They don't make stuff like they used to.
As for having an inside line on the decision making, it varies. On many projects I do have quite a bit of influence on the format we'll shoot, and whether or not it will be film or digital. I certainly have a lot of influence on the equipment choices (and film stock choices on film originated projects).
The bottom line always affects all of these decisions, and in my experience, producers of both theatrical feature films and TV shows scrutinize the bottom line equally. The trend has always been that everyone wants it done cheaper and faster than in years past, without sacrificing the quality if possible. They do call it "Show Business" after all.
Sorry for rambling on so much. I got carried away!
Bill Pierce
Well-known
The thing that worries me about digital is that once you've lost highlight detail there's no way to get it back. When magazine photojournalism went from black-and-white negative to color transparency (the mags went color for the ads and slides were easier to edit than neg) still photographers finally learned to bracket exposure. Maybe the most journalistically important image wasn't exposed properly, but you probably had an acceptable back up. Movie guys can't bracket
I don't worry about DP's on features, but I can see young documentary shooters blowing an important take when something unexpected but important happens. (It's not just dropping film costs and, sometimes, smaller crews that will move them to digital. With Red bringing in their new 5 meg body at 40G and selling the old one for 17, Red could become the digital version of the old Bolex or used Arri that a lot of documentary shooters started with.) What is the exposure latitude for something like a Red raw file?
I don't worry about DP's on features, but I can see young documentary shooters blowing an important take when something unexpected but important happens. (It's not just dropping film costs and, sometimes, smaller crews that will move them to digital. With Red bringing in their new 5 meg body at 40G and selling the old one for 17, Red could become the digital version of the old Bolex or used Arri that a lot of documentary shooters started with.) What is the exposure latitude for something like a Red raw file?
