This is a presentation that I gave in 2003, I really enjoyed it :-)...........

I’d like to start this by mis-quoting Henry Kissinger

He originally made the comment about politicians

“90% of the people talking about HD give the honest 10% a bad name”

More evasions, obfuscations and downright lies are told about HD than there are ever uttered in Westminster!

I’m interested in making quality pictures

Pictures that influence the viewer, either to buy something (my ads) or feel something (my drama)

I expect to use a wide range of tools to do this

I may use colour effects, extreme lenses, contrast or gamma effects

I might use blue or green screen

I may well use variable speeds

The common factor in whatever I shoot is an attempt to produce the best and most appropriate image I can for that project

A few examples: - (run tape)

They were all dubbed off Standard Definition PAL DigiBeta except for SchoolDisco which came off DVCam

So why did I shoot them on film rather than digitally?

We shot the Lego one was shot on super-35 and post produced at 2K

This was because there was a lot of keying and compositing of pictures that the full bandwidth 4:4:4 uncompressed image made possible, well, made invisible

There was also some varispeed

The Sharps was super-35 again and is a mixture of Standard Definition, 1K and 2K as appropriate to the shot

One of the shots is made up of 34 layers!

Every shot, hell every frame, is manipulated in one way or another.

All the walking shots of the model are at 29fps

We did this because we tested every speed from 25 to 32 and found that she looked best at 29

And yes! There is a huge difference between 28 and 29 or 29 and 30!

I included SchoolDisco.com because it was shot on 16mm

The total cost of the camera hire, stock and processing was less than an HD kit would have cost to hire!

So there’s a good reason to use film J

Hey! Show me any other HD camera this size! (Hold up A-Minima)

Why film rather than HD for keying and post manipulation of the image?

Well, the most widely available HD camera, the F900, records compressed 3:1:1

In plain English, they throw away 25% of the Black and White information and 75%!

Yes! 75% of the colour information!

And then the little that’s left they compress 4.4 times!!

How anyone can describe that as High Definition is beyond me!

Of course it’s totally unusable for any quality post or FX work

And before anyone says Attack of the Clones look at issue 90 page 98 of Cinefex magazine, you tell me what camera that is, it’s not an F900

Now there are alternatives to this;

You can take the 4:4:4 uncompressed route as launched originally by Thomson with the Viper and soon to be available from others

Of course if you want to go the Sony route with the F950 and HDCam SR you’ll have to wait at least 18 months

Or Dalsa, and you’ll have to wait?????

How long?

So why don’t I like this route?

Full bandwidth 2K uncompressed pictures!

What can’t I like?

Well actually I do like it; it’s just there have been a few practical problems using it for the last year

Problems that have now been addressed so I expect to see more productions using this approach

What were the problems?

Well, as the data rate is so high, there is no tape format that can cope with it

There still isn’t,

In 18 months or so you should be able to get a 2:1 compressed 4:4:4 tape recorder from Sony (HDCam SR), and that’s an acceptable level of compression

But, that’s a long long way away even if they hit delivery schedules

So, you have to record to disk

That isn’t a problem in itself

It’s just that the Disk system that the Viper was launched with had a control unit the size of a Hammond organ! 

It wasn’t practical in the field

Oh I’ve used it on location

But I’ve also flown Aeroflot!

Neither of which I’m in a hurry to repeat!

The post work flow wasn’t sorted last year either

You get all this data on disk and what do you do with it?

Keep all the disks until you do your online?

They charge a hefty daily rental for those disk arrays!

Or do you dump it all to disk at your favourite post house

You think they aren’t going to charge you for extended use of huge amounts of disk space?!

Anyway as I said earlier, all this is working itself out now

There are now a number of hard disk recording systems that are easy to use and have all kinds of back-up options

By “now” I mean either available now or “real soon now”

It’s all coming but you’re going to be a pioneer if you do it this year.

I do however love the pictures out of the Viper

These are Viper pictures running in the background

And once they get the fixes to the disk problems out into the rental market I’ll be happy to use it.

As for the other 4:4:4 cameras coming, well, they’re at least 18 months from delivery so we can afford to ignore them and wait and see if anything leapfrogs them!

And it will! Maybe something with variable speeds, time lapse, upgradeable

CCDs, PL mount film lenses, colour V/F, uncompressed disk recording on board, a really solid aluminium body J

Of course one of the biggest problems with any HD camera is a ViewFinder that’s Black and White and half the definition, if you’re lucky, of the picture you’re shooting.

Brings back memories of being a TV camera operator a long long time ago

Director screaming into the talkback “stay on the blue, stay on the blue”

My reply of “and precisely which shade of grey is blue?” didn’t go down too well

Again this is being sorted, but right now your world is 1” high low resolution Black & White if you shoot HD

I love the optical V/F for the Thomson, colour pictures at a higher definition than you’re recording, no batteries required to see a picture, being able to see things before they come into shot and accepting standard PL mount lenses

Now there’s an idea J

Again, I’m waiting for it to get into rental houses

So basically what I’m saying is that HD is coming

It will be really good

But it’s not here yet

As a replacement for Betacam now?

Maybe

As a replacement for film today?

Forget it

Oh and when you hear of series shooting on HD just ask yourself

“Would they have shot on HD if they got the same level of discount on film cameras and stock?”

You know the answer to that

When people compare HD formats or HD with film they generally don’t do an all-inclusive comparison

They pick on one aspect that may be better in isolation and ignore all the other factors

I can do all kinds of sums to produce whatever kind of result I want

I can make cars, houses & clothes much cheaper

I can make more cars fit on the roads; more houses fit on the land, and make more clothes out of the same amount of cloth

It’s easy!

I just have to make everything for people who are 4 feet tall!

It’s nonsense! I know its nonsense, you know its nonsense

But I can do the sums and prove that we can all save money

And that brings us back neatly to where we started

Evasions, obfuscations and downright lies