Let's talk real about cinema-look…

[johannsebastianbach]

Hey there,

so even if you use all the film-look techniques, 24fps, 1/48 shutter, shallow depth of field, stabilize camera movement, light up professionally, cinemascope aspect ratio, have good actors, color grade perfectly and do the framing and everything else right. I have the feeling that with Magic Lantern RAW or even a Blackmagic you still can't get footage to look like it would be from a high budget film production or could be shown as a movie in movie theatres. Is there anything else, that could be done or I forgot?

At this point I am at the end of my knowledge and can't explain what a Red Epic or a Arri Alexa does differently. I guess it has something to do with how their sensors do interprets motion, I can feel it, but I can't explain why it looks so differently. At least I didn't see any video from ML/BM close enough, that I wouldn't spot the difference to a DSLR. Any link to clips to prove me wrong would be awesome.

Thanks in advance.

(Red Epic Dragon)

[Danne]

http://priceonomics.com/why-every-movie-looks-sort-of-orange-and-blue/

http://theabyssgazes.blogspot.se/2010/03/teal-and-orange-hollywood-please-stop.html

[ddelreal]

I know you mentioned lighting but believe me, you have to do more than buy expensive lights. You have to pay for people to help you light. Lighting is one of (if not THE one and only) the most critical aspects of filming. Highlight rolloff is probably the second thing that is noticeable on high quality productions - hence the use of RED, ARRI and BM.

[hjfilmspeed]

Another thing that is difficult capture with lower budget cameras is ... well .. motion. On older film cameras , the mechanical shutter garonteed smoother motion capture at any shutter. I'm not sure if arri and red are able to achieve this digitally but it's possible. The best motion capture from any digital cinema camera in the $4000 range is the Digital Bolex. That camera , to my eye had the best color and motion capture in its class. But NOOOOOO spec hungry masses favor "4k 100p" nonsense and that's why the D16 is no longer on the market. It's VERY sad to me.

[ddelreal]

Another thing that is difficult capture with lower budget cameras is ... well .. motion. On older film cameras , the mechanical shutter garonteed smoother motion capture at any shutter. I'm not sure if arri and red are able to achieve this digitally but it's possible. The best motion capture from any digital cinema camera in the $4000 range is the Digital Bolex. That camera , to my eye had the best color and motion capture in its class. But NOOOOOO spec hungry masses favor "4k 100p" nonsense and that's why the D16 is no longer on the market. It's VERY sad to me.

Agreed. Very sad. I'll take dynamic range, good color science and good motion capture qualities over resolution any day.

[johannsebastianbach]

I know you mentioned lighting but believe me, you have to do more than buy expensive lights. You have to pay for people to help you light. Lighting is one of (if not THE one and only) the most critical aspects of filming. Highlight rolloff is probably the second thing that is noticeable on high quality productions - hence the use of RED, ARRI and BM.

I worked as a lighting tech once for a more sophisticated production and know what you mean. But it's not what I'm talking about. There is some subtle difference between the cameras I can't explain.

Regarding the highlight roll-off, I think that ML RAW does quite a good job. I always do manual ETTR with RAW-Zebras and expose just 1-2 stops before clipping. So you still have detail in the highlights. (There is more information in brighter areas [less noise], and if you need to darken, you are going to edit it anyway.)

[johannsebastianbach]

Another thing that is difficult capture with lower budget cameras is ... well .. motion. On older film cameras , the mechanical shutter garonteed smoother motion capture at any shutter. I'm not sure if arri and red are able to achieve this digitally but it's possible. The best motion capture from any digital cinema camera in the $4000 range is the Digital Bolex. That camera , to my eye had the best color and motion capture in its class. But NOOOOOO spec hungry masses favor "4k 100p" nonsense and that's why the D16 is no longer on the market. It's VERY sad to me.

I had a look on some Digital Bolex on vimeo and indeed, to my eye it looks a lot more movie-like.. Do you guys know any articles about this "smoother motion" I would like to see some comparisons or understand the mechanics behind it. Is there a cinematic term for that? - There is not much Magic Lantern can do about it, right? 

[hjfilmspeed]

I believe the proper term is motion cadence. Found a couple of links
http://www.red.com/learn/red-101/global-rolling-shutter
Red now has an optional motion mount
http://nofilmschool.com/2013/09/red-goes-global-shutter-new-motion-mount-epicscarlet-plus-new-dragon-footage

Mechanical shutter and certain global shutters can render smoother more natural motion. Research motion cadence

[Frank7D]

Set design. Take a look at most classic movies and you will notice that every detail that appears in frame--including the color scheme--is carefully controlled and serves a purpose. I was recently looking at frames from "Naked Lunch" and it was almost funny how many elements were red in color, down to the numbers printed on a glass vial. Before you press the record button, the scene in front of your lens should be as carefully composed as a painting, if you want that "real movie" look.

[johannsebastianbach]

@Frank7D True true…

@hjfilmspeed Thanks a lot. Good news, I think I understand it better now. It was the motion interpretation of the DSLR.  Bad news, there is no low-budget way to achieve this look I'm so intrigued with. Cheapest Camera are the blackmagic 4k ones but I heard a lot bad about it from users.

I think I saw a Thread in this forum about a (expensive) programm, which emulates global shutter movement for rolling shutter video, if you film with 360 degrees shutter angle. Couldn't find it again, does somebody has the name?

[Andy600]

http://tessive.com

[keel]

Tessive is quite nice. I have never seen this program before.

[Oedipax]

Wow, Tessive does look extremely interesting. Thanks for the link! I wonder if there are any examples of things like short films or music videos where this technique was used to emulate a more filmic motion blur/cadence than what modern digital cameras (even at a 'correct' 1/48 shutter) often give.

[keel]

I'd love to see skateboarding

[Teamsleepkid]

digital camera was made by man(computers 1,0's) film camera was made by god(analog, science)

[bpv5P]

Use good equipament. Canon 5DMKIII is probably the best now (2017) to work with MagicLanternVideo (MLV), but 50D is very cheap and works great on lower resolutions. If you have money, digital cameras such as Arri Alexa is the way to go, but we'll see how Axiom camera will be on future.
Some things to remind:

- 24fps (exact fps)
- 180 degree shutter speed (1/48s) - Use Neutral Density filter to get into this when necessary
- ISO no more than 500 (use artificial light when necessary)
- High DR (>14 f-stops). Use dual iso if necessary
- Expose to the right (~+2 f-stops)
- Anamorphic lenses (choose cinemascope aspect ratio)
- High speed lenses (~f/2.0 or more open). Old lenses work great and cost less (see M42 mount lenses, such as Takumar).
- Optic Filters: Polarizer and, in some instances, Fog filter (look on Schneider Digicon)
- Post-processing:
   - High quality demosaicing. If you have time and computing power, AMaZE or IGV is probably the best
   - Fix your lens distortion with lens profile / flat-field
   - Fix less chromatic aberration and vignette
   - Remove noise first, then sharp it (deconvolution seems to get better results, but too processor intensive)
   - Compress highlights and lift shadows
   - Use a highlight recovery algorithm, such as color propagation
   - Use a Log, such as AlexaLog, to get flat and high DR image
   - Color grade using 3DLut's can help. Impulz does the job. Teal and Orange seems to be the rule since the 80's, but I wouldn't be afraid to explore other color color palette.
   - Grain or dithering can help with plastic look of denoise algorithms. Cinegrain is good.
   - Slow motions can add a interesting atmosphere if well used (twixtor help with this)
- Well compressed file for reproduction. Work with lossless format (such as ProRes) and export with H.264/AAC or VP9/Opus (if you're reading this on future, maybe Daala from Xiph is already a thing, idk).


But, visual quality is not all, it's just a way to express an idea.
To a technical person, the best image would be a 18% grey card, since it has the best dynamic range and best SNR, although it don't express nothing.
Movie needs to be a externalization of human emotions in a audiovisual platform. You have to construct a atmosphere, so people watching it can understand the message you're trying to express.

[mothaibaphoto]

Parfocal lens - that what makes video on OP looks so different.