First of all Eid Mubarak everyone, im finally back to blogging.
According to this article it says the Steven Speilberg (Director) has refused to shoot the 4th Indiana Jones sequel in digital format, instead he’ll be shooting in Film. George Lucas (movie Writer) insisted to shoot on Digital, he’s one of the pioneers of digital filming btw – but steven Speilberg joked saying that he is the last person in Hollywood still cutting the film negatives.
My take is that the gap between film and digital is getting very close, most digital films add grain effects just to match the grainy film look, before the dynamic light range of whites/blacks holds better in film, but today Digital has proven to capture more dynamic range than film. It’s hardly makes a difference to a the average guy/gal to notice what format the movie is shot in,. Spielberg learned the old-skool way of cutting film negatives, and still insists on making movies that way – he didn’t use an Avid system yet (one the most popular Non Linear systems) But at least he could’ve used easier methods, new tools because the technology is advancing.. he’s an old-fashioned guy for sure .. I’m with George on this one – ma 3endek salfa ya Steve :p
Format wars and debates are always happening and won’t stop so soon. As I see it, what matters in the end is the story, and what someone has to tell and say.
4 Comments
The problem with the latest Star Wars films is that they were “too clean”.. for me at least, and I didn’t even know that it was shot digitally back then. I can’t even imagine Indiana Jones looking so clean because (if it will be shot in the same manner as to old films) it would definitely look fake, and I think that is one of the reasons for Speilberg’s refusal to go digital.
Sure there are digital grain and other “film look” tools to use, but at the end nothing beats the real thing :)
Digital cinema can work, if it was used the right way for the right reason. Miami Vice, for example, looked great because it was digital. It had a documentary/reality kind of feeling, and the digital processing helped to achieve that brilliantly.
In photography it is the same thing. There are many great professional digital cameras in the market, yet, there are many photographers still think film cameras are special, and they are right if you ask me :). I have a very good DSLR camera (Canon 5D), but I still use an old Minolta with Kodak film from time to time, it just feels great :).
good blog,
best regards.
thanks for your reply moayad, you really have a point here, Since I started using digital formats, the degree of freedom of what you can do with that medium is huge, one could easily fake a film look with new tools, but, as you pointed the “feel” is different, the classy touch is missing, it’s like telling Ford to build an old mustang, even if they could match it, the classy “feel” of it is gone .. but since I started off at digital it doesnt make a difference to me, since I haven’t used the film medium before, perhaps if I do my opinion could change :)
and thanks again !
This is great info to know.