What is the Film Noir Look ?

raytoei@gmail.com said:
helenhill:

Love your photos in flickr. The blacks are inky, very nice.
Can I ask which slow film you are using ? I read that you use quite a bit of Fujifilm, is this Acros 100 for your Noctilux shots ?

thanks
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Oh hello Ray
.I LOVE the word 'inky' ...it brings to 'MIND' a rich Pool of Lush Black.
You are Correct RE: Acros & I bounce between that & Tmax 100...
Cheers & Thank YOU - xo- H
 
I'm seeing some great examples of the genre in this thread! There is good work to be seen here! Clearly, pushed film with some inky (for you, Helen) blackness is crucial to the genre, as opposed to shooting at or below box speed. But that alone is not enough. Appropriateness of subject matter counts. So I'd say Cinema Noir occurs at the intersection of technique and subject.
 
MPerson said:
Whilst Tri-X has changed I may experiment with good old Double-X and ORWO N 74 Plus using his developing process.
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Eastman XX is always a good choice. And as chance would have it, this is in Rodinal/R09. I'm guessing a fair amount of the films being discussed here were shot on XX?

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KenR said:
Isn't Delta100 shot at 400 a 2 stop push?
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It would be. See Johan's post at #78 above...

The rule-of-thumb is probably approximate, but a starting point on the way to the look he wants. Most of the drama in the car shot comes from the highlights and I'm not sure how well that would print without some extremely careful control over the car and background lighting 🙂
 
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Although Carol Reed directed The Third Man, Welles did direct the chase scene through the sewers. The hands reaching up from the sewer grate are not Welles's but rather Reed's. Great film. That zither music sold awfully well while the movie was in circulation.

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doesn't get much better than that.
 
buzzardkid said:
I'm kinda hoping to get some like this:
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Oh, and when it comes to the summum of 'modern' Film Noir, check Billy-Bob Thornton in The Man Who Wasn't There, or go see RumbleFish (complete film, Chinese video server, slow).
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The Night of the Hunter has always been one of my favorite Robert Mitchum movies. I think there are Noir moments in it, but it's not all dispear. Very powerful, and really well done. Great cast. Definitely worth checking out.
 
Hey, thanks for this thread. I've been wondering what photographic 'thing' to explore recently, and you lot have given me the answer. And it's perfect for the dark winter evenings.

I think all of them are HP5+ shot at EI1600 and dev'd in DD-X for 13 minutes at 20C.

Here are some of my snaps that seem 'Film Noir' to me:









 
Melvin said:
Caravaggio Judith and Holofernes
The original master of Noir
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Definitely a master of chiaroscuro!
His life would make a good film noir (off-topic, anybody recommend a good book on Caravaggio's life and death, saw a BBC documentary which got me interested).

The first thing that went through my head on seeing his 'Kiss of Judas' painting was that he had blown the highlights 🙄

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Nathan JD has it, Film Noir is born of cheapness. A single, bright light source, cheap film stock. Cinematographers did what they could with it. I like Helen's work too but Film Noir it is not. Just my opinion.
 
The funny thing about Film Noir being shot at night is that often night scenes were shot during the day using a dark red filter, an effect the French named "Nuit Americaine", ("American night"), from which the Truffaut film draws its name. But of course you can tell that many outdoor scenes really were shot at night.

A good book about Caravaggio and other criminal or crazy artists is Born Under Saturn. One of the biographies actually includes translations of the original police reports on Caravaggio, various assault and batteries, carrying a sword without a permit, etc which are fun to read. I can't remember which biography it is, but there can't be that many.
 
Found this chart on the web on the film differences.

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sort of explains this article on using tri-x with microdol, lacking of shadow details, pushing produces grain.
 

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TareqPhoto said:
Still i don't know what is film noir, forgive my understanding!!!
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It's a photographic and cinema genre, and as the name implies it has to do with darkness, figuratively and literally.

It's kind of one of those "hard to describe but you know it when you see it" concepts. You probably already know how to identify it.

There's another thread here which is accumulating quite a few examples of the concept. 🙂

Edit: Surf here:

http://www.rangefinderforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=93032
 
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