Perya (Town Fair) - a Canon 7D Short

[Eddy Robinson]

> Our ears hear at much higher frequencies than our eyes see

Audible sound is roughly 20Hz-20kHz, while visible light is about 400–800 THz.

What I mean here s the entire optical system rather than just the photosensitivity of a given cell on your retina; when you consider the time it takes for your eyes to react to changes in amplitude, it seems to top out at around 100Hz in the lab, and 24fps (with an appropriate degree of motion blur) is still good enough to seem smooth in the cinema.

So if I showed you alternating frames of contrasting colors, past a certain frame rate it would just start to look gray. Our ears track changes of (about) 2-4000 times greater frequency.

I actually quite like the sound of the good old Moog.

So do I, but my point is that it has its own very interesting sound - you wouldn't use it to fool someone into thinking you were playing a trumpet or a guitar, although emulating the timbrality of real instruments was the original goal of synth manufacturers.

 

[ydgmdlu]

IS IT ORGANIC??? This is annoying... because as some have stated it's not about organic it's about analog vs digital.

Organic: relating or belonging to the class of chemical compounds having a carbon basis

Your MiniDV cam has carbon atoms all through it, your HD camera, your hardrives, your PCs. Not just film stock. FOR GOD's SAKE WE LIVE ON THE PLANET EARTH!!! Carbon atoms are unavoidable!

Well, I think that there's a deeper implication intended when some people use the word "organic" to describe film. Basically, they're trying to say that film stock is somehow "alive" or has "soul." :huh:

Guys, it's not the film stock, it's the work that you, as the artist, put into the image.

 

[Rakesh Jacob]

Semantics are awesome! *high five*

:nads::dankk2:
Sorry but it was brought up and ignored, I think it's very valid to the understanding of why and where it's going and how it'll it get there.

Well, I think that there's a deeper implication intended when some people use the word "organic" to describe film. Basically, they're trying to say that film stock is somehow "alive" or has "soul." :huh:

Guys, it's not the film stock, it's the work that you, as the artist, puts into the image.

To further my point "organic" is used like a religious statement or mystic mantra. It's definable! Some people here are trying to tell us what it is. Some people wanna believe it's something it's not, IT AIN't MAGIC!

 

[Jean Dantes]

All I said, in a nutshell, was that digital cinematography and traditional film cinematography (which I did call "analogue cinematography" in my previous post) are two different animals. They share the same ancestry, but are not the same species.

I don't hate digital. I never said I hated digital. I never said film was better than digital, or that digital was better than film. I started this thread because I love the look of what a current digital camera, the Canon 7D, is producing.

This isn't a question of what this software can do to this and that - it's a very, very simple OBJECTIVE fact - digital will never be film, and film will never be digital – precisely because FILM IS FILM and because DIGITAL IS DIGITAL.

You can grab a digital camera and shoot at 23.976FPS, you can shoot with a 180 degree shutter, you can shoot with 4:4:4 chroma sampling, you can shoot with a 3.2 Gbit/s bitrate like the Dalsa, you can even use the best lens in existence, but it still won't be film precisely because you're not shooting on film.

Again, I wanna make it clear - I never said one format was superior to the other. All I said was that digital cinematography and analogue/traditional cinematography ARE DIFFERENT.

I'm sure that if you tracked down Dion Bebe and asked him if he employed the same photographic techniques when he shot "Chicago" (which he filmed using 35mm Kodak stock) to when he shot "Miami Vice" (which he filmed using the Thomson Viper), he will tell you that he employed different techniques because they are DIFFERENT formats.

Actually, speaking of Dion Bebe, when he shot "Collateral", alongside cinematography Paul Cameron, they employed three different cameras (Thomson Viper, Sony HDW F900 and Panavision 35mm Millennium cameras) to get various looks:

"The difference between film and HD, says Cameron, is that film's sensitivity falls off sharply at the bottom of the curve, transforming subtle shadows into deep rich blacks. But what if, he asks, you went into those shadows? "How do I record what the eye sees at the toe of the curve?" Where everyone is trying to make black, Mann decided he would go into those shadows and pull out information to create intense emotions."

(you can read the whole article here if you like: http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0HNN/is_8_19/ai_n6171215/?tag=content;col1 )

Lighting, framing, camera movement, frame rates, etc is where digital cinematography and traditional analogue cinematography are related. But the mistake you guys are making is that you are downplaying the importance of film stock and the chemical process that follows it - traditional analouge cinematography requires that step, and it's a very important one. Hell, you could have even looked here if you wanted:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cinematography#Film_stockhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cinematography#Aspects_of_cinematography

I gonna reiterate this one last time – I never said one format was superior to the other, all I said was that digital won’t look like film because digital is not film. I’m sure digital will someday replicate the look of 35mm film (we are already seeing very close results), however, no matter how close it comes, it will never be film because it is not film. How much more objective can I make my point?

And please don’t insult me by calling me "layman". Let’s keep this mature and respectful.

 

[Kholi]

This isn't a question of what this software can do to this and that - it's a very, very simple OBJECTIVE fact - digital will never be film, and film will never be digital – precisely because FILM IS FILM and because DIGITAL IS DIGITAL.

You can grab a digital camera and shoot at 23.976FPS, you can shoot with a 180 degree shutter, you can shoot with 4:4:4 chroma sampling, you can shoot with a 3.2 Gbit/s bitrate like the Dalsa, you can even use the best lens in existence, but it still won't be film precisely because you're not shooting on film.

Again, I wanna make it clear - I never said one format was superior to the other. All I said was that digital cinematography and analogue/traditional cinematography ARE DIFFERENT.

This shouldn't have to be said so many times, but it's great that it's sticking somewhere. Digital will NEVER... EVER be film. It will always be digital, no matter how you choose to slice it, or shoot it.

 

[billy fattey]

This shouldn't have to be said so many times, but it's great that it's sticking somewhere. Digital will NEVER... EVER be film. It will always be digital, no matter how you choose to slice it, or shoot it.

I'm surprised to hear this in modern times. It seems more like something people in the 19th century would say. Everything is eventual. There is nothing that will never exist. Atoms are atoms. Quarks are quarks. We have learned to manipulate some of it now and will eventually be able to manipulate all of it. There will be no difference between the protein you get when you eat an artificial man-created chicken and the old fashioned ones that hatch from an egg. Digital will surpass film, replace film, be film. You can debate about where we are now with the technology but to state anything certain or use words like "never" when talking about the future doesn't make a lot of sense to me.

 

[ydgmdlu]

All I said, in a nutshell, was that digital cinematography and traditional film cinematography (which I did call "analogue cinematography" in my previous post) are two different animals. They share the same ancestry, but are not the same species.

The same can be said of the different kinds of film cinematography and the different kinds of video cinematography (which includes analog video). Each "kind" (or "discipline," as I called it) has its own tools, workflow, and quirks to master. Shooting B&W film is not the same as shooting color film; lighting and production design have to be specialized for each. Shooting IMAX is also way more different than shooting 35mm. Same ancestry, different species, just like you said. But they are all cinematography. So why make a special distinction for all of the video formats? "Separate but equal" in your mind, right? The Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences and the various national and international cinematographers' guilds don't make such a distinction. The Academy Awards used have separate categories for B&W and color cinematography, but those went away decades ago.

You made the assertion that one of the other posters didn't understand what cinematography truly is. (Quite presumptuous, wouldn't you say? What gives you the right?) Your assertion is that knowing film stocks and chemicals matters. What I'm saying is that, yes, those things are good to know when your goal is specifically to work with film (celluloid), but they are not necessary to call yourself "cinematographer." Many cinematographers are utterly unfamiliar with digital cinematography. Many digital cinematographers are unfamiliar with film cinematography. Yet they are all cinematographers. Now, I anticipate that you're going to say that what I just said proves your point, that film and digital/video are separate. But no. There are many film cinematographers that are unfamiliar with B&W cinematography and IMAX cinematography. There are conceivably some digital cinematographers who are unfamiliar with shooting with traditional broadcast analog video.

The point is that being a cinematographer only entails knowing how to use tools and processes to create the images that you want. If you want to be more specific and exclusive in your definition as you have been, then that would exclude many competent, professional cinematographers. Now that's what I call insulting.

I don't hate digital. I never said I hated digital. I never said film was better than digital, or that digital was better than film. I started this thread because I love the look of what a current digital camera, the Canon 7D, is producing.

Fair enough, but why make a bunch of unsupported, negative assertions about a medium in which you have not demonstrated much expertise?

This isn't a question of what this software can do to this and that - it's a very, very simple OBJECTIVE fact - digital will never be film, and film will never be digital – precisely because FILM IS FILM and because DIGITAL IS DIGITAL.

You can grab a digital camera and shoot at 23.976FPS, you can shoot with a 180 degree shutter, you can shoot with 4:4:4 chroma sampling, you can shoot with a 3.2 Gbit/s bitrate like the Dalsa, you can even use the best lens in existence, but it still won't be film precisely because you're not shooting on film.

No disagreement here. In fact, I used almost those exact same words in another thread. But what you seemed to be saying was that there would always be a clear, qualitative difference in the final image, something that you felt was very important. Me and others here were disputing that assertion.

Again, I wanna make it clear - I never said one format was superior to the other. All I said was that digital cinematography and analogue/traditional cinematography ARE DIFFERENT.

Then why did your earlier statements come across like you were saying that film is superior to digital?

I'm sure that if you tracked down Dion Bebe and asked him if he employed the same photographic techniques when he shot "Chicago" (which he filmed using 35mm Kodak stock) to when he shot "Miami Vice" (which he filmed using the Thomson Viper), he will tell you that he employed different techniques because they are DIFFERENT formats.

B&W and IMAX cinematography are different from color 35mm cinematography and require different techniques.

Actually, speaking of Dion Bebe, when he shot "Collateral", alongside cinematography Paul Cameron, they employed three different cameras (Thomson Viper, Sony HDW F900 and Panavision 35mm Millennium cameras) to get various looks:

"The difference between film and HD, says Cameron, is that film's sensitivity falls off sharply at the bottom of the curve, transforming subtle shadows into deep rich blacks. But what if, he asks, you went into those shadows? "How do I record what the eye sees at the toe of the curve?" Where everyone is trying to make black, Mann decided he would go into those shadows and pull out information to create intense emotions."

No surprise there. That's because digital cinematography has not advanced to the point where any look imaginable, including any film stock look, can be achieved on a whim.

But the mistake you guys are making is that you are downplaying the importance of film stock and the chemical process that follows it

No, what we are saying is that someday, a digital process can give you ANY LOOK THAT YOU WANT. By that point, film stock and chemical processes won't matter in the goal of achieving a look, except when you have to work with film.

traditional analouge cinematography requires that step

That's just stating the obvious. But we're not talking about "traditional analog cinematography" in particular, we're talking about cinematography in general, which includes the video/digital options.

And please don’t insult me by calling me "layman". Let’s keep this mature and respectful.

That wasn't meant as an insult. I used the term to describe myself. I used the term to describe you specifically because you didn't appear to show any advanced, technical understanding or knowledge like Eddy has done, and you made some statements that seemed to suggest, for lack of a better word, ignorance about digital technology.

 

[Jean Dantes]

This shouldn't have to be said so many times, but it's great that it's sticking somewhere. Digital will NEVER... EVER be film. It will always be digital, no matter how you choose to slice it, or shoot it.

Amen.

 

[Kholi]

I'm surprised to hear this in modern times. It seems more like something people in the 19th century would say. Everything is eventual. There is nothing that will never exist. Atoms are atoms. Quarks are quarks. We have learned to manipulate some of it now and will eventually be able to manipulate all of it. There will be no difference between the protein you get when you eat an artificial man-created chicken and the old fashioned ones that hatch from an egg. Digital will surpass film, replace film, be film. You can debate about where we are now with the technology but to state anything certain or use words like "never" when talking about the future doesn't make a lot of sense to me.

All of it sounds like people wanting a film look but not wanting to pay the price for it to me. Digital may surpass film "technically" like how a Veggie Burger is "technically" better for you. It sure as hell ain't beef, though, and it will never BE beef. Might vaguely taste like it, might vaguely smell like it. Isn't it.

 

[Cranky]

There are two different questions here.

1) Can digital represent real life better than film? -- yes, it can, given that sampling rate and quantization range are high enough.
2) Can digital emulate film? -- yes, it can, given that sampling rate and quantization range are high enough, and that appropriate transfer functions are used to emulate film stock.

The only issue is sheer amount of data and processing. Is it economically viable to handle all this data digitally, or it is easier just to use good old chemical process.

 

[ydgmdlu]

All of it sounds like people wanting a film look but not wanting to pay the price for it to me. Digital may surpass film "technically" like how a Veggie Burger is "technically" better for you. It sure as hell ain't beef, though, and it will never BE beef. Might vaguely taste like it, might vaguely smell like it. Isn't it.

It's all psychological, just like typewriter versus computer word processor and flatbed editing machine versus software NLE.

And besides, if it could taste indistinguishable from beef and have exactly the same texture, then why would not being real beef matter?

 

[ydgmdlu]

The only issue is sheer amount of data and processing. Is it economically viable to handle all this data digitally, or it is easier just to use good old chemical process.

You actually make a good point here, which nicely counters what Kholi was trying to say. The technology to make digital look indistinguishable from film may actually be very expensive, even more expensive than film itself. (In fact, in studio productions, digital cinematography systems typically don't provide significant cost savings over film.) But I'd live with the expense, simply because I don't want to deal with the massive usability issues of film.

 

[ydgmdlu]

And just to make this clear: I personally think that the film image is superior to digital in almost every way, but I'm only talking about the way that things are today.

 

[JimmieMyers]

As someone with a background in music production, I have to agree with most of what Eddy is saying. In audio recording, analog tape is nearly extinct. It is not pointless, but digital just got so good at *emulating* it, that it's become mostly luxurious, if not downright inconvenient. And still, tape does, scientifically, factually, sound better than digital. But people will argue until their lips fall off about that fact (just as they are here about film) and 9 times out of 10 (fabricated figure, bear with me!), the person who swears by 2" tape will not be able to discern a difference in a "blind" test. That same person will not be able to tell the difference between a well emulated 1176 compressor vs. an analog 1176 compressor. Especially not in a mix. Not even guy who do this all day long. They can nitpick, A/B compare and barely tell, but in a mix, they wouldn't bet money if they were smart. It's just gotten that close. It's not perfect... but it's very, very good.

What Eddy described in regard to an emulation of how film reacts, rather than just how it looks one frame at a time, is exactly the sort of approach that brought these digital audio emulators into being. I feel that it's certainly only a matter of time before the equivalent occurs with digital cinema.

However! It does seem to be a bit trickier. Despite the scientific facts Eddy presented about our aural and visual senses, I believe most people have naturally honed their vision for far longer than most people have honed their hearing. Even extremely gifted musicians and engineers struggle to find words to describe the intangible qualities of audio. "Warm, dark, glassy, spongy, raunchy..." and on and on. These are undefinable concepts. Visually, we are a bit better at actually describing what we see, and discerning changes. When a picture is warm, it is yellower. When it is cool, it is blue. When it is grainy... it is grainy. Same with "clean, dark" and so on. We can define what that means. This leads me to believe that it will be a bit harder to emulate film to such a degree that we don't notice. Our eyes, fooled by plenty of illusions (something movies depend on!), are still extraordinarily perceptive. But it will happen. I am convinced of that, and I look forward to it!

And still, I need to reiterate the point that none of this would make a movie any better if it wasn't already good. There's no auto tune for acting yet, ditto for writing - and even in audio, auto tune can't write you a good melody. It's still all soul, and those things are just as analog as ever.

 

[Rakesh Jacob]

Ahhh this takes me back to the mid 90s, projects studios were everywhere! In my studio I was making the transition from reel-to-reel to ADATs (modular 16bit digital recorders). The first thing I did was re-track the music I had just recorded on tape to Adat. Not a transfer, mind you, but completely re-recording it to Adat. IT SOUNDED LIKE DONKEY A$$$!!!! Horrible! WTF! Problem is I allready had gotten used to the way that song sounded with "lovely" analog characteristcs, the Adat sounded stringent, characterless and almost too detailed and pristine.
I made a decision that day to scrap that song and scrap analog and move forward!
The benefits of going digital and the toys that were on the horizon were too important and I believed that either the technology would catch up to analog OR in a few years the kids (most musicians primary audience) would NOT know the difference and certainly wouldn't care.
By the time I quit music in the middle part of this decade, everything was possible in a completely software environment and I was happy being efficient and empowered!

I feel the same way about filmmaking. I'm only in it because the technology exists for me to create my art effeciently, competently and with a sense of empowerment. For some the actual use of "Film" IS part of their art. And that's a beautiful thing, but it's not my thing. And here's hoping everyone gets to create their art their way... but be aware you cannot stop progress, I'm not the arbiter of what that means but there is a commenly accepted convention that points to digitization of ... everything. Film isn't going away anytime soon, but... it is eventualy.
In the end there's really no need to argue about it and throw around grand sounding descriptions of why film is so much better, I get it, I see it, but... here's looking to the future, we are better off finding ways to make digital processes better emulate analog ones if you really wanna hold on to that look. Saying film will never die is just painting yourself into a corner.

 

[ydgmdlu]

For some the actual use of "Film" IS part of their art. And that's a beautiful thing, but it's not my thing. And here's hoping everyone gets to create their art their way...

Amen. Just like how I respect Larry McMurtry for being in love with his typewriter and Spielberg for insisting on using flatbeds. If that's what it takes for them to create masterpieces, then more power to them.

 

[ydgmdlu]

For some the actual use of "Film" IS part of their art. And that's a beautiful thing, but it's not my thing. And here's hoping everyone gets to create their art their way...

And also allow me to admit to something that digital cinematography truly will never be able to do: It would never have allowed Stan Brakhage to create the scratched-on-film, paint-on-film works that made him an icon of the American avant-garde. With Brakhage, part of the point was to appreciate how he worked with his hands on the celluloid itself.

 

[ydgmdlu]

On the other hand, there's that guy who typed a novel on his smartphone while riding the subway every day. Now there's appreciating somebody's painstaking efforts... in the digital realm.

 

[Rakesh Jacob]

And also allow me to admit to something that digital cinematography truly will never be able to do: It would never have allowed Stan Brakhage to create the scratched-on-film, paint-on-film works that made him an icon of the American avant-garde. With Brakhage, part of the point was to appreciate how he worked with his hands on the celluloid itself.

Wow that literaly is "For some the actual use of "Film" IS part of their art." COOL!

 

[Jean Dantes]

In the end there's really no need to argue about it and throw around grand sounding descriptions of why film is so much better, I get it, I see it, but... here's looking to the future, we are better off finding ways to make digital processes better emulate analog ones if you really wanna hold on to that look. Saying film will never die is just painting yourself into a corner.

I never said film was better. I said digital will never be film.

That's all.

I never said digital was better. I said film will never be digital.

I just presented the very objective fact that digital will never be film (and vica versa) precisely becuase film is film, and digital is digital.

Like I said many times over, I started this thread cause I'm in love with the images the 7D can produce (especially considering it's price). I am a recently unemployed, full-time University student. I shoot most of my **** on anything I can get my hands on. I've shot on everything, even 16mm. Most of time it's SD miniDV cams from the 90's that I borrow of whoever is willing to lend me one.

Narrative is king, regardless of what you shoot on. I know that.

And I never said film won't die. I said it's gonna be around for a long time coming.