Why the XL1??

[Jean-Philippe Archibald]

That's right!

[Kevin Dooley]

Okay, no one dreams of shooting on 16mm, but if the depth of field is determine by, amongst other things, the size of the image captured, then using 16mm lenses on a 2/3" camera should give you a very similar look to 16mm in terms of depth of field amongst other things, right? I can think of at least on feature that was shot on 16mm and looked great, probably more if I bothered to take the time. So this, while not giving you a 35mm film look, could give you a film look. . . Any holes in this logic??

[Charles Papert]

Well, the hole in the logic is that video is still video, and film is still film. There seems to be a growing misconception that shallow depth of field on a DV camera means it will look just like film. I've seen footage made with the Mini35 that looks just like video, with the background out of focus. Not so good.

16mm looks like film because it is film. Standard 2/3" video lenses give you the same depth of field as 16mm lenses if they were mounted to the same camera, as will the Digiprimes--and it's still video. My personal feeling is that the frame rate is more important in the all-elusive film look than the depth of field. Now that 24p is a reality for the under-$5000 market (and the XL1, with its let's-call-it-30p-for-the-sake-of-argument frame mode, started all this), the next frontier is depth of field, and obviously folks are going nuts over this--check out how many times the Agus35 thread has been read and replied to.

The bottom line remains, after the frame rate and depth of field issues are resolved: the real key to making your video look and FEEL like film to the viewer is by the way you compose, light, post-process and edit your footage. A great shooter may be able to make frame mode XL1 with standard lens look more filmic than a hack with an Cinealta camera and a PRO35 setup.

Oh, almost forgot...

<<(or a camera with 35mm/1.4" CCD's which of course doesn't exist>>

http://www.dalsa.com/dc/dc.asp

[Kevin Dooley]

Wow, that's really cool. Unfortunately unless I win the lottery I think I'll be doing without it.

As for the rest of your post, I understand that the onus is as much on the filmmaker (if not an incredible amount more) to make his video look like film. If you don't light and compose for film, it will never look like film.

I do love 24p, but in leui of being able to shoot in 24p on the XL1, DOF is the highest problem to work around, IMO.

[Aaron Koolen]

So that Dalsa is 14bit per RGB channel I take it! Holy shit.

I agree with Charles with regard the framerate adding alot to the film look (Along with deinterlacing). I'd never experienced this until I did my LadyX episode. Wasn't until I deinterlaced that the quality of my footage magically changed. No where filmic of course, but it lost that crappy smooth video look.

Oh and Kevin, just use forced perspective. Make all your background objects bigger than real life, place them farther back from the subject and they'll look the right size and go out of focus ;)

Aaron

[Rob Lohman]

Imagine, Aaron, what would have happened if you shot if in frame
mode in the first place. To my eye the Canon frame mode just
looks wonderful. Beter (and this is a subjective term here!) then
I can get with a de-interlacer. Yes I know I am loosing resolution,
but I don't care. I care what the final image looks like.

[Kevin Dooley]

Canon Frame mode is interesting, I just don't know if I can bring myself to use it on a full lenght project. The judder seems really bad to me.

Oh, and force perspective is great and all, except when your shooting in someone's small house and you just don't have the ability to do that. Works great outside though.

[Aaron Koolen]

Kevin on the LCD it will look worse that it might on say a TV or on your computer. I've never tried projecting my footage to see how that looks so can't comment there.

Aaron