Film Flashing for Digital?

[CalebStephens]

Hello all, I'm relatively new to the forums - long time creeper.

I have been researching film flashing techniques/devices (panavision panaflasher and Arri Varicon) for an upcoming project and I've been noticing something by messing around with my digital cameras.

It is not anything profound by any measure, but by letting light catch the lens just right (just before allowing it to flare) the shadows and low end of the image are naturally boosted about a half to a full stop, depending on the intensity and proximity to the lamp. The color temperature and mids and highs are unaffected to my eye. I spent about an hour and a half messing with this today.

Now I know it is impossible to "Flash" digital, but this is kind of looking like it is getting a similar result, granted it is not as controllable as a dedicated flasher.

So I am thinking that something could be pretty easily configured to control this and add an additional stop to the latitude when desired.

Has anyone else ever experimented with this? Am I out of the loop?

I am sure that this will vary depending on the glass, but I tested a couple L series, Zeiss ZFs and a slew of vintage Nikon, Canon, Minolta and Vivitar glass.

 

[Joe Calabrese]

i guess i haven't heard of it before because it would vary greatly depending on lenses, filters, etc. There's just too many variables for it to be as reliable as flashing film. But hey, if your onto something, I'd definitely be interested in reading about this.

 

[Ryan Patrick O'Hara]

It is not anything profound by any measure, but by letting light catch the lens just right (just before allowing it to flare) the shadows and low end of the image are naturally boosted about a half to a full stop, depending on the intensity and proximity to the lamp. The color temperature and mids and highs are unaffected to my eye. I spent about an hour and a half messing with this today.

Any time a bright incident or reflected light source strikes a lens there can be contrast reduction in the image from the light rays bouncing around the glass elements within the lens and infiltrating areas of the sensor where the light would not otherwise gone, raising the blacks. These scattered light rays equally hit the lighter areas of the image but because of how lighting works, the lighter areas are many many times brighter, so it doesn't really show.

Modern lenses have coatings which prevents this from happening, although it still does when exposed to a very high intensity. Older lenses may lack coatings and leave them very susceptible to the effect. Despite which lenses you choose, there are also filters which can be placed in front of the lens which are designed to accomplish this task. Reseach cinema soft-con, pro-mist, bpm, etc filters and filters like those.

Now I know it is impossible to "Flash" digital, but this is kind of looking like it is getting a similar result, granted it is not as controllable as a dedicated flasher.

Flashing is not the same physical process as 'spiking' a lens to reduce contrast... but the results are very similar. Check this out, it's a device that can send light into the lens for this reason or toward the subject to give either a lift in the shadows or a colored tint to the shadows.

Has anyone else ever experimented with this? Am I out of the loop?

I am sure that this will vary depending on the glass, but I tested a couple L series, Zeiss ZFs and a slew of vintage Nikon, Canon, Minolta and Vivitar glass.

I have experimented with this quite a bit. I usually use filtration in front of superior modern lenses to give various amounts of lift to the image when I want. However the idea of doing this with color, possibly increasing, decreasing, changing in color, and etc during the shot has enticed me to design my own rig with color changing LEDs around the mattebox. It's going well, and I plan on using it in an upcoming television pilot about paramedics. I want to slightly flash the image with red and blue LEDs on the mattebox to give it a very organic look and polluting the shadows with red and blue, while skin tones should remain normal so long as they are lit to a decent exposure.