“Digital” Filmmaker
Saturday, September 12th, 2009Conflict!
Boy that seems to be the driving force behind a lot of businesses, telecommunications or otherwise. Heck, in most people’s lives too! Would life be better without it? I think we’ll never know.
There are at least three sets of competing technologies in the telecommunications industry that I am aware of at present time, trying to control their market shares. One is editing programs. Avid, Apple and Adobe are the bouting companies there. Then there’s the famous “I’m a Mac, I’m a PC” fight. And then finally there is digital movies versus film movies. There are many more, like digital radio vs. standard radio or Internet TV vs. HD TV but I’m going to talk about the one I’m most connected to recently, film format vs. digital format.
I’m an up and coming indie “digital” filmmaker. I haven’t even cut one frame of film. I started my new journey a year and a half ago.
There are people on both sides of the fence on this controversy. Old-timers and newbies alike sit on either side of this debate. My uncle works for a major studio as a projectionist. He has worked there for quite a long time. He plans to retire in ten years. According to him he’ll still be playing movies on film projectors when he does.
He is among the group of people that embrace both technologies but prefer the older film technology. Another is Director of Photography, James Mathers. James spoke at a recent Orange County new media event on the future of digital cameras, specifically on what’s called 4K, meaning 4,000 lines of resolution (vs. 1080 which is HD). He loves to shoot on the new 4K cameras but states that he prefers to shoot film. I’ve noticed that most people, who have experience shooting film, prefer it. I think it’s more of an art thing. They feel more control and artistic when working with light in an analog manner, rather than dealing with it in an impersonal digital format on an impersonal computer, to boot.
Theatres are slowly changing to digital projection but according to my uncle, “They cost more to fix and are being replaced by film projectors when they do break down.”
I was at a recent HD Expo, March 5th, 2009. There, another old-timer, Rodney Charters, ASC, talked about his experiences shooting on new 4K technology cameras and that the show he works on 24, has made the switch to all digital, “no more film”. It was also during this seminar that I learned a stunning fact. One of the two top producers of digital projection technology was the very company my uncle, the die-hard film man, works for. It’s going to make for an interesting conversation the next time I see him!
To put things in perspective, film is closer to 6K in its resolution but it is expensive and film is delicate. I’m sure you notice the scratches in the film when you’re at the theater. The RED company is working on cameras now that will shoot digitally at 10K. There are lots of people very anxious for them to come out with them. Digital projection is much clearer, no scratches. Not to mention, the world is being trained to like HD and accept no less.
There have been many Kodak plant closures. Film processing is only done in a few places these days, when it used to be all over. Film also uses a lot of chemicals to process and there are arguments as to whether or not film isn’t destructive to our environment. There is even some that argue back that maybe the creation of digital media is destructive too. But I think the trend will always go towards the new. I don’t know anyone working on new film technology.
I work in the computer industry and watched the old dogs fight to keep main-frame computers and THEIR jobs from going away. But schools don’t teach main frame computing anymore and companies are moving away from them too. That’s just the way it goes. Out with the old and in with the new.
There are many similar stories in all types of technologies.
The next point of contention is archiving. Film lasts a lot longer than digital data. But they are coming to terms with that too. Just as punch cards moved to tape and then to digital storage in the computing industry, so will go film. They are already agreeing to terms of such storage.
Very few people learn to shoot and edit on film anymore. (I hope I get to here at RCC before it goes away but merely for historical study, really.)
Universities, like USC, are going all digital. Theaters are moving in that direction. Kids growing up probably won’t even know what “film” is. When they are grown, I suspect, film will be gone.
I don’t think the feud is as rough as the one between David Sarnoff and Edwin Howard Armstrong but I’m sure there are some people with stakes in the film industry that are fighting just as hard to stay around.
For my uncle’s sake, I hope it does take ten years to resolve. But in the end, I know I’ll be there working in digital as will many others, until the next new thing comes around!
