Question for Barry

[neomoviedude]

Hi Barry,

It seems to me or at least my eyeballs that outdoor shots with the hvx200 or natural lighting seems to have a more filmic look. Please check out this clip.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R2q5Zx1sbQE

1. my first question is how can I create a more natural lighting for internal shots? Which lighting kits mimic natural lighting or outdoor lighting? i've observed that using fluorescent lighting is a dead give away that something was shot on video.

2. i've seen some outdoor shots with the hvx200 that seem to have more green tones in the image. does that mean there are more green pixels?

Barry if you're around i'd like your input. Or if anyone knows the answer I'd appreciate it.

thanks.

 

[ozduc]

1. my first question is how can I create a more natural lighting for internal shots? Which lighting kits mimic natural lighting or outdoor lighting?

I think you need to study some books on lighting for film and video. There are certain lights which do have a daylight look to them (HMI's). However it is not so much a "lighing kit" that mimics natural lighting but it is more the case of what a talented DP can do with certain lights to make it look like natural lighting.

 

[Barry_Green]

There's a world of difference between making something look like it was shot on film, and accomplishing what most people mean when they say "the film look."

Making something look as if it was shot on film has nothing to do with lighting, camera movement, art direction or anything like that. All that stuff is important to "The Movie Look", but not to making something look as if it was shot on film; after all, there are tens of thousands of miles of 16mm and 8mm home movies out there that had no lighting, no actors, no director, no art direction, no sound, no anything, yet it all still looks like film (because it *is* film).

The "film look" is an important component of "the movie look", but is only one part of it.

The dead giveaways that you shot on video instead of film are:
1) motion rendition; if you shot at 60i it's going to look like video no matter what else you do. 24P overcomes this and delivers film-style motion.

2) Blown highlights. Film typically has a lot more dynamic range than film. If you're trying to capture a high-contrast scene on film, the highlights will usually gently roll off into a smooth transition to pure white. But in video you have much less range, and highlights will usually smack into ugly overexposure very quickly. You have to control your highlights when shooting video to make sure you don't run into this problem. The knee can help a little, the zebras will let you know when you're in danger of it happening, and proper lighting will let you avoid it entirely.

3) The gamma. Video gamma was designed to provide proper brightness rendition to a television set, but doesn't really work the way film's characteristic curve works. What that means is, the "s-curve" of video's gamma is very different than the "s-curve" of film's characteristics (if you're familiar with using the "curves" command in photoshop). Panasonic provides the cinelike-D and cinelike-V gammas to match more of the way film renders brightness and tonality.

There are other elements, such as color and contrast, but those vary widely among film stocks and can vary widely in the HVX as well. But the main things to sell the "film" illusion are to use 24p, control your highlights, and use the cinelike gamma. Moving the camera like a film camera helps as well; don't wave it around like a home video camera, but plot out your moves as if it was a big, heavy, ponderous film camera and you'll help sell the illusion that much better.