The Aesthetic

[TomTheDP]

11 hours ago, Video Hummus said:

In the last 8 years

1. Streaming resolution has gone up. I remember when YouTube maxed at 720p and they called it HD!
2. Streaming bitrates have gone up.
3. Better codecs are being used.
4. TV manufactures and streaming services are working on a true "cinema" display standard for viewing.
5. Storage $/GB have continued to decline.
6. Camera media is getting larger and more inexpensive (You can get a 512GB CFExpress card from Angelbird that can handle 8K for $179).
7. Cameras are universally adding 10-bit color in camera.
8. Some cameras are offering 12-bit internal RAW at fairly reasonable bitrates.
9. Camera resolutions are going up
10. Color science is improving in multiple brands
11. Professional grading and editing software is more available and cheaper than ever
12. You can learn how to professional grade your footage FREE to maximize the 10-bit / 12-bit color coming out of your camera.

And that is perfectly valid way to shoot. And so you buy the camera that works best for you and gives you the best SOOC result. As things evolve you switch up your gear to get better results and an easier workflow. This is how technology works. Now you can get cameras that shoot seasoned SOOC colors that look decent in 10-bit. Many of your clients will probably own or WILL own a 10-bit HDR TV / monitor where the footage will shine and look good.

 

Then take your 5K/6K/8K oversampling camera and put it in a 2K/4K mode with as high as a bit depth as you can get. Color your footage however you want.

Hell, if you camera shoots 12-bit+ RAW. Then shoot that and then conform it to ARRI LOG-C and grade it just like an ARRI camera minus a few stops of dynamic range. You can do that now! So until ARRI releases a mirrorless camera with IBIS you won't be happy. I would say the other brands are coming up faster to reaching that point than you think. You just might have to accept that your 2-4K 10-bit plus footage will be oversampled from 8K or more.

Colorspace transform or whatever you use to conform to ARRI log doesn't really work well. Even using extremely carefully designed luts like Alex at emotive color makes isn't perfect.

Not that it matters as clients generally have no taste, especially ones that can't afford a high end camera/media producer.

[leslie]

9 hours ago, Video Hummus said:

In the last 8 years

1. Streaming resolution has gone up. I remember when YouTube maxed at 720p and they called it HD!
2. Streaming bitrates have gone up.
3. Better codecs are being used.
4. TV manufactures and streaming services are working on a true "cinema" display standard for viewing.
5. Storage $/GB have continued to decline.
6. Camera media is getting larger and more inexpensive (You can get a 512GB CFExpress card from Angelbird that can handle 8K for $179).
7. Cameras are universally adding 10-bit color in camera.
8. Some cameras are offering 12-bit internal RAW at fairly reasonable bitrates.
9. Camera resolutions are going up
10. Color science is improving in multiple brands
11. Professional grading and editing software is more available and cheaper than ever
12. You can learn how to professional grade your footage FREE to maximize the 10-bit / 12-bit color coming out of your camera.

 

in the context of kyes topic Aesthetics, isnt it more about the camera / lens relationship although editing/grading certainly does contribute as well to the final look. 

your points while valid, in general, kinda prove that we are getting more "spoiled" for choices don't they ?  but are they the look ?

For me, Cinema and film defined a "LOOK"  Now with digital being all the rage, we are all trying to get back to that  "look"  which is subjective to say the least. If in doubt take a look at the whole og verves p4k debate and thats just one brand.

I kinda feel that cinematographers and directors of photography aught to be congratulated for getting the look right most of the time. But then they wouldn't be blockbusters, if they got it wrong  i guess. 

I have to wonder, while it may be nice to emulate a look, are we as a bunch of mundane normal people ( a couple of us at least 😉 )  striving to hard to obtain a look ?  When is it over the top, for breaking out the fill light, key light, back light for a family get together ? 🤔

There's 7 billion or so people on the planet , these days you can buy a camera and lens, gain a following all over the world. Is that the look or success, maybe more to the point is it profitable? If its for your own personal consumption or family memories does it really matter ?  There's an interesting topic for another discussion perhaps.

[webrunner5]

 Film look and Cine look are fast becoming a thing of the past. You have nearly a generation of young people that what looks good comes from a Smartphone. Hardly Cinematic. And with the push for 8K, 12K you are in no way going to get a "film" look from that.

 I must admit I am liking the cleaner look the more I see it. It represents reality more often than not. And we have a lot more Dynamic Range on these new cameras to boot. And that adds to even more reality. Why try and cover it up. Our eyes appreciate beauty, clarity, and definition. Why mask it with some pretend made up LUT. 

 Action films now seem to be the rage and they sure as heck aren't Filmic as heck. I look at some of these Anamorphic lens films and it gets pretty damn old quick. It looks fake as hell, and it is. Don't get me wrong I like the color of say my OG BMPCC but using shit lenses to get a 8mm look isn't my cup of tea on mine anymore. I want the colors and the clarity. Not some smeared ass look we hated 15 years ago. I want reality, not some outdated look from the past. I think your chasing the wrong horse in the long run.

[TomTheDP]

24 minutes ago, webrunner5 said:

 Film look and Cine look are fast becoming a thing of the past. You have nearly a generation of young people that what looks good comes from a Smartphone. Hardly Cinematic. And with the push for 8K, 12K you are in no way going to get a "film" look from that.

 I must admit I am liking the cleaner look the more I see it. It represents reality more often than not. And we have a lot more Dynamic Range on these new cameras to boot. And that adds to even more reality. Why try and cover it up. Our eyes appreciate beauty, clarity, and definition. Why mask it with some pretend made up LUT. 

 Action films now seem to be the rage and they sure as heck aren't Filmic as heck. I look at some of these Anamorphic lens films and it gets pretty damn old quick. It looks fake as hell, and it is. Don't get me wrong I like the color of say my OG BMPCC but using shit lenses to get a 8mm look isn't my cup of tea on mine anymore. I want the colors and the clarity. Not some smeared ass look we hated 15 years ago. I want reality, not some outdated look from the past. I think your chasing the wrong horse in the long run.

I don't know there is a pretty big push for older aesthetics among young people. The entertainment space is becoming more and more diverse. Classic anime is hugely popular with younger people. There is room for all aesthetics imo.

I kind of agree with you on anamorphic lenses, I am not a big fan, at least for most stuff. I value lens choice a lot more than camera though. The lens you use is the difference between a sharp and soft image.

[MrSMW]

2 hours ago, TomTheDP said:

I don't know there is a pretty big push for older aesthetics among young people. The entertainment space is becoming more and more diverse. Classic anime is hugely popular with younger people. There is room for all aesthetics imo.

I think so also...

I don't think people outside of the industry have much say in regard to the aesthetic and nor do they/we have much say over the content other than voting with our feet and wallets in regard to the latter.

Plus our all important keyboards of course.

I just watched Dune this weekend and was blown away by the aesthetic.

Best movie ever? Well that one is debatable and in regard to the aesthetic, is it all 100% real?

Of course not, but that combination of real + manipulated, the lighting both at the time of capture and fiddled with in post, the tonality of each scene etc...

Shot on digital, transferred to film and then scanned back to digital in order (in their words) to combine the best of both for some kind of crossover look.

It appealed to my aesthetic anyway!

 

[kaylee]

17 hours ago, Video Hummus said:

Oh shit! Did they digitally crop for an artistic intent? Amateurs!

just for the record here, i have no idea why anyone wouldnt want more resolution from a camera shooting video, its not any different than stills to me (??). i want a nice high res unsharp image and ill do the rest. clearly better in post – color, vfx, etc. where am i wrong

[mercer]

33 minutes ago, kaylee said:

just for the record here, i have no idea why anyone wouldnt want more resolution from a camera shooting video, its not any different than stills to me (??). i want a nice high res unsharp image and ill do the rest. clearly better in post – color, vfx, etc. where am i wrong

Hey Kaylee, how in the hell are you?

I don't think you're wrong at all... but neither is Kye. In fact, I think his point is being missed here. Higher resolution is fine... to a point... but it's completely unnecessary when you consider that it's all the camera manufacturers are giving us.

Two years ago when 6K was popping up, most people here were saying that 4K is more than enough and we'd rather have higher bit depth and better DR. Instead, they give us more resolution and now some of those same people really NEED 8K.

I can't tell you how many times I have almost bought a Sigma FP because I thought I needed 4K raw, but at the end of the day, I still haven't made enough with my 5D3 and ML Raw. I'd rather have 14bit color and internal 1080p raw than 4K raw, a bunch of new storage and a computer upgrade. I actually don't think any upgrade, shy of a Komodo, or better would be worth the trouble at this point... especially when you consider the OG Alexa Mini is probably still the most used camera in Hollywood. I, mean, Yellowstone, the highest rated TV show still shoots with the Mini... and nobody could say that's and outdated image... that's gotta mean something.

But everybody has different needs, so YMMV.

Btw... can you send me a link to your short film? I've been wanting to watch it again.

[kaylee]

13 minutes ago, mercer said:

Hey Kaylee, how in the hell are you?

hey lol im good. how are you?

13 minutes ago, mercer said:

[entire rest of post]

oh i agree 100%

13 minutes ago, mercer said:

can you send me a link to your short film? I've been wanting to watch it again.

awww, sure, but it sucks lol. thank u tho. ill pm u

ive been working on a bunch of new stuff. i made a funny pitch film to fund my next 5 lil films or so, and now im trynna get that out there. never give up

[kaylee]

also @kye i fundamentally agree with your point, as an artist, profoundly

less is more – i did not make that up 😂

but now we're getting into weird territory that cant be evaluated with lens charts

(paintings by chuck close)

[mercer]

23 minutes ago, kaylee said:

hey lol im good. how are you?

oh i agree 100%

awww, sure, but it sucks lol. thank u tho. ill pm u

ive been working on a bunch of new stuff. i made a funny pitch film to fund my next 5 lil films or so, and now im trynna get that out there. never give up

I'm hanging in there, thanks.

Well played with the "100% agree." Well played.

Thanks for the link. I don't remember it sucking at all. I remember it showing a strong artistic hand crafted it.

5 more films?! That's great news. I admire your work ethic. Did you pitch a producer? I am so horrible at pre-production. I just want to write a script and shoot it. I hate casting and funding, etc... you know all of the things that make a movie happen. 

[leslie]

1 hour ago, MrSMW said:

 

I just watched Dune this weekend and was blown away by the aesthetic.

Best movie ever? Well that one is debatable and in regard to the aesthetic, is it all 100% real?

Of course not, but that combination of real + manipulated, the lighting both at the time of capture and fiddled with in post, the tonality of each scene etc...

Shot on digital, transferred to film and then scanned back to digital in order (in their words) to combine the best of both for some kind of crossover look.

It appealed to my aesthetic anyway!

 

YES Yes and yes 

I already said this in a different post somewhere else. Kinda glad that someone else with some skill enjoyed it like i did. 

Mrsmw help yourself to a cookie out of the cookie jar 😉  The rest of you get out there and see it, we both cant be wrong. 😀

[Django]

19 hours ago, Video Hummus said:

And that is perfectly valid way to shoot. And so you buy the camera that works best for you and gives you the best SOOC result. As things evolve you switch up your gear to get better results and an easier workflow. This is how technology works. Now you can get cameras that shoot seasoned SOOC colors that look decent in 10-bit. Many of your clients will probably own or WILL own a 10-bit HDR TV / monitor where the footage will shine and look good.

One of the great cine features that made it to R5C is LUT import support. I use this all the time on my FS7 in order to get specific looks SOOC (Venice, ARRI, Fuji/Kodak etc but also super custom LUTs). This opens up an infinity of SOOC looks as you are no longer reduced to the 5 or 6 manufacturer picture profiles. An essential feature when working on projects with fast turnaround.

1 hour ago, mercer said:

I, mean, Yellowstone, the highest rated TV show still shoots with the Mini... and nobody could say that's and outdated image... that's gotta mean something.

But everybody has different needs, so YMMV.

Different needs and different requirements.. for example Yellowstone is a a Paramount Network show, meaning it is broadcasted in 720p / 1080i (and in 1080p on streaming network). Meaning the Alexa Mini's 3.2K is more than sufficient. 

Quick search reveals this interesting info:

We shot three-cameras most days, on the ARRI Alexa Mini and the ARRI Amira in ProRes 4444 3.2K, Log-C. We carried several sets of ARRI Ultra Prime lenses, and a selection of Angenieux zooms, including the 45-120 and the 24-290. I am a big fan of the Ultra Prime lenses for their simplicity and gentle rendering. I shot Wind River on the older ARRI/Zeiss Standard Speed primes and have always admired their elegant sharpness and gentle yet detailed falloff. The Ultra Primes carry that same DNA in a more modern housing, suitable for the scale of a production like this one. I find them unfussy and gently flattering, with just enough personality to enhance the natural lighting scheme we were striving for. I viewed on-set--and subsequently completed the DI--through a custom LUT I have been refining over several years.”

Kind of ties in to what I was saying above about custom LUT support being such a great feature.

2 hours ago, MrSMW said:

Shot on digital, transferred to film and then scanned back to digital in order (in their words) to combine the best of both for some kind of crossover look.

It appealed to my aesthetic anyway!

The hybrid making of Dune is definitely interesting. Reminds me of a big trend in electronic music production which is called analog summing (roundtrip through analog) in order to shave away digital harshness..

"it gave us the feeling we had been picturing a certain texture that’s painterly but feels timeless…The film has softened the edges of the digital. It gave us something that film acquisition couldn’t give us, and it gave us something that digital acquisition couldn’t give us"

 

 

5 hours ago, webrunner5 said:

I must admit I am liking the cleaner look the more I see it. It represents reality more often than not. And we have a lot more Dynamic Range on these new cameras to boot. And that adds to even more reality. Why try and cover it up. Our eyes appreciate beauty, clarity, and definition. Why mask it with some pretend made up LUT. 

Yeah it is really quite subjective but also depends on the content/medium. Narrative fiction often requires a heavier look, whereas documentaries are much more neutral. 

5 hours ago, webrunner5 said:

Film look and Cine look are fast becoming a thing of the past. You have nearly a generation of young people that what looks good comes from a Smartphone. Hardly Cinematic. 

Again depends on content/medium, but you're certainly right about Gen Z: I can tell you that when contracted to do certain social media content like IG stories,  clients usually insist on using iPhones so that the content appears "authentic". And if you do use an MILC, then you need to avoid shallow DoF, shoot in vertical, avoid LUTs etc. Basically you're emulating smartphones.

A lot of Fashion brands have also switched their aesthetic to shooting online photo campaigns on smartphones instead of FF or Medium Format. This includes the likes of very famous photographers which is kind of a shock and a trend change nobody would have predicted a couple years ago. 

[kaylee]

3 minutes ago, mercer said:

Well played with the "100% agree." Well played.

loool no i do agree 😂 no irony i swear

6 minutes ago, mercer said:

I remember it showing a strong artistic hand crafted it

oh i well i find that quite touching. i needed that. thank you very v much

9 minutes ago, mercer said:

5 more films?! That's great news. I admire your work ethic

thank you, i wish it was better tbh, but i keep making things.

16 minutes ago, mercer said:

I hate casting and funding, etc... you know all of the things that make a movie happen. 

oh good news: if you get deep into it youll hate it MORE

/ive been making things. the pandemic kinda messed me up BUT

as long as we're talking about art here........

i take my art practice super seriously. im super self critical and it can be paralyzing – im sure many of you can relate

but every time i make a lil film, it gets so much better. and i take these things as defeats, still, because there are inevitable (yet unpredictable) disasters one way or another, but i LEARN SO MUCH that after the shoot and im done licking my wounds i can go back and say Wow im growing as a filmmaker. i just learned not to do 1000 things that ill never do again. and my Big Idea turned out pretty well, i was right about a lot of things, not perfectly executed, far from it – but im getting better all the time. and one day my reach will catch up to my grasp.

so my point is that the only advice i have for any filmmaker is: just keep making stuff. you'll see

[kye]

19 hours ago, Video Hummus said:

In the last 8 years

1. Streaming resolution has gone up. I remember when YouTube maxed at 720p and they called it HD!
2. Streaming bitrates have gone up.
3. Better codecs are being used.
4. TV manufactures and streaming services are working on a true "cinema" display standard for viewing.
5. Storage $/GB have continued to decline.
6. Camera media is getting larger and more inexpensive (You can get a 512GB CFExpress card from Angelbird that can handle 8K for $179).
7. Cameras are universally adding 10-bit color in camera.
8. Some cameras are offering 12-bit internal RAW at fairly reasonable bitrates.
9. Camera resolutions are going up
10. Color science is improving in multiple brands
11. Professional grading and editing software is more available and cheaper than ever
12. You can learn how to professional grade your footage FREE to maximize the 10-bit / 12-bit color coming out of your camera.

And that is perfectly valid way to shoot. And so you buy the camera that works best for you and gives you the best SOOC result. As things evolve you switch up your gear to get better results and an easier workflow. This is how technology works. Now you can get cameras that shoot seasoned SOOC colors that look decent in 10-bit. Many of your clients will probably own or WILL own a 10-bit HDR TV / monitor where the footage will shine and look good.

 

Then take your 5K/6K/8K oversampling camera and put it in a 2K/4K mode with as high as a bit depth as you can get. Color your footage however you want.

Hell, if you camera shoots 12-bit+ RAW. Then shoot that and then conform it to ARRI LOG-C and grade it just like an ARRI camera minus a few stops of dynamic range. You can do that now! So until ARRI releases a mirrorless camera with IBIS you won't be happy. I would say the other brands are coming up faster to reaching that point than you think. You just might have to accept that your 2-4K 10-bit plus footage will be oversampled from 8K or more.

Your points are all true, but what I'm getting at is that the balance is off.  

If I got a family car and made it sportier it would be good and appeal to a wider audience.  If I made it faster still it would appeal to a narrower audience and most people would want other improvements rather than speed, for example perhaps safety or comfort.  Making it faster and faster and faster leave behind most people because they'll never need the speed  but would really prefer to pay for extra safety and comfort and a better stereo instead of paying for speed they won't use.

Cameras are like that now.  The only people where 8K is actually better than 6K in any meaningful way (when actually looking at the end result) is people doing VFX of some kind (crazy stabilisation, severe cropping, VFX) but they're specialists.  So 8K is really a feature for specialists that is implemented in every camera.  So we all have to pay for this feature that we won't really benefit from.  But it's worse because all the energy being put into that feature is investment that could have been put into the other things that would have been of more use to a wider audience.

Take the OG BMPCC for example.  It was 1080p RAW internal, but had terrible battery life.  You'd think that in a decade they'd have a camera that would take care of the battery life, because that was one of the cameras leading issues.  Not so, the R5C can record 8K RAW, but not on battery.  They've under-improved one feature and over-improved another.

It's like Canon announcing "Last year we announced our 25K flagship camera which required external power to record, and that wasn't the ideal camera for everyone, so we're proud to announce that our new camera is 50K and still requires external power to record!" and people are sitting back and thinking "WTF - you worked on the wrong thing!".
Similarly, think about the reaction when Panasonic keep releasing camera after camera with more and more resolution, larger sensors, but the AF is still the Achilles heel of the whole thing - "WTF - you worked on the wrong thing!".

That's what I'm doing now.  I'm sitting here looking at my OG BMPCC, my BMMCC, my GH5, my GX85, and thinking that all those cameras had weaknesses that would be great if they were fixed, but the current crop of cameras has been improved in ways I didn't want (and very few people actually benefit from) and most of the current cameras still have the same issues as before.

They're working on the wrong things, diverting money from the right things.

19 hours ago, Video Hummus said:

Oh shit! Did they digitally crop for an artistic intent? Amateurs!

Hahaha. I love the old "I found one example in the entire history of mankind - therefore your argument has no merit at all so go home and let the rest of us forget you ever existed" logic 🙂 

6 hours ago, leslie said:

in the context of kyes topic Aesthetics, isnt it more about the camera / lens relationship although editing/grading certainly does contribute as well to the final look. 

your points while valid, in general, kinda prove that we are getting more "spoiled" for choices don't they ?  but are they the look ?

For me, Cinema and film defined a "LOOK"  Now with digital being all the rage, we are all trying to get back to that  "look"  which is subjective to say the least. If in doubt take a look at the whole og verves p4k debate and thats just one brand.

I kinda feel that cinematographers and directors of photography aught to be congratulated for getting the look right most of the time. But then they wouldn't be blockbusters, if they got it wrong  i guess. 

I have to wonder, while it may be nice to emulate a look, are we as a bunch of mundane normal people ( a couple of us at least 😉 )  striving to hard to obtain a look ?  When is it over the top, for breaking out the fill light, key light, back light for a family get together ? 🤔

There's 7 billion or so people on the planet , these days you can buy a camera and lens, gain a following all over the world. Is that the look or success, maybe more to the point is it profitable? If its for your own personal consumption or family memories does it really matter ?  There's an interesting topic for another discussion perhaps.

There's an interesting error of logic that people seem to be making around colour science.

I keep saying that I wanted better colour science, and people keep saying that now 10-bit and RAW is more affordable so there I have it, but this is missing the point.  Colour grading RAW is very difficult and manufacturers are much better at doing it than we are (otherwise, why are people so enamoured with Canon colour, if anyone can do it?) so actually, the lower the cost of the camera, the better I want the colour science because the worse the owner will be at colour grading and the less money they can devote to it.

5 hours ago, webrunner5 said:

 Film look and Cine look are fast becoming a thing of the past. You have nearly a generation of young people that what looks good comes from a Smartphone. Hardly Cinematic. And with the push for 8K, 12K you are in no way going to get a "film" look from that.

 I must admit I am liking the cleaner look the more I see it. It represents reality more often than not. And we have a lot more Dynamic Range on these new cameras to boot. And that adds to even more reality. Why try and cover it up. Our eyes appreciate beauty, clarity, and definition. Why mask it with some pretend made up LUT. 

 Action films now seem to be the rage and they sure as heck aren't Filmic as heck. I look at some of these Anamorphic lens films and it gets pretty damn old quick. It looks fake as hell, and it is. Don't get me wrong I like the color of say my OG BMPCC but using shit lenses to get a 8mm look isn't my cup of tea on mine anymore. I want the colors and the clarity. Not some smeared ass look we hated 15 years ago. I want reality, not some outdated look from the past. I think your chasing the wrong horse in the long run.

I think you're hitting the nail on the head here, The Aesthetic is about getting the right look.  It's a "right amount" mindset rather than a "more is always better" mindset.

If you concentrate on the right amount, then you're interested in getting the right amount of resolution from the sensor, the right amount of resolution and sharpness from the lens, the right amount of distortions, etc.

The challenge is that, for everyone except specialist VFX applications, the right amount of camera resolution has already been gained and now they're just piling on more and more, but we haven't gotten the right amount of other things, like functionality or reliability.

The R5 was a classic..  it can record way more pixels than you need, for way less time that you needed.  It doesn't average out!

2 hours ago, MrSMW said:

I think so also...

I don't think people outside of the industry have much say in regard to the aesthetic and nor do they/we have much say over the content other than voting with our feet and wallets in regard to the latter.

Plus our all important keyboards of course.

I just watched Dune this weekend and was blown away by the aesthetic.

Best movie ever? Well that one is debatable and in regard to the aesthetic, is it all 100% real?

Of course not, but that combination of real + manipulated, the lighting both at the time of capture and fiddled with in post, the tonality of each scene etc...

Shot on digital, transferred to film and then scanned back to digital in order (in their words) to combine the best of both for some kind of crossover look.

It appealed to my aesthetic anyway!

The trip to film and back is a perfect example of an artistic treatment rather than a 'fidelity' treatment.  Essentially it degraded the process in every way possible, when viewed from a technical perspective.  Lower sharpness, lower resolution, altered colours, and cost both time and money.  Worse technically, but better aesthetically.

2 hours ago, kaylee said:

just for the record here, i have no idea why anyone wouldnt want more resolution from a camera shooting video, its not any different than stills to me (??). i want a nice high res unsharp image and ill do the rest. clearly better in post – color, vfx, etc. where am i wrong

If I make two versions of a camera, one with a lower resolution sensor and one with a higher resolution sensor, the higher resolution sensor one will:

• drain the battery faster, or require a larger heavier more expensive battery (camera has to process more pixels)
• fill the memory card faster, or require a larger more expensive card
• have worse low-light and noise performance
• have worse colour (think about how colour goes to shit in low light)
• cost more to manufacture
• require a faster computer to edit, or require time to render proxies

To a certain extent these costs are hidden, because technology is getting cheaper, so the cost of getting a memory card that can record an hour of footage doesn't go up from year to year.  However, if I already own a large enough SD card for a given resolution, and they don't increase the resolution of the camera, the cost of an SD card for that camera drops to zero because what I own now is fine and I don't have to buy anything.

This is a point that most people don't realise.

11 minutes ago, leslie said:

YES Yes and yes 

I already said this in a different post somewhere else. Kinda glad that someone else with some skill enjoyed it like i did. 

Mrsmw help yourself to a cookie out of the cookie jar 😉  The rest of you get out there and see it, we both cant be wrong. 😀

I've seen it.  Great film, really really enjoyed it.

For anyone in this thread using this as an example of higher resolutions being useful, absolutely.  Anyone shooting a VFX film with a budget more than $100,000,000 - please understand that I'm not talking to you! 🙂 

8 minutes ago, Django said:

One of the great cine features that made it to R5C is LUT import support. I use this all the time on my FS7 in order to get specific looks SOOC (Venice, ARRI, Fuji/Kodak etc but also super custom LUTs). This opens up an infinity of SOOC looks as you are no longer reduced to the 5 or 6 manufacturer picture profiles. An essential feature when working on projects with fast turnaround.

Different needs and different requirements.. for example Yellowstone is a a Paramount Network show, meaning it is broadcasted in 720p / 1080i (and in 1080p on streaming network). Meaning the Alexa Mini's 3.2K is more than sufficient. 

Quick search reveals this interesting info:

We shot three-cameras most days, on the ARRI Alexa Mini and the ARRI Amira in ProRes 4444 3.2K, Log-C. We carried several sets of ARRI Ultra Prime lenses, and a selection of Angenieux zooms, including the 45-120 and the 24-290. I am a big fan of the Ultra Prime lenses for their simplicity and gentle rendering. I shot Wind River on the older ARRI/Zeiss Standard Speed primes and have always admired their elegant sharpness and gentle yet detailed falloff. The Ultra Primes carry that same DNA in a more modern housing, suitable for the scale of a production like this one. I find them unfussy and gently flattering, with just enough personality to enhance the natural lighting scheme we were striving for. I viewed on-set--and subsequently completed the DI--through a custom LUT I have been refining over several years.”

Kind of ties in to what I was saying above about custom LUT support being such a great feature.

The hybrid making of Dune is definitely interesting. Reminds me of what some do in electronic music which is record digital instruments to analog tape then back into the DAW to take away digital harshness..

"it gave us the feeling we had been picturing a certain texture that’s painterly but feels timeless…The film has softened the edges of the digital. It gave us something that film acquisition couldn’t give us, and it gave us something that digital acquisition couldn’t give us"

 

 

Yeah it is really quite subjective but also depends on the content/medium. Narrative fiction often requires a heavier look, whereas documentaries are much more neutral. 

Again depends on content/medium, but you're certainly right about Gen Z: I can tell you that when contracted to do certain social media content like IG stories,  clients usually insist on using iPhones so that the content appears "authentic". And if you do use an MILC, then you need to avoid shallow DoF, shoot in vertical, avoid LUTs etc. Basically you're emulating smartphones.

A lot of Fashion brands have also switched their aesthetic to shooting online photo campaigns on smartphones instead of FF or Medium Format. This includes the likes of very famous photographers which is kind of a shock and a trend change nobody would have predicted a couple years ago. 

LUT support in camera would be great.  Guess why they don't include it in lots of cameras?  It takes processing power.   ............processing power that would be spare if the camera wasn't processing so many pixels!!

46 minutes ago, Django said:

Again depends on content/medium, but you're certainly right about Gen Z: I can tell you that when contracted to do certain social media content like IG stories,  clients usually insist on using iPhones so that the content appears "authentic". And if you do use an MILC, then you need to avoid shallow DoF, shoot in vertical, avoid LUTs etc. Basically you're emulating smartphones.

A lot of Fashion brands have also switched their aesthetic to shooting online photo campaigns on smartphones instead of FF or Medium Format. This includes the likes of very famous photographers which is kind of a shock and a trend change nobody would have predicted a couple years ago. 

This desire for "authenticity" through the smartphone look has been around for years but is interesting that it has permeated this far.  I remember reading about it years ago when I wasn't even into video yet.

IIRC people don't trust the more polished, longer focal length, shallower DoF image because they became so associated with big corporates (the only ones who could afford that look) making highly polished videos that lied about crimes against humanity and the oppression of the poor and working classes etc (you know - business as usual).

Yet, the vloggers still seem to want shallow DoF, and go to extraordinary lengths to get it, so who knows if that aesthetic will somehow gradually be redeemed due to the huge volume of honest authentic people vlogging with a shallow DoF out there.  
Conversely, I wonder if we're in for a spate of heavily misleading content with the smartphone look somehow tarnishing the 'authenticity' that this look currently enjoys.  If you get enough people spouting anti-social crap through it then that would do it, but of course that would require the people watching to realise that the content is anti-social, rather than radical free speech.  Seems we're losing the ability to tell fact from lunatic in the current climate!  Still, it's a genuine thing since the authenticity came from the content of that 'look' being more honest than the previous 'look'.

[kaylee]

how is this discussion ranging from SD cards to Alexa 65s im confused

[MrSMW]

2 minutes ago, kaylee said:

how is this discussion ranging from SD cards to Alexa 65s im confused

Someone, somewhere, will be asking the question, "what SD cards did they shoot Dune on?"

 

[MrSMW]

Does anyone know what SD cards Villeneuve used to shoot Dune on?

[kaylee]

7 hours ago, TomTheDP said:

Classic anime is hugely popular with younger people.

not to change the subject – i find this fascinating

[kaylee]

Just now, MrSMW said:

Does anyone know what SD cards Villeneuve used to shoot Dune on?

kayleerumors is reporting that is was 12k SD

[Emanuel]

5 hours ago, kaylee said:

hey lol im good. how are you?

oh i agree 100%

awww, sure, but it sucks lol. thank u tho. ill pm u

ive been working on a bunch of new stuff. i made a funny pitch film to fund my next 5 lil films or so, and now im trynna get that out there. never give up

Just jealous now : D don't forget to send to someone else too : P