Netflix Originals camera requirements

Barry_Green said:
If you really want to make a difference by voicing your opinion, the only people on earth who can make that difference are the Netflix technical review staff. That's why I asked why it was so important to you that this argument has raged on for as long as it has -- if you want to change it, you have to take it up with the few people who are on that technical review board. Complaining here will result in absolutely nothing changing.
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I will not address the rest of your post. I think combatentropy did a good job there already.

I just wanted to state the obvious. That the argument has only raged on for as long as it has because others are also arguing. I'm not in here alone.
 
Sttratos said:
I will not address the rest of your post. I think combatentropy did a good job there already.

I just wanted to state the obvious. That the argument has only raged on for as long as it has because others are also arguing. I'm not in here alone.
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To what end? You may as well argue that the human being is a bad design, because the nose is upside down over the mouth... I'm sure a lot of people would agree, but there isn't a damn thing you can do about it so what's the point? Feelings? I guess. Like I said, I don't do feelings, so if that's what this comes down to, I'll stay out of it unless specifically invoked.
 
I really don't understand why people are getting so riled up about this stuff. I just finished watching Master of None season 2 (shot on the Varicam) and it was exquisitely beautiful. You certainly couldn't fault the visuals, and 'New York at night' stuff was incredible.

Another recent show I finished was The Queen, shot on Sony F55s. And that would now have to be in my top five list of the best looking series ever photographed.

And Sony/Canon/Panasonic 4k is all of a whopping 23% higher than 3.2k from the Alexa - so nobody is suffering from painfully sharp images (relatively) from any of these cameras (compared to the Arri at least). And conversely, no one is lacking for detail from the Alexa.

I would have, straight up, zero hesitation to use any of these current cameras on any show I had to shoot (even if their usage was dictated to me). They're all good enough that lensing, grip and lighting packages would be a bigger concern to my mind.

What we have here, is an embarrassment of riches. So how about we be thankful, rather than bitter.
 
Sttratos said:
What does that prove? Or do you really think a DP would come forward and say he wishes he had used another camera?
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...They are stating why they chose to shoot with the Varicam 35 over the usual competitors, this included ARRI cameras. In both cases each DP chose the Varicam 35 because of the image it produces.

Sttratos said:
I read a very telling article on American Cinematographer the other day. They were covering a TV show which shot on Sony cameras and went on to explain that because the show was made by Sony it meant using Sony cameras.
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Panasonic has nothing to do with either of these popular shows, so these DPs were free to pick ANY CAMERA and in the end they chose the Varicam 35 over shooting with ARRI, RED, and Sony cameras. To me this says that they really liked the image the Varicam 35 produces.
 
Sttratos said:
I didn't compare the Alexa. I know it is a 3.2k Bayer. But it has nothing to do with it. I was merely saying they specifically asked for true 4K nut accept cameras which are not true 4K. Dismiss it as semantics if you wish...
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Except, it's not semantics. It's a company that is set up to deliver 4K to people who have gone out and purchased 4K sets. Maybe the DCI should have gone for 5K or 6K but they didn't and 4K became the standard and it makes more than enough sense for a streaming leader to go with it.
 
My current series has a 4K mandate, and the pilot was shot on RED. I asked our post producer if Alexas would be acceptable and they were. Ultimately I decided to go with Varicam LT's and I haven't regretted that decision. We are largely handheld so the operators appreciate the light package, and the lower cost compared to Alexa Minis gave me more room in the camera package for other things. And the high ISO capability has once again proven its worth when we overcrank or drop to a 45 degree shutter and I don't have to light to a higher stop. Who knows what I'll use on my next show; depends on what I need to to do and what the demands are.

What I can tell you is that I am very rarely told by producers what camera to use. I'm often asked my preference in interviews and to be very honest, the main reason for this seems to be that they've had issues with RED in the past, primarily on the post side. So they are always happy to hear Alexa, and while Varicam is still a little exotic for some, I'm quickly able to prove its worth when I explain the specific advantages of that product line.

After hearing anecdotes for years on message boards about lower budget productions, corporate jobs etc., I think it's safe to say that there is much more "meddling" going on from clients at that level who want to prove their knowledge base by badgering the DP on their choices of equipment. I rarely have to defend my gear selection after those preliminary discussions about the camera. Some directors want to know the lens package but that's more about making sure we are covered for the ranges of focal lengths they like to use than the actual brand, although with younger directors I'm seeing them more engaged in that discussion, since optics are the "new black".
 
I tried to show that Sttratos' concerns are unwarranted by taking us back to the Zacuto shootout. People actually thought that the shootout would lead to everyone dropping Arri's and Reds and demanding GH2s. One person actually blogged to that effect.

Let's address Sttratos concerns directly rather than talk about cameras, as that will get us nowhere. If I have it right, Sttratos has a similar concern as those during the Zacuto shootout; that Netflix's requirements and camera list will spread. S/He has a secondary concern about the specifications themselves as being inconsistent, but let's ignore that because s/he said that Netflix itself is of no concern, only the spread of the requirements.

But before we can discuss this concern, we need to understand a few things. To Sttratos:

1. What makes you think the requirements will spread? Is this the same unwarranted fear as the Zacuto shootout or is there some merit to it?
2. If they spread, how does that affect you?
3. To what entities do these requirements need to spread such that it will affect you?


Once we understand these points, we can aid Sttratos with the concerns.
 
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david w. Jones said:
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
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balsa wood
 
Lustgarten said:
I was just thinking how funny it would be if the sound section had a similar thread.
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Well, yeah, wouldn't there be a similar uproar if Warner Brothers Music required that record producers start with 24-bit 96 kHz?

I'm sure there is a lot of nice gear to that spec, just like with 4K. But there also is a lot of nice gear that isn't.

It's one thing to recommend it. It's another to require it as a baseline.
 
Sttratos said:
What does that prove? Or do you really think a DP would come forward and say he wishes he had used another camera? It would be the same as saying he thinks the show doesn't look as nice as it could. It's a PR disaster.

I read a very telling article on American Cinematographer the other day. They were covering a TV show which shot on Sony cameras and went on to explain that because the show was made by Sony it meant using Sony cameras. The DP said he had never used the cameras but when he tested the cameras he was not unhappy with them. These were his words. Notice he didn't say he loved it or anything. He basically said he didn't hate it. I was actually surprised he didn't use a more PC comment, like at least saying he quite liked it. It wouldn't be the same as saying he loved it but at least not so obvious. I guess he is a big enough name or just don't care.

Now, I'm not saying the DPs above didn't truly love the Varicam. I'm just saying that these type of quotes prove nothing. Because they would never say they would prefer to work with another camera even if they did. So pointing to this quotes is pointless. It will always be praise. They want to be hired again. Which is what makes the comment from the DP in the AC article even more telling.

Besides I'm pretty sure some people would indeed prefer some other camera over the Alexa. It's perfectly possible. Why not? I'm not saying it isn't. Preference is a personal thing. It would just not be the majority as the current numbers tell us.
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I have worked in this industry long enough to know that for these people their integrity is everything. They are not forced to do these articles and in fact some choose not to. The reasons they choose not to are various, including not wanting to appear to be favoring any one tool or simply being shy or uncomfortable in presenting themselves out there in such a way. But what is absolutely certain to me is that no DP would speak fondly of any camera or other product unless they truly believed it. If they say they like Alexa or VariCam or chocolate soda, it's because they really do.
 
Sttratos said:
I'm sorry Mitch. But I had the impression you worked as a DP before? If so, how can you say that? The way you expose does not control the way your camera rolls the highlights. You can protect for the highlights, sure. But that doesn't make the camera roll the highlights nicely or more nicely. It only avoids that the camera has to touch the highlights at all. This is not the same as rolling the highlights nicely. This does not give you the same nice look of rolling the highlights nicely. This does not make it as easy to work with the camera as a camera which rolls the highlights nicely. If I'm missing something, please do tell.

As for not being able to light my way to higher resolution, I personally prefer a nice image than a sharp harsh one.
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Yes I have worked as a DP. two dozen features, teo TV series and 100s of other projects large and small. And when I started it was in black & white reversal, where one only had a couple of stops to work with before the image went totally white or totally black. So you learned to light to that, plain and simple. And then if you wanted to roll of highlights or anything else, you worked with power windows and other tools in post to control and shape the image that you didn't have the ability to during production. It's far easier today and there's way more room to work in pretty much all aspects of the image.

I must have shot with 50 different camera models in my career, a dozen different film stocks and then various combinations of push or pull exposure and processing. Lots of shifting parameters to the image capture. The first thing I would do on any job is test the camera and/or stock & processing. I would learn how much I could get away with dynamic range, contrast, color channel saturation, noise, on and on. And then I would work and light creatively based on these factors. When DPs revert back to using the same camera again and again, it's usually because they are comfortable with the parameters and they feel they know what they can get away with on the machine without having to test it. I know people who didn't switch setups for a decade at a time because they just didn't want to. It didn't matter if something might be better for what they were trying to do, they didn't feel like learning something different. I never had that feeling -- I liked to challenge myself on every job if I could.

So anyway, that's how I can say what I say.
 
Mitch Gross said:
I have worked in this industry long enough to know that for these people their integrity is everything. They are not forced to do these articles and in fact some choose not to. The reasons they choose not to are various, including not wanting to appear to be favoring any one tool or simply being shy or uncomfortable in presenting themselves out there in such a way. But what is absolutely certain to me is that no DP would speak fondly of any camera or other product unless they truly believed it. If they say they like Alexa or VariCam or chocolate soda, it's because they really do.
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Thanks for those edifying comments!
 
combatentropy said:
Well, yeah, wouldn't there be a similar uproar if Warner Brothers Music required that record producers start with 24-bit 96 kHz?

I'm sure there is a lot of nice gear to that spec, just like with 4K. But there also is a lot of nice gear that isn't.

It's one thing to recommend it. It's another to require it as a baseline.
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Actually, back in the day - we all remember "back in the day", don't we? - when CD's were becoming popular, a common certification was one of AAD, ADD and DDD. (no, DLD was not a sign of excellence, then or now). First letter stood for recording, second for mixing and third for mastering. A lot of AAD's from the late-60's-early-70's did not sound up to the CD quality because there was a lot of tape hiss from the analog mixing/track bouncing. ADD sounded fine and DDD was the sign of a recent/new recording made onto a digital recorder. Those often sounded like crap also but, at least, they were tape hiss free. Soon after that, the recording engineers figured out the shortcomings of the early digital recorders and the sound quality took another jump up.

PS. There are audio streaming services like Tidal and Deezer that promise to deliver "CD quality" sound. For a small fee. Which is, oddly enough, higher than Netflix.
 
On the one hand I understand the uproar...but on the other hand, how many of you are actually submitting any work to Netflix or even likely to be submitting any work to Netflix in the near future ( if ever )?

I would imagine that the percentage of content appearing on Netflix that was shot on a camera owned by the Producer or the DP is not a substantial percentage. Most of the series on Netflix were shot on a rented camera and of a budget where the DP could use just about any camera he or she wanted.

Seems like a lot of furor over something that doesn't effect most here in any manner.
 
Sttratos said:
Of course many of them would still be shooting film with 11 minute run times, grain and a comparatively low light sensitivity, but way better color and color separation, unmatched skin tones and overall aesthetics. Are we going to make this a film vs digital thread now too?

Of course people will use what they know, if that works well. For you to sway them away you have to come out with something that works better. Much better. Otherwise why would people trade? The fact people haven't moved away from the Alexa and there are high budget movies using it right now as we speak just means nothing has beaten the Alexa yet. There are cameras that see more in the dark, there are cameras with more resolution. But none has beaten the whole package yet. If the Alexa had been fully beaten you can be sure they wold trade. But when you look at the new stuff and goes, meh, where is the reason to dump what you already trust?

I doubt very much any of the DPs shooting Alexa in high budget Hollywood movies are also renting their cameras to the production. And to me the high budget Hollywood movies are the benchmark. Because they can use anything on earth. Even 65mm film as Tarantino and Nolan are now using.
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You are making some assumptins that are simply not true, and frankly they are at counterpoint to one another. If people could shoot on anything and people would still want to be shooting on film, then why is film production still in freefall decline?

The reason is economics, which is what runs so much of this. Alexa is "good enough" for motion picture production (with the exception of a relatively few holdouts) and it is far more economical than film, therefore Alexa wins out because this is a business. Other cameras don't have to look particularly better, because it is going to take a long time for that to make a difference. The other cameras have to offer something that is better as part of a business model. These cameras are not different enough in price to Alexa to make a difference, but if 4K theater projection becomes more widespread then the demand for 4K originated content will continue to rise. If one does the math for the lighting & grip for a large night sequence is factored (including the gear, the size of crew, the number of rucks, the generator needs, the production schedule time, on and on), then the economic advantage of a VariCam at 5000 ISO is quite clear over an Alexa at 800 ISO. And as producers and DPs are becoming more and more aware of these differences they are in fact beginning to make different choices, just as DPs did when high speed film stocks (500 ISO!!) arrived in the early 80s.

Measuring the state of the industry based on Hollywood feature films is myopic at best. It's a very small part of the production landscape and in many ways a diminishing one. And because there is so much money at stake it is generally one of the most conservative from a technical standpoint. Changes in this market segment are made kicking and screaming because no one wants to take the risk at making a change, just like they like to make sequels because they are proven.

And lastly, you would be surprised by how many DPs own some if not the majority of their own gear. Many have this hidden by subrenting it through rental houses with which they have longterm relationships. Occasionally there are guys like the late Michael Ballhaus, who was basically one of the first in line for every new camera or other item out of Munich from ARRI and would rent this gear to his shoots. But there wasn't anything wrong with any of this and in fact Ballhaus had a company that would rent out his gear if he wasn't using it.
 
Sttratos said:
Again, can we stop comparing SD to HD as being the same as comparing HD to 4K? There are several articles, papers and tests which show the difference between SD and HD is way larger than the difference between HD and 4K. One can only tell the difference from HD to 4K if he pixel peeps. This is an old subject. I understand you have a 4K camera to sell now. But honestly, why insist in such an out of place comparison? Let's wait and see if shows shot on HD will start being rejected in the near future, instead of trying to predict the future based on apples to orange comparisons.
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Wow, maybe you should go back and read what I wrote and what you quoted. Just because you do not feel that it is much of a difference doesn't mean that the future will agree with you. There are plenty of examples of the same thing being said in previous technological steps. And as I wrote, even if you do not feel the difference is not that grat, someone has to draw a line in the sand and this is where Netflix chose to do it.

Why are we just talking in circles here?
 
CharlesPapert said:
My current series has a 4K mandate, and the pilot was shot on RED. I asked our post producer if Alexas would be acceptable and they were. Ultimately I decided to go with Varicam LT's and I haven't regretted that decision. We are largely handheld so the operators appreciate the light package, and the lower cost compared to Alexa Minis gave me more room in the camera package for other things. And the high ISO capability has once again proven its worth when we overcrank or drop to a 45 degree shutter and I don't have to light to a higher stop. Who knows what I'll use on my next show; depends on what I need to to do and what the demands are.

What I can tell you is that I am very rarely told by producers what camera to use. I'm often asked my preference in interviews and to be very honest, the main reason for this seems to be that they've had issues with RED in the past, primarily on the post side. So they are always happy to hear Alexa, and while Varicam is still a little exotic for some, I'm quickly able to prove its worth when I explain the specific advantages of that product line.

After hearing anecdotes for years on message boards about lower budget productions, corporate jobs etc., I think it's safe to say that there is much more "meddling" going on from clients at that level who want to prove their knowledge base by badgering the DP on their choices of equipment. I rarely have to defend my gear selection after those preliminary discussions about the camera. Some directors want to know the lens package but that's more about making sure we are covered for the ranges of focal lengths they like to use than the actual brand, although with younger directors I'm seeing them more engaged in that discussion, since optics are the "new black".
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The voice of reason, by someone who actually deals with it in practice rather than theory.
 
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