Many filmmakers think that the quality of digital image is inferior to the celluloid image, and that movies shot on 35 mm look much better than the electronic image. But in reality, the preference for 35 mm seems to be psychological rather than based on technical advantages. We are so accus- tomed to the technical characteristics that the celluloid film stock dictates, that we are hardly aware of its aesthetic deficiencies. At present, digital shots provide a virtually different aesthetic, which has its specific technical problems and advantages. Film directors and cinematographers should therefore be aware of these characteristics and know how to take advantage of them before choosing the medium on which to shoot.
But the preference for film is based on something psychological.‘It is very strange, when you have worked with HD for some time and return to cellu- loid,’ Peter Hjorth states. ‘The excess quality of the film stock is actually not as large as you imagined. You still have to get it right when shooting on film. Film is better, but it is not so much better as one might imagine. It has to do with what you are accustomed to, or how the spectator is brought up.’
The resolution in digital images is better with HD, but it can still be improved. The image capture format is 1920 pixels horizontally and 1080 pixels vertically, but at the moment the image is down-sampled to 1440 hori- zontal and 1080 vertical pixels before compression in 16:9, 1.77:1 or masked to Cinemascope format and the compression can be problematic. Normal film copies have about 2000 lines even though there were 4000 to 8000 in the negative, so the quality of a celluloid movie normally does compare to the HD quality.‘The problem with HD is that there is no headroom in the record- ing format, as there is on celluloid. Therefore, shooting has to be more precise. When editing a film you can zoom into the negative, or copy a second time, but such photographic manipulations are rarely possible on HD. You have to have optimal shots, in order to obtain OK copies, but at the moment, there is no excess as in celluloid, as we are accustomed to, one cannot obtain extra data from the negative, as in celluloid,’ Peter Hjorth states.
The compression also results in a shallow black – white exposure room. There are few details in the black, as well as in the white, which tends to become burnt-out white areas, much more than in other digital recording media. The compression of HD images means that the quality becomes progressively worse for each generation. Sony has come out with a HD-CAM SR, which uses a lower compression ratio, and Thomson’s Viper camera interfaces directly with an uncompressed hard disc system capable of recording full colour RGB, thereby bypassing the limitations of storage on digital tapes.
Another problem is the depth of field. HD cameras have short focal lengths and therefore a deep focus, which is well suited for the newscasts and documentaries for which the cameras were created. But a deep focus is
not ideal for shooting fiction films, in which the main character should be isolated from the background. The effect of deep focus is that the back- ground becomes more important and can interfere in the picture, which becomes cluttered with unimportant details. By focusing on different elements in the picture, the cinematographer directs the attention of the spectator from one element in the image to another. But since important features in the foreground cannot be isolated from the background, then the digital image can look ‘messy’. A way to overcome the deep focus prob- lem is to shoot in controlled studio surroundings, or to shoot long shots on location. Arriflex, the traditional film camera provider, is in the process of designing a digital fiction camera with traditional focal lengths from film cameras, which will solve the deep focus problem. It is expected to hit the market in a couple of years.
The aspect ratio 1:1.77 expands the image compared to the Academy format (3:4), which the Dogma rules prescribed. ‘It has the breadth, which functions well even in a psychological film, such as Wilbur,’ Lone Scherfig explains, ‘because more people can be together in the image, so that you don’t have to cut from person to person. There is space for them, so you can make a shot in which more people are together. When two actors are together, it is possible to shoot almost a close-up of both actors. You can obtain serenity if you are aiming at that’ (Wilbur, DVD commentary).
The Japanese have overcome the problem of the lack of pixels with a 4K digital camera, but still the black–white room appears to be narrow. The company, Communications Research Laboratory showed a test film pro- gramme in Paris in December 2003 in a stunning quality, which by far exceeded that of conventional movies in the richness of details. The test film
Fall in Kyotohad a poetic atmosphere in red and yellow colours of falling leaves with stunning details.The same location appears in Lost in Translation but in a significantly lower image quality than the 4K camera was able to produce. The recording format however, required some kind of compression, which had a negative effect on the black – white balance. The test films were shot at 24 fps, which was too slow to reproduce the movements of a Japanese dancer, whose arms seemed at times to disappear. Still, the 4K projection demonstrated clearly that the future belongs to digital projection.
Other problems arise when the digital movie is transferred to celluloid for distribution, which has to be done because we do not yet have digital exhibition in Denmark. ‘The movies that come out on HD today look great. The image is sharp, lush, and with a good contrast. But when the digital master is transferred to a celluloid premiere copy, you have to make an optimal transfer with equipment that can rarely be adjusted to anything but the specified factory adjustment in order to create an optimal copy,’ Peter Hjorth states. ‘In comparison, if you transfer from a 35 mm negative, the amount of information that you transfer to the premiere copy is only a fraction of the information present in the negative.’
Finally, it is necessary to introduce standard adjustments for the projec-
torsin digital exhibition, such as using a standard speed, how to handle the adjustment of the colour balance, etc. ‘It is currently necessary to make a copy for the average digital cinema. The parameters can vary on the projec- tors, and adjustments can become an endless process, so it would be preferable if we introduce a common standard,’ Peter Hjorth states. ‘That would take place in the distribution, which is even more uncontrollable than the production sector … not to mention the specific interests Hollywood might have in postponing the introduction of digital competition.’
‘In fact, there is nothing fundamentally wrong with digital equipment. There are a lot of technical problems, because we are in a transition phase, but the problems are being solved. Many reject the HD format, claiming that something is wrong with the cameras, when in fact they are caused by economic problems, such as a budget too low to acquire sufficient light, or good actors, etc.,’ Peter Hjorth explains.