Film: not quite dead yet

In a digital world, analogue is considered to be on the path of extinction, but film capture is not ready to go quietly into the night. Miguel Gonzalez found that DOPs and big companies still have something for film.

There are no statistics about the film/digital split in Australia, but with fewer Hollywood projects shooting here, film companies have suffered.
Fuji felt the lack of big budget international productions; in 2009 they only had one major Hollywood project, the thriller Don’t Be Afraid in the Dark, which was shot on film in Melbourne using, atypically, both Kodak and Fuji stock.
The digital adoption trend is real, according to Fuji’s general manager for recording media and motion picture film Marc Van Agten, but mainly in the smaller budget feature segment.
“If you rate your movies by budget or success, most big ones were shot on 35mm film last year,” he said. “The ones that picked up awards and had reasonable budgets of more than $6m were shot on film: Mao’s Last Dancer, The Boys are Back, Bright Star, Charlie & Boots, Beautiful Kate, Disgrace… even films with a smaller budget like Samson & Delilah were also shot on film.”
Kodak’s manager for sales and marketing in Australia and New Zealand David Hill agrees: “It’s difficult to obtain accurate data in regards to the film/digital split due to the large number of films being shot in Australia, everything from shoestring budget features to international studio productions, but the majority of motion pictures that make it to cinemas and receive award nominations are still produced on film. The same is true for TVCs for international brands.”
FILM MADE CHEAPER
According to Van Agten, the initial cost difference between digital and film can be a deciding factor for a production when looking purely at the cost of shooting per minute or per foot. But digital projects tend to shoot a higher amount of extra footage, which makes post-production costs go up.
“That doesn’t happen with film because you’re trained to shoot on a 400ft can of film so you shoot on those increments.”
The cost factor has also been alleviated by the increasing popularity of 2-Perf cameras, which make a film load last twice as long. Film is normally pulled down into the gate four perforations at a time, to
produce a frame that is normally cropped down to 1:85:1, wasting a considerable amount of film.

This ‘2 Perforation Pulldown’ or techniscope technology, first developed in 1966, pulls down only two perforations at a time, using half the amount of film for a 2:4:1 frame, which is significantly smaller than the 4-perf frame in terms of surface. The popularity of 2-Perf was limited because it required an optical lab process as opposed to a contact print, but with the advent and lower costs of Digital Intermediates, 2-Perf has become more viable.
Panavision offers the Panaflex GII and Platinum cameras in 2-Perf, and ARRI too has made its Arricam and Arriflex available as 2-Perf.
The recent Australian hit Bran Nue Dae had a budget that initially did not allow for film, but DOP Andrew Lesnie was able to shoot on film using 2-Perf.
“Lesnie has received critical acclaim for the look of the movie and the way the landscape was captured, so 2-Perf is a real alternative to going digital,” said Fuji’s Van Agten.
While 35mm has been re-vitalised by 2-Perf, not all film formats are still going strong. Stefan Sedlmeier, general manager at ARRI Australia, foresees the decline of 16 mm as an acquisition format, as low and mid-budget productions – the type that would traditionally shoot on 16 mm – are precisely the ones transitioning to digital.
“It is not necessarily a format that can be sustained much longer for acquisition in Australia and New Zealand,” he affirmed. “It’s still preferred to shoot at remote locations because of its reliability and robustness, so it won’t disappear completely.
“While film will still be there for different reasons – for purists, for quality-oriented customers, for exhibition, for international exchange for developing countries, or for long term archiving – it will be 35mm and alternatives such as 3-Perf or 2-Perf, but 16mm is definitely declining.”
Digital is prevailing over the 16mm format in Australia, a country that is usually defined as an early adopter of technology. Sedlmeier believes one of the reasons is that high definition has become a standard for Australian productions, and 16mm is not good enough for HD.
“The Australian industry loves new products; they are early adopters of new technology, and they have fast-changing minds. These are very passionate cinematographers,” he said.
THE QUALITY DEBATE
Discussions about film’s aesthetic and technical advantages are as fierce as a religious or political debate. There are facts but the main assessment remains one of perception. According to Sedlmeier, current digital cameras can’t replace 35mm in versatility and quality.
“It’s not just the pixel count; it’s the fidelity and natural qualities of the image. Film is still a very powerful medium; it can store the equivalent of about 1GB per second of data and it doesn’t really matter
how long it is, film can cope any kind of data amount. This is not necessarily true with digital storage yet, especially long term storage,” he argued.
Kodak has a campaign entitled Film. No Compromise to educate the industry on the benefits of shooting on film, but according to Hill, the company is “technologically agnostic”.
“With film, there is no compromise on image quality, production values and efficiencies, post-production workflow, and the ability to repurpose content for the future,” he explained. “But there are so many new opportunities to make, manage and move images and information; we serve the marketplace with solutions across different workflows, film and digital, and helping those technologies work seamlessly together.”
Academy Award-winning South Australian cinematographer Dean Semler (Dances with Wolves, Mad Max 2 and 3, 2012) has done seven projects on Panavision’s Genesis camera and believes the quality of the images is “as close to film as you could get”, with the advantage of instant high quality rushes, long running times and the ability to shoot in extremely low light levels.
Still, he “thoroughly enjoyed” the opportunity to work with the western Appaloosa in 2008, and finds the latest fine grain stocks from Kodak and Fuji “remarkable”.
“They still hold an edge on the digital images,” he admitted.
David Gribble (The World’s Fastest Indian, Fires Within) has a metaphor for it: digital is “like a painting without brushstrokes”.
“A digital image doesn’t have the grain structure to it. Maybe it’s because we’re used to seeing grain, so it’s as if you suddenly saw a painting without brushstrokes, you might think ‘this is terrible!’
“The grain look can be achieved in post, but it costs time and money, so it’s not necessarily cheaper. Besides, a cinematographer has to be aware that promises made in the field aren’t necessarily kept in
the post for a number of reasons.”
Not everybody agrees on the superiority of film.
Ben Allan (All Saints, The Will) was an early adopter of digital high definition and his work made him the youngest person ever to receive the ‘ACS’ letters from the Australian Cinematographers’ Society. He also created The Grading Sweet, a package of colour grading plug-ins for Apple’s Final Cut.
“It’s past the point where there’s definite technical reasons to say film is the way to go for the ultimate quality and it’s easy to demonstrate that,” he said.
According to Allan, the choice is now purely a subjective creative one because the technical superiority has been overcome.
“These high-end cameras offer as much latitude, depth of field control and colour control as 35mm film.”

NEW POSSIBILITIES
Not all is said and done in terms of film. While it is true that major breakthroughs are unlikely to take place in the world of film cameras and stock, demand
is still there and both Fuji and Kodak continue to release new products. They’re still spending money on research and development, to produce improved ‘neg’
and post stock.
“All parties continue to invest in the film business, and someone like Kodak or Fuji wouldn’t be pouring money into it if they didn’t see a future for it,” said
Van Agten.
Fuji is looking at developing higher speed stock that can be shot in lower light, as well as achieving richer blacks and expanding the range for low-contrast films.
Its new Vivid 500 was used in Don’t Be Afraid of the Dark and it is designed to produce colour intensive images in challenging conditions such as night scenes.
A new 250 daylight stock will be launched in mid-2010, with samples currently being sent to cinematographers.