Ask David Mullen ANYTHING

[Andrew Phillip]

Hi David, how are things? My question is a bit more general, but any help on the matter would be appreciated. I'm just in pre-production for an upcoming shoot and I'm gathering pictures and examples to bring to my DP to show him the look I'm after. What I really want to know is how I could achieve a 60's film stock look using the RED. I'm just a director, so I'll be passing this info on to my DP. Anything about colour temperature, how to shoot the footage for better manipulation in post, characteristics of the period, etc. If you don't get to it, no problem. Thanks in advance. :)

Andrew

[Roberto Lequeux]

(re-posted, the original was way to general)

I know you hate judging on a computer screen David, and prefer not to put time and energy into analyzing tools that aren't yet available, so I am sorry for asking. But have you seen the HDR footage posted on Recon? I wonder if you have any thoughts on its motion blur, or any other thoughts on Red's HDR development, especially regarding lighting for naturalistic exteriors with so much DR available.

[David Mullen ASC]

Are their certain lenses/brands known for being softer/lower-contrast? If so, which ones?

Older lenses basically, like Cooke Panchros, B&L Baltars, Panavision Ultra Speeds, etc. Also older zooms, like the Cooke 5:1. Also any lens with older coatings or the coatings removed.

[David Mullen ASC]

(re-posted, the original was way to general)

I know you hate judging on a computer screen David, and prefer not to put time and energy into analyzing tools that aren't yet available, so I am sorry for asking. But have you seen the HDR footage posted on Recon? I wonder if you have any thoughts on its motion blur, or any other thoughts on Red's HDR development, especially regarding lighting for naturalistic exteriors with so much DR available.

Looks impressive so far. Honestly, I'd need some frame of reference to judge them more accurately, some comparisons to other cameras or to film negative. But my own experience with shooting neon signs in Las Vegas tells me that there is a very high DR in those tests, and I didn't really catch any motion problems.

[David Mullen ASC]

Hi David, how are things? My question is a bit more general, but any help on the matter would be appreciated. I'm just in pre-production for an upcoming shoot and I'm gathering pictures and examples to bring to my DP to show him the look I'm after. What I really want to know is how I could achieve a 60's film stock look using the RED. I'm just a director, so I'll be passing this info on to my DP. Anything about colour temperature, how to shoot the footage for better manipulation in post, characteristics of the period, etc. If you don't get to it, no problem. Thanks in advance. :)
Andrew

It's both a technical issue and a stylistic issue. 1960's Kodak 35mm color negative (5250 and 5251) was 50 ASA tungsten until 1968 when Kodak introduced 5254, which was 100 ASA tungsten. So first of all, you have to imagine all the workarounds to deal with 50 ASA or 100 ASA film stock in terms of lenses, lighting, post, etc.

You also had a certain number of movies still being released in Technicolor dye transfer prints, which were more contrasty and more saturated than EastmanColor prints.

You had a certain amount of hard lighting left over from the 1950's plus as a way of dealing with slow film stock. You had zooms emerging as a popular lens.

The stocks themselves were not unusual, obviously a bit softer and grainier than a Red One MX image would be. One question is whether you want to bother with grain simulation in post. The softness is easier to create, with filters or older lenses, etc.

You sort of have to pick your role models to match to because there was a lot of stylistic changes happening in the 1960's.

[soren k jensen]

Dear David,
I will be shooting an interview on a small sound stage. The talent is to appear as if she is sitting close to a campfire. I have seen flicker boxes in use, controlling several gelled lights. But I am not impressed by the results. Do you know of anyone who has used DMX controlled lighting from a computer, to control the flickering of several light sources? What would you prefer to do?
Thanks, Soren

[Clint Lealos]

It's both a technical issue and a stylistic issue. 1960's Kodak 35mm color negative (5250 and 5251) was 50 ASA tungsten until 1968 when Kodak introduced 5254, which was 100 ASA tungsten. So first of all, you have to imagine all the workarounds to deal with 50 ASA or 100 ASA film stock in terms of lenses, lighting, post, etc.

You also had a certain number of movies still being released in Technicolor dye transfer prints, which were more contrasty and more saturated than EastmanColor prints.

You had a certain amount of hard lighting left over from the 1950's plus as a way of dealing with slow film stock. You had zooms emerging as a popular lens.

The stocks themselves were not unusual, obviously a bit softer and grainier than a Red One MX image would be. One question is whether you want to bother with grain simulation in post. The softness is easier to create, with filters or older lenses, etc.

You sort of have to pick your role models to match to because there was a lot of stylistic changes happening in the 1960's.

Wow, what a coincidence! I am shooting a 50s/60s commercial spot in Istanbul in a week and I was thinking about ways to create that look with the Red camera. You mentioned achieving the softness of the time period with filters and lenses. Can you elaborate? Thanks David.

[cristiano casone]

Wow, what a coincidence! I am shooting a 50s/60s commercial spot in Istanbul in a week and I was thinking about ways to create that look with the Red camera. You mentioned achieving the softness of the time period with filters and lenses. Can you elaborate? Thanks David.

Hi david,
Only one question: how can i import a look from redcineX to red cam?
I tried, but the camera says that there is nothing to import.
Please help me.

Thanks, Cristiano from Milan

[juliensees]

Hi David,

I'm curious about what type of solutions you would do with the following situation that I've found myself in:

I'm shooting in an apartment with frosted windows, and as shooting has begun I've had trouble with the windows being much hotter than the rest of the scene. Shooting on the Red, I have a 1.2kw HMI Par going through each window, and though the lights themselves are not as much of a punch as I would like, (actually hitting the actors) the white/frosted windows are already blowing out.

My question, is how do you deal with frosted windows or even sheer curtains or anything of that sort when you want your key light to come from those same windows and your giant source outside, without blowing out the windows?

Thanks,
-Dan

[David Mullen ASC]

Dear David,
I will be shooting an interview on a small sound stage. The talent is to appear as if she is sitting close to a campfire. I have seen flicker boxes in use, controlling several gelled lights. But I am not impressed by the results. Do you know of anyone who has used DMX controlled lighting from a computer, to control the flickering of several light sources? What would you prefer to do?
Thanks, Soren

It's always a stylistic cheat; I would get beyond that to some extent. But if you study a real fire, you generally have a base level of output that varies to some small extent plus momentary jumps as flames flare up & die. So basically you want a slow, minimal dimming up & down of level from your fake campire that has enough randomness to it, plus the occasional fast flicker, again random.

It also depends on how large a fire you are simulating.

My favorite technique is very low-tech: put a couple of small orange gelled lights behind a light diffusion frame (to blend them a bit) and then wave your hands, fingers, whatever, in a dancing, random pattern between the lights and the diffusion. The first time I did this was on a student film: I had a 2K zip off-camera gelled full orange and someone wiggled their fingers in front of the light to create a torchlight effect. It was totally believable. I've improved the effect by having a second person running a dimmer of some sort (like a Variac) for the slow pulsing effect as the first person does the hand dance in front of the lights. But given that some people aren't good at this, plus it can be distracting for the actors to have someone in their line of sight waving their hands all about (I once had David Arquette laughing during a scene where he was supposed to be watching a TV set, which was lighting his face: seeing me sit in front of a blue Kinoflo waving my hands around like a bad performance art piece was too amusing for him...) the other choice is to go with a flicker box. So I might have two lights through the same frame of light diffusion, one on a dimmer and one on a flicker box. Or more than two, one perhaps not dimming at all for the base exposure, or multiple ones on dimmers. It's the randomness of tempo and level that is the more important, to not get into a regular pulsing pattern.

Another technique that Conrad Hall liked was to shine an orange-gelled hard light through an actual fire with a lot of smoke: the rising smoke causes the light shining through it to flicker.

Probably the best approach (besides just using real fire) is to do what Alan Daviau did on "Empire of the Sun" which is to blend the light from a flame bar with some orange-gelled light coming through the fire.

But assuming that you can't use real flames, then I think the idea of blending a dimming light with a randomly flickering light is the best, unless you have some skills at waving your hands and fingers in front of a light in a dancing pattern.