Netflix Originals camera requirements

[Mitch Gross]

I hate store-bought gefilte fish, and the low sodium variety tastes like sawdust. I'm spoiled because my grandmother used to spend days making hers, but I'm pretty sure it was stuff with salt.

So much European Jewish food is salted and brined, in part because it's how the peasants preserved food for the winter. But with all that heavy, salty foods, it's no wonder Jews die from heart attacks. And then there's this old chestnut:

Do you know why Jewish men die before their wives? They want to.


Thankd man, I feel much better now.

 

[David_Manning]

Mitch (Gross), I'm not trying to argue semantics at all!... but isn't this Netflix's APPROVED list, not their pre-approved list? We all understand they can buy a good picture, no matter how it originated. But for a film to be produced by Netflix, this is the list. That is my understanding. I mean, if Spielberg showed up and said he wanted Netflix to finance a film and he was shooting on an iPhone, Netflix WOULD play ball. So...this is a Netflix guideline, not a mandated list, right?

I'm not trying to be argumentative. I think it's an interesting industry discussion.

For the plastics discussion--great reference to The Graduate by the way--yeah, plastic can be great. There is a lot of plastic in the jets I fly. But we all know my point...Holga doesn't make a good plastic lens (or camera, for that matter)...which is why it's so fun to experiment with!

 

[Mitch Gross]

Mitch (Gross), I'm not trying to argue semantics at all!... but isn't this Netflix's APPROVED list, not their pre-approved list? We all understand they can buy a good picture, no matter how it originated. But for a film to be produced by Netflix, this is the list. That is my understanding. I mean, if Spielberg showed up and said he wanted Netflix to finance a film and he was shooting on an iPhone, Netflix WOULD play ball. So...this is a Netflix guideline, not a mandated list, right?

I'm not trying to be argumentative. I think it's an interesting industry discussion.

For the plastics discussion--great reference to The Graduate by the way--yeah, plastic can be great. There is a lot of plastic in the jets I fly. But we all know my point...Holga doesn't make a good plastic lens (or camera, for that matter)...which is why it's so fun to experiment with!

It may state Approved but it functions as a Pre-Approved. For any job Netflix wants to know what gear you'll be using and your post workflow. If you stick with the equipment they've already said yes to and work with companies they already know, they'll pretty much say "OK, great" and be done with it. Anything else and they'll ak some questions to make sure all will be fine. Of course if someone is shooting a $50M production and chooses the URSA 4.6K or the FS7 then Netflix will look at them funny and want to know why the job wants to go that way instead of the F55 or VariCam, even though all of the cameras are on the list. But if there's a good reason then it can be allowed -- they're just looking out for their investment.

Likewise there are some non-approved cameras that can be used. For a production that is still to be released (I think it'scoming in the Fall), a production wanted to use a tiny camera that output 4K RAW. Nothing recorded the signal yet, but Convergent Design was working on the support on the Odyssey7Q+. I was on the phone with Netflix once a week until we had a stable beta, and Netflix tested the workflow and recorded files the next day. The production had to push all the shots it wanted to do on this camera until the end of the shoot schedule but Netflix bent over backwards to make sure the director got what she wanted and the DP got what he wanted. I don't think that setup appears on the "approved" list because it is so technically challenging and particular that Netflix doesn't want to promote it as a straightforward solution -- it's actually quite complicated. But the Network will accept material shot on this system, but you REALLY Have to talk to them first and be instructed in just what is needed for a successful shoot with the setup.

The point is that this doesn't exist in a vacuum. You talk with the technical workflow people at Netflix and they make sure everything will work out.

 

[David_Manning]

Thanks for your insight, Mitch.

 

[GaryinCalifornia]

lol...

If you're going to get 50m to do a movie... you're going to be smart enough to go with a higher end camera because you'll probably have to have approval of your dp as well or to be honest you're going to have a track record they've already approved of as well...

I can't even tell you our budget on the last film I worked on as a producer and I can tell you it was lot less than that... a lot less and we used 2 Alexa's...

Again not afraid of change. Joking with a friend about this on Sunday. I've shot or rented Arri (4 models) 35mm & S16, to Cine Alta to Red to Alexa, with Si2k's & JVC HD100 (both in jet fighters), EX1, Varicam & even my DVX for footage shot in Cancun and then convert to Sony HD for feature work. And probably at least 10 more for non feature work...

 

[puredrifting]

I am willing to bet that 99% of the people posting in this thread (myself included) will never be commissioned by Netflix so this seems much ado about nothing.

 

[GaryinCalifornia]

I am willing to bet that 99% of the people posting in this thread (myself included) will never be commissioned by Netflix so this seems much ado about nothing.

I haven't given up hope yet. I have at least 5 films aired on Netflix. Just have to find an agent to get me in the door and truthfully I think it'd be easier to just go out and make a movie that will show your skills.

Personally Netflix is good for the consumer. But bad for the filmmaker.

The link doesn't seem to want to work, when looking up on google. So just did a quick cut and paste jump.

www.forbes.com/sites/.../08/.../netflix-will-rip-the-heart-out-of-pre-sale-film-financin...
Aug 9, 2014 - Netflix Will Rip the Heart Out of Pre-Sale Film Financing ... This trend will have a huge effect on how independent films are financed. ... reach will rip the heart out of these sales, because it will destroy the value of DVD and pay ...

lol maybe I should delete my imdv link below. So just in case someone there is reading...

 

[Eric Coughlin]

I am willing to bet that 99% of the people posting in this thread (myself included) will never be commissioned by Netflix so this seems much ado about nothing.

I got offered a shoot for a Netflix show, but I was already booked so I referred it to my co-worker who used his A7S II in 4K for gimbal shots as a B-cam to their F55.

 

[High1ander]

Some people seem to miss that one reason Netflix might want to have "pure/only" 4K is that when they "sell/advertise" to consumers they can say "All our shows in splendid 4K" without resorting to saying "All our show in splendid *4K" - *4K being the master but the recorded image was a non-4k... This is a minor thing, but it still allows them to boast about it since others don't demand "true 4K". Because sadly we all know that consumers will buy the product based on how many K's there are, they don't know/care if it is shot on Alexa, Red or FS7, they just want that 4K because it is supposedly better (same thing with photo cameras back when megapixels was the end all be all measurement for the public).

 

[David W. Jones]

Some people seem to miss that one reason Netflix might want to have "pure/only" 4K is that when they "sell/advertise" to consumers they can say "All our shows in splendid 4K" .

People watching movies don't care which camera was used to shoot it. They could care less if it was acquired with an 8K sensor, 4K, 2K, or whatever. The only people who care about crap like this are on this forum.

And I still don't get why folks are upset about camera X being acceptable to Netflix while camera Y is not, when I can have almost any camera ever manufactured shipped to my location.

Sorry for the interruption, now I'll get back to the carpentry forums where folks are arguing over the use of wooden handle hammers.

Dave

 

[GaryinCalifornia]

Sorry for the interruption, now I'll get back to the carpentry forums where folks are arguing over the use of wooden handle hammers.

Dave

Well having to build a wheelchair ramp for my mom and adding to the deck. I found that my dad's old wooden handle hammer seemed not slip out of my hand when it was sweaty rather than the newer one with the rubber handle. lol its probably 30 years old too.

Oh I do have a modern nail gun. But, it needs to be replaced. An ex-friend borrowed it without permission and returned it all rusty and of course not working.

 

[High1ander]

People watching movies don't care which camera was used to shoot it. They could care less if it was acquired with an 8K sensor, 4K, 2K, or whatever. The only people who care about crap like this are on this forum.

And I still don't get why folks are upset about camera X being acceptable to Netflix while camera Y is not, when I can have almost any camera ever manufactured shipped to my location.

Sorry for the interruption, now I'll get back to the carpentry forums where folks are arguing over the use of wooden handle hammers.

Dave

I just said people don't care about "cameras", I said all they care about when buying a TV or deciding if a service provider is better than the next is the "magic number" which now happens to be 4K (because that is the most "tangible" thing you can show now that Average Schmo can understand, 5-7 years ago it was 3D). There is a reason why people are buying crappy 4K TVs instead of good Full HD, and that is because people can't wrap their heads around other measurements. They think a 600Hz TV is better than a 200Hz by default, they don't ask or look for Delta E measurements, clouding, etc... The same goes for a service provider for ISP or TV, speed and resolution matter more than reliability and quality because the latter is harder to quantify in a meaningful way...

So again, "normal" people don't care about the cameras used, but they care about the product they buy, because why buy a 4K set and not watch 4K content? I mean, all things equal, one service provider (Netflix) promises that all their own content is 4K and the other service providers (HBO, Hulu, Amazon...) will not guarantee it, why would you then choose the latter if all other things are equal?

In the US (at least when I lived there back when Netflix was only DVDs) Netflix had a really big library and now seems like the best option all things equal. But in Sweden the Netflix library is not as big, it is only 38% of the US library and that means they have stiffer competition against others, like HBO, Viasat, Cmore... So when you can't play they "I have the biggest library"-card you gotta compete with other stuff, like now offline-mode, better quality, lower price...

Although, all that is a smaller part of the benefit of having true 4K, the biggest reason I guess is just that it is good for future-proofing and showing you are committing long term for this and that you minimize the "slippery slope" of someone saying "but the Alexa makes better pictures than camera **** even though it is only 3,4K". Just like good 16mm is better looking than many 4Ks (in terms of color/latitude)...

 

[Eric Coughlin]

One thing confuses me about 4K "future-proofing" compared to Arri's 3.2K. Let's imagine you're comparing Arri Alexa 3.2K to say an A7s II 4K, Red 4K, etc., and let's also imagine that the Arri 3.2k is actually sharper with more detailed than theses other cameras (which I've often heard is the case), such that when upscaled to 4K, it still looks sharper than these other cameras shooting a native 4k resolution (which they then use various compression, interpolating, (poorly) down-sampling the sensor (and various other technical terms I may not know the full meaning of) to essentially get a less sharp image than the Arri gets).

So, in say fifty years from now when the screens are all 16K resolution, and people are watching say 3.2k Alexa footage on that 16k screen, and 4k Red footage on that 16k screen, and the Alexa footage is still sharper and more detailed on that 16k screen, then how exactly is that Red 4k footage considered more future proof if it looks less detailed and less sharp on the 16k screen?

It seems to me that actual resolution and detail is more important than sensor resolution specs for future proofing. A 5D Mark III for example is said to be a 1080p camera but is really more a 720p camera in actual resolution.

 

[Nirv]

One thing confuses me about 4K "future-proofing" compared to Arri's 3.2K. Let's imagine you're comparing Arri Alexa 3.2K to say an A7s II 4K, Red 4K, etc., and let's also imagine that the Arri 3.2k is actually sharper with more detailed than theses other cameras (which I've often heard is the case), such that when upscaled to 4K, it still looks sharper than these other cameras shooting a native 4k resolution (which they then use various compression, interpolating, (poorly) down-sampling the sensor (and various other technical terms I may not know the full meaning of) to essentially get a less sharp image than the Arri gets).

Interesting take, I don't agree at all in fact I'd say the opposite but it's an interesting start to a conversation.

A feature of these forums is the mythologising of Arri and the apparent 'mindshare' it has here. In my time reading these forums I've seen many 'Sony Look' and 'Arri Look' threads and the one thing they have in common is that those who claim to see the Sony and Arri look in everything cannot, no matter how hard they are pressed, can adequately describe these so called 'looks'. It seems to me these 'looks' are mostly created in the mind.

Ive watched countless of the popular Netflix all shot on Varicam (13 Reasons), RED (HoC) and F55 (The Crown) and there is absolutely nothing between them, the images all look fantastic and a testament to the quality of the bloke pointing the camera.

I'd love to know why the Arri look is still preferable to some here, if you're in that camp what makes the Arri image better than the 3 examples above. What have the Arri engineers achieved and how have they achieved it or what have the other 3 manufacturers not done?

 

[puredrifting]

Interesting take, I don't agree at all in fact I'd say the opposite but it's an interesting start to a conversation.

A feature of these forums is the mythologising of Arri and the apparent 'mindshare' it has here. In my time reading these forums I've seen many 'Sony Look' and 'Arri Look' threads and the one thing they have in common is that those who claim to see the Sony and Arri look in everything cannot, no matter how hard they are pressed, can adequately describe these so called 'looks'. It seems to me these 'looks' are mostly created in the mind.

Ive watched countless of the popular Netflix all shot on Varicam (13 Reasons), RED (HoC) and F55 (The Crown) and there is absolutely nothing between them, the images all look fantastic and a testament to the quality of the bloke pointing the camera.

I'd love to know why the Arri look is still preferable to some here, if you're in that camp what makes the Arri image better than the 3 examples above. What have the Arri engineers achieved and how have they achieved it or what have the other 3 manufacturers not done?

Actually, the Arri look, for me, is easily definable. I work on three different TV shows, all shot on the Alexa and Alexa Mini. It's really pretty simple. When I sit in video village, looking at the monitors, what I am seeing on the monitors, particularly on Homeland, looks indistinguisahble from 35mm film that I used to look at in transfer bays all across LA. I've interviewed the show's DP, David Klein ASC, quite a few times, hung out with him on set and have watched him work for hundreds of hours and we've talked about this. I've hung out with all of the show's operators and ACs and they talk about this. I grew up in the business shooting 35mm on the Arri BL4, 435, 535, Panavision Golds, as well as mamy cheaper Russian 35mm cameras. That is thing that I miss about film. Really all that mattered was the lens, the stock and the lighting and it looked the same, regardless of which camera you used. The Arri Alexa and even the Mini have a specific way that they react to filtration, highlights, skin tone that resembles film more than any of the other cameras you described. It's the way highlights rolloff, knee, gamma and how flattering it makes people look.

REDs, Varicams and F55s can all look excellent, I completely agree, but for me, there is always something a tiny bit off. I've shot with the F55 a bit and while it looks good, a lot must be done in post to make it look good and it has a certain look that seems highly dependent on how it is treated in post. I am in love with the look of the Varicam for the same reason as you, (13 Reasons looked amazing except for some of the blues and purple LED light flares at the high school dance did some very weird, glowing, sparkling thing that didn't look film-like at all, that was really my only issue with the Varicam), but the skin tones and overall look and feel were beautiful, RED looks amazing as well, but I never look at a RED project I have shot or others have shot and think that it closely resembles film, it has it's own super clean, analytical look. Not saying the Arris look "better", I am saying that the Arris resemble film more to me. If I were younger and had never shot film, I would probably prefer the look of the RED or Varicam more. I'm not enough of a video engineer to explain it in technical terms, but I bet someone like Adam Wilt could actually break it down into logicial, technical terminology that might make more sense to you than my ramblings about film look ;-)

 

[Gweilo66]

That highlight roll-off issue seems to be a factor between the Canon DSLRs and the C line. I think the distinction between that and raw dynamic range tends to get err..overlooked.

 

[GaryinCalifornia]

lol I think its the same with me. Just watching the DIT transferring the footage on our Alexa shoot. It looked like film to me.

All these cameras will work and its been said many times its the people behind the equipment that really counts.

But if money was no problem. I'd probably go for an Alexa or a mini.

 

[Nirv]

Actually, the Arri look, for me, is easily definable. I work on three different TV shows, all shot on the Alexa and Alexa Mini. It's really pretty simple. When I sit in video village, looking at the monitors, what I am seeing on the monitors, particularly on Homeland, looks indistinguisahble from 35mm film that I used to look at in transfer bays all across LA. I've interviewed the show's DP, David Klein ASC, quite a few times, hung out with him on set and have watched him work for hundreds of hours and we've talked about this. I've hung out with all of the show's operators and ACs and they talk about this. I grew up in the business shooting 35mm on the Arri BL4, 435, 535, Panavision Golds, as well as mamy cheaper Russian 35mm cameras. That is thing that I miss about film. Really all that mattered was the lens, the stock and the lighting and it looked the same, regardless of which camera you used. The Arri Alexa and even the Mini have a specific way that they react to filtration, highlights, skin tone that resembles film more than any of the other cameras you described. It's the way highlights rolloff, knee, gamma and how flattering it makes people look.

REDs, Varicams and F55s can all look excellent, I completely agree, but for me, there is always something a tiny bit off. I've shot with the F55 a bit and while it looks good, a lot must be done in post to make it look good and it has a certain look that seems highly dependent on how it is treated in post. I am in love with the look of the Varicam for the same reason as you, (13 Reasons looked amazing except for some of the blues and purple LED light flares at the high school dance did some very weird, glowing, sparkling thing that didn't look film-like at all, that was really my only issue with the Varicam), but the skin tones and overall look and feel were beautiful, RED looks amazing as well, but I never look at a RED project I have shot or others have shot and think that it closely resembles film, it has it's own super clean, analytical look. Not saying the Arris look "better", I am saying that the Arris resemble film more to me. If I were younger and had never shot film, I would probably prefer the look of the RED or Varicam more. I'm not enough of a video engineer to explain it in technical terms, but I bet someone like Adam Wilt could actually break it down into logicial, technical terminology that might make more sense to you than my ramblings about film look ;-)

Thanks for having a try but it's the technical terms that are important to defining the look. I've read that Arri's philosophy was to create a digital film camera and they certainly appear to have achieved that I know most other camera manufacturers have their own philosophies which results in different looks, i.e. RED has always pushed the resolution envelope in search of a new digital medium for film.

Now, imagine if I were a plugin developer for Davinci Resolve and I wanted to create an Arri Look plugin so if I were to drop the plugin on footage from any of the other cameras so that the footage looks visually indistinguishable from actual Arri footage to avoid the 'there is always something a tiny bit off' feeling? What would the image operations applied to the other footage to create the Arri Look? Another way, what is the secret sauce of the Arri image processing.

Here's my stab.

1. Resolution. I think this is pretty fundamental to the look.

2. Arri also seem to take a lot of care about the filtration of frequencies within the image. I think they roll off the high and low frequencies leaving a pass band that seems to 'pop' more than other camera footage. I'd say the hallmark of the arri look is the 3D pop of images.

3. Colour. I think this is an area where there's the least difference, most modern cameras do an excellent job of capturing wide gamut colour information and given a decent codec most looks can be recreated in post.

4. Dynamic Range. I know Arri claim 14 stops but I really think that is a conservative figure. My FS7 had 14 stops of DR and I always looked at Arri images thinking there more in the blacks and more in the top to play with. Arri's black were clean of noise while the FS7's could be quite noisy.

If there is anyone out there who does understand the types of secret sauce that goes on in the camera and can explain the technicalities of camera looks I'd be very interested to read what you have to say. Is No.2 above plausible?

cheers.

 

[DLD]

Alexa has a dual sensor readout, which -

a) gives it a higher dynamic range

b) allows it to roll off the highlights much smoother without the abrupt clipping.

It also has built in low pass filters and (probably) a multiple pass debayering process.

And, as been said, it was made to resemble film.

 

[David W. Jones]

And you can pickup a used Alexa Classic EV with high speed license for right at $10K right now.

Just something to think about for those Jonesing for an Alexa.