The Real Issue Regarding "Film Look"

[Charles Papert]

Rodriguez had a lot of help getting his images to look the way they do--the so called "rebel without a crew" has a talented support team hidden behind the curtain.

[Emre Safak]

Which film can you pull 16 stops out of?

[Andrew Khalil]

In my opinion, obviously arguable, is that the major issue regarding video now are the several limitations in the whole system. Please let me know if I'm wrong in what I'm saying or if anything is so rediculous it just wouldn't work. Let me elaborate:

first issue are the sensors - they're still really, really, tiny compared to the smallest dSLR sensors. ie, the sensor in my Digital Rebel (a 1.6x) is several times larger than those in pretty much any video camera, even a 60,000 dollar Vari-cam has 2/3 inch sensors, still tiny compared to 35mm. While not the same as film, the dynamic range of dSLRs is still very impressive compared to that of all prosumer video cameras - I've never used a Vari-cam or F900, so I can't really comment on those. Now the problem is why can't manfacturers, particularly Canon with all their innovation and the fact that they design they own sensors, produce a video camera with a larger sensor, eventually going with a full frame sensor when technology costs come down?
A larger sensor with larger pixels will have incredible low light performance, more dynamic range, and the shallow dof we all love to see.

Now, here are the only two issues I can see in the way of this: lens size and recording format, both of which can be overcome.

With a larger sensor, we won't be able to have 20x zooms, but I think most of the people who would buy my theoretial camera would be willing to sacrifice range for the larger sensor. Imagine an XL series camera from Canon with a large (1.6x, 1.3x, or even full frame) sensor with an EF mount instead of an XL mount, giving the operator access to all of Canon's awesome, high resolution lenses. In my opinion, it would be an awesome camera, except for one thing which brings me to my second issue:

recording format - in order for a camera to be able to have awesome dynamic range and resolution, the recording medium has to have enough space to store it which is why I think the miniDV format really needs to be abandoned - it's the limiting factor/excuse that's preventing cameras from having all the characteristics we want to see in our images. How about about a new format (doesn't even have to be a tape) that allows for a little bit more space. Yes, there are already formats like DVCProHD and others, and in reality, it wouldn't be hard to use those formats in some form in a camera.
Here's my reasoning - a photo from my Digital Rebel in RAW (uncompressed) format is roughly 7 mb. Multiply that by 30 (for simplicity's sake, we may also try it with 24 or 29.97 depending on how we're shooting) and you get 210mb in one second of video. Now it may seem high, but when we consider today's technology, is it really (I'm actually curious to know if that's possible)? Also, we won't need all 6 megapixels in HD video, so in reality, it will be much lower.
Am I totally off with this theory, or are these the basic 2 things that would give us a nice film look in video? I simply look at the photos from my dSLR and they look very film-like and simply gorgeous, now why can't that same technology be applied to video?
I'm assuming cost will be the major issue at first, but that should eventually come down.

[Bill Porter]

Originally Posted by Andrew Khalil

why can't manfacturers (snip) produce a video camera with a larger sensor, eventually going with a full frame sensor when technology costs come down?

(snip)

How about about a new format (doesn't even have to be a tape) that allows for a little bit more space.

(snip)

why can't that same technology be applied to video?

(snip)

I'm assuming cost will be the major issue at first, but that should eventually come down.

You answered your own question: Cost.

It takes a tremendous amount of money to create, launch, and support a new product. Without large numbers of sales, the company would lose money.

Right now the issue in our market segment is whose 1/3" CCD camcorder to buy. The issue is not, "Am I going to buy one or just not do any video at all until full frame sensors come out?" Nice position to be in for the manufacturers! :)

[Andrew Khalil]

yeah, I definitly don't see a camera like the one I describe being affordable anytime soon, I see it more as a camera among the ranks of the F900 and varicam - megaexpensive that studios would use, then it would come down in price in a few decades so we could afford them:P

[Graeme Nattress]

I don't think it's that the tech is too expensive, just that the big camera companies don't want to go that route for political reasons. The idea is very, very sound.

Graeme