Are they fudging the truth?

roxics

roxics

Veteran
Let me start by saying I'm not some digital fanboy. I've shot film in the past (16mm and super8) and I'd love to work with it again.

With that said, every so often I hear film fans exclaim how super 16mm is easily 2k scanable and now 4k scanable and so on. As if the resolution keeps increasing everytime digital scanning resolutions increase. It's their way of saying "film is still superior no matter what" because it can always be transferred to the next big digital medium.

Well I wonder how true that is. I mean sure you can scan film at higher resolutions. It's an analog format that exists in reality, you could scan it down to it's atomic structure if you really wanted to. But that doesn't mean it's really going to be any higher resolution. At some point all you're going to get is grain. So if you scan a 16mm negative at 4K resolution, sure it will now be 4K, but will it really be anywhere near as sharp compared to a digitally aquired 4K image?
 
Nope.. it wont compare to next gen digital, but you have to admit that there
is an appeal to have a 'future proof', 200+ year shelf life negative out of a 30+
year old camera.

I've shot a lot of film. I still own an old, Arriflex 2C thats easily 15 years older
than I am. I have a PL mount on it and can slap on a circa 2006 set of Panavision,
Cooke or Zeiss lenses and load 400' of Kodak's latest Vision2 stock and I'm at
the high end of image aquisition on a sub-$4000 camera. The camera sounds
like a B-17 coming in for a landing, but the imagery is FANTASTIC.

I also shot all my 'home movies' on Super 8, so I straddle both film and digital
at a number of levels... consumer up to pro. My DVX is starting to get more
attention, but my 'teaser' is being DVX shot.. the film will be 35mm. Period.

In the end, I love digital. I love digital-analog hybrids even more. In fact, if
it was on someone else's dime, I'd aquire with film all the time, than manipulate
in post with digital tools with a film master/digital archive. S16 has its place
and for specific projects, makes a lot of sense. We've prolly got another 5-10
years and a 'paradigm' shift to larger CCDs and better optics before the bulk
of guys actually shooting film for a living are gonna start carrying the 'film is
dead' flag around fulltime.
 
You should be more concerned about what you want your film to look like. Not what the viewers want it to look like.
 
PJC said:
Good point. Plus, as we go into the future, viewers are going to want a cleaner image. The grain in film will look out of place.
Click to expand...

pff I don't think so. It's negligible when you consider what you're getting with actual film. In audio terms; it's like complaining about having a very slight amount of hiss on a Studer 1/4" tape deck. It doesn't matter. The musical performance captured will sound rich. If anything the hiss will act as a complimenting dither.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not a film fanboy, or a digital fanboy.

If I had unlimited resources, as in a camera that didn't sound like a B-17, and virtually unlimited film stock; I would go with Super 16 over current digital cameras. Well, unless Robert Rodriguez or George Lucas let me borrow theirs'. :grin:

I hope in new generations of digital they develop some internal software that emulates the gate of an analog camera. They should deeply study the aesthetic way of what makes a film camera click. In audio they've made very successful emulations of vintage hardware by mapping out each component and designing algorithms per every step of the signal flow. I think it could be done. I think one day digital will be amazing. In might be after NAB this year! :grin:
 
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Quick! Red! you need to add a shutter in front of the Sensor! Can you do it before, say, Monday? :cheesy:

- Mikko
 
After scanning many of my 35mm slides over the years, you definitely have a limit. My 3000 dpi slide scanner can achieve the grain point fairly easily, and that's with professional grade ASA 25 and 64 slide film, which has to be better than your average 35mm movie film.

I could be wrong, but that what my eyes tell me.
 
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