G35 Similo

[PIMP]

First off I don't know if this is the right thread to pose this question on. If I am wrong forgive me.

So I am a huge MACGREGOR fan. In my opinion his shorts are the best I have seen. I even bought the g35 because of his work. I just find it so inspiring. Anyway my question is one posed by many others before - how did he get that look?"

In my research I have found that he does practical lighting. If you see the few bts pics of him at work you see there is no light whatesover. He just knows what time of day to shoot. And by his own admission he claims to do very little color correcting in post. However I am under the belief he does something in post to give him that very specific texture. In similo specifically the scene where the couple are making love. The whites are so engaging and just pop as well as the skin tone.

I ve been shooting in a white room. Lighting it with many different ways, using existing light and can't get that specific texture. I am not shooting with the dvx as he did (i use the hvx) But even his film 18seconds shot with the hvx has that distinct feel and texture. So I ask of you guys what you guys think he does to make his work so brilliant. I realize he is a genius shooter. But there must be a way a newbie like myself can aproximate that look. I even emailed him. And he says the same thing without disclosing anything " I don't do anything special."

Too bad he jumped ship to the RED CAMERA. Otherwise he would still be one of us and he could provide some insight.

thanks

[bimdas]

looks like a lot of thought goes into his stuff. the stuff that often gets neglected like following a color palette theme. having costumers and set design and interesting locations. ie he didn't just show up at a random location with some actors who came to act in what they felt like wearing that morning.
he looks in control of the overall look and style and clearly he is a visionary.
if he had a theme it looks like he goes for muted colors with added contrast and lots of select desaturation in post.
he is a genius, I wish I had all them camera and lighting skillz plus all that other mumbo jumbo.

[PIMP]

Sounds like that might be the macgregor formula.

[Toenis]

Art direction and cast too. Envision then realize or find someone to envision and realize.
Far too many times we tend to envision what we technically know or have been conformed to - a form of blindness.

There are masters of the trade and then there are the trade masters.
A craftsman is very different than an artist or a visionary.
You can always mimic tough and find your own formula on the way.

French/European films are often the best known for art direction that goes even with the cast, even with the extras, not to mention the unique locations often used just as an artistic choice. It is amazing what can you do with a movie budget of 1mil EUR in Spain or in Eastern Europe. In Russian there is/was a word for fiction movies back in the USSR times - artmovies, and that goes for every non-documentary movie I saw when I was a kid. In western culture artsy movies are those of small distribution and kind of repressed ones if I get it correctly and may do a bit harsh conclusion. Something like hippies compared to burgleroise.

Cheers,
T

[PIMP]

The grading is actually a little darker than the version that's currently up.
Basically mac shoots to preserve lots of shadow detail. With mac, the post process is usually one of desaturating and and bringing the blacks down to just 0 or crushing them slightly. With this one it's a lot of desaturation in post and it goes pretty dark so it has a darker feel to it.

This comes from his partner in crime. Jack Daniel Stanley

i am going to toy with this recipe

[jenningsp]

you can do a lot with colour grading as well :) you can get very close to the look of similo if you can grade well. the background isn't white so you don't get the full effect but it's all natural light and the DVX/SGpro.

http://e.imagehost.org/0952/similotest.jpg

this was done in after effects with a slight red curve decrease. then i desaturated the reds, magentas and yellows. then i brought back some colour by increasing the overall saturation. then i added a very slight bleach bypass type effect.

the DVX does have a nice texture to it that the HD cameras don't seem to have. i have no idea what it is, but i can feel it.

[dan]

I remember well similo. It brought a lot of magic and it took a lot of magic away. Nice flick.

[PIMP]

wow you are right. that looks pretty close. damn you hvx why don't you have the same texture?