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*intermediate negative stock, not internegative stock. It won’t let me edit my response for some reason.
As David mentioned, and I can only confirm with the first Dune film, they only used a 1 ASA internegative stock which could’ve only added a very subtle look/feel to the image, and I can understand why that would make one wonder if it was worth it.
That’s why I mentioned The Batman, because it seemed Greig Fraser leaned in more heavily to the process by actually creating a print from the negative generated, and if I’m not mistaken did a bleach-bypass on the print, which I can imagine is much more worthwhile for the cost.
I’m sure you can get pretty close with print emulation LUTS and Live Grain, but where I’m intrigued by the film-out process is the renewed relevance of pushing/pulling and film development/printing techniques that are logarithmic in nature, which require a lot more hoops to jump through to try and replicate in software that is often-times linear in nature – I’m definitely generalizing at this point since grading software has become pretty nifty but I think in broad terms that is usually the discrepancy between the “look” of film vs. digital workflows that Ryan might be getting at.
If not, sorry for hijacking this thread!
I was curious about this as well, and although it’s been around, the opposite process of doing a film-out from a digital negative seems to have become an aesthetic choice on more and more films recently (that can afford it).
The only one that comes to mind that actually struck a print, scanned it back, and used that as the final grade was The Batman but I’d love to hear if anyone knows of more recent (or older) films that have done the same.
It would be interesting to see how popular the process might become and if that will result in an inverse trend to your original question – film acquisition and digital finish (so-to-speak) vs. digital acquisition and print finish (a misnomer since the D.I. is still very much in the equation but I don’t know how else to put it), and seeing whether or not the latter inherently looks closer to film pre-digital intermediate/projection.
Of course!
I agree completely, and I think that goes without saying – I didn’t want to imply the opposite, I was just pointing out the commonality in the references you pulled.
Nonetheless it does touch on the idea that if you find yourself lighting an actor for a scene and you aren’t aesthetically happy with the frame, but the staging and lighting is what’s right for the story, there are subtle ways to cheat the position of the light to give slightly more dimension while still convincing the viewer of where the source is being motivated from.
Cheers Max.
Hi Max,
I can offer a few suggestions but I don’t know how insightful they’ll be;
The first is to angle your light higher than your subject in relation to the camera. A lot of the frames you’ve shared have Roger’s camera placement at eye level or below the actor, with what seems like the light being situated above both (if only slightly). Having the light above the camera will also eliminate the issue of shadows caused by the camera, but a really soft source helps negate it as well. Although a lot of cinematography nowadays tend to avoid front lighting subjects because of the flatness that can result, this lighting setup is used a lot for “beauty” lighting as it can offer pleasing shadows on the face, albeit in a more commercial/stylized way, if that’s something you’re going for.
The second suggestion is to place your subject further from the background – this adds three dimensionality to the frame as you can see from Roger’s examples where there is a space that recedes behind the actors but it also adds separation between the intensity of the light on the actor and it’s falloff onto the background, increasing the contrast ratio and making the focus of the frame very clear.
Related to that is the choice of the size of your light source which is dependent on what is motivating said source (all of these frames seem to be light from windows) and spatial restrictions; a smaller light closer to your subject will have more abrupt falloff and add more “shape” to the contours of the face (an actor holding a candle as an example) while a larger source further away (in the case of a window) will diminish those features but feel more natural, and additionally a window frame naturally cuts the light coming through it, offering a little bit of control over the spill and shape of the light (sheers/curtains are a quick and easier way to modulate that).
Really appreciate the thoughtful responses, David. I completely agree in regards to the use and definitions of artificial and natural light, my question might’ve been unclear and my use of the word “manipulating” a little misleading – when noting the dichotomy I was mainly referring to a stills street photography background where compositions and light are mostly found, while a cinematography setting generally offers more options/tools for control.
To that end, and because as you said it’s entirely project dependent, I guess I was just curious if there were any specific projects/scenes you or Roger worked on where you combined lighting and exposure compensation creatively to get a look in-camera you wouldn’t have gotten as close to otherwise.
In the same way you might do push/pull processing on film, was there a time shooting digitally where in conjunction with the lighting, you for example changed the ISO to increase or decrease the global contrast of the image or redistribute the dynamic range?
Nevertheless amidst these hypotheticals your comment that the simplest approach is often the best is very sage advice, I was just wondering if the dynamic described above is as relevant on digital as it is on film – in the interest of creating a shot in camera that comes closest to the final look one might be going for.
