[quote=“cyber-lili”]
QT and RR have said that they want the celluloid look through a digital shooting. Is that enough to convince everybody ?
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When the cinemas get rid of the old fashioned projectors for high class video projectors I want to see a movie shot with video look. In other words it looks like ‘The Cosby Show’ or ‘Roseanne’ as opposed to ‘Frasier’ and ‘Friends’ but it will only work on a big motherfucker of a screen.
Speaking of American sitcoms ‘Curb Your Enthusiasm’ (depending on where you watch it) has either a video look or a film look. It’s called ‘field removed video’.
[quote=“Clinton Morgan”]
I’ve heard conflicting stories about High Definition Cameras. On the one hand that they are cheaper than normal film and on the other hand they aren’t really that cheap at all.
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Celluloid is more expansive that a digittal shooting. What isn’t that cheaper is all the work on post-production with the special effects.
Thats the thing, QT isnt doing a CGI film, hes doing a regular film, why does he need digital? Its because Robert Rodriguez likes it, so hes influencing QT.
he just showed him that it’s easier, more productive, and more efficient. the question is WHY NOT shoot digital. shooting digital has nothing to do with CGI or anything, it’s just a different way of producing the film, one that a) doesn’t cost as much b) goes faster c) offeres more possibilites and d) makes it easier to do the DVD
[quote=“Clinton Morgan”]
I’ve heard conflicting stories about High Definition Cameras. On the one hand that they are cheaper than normal film and on the other hand they aren’t really that cheap at all and make no difference to the telephone number length of the budgets on movies. You might as well shoot on 35mm.
Reel to reel projection will probably die out as many cinemas are gradually converting to digital projectors. ‘Revenge of The Sith’ was shot on video but had grain added to it for cinemas that projected the movie with reel to reel projectors. Similar to the early days of printing. The first printed books were designed to look like they were handwritten.
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It’s funny you should say that about Revenge of the Sith, I don’t know whether you noticed this, it probably hasn’t got anything to do with what you said but, there were many a scene which seemed quite blurry to me. It was very off-putting at times. I saw the film twice at different cinema’s and at both in some of the scenes the background was blurry. It wasn’t just my eyes either as my friends also noticed this as did my dad when he went to watch. Did anybody else have similar problems?
Also, about the digital thing… I think if QT now uses a digital camera, that will be ok with me as long as his films don’t look so crystal clear as to appear artificial. Once Upon A Time In Mexico felt too clear for me to the extent that it seemed like there wasn’t much detail in each shot. There was a lot of bare environments. Also, didn’t QT shoot with a HD camera for Grave Danger, because if that was a digital camera, I’m all for that. It looked absolutely stunning, without losing any of that grittiness. Furthermore, Kill Bill looked VERY nice, so if he can achieve similar results in future work, then I don’t see why there is a problem using film. It is when QT crosses the line and uses the digital technology to enhance his films like for example, RR adding digital blood to the walls in the hospital scene in OUATIM. In fact, why the fuck would you add digital blood? Is is too hard to dab on some movie blood on the walls? Anyway, if QT uses digital technology just to shoot his films, then fine, just don’t use CGI, don’t fucking add things, or remove things and start fucking about with the scenes.
Had a quick Google. According to this site http://www.smsprod.com/rental/digital.html it costs over $1,350 a day to rent professional HD camera equipment (I did a bit of math. You pay $800 a day just for the body of the camera.).
well I guess a professional movie company would use better equipment as that site offers. I am sure they have contracts with Sony or Panavision or whatever
i do agree that digital is the future,it’s far more practical for a start etc…but strictly from an aesthetic,NOT nostalgic, point of view,nothing beats 35mm for me.
there have been obvious exceptions with digital- collateral and of course sin city have both proven that digital can can be employed in a unique and visually stimulating way.
however, for the most part, i have seen my fair share of crappy dogme style indie movies that just SUCKED visually,closeups all fuzzy and distorted, and that crappy,CRAPPY ‘ghosting’ effect when characters make sudden movements or when light sources move(i.e. tracking shots of streetlights).ugh.
NOW, in relation to GRINDHOUSE, i think it will be a GOOD THING.
i, for one,want to see how they achieve the ‘shitty’ washed out 16/35mm 70’s look on digital, and with the talent involved, i have no doubt they will suceed.
If RR can bring that cheaply shot 70s Grindhouse look to the films, I have no problem with it. I just dont want to be aware that it was shot with digital at all.
There was one movie in the 1970s that was video to film and part of an exploitation genre (if you can describe rock and roll movies as exploitation and I do) and that movie was ‘Frank Zappa’s 200 Motels’:
Television nowadays uses a lot of digital instead of film. For example ‘Bleak House’ and ‘Rome’. I hope to God that film does not die out. Video might be able to look indistinguishable from film these days but celluloid still rocks. Another movie shot on HD is ‘Collateral’.
please don’t mix up video and digital filming with the actual use of High Definition filming, which is what we are talking about here. Of course we don’t want to have QT shoot his movie with a crappy 500 bucks MiniDV camera :_)
well there’s a problem you see. because that’s a matter of definition. coz what’s in a VHS tape? a tape of film… so yeah, High Def is not really film. but it’s not video either. it’s just a digital format it’s not really the type of storage anymore that definites the term, is it… a very difficult question
There’s a switch on HD cameras that allows you to decide between the film-look and the video-look (the British sitcom ‘Green Green Grass’ is the first to be shot on HD but it has been given that video-look). It will be intially saved on tape (or even disc) but not film as there will be no need for processing, so basically a lot of movies are being/will be shot on video*. If cinemas do convert to digital projection then no film will be used at all and we might call it " Going to the MPEGs" in future. A VHS tape is not a tape of film, the materials and quality of the materials are different. Basically (at certain times) HD is video that looks like film.
Unless you’ve actually shot in film I don’t think you (meaning anyone) can comment on how easy/hard it is to use. I too was once a hardcore, never say die film fan. That is until I shot on film. I shot both 16mm and 35mm and I can tell you, that while it was a learning experience, I will never shoot on film again.
I was in the process of editing my 35mm short and I popped in my new Once Upon a Time in Mexico DVD. I watched the special feature with RR talking about digital vs. film and it hit me: “Holy shit, this guy has got it right.� Had I not gone though actually shooting on film and facing the problems and setbacks he talked about I would have never even taken the idea of digital seriously. Film is a waste of time, money and effort.
When we shot my 35mm short several times I found myself staring at my monitor while my DP took 15 min. to make sure the light wouldn’t fade away in the shot due to the film speed. 15 min. doesn’t sound like a lot of time, but when you’re ready to roll, you’re ready to roll. And 15 min in the small budget/limited time/massive amount of setups film world is a lot of fuckin’ time.
Do you have any idea what it’s like to look at a monitor and it look like shit but you’re DP assures you that when it’s printed it will look great? I do. With film you are rolling the dice. You don’t know if what you shot will look like Saving Private Ryan or Saving Silverman, and bad calculations can make those types of mistakes happen. With digital, you know what you’re going to get- no guess work. And you don’t need to wait until you get your film printed and (in our case) telecined. I shot my movie and had no idea how it would look until about a week later. That’s a rough feeling, let me tell ya.
From changing mags every 10 min of film shot, to guessing what my picture was going to look like to constant lens changes to (as RR says) not being able to move at the speed of thought, I will never shoot on film again.
And to those who say they hate digital and say they can see the difference, shut the fuck up. If that’s the case go watch Star Wars Ep I and tell me all the shots that used a digital camera instead of film. Most people can’t tell the difference and wouldn’t know the difference unless they were told that one was digital. And yes, with digital you can accomplish any look you want, you just have to know how to use the medium (the same held true for film over 100 years ago). A lot of the things you’ve seen, that were shot in digital, that looked like shit, was because the people using them didn’t know how to.
Let’s say you took a street to work each day for years. And then one day someone tells you that there’s a new road where there’s less traffic, no stop signs and it’s quicker, would you still take the old root just because that’s what you’ve done for years? Of course you wouldn’t. And again, unless you have used both I don’t think you can really have a valid opinion on what works and what doesn’t and well as what’s possible and what isn’t.
Digital is the future and film may not be dead but it does have cancer, and it’s name is digital.
If it helps the movie get better, shoot digital. If it doesnt, dont! simple like that. The materials you use to make something have to contribute into making a good final product. I think that digital can be good, but don’t know if it wil have this grindhouse feel to it. If they can make it have that feel it’s ok.
Also shooting it digital is a different craft. So I hope they won’t be affected by the way they shoot it. I hope they keep it old school and that the way they make it reflects on the screen.
Also I would like to comment:
A movie shot digital can still be refered to as a film. A word like film maybe originally only defined a piece of celluloid, but grew into something larger and people named a movie also “a film”
just like: martial arts movies are refered to as kung fu movies (although they might not have kung fu in them).
Or: a writer who writes a book. It all is typed, but you still say that he wrote it.
Over time definitions of things change and the same word can have multiple meanings, so does the word film.
i guess im not an expert on this, but wouldnt editing with a digital be way easier than with film too? i mean if you can just get a nice computer and upload all your digital footage and use a good editing program, you could probably cut down on the time that would take right? maybe i’m wrong, but i’d feel like that was a big advantage if i was a director.
[quote=“bigkahuna”]
i guess im not an expert on this, but wouldnt editing with a digital be way easier than with film too? i mean if you can just get a nice computer and upload all your digital footage and use a good editing program, you could probably cut down on the time that would take right? maybe i’m wrong, but i’d feel like that was a big advantage if i was a director.
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yeah that’s one among many advantages. shot digital, edited digital, and ideally screened digital too. no processing, no money wasted. no quality lost.
[quote=“Scarface”]
Am I the only one who’s finding it totally ironic that they’re shooting a grindhouse movie in digital format? Somehow it doesn’t make any sense.
Celluloid is dead? I don’t think so. Just because Star Wars, Sky Captain, Sin City and a handful of other movies were shot in digital doesn’t mean that the future of filmmaking lies in digital format. Celluloid will never die. As good as the final results may turn out to be, digital still ultimately implies a lazy form of filmmaking.
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Not that much more lazy…but even so; why shoot with film just to say your crew isn’t lazy? Save a shitload of money. And there’s so much more to filmmaking than deciding whether to use digital or film. You also quoted that “Celluloid will never die”…which I belieive may be true to all filmmakers that started their career before the digital age, but every “new age” director coming forth will use digital and eventually all the oldschool people will be gone one day which leads to an age of 100% digital. (just my thoughts)
