Gotta ask this stupid fliter question

TC

TC

Resident Agitator
I hate to ask this, I was hoping some trainee would ask, and save me the embaressment. I've never had any experience with filters, and I'm having a problem understanding their uses. I understand the grad. ND, or like a polarizer. But why the colors? Can't you just do that in post? It seems a bit silly to me not to have a clean version of the footage, and fool around with tints and such in post.
 
Re: Gotta ask this stupid fliter question

Sometimes it's simpler to get the effect you want in-camera. Maybe someone else will be doing the editing, or maybe the effect is difficult to achieve in post. Also, because of the highly compressed nature of DV, it can be cleaner to do less manipulation in post. As always, it helps to run some tests. if you're happy with the results of color grading in post, you can do without the filter. With the DVX, you have a lot of choices for grading the color--filters, menu settings (chroma phase, chroma level and color temp), creative white balancing, and post-production.
 
Re: Gotta ask this stupid fliter question

I suppose it depends on your school of thought (old school vs. new school?). Yes, you can control the image to a greater degree with software, but that *can* take a lot of time and money. Any effects you add optically at the shoot through the use of filtration on the lens will mean that much less time spent in post creating those effects. However, you are somewhat married to the filtration you use and its effects might not be desirable in the end result.

I saw some of Top Gun over the weekend on (I think) TBS. Anyhow, the DP used very warm-colored grads on many of the exterior scenes between Tom Cruise and Kelly McGillis... you know, the scenes where they play "Take My Breath Away" as Tom 'Cruises' on his bike?

I guess it comes down to several factors:
Are you going to be the DP?
Do you have the necessary filters (and mattebox) necessary to create the effects you desire?
Can you afford them prior to needing them?
Do you know someone who has the necessary filters and mattebox? Will they charge you? Can you afford it?

Are you doing the editing?
Do you have the necessary software to create the effects you desire?
Can you afford that software prior to needing it?
Do you know someone who has the software? Will they charge you? Can you afford it?

Personally, I think it's much more expensive to invest in the mattebox and filters necessary to create color effects. In most cases, you'll be happy with the color-correction features of the more popular NLE software.
 
Re: Gotta ask this stupid fliter question

One other reason to use optical filters over digital manipulation is that there actaully is a difference in the final product. Optical filters allow different amounts of light into the camera thus creating a different overall effect than can be reached with post manipultion. The difference may be subtle, however there is a difference and many DP's will have it no other way.
 
Re: Gotta ask this stupid fliter question

I shoot documentary programing for Broadcast, on BetaSP. excuse me when I am not sure about the english technical terms, I work in Germany and forget how I called things in English.

When shooting outside, I almost always insist on my Matte Box with a French Flag. Mostly, for the ability to control my Backlight on the lens. I keep four Gradient filters in my vest, two gray, one blue, and one sunset. One UV and a Polarizing screw on filter. I always stick my gray verlauf filter in when the sun is peaking into or full in the shot. I like that my box holds two filter brakets at one time and I can slide another gray in when the contrast ratio is real high. The last time I used that well, is when I shot a scene in Berlin in which we wanted a shot in front of a Publisher building (Axel Springer Verlag). Which sat directly on the Berlin Wall. In the shot we have several employees (the hottest ones we found) from the paper walking along the sidewalk in front of the Springer building where the Berlin Wall once stood. The sun was just peaking directly over the roof of the bilding in the background. We want to shoot it now. With the two gray verlauf filters in and the box turned about 10 degrees couterclockwise to match the line of the roof, I could open the Blender up enough to properly expose the building and talent, (who were catching beutifull reflections from the sun hitting the neighbor buildings white stone and glass fassada.) Killer shot, looked SUPER. The camera is sitting on two sandbags beside the line of bricks, the Axel Springer building filling the frame, the roof cutting a line through the shot from 2 o'clock til 8. The sun peeking over the roof in the last seconds before in dissapears behind the fassade, lens flair circles running South East. The babes with their short black buisness skirts and handbags walking through the picture lit up with reflections from the neighbor building, as if we sat down and planned it that way.

Phisically Impossible without the filters, only other option, to shoot it when the sun was in the "right" place, was not within the patience of the production schedule, and would not have looked near so good, AT ALL. Ordering the generator truck, a few HMI Banks to light up the building and talent. Not in the possibilities, because the shot is not THAT important. Without my filter box I would have had to compromise what my director wants. and that would have pissed him off. leaving the sky and the building out of the shot were not in his options. If I did not have the Matte Box and the right filters to deliver the picture he wanted, I am sure it would have been my last shoot for him. Post production can't help you there.

When shooting Panoramic views, Post card city shots and Mountain Vistas. I like to try out my colored Gradiant filters. But I always shoot it first, pure. Mabee they can do it better in Post, or don't want it at all. But!. Don't leave it up to them to do it!. They won't!. Post is Lazy, or they are simply in a hurry, and it looks already good enough for them. Always.

Only you as a cameraman see the shot and say. that looks good, but with the Blue Gradiant Filter, there is a difference, then It looks Really sweet. They will never think that in post. And, at the end of the film it has YOUR name next to camera. And when that shot looks super with that filter, let it be what YOU did, other camera men know, you know it, when you see that shot if it is optik or rendered. If they had to do it in post, then the cameraman droped the ball.

Robbie_J
Potsdam Germany
 
Re: Gotta ask this stupid fliter question

That sounds like an awesome shot. Any chance we can see a grab?
 
Re: Gotta ask this stupid fliter question

I have personally fallen in love with the ND Grad filter and now cant understand why anyone would not make a Mattebox a top priority (other than budget).

Usually the camera tells us when to apply a Grad but with the Filter the camera does not do this as much because Im already filtering the sky out while keeping the landscape (below the horizon) optimally exposed.

The Polorizer is amazing in taking the glare off not just glass and water but anything that reflects; leaves, grass, asphalt.
 
Re: Gotta ask this stupid fliter question

So it wasnt that stupid . . . I have learnt alot on this one :o
 
Re: Gotta ask this stupid fliter question

YAY! I made a good thread! Now I have to same up for the Chrosziel...

Wait a minute! That's not good! Damn you all!
 
Re: Gotta ask this stupid fliter question

i for one would like to see a dvd that not only showed the filters "look" but more of a tutorial on how to use them better!

matthew
 
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