Hollywood films still largely shot on film - I didn't know that

Gaga said:

To ease some of the confusion with frame rates.

24p Cinema standard, really it's 23.97 frames per second.
25p PAL TV standard, so europe.
30p NTSC TV Standard, so america and some other places.

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Anyone game to talk about time code and the nightmares involved when you try to handle all these frame rates? Especially when you're working in post with a US co-production. I forget the detail, it only recurs in nightmares about the past. As far as I know the frame rates relate to AC mains frequency.

BTW part of the American use of film is, to my knowledge, the large quantity of production and post production sprocketed film gear in US studios, perhaps it's changed since I was there. Countries like New Zealand (Peter Jackson) have a smaller inventory of equipment and can change more easily.

Also as so much of PJ's work is for digital processing it makes sense to have a digital master, saves all that telecine transfer.

Film shot for cinema release is 24 frames per second (exact)

Mains frequency in Europe is 50Hz.
The PAL television standard (europe) is 50 interlaced fields per second
Film shot for TV in PAL land is often shot at 25 frames per second. This translates nicely to 50 interlaced fields, as both upper and lower field can represent the same frame.

Film shot for cinema release (24fps) is often shown on PAL TV at 25fps. The small increase in motion speed isn't noticeable, although often the audio has the pitch shifted as it is easier to spot the difference there.


Mains frequency in USA is 60Hz.
The original NTSC television standard (USA) was 60 interlaced fields per second. However, with the introduction of colour TV, in 1953 it was necessary to tweak the standard slightly to reduce interference from the colour information, this means technically NTSC these days is 59.94 interlaced fields per second.

Unfortunately films shot at 24fps don't translate nicely to 60 (or 59.94) fields. To work around this a '2-3 pull down' is used. This means the first frame of film is represented by 2 fields, the second frame of film is represented by 3 fields, the third frame is 2 fields again etc. onwards. This means every two frames of film becomes 5 fields of NTSC, therefore 24 frames per second becomes 60 interlaced fields.

Now, as already mentioned, colour NTSC isn't 60 interlaced fields these days, it's 59.94. Therefore anything shot on film for TV use is actually shot at 23.976 frames per second. This then means it accurately translates to NTSC.

Anything shot for cinema release at 24fps still gets transfered to NTSC at 23.976, and once again the slight change in speed goes unnoticed.

Problems can start to occur when syncronising sound if film was shot at 24fps but is being telecined at 23.976fps. The audio will start in sync, but the 0.1% difference will gradually become evident and the two will drift apart again.

Crystal sync. movie cameras will often have settings for 23.976fps, 24fps and 25fps. It is important to know what your post production route is before you start exposing film to make sure you run the camera at the best speed. If you get it wrong then it can cause a lot of hassle (and expense) to work around it.

Edit: Incidentally the terms 'i' and 'p' for 'interlaced' and 'progressive' are totally meaningless when shooting film, which only works in 'frames'.

In a bid to make the output from video cameras appear more 'film like' a number will shoot in 'progressive' mode, rather than 'interlaced'. This basically means both upper and lower fields represent the same moment in time - in much the same way a frame of film does. So rather than recording 50 'interlaced' fields, they capture 25 'progressive' frames. The terms 25p, 50i, 50p, 60i, 60p are all related to HD video, nothing to do with shooting film at all.

As for digital projections: It's actually HARDER to control leakage before. All it takes is a hacker and you get perfect cinema-quality bootlegs. No VHS stuff with people in front, no DVD ripping needed... You essentially open the door to massive profit loss, and before the movie's even out!


Way to shoot yourself in the foot, hollywierd!

Markster said:

As for digital projections: It's actually HARDER to control leakage before. All it takes is a hacker and you get perfect cinema-quality bootlegs. No VHS stuff with people in front, no DVD ripping needed... You essentially open the door to massive profit loss, and before the movie's even out!


Way to shoot yourself in the foot, hollywierd!

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Because they can save a boatload on printing costs for each release. I don't know what the exact costs total up to, but I think it's in the millions. 4000 release prints for a typical Hollywood movie at a couple thousand a pop.

Film may still be needed

Gaga said:

Quite a few films are still shot on film, but with the rise of camera's like the RED ONE, it's becoming less frequent. Films like Pirates of the Caribbean 4, Harry potter 7 and The social network, to name a few.

I hope that film doesn't die out. It still has advantages over digital, like you can rescan it at a higher resolution, you can't do that with digital, once you've filmed something you can't change the resolution without losing quality. Which menas the film industry will make more money in the long run with re-masted copies of the film.

It will be inevitable that hollywood will stop using film, which is a shame. It's only really been in the last few years that digital has started it's takeover.

The main thing I'm worried about, is if hollywood stops using film, then film will be discontinued altogether. When that happens, to everyone on apug, everyone who shoots film, we will have a huge global protest.

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I remember a few years back my husband told me that our local police department was still using film to photograph crime scenes. Negatives can't be altered, but digital images can. If prosecutors start losing cases because digital crime scene photos are suspect, there will still be a demand for film.

fdfjc said:

I remember a few years back my husband told me that our local police department was still using film to photograph crime scenes. Negatives can't be altered, but digital images can. If prosecutors start losing cases because digital crime scene photos are suspect, there will still be a demand for film.

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Now that's interesting. Never thought of that.

Ross Chambers said:

Also as so much of PJ's work is for digital processing it makes sense to have a digital master, saves all that telecine transfer.

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One thing that often gets forgotten in the film vs digital cinema discussion is that digital storage, moving and duplicating HUGE amounts of data is not fast or cheap. In significantly budgeted projects there is not a significant difference in cost between digital and film acquisition and getting it to post. Another issue is archiving, digital is much more expensive to store long term.

I do think more from the post production end of the job, but I did span the sprockets and splicer days and the digital innovations. Imagine the joys of reverting to a previous cut when the producer and/or director, after trying endless variations says those immortal words: "I think I liked the first way we did it" and the poor editorial staff have to rip the cutting copy apart and try to restore all those strips of film and sound to their original order. Or imagine the sound post guys keeping everything in sync and in place when CGIs are arriving right up to and often during the mix and nobody's sticking to the duration allocated to those shots in the cut.

All this is eliminated by the "Save As first cut" in the first case and the push these tracks up or down by x time code numbers in the second.

Nahh. These days, if something's being shot at 120 FPS for more than maybe several seconds at a time, it's on video. Back in the old days though, video could *not* be shot at more than 30 FPS, so if something were to put in slow motion, they had to shoot it on film at a faster rate than 24 FPS, but that was only for short bursts.

Why would computer files be "much more expensive to store long-term" than big reels of film, when you can just keep them on hard disks, cards, or optical discs, and especially optical discs last many decades if not hundreds of years? Maybe a hard disk drive will need to be exercised every so often, so that might not be a great long-term option, but how about flash storage? That's really not that expensive per gigabyte anymore. And you can get data DVDs for as low as 20 cents apiece, or burn data onto single-layer Blu-ray discs for as low as $1.00 per disc! "Much more expensive"? Geesh, with film, over the long term you have to store it in carefully climate-controlled vaults, don't you? Tell me that's "so much less expensive" than storing optical discs without having to worry about that so much.

MaxxFordham said:

Nahh. These days, if something's being shot at 120 FPS for more than maybe several seconds at a time, it's on video. Back in the old days though, video could *not* be shot at more than 30 FPS, so if something were to put in slow motion, they had to shoot it on film at a faster rate than 24 FPS, but that was only for short bursts.

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NOPE.

MaxxFordham said:

Why would computer files be "much more expensive to store long-term" than big reels of film, when you can just keep them on hard disks, cards, or optical discs, and especially optical discs last many decades if not hundreds of years? Maybe a hard disk drive will need to be exercised every so often, so that might not be a great long-term option, but how about flash storage? That's really not that expensive per gigabyte anymore. And you can get data DVDs for as low as 20 cents apiece, or burn data onto single-layer Blu-ray discs for as low as $1.00 per disc! "Much more expensive"? Geesh, with film, over the long term you have to store it in carefully climate-controlled vaults, don't you? Tell me that's "so much less expensive" than storing optical discs without having to worry about that so much.

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You might want to do some research. DVD's, are you kidding me?
I've got a couple dead external hard drives under my desk I'll sell you. Make an offer.
There isn't anything as archival as film in a can.

What manufacturers supply film to Bollywood?

Some cine is still shot on film, e.g. Starwars episode 7

But it was the print distribution film that was the largest fraction of the coating volume, and that is still shrinking as theaters go digital cause they cannot get titles on film.

It is exactly like 'have you tried buying a film camera in your local cam shop?' - I need to go to large town to see a (used) film camera in a window. The local smart phone shops are next door in malls.

PAL is 25/50 Hz, but if you try separating the even and odd lines some people will be disturbed, YMMV.

When US TV relays were shown they used to be frame converted (in real time) to PAL frequencies donno what they do now days.

The last Bollywood set I was on was using a 'hybrid' 35mm Arri - this allowed them good first takes every time. This cut down their film usage, though not time on location.

The last cine director I spoke with some time later (who was also shooting with a hybrd Arri) was well impressed - by this.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Good_(producer)

"this allowed them good first takes every time. This cut down their film usage, though not time on location."
how does a different camera allow them to get good first takes every time? Does it make the actors or camera operator better?

I think I've worked with every arri out there but haven't heard of this "hybrid" you speak of. Please post a link to it on Arri's website.

I read an article recently...interesting. I also read that all of the major film production
houses, Fox, MGM, Paramount etc have all committed to film orders for a long time to come to
ensure supply of film stock.

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way...ns-our-era-could-become-the-digital-dark-ages

MaxxFordham said:

Why would computer files be "much more expensive to store long-term" than big reels of film, when you can just keep them on hard disks, cards, or optical discs.

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Maybe it was more expensive four years ago, when that was posted?

wildbill said:

You might want to do some research. DVD's, are you kidding me?
I've got a couple dead external hard drives under my desk I'll sell you. Make an offer.
There isn't anything as archival as film in a can.

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Also, it's entirely possible for a good engineer with a reasonable workshop to restore a film projector, or even build one from scratch. You can't make a hard drive or flash drive in a home workshop, or knock out a few electronic components.

As to archival quality of media, I have on my desk a Zip-disc with photos and material from the solar eclipse of 1999....this disc doesn't work any more, you can't buy new drives, and the last zip drive I had was in my desktop which I binned when it gave up ten years ago.

MaxxFordham said:

Why would computer files be "much more expensive to store long-term" than big reels of film, when you can just keep them on hard disks, cards, or optical discs, and especially optical discs last many decades if not hundreds of years? Maybe a hard disk drive will need to be exercised every so often, so that might not be a great long-term option, but how about flash storage? That's really not that expensive per gigabyte anymore. And you can get data DVDs for as low as 20 cents apiece, or burn data onto single-layer Blu-ray discs for as low as $1.00 per disc! "Much more expensive"? Geesh, with film, over the long term you have to store it in carefully climate-controlled vaults, don't you? Tell me that's "so much less expensive" than storing optical discs without having to worry about that so much.

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Here's some interesting reading.

Technicolor and Deluxe both still develop large quantities of film for the industry. HUGE quantities. I don't think they plan on getting out of the business any time soon.

Tamara said:

Here's some interesting reading.

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That's the article I was referring to.

Jeff Bradford said:

Technicolor and Deluxe both still develop large quantities of film for the industry. HUGE quantities. I don't think they plan on getting out of the business any time soon.

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Really?
Technicolor is hanging on by a thread. They aren't making it in the digi world either and closed the lab in Hollywood. http://sfvbj.com/news/2015/mar/26/technicolor-closes-burbank-offices/

Deluxe Hollywood closed it's doors last year. http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/behind-screen/deluxes-hollywood-film-lab-close-686600

Been away from this for a while but it was my understanding that a movie with a budget of 60 million would spend another 60 million on prints and distribution and the same again on advertising.

As for forensic evidence, I think legally they don't need film as "proof" but with digital they need the original card or storage device with the unedited, untouched capture.

fdfjc said:

I remember a few years back my husband told me that our local police department was still using film to photograph crime scenes. Negatives can't be altered, but digital images can. If prosecutors start losing cases because digital crime scene photos are suspect, there will still be a demand for film.

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The vast majority of law enforcement dept. are all digital now. The expected challenges never materialized or found unfounded. Procedures were put in place to insure the images were not altered.

Unfortunately you have to trust them to actually follow referenced procedures. Which I find difficult these days.