28 DAYS LATER looked decent in its home-video edition - less in the theatrical one.
Hope he'll get to shoot it on progressive scan format.

A little film called COLLATERAL was also shot completely on Digital Video.

How's that for decent?

Unless I'm mistaken, (a possibility) COLLATERAL was shot on High Definition Video, and 28 DAYS LATER was shot on Standard Definition Video.

Actually, a "prosumer"-grade HD camcorder runs about $3500 (American dollars) Perhaps Stanley will go this route?

Glurrk is right: COLLATERAL was shot on HD format and had an high experienced DP working on it. The HD format is still experimental (don't care about what Rodriguez says), and in fact they had any kind of problems with it.

28 DAYS was shot with a couple of CANON XL1S mini-DV cameras that are Normal Definition Cameras (EDIT: I should've said Standard Definition...whatever...) and don't need a balls-like-bulls cinematographer to get it right (I have a XL2 progessive scan camera myself and is not that hard to make it working good) - but, of course, since they're semi-professional cameras, their results are not the same as what you can get with HD when it works good.

28 DAY LATER transferred on 35mm (the version you could see at the movies) was looking like a 16mm blow-up, but less fascinating (no TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE-ish). This is because you can have the highest resolution ever, but if you're recording on a small tape like the Mini-DV, you'll never see the result on screen. Is not strange that COLLATERAL, THE RUSSIAN ARK and all the movies shot on progessive scan in HD had the camera linked to a big hard disk (the size of a backpack) to not lose any pixel of resolution.

HD is still an expensive format: one day, as everything connected to digital technology, it will be cheap and what Rodriguez says (everybody doing their own movies that look like real ones) will be true. Now, only Studios can say it is cheap.

But if VACATION will be distribuited only in Home-Video, it will look very well.




I don't understand your sarcasm, SIC.

You're talkin' about the Sony HVR-Z1E-S camcorder, right? It doesn't have the progressive scan and all the guys (professionals) who talked about it told me is not that good. One, actually, preferred to get back his old JVC GV5000 after using it for a week.

A real HD camcorder goes for 69.900 euros (70000 and more dollars).

In this period JVC has just released a HD camcorder with progressive scan in MINI-DV format that goes for 4000 or 5000 euros - and it's the first of its kind.

I think that VACATION is on normal DV format: a lot of independent directors are using it for their pictures and they look good. Is a format every professional cameraman know well and can get good thing out of it.

Spawned by the erroneous conclusion that there was a much lesser rift between 28 Days Later and Collateral than there actually was.

I do know it was shot on HD, but kind of passed it by. My bad.

No problem, man.

Although that Sony camera is newer, I prefer the JVC JYHD10-U (that's the progressive scan model- bought one myself a few months back.) Superb picture in daylight, a little less grand in dimly-lit areas. Still, that progressive-scan picture looks far better than that "interlaced" nonsense the Sony camera is giving...

(My own opinion, anyway.)

This is the camera I was talkin' about:

http://pro.jvc.com/prof/Attributes/pics.jsp?tree=&model_id=MDL101539&itempath=&feature_id=04

JVC GY-HD100

I was tempted by it when I was going to buy my new camcorder, but here in Italy it has become avaiable just a couple of weeks ago - and I needed my camera earlier.

So I preferred the CANON XL2.

Well, we're a bit OT, isn't it?

I suppose we could move this to the "Filmmaking Section" if it goes any further!

That JVC looks REALLY nice... I bet it blows away my JYH10-U. Someday...
(sigh...)

It surely does (looks nice) and definitely blows away our XL2 or JYH10 - but I don't think something like it would be really necessary for the next 2\3 years.

Most of the people don't have HD TVs and Standard Definition Video is still working well (a lot of pros are working with it and won't change their equipment until they will be forced to).

So it means that you and me can keep using our camcorders without fear.



And starting saving money for the future

For the heck of it, I'd thought I'd post some screenshots from my JVC cam:

This is in poor light.

Not that good- very grainy.

This is in daylight. (Obviously)

The detail is incredible (to me, anyway. I didn't want to post large pictures because that can get annoying.)

Veery nice camera indeed!!

Tonight I finally had the chance to shoot something very interesting with my CANON XL2 and now I have the proof that the money was well spent.

I love filmcameras, but now I'm really waiting for the actual happening of this "digital revolution": I mean, shooting with this equipment is just a pleasure - it can do almost everything.

I only had two crappy 100watt lights (filtered with coloured plastic: green and red mostly) and the result is like a Mario Bava's movie - no kidding, it is (not because I'm a great cinematographer, but because this kind of camera just rocks). Of course, I had to work on the camera colour balance, since XL2 has standard cold colours (not like machines as the PANASONIC AG-DVX100), but then what you get is awesome.

Then I shoot the Moon (tonight here is full), just for trying, and I got excellent results - with natural light!

Eventually, I also picked up a flashlight - to simulate the pov of somebody holding it and what I got was incredibily realistic.

The road is still long (in my opinion 10 years for a total switch to this machines - and by that time their performances will be even better than film), but yeah, that's the future.

I've used tiny light kits to good effect myself. Here are some screen grabs from a movie I did back 1999. (Pardon the grainy quality- I should have grabbed the frames from the master tape)

One plain light bulb is some distance away, lighting her face, while another blue-colored bulb is simulating a computer monitor she's sitting near.


This was originally a cream-colored office- we just hit the wall with a red-colored bulb and that same plain white light some distance away to light the face. (The blood on his fist comes from the fact that he's just pounded one of the protagonists some 30 seconds ago...)

Oh, and this movie was shot with an XL-1. Wonderful camera! -and yes, HARDWARE was an influence in its lighting. I always admired Stanley's use of wildly-colored lighting throughout that movie- to me, it made the film more vibrant.