Re: [APML] Film vs Digital - Not Just Astrophotographers

["Alson Wong" <alsonwong@earthlink.net>]

I recently watched the documentaries on the new "Fellowship of the Ring"
DVD, and they demonstrated how they scanned their live-action 35 film into a
digital format and then made adjustments to contrast, color balance, and
color saturation, sometimes selecting only a portion of the frame (actor's
face or eyes), before transferring the altered images back onto film. This
appeared to be very similar to what film photographers do in the digital
darkroom.

Alson

----- Original Message -----
From: "Andrew Schott" <aschott@cfl.rr.com>
To: <astro-photo@seds.org>
Sent: Saturday, December 28, 2002 7:19 AM
Subject: Re: [APML] Film vs Digital - Not Just Astrophotographers


> I saw "Star Wars: Attack Of The Clones" in a digital "DLP" cinema and as
far
> as I am concerned, film in the theatre is already obsolete!  Incredible
> clarity, color fidelity, contrast, stability unmatched by any film
rendition
> I've ever seen.  The picture was bright, flicker free and very comfortable
> to watch.  The motion rendered in the fight scenes was very intense as the
> matter of shutters and mechanical film movements aren't in the way of
> quickly displaying each frame.
>
> Now, as to the matter of using digital methods for imaging, that remains
to
> be seen.  I don't think there have been any "all digital" movies released
> yet.  I'll be first in line to see them when they are!
>
> I know you'll hear a big hue and cry from the cinematographer unions when
> the switch does occur.  There's a big industry centered around
professionals
> who spend their entire careers learning to control exposure, how to shoot
> for final effect and knowing exactly how any given film will react to the
> scene lighting.  They're not going down without a fight.
>
> I think "Oh, Brother, Where Art Thou?" was the first film that was
> completely digitally mastered.  They took the negatives, uncut, and
scanned
> them in to their computers and used digital image manipulation to edit and
> control the color/contrast/mood of the film throughout.
>
> What this has to do with astrophotography isn't clear....  I guess I'm
> waaaaay OT here, but there's always a benefit when more and more
industries
> are demanding quality CCD chips and projection methods.  It will trickle
> down to our level as far as improving digital capture and rendering.
Could
> be very bad for film though:-(




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