puredrifting
Major Contributor
Deeply profound. But too much shallow DOF.
Deeply profound. But too much shallow DOF.
The imagery is fitting, but the sound is a little muffled (did he forget to take the lens cap off the microphone?).
puredrifting
Major Contributor
I can only speak for myself, but I think all of the tools and vocabulary mentioned and plenty that weren't are all valid parts of the film making lexicon. I don't hate any of them, even an orange and teal grade, if it's motivated by and enhances the story. It's a miracle that cameras, lenses and lighting can all look as good as they do today at a ridiculously low cost. We have so many ways to creatively and easily move the camera, which is super cool.
The issue I have is the blunt force application that just doesn't work aesthetically and more importantly, numbs the viewer to what was cool and miraculous about the innovation in the first place because of misuse or overuse with no consideration of storytelling and aesthetics. It feels as if we are in the era of everyone has a hammer and the filmmaking world is nothing but nails. We shoudn't have the camera zipping all over the place just because gimbals and sliders are cheap and simple to use now. We shouldn't shoot in anamorphic when that format will be a detriment, not an enhancement to the storytelling. The underexposure issue that this thread started on is just one more aesthetic choice that people are making that really is rarely needed or wanted by the audience or the story, it seems as if a lot of it is trend and trends in our business end up looking ridiculous as soon as the trend fades out.
If you look at the most talented and accomplished visual storytellers since the medium was invented, not all but most of the best, the ones that have withstood the test of time, used the effects and style of the day in creative and motivated ways. John Ford dollying in straight in and fast on John Wayne from that low angle in "Stagecoach" was considered a bit of a gimmicky approach in it's day, but Ford knew it would cement Wayne as an icon and it did and it did help tell the story better since we then knew how Wayne's character figured in the story. Even some of the zooms in features during the 70s, in most cases they look cheesy, but in a few films, those cheesy zooms actually enhanced the story. So it's not that the tools are terrible or shouldn't ever be used or experimented with, they should obviously. But I see a lot of image makers using them in ways that actually make the storytelling and the viewing experience worse. If the gimmicks and tools you are using detract and make the story worse, generally they aren't a good idea.
Also, I find it interesting that if filmmakers applied the same "underexposure" to the audio in the film, there would be a mass uproar that the film was "unwatchable" because you couldnt hear what the characters are saying. If the underexposure and murk make it so the audience cannot even tell what's happening on screen, in most cases, that's a fail. The way you make images that look and more importantly feel dark, is by managing contrast ratios, usually on a close to well exposed image. In today's digital environment, there's little reason to deliberately underxpose images with what can be easily accomplished in post with more quality, refinement and nuance. Just my .02 worth.
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After doing a few tests, the best looking dark shots start with getting the desired contrast ratio with sufficient light for the sensor. Then using curves, pull everything down in post to get the desired look. Underexposing, while it requires less post work to get the final look, doesn't look nearly as good due to noise as well as having far less flexibility in post.
puredrifting
Major Contributor
According to Google, here's our choices: https://www.google.com/search?q=famous+mustache+guy
If not Magnum PI. Hmm Cronkite doesn't fit the role. Google knows all, so we've gotta pick one... must be... Eddie Murphy! He was great in GhostBusters and Beverly Hills Chihuahua.
(for some reason "Loni" and "Aluminum Foil" seem relevant)
Eric Coughlin
Veteran
I see Burt Reynolds. He was in a low budget ($200,000) movie locally (in Sarasota, FL) that some of my friends helped on as crew around a year or two ago.Great discussion. But are we really going to let Eric slide on that self-portrait / modeling head shot? Why does that shot look familiar? Oh yeah, now I remember!-
all in good fun, Eric. You had to know someone would give you grief for that pic!
I was going for John Krasinski.
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joema
Active member
There are two separate issues here: the dark look and the flat look.
In some TV commercials and news pieces, I am increasingly seeing content apparently left in log or a pronounced color profile. I first thought it was a stylistic decision -- an artistic device to look different and catch the viewer's eye. However I think some of these are just mistakes where they shot it in log or with a profile and the downstream people thought it was an artistic look so left it that way.
Here is a CNN field news piece where at 00:36 and 03:50 they repeatedly cut between two different cameras with different white balance and gamma profiles. If the entire thing was shot one way you could argue it was artistic. But when they cut between two cameras, that indicates it was probably a mistake which was never rectified in post.
http://newsvideo.su/video/3314018
I've seen much worse than this, where an entire piece or one camera is in a very pronounced log mode. I also see it on some web material. Maybe they are just searching for a different look to stand out vs their competitors, or maybe they don't understand what they're doing.
combatentropy
Veteran
Are many people unwilling to let go of the shadow detail that they see in the log profile? To make it to look normal, they must raise the contrast, which would push some textures into darkness.
CharlesPapert
Director of Photography
I can't speak for a single other one of my colleagues than myself on this, but I do know that most of us attack this all very differently.
I came up in the era where one's meter was your most valuable tool outside of your own eyes. These days it sits neglected in the case almost all of the time. My gaffer does use his to set the initial levels, and I make final adjustments based on a combination of calibrated reference monitor (I use the Sony A250), waveform/RGB parade and false color, in that order. Regardless, I still think of and communicate in stops, or fractions of stops, as I always have. Slightly to my surprise, I'm still able to "feel" light levels when out on the set, i.e. I can generally walk into a room and know what the exposure is in a given area within a fairly tight range.
A few months ago we were pre-lighting a set that was adjacent to our shooting set, we were in a major pressure cooker timewise and I was running back and forth giving notes to the electric crew down to dropping scrims etc. This was an interior shot night for day, and we had several large windows looking out to a covered breezeway that we had to bath in HMI to appear as day, yet in shadow (quite a bit more complicated than diffusion on a window that just needed to be blown out, for instance). I kept meaning to grab meter but always forgot. I gave as many notes as I felt I could without seeing it on camera, assuming we would make final adjustments once we made the move. When my monitor came online, I was pleasantly surprised to see that every instrument was right at the level I needed it to be. I tell this story not to impress, but to point out that despite my preference to light via monitor, I seem to have managed to retain the OG skill of lighting by eye with meter as confirmation. I don't really think my ratios have changed substantially--I'm filling out the digital negative as much as I did with film (and the far more delicate range of pre-log video).
I did recently shoot a short film and decided to play it less safe than I usually do with dark interiors that have much of the information in the toe (which is to light to my satisfaction, then open up 1/2 to 2/3 of a stop to fatten the negative, as it were). In post, the director wanted to open up a face here and there and I saw the noise come up. We were able to tame it with some NR and detailed work within the window, but I can't say as the final result was really worth exposing down to begin with. Admittedly I work in a genre that much of the time requires seeing into faces and eyes more than the sexy dramatic stuff, so I'm used to having to play it a little safe, so that is what it is.
abreu-canedo
Well-known member
Wow! Spot on, by eye? Nice! That level of visual intelligence is a product of experience and skill. I aspire to that. I'm trying to learn to rely on my eye. And while I think I'm pretty good, I've never gotten it spot on first try.
The above statement you quoted by me is just me trying to entertain the problematizing of dark images. But I don't really think of it as a problem. I just think that there are tastes and there are levels of quality. There's work that's poorly captured and there is work that is not to someone's taste.
While most of the time I shoot brighter to back images away from the noise floor then bring them back down in post, there are many ways to approach it. Ultimately, to each their own.
I learned with light meter, but I use false color and WFM parade on Sony PVMA170. I also light to the show LUT, so I can predict the way contrast ratios and diffusion quantities will play in the final image. But like you, I'm still thinking in terms of stops...albeit not at your level of expertise, I'd venture to say.
Thanks for sharing your techniques, though! Helpful, for sure
hscully
Veteran
We shot one a couple of weeks ago. The scene is a bedroom at night with “no light.” I had a tungsten skirted top light, two bulbs on a half CTO daylight 4 bank as “moonlight.” Using that as back light I used I a single quasar tube in a kino enclosure with a grid sometimes as an eyelight/slight fill and one hot practical for “turning the light off” moment at the beginning. I shot RAW and just changed the exposure in post as a starting place.
I did a test, showed it to the client so they would realize that on the day, that all that light will be pulled down and with well exposed images and constant ratios, it looks great and, although the darkest shadows were >= 4 stops under key, whatever noise in those underexposed areas were crushed out. - I use a meter when setting up. I find it to be much faster as I don’t need the camera and monitor to know what’s happening.
There are some specular highlights that require some work but in all, I like to shoot well exposed and lower in post. Shooting at high ISOs, even when the camera can do so without really bad noise, doesn’t work for me. You still need light on your subject to pull them off those shadows.
Regarding movies like Arrival - they play better in theaters where the room is dark and the screen fills your peripheral vision. Watching it on a phone, or even at home, in a bright environment, it seems too dark. I think it’s meant to be seen in the dark. No?
I did a test, showed it to the client so they would realize that on the day, that all that light will be pulled down and with well exposed images and constant ratios, it looks great and, although the darkest shadows were >= 4 stops under key, whatever noise in those underexposed areas were crushed out. - I use a meter when setting up. I find it to be much faster as I don’t need the camera and monitor to know what’s happening.
There are some specular highlights that require some work but in all, I like to shoot well exposed and lower in post. Shooting at high ISOs, even when the camera can do so without really bad noise, doesn’t work for me. You still need light on your subject to pull them off those shadows.
Regarding movies like Arrival - they play better in theaters where the room is dark and the screen fills your peripheral vision. Watching it on a phone, or even at home, in a bright environment, it seems too dark. I think it’s meant to be seen in the dark. No?
Liam Hall
Veteran
I watched a really bad film on a plane last week that was lit intentionally dark. Awful film. Awful cinematography.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5516328/?ref_=nm_flmg_act_8
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5516328/?ref_=nm_flmg_act_8