Sony pd100a possible film asthetics...? at DVinfo.net

James Johanson · October 3rd, 2006, 03:54 PM

Hey not sure if iam posting this in the proper place, sorry if it is. I was wondering if its possible to achieve a film type look with a sony pd100a dvcam camcorder. I've seen older movies such as King is Alive(sony pd100a), Dancer in the Dark(sony pd100a), and i was highly impressed with the quality of film. I understand lighting and other figures must be taken into consideration. I generally use a 30sec shutter, wide angle lens, and white balance the picture that is all. With some decent lighting, and filming, the quality doesn't stand up to well. Other there any other factors in post such as 24p converting programs, or deinterlacing in premiere? that can improve upon the picture, or i just have film much better?

Don Bloom · October 3rd, 2006, 04:04 PM

Films that are done on DV are generally converted to real film, therefore the film look. Colorists, telecine and the general look of film make DV footage film like.

However there are numerous ways in post to get quite close to that look. Color correction, perhaps motion blur, maybe some glow effect, of course rendering to a different rate (24fps) deinterlacing...all of these things can help achieve the "film look". Remember that the look you are trying to achieve is up to you so my suggestion is to play with the footage in post and see what you can do with it. You'd be surprised what a bit of tweaking can accomplish.

Don

Ben Eytalis · December 10th, 2006, 09:44 PM

Hey James,
here is something I shot with a PD100a and achieved a sort of film look:
http://lunarvue.com/cherrys02.mov

had some success in achieveing a "psuedo" film look from my old well-used PD100a. I esed FCP to edit the spot, but I also use Premiere Pro 2.0 at my other job, and this short cut will also work with PP2.....
When I did this project I didn't have any really cool film effect plug-ins, but I had once read a little trick about how to create your own "film look."

Heres how:
Place your clip on V1 and copy it to V2 right above it.
De-interlace the lower fields of one clip and the upper fields of the other.
Then lower the opacity of the V2 clip to 50%
Thats it!

I then added a silk/fog effect to the entire sequence to give it a softer look. I also cranked the saturation a bit and added some reds to the gains to warm it up just a bit.
The overall effect was pretty satisfactory. Of course the clip kind of loses somthing in the compression to quicktime. Anyway...I've since aquired true film effect plug ins, and the results are about the same as the little home-made effect. I'm told that my home-made shortcut is exactly what the film effect plug-ins do, but don't quote me on that.

Good luck! Love to know what you accomplish with your PD100.
-Ben

Quote:

Originally Posted by James Johanson

Hey not sure if iam posting this in the proper place, sorry if it is. I was wondering if its possible to achieve a film type look with a sony pd100a dvcam camcorder. I've seen older movies such as King is Alive(sony pd100a), Dancer in the Dark(sony pd100a), and i was highly impressed with the quality of film. I understand lighting and other figures must be taken into consideration. I generally use a 30sec shutter, wide angle lens, and white balance the picture that is all. With some decent lighting, and filming, the quality doesn't stand up to well. Other there any other factors in post such as 24p converting programs, or deinterlacing in premiere? that can improve upon the picture, or i just have film much better?

Bryan Wilkat · January 15th, 2007, 01:03 PM

i'm not sure exactly what features are on the pd100, but you should check your settings and see if you have a "sharpness" adjustment, if you do, bring the sharpness all the way down. thats one crucial element that i find makes video more noticeable, things are always too sharp, when they're too sharp they get pixelated and it looks bad. lowering the sharpness helps achieve the more smooth film type look of your footage...and try to avoid badly light areas, it'll make your footage grainy. dont get me wrong, film can be grainy too, but i find video has a distinctive digital grain which is quite different on a big screen than natural film grain.

October 3rd, 2006, 03:54 PM	#1
James Johanson New Boot Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: New York, NY Posts: 16	Sony pd100a possible film asthetics...? Hey not sure if iam posting this in the proper place, sorry if it is. I was wondering if its possible to achieve a film type look with a sony pd100a dvcam camcorder. I've seen older movies such as King is Alive(sony pd100a), Dancer in the Dark(sony pd100a), and i was highly impressed with the quality of film. I understand lighting and other figures must be taken into consideration. I generally use a 30sec shutter, wide angle lens, and white balance the picture that is all. With some decent lighting, and filming, the quality doesn't stand up to well. Other there any other factors in post such as 24p converting programs, or deinterlacing in premiere? that can improve upon the picture, or i just have film much better?

October 3rd, 2006, 04:04 PM	#2
Don Bloom Inner Circle Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: Chicago, IL Posts: 6,609	Films that are done on DV are generally converted to real film, therefore the film look. Colorists, telecine and the general look of film make DV footage film like. However there are numerous ways in post to get quite close to that look. Color correction, perhaps motion blur, maybe some glow effect, of course rendering to a different rate (24fps) deinterlacing...all of these things can help achieve the "film look". Remember that the look you are trying to achieve is up to you so my suggestion is to play with the footage in post and see what you can do with it. You'd be surprised what a bit of tweaking can accomplish. Don

January 15th, 2007, 01:03 PM	#4
Bryan Wilkat Regular Crew Join Date: Jan 2007 Location: Montreal, Canada Posts: 171	i'm not sure exactly what features are on the pd100, but you should check your settings and see if you have a "sharpness" adjustment, if you do, bring the sharpness all the way down. thats one crucial element that i find makes video more noticeable, things are always too sharp, when they're too sharp they get pixelated and it looks bad. lowering the sharpness helps achieve the more smooth film type look of your footage...and try to avoid badly light areas, it'll make your footage grainy. dont get me wrong, film can be grainy too, but i find video has a distinctive digital grain which is quite different on a big screen than natural film grain.