A new way of shooting coverage with the RED?

[PaulClements]

Perhaps with Red's projector the future reality of cutting in 4k on a relative screen size won't be out of the question Mike. Sounds like an editors dream come true to me.

[Jason Murphy]

Well, Mike, if the RED 4K projectors are half as good as the RED ONE seems to be in terms of price and performance, viewing dailies and edits on one of those guys could (and in many cases should) become an excellent addition to the 4K post workflow.

And tallsided, you're certainly not alone in thinking of all sorts of cool new and perhaps unnecessary or aesthetically detrimental things that can be done with 4K acquisition. I've been coming up with a number of them myself (I plead the Fifth here).

And your suggestion certainly has its own applications: if you're doing a project where you're taking 4K footage, going into the image and doing more experimental stuff with it, like the equivalent of complex optical printer work that many avant-garde filmmakers (like Pat O'Neill et al) did in the 70's and 80's, 4K is a huge boon, and very exciting. This seems to me to be a huge area of potential for the digital image that very few people are taking advantage of.

Of course, another thing that we can all take away from this thread is this: just because George Lucas did it doesn't make it a good idea. 'Attack of the Clones' was crap, and I think it may not be unfair to lay some of the blame on aesthetic laziness brought about by the discovery of newfound digital tools that were totally unnecessary.

[M Most]

It's fine to use these tricks in editing, but to actually shoot a movie that way comes off as a bit lazy.

True for theatrical releases. But for television, this has been done for quite some time. Back in the early 90's, I was the colorist on "L.A. Law," which for a number of years, we transferred directly from assembled negative. On most of the courtroom scenes, two cameras were used for pretty much every setup. For shots of witnesses on the witness stand, the usual M.O. was to shoot two sizes, relatively wide and relatively tight, and if a 3rd size was needed (usually a tighter closeup), it was created in post from the tighter angle. This was useful in part because courtroom days were interminably long (you have no idea), and also because on those days, the company exposed copious amounts of film already. Using the post route for some of the tighter shots really did help in terms of production time. We would also create push-ins in post for similar reasons.

[David Mullen ASC]

Well, that's one of the exceptions like the ones I mentioned, like when a baby leaves the set before you got the close-up or the actor delivered a better take in their medium shot. Yes, in multiple-camera scenes with crowds, whatever, occasionally you have to create a tighter shot in post to get a cutaway of a reaction or something.

But as you said, the lower the resolution of the final distribution medium, the more you can get away with tricks like that.

Truth is that when you're talking about close-ups of people's faces, you can get away with a little resolution hit from a minor crop & enlargement as long as there isn't grain being enlarged, so zooming-in a little digitally is not a big deal if it's not overdone.

[Deanan]

George Miller said something like that when he did "Road Warrior" -- when he looked at the viewfinder image, he imagined it was being projected on a big screen with tiny people sitting below it.

That's a very cool vizualization technique.

Hmmmm, how wrong would it be if we put a little audience
in the EVF?

I'm only half kidding :)


Deanan

[d. sweetman]

I want to see more coverage like RAN. I don't think there's a single close-up in that film, and it works so much better than a lot of today's seemingly DVD-conscious coverage style. I think as more people get HD TV's and HD DVD's coverage will start to move back out.

[Gavin Greenwalt]

That's a very cool vizualization technique.

Hmmmm, how wrong would it be if we put a little audience
in the EVF?

I'm only half kidding :)


Deanan

I've been saying this since the beginning and I'm going to continue hounding this idea until the camera ships. I want 8bit grayscale tiff import for arbitrary gates. Whether that be horizon lines, aspect ratios or little mystery science theater cutout people at the bottom. I really do believe there is a huge opportunity for an overlay in the monitor. This could also be really handy if you plan on later overlaying something like binoculars or rifle scopes just to help you compose better.

You could upload several uncompressed grayscale tiffs and then you can adjust the opacity and blending mode so if you want it to be an add or a subtract depending on the lighting.

[Nick Shaw]

I gather the overlays in the EVF are done with a Flash engine, so in thoery anything's possible with future upgrades.

[Stephen Gentle]

Well, Mike, if the RED 4K projectors are half as good as the RED ONE seems to be in terms of price and performance, viewing dailies and edits on one of those guys could (and in many cases should) become an excellent addition to the 4K post workflow.

The RED 4K projector would be excellent for dailies if they supported the RED-DRIVE - imagine shooting to a couple of RED-DRIVEs, and then just plugging them in and playing out the clips - that would be awesome.

Also, editing with a 4K projector would be amazing.

I can't wait for some more details...

[zak forrest]

That's a very cool vizualization technique.

Hmmmm, how wrong would it be if we put a little audience
in the EVF?

I'm only half kidding :)


Deanan

man we shoudl be able to superimpose anything we want into that thing. it would be awesome.