what filter does hollywood movies use ?

[whiskey29]

You probably know what I mean. If you ever see the raw uneditted hollywood movie in TV, it looks like just our home movie. It seems that when they edit the movie, they change the white balance or add some more red filter or something like that. The picture looks completely different and better in eyes.

Does anybody know for sure what filter those proffessional editors add to their video ?

[bvcproductions]

That's what I want to know as well. At the moment I'm playing around with different effects and colour settings in premiere, and if I find out I'll let you know, but if anyone else already knows, please tell me.

[whiskey29]

thanks bvcproductions, please let me know if you find one.
It seems to me that they add some sort of soft filter and modify the color tone ie. more red.
but somebody must already know this...

[Syphic]

I too am curious what filter they use. Ive seen certain filters for premiere that say " make your film look like hollywood style film", and its a filter that says 16mm and 32mm film which is what they use for hollywood movies. One is a plugin by a company and its called "cinelook".

[BJ_M]

we use a DaVinci or Pogle color correction system . they are $400,000 -$500,000 (used) for the majority of films.


You can get somewhat the same look w/ Shake w/ the saphire plug-ins and others ($14,000) or AE w/ some various plug -ins (magic bullet is great if you have DV or video source ($1200-$3000) or dfx Fusion w/ also a few plug -ins ($5000 - $8000) .

[Cornucopia]

I'd say your best bet (read: relatively low $) on color correction right now would be AVID XpressDV 3.5 (Win/Mac) or FinalCutPro 3 (Mac only). Otherwise AfterEffects and/or Premiere with 3rd party ColorCorrection plugins might work. These are ALL far short of what you can do with the real thing, though.

Also, I've seen movie outtakes before, and I would disagree that they look just like most peoples' home videos. You'll NEVER see camera shake unless it's on purpose (ala Blair Witch). Lighting and composition are much better. Here, I believe they use the filter or plugin known as "PROFESSIONALISM". Additional production equipment such as light meters and chip charts help a little too.

Scott

[vandakeg]

hey BJ_M.. correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't Magic Bullet for AE only available for the mac version? is there a similar plugin for those of us w/ the PC version of AE?
BTW, I have found a trick that seems to do fairly well w/ the DV i capture w/o using any plugins.
First, I copy the clip, and put a 2 or 3 level posterize on it. I then put a blur, and blur it about 10-20%. I choose color burn for the transfer mode. Finally I change the opacity until the picture looks clear again. It seems to do a pretty good job bringing the color out.

[whiskey29]

wh0a BJ_M .... $5000 is still too much.. I would go and get a better camera with 3 CCD with that kind of money LOL.
I;m just a home video maker who wants to take home video for memories sake.. but i want to make it looks good too. and buting those stuff would burns my pocket.
I think i have to live with what i got and try to play with the filter.

[SaSi]

Another difference in "professional" cameras is the FILM and the LENSES. Home camcorders shoot at 704 x 625 at best and CCDs with fast response are not as good as a Film.

Movie film (35mm) can have a density of almost 4, giving something like 40 bits resolution. CCD cameras will not go beyond 2.4 (at least according to Kodak). This makes a lot of difference in colour representation.

Also, as I have found out scanning film, scanning a 35mm positive at 2400dpi optical resolution gives almost twice as much detail as 1200 dpi does (at least with a decent film scanner, like Canon or Nikon).

Therefore, the source, the film, has a much better quality than CCD camcorder.

Now the lenses. Panaflex lenses, apart from modifying the image to fit a 16:9 aspect or more, they have excellent quality, sometimes better than high-end SLR lenses. Camcorder lenses are not a match by far.

Therefore, the source, the film, gets better content with professional lenses than with a home camcorder one, same way you get better photos with a high end SLR camera with good lens compared with a compact (film or digital).

I have watched an interview with Steven Spielberg and a short discussion on digital movie. His words were that: Digital is fine for proofing scenes, but you can't get good quality from them.

As far as camera shake, have you seen cameras on wagons moving over rails? Have you seen how many people it takes to man that thing? Cameraman (the manager), Focus operator (just to focus the lens - no autofocus), boom operator (to direct the $2,000 microphone correctly - no built-in-camera-mic) and a few hours of planning before the take, just to make sure things are done properly. Oh!, and I almost forgot. They also have a director

All film editing (apart from post-production and special effects that are done on computers - but they are not part of the majority of footage), is done on the original film. No transcoding, no colour loss, no image degradation. Only danger is scratching the film surface, but 100 years of experience has helped sort that out.

Transcoding to DVD is done with high end equipment that don't sacrifice quality for $$$ (don't have to). And the results of some digital image enhancers are absolutely stunning. I've seen a realtime image enhancer working. It takes video in and gives video out, used to "restore" VHS quality. It can take crap in and give excellent results at the output. It's supposed to compare, interpolate, predict and blend images across an average of 30 frames at a time buffering data into memory and processing video using multiple DSPs. It's not very expensive, at $12,000. But this, of course is for professional use. You might be able to achieve the same performance with a PC application, and it might take 2 days with an experienced person watching and calibrating settings. That could easily mean $500 in labour only. If a studio needs to do that, and has, say, 500 tapes to restore, they will buy perhaps half a dozen of those and get their money back in a week.

That's the difference between amateur-hobby and business.

[djmattyb]

What you are looking for is a plugin for Premiere called Film FX by a company named BigFX. It's a great plugin that can make home video look like film. It costs US$ 499.00 but you can "try" it if you find it on Kazaa.

Check out the presets:

Over 50 Film Stock Presets:

Don't feel like learning all of the controls? You don't have to. We've included dozens of preset stocks for you to choose from as well as some special effects settings to give you a taste of what FilmFX can do for you.

35mm Presets
• BW Eastman DoubleX 5222
• BW Eastman PlusX 5231
• BW Fuji FG
• Color Agfa XT 320HS
• Color Agfa XT 100
• Color Agfa XTS 400HS
• Color Eastman EXR 5245 50D
• Color Eastman EXR 5248 100T
• Color Eastman EXR 5293 200T
• Color Eastman EXR 5298 500T
• Color Fuji F-125T
• Color Fuji F-250D
• Color Fuji F-500
• Color Fuji F-64
• Color Fuji F-C1
• Color Fuji F-CP
• Color Kodak Primetime 5620 640T
• Color Kodak SFX 200T
• Color Kodak Vision 5246 250D
• Color Kodak Vision 5274 200T
• Color Kodak Vision 5277 320T
• Color Kodak Vision 5279 500T
•
16mm Presets
• BW Eastman DoubleX 7222
• BW Eastman DoubleX 7276 Reversal
• BW Eastman PlusX 7231
• BW Eastman Tri-X 7278 Reversal
• BW Fuji RP
• Color Agfa XT 320HS
• Color Agfa XT100
• Color Agfa XTS 400HS
• Color Eastman EXR 7245 50D
• Color Eastman EXR 7248 100T
• Color Eastman EXR 7293 200T
• Color Ektachrome 7231 Daylight Reversal
• Color Ektachrome 7240 Tungsten Reversal
• Color Ektachrome 7250HS Tungsten Reversal
• Color Ektachrome 7251HS Daylight Reversal
• Color Fuji F-125T
• Color Fuji F-250D
• Color Fuji F-64
• Color Kodak Primetime 7620 640T
• Color Kodak Vision 7246 250D
• Color Kodak Vision 7274 200T
• Color Kodak Vision 7277 320T
• Color Kodak Vision 7279 500T
•
8mm Presets
• BW 8mm
• Color New 8mm
• Color Old 8mm
•
Special Effects Presets
• Alien Eyesight
• BW News Reel
• BW Old Home Movies
• BW Very Old and Beat Up
• Color Old Home Movies
• Color Over Saturated 60s Look
• Cool and Contrasty
• Day For Night
• Golden Glow
• Infrared
• Night Vision Goggles
• Rad Titles
• Rain
• Saving Private Ryan
• Sepia Tones
• Soft Interview
• Warm and Contrasty
• White Hot Flash

[BJ_M]

I'd say your best bet (read: relatively low $) on color correction right now would be AVID XpressDV 3.5 (Win/Mac) or FinalCutPro 3 (Mac only). Otherwise AfterEffects and/or Premiere with 3rd party ColorCorrection plugins might work. These are ALL far short of what you can do with the real thing, though.

Also, I've seen movie outtakes before, and I would disagree that they look just like most peoples' home videos. You'll NEVER see camera shake unless it's on purpose (ala Blair Witch). Lighting and composition are much better. Here, I believe they use the filter or plugin known as "PROFESSIONALISM". Additional production equipment such as light meters and chip charts help a little too. :wink:

Scott

Vegas 4 has one of the best color correction you wlll find - much like FCP's and nicer than AVID DV ... includes 3 wheel color controls and real time scopes and histograms .

[BJ_M]

hey BJ_M.. correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't Magic Bullet for AE only available for the mac version? is there a similar plugin for those of us w/ the PC version of AE?
BTW, I have found a trick that seems to do fairly well w/ the DV i capture w/o using any plugins.
First, I copy the clip, and put a 2 or 3 level posterize on it. I then put a blur, and blur it about 10-20%. I choose color burn for the transfer mode. Finally I change the opacity until the picture looks clear again. It seems to do a pretty good job bringing the color out.

Magic Bullet is avaiable for the pc , reg version is $499 and HD/Film version is about $1995 - really a great plug in , though slow ..

filmFX i dont know anything about - looks like a grain filter (as in adds)

[BJ_M]

I have watched an interview with Steven Spielberg and a short discussion on digital movie. His words were that: Digital is fine for proofing scenes, but you can't get good quality from them.

Old interview or something ? because he as well as many other directors are slowing switching to HD video .. though shooting on film has a added depth still not avaiable in video ..

the latest D-Cinema projectors use the newest TI chip (which is just starting to ship) and have 35trillion colors playback (more than film) and these are 2k resolution chips for native 1080 playback not interpolated like the older 1280 chips. the contrast ratio is now at 1700:1 also .. basicly we are at and a little beyond 35mm in the look on the screen.

we have this film vs. video debate constantly at work and w/ our clients ..

[SaSi]

I have watched an interview with Steven Spielberg and a short discussion on digital movie. His words were that: Digital is fine for proofing scenes, but you can't get good quality from them.

Old interview or something ? because he as well as many other directors are slowing switching to HD video .. though shooting on film has a added depth still not avaiable in video ..

the latest D-Cinema projectors use the newest TI chip (which is just starting to ship) and have 35trillion colors playback (more than film) and these are 2k resolution chips for native 1080 playback not interpolated like the older 1280 chips. the contrast ratio is now at 1700:1 also .. basicly we are at and a little beyond 35mm in the look on the screen.

we have this film vs. video debate constantly at work and w/ our clients ..

I know this debate between analog and digital is never ending. I still "debate" with friends about lamp vs transistor ampliphiers, let alone Vinyl vs. CD.

By the way, I realize the Spielberg interview is old. It was about one of the Dinosaur movies he made; can't remember which one, but must be 3 years or so since I saw it. I know things have progressed since then.

Regarding the 35mm film vs digital, it all comes down to the CCD (or equivalent technology) used. How many pixels is the question. I have played a little (only ) with a Canon EOS D1s camera at more than 11MPixels. Yes, quality is outstanding. This camera would make me forget even the highest quality kocachrome film and analog cameras. But, are there any VideoCameras that shoot at such resolutions? (Just curious - There has to be, otherwise how can HDTV become true?)

[BJ_M]

Our Viper FilmStream™ Camera has no equal. With three 9.2-million pixel Frame Transfer CCDs, it delivers an uncompromised output of 4:4:4 RGB, 10-bit log. When your digital cinematography project demands the highest quality, this compact camera is the only tool you need.

Key Features

·
4:4:4 RBG dual-link uncompressed output through unique FilmStream™ module

·
Captures raw data directly from CCDs to recorder

·
Native 16:9 or 2.35:1 aspect ratios using 9.2-million pixel Frame Transfer CCDs

·
Multiple format support:

-
1080p — 23.98, 24, 25, 29.97, and 30 Hz (internal 3:2 pulldown available @ i59.94)

-
1080i — 50, 59.94, and 60 Hz

-
720p — 23.98, 24, 25, 29.97, 30, 50, and 60 Hz


·
Mechanical shutter to guarantee no-smear images

·
Electronic viewfinder zoom, and Crawler feature for critical focus requirements

http://www.thomsongrassvalley.com/docs/Brochures/cameras/viper/viper_br.pdf

[miamicanes]

Another difference between home video and professional film is the amount of attention given to getting things like gamma, white balance, and colors *EXACTLY* right... on every single frame of the final print that gets made before it goes to theatres and video. Making them look "good" isn't enough... they have to be *perfect* and *visually consistent* from shot to shot.

For example, suppose a scene gets shot where somebody is standing in front of a window, presumably illuminated by natural daylight (or lots of halogen) shining in through it, then the camera cuts to another angle with different lighting. For a big-budget movie, someone (or some group) will have the task of equalizing the look of both shots... possibly allowing some tiny bit of variance if viewers would *expect* the shots to look different, but still less than probably exists in the raw film.

Also, it's important to remember that film has WAY more dynamic range than camcorder-grade CCDs are capable of producing. Put another way, a scene that a camcorder would capture as a silhouette on a white background might show up in professional-quality film as a somewhat dark person (with recognizable details) standing in front of a window with a bright (but viewable) scene outside. With a little work and good video editing software you can probably regain a tiny bit of the light and dark detail from the camcorder CCD-captured video, but it's NEVER going to look anything like a frame of film that was individually digitized.

[Mirror_Image]

http://www.lafcpug.org/feature_video_film.html

That explains a couple of things.

[bvcproductions]

Thanks a lot people, I'll try some of the things you suggested, but my house is worth a lot less than the equipment people suggested here. $500 000 for a machine??????? If I have that much money, I'd rather buy a Ferrari.

thanks again, but if anyone knows if this could be done in premiere or something like that I'll be really happy