Ask David Mullen ANYTHING

[David Mullen ASC]

The main problem is color balance -- if you are shooting in daylight conditions and you want your artificial lights to match in color, they have to be 5500K-ish, either by using HMI's or gelling tungsten, and the Full CTB gel that converts 3200K to 5500K loses nearly two-stops of light output. Start out with a small tungsten light and then gel it with Full CTB and you have a pretty weak light.

The problem of matching the color temp of your lights to the natural light in the location is entirely independent of whether or not your camera or film stock is balanced for tungsten or daylight.

Not to mention that tungsten hardware store work lights won't do diddly-squat outdoors in daylight conditions, plus they are probably not bright enough indoors for 120 fps photography (where you've lost about three f-stops of exposure compared to 24 fps photography) unless they are close to the subject, or you have a lot of them -- and then you get into power consumption problems just as if you had a couple of big tungsten lamps.

In other words, a 250w tungsten worklight is not a substitute for an 18K HMI.

For close-up work in slow-motion, maybe a medium shot, in 3200K balance conditions (like a night scene), they could work.

[Dominic Jones]

I have to interview new people now & then for different shows.
I've refrained from joining this thread for a long time, simply because it's been such a great read, but I've got two questions - the first related to the quote above, and the other purely unrelated...

Here goes:
1) I do a fair bit of focus pulling, and the only people I work with are those who I've worked with by chance who then use me again - I guess (thinking whilst I type) this is a two part question, but how do you find AC's to interview, and what format would your selection process take? Would you expect to see a reel of impressive pulling, or simply a CV and a chat to see if you think the AC in question is confident in their skills? I presume a reel for a puller (I haven't got one, btw) is pretty pointless, as you can always select the shots that are in focus! How do you determine, without working with someone, who's good? Do you only work with those who've been recommended by other DPs you trust?

2) I'm also a low-level DP (of course!), and I've, in the last year or so, been lucky enough to get some great gigs and work on a couple of well respected features, although not as the lead cinematographer - I've done some 2nd unit and some operating for really good guys - and I'm really keen to try to find some low-budget indie features to DP (I've got one to my name, but it's a documentary, which is of course not much use for garnering interest from the drama crowd). Do you have any advice on how to break into that circuit?

In addition to the questions, and at the risk of sounding sycophantic, I'd like to take this opportunity to thank you for (a) being so open with your knowledge and helping, I'm sure, many, many people to improve their skills and also for some wonderfully enjoyable hours of viewing - Northfork is one of my favourite films of the last decade or so, in no small part thanks to your beautiful camera-work...

Actually (sorry, thinking on my feet here!), that leads to another question:
How do you feel about the "loss" of lab/film processes when shooting digitally? For instance, on Northfork I know you flashed the film and used an ENR process at the lab (thanks to your blog!). Do you think, as a simple point of reference, that you could have achieved the same look if you had shot digitally, and do you feel that you gain or lose some ability to express yourself in different ways when shooting on one "format" or the other?

[visakk]

I am sorry, I missed two important details in my question.
1)As I cannot match the color, I want to shoot completely at night and using only work lights
2)When I mentioned 200/300, I intended Number of lights, not tungsten wattage.
Hope my question is clear now.

[visakk]

I am sorry, I missed two important details in my question.
1)As I cannot match the color, I want to shoot completely at night and using only work lights
"In other words, a 250w tungsten worklight is not a substitute for an 18K HMI."
2)When I mentioned 200/300, I intended Number of lights, not tungsten wattage.
Hope my question is clear now.

[Dominic Jones]

Hi visakk,

Sorry if I sound impudent by answering this in place of David Mullen (and I'm sure he'll have much more to say than I do!), but one issue to watch out for is flicker.

I don't know what wattage work lights you have available to you, but generally, in my experience, they tend to be ~500w units. Due to the relatively small filament size of these flicker can be a problem at high framerates due to the filament "cooling" in the down cycle of the AC power. It probably won't be a problem at 120fps, but you might want to test the specific units in question before a shoot, just to be sure...

[David Mullen ASC]

Well, certainly hundreds of 500w (if that's what they are, for example) lamps is a lot of light output, but then you have hundreds of extension cords to power them, you have to mount hundreds of lights to something usually. And if running them off of household power, then you can only load each circuit with 20 amps, which may be only three or four worklamps per circuit (not per outlet).

Worklamps are OK... but they are hard to gel, hard to control spill from, hard to aim/focus. I'd use them for a beginner's lighting package for bouncing and whatnot, but I wouldn't invest in hundreds of them -- if I had that much money, I'd start looking into some used movie lamps.

You have to ask yourself if you've got the power for hundreds of tungsten worklamps, like from a generator, it may be easier to deal with some 9 or 12-light MaxiBrutes or something if you need a bright backlight for a slow-motion rain sequence.

Let's say you are happy with the noise of the RED at 1000 ASA. So you need to compensate for running the camera at 120 fps, which is about 2 1/2 stops compared to 24 fps -- that means lighting your night exterior to something like a 160 to 200 ASA level. Possible with worklights in medium shots but probably not wide shots or where the lights are far back, like on a three-story apartment rooftop.

[David Mullen ASC]

Regarding hiring AC's, I just worked with a great one in NYC, Frank Rinato. I basically got his resume, liked his credits, saw that he's done a lot of night work (which tends to be near wide-open photography). I interviewed him, liked his quiet professional demeanor, hired him.

The thing with AC's is that you have to consider things like whether they've done a lot of A-camera 1st AC work or just B or C-camera 1st AC work. Sometimes when all someone has done is day-played here and there, you don't really know how good they are, or how well they can supervise a camera crew and equipment package over a long feature shoot. It's not just about focus-pulling.

There are unique qualities that an A-camera 1st AC on a narrative feature film has to have compared to someone shooting one or two day commercials, or pulling focus on the occasional B or C-camera. They are really part of the storytelling process -- they have to understand dealing with actors and sensitive scenes, about timing focus to emotion and dialogue. And they have to be in it for the long haul, day after day.

Good 1st AC's can be a bit temperamental sometimes, it's hard to describe without seeming like an insult, but the good ones are somewhat anal-retentive, it's such a demanding job that requires precision yet speed. They can be a bit like racehorses sometimes, the good ones. The really mellow ones are easier to work with of course, but I always get nervous when the 1st AC is too relaxed... :wink:

As for finding indie feature DP work, it's mainly about meeting directors and producers, the only people that can hire you. If that means doing some freebee short films now & then, working with recent film school graduates, whatever, that's what you have to do to build-up those contacts. It's a snowball effect, one feature credit at a time.

If "Northfork" had gone through a D.I., it would have looked a little different, not worse or better, just different. However, there is something unique about using the silver retention process on the prints (as we did) because you then can go beyond the D-max of the print stock and get these beautiful blacks with this silver grain in the image, which is wonderful. It conjures up some of the expressive textural qualities of b&w photography, that "sootiness".

[Shawn Nelson]

Hey David, after I tracked down some more of your diaries and read them, it seems you often smoke internal scenes. So for medium rooms (living rooms, kitchens, bedrooms, etc), what is your hazer of choice?

[David Mullen ASC]

I prefer real "hazemakers" over party foggers, etc. They put out a finer mist so there is less work in terms of wafting the smoke around.

http://www.rosco.com/uk/fog/hazemaker.asp
http://www.fogfactory.com/haze/haze.html
http://www.smokemachines.net/buy-hazers.shtml

Unfortunately, too often I've ended up with a cheap party fogger in a drafty location...

[Videoteque73]

Do hazers or smoke machines damage mechanics in tape camecorders (DV, HDV)???

[Mike Prevette]

Well considering it's evaporated Oil I would say in large quantities yes. but for most of my shoots we keep the door on the camera closed ;) i'm sure you could cause some issues if you aimed the fogger right into the camera body.

[Jeremy Teman]

I'm sure it's no worse on the camera than shooting outside downtown LA for an hour...

[Zk2007]

Well considering it's evaporated Oil I would say in large quantities yes. but for most of my shoots we keep the door on the camera closed ;) i'm sure you could cause some issues if you aimed the fogger right into the camera body.

Does this apply to normal fog machines too. I have no idea what their fluid is composed of.

[David Mullen ASC]

They are all similar, sort of a water-oil mixture that is heated up. With the cheap ones, I'd put a piece of cardboard underneath because it can get oily right around the nozzle, on the ground. I haven't had any real problems with a video camera or other electronics.

Making sure smoke detectors are turned off, now that's a problem. Always warn the locations person that you will be using a fogger so he can get the alarms turned off.

[Babu Kantamneni]

I have certain gaffers and key grips (and 1st AC's) that I try to get hired on first, but often either they are not available or I am working on a distant location where the production wants me to hire locally. So I have to interview new people now & then for different shows.

Thx David

[Billy Summers]

I've had a bit of an addiction to these devices and there light refracting qualities as well.

I too have found the "hazers" to be much finer and hang in the air much longer.
A "stadium hazer" ( I think it can run constantly for like 72 hrs or so)
is definitely the way to go (Foggers suck! I still use them when forced:pinch: )

...However
I worked on a show where practically every interior shot was Hazed. After a few rigorous weeks of this, we started getting an error with the camera (Varicam). We ended up switching it out for another, I guess the heads got gummed up and needed to be cleaned?

I don't know if it's a different fluid, or the Hazer just emits a finer mist(?) but it eventually finds it way into minute areas.
We also set off alarms, even ones that were covered with Gaff tape...

[ibloom]

I've had a bit of an addiction to these devices and there light refracting qualities as well.

I too have found the "hazers" to be much finer and hang in the air much longer.
A "stadium hazer" ( I think it can run constantly for like 72 hrs or so)
is definitely the way to go (Foggers suck! I still use them when forced:pinch: )

...However
I worked on a show where practically every interior shot was Hazed. After a few rigorous weeks of this, we started getting an error with the camera (Varicam). We ended up switching it out for another, I guess the heads got gummed up and needed to be cleaned?

I don't know if it's a different fluid, or the Hazer just emits a finer mist(?) but it eventually finds it way into minute areas.
We also set off alarms, even ones that were covered with Gaff tape...

I wonder if that's an issue for Red, since so much air is pulling through the camera. I realize the actual electronics are sealed off, but just something to consider with care and maintenance.

IBloom

[Zk2007]

On the other hand, RED has no recording heads, which seems to be the main problem when it comes to the oily mist from hazzers and foggers.

[Videoteque73]

Mechanics stinks! :sick:

I am sure with the RED you can save yourself of infinite mechanical errors!!! :love:

I once met an documentarist who got a camcorder messed up because he was recording near a volcano!!! :waaa: :waaa:

[Cail Young]

I don't know if it's a different fluid, or the Hazer just emits a finer mist(?) but it eventually finds it way into minute areas.
We also set off alarms, even ones that were covered with Gaff tape...

This is why you get the location owner to isolate the fire alarm in whatever area you're in.

[Shawn Nelson]

David, have you yet shot with the Red and do you have any plans to use it on a feature?

[David Mullen ASC]

I look forward to finding a feature project to shoot on the RED. I've only played around with the camera so far.

[Richard Darge]

David, have you reserved a Red?

[Shawn Nelson]

Hey David, sorry to ask you another gear question, but do you know what ringlight this is?

[David Mullen ASC]

Looks homemade, like a ring of MR16's.

No, I don't have a reservation. I'm not an equipment owner type... hasn't been necessary as a DP in my case.

If I ever go back into personal filmmaking, or have a huge windfall of money, I'd consider it.

[Panos Bournias]

Hi David I am interested in buying a set of prime S35mm lenses from Optica-Elite. The prices are reasonable and they look like a good solution for the red. I was wondering if you have ever tested these lenses or know someone else who did so. Any reviews...
Thank you
Panos

[rascom]

Hey David. This question might have been covered earlier in this thread, but do you consider it important for for over-all look and continuity of a feature (or a scene) to stay at the same focal length and f-stop, especially for cutting between master shots and close-ups so that DOF doesnt change too much. According to an interview with Darius Khondji, for each film he has shot, he has a main lens, say 27mm, that is used for most of that film. Do you think this important to a consistent perspective or do you think it is better to choose a specific lens and/or f-stop according to what the shot require?
Thanks

[David Mullen ASC]

There are no "rules" per se -- some people like the dynamic quality from jumping from extreme wide-angles to telephotos, for example. Commercials and music videos tend to do more of that. Michael Bay or James Cameron action movies.

Sticking to a limited focal length range and f-stop gives the footage a consistent tonal quality, ala "The Godfather" or other movies shot by Gordon Willis. Or look at Ozu's movies, all shot on a 50mm. It's a more restrained, elegant style.

The advantage of sticking to the same f-stop within a sequence is not just for visual consistency in depth of field (which will vary anyway by how close the subject is to the lens) but it also makes lighting continuity easier because you aren't relighting every set-up with wildly different levels. For example, if you lit a wide shot to f/2.8, you could change the key light on a close-up, but keep the f/2.8 level, and probably not have to change many of the background lights or the general fill level. However, if you lit the close-up to f/5.6, you'd have to relight the background as well, plus raise the fill light level to maintain the same contrast ratio.

[David Mullen ASC]

Hi David I am interested in buying a set of prime S35mm lenses from Optica-Elite. The prices are reasonable and they look like a good solution for the red. I was wondering if you have ever tested these lenses or know someone else who did so. Any reviews...
Thank you
Panos

I haven't used them so I can't give you any first-hand accounts, but I've heard good things about Elites generally in terms of sharpness.

[Shawn Nelson]

Sorry if this has been asked before, but what single shot of yours are you most proud of?

[David Mullen ASC]

I don't have any single shot. Many of my favorite shots have little to do with my skills, but the luck of capturing some great sky or something. Here are a few:

http://www.davidmullenasc.com/af11.jpg

http://www.davidmullenasc.com/tfi2.jpg

http://www.davidmullenasc.com/northfork31.jpg

http://www.davidmullenasc.com/shadowboxerDVD8.jpg

[Zk2007]

The advantage of sticking to the same f-stop within a sequence is not just for visual consistency in depth of field (which will vary anyway by how close the subject is to the lens) but it also makes lighting continuity easier because you aren't relighting every set-up with wildly different levels. For example, if you lit a wide shot to f/2.8, you could change the key light on a close-up, but keep the f/2.8 level, and probably not have to change many of the background lights or the general fill level. However, if you lit the close-up to f/5.6, you'd have to relight the background as well, plus raise the fill light level to maintain the same contrast ratio.

Yes, it really makes things easier and that's what I normally do when filming indoors. I guess there's little reason not to do it that way in an internal shot. With externals I can understand that playing with the iris may make thing easier sometimes, but inside I can't really think of a reason not to film in a constant T-stop.

[MarkusKloiber]

David,
I could stick with some technical issues e.g. How Did you Achive that Mood/Shot/Scene in The Astronaut Farmer, Northfork ...
But if i get this chance to "ask anything" i'd ask:
WHAT'S YOUR INSPIRATION FOR FRAMING, YOUR LIGHTING, YOUR CAMERA MOVES, YOUR WORK IN GENERAL?
Do you see pictures when listening to Music and/or vice versa?
What's your inspiration when it comes to "writing with motion"?
What's the nutrition of your imagination, your intuition?
I remember an interview with M.Ballhaus and Chris Doyle talking about the cultural influences of American vs. European cinematographers.
two people will perceive the same sunrise differently-what's your opinion on that?

[Rudi Herbert]

David,

Finally got to see the Astronaut Farmer on DVD. The encoding is terrible, some parts of look like the very first attempts at encoding MPG2 on the hardware assisted home computer of ten years ago. Disservice to your hard work and everybody else who labored to make the film as good as it could be. BUT, have to say that it is the first time I feel the photography elevate an otherwise average film to a higher level. The low (by American standards) budget of the film shows, and the premise, though original, never climbs above just being a cool idea, and the story and characters, though likeable, progress with the predictability of a soap opera. But I loved the warmth and intimacy and coziness the lighting gives all the family scenes at the dinner table, the hangar, etc, and the rich glow and expansive palette of the exterior shots. It's easy to see Storaro's genius on something like the Last Emperor, or Doyle's uniqueness on Hero, but to make Astronaut look so big and rich, that's also the work of an accomplished craftman. Congratulations!

[David Mullen ASC]

The DVD encoding on "Akeelah and the Bee" is really horrible too.

--

I'm an American, culturally, but also being half-Japanese, raised around Japanese art in the household, there is a little of that influence there.

I was also raised mainly out in the Mojave desert, so I suppose there is an aesthetic that develops from growing up in a wide-open space like that - maybe that's why I like CinemaScope so much...

I'm also a big fan of John Ford and David Lean movies, and I think that love of landscapes creeps into my work.

I've always liked expressiveness in color and contrast, which is perhaps one reason I'm drawn to the work of Storaro or Doyle, or old 3-strip Technicolor movies, like those shot by Jack Cardiff or Leon Shamroy. But I love b&w movies too. Maybe what interests me is non-real ways color can be manipulated, either pulled out or increased.

But for me, it has to be justified by the material, and some material really needs a delicate hand, an honest and natural presentation of the story.

Straight-up Realism though, in general, bores me a bit. Though some stories need it.

--

In terms of specific inspiration, that varies per movie. I wanted "Astronaut Farmer" to be reminiscent of Norman Rockwell paintings and Mercury-era NASA, sort of 50's retro meets the Old West. For "Northfork", it was the winter landscape paintings of Andrew Wyeth. For "Twin Falls Idaho", it was the color symbolism of Munch meeting the light and framing of Hopper.

[TimPipher]

Hello David. Let's say a TV producer is deciding among three cameras for his new TV show and is meeting with three camera owners.

Camera owner one says "My camera is 4K, so it's going to produce a better image than the other two".

Camera owner two says "My camera is only 2K, but for output to TV, it won't make any difference vs. 4K".

Camera owner three says "My camera is 1920 x 1080p full raster HD -- that means it's 1.92K. 1.92K is virtually the same as 2K, and for TV it wouldn't make a difference anyway".

I know there are many other factors/specs for consideration in choosing a camera for TV, but based strictly on resolution, would camera owner three be correct?

If the question were for blow up to 35 mm film instead of TV, would it be a completely different answer?

[Stephen Williams]

Hello David. Let's say a TV producer is deciding among three cameras for his new TV show and is meeting with three camera owners.

Camera owner one says "My camera is 4K, so it's going to produce a better image than the other two".

Camera owner two says "My camera is only 2K, but for output to TV, it won't make any difference vs. 4K".

Camera owner three says "My camera is 1920 x 1080p full raster HD -- that means it's 1.92K. 1.92K is virtually the same as 2K, and for TV it wouldn't make a difference anyway".

I know there are many other factors/specs for consideration in choosing a camera for TV, but based strictly on resolution, would camera owner three be correct?

If the question were for blow up to 35 mm film instead of TV, would it be a completely different answer?

Hi,

I would ask what lenses you & the other cameras owners were going to use. Good lenses will cost way more than the camera body, that applies to a Red or a Viper for that matter.

Stephen

[TimPipher]

Hi,

I would ask what lenses you & the other cameras owners were going to use. Good lenses will cost way more than the camera body, that applies to a Red or a Viper for that matter.

Stephen

Hello Stephen. Of course you're right, and there are other factors too, I'm sure, but simplifying everything down to 4K vs. 2K vs 1.92K, I wonder what the answer is?

Your point does lead to other interesting questions though, like RED with their 18-50 mm zoom versus the Panasonic HPX3000 with a CAC enabled Canon zoom (virtually equal to good quality primes according to the Panasonic brochure), but I figured I wouldn't make the question too specific.

[David Mullen ASC]

Well, that's the thing, I don't believe in reducing things down to a level that has no practical value. I'm sure it would be possible to design a really crappy 4K camera and a really fantastic HD camera, so pixel resolution of the camera alone would not be enough information to make a decision.

And in truth, not all 1920 x 1080 cameras are the same, resolution-wise. A Sony F23 and a Sony HVR-V1U can both do 1080i recordings, but that doesn't put them in the same ballpark, image quality-wise.

I think for HD broadcast, the resolution differences between a 4K, 2K, and pro HD camera are not going to be the deciding factor, assuming that all three cameras are of decent quality with good optics and minimal artifact problems, etc. At that point, since they all may seem similar in resolution in an HD broadcast, the deciding factors may be things like 35mm-style depth of field, dynamic range closer to that of film, color, workflow, ability to do chroma-keying, etc. And cost, of course.

If I were a smart producer faced with such options, I'd probably insist on seeing some comparison tests before I made up my mind.

[Charles Adams]

David, and community, I apologize if this has already been asked and answered but I thought I'd ask again anyway:

David, which equipment/gear do you own and bring to nearly every shoot other than your wits and skills? There any items you do not rent and prefer to own instead?

I notice some cinematographers own a lot of their equipment for example while others do not. Just wondering what you considered essential.

Thanks for such an invaluable thread!

[Zk2007]

Hey David. I talked to a director today who wants me to shoot a movie for him in HD. As he started talking about low-key, noir, lots of shadows, night exteriors, etc, the word “nightmare” started forming in my mind. I’m glad we were talking on the phone and he couldn’t see my face. The thing is noir, low-key, lots of shadows in HD is suicide in my opinion unless you like noise. I have done it once and I wasn’t happy with the results. But judging by his enthusiasm I would say he’s pretty bent on that style. I’m meeting him tomorrow to discuss the project and it would be great to come already with a semi-formed opinion about the matter. Based on my prior experience I would just try to convince him to shoot film, even if S16 or abandon the low-key idea. But I thought I would ask your opinion on the subject before talking to him. What would be your approach to shoot a project like this in terms of avoiding noise and other problems related to HD in this case scenario?
As of now I have no idea of budget yet.
Thanks.

[Shawn Nelson]

Hey David. I talked to a director today who wants me to shoot a movie for him in HD. As he started talking about low-key, noir, lots of shadows, night exteriors, etc, the word “nightmare” started forming in my mind. I’m glad we were talking on the phone and he couldn’t see my face. The thing is noir, low-key, lots of shadows in HD is suicide in my opinion unless you like noise. I have done it once and I wasn’t happy with the results. But judging by his enthusiasm I would say he’s pretty bent on that style. I’m meeting him tomorrow to discuss the project and it would be great to come already with a semi-formed opinion about the matter. Based on my prior experience I would just try to convince him to shoot film, even if S16 or abandon the low-key idea. But I thought I would ask your opinion on the subject before talking to him. What would be your approach to shoot a project like this in terms of avoiding noise and other problems related to HD in this case scenario?
As of now I have no idea of budget yet.
Thanks.

Uh...why not just recommend to shoot on Red? It's deeper into the blacks than even 35mm from most anecdotal reports.

[Zk2007]

RED is not widely available yet.

[David Mullen ASC]

I posted these shots before from "The Quiet", shot in HD on the F900:

http://www.davidmullenasc.com/quiet1.jpg

http://www.davidmullenasc.com/quiet2.jpg

http://www.davidmullenasc.com/quiet6.jpg

I had a little noise problems with a few dark blue-lit scenes visible in the 35mm film-out, but I could have avoided it if I had used a little more light and had not used +3db gain on some shots, in retrospect (I didn't see the noise on an HD monitor.) HDCAM has a particularly noisy blue channel.

There is no reason why dark & shadowy scenes in HD have to be noisy; noise is mainly due to underexposed footage being lightened in some way in post, or by boosting the gain in camera, or by lifting the shadows up. Just light the scenes in such a way that you are not "lifting" the shot in anyway, in camera or in post. Don't use Black Gamma (Stretch) to lower contrast in the shadows, don't use gain, don't underexpose too much. Then it should be fairly clean-looking in post, especially if you bring it down slightly in post, crush the blacks a little.

Of course, you may be referring to a particularly noisy HD camera like the HVX200...

RED isn't particular "better" for blacks -- blacks in digital color-correction is just a matter of where you want to set the blacks. You can't get blacker than "0". But RED might be less noisy in the shadows than whatever HD camera Zeke or Zak was thinking of using. Again, though, it's really a matter of exposure in terms of controlling noise.

I actually think digital cameras are well-suited for low-key shadowy photography -- it's high-key sunny stuff that can be the problem.

[David Mullen ASC]

David, which equipment/gear do you own and bring to nearly every shoot other than your wits and skills?

I have an incident and a spot meter, that's about it.

I mean, I always carry a small high-powered flashlight in my kit as a prop if needed for a flashlight scene, in case the props person doesn't get one bright-enough. At home, I have a Chinese Lantern, a piece of foamcore, and a wooden diffusion frame of 216 that I drag around when I have to shoot a test or the occasional interview. I don't take them to my feature shoots usually since they have that stuff for me.

I have considered buying some filters, maybe diffusion, that I tend to use many times. I am also considering getting a LitePanels LED onboard light as an eyelight. They are making a really small, lightweight one that uses four AA batteries, that will be sold in January. Seems very simple to use and set-up into a camera.

I'm pretty hesistant to spend money...

[Shawn Nelson]

David,
What type of movie do you really want to do? A monster sized period epic (Gladiator'esque), Sci-Fi, ... etc?

[Matthew Bennett]

At home, I have a Chinese Lantern, a piece of foamcore, and a wooden diffusion frame....

I'm pretty hesistant to spend money...

Wow, what a monk! I picture you in a sparse room with your lantern, single piece of foamcore and wooden frame...

I don't understand.. between shoots, don't you get the urge to shoot things and experiment without direction? Or do you only get to shoot during a feature, and leave it at that, all the rest of the time spent 'theorizing'? Interesting way of life. How do you get creative in your down time?

[David Mullen ASC]

Shooting a feature is pretty intensive work, so the couple of months until the next one comes along is a good time to do something other than shooting, like catching up on movies, going to equipment shows, ASC meetings, writing articles for magazines, travelling, reading books, etc. I appear on panel discussions, speak to students. I've been doing some writing for the next edition of the ASC Manual.

You need periods of activity and reflectivity, time to digest what you've learned on your last shoot. So going immediately from shoot to shoot doesn't appeal to me. That develops certain skills, of course, but you never have time to step back and re-evaluate.

As for having my own camera to run tests, that appeals to me, but since I generally shoot 35mm, buying a 35mm camera and shooting and posting tests with it on my own dime is not really in my budget. I save my testing for a particular production.

As for personal projects, I used to do that back before I became a professional cinematographer and someday I might go back to that between jobs.

[Phil Becque]

Hi David,

I should start by saying that I don't know very much about photography, film cameras, or cine lenses. I've completed a few DV docs as a one man band, the last one won a couple of awards and was described as "mind alteringly cinematic" which I'll take as a huge compliment. Looks like I got something right by accident! Anyway.

There's a shot in 'Jaws' where Rod Schnieder is on the beach and he sees the great white shark for the first time attacking a child in the water. The camera seems to push in to his face quite rapidly going from a wide shot to an ECU. I hope you can remember the shot I mean? It's a pit of the stomach moment for the audience.

The question I have is: what do you have to do at the camera end to make this sort of shot work?

I can understand you need to dolly in quite rapidly - but what sort of lens would you imagine they used?

And how did they set that up and operate the camera controls to get that effect?

I'd like to try a shot like that one day, so any pointers you can give me about how to set up my RED (when I get it) would be deeply appreciated.

Many thanks, Phil

[fergus]

hey Phil,

you do that by moving the camera and zooming in the opposite direction. This changes the background from "compressed" as you get with a telephoto lens (50mm upwards on a motion film camera, the RED1, or a cropped DSLR) to open with more depth of field in focus as you get with a wide angle lens, or vice versa..
You can try it with any video camera: choose an object in the frame, and walk towards it or away from it keeping the object the same size in the frame by using the zoom.

But then you probably know this all already..

"mind alteringly cinematic"!! Fantastic.. :-)

[Timage]

It's called the vertigo effect. Hitchcock made this "visual effect" famous first used in his film Vertigo.
Spielberg once said, you should only use this effect 2 times in a movie. 1 zoom in, 2 zoom out. Otherwise it will loose its worth.

Jaws is a good example of doing it right.

Cheers
Tim

[Phil Becque]

hey Phil,

you do that by moving the camera and zooming in the opposite direction. This changes the background from "compressed" as you get with a telephoto lens (50mm upwards on a motion film camera, the RED1, or a cropped DSLR) to open with more depth of field in focus as you get with a wide angle lens, or vice versa..
You can try it with any video camera: choose an object in the frame, and walk towards it or away from it keeping the object the same size in the frame by using the zoom.

But then you probably know this all already..

"mind alteringly cinematic"!! Fantastic.. :-)

Hey Fergus -thanks for the info - no I didn't know that. Very helpful, what about the focus and aperture? I guess you have pull focus really well to get the desired effect? Would you normally keep the same aperture?

So for this effect you push in but zoom back to a wider shot? Have I got that right?

Yeah - I'm over the moon about the compliment - must have been the Art Beats time lapse stock footage - ooopps what a give away . . . . I did get a handful of nice shots in the project from my visits to Yosemite but that was more luck than judgement.

Cheers, Phil

[Phil Becque]

It's called the vertigo effect. Hitchcock made this "visual effect" famous first used in his film Vertigo.
Spielberg once said, you should only use this effect 2 times in a movie. 1 zoom in, 2 zoom out. Otherwise it will loose its worth.

Jaws is a good example of doing it right.

Cheers
Tim

Hi Tim, Ahh Hitchcock heh? Funny I don't remember that - I'll have to get Vertigo now and look out for it - top steer - thanks.

I'm not sure how this works dramatically in reverse though - zooming out?

Any thoughts or examples on that?

Cheers, Phil

[fergus]

Dramatically I think the idea is often that the compression/decompression of the background reflects the mental state of the character.

You have to pull focus, zoom and move the dolly in unison. So not an easy shot then..:whistling:

[Stephen Webb]

You'll see it pop up in Top Gear a lot too, as they tend to zoom in from the camera car whilst accelerating away rapidly (& vice versa).

Doing it slowly is cool. I seem to remember a shot in Ken Branagh's Hamlet that utilised this effect for a single shot lasting several minutes (and that was shot in 70mm too!)

[Phil Becque]

Dramatically I think the idea is often that the compression/decompression of the background reflects the mental state of the character.

You have to pull focus, zoom and move the dolly in unison. So not an easy shot then..:whistling:

Yeah - AND have your actor change their expression at the same time - ouch! I wonder how many takes that needs! But thanks I get the idea!

[David Mullen ASC]

Yes, because the camera is moving towards or away from the subject, you have to follow focus. The tricky part, unless you set-up an elaborate motion-control rig as they did for "Quick and the Dead", is timing the speed of the zoom and dolly and getting them (the 1st AC or operator on the zoom motor and the dolly grip) to start and stop at the same time, unless you can just use the middle of the effect in editing. Requires a number of takes to get the timing right.

You are basically limited by the zoom range of the lens. The 18-50mm zoom on the RED would give you a shorter duration effect (unless you did it very slowly) compared to a 10:1 zoom.

Whether you dolly-in/zoom-out or the reverse just depends on whether you want to gradually go to a wide-angle close-up or a telephoto close-up. As you zoom out to a wide-angle while pushing in, the increasingly wide-angle perspective makes the background look like it is shrinking away from the subject.

Spielberg also did the effect in "E.T.", a high-angle hilltop view of the neighborhood.

"The Mission" did the effect when DeNiro after kills his brother and he stands looking down at the body, holding the sword.

"Good Fellas" used for the 2-shot of DeNiro and Liotta in the booth of the diner talking. I believe that Scorsese and Balhous used the effect in other movies too like "Color of Money."

Yes, Hitchcock did it first for "Vertigo", but for Jimmy Stewart's POV shots using a miniature. When Hitchcock was told it would cost thousands of dollars to build a bell tower interior miniature that the camera could crane up and down inside of while looking straight-down, Hitchcock them to turn the miniature on its side so the camera could run horizontally, which was cheaper.

[Phil Becque]

You are basically limited by the zoom range of the lens. The 18-50mm zoom on the RED would give you a shorter duration effect (unless you did it very slowly) compared to a 10:1 zoom.


If I could hire 'any 35mm' zoom for this - and the subject is a persons face 12 feet away and you wanted to get to 4 feet and still have a clean ECU shot - would you have any recommendations?


Whether you dolly-in/zoom-out or the reverse just depends on whether you want to gradually go to a wide-angle close-up or a telephoto close-up.

Hmmm ?


As you zoom out to a wide-angle while pushing in, the increasingly wide-angle perspective makes the background look like it is shrinking away from the subject.

Ahh ha ! Yeah that's what I want - thanks!


Yes, Hitchcock did it first for "Vertigo", but for Jimmy Stewart's POV shots using a miniature. When Hitchcock was told it would cost thousands of dollars to build a bell tower interior miniature that the camera could crane up and down inside of while looking straight-down, Hitchcock them to turn the miniature on its side so the camera could run horizontally, which was cheaper.

Old Alf - he knew how to save a bob or two for his lunch! Ho ho!

Thanks David - very instructive - I tried just zooming in on one of my interview takes to emphasize something I knew was important - it only "sort of worked" - I hadn't thought about the subtulties at that point.

Cheers, Phil

[David Mullen ASC]

All that matters is that you pick a zoom that focuses as closely as you will need and has the zoom range that you need.

[tonaci]

Hi David,

During a recent discussion with a DP, it seemed like he was more comfortable shooting film because when he established a certain look/feel/mood/tone on set with film it was more "permanent" in a sense. However, when shooting digitally in raw with a camera like RED..when the footage is handed over, there is some concern over how much more control to the image is given to the person working with the footage in post. How do you feel about this?

[David Mullen ASC]

Well, it all depends on how the footage is handled in post. I would argue the opposite in some ways, in that when I shoot film or digital, I know the results I will get (and be even more confident with digital, since it is WYSIWYG), but whether the dailies will be accurate tends to be much more of a problem with film due to the amount of control that a telecine colorist has over the material.

At least when I shoot HD, I just hand a tape over for dubbing.

Now, that has been HDCAM shoots -- I haven't done a feature yet where I was shooting with a camera recording 10-bit LOG where I'd need dailies converted through a LUT.

I'd probably set-up a basic conversion for the dailies people to use to reduce variables.

This does bring up an issue regarding the ASA settings in RED that I need to discuss with RED team, because I feel they can give you misleading results when you convert the files. Not a real problem, per se, more of a conceptual or procedural issue.

I do have a general feeling in regards to skintones in digital -- that film tends to have a "default" skintone when you shoot and print it, whereas sometimes in digital color-correction, you are hunting around for whatever combination of shades makes up what you can all agree on is a "normal" fleshtone. Sometimes I feel like I'm making up some color called skintone, and a day later, I'd probably do it differently. That can be frustrating.

[Timage]

Hi Phil

It can help the storytelling in boht ways. Zoom in and zoom out. By zooming in you can pic a certain detail in the background that is important. Maybe a bad guy that hides some where. By zooming out you can show more of the whole location. Maybe theres a knight standing on a hill looking down on the battlefield.
By zoomin out and approaching the knight at the same time you can see more and more of the battlefield. The Knight in the foreground doesen't change but the battlefield gets bigger and bigger. Maybe the knight is scared of the big army, this vertigo effect could help showing that. Because suddenly the audience can see why he's so scared.

This works also the other way around. Maybe there is the knights biggest enemy on that field. By zooming in and moving back you can see that enemy
in the crowd sticking out.

I hope I could help you with that poor man's explenation. David could say it much better I guess.

Cheers

Tim

[krd]

It can help the storytelling in boht ways.

Maybe so, but because this effect can't happen in "real life", it can and does create a sense of unease on screen.

Clearly, disorientation was the rationale behind using this technique in Vertigo, and the same is true of the diner shot in Goodfellas.

When the effect is used for no other reason than to change the emphasis in a shot, it may call attention to itself. The laws of perception are being violated, and you wonder, why?

[number6]

Tim, both yours and David's comments certainly added to my knowledge base. But I am wondering if there are any negatives to shooting some low magnification fixed lens or another, and dollying up to a subject until the face/object is almost full frame? Pros or cons... both? David?

[David Mullen ASC]

I'm not sure what you mean by "low magnification fixed lens". Are you asking if there is a problem with dollying into an ECU using a wide-angle lens, assuming it can focus that closely?

[number6]

I'm not sure what you mean by "low magnification fixed lens". Are you asking if there is a problem with dollying into an ECU using a wide-angle lens, assuming it can focus that closely?

No, not a wide angle. Probably will go with Nikon mounts and was thinking using a 35mm lens and simply moving toward a subject with no zooming from the lens. Just an approach, but not an extreme close-up. probably would only fill up the 2k portion of the sensor while shooting in 4k. May not do this, just wondering what the effect would be.

[Phil Becque]

Hi Tim and krd,

Tim, I get what your saying about where the emphasis changes in the shot - and I like that idea. I hadn't thought of that as a narrative device; but I see now how it could come in handy. Good stuff! I have to say that's been one of my problems, with just starting out making films, is getting familiar with all the film 'language' that's available.

At the moment I'm literally shooting in the dark through lack of knowledge and experience - though I do enjoy pushing myself up the learning curve with all the help that's available on this forum. It's a real treasure - so thanks everybody!

And krd I really see your point as well - you don't want the shot to draw attention to itself - but you still want the audience to feel uneasy in some way. I think that's a really fine line to tread. And you do see the pro's get that wrong from time to time.

I remember the first time I saw handheld camera work on 'Alien' - I was nearly sick in the theatre - it was very effective as an unsettling device but it was also horrible to look at - I kind of jumped out of the film at that point which was a pity as it had been so good up until then. Maybe it was just overdone?

Then all this handheld stuff became very fashionable in UK televison productions as an artifice to try and inject edgyness when nothing was really happening in the plot. It's just awful - get a better story line with some real tension it for pete's sake!

Anyway I'll get off my soapbox now.

Thanks for all the comments on this - I'm going to give it a shot and see how it turns out!

All the best, Phil

[Phil Becque]

All that matters is that you pick a zoom that focuses as closely as you will need and has the zoom range that you need.

Hi David, Yep I can see that's important because you want all the movement to happen together and in sync for the same ammount of time.

Thanks for your help.

All the best, Phil

[Zk2007]

I posted these shots before from "The Quiet", shot in HD on the F900.

I had a little noise problems with a few dark blue-lit scenes visible in the 35mm film-out, but I could have avoided it if I had used a little more light and had not used +3db gain on some shots, in retrospect (I didn't see the noise on an HD monitor.) HDCAM has a particularly noisy blue channel.

There is no reason why dark & shadowy scenes in HD have to be noisy; noise is mainly due to underexposed footage being lightened in some way in post, or by boosting the gain in camera, or by lifting the shadows up. Just light the scenes in such a way that you are not "lifting" the shot in anyway, in camera or in post. Don't use Black Gamma (Stretch) to lower contrast in the shadows, don't use gain, don't underexpose too much. Then it should be fairly clean-looking in post, especially if you bring it down slightly in post, crush the blacks a little.

Of course, you may be referring to a particularly noisy HD camera like the HVX200...

RED isn't particular "better" for blacks -- blacks in digital color-correction is just a matter of where you want to set the blacks. You can't get blacker than "0". But RED might be less noisy in the shadows than whatever HD camera Zeke or Zak was thinking of using. Again, though, it's really a matter of exposure in terms of controlling noise.

I actually think digital cameras are well-suited for low-key shadowy photography -- it's high-key sunny stuff that can be the problem.

In my prior experience shooting low-key in HD I noticed that unless I would crash the blacks or accept minimum shadow detail or none at all, the result would be noise. If I tried to get a decent level of detail in the shadows it would turn into a milky brown and very noise. I’m pretty sure HDCAM is better but I was shooting DVCPRO-HD with the HVX200 as you guessed. I was trying to get the look in camera as close as possible but in the end we had to choose either shadow detail or cleaner blacks (crushing them in post). As the action in the shadows was important we had to live with the noise. So for this time around I thought about trying to get the look more in post, shooting more flat and brighter and adding contrast and darkening the picture in post while lightly crushing blacks to a point where the level of shadow detail is still acceptable and pray it will be low-key/high contrast enough to get the right look. But I’m not sure this is the best approach for a compressed format and I’m sure we won’t be shooting RAW.
I have no idea of what format they want to shoot yet as he said he was still looking at his options and budget and that we could talk about it in person today. But by the sound of it I don’t think they can afford HDCAM.
The frames you posted look great. I remember seeing Star Wars on theaters and it being way noiser. There were some low light shots that were really bad.

[Matthew Rogers]

Hey David, I'm looking at buying an 8x8 overhead to add to my grip gear. While I will expand the different fabrics I have for it in the future (currently getting black solid, single net, double net, and some kind of silk) I am trying to figure out what kind of diffusion I want to get. I saw that on Cinematography.org that you said china silk has more of a star pattern/spotting effect that grid cloth. I would like more even diffusion, so I thought that maybe a 1/4 grid might be a better choice for me (more overhead/side use with the sun.)

Also, do you know if any grip companies make a 4x4 checkerboard bounce that fits on a 4x4 frame? I liked the idea of getting a 4x4 frame with a bounce instead of a 42"x42" hard reflector since I could use it in other situations also.

Of course, I could just be fooling myself!

Matthew

[David Mullen ASC]

Usually 6x6 is the smallest frame I see material stretched over -- people usually glue material to 4x4 frames with snot tape and whatnot. A checkerboard pattern on a 4x4 area seems rather small to have much point compared to a solid color of whatever tone you want.

The advantage to silk, even though it is not the most efficient of diffusers, is that it doesn't snap as much in the wind compared to other materials, so I still use it.

When I need a lighter amount of diffusion, I like the to use Half Soft Frost, which is similar to Opal in diffusing strength, sort of a shower curtain material. You only lose a half-stop of exposure under the stuff, so it's not so distracting when people walk from full sun to being under the diffusion (though I usually clip some tree branches to the edge of the frame so you don't see the obvious shadow pattern of the frame and material tied to it pass over the actor's faces.)

So Silk and Half Soft Frost are the two types of large overhead diffusers I tend to carry. I haven't tried 1/4 Grid yet.

[cineben]

Hi David,
Your participation in this forum is a great resource to disseminate such specialized knowledge that stems from someone of your experience. Especially in what can be an 'evasive' industry at times.

I have a couple of questions concerning your fstop of choice.
What system do you use to figure out which fstop gives you the sharpest resolution for a given lens?
What is the sweet spot you like to work in for a lens stop?
...and for focal lengths...
What focal lengths do you prefer to work with on a given shoot?
When choosing your lenses for a production, do you typically choose a selection that covers the complete gamut of ranges by mixing zoom and fixed, or do you specifically choose certain focal lengths? (If you are not committed to the specifics of the storyboarding)

Thanks David,
Ben Garvey

[David Mullen ASC]

The general rule is that most lenses are sharpest two stops closed down from wide-open, although my general rule is that most lenses benefit from being closed-down by one-stop.

However, it's hard to ignore the fact that large night exteriors, for example, usually require pretty wide-open stops.

Not all movies have to be shot at the optimal f-stop anyway -- some might want to effect of a lenses that has some softness when shot wide-open, for example. For example, most 35mm anamorphic lenses need to be stopped-down to f/4 at least to reduce the anamorphic distortions and get a decent depth of field, but many DP's love to shoot them at f/2.8 for the optical distortions and super shallow-focus look.

I mainly pick a set of lenses that will cover all the sorts of shots that the director may want. I'm not much of a fan of super wide-angle shots myself so when putting together a lens package, I have to ask the director whether he thinks he'll want someting as wide-angle as a 14mm, let's say (in 35mm photography). Or conversely, how often he thinks we'll be using lenses longer than 200mm. Because invariably at some point, the line producer will be asking me to trim the size of the package down if I simply put every prime and zoom lens I think we might use at some point. Gets worse with anamorphic since those can be 3X the cost of renting spherical lenses.

For example, if we plan on doing a lot of macro work, I might carry a macro lens on the package, but if it is only the occasional tight insert, usually I can get that on the long end of the zoom, and use a mild diopter filter if necessary, so I won't carry a macro for the whole show. Sometimes I'll carry something odd like the 45mm slant-focus lens, if I think I'll get some milage out of that.

As for whether to use a set of Zeiss Super-Speeds, Panavision Primos, Cooke S4's, Zeiss Ultra Primes, etc. it depends on the budget, the look of the show, where the cameras are being rented, how fast do I need my lenses to be, etc. Then I usually have to get a decent zoom that intercuts OK with the primes.

Generally on a spherical show, I'll light night interiors to T/2.8, night exteriors to T/2.0, and day interiors to a higher stop like T/4 or T/5.6, just because I hate using ND gel on windows so would rather build-up the interior level to balance somewhat with the view. But there are always exceptions -- you may have a day interior scene that needs to be lit much lower or much higher for some reason. You may have a night exterior shot that needs a zoom, so you have to light for that level, since most zooms are slower.

On an anamorphic show, I try and get another stop of light, so T/4 for night interiors, T/2.8 for night exteriors (partly because anamorphic lenses like the C-Series don't go faster than T/2.8 anyway.) And the anamorphic zooms are often only a T/4.5 wide-open, so you need basically an T/5.6 level.

Also, you have to be prepared for slow-motion shots. If I know that the director is going to want a 48 fps version of the set-up, I'll try and light to a higher level than a T/2.8 at 24 fps because I don't necessarily want to shoot at T/2.0 for the 48 fps shot. But sometimes you have to.

I'm not a DP who likes to shoot wide-open all the time. Coming from low-budget indie movies shot quickly, I think it slows you down even though you'd think it makes lighting easier. But generally it takes just as much time to set-up a 1K as it does a 650w light, and I'd rather have a better chance of getting the take in focus right away than to lose time having to get a lot of focus marks and a lot of takes because the depth of field is so shallow.

Generally, for most dramas, I like the look of medium focal lengths, since they have a very neutral and natural perspective, not distorted one direction or the other. But generally I pick a focal length for the amount of optical compression I want in the shot. Even something as simple as an over-the-shoulder 2-shot feels different when shot on a 50mm versus a 75mm.

[fergus]

Hi David, I had the pleasure of watching La Vie en Rose last night. Only on DVD though..
Have you seen it yet? The DP, Tetsuo Nagata, lit it very dark. In many scenes the practicals are much brighter than the actors and in most of the movie, the shadows (most of the screen) are allowed to go completely to black.
Are there any rules when lighting this close to the edge? I'm wondering how dark you can light the face of your main character? And are there any issues with noise when trying this with a Digital camera? (I'm thinking of macgregor's currently fascinating "Issues" thread..).

thanks

[visakk]

How do you watch movies for introspection of good cinematography.
Certainly I cannot tell the difference between Oscar nominated movie and a Oscar winning movie(for Best cinematography).
Like many movie goers, we are attracted by flashy camera work,how should we approach movie watching for good cinematography.

[Shadow]

Hi David, I was already reading with attention your reply in Cinematography, I just found this thread here and it is very instructive. Always nice to have the "point de vue" from an ASC. I will try to catching up.

[David Mullen ASC]

I'm wondering how dark you can light the face of your main character? And are there any issues with noise when trying this with a Digital camera?

There are a couple of issues jumbled up in there. In terms of how underexposed an object can be and still be visible, that can be tested for. It also depends on how the image will be post color-corrected and presented. On film, generally I think a Caucasian face that is 3-stops underexposed will feel very dark but also clearly visible (depending on pale they are, considering I'm talking about an incident light meter reading.) Any more underexposed than that and the face will still be visible, but be close to dropping out on some print stocks, or if you start crushing the blacks in post, etc. Generally four-stops under is really dark and five-stops under is black, but it really depends on the reflectivity of the subject. On a digital camera, you can see right there on a monitor if there is shadow detail or not, so it's not so hard.

But there is also the issue of tonal range in the shot, whether a face feels darker because it is juxtaposed against a bright background, for example. A lot of this is psychological. Our eyes tend to like a frame with a bright highlight and a pure black somewhere in the frame, no matter how the majority of the image is exposed. When Nestor Almendros shot "Goin' South", he had a scene in a gold mine that was very underexposed on the faces and walls of the cave, but because there was always a bright lantern somewhere in the frame, the viewer does not think the shot is accidentally underexposed because there is a bright highlight in the shot somewhere. Without it, if the brightest thing in the frame is three or four stops underexposed, it tends to look murky. Hence why dark film noir movies always tend to have a small streetlamp or wall practical in the background when the character is in the shadows.

Noise is overall, so if you are exposing and printing or color-correcting at a decent level where the overall noise is low, then having most of the frame in darkness won't give you a noisy image. Noise tends to appear when you are giving the frame an overall low level of exposure and having to process or color-correct it back up in brightness.

For example, the black level in film really depends on where the blacks are set in processing and then how it is presented. Let's say you process unexposed film, as if you shot with the lens cap on, no image on the negative at all. Well, you can't get "blacker" than that on the negative, no information recorded whatsoever. Now how black the blacks will look in a print of that blank negative will just be a function of the printer lights used (low numbers require more light and high numbers use less light.) So if the blank negative was printed at 15, 15, 15, the blacks will be milky. If the print is made at 40, 40, 40 (the scale is 1-50), then the blacks will be very solid.

Same goes for digital -- you can't get much blacker than shooting with the lens cap on, let's say, with the camera at 0 db (no gain). So how noisy that black will get will depend on how much you push that signal in post color-correcting. Or shooting with the RED at 100 ASA, let's say -- you can have a dark scene with the frame mostly made up with pure black and it won't be noisy. But process it as a 1600 ASA image, or simply brighten it in post, and it will become a noisy image. So dark shadows in the frame per se doesn't mean you always get a noisy image -- how much that signal has to be lifted or boosted or stretched in the shadows will determine how noisy it gets, and that may be based on how you originally exposed the key subject in the frame and then how bright you need it to be in post.

[Joe Carney]

for the DIY crowd, there is a site called
http://www.kitebuilder.com that sells bolts of rip stop nylon (gridcloth) at various weights and colors. I purchased white..60yds at 5' wide of .65 ounce per yard (nearly translucent at that weight) for under 300.00 USD. That was on sale. They have by the yard prices from 2.50 to 15.00 depending on what and how much you get.
If any section has defects, they will replace it.

I purchased enough to make an almost 30'x30'. I'm having a problem finding someone to sew it together for me at the moment.

[David Mullen ASC]

How do you watch movies for introspection of good cinematography.
Certainly I cannot tell the difference between Oscar nominated movie and a Oscar winning movie(for Best cinematography).
Like many movie goers, we are attracted by flashy camera work,how should we approach movie watching for good cinematography.

Well, who wins the Best Cinematography Oscar is very much a matter of things outside the cinematography itself (how the votes split, for example) -- the nominations in a sense matter more since only cinematographers are allowed to make the nominations, whereas the whole Academy votes on the winner. I don't give much thought as to the actual winner in terms of its artistic significance, other than it's great honor and career boost for the winner. On the long shot I ever get a nomination, I'm sure I'll start caring a lot more as to who wins...

Don't discount the aesthetic pleasure of looking at beautiful images -- that's as much a part of the cinematic process as anything else, even if it may be devoid of much intellectual meaning. Why do you think so many European art filmmakers put beautiful actresses in their movies (Bergman, Truffaut, etc.)? Keeps you watching, doesn't it?

Good cinematography is always at the service of the narrative and the intellectual themes of the movie, so you look for use of color and contrast, composition, in ways that seem to enhance the mood, or suggest where to be looking, or having motifs that repeat in symbolic fashion, etc.

Great (famous, talked-about, award-winning, inspirational, etc.) cinematography has to go a little beyond that, I think, but how it does that is somewhat debatable because it tends to cross the line (or skirt it) into being obvious, calling attention it itself. It's hard to be famous for your subtlety unfortunately. Even great cinematographers are often known better for their flashier work.

I'm not sure that's such a bad thing though. It's a little like a performance of a symphony -- all the musicians are supposed to support each other, but that doesn't mean the piece / performance doesn't have a dominant instrument now and then. It's OK to notice the trumpet or the flute, whatever, if the composer and conductor want you to do. The symphony may even be written to showcase an instrument. Movies can be like that too, most place acting at the forefront but others may place the image in the forefront, or the editing style, etc.

Some great cinematography is just an example of the classical style at its most technically perfect, rich, fine-grained, sharp, beautiful lighting, etc. Virtuoso work. Some great cinematography is not technically great -- it even pushes notions of what constitutes good cinematography -- but it is clearly in the service of the ideas of the story and director, and it often experiments with unconventional approaches, perhaps creating new elements to be incorporated into conventional cinematography.

[visakk]

Thanks for the explanation,
How do we understand the cinematography work in "300" is it good cinematography, is it flashy work..?
Of course it did definitely set the mood/tone of the movie in the right way.
I(like many) definitely like such work and movements, but several times felt that camera work is calling for too much attention, we were suddenly immersing ourselves more in editing/cinemtography work rather than the story.

A Technical question:
How did they achieve such slower motion in "300"? is it After Effects/ Higher FPS?
Which method(between Higher FPS & Editing in AE) is good for

1)Eyes
2)Budget (in terms of lighting, raw stock vs post work)
3)Time (shooting time vs post-prod )
4)Other(if any)

[fergus]

thanks David, that's a brilliant answer!
What is proper exposure, is it 50% grey? I'm looking for the reference point in the image to calculate x stops under or over..

[David Mullen ASC]

I think Larry Fong's work in "300" was excellent.

As for the flashiness of the movie, that was a choice, part of that Frank Miller graphic comic book style like "Sin City" had -- I thought it was daring to apply it to a historical subject like this one. The hard part when you decide to make a movie in that style is to be consistent, because it's hard work to shoot a feature in the same style as a commercial/music video and maintain the quality and tone, due to the sheer number of set-ups that a feature has compared to a 60-second spot. Of course, it also points to the dangers when you pull it off, that is, it's a bit exhausting to watch.

It's almost always cheaper and faster to do slow-motion in post and it almost always looks better (and is harder to do) to do it in camera by shooting at high frame rates. For "300" they shot at high frame rates.

[David Mullen ASC]

Proper exposure in a scene is whatever gives you the effect you want.

As for proper ASA rating to keep noise down to a minimum, you need to test for that. Once you find that rating, then you expose the subject for how bright or dark you want it to look.

[big lebowski]

I think Larry Fong's work in "300" was excellent.

I was extremely distracted by the continuous change in grain structure in "300". Some shots had no visible grain at all, some shots had moderate grain, and some shots were obviously reframed in post so that the grain was monstrous.

I don't know if this is also related to different film stock in use (5212 and 5229).

David, do you have similar experiences with varying grain in your movies?

[David Mullen ASC]

"300" was mostly shot on 5229, which is moderately grainy. I think they decided to use grain as a textural element, otherwise they probably could have just digitally degrained the whole movie. It was probably an artistic choice to make it more prominent at certain moments, but maybe not. Not all directors or DP's mind it when the occasional shot gets grainy. Sometimes a shot like that comes up in dailies or in post and the director's response is "oh, that looks cool!" Just like other artifacts, like lens flares.

I've had some grainy shots in my movies, sometimes due to accidental or unavoidable underexposure (sometimes by 2nd unit, not by me -- but sometimes the mistake was mine.) Most of my movies have had minimal grain, I'm generally not a big fan of graininess -- but then, I haven't shot any gritty urban crime movies, for example.

[big lebowski]

Not all directors or DP's mind it when the occasional shot gets grainy.

I'm not opposed to grain as long it's more or less consistent within a certain scene. But when in a dialog scene a medium shot of A with moderate grain is intercut with a close-up of B with excessive grain it somehow distracts me. It's like the two people are not at the same place at the same time.

Anyhow, we don't know if it was a technical problem or fully intentional.

Thanks for this great thread, David.

[David Mullen ASC]

Consistency in texture is usually the desired goal for the typical dramatic movie, unless you are cutting in flashbacks, drugged POV's, who knows what. It's all a part of the classical Hollywood style where the cinematic tricks are supposed to go by unnoticed by the "average" viewer and be subservient to the narrative.

However, these new "graphic novel" adaptations blend elements of music videos, commercials, and other graphic arts where a discontinuous texture is not uncommon.

[Drew Mylrea]

Hi David, again - thanks for the thread;

When a film you shoots gets graded, are you there helping with the color correction? If so, what is the process that you go through and what order do you move through grading (as in - do you establish a look with a wide shot after playing around with colors, etc and then grade all other shots in the scene off of that template)?

You talked earlier about establishing skin tones - when does that come to play in the process and how do you go about manipulating them (not technically, but ideologically what are you looking for / to do?)

Lastly, how long do you typically spend on a grade?

Look forward to hearing all about it! - drew

[David Mullen ASC]

Generally in a traditional photochemical timing, it takes at least three answer prints, usually with two days at least between each print. After that, one or two of the reels may need additional correction, so it's about a two-week process, but each session is only the time it takes to screen the movie.

In color-correction a feature for home video off of a color-timed I.P., it usually takes about a 5-day week in a telecine suite, maybe four days of correction and one day of laybacks to tape. Full 8-hour days in the suite, although the D.P. may skip out now & then if the colorist has a few hours needed to mark edits or make general adjustments.

In color-correction for a feature using a D.I. from a scan of the original negative, it usually takes about two weeks (10 days), and these are eight-hour days, but again, sometimes you can leave the colorist alone for some hours as they do the groundwork, balance shots, etc.

You generally go in shot order, setting the look with the first shots in a scene, but sometimes you need to jump first to a more indicative shot that will set the look for the whole scene, maybe a close-up when the character steps into a certain light, etc. The colorist will save certain frame grabs in a store as you go, to be recalled as needed for matching other shots to, either with A-B switching or doing a wipe or split-screen.

Your comments to the colorist when timing a face are things like "it needs a little more yellow in it", "it's getting too flush, take down some of the red", etc. -- some faces can be adjusted through choice of hue, while other times, you may be playing with chroma levels (some faces just look more saturated than others.) You're basically playing with levels of red, green, blue, yellow, cyan, and magenta, either adding or subjecting to shift the color, and also contrast (gamma), black level, saturation level, etc. It's also helpful to have a frame grab stored of a scene shot in white light when you're timing a long scene shot under a colored light, because your eyes can get tired or used to the odd color and start to filter it out, which tricks you into adding too much of the color afterawhile (you stare at a blue-ish scene for too long and it starts to look normal to your eyes) -- so now and then you want to put up a normal-looking shot as a reference. Same goes for timing a dark scene, it helps now and then to look at a shot in normal brightness.

[macgregor]

I think Larry Fong's work in "300" was excellent.



It's almost always cheaper and faster to do slow-motion in post and it almost always looks better (and is harder to do) to do it in camera by shooting at high frame rates.


What? Post slow motion looking good? :w00t:

[big lebowski]

What? Post slow motion looking good? :w00t:

I think you misunderstood David.
He said that it's cheaper and faster in post.
But it mostly looks better shooting at high frame rates.
Chill down, Mac. :tongue:

[nzben]

What? Post slow motion looking good? :w00t:

I think in this case David is talking about the slowmotion/speed ramping in 300, as a post effect rather than trying to do it on in-camera. Of course you shoot highspeed on set, then in post ramp faster (and possibly slower) as required.

With some of the ramping going on in 300 it would have been very timeconsuming and costly to achieve totally in-camera. You could also argue from a non-purest point of view that doing in post looks better than in-camera because the in and out points and degree of ramping can be so exact, and creative decisions about where they go in the cut can be made after the fact.

[David Mullen ASC]

All I said was that doing slow-motion in camera looks better than doing it in post. As for ramping, there are good reasons to do it in post to material shot at a high frame rate, as long as you don't mind the short shutter angle look of the material when it is converted to normal speed.

[SacRiverFilms]

Decide to post this here instead of the other thread... Don't Sell your film cameras yet...

Talking about Kodak and Fuji sells... I haven't even thought about it till today... I guess Agfa is dead.... or am I just saying how young I am...

[Rudi Herbert]

David,

since you've been dusting off your knowledge on 3-strip technicolor and other arcane, but beautiful, formats of old, I wanted to ask you something. Last night I was, yet again, sleepless and running through my must-watch-at-least-twice-a-year DVDs and watched "The Vikings", photographed by Jack Cardiff in 1958. I have to say I love that film, it was the first one ever that conveyed to me a very strong sense of the amazing power of photography with all its majestic vistas and the amazing colors. But I wondered about a few technical details as well.

Being shot in 1958, I would assume the only stock available was 100 ASA, yet there are plenty of night and low light interior scenes that look amazing, without a speck of grain or noise and without a hint of being overtly lit. How did they manage something so difficult 60 years ago? Do you happen to know the stock used for the movie, and/or any techniques used by Cardiff to make low light situations look like they were shot on contemporary, faster stocks? And what about the color rendition? Blues are very cobalt like, fire renders orange instead of red, blacks have a bluish hue, but all in all, what a wonderful feast for the eyes that photography is. Do you know what the stock, process and techniques used for that film were?

[David Mullen ASC]

It would have been shot on 5248 (not the EXR 100T 5248 from the 1990's, Kodak reuses numbers...) The first Kodak color negative stock was called 5247 and came out in 1950; it was 16 ASA daylight.

It was replaced in 1952 by 5248, which was 25 ASA tungsten.

A 50 ASA stock didn't come out until 1959, called 5250, and "Spartacus" was one of the first movies to use this new "fast stock". Then in 1962, Kodak replaced it with a finer-grained 50 ASA stock called 5251.

A 100 ASA stock didn't appear until 1968, called 5254. This means that such movies as "Lawrence of Arabia" and "2001" were shot on 50 ASA stocks, which is amazing (particularly "2001".)

The mid 1950's saw the introduction of larger negative formats like VistaVision, 65mm Todd-AO, etc. This compensated for the graininess of Kodak color negative of the day. "The Vikings" was shot in Technirama, which was 8-perf horizontal 35mm (like VistaVision is, and also 35mm still cameras) but with the addition of a 1.5X anamorphic lens to squeeze a 2.35 : 1 image onto the 8-perf negative (which is normally closer to 1.50 : 1). "Spartacus" and "El Cid" were also shot in Technirama, but printed to 5-perf 70mm for release prints, thus calling itself "Super Technirama 70".

Before 5-perf 70mm printing from 8-perf 35mm was an option in the later 1950's, Technirama movies were normally reduced down to 35mm anamorphic (CinemaScope) for release printing, but using Technicolor's dye transfer process. (There was never a dye transfer machine built to do 70mm prints and 8-perf 35mm projection never caught on.) I don't know if "The Vikings" ever got a 70mm release originally.

Anyway, the larger negative accounts for the finer-grained, sharper image, along with the generally harder lighting of the day. And, of course, Cardiff is a great cinematographer.

You can look at a chronology of Kodak stocks here:

http://www.kodak.com/US/en/motion/products/chrono2.jhtml?id=0.1.4.28.14.4&lc=en
http://www.kodak.com/US/en/motion/products/chrono3.jhtml?id=0.1.4.28.14.6&lc=en

This is a great site to spend some time in, the American Widescreen Museum:
http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/widescreen/wingtr1.htm

[ChrisLyon]

Too... much... knowledge!

http://phumphries.com/forums/images/smilies/killtard.gif

[DorkmanScott]

With some of the ramping going on in 300 it would have been very timeconsuming and costly to achieve totally in-camera. You could also argue from a non-purest point of view that doing in post looks better than in-camera because the in and out points and degree of ramping can be so exact, and creative decisions about where they go in the cut can be made after the fact.
I'm pretty sure 300's action was almost all shot at high frame rates (between 50fps and 150fps, according to IMDB).

It's easy to speed up slow-motion in post -- assuming, as David pointed out, you don't mind the higher shutter speed in the "normal motion" stuff. Fortunately, the high-shutter look has become a standard in epic action, so it's perfectly acceptable for the aesthetic.

[Jason Ing]

"I'll take Cinema for $1000, Alex."

"A highly intelligent, knowledgeable, and talented DP who is also a generous and excellent educator."

"Who is David Mullen?"

"That is correct"



It would have been shot on 5248 (not the EXR 100T 5248 from the 1990's, Kodak reuses numbers...) The first Kodak color negative stock was called 5247 and came out in 1950; it was 16 ASA daylight.

It was replaced in 1952 by 5248, which was 25 ASA tungsten.

A 50 ASA stock didn't come out until 1959, called 5250, and "Spartacus" was one of the first movies to use this new "fast stock". Then in 1962, Kodak replaced it with a finer-grained 50 ASA stock called 5251.

A 100 ASA stock didn't appear until 1968, called 5254. This means that such movies as "Lawrence of Arabia" and "2001" were shot on 50 ASA stocks, which is amazing (particularly "2001".)

The mid 1950's saw the introduction of larger negative formats like VistaVision, 65mm Todd-AO, etc. This compensated for the graininess of Kodak color negative of the day. "The Vikings" was shot in Technirama, which was 8-perf horizontal 35mm (like VistaVision is, and also 35mm still cameras) but with the addition of a 1.5X anamorphic lens to squeeze a 2.35 : 1 image onto the 8-perf negative (which is normally closer to 1.50 : 1). "Spartacus" and "El Cid" were also shot in Technirama, but printed to 5-perf 70mm for release prints, thus calling itself "Super Technirama 70".

Before 5-perf 70mm printing from 8-perf 35mm was an option in the later 1950's, Technirama movies were normally reduced down to 35mm anamorphic (CinemaScope) for release printing, but using Technicolor's dye transfer process. (There was never a dye transfer machine built to do 70mm prints and 8-perf 35mm projection never caught on.) I don't know if "The Vikings" ever got a 70mm release originally.

Anyway, the larger negative accounts for the finer-grained, sharper image, along with the generally harder lighting of the day. And, of course, Cardiff is a great cinematographer.

You can look at a chronology of Kodak stocks here:

http://www.kodak.com/US/en/motion/products/chrono2.jhtml?id=0.1.4.28.14.4&lc=en
http://www.kodak.com/US/en/motion/products/chrono3.jhtml?id=0.1.4.28.14.6&lc=en

This is a great site to spend some time in, the American Widescreen Museum:
http://www.widescreenmuseum.com/widescreen/wingtr1.htm

[Jason Ing]

Thanks for generously sharing your time and wisdom, David. I just wanted to say that I know it takes more then just knowledge and experience to be a good teacher. Teaching is it's own skill and talent. I've read this entire thread, learned a lot like everyone else, and have to say you are an excellent teacher.

[David Mullen ASC]

Thanks, I try.

[Jason Ing]

Seeing that you use frame grabs of dvds as a learning tool (I like to see them in an editing software as well), how visually close are the dvd versions to your original movie version? And, how about any blue ray/hd versions? If I didn't originally see a movie in the theater, I always wonder if I'm watching what the DP really meant to shoot... "Did they really mean to crush all the blacks like that? That's a lot of hot spots. How did they get that look?, etc. etc." Even a difference in tv technology makes a difference; I remember watching Matrix side by side on two 52 inch hdtvs, one a plasma that lost all the detail in the shadows and the other a rear projection that revealed a lot of detail.

[Shawn Nelson]

Ditto to Jing's thanks. I super appreciate your willingness to help us along the path!

Continuing on :-). What do you think of flicker boxes? That is for things like mimicking firelight or candle effect. Do you use them? The ones I've seen are Magic Gadgets.

[David Mullen ASC]

Well, DVD viewing is very different than watching a movie in a theater. Most of my DVD's were supervised by me, color-correction-wise, but the DVD authoring is out of my control, and some of the compression used has been quite awful. I found some terrible compression artifacts in the DVD of "Akeelah and the Bee".

None of my movies have been released on HD-DVD or Blu-Ray as far as I know. If they were, it would have used the same HD home video master used to create the SD downconversions for the DVD versions.

--

I use flicker boxes like the Magic Gadget for firelight & TV light effects, usually more than one. Or I have one light on a flicker box and one on a dimmer being faded up and down manually, both blended through one frame of diffusion.

[Thor Wixom]

David,

I asked this over in the Lens Test Forum, but I thought I'd ask you directly.

The combined price of the Red 18:50 + 50:150 is $15,000.

A Ziess Standard Prime Set costs about the same.

It's an either or since I have $15,000 budgeted for glass.

I'd like to know which option you would choose, and why... and if you can think of a better way to spend that budget, please mention that, too.

Thanks!

-Thor

[David Mullen ASC]

I prefer using prime lenses in general, so I'd get the Zeiss set, but that's just me. Some people would find the absense of zooms a real problem for certain types of shooting, especially docs, EPK's, etc. where swapping lenses is not an option. So it depends on the nature of your project. For most of my 35mm features, I only use the zoom about 5% of the time, when I need to zoom basically, or when shooting a stunt outdoors. Otherwise, I use primes. But I just did a TV series where we used zooms 90% of the time on our 35mm cameras.

Of course, you could eventually add a zoom to the package later when you get more money, or rent a zoom in the meanwhile.

You have to weigh the fact that zooms give you all the focal lengths and are faster on the set because you aren't swapping lenses all day, versus primes which will be sharper, faster, less prone to flare. Of course, with an 18-50 and a 50-150, you may find yourself switching lenses more often than you think if each set-up changes radically enough from wide to tight.

[sander kamp]

Hi David, I have two questions:

1) When doing pans with nothing in the foreground - say a landscape - is there a general rule as to the relation of: speed of panning/shutter angle/lens length? I ask this because in my limited experience I have found that motion blur, like in 180 degree shutter, just blurs the image rather than helps to smooth it and a high shutter speed and moving too fast makes the images stutter.

2) Are mirrors ever used for odd angles of shooting? I have never read or heard anything about it yet it seems so logical. Naturally these would have to be optical mirrors, not the kind with the mirror surface behind the glass. Could you for instance mount a mirror to the side of a car and conveniently shoot from the back seat?

I think it is really amazing you have time to answer all these questions here! Really appreciated!

[David Mullen ASC]

There was an old rule about safe panning speed for landscape shots. One website says:


http://www.tech-notes.tv/Archive/tech_notes_035.htm
The recommended panning speed for a 35 mm camera running at 24 fr/sec with a 180-degree shutter and a 50 mm lens is 90 degrees in 23 seconds.


In other words, verrrrryyyy sllllooooowwww....

I've never been much of a fan of panning across a landscape actually, unless the pan ends on something significant, as a reveal.

--

Yes, some DP's carry around a front-surface mirror for angles where the camera can't get into -- and then flipping the shot in post. The mirrors tend to be heavy and expensive when larger.

Read Roy Wagner's article here about using mirrors:
http://www.theasc.com/clubhouse/tricks.htm

[sander kamp]

Thanks, David!

[Thor Wixom]

David,

Do you have an opinion about the Elite lenses?

-Thor

[David Mullen ASC]

I think someone already asked that...

I've heard they are good. The problems with Russian-made lenses tend to be consistency in the mechanics & manufacturing, not the sharpness.

[Thor Wixom]

Sorry, David.

I'll search this thread next time before I ask.

Thanks for you help and insight!

-Thor

[David Mullen ASC]

I could be confusing this with a Cinematography.Com thread, certain questions come up periodically. Mitch Gross and Matt Uhry knows this stuff (buying lenses) better than me.

[ShannonRawls]

Hey David,

just wanted to say Hi. *smile*

[Shawn Nelson]

David, what would you consider to be the shortlist (10 movies) that every growing cinematographer *must* see? Not that these are necessarily good movies, but that visually you'd consider them necessary for someone learning the craft to have experienced.

[Rudi Herbert]

You're giving him only 10 options? You're killing him :-)

[David Mullen ASC]

Yeah, now I have to cut down my 100 titles of "must see" movies... 10? You could get through that list in a week...

Off the top of my head, I'd say:

Silent: Sunrise
B&W Sound: Citizen Kane, Night of the Hunter, Battle of Algiers
Early Color: Gone with the Wind, Black Narcissus, Moulin Rouge
Color: The Godfather Part II, Barry Lyndon, Days of Heaven...

Heck, I already hit 10 and I didn't get past 1979!

Easier to just repost my old list:

FAVORITE CINEMATOGRAPHY BY DECADE

Silent Era:
Broken Blossoms (1919)
The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (1921)
The Last Laugh (1922)
Nosferatu (1922)
Battleship Potemkin (1925)
Sparrows (1926)
Metropolis (1927)
Sunrise (1927)
Wings (1927)
The Passion of Joan of Arc (1928)

1930’s:
All’s Quiet On the Western Front (1930)
Morocco (1930)
Dishonored (1931)
Scarlet Empress (1934)
Bride of Frankenstein (1935)
Midsummer Night’s Dream (1935)
Garden of Allah (1936)
The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938)
Alexander Nevsky (1938)
Drums Along the Mohawk (1939)
Gone With The Wind (1939)
Wuthering Heights (1939)
Young Mr. Lincoln (1939)

1940’s:
Grapes of Wrath (1940)
The Long Voyage Home (1940)
Rebecca (1940)
Citizen Kane (1941)
How Green Was My Valley (1941)
Casablanca (1942)
The Magnificent Ambersons (1942)
The Life & Death of Colonel Blimp (1943)
Henry V (1944)
Jane Eyre (1944)
Meet Me in St. Louis (1944)
Mildred Pierce (1945)
Spellbound (1945)
Beauty and the Beast (1946)
Duel in the Sun (1946)
Great Expectations (1946)
A Matter of Life & Death (1946)
My Darling Clementine (1946)
Black Narcissus (1947)
The Fugitive (1947)
Out of the Past (1947)
Hamlet (1948)
Oliver Twist (1948)
The Red Shoes (1948)
The Third Man (1949)


1950’s:
Rashomon (1950)
An American in Paris (1951)
Moulin Rouge (1952)
Othello (1952)
Singin’ In The Rain (1952)
Ugetsu Monogatari (1953)
On the Waterfront (1954)
Seven Samurai (1954)
Night of the Hunter (1955)
Pather Panchali (1955)
Aparajito (1956)
Lust for Life (1956)
Moby Dick (1956)
The Searchers (1956)
The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)
The Seventh Seal (1957)
Throne of Blood (1957)
Wild Strawberries (1957)
Touch of Evil (1958)
Vertigo (1958)
Apur Sansar (1959)
Ben-Hur (1959)

1960’s:
Psycho (1960)
Spartacus (1960)
El Cid (1961)
One-Eyed Jacks (1961)
Yojimbo (1961)
Lawrence of Arabia (1962)
Cleopatra (1963)
8 1/2 (1963)
Hud (1963)
The Trial (1963)
Dr. Strangelove (1964)
I Am Cuba (1964)
Dr. Zhivago (1965)
Help! (1965)
Red Beard (1965)
Bonnie & Clyde (1967)
The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly (1967)
In Cold Blood (1967)
Hell in the Pacific (1968)
Romeo & Juliet (1968)
2001 (1968)
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969)
The Wild Bunch (1969)

1970’s:
The Conformist (1970)
Patton (1970)
Ryan’s Daughter (1970)
A Clockwork Orange (1971)
The Devils (1971)
Fiddler On The Roof (1971)
The French Connection (1971)
Klute (1971)
The Last Picture Show (1971)
McCabe & Mrs. Miller (1971)
Cabaret (1972)
Cries & Whispers (1972)
Deliverence (1972)
Fat City (1972)
The Godfather (1972)
Last Tango In Paris (1972)
The Exorcist (1973)
The Long Goodbye (1973)
Paper Moon (1973)
The Three Musketeers (1973)
Chinatown (1974)
The Godfather, Part II (1974)
Lucky Lady (1974)
Murder on the Orient Express (1974)
The Sugerland Express (1974)
Barry Lyndon (1975)
Day of the Locust (1975)
Three Days of the Condor (1975)
All the President’s Men (1976)
Bound For Glory (1976)
Network (1976)
1900 (1976)
The Outlaw Josey Wales (1976)
The Return of a Man Called Horse (1976)
Robin & Marion (1976)
A Bridge Too Far (1977)
Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)
The Duelists (1977)
Eraserhead (1977)
The Exorcist II (1977)
Jesus of Nazarith (1977)
Days of Heaven (1978)
The Deer Hunter (1978)
Interiors (1978)
Superman (1978)
Agatha (1979)
Alien (1979)
Apocalypse Now (1979)
Dracula (1979)
Manhattan (1979)
1941 (1979)
Tess (1979)

1980’s:
The Elephant Man (1980)
The Empire Strikes Back (1980)
Heaven’s Gate (1980)
Raging Bull (1980)
The Shining (1980)
Stardust Memories (1980)
Chariots of Fire (1981)
Excalibur (1981)
Pennies From Heaven (1981)
Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)
Reds (1981)
True Confessions (1981)
Blade Runner (1982)
Das Boot (1982)
E.T. (1982)
One From the Heart (1982)
Sophie’s Choice (1982)
Fanny & Alexander (1983)
The Right Stuff (1983)
Rumblefish (1983)
Wagner (1983)
Yentl (1983)
Amadeus (1984)
Dune (1984)
Greystoke (1984)
The Natural (1984)
1984 (1984)
Brazil (1985)
The Color Purple (1985)
Ladyhawke (1985)
Legend (1985)
Mishima (1985)
Out of Africa (1985)
Ran (1985)
Blue Velvet (1986)
The Mission (1986)
A Room With A View (1986)
Angel Heart (1987)
Empire of the Sun (1987)
The Last Emperor (1987)
Red Sorghum (1987)
Someone to Watch Over Me (1987)
Baron Munchausen (1988)
Tequila Sunrise (1988)
Tucker (1988)
Born On the Fourth of July (1989)
Fat Man & Little Boy (1989)
Mountains of the Moon (1989)

1990’s:
Akira Kurosawa’s Dreams
Dick Tracy (1990)
Ju Dou (1990)
The Godfather, Part III (1990)
Hamlet (Zefferilli) (1990)
Henry & June (1990)
Memphis Belle (1990)
Miller’s Crossing (1990)
The Sheltering Sky (1990)
Barton Fink (1991)
Bugsy (1991)
Delicatessen (1991)
The Doors (1991)
JFK (1991)
Raise the Red Lantern (1991)
Terminator II (1991)
Tous Les Matins Du Monde (1991)
Batman Returns (1992)
Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1992)
Far & Away (1992)
1492 (1992)
Jennifer 8 (1992)
Howard’s End (1992)
Like Water For Chocolate (1992)
Unforgiven (1992)
The Age of Innocence (1993)
Little Buddha (1993)
The Piano (1993)
Remains of the Day (1993)
Schindler’s List (1993)
Searching For Bobby Fischer (1993)
The Hudsucker Proxy (1994)
Legends of the Fall (1994)
Natural Born Killers (1994)
The Secret of Roan Inish (1994)
The Shawshank Redemption (1994)
Wyatt Earp (1994)
Braveheart (1995)
Casino (1995)
City of Lost Children (1995)
Crimson Tide (1995)
Flamenco (1995)
A Little Princess (1995)
Nixon (1995)
Seven (1995)
A Walk in the Clouds (1995)
The English Patient (1996)
Evita (1996)
Fargo (1996)
Michael Collins (1996)
Amistad (1997)
Character (1997)
Kundun (1997)
Titanic (1997)
A Civil Action (1998)
Dark City (1998)
Saving Private Ryan (1998)
Tango (1998)
The Thin Red Line (1998)
The Matrix (1999)
Sleepy Hollow (1999)
Snow Falling On Cedars (1999)

[ChrisLyon]

What? I totally read all the way to the bottom expecting the 2000s.

What a great list. I need to add a lot of these to my collection. I've seen all of them post 1940s i think once upon a time but need to see them again.

[Yannick Hagman]

David

Could you give us a short sum up of cheap, but good looking lights. Sure you're working with pro stuff mostly now, but what have you used before? And what would you buy as a life time investment?

Cheers

[David Mullen ASC]

Chinese Lanterns and homemade fluorescents are simple ways of getting a nice soft light. Reflector dishes from hardware stores with lightbulbs are useful.

Otherwise, you need to start building up a simple tungsten package, maybe get a used 650w or 1K fresnel as your "movie light" (fresnels produce nice clean sharp patterns). It's nice to have a few lights that have a spot-flood capability and allow scrims to be dropped in. A few simpler open-faced lights are useful too.

Daylight-balanced lighting used to require HMI's but now there are also LED's and compact fluorescents to give you that color temp.

Eventually you'll want a range of lights including something as bright and punchy as possible that can still be plugged into an ordinary 20amp household circuit. That tends to be the 1200w HMI PAR, a tungsten PAR64 1K with a narrow spot globe, 2K tungstens (and 1K Xenons, which are too expensive to own).

You need something big and bright for lighting at a distance, or creating a strong backlight (faking sunlight), or creating large soft lights, you need something small for accent lighting, you need something naturally soft, and you need workhorse lights that can be used for bouncing & diffusing, etc. And a collection of light bulbs of all types.

[number6]

David, what about halogens? Is there any reason to exclude them from a set?

[David Mullen ASC]

Tungsten halogens? They are commonplace in movie lights. You mean inside hardware store worklights? You have to be more specific than "halogens".

[number6]

Tungsten halogens? They are commonplace in movie lights. You mean inside hardware store worklights?

Yeah, Black and Decker stand with dual 1500?, maybe 1000 watters.

[David Mullen ASC]

If it puts out light, it can be used. It may not be as controllable as you'd like, but for a DIY lighting kit, they can be useful. Don't make an entire kit out of a bunch of these lights though because your money might be better spent in creating a package with more variety.

[rascom]

Hey, I would like to know what your approach to shooting miniatures are.
When shooting wide or close up of a miniature to get that 'larger than life'-look, is it better to use a longer lens away from the model or to get closer with a wide angle? And what about DOF?
I read somewhere that for example shooting a RC-miniature (or any other moving miniature for that matter) overcranked at for example 75 fps gives the effect of a much larger object moving.
Of course, I think, shooting a miniature should be done in coherence with the rest of the cinematography, but what can be done cheat the viewers perception to make a small model seem huge?
Rasmus

[David Mullen ASC]

You have to think about what the perspective would be of a camera if this object were full size, so often low and close, and wide-angle, gives the miniature some sense of being larger. But there are some circumstances where a telephoto view would be justified, like for a telephoto perspective.

You need as much depth of field as you can get. Rarely would you have too much depth of field. Think about it -- if this object were real and was twenty feet away at the closest edge, then all of it would fall into focus in real life. So basically you want to avoid having part of the model go out of focus.

Overcranking is necessary to give motion scale when it interacts with things like dust, dirt, moving cloth, water, whatever. Or there are explosions in the shot. If not, then it's easier to get more depth of field by undercranking and just moving the model very slowly, like for a spaceship moving through space.

Overcranking and stopping down requires a s-load of light, which is why some people shoot miniatures outdoors in real sunlight. Sometimes tilt-focus lenses can be used to create a fake deep focus effect if everything falls along a diagonal plane to the camera.

[rascom]

Thanks for the tips. The shot I'm trying to figure out is sort of a sfx shot with a strange globe(suspended with fishwire or similar) spinning/orbiting in space, shot on green screen. The globe doesn't physically interact with anything like with a spaceship flying through space, so the option of undercranking and spinning it very slowly is great. With this kind of perspective(earth from space) would it then be best with a long lens or maybe to give it a huge perspective/volume to shoot it with a fish eye and stop it all the way down to f/16 or to when diffraction kicks in?
http://www.museum4kids.net/images/2004%20Pix/Opport%203/EarthFromSpace3.jpg

Rasmus

[number6]

If it puts out light, it can be used. It may not be as controllable as you'd like, but for a DIY lighting kit, they can be useful. Don't make an entire kit out of a bunch of these lights though because your money might be better spent in creating a package with more variety.

Thanks David. I just have a couple of the light sets in the garage and since they are switchable to 500 watts, thought I could maybe use them for an indoor scene or two where I will have AC pouer. Also plan to build a couple of groupings for using screw in fluorescents. By mixing and matching white and yellow bulbs, as well as different wattages, I hope to be able to regulate temperature and intensity. It will be time consuming, but time is cheap when you are on a nello budget.

edit: thanks for the tip about the reflector lights earlier. That will become a part of my kit as well.

www.nelloproductions.com (site under construction)

[Yannick Hagman]

Thank you, David.

[Jay A. Kelley]

I think this is the longest running thread on REDuser.net

Jay

[number6]

I think this is the longest running thread on REDuser.net

Jay

Yeah, it should have its oun search feature.

[Shawn Nelson]

Yeah, it should have its oun search feature.

You can search for specific posts within only a certain thread, it's an advanced search feature, very helpful.

[Shawn Nelson]

David, what are your thoughts on the quality of HMI light vs the quality of tungsten? This is disregarding efficiency or usefullness, just in how you like the look of it. Let's say you're on a closed indoor set with ample power grids and so you can equally choose either, do you favor one or the other?

[David Mullen ASC]

Generally tungsten looks more attractive on fleshtones, more than HMI's, LED's, or fluorescents. And they come in a wi