It looks remarkably simple, but so effective! I know the budget wasn't large for the project, and it's some kind of digital, but just curious. (Tech Specs don't say anything quite yet.)
RED? Canon DSLR? If anyone knows, please share!
Canon 5d Mark II
shareReally? That's insane! How did you find that out?
shareLook under Technical Specs in the IMDb page for 'Frances Ha'. It's listed there.
shareRegardless of which exact digital camera, it looked like crap combined with digital projection. And, I did see it at a top notch L.A. theater.
You could see the digital noise in several scenes. The contrast was so off, you can't really call it a "Black and White" movie.
It was more: "Grey and Greyer"
It's supposed to look lo-fi. And honestly, it's kind of refreshing to be able to see "noise" and not everything looking so super overly sharp. It was a bit jarring at first, but it fit the film like a glove.
shareAgreed, wearyourlove. I thought the film looked beautiful, really.
I think there's been a rape up there!
I miss the days of film grain. Eyes Wide Shut was the last film I can remember seeing that had such beautiful grain in it.
shareGrain. Yes. But, wavy digital lines? Mosaic blurring and jagged edges? Folks here are waxing poetic for that stuff?
And, how about the fact that a Black & White movie can't deliver true Black OR White?
I'm not defending it, I was just lamenting. I didn't find it that terrible though. And I don't know what you are talking about with true black and white. I am not aware of any standard black and white. Variations in black and white have been the norm since the beginning of photography.
sharere:"I am not aware of any standard black and white."
Huh?
There is Black (like the letters you are reading right now)
And, there is White (like the background of the IMDb template).
FRANCIS HA was somewhere in between.
Of course there is a greyscale, but, a proper Black & White film should be able to achieve a true deep black and a silvery white on the...uh...silver screen. I talked to a cinematographer who saw the film and he too was disappointed in the poor black/white levels of the movie.
Sorry, but that statement is utterly ridiculous. There's no default for the way any particular movie should look. I guess Mizoguchi's films are now rendered illegitimate because he preferred to work in gray half-tones? Was Sansho the Bailiff not "proper" black and white? Your argument is just inane.
shareYou miss the point.
OF COURSE, there is grey-scale (as I noted in the previous post).
But, the problem is that current digital projection CAN'T achieve true black. As one projectionist explained to me, the issue is that to get to true black, a digital projector would have to turn down the contrast so far that lots of digital noise would appear. That is why digital prints (even for color films) never has the deep rich blacks of 35mm film.
Simple test at your next attendence of a digitally projected movie: Just about every movie theater has either Black cloth or black painted walls as a frame around the movie screen. Look for a black object in the movie. Now, drift your eyes over to the Black Frame around the movie screen. You will NEVER see the same deep level of black in the digitally projected movie as you see in the Black frame around the movie screen. NEVER.
It is not a question of using grey-scale, it is the current inability of digital projection to achieve black level. In the case of FRANCIS HA, you also have the additional handicap of using a cheap still camera tricked out for motion use which accounts for the heavier than normal digital noise in the image.
Show me an interview where Noam Baumbach says that, "I didn't want ANY black or ANY white in the movie." In fact, it's quite the opposite. In several interviews, Woody Allen's MANHATTAN is cited as a major influence, particularly the Black & white photography. I've seen beautiful 35mm prints of MANHATTAN. There are deep blacks and shimmering whites. If Baumbach and his cinematographer Sam Levy were trying to achieve what Allen and Gordon Willis did, they have failed miserably.
The reference to Manhattan has little to do with an actual visual similarity and everything to do with a reverential homage to Allen's type of witty character banter and relationship comedy. Allen's film is in an elegant, classical 2.35:1 ratio. Baumbach is clearly not trying to replicate that.
shareSo, by sidestepping, you are ceding that digital projection is incapable of showing true black and white. And, that Baumbach and Levy weren't try to have a graayish maw as their chosen palatte.......
shareI honestly don't have enough knowledge of projection, digital or otherwise, to offer an opinion on that.
As for their intention on how they wanted the blacks and the whites to look... who knows? But I absolutely believe they were going the lo-fi route, as everything from the choice of camera to the mumblecore influences would attest. Bearing that in mind, the aesthetic fits the film perfectly.
Neither the director nor the cinematographer is choosing the deliverable. If the producers or distributors insisted on film, they could have a film made from the digital product. Even if I don't like video projection as much, I have to admit that the advances made in the last couple of years are impressive. For this film I sat in the third row where the screen size was overwhelming relative to distance, and I was mostly impressed with the effect of the movie, and I found it matched artistically with the movie.
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Grain. Yes. But, wavy digital lines? Mosaic blurring and jagged edges? Folks here are waxing poetic for that stuff?
And, how about the fact that a Black & White movie can't deliver true Black OR White?
Impossible. You can't retroactively "add" black and white and stabilize the wavy mosaic digital artifacts to a digitally shot movie without doing heavy duty CGI. Plus, all 35mm film prints these days go through the dreaded DI (Digital Intermediate) process which flattens out the blacks and whites of movies actually shot on 35mm film.
And, even if it were true, it doesn't matter. The studios are rapidly phasing out 35mm film prints, so you won't even have the choice.
I don't doubt your bad cinematic experience, but let me assure you, the creators of this film were well aware of the shortcomings that go with shooting digitally.
This is digital. Of course you can add black and white retroactively. This is not digital video (DV). Just like film, this was shot in single frames. And it wasn't just shot in the b/w mode of the 5D Mark II. A substantial amount of the (admittedly moderate) budget went into post, to create the certain look the people behind it had in mind (while it may not meet your personal esthetic demands).
Given your insight, you should know that it's not just 35mm prints that go through DI (Digital Intermediate). Every movie intended for the big screen undergoes DI. So following your argumentation the desired contrast you're looking for should be extinct.
If this movie would have been shot on high ISO Ultra 16mm b/w film, would you be here complaining about grain? See, I'm not trying to lecture you, I'm just writing all this to give the people who come here and who might lack your understanding some more perspective.
As for the "wavy mosaic digital artifacts". Most people will know digital artifacts from their LCD/LED tv's that are unable to produce smooth and rich blacks. A visually dark television series like "Game of Thrones" might look really lousy on a LED, while it would look perfect on a plasma display, which usually don't suffer from the black level issues.
Yes, digital artifacts can also originate from improper lighting/exposure. But, please bear in mind, this film was shot almost exclusively using available light.
And I deliberately pointed out that you said "top notch theater". If this describes a theater that usually knows how to handle 35mm b/w film, then they still might have difficulties with the digital projector (a common thing among those little theaters that are forced to switch. While there is a lot less to do now, there's still plenty to go wrong).
If you're talking about a modern multiplex chain, then don't assume the twenty-somethings working the projectors have that much experience calibrating/projecting b/w. Yes, it's not rocket-science but there's a reason why a lot of directors refuse to watch their films (b/w or color) when they can't make sure they are being viewed as intended. A minor tweak on the brightness can make a big difference.
Last but not least, I think we can agree upon the sadness of the demise of 35mm, 70mm or film in general.
Peace!
You make decent points. And, yes, it's a damn shame that film prints are being phased out this year. A tried and true 100 years+ old technology just being thrown into the trash including selling perfectly operating projections for SCRAP metal!!
But, I have to emphasize that I live in L.A. and I work in the industry. I go to some of the finest theaters in the country, including private venues. Digital projection matching film simply DOES NOT EXIST right now. In fact, the better the projection, the MORE noticeable the flaws. You can mask some digital deficiencies in DI, but you would have to so smooth out the image that it would have looked even worse than it did to do so. Think of all those 'noise reduction' settings on TVs if they are cranked too high.
And, yes, the dreaded DI even takes away from movies shot on 35mm film (doubly so if you see the movie projected on digial; and I DID mention 35mm going through DI in the post prior). You have to attend a revival theater and see a vintage 35mm (or, better yet, 70mm) print to find out what you are missing! Sadly, we are dealing with a generation that thinks an MP3 listened to on tiny Ipod earplugs is how music "sounds" - so, Digital Projection is just another step in technological regress.
Finally, yes, 16mm does look superior than 5D digital. Check out FRUITVALE STATION or BEASTS OF THE SOUTHERN WILD. Both, far superior to FRANCES HA - and, you can actually see real BLACK!
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From the newly released Criterion essay on Frances Ha, written by Annie Baker:
The vulnerable, living-and-breathing quality that every character in the movie possesses is also in the cinematography. The images in Frances Ha have a kind of luminous, throbbing quality that I previously thought was possible only on film. It is the warmest and most analog-feeling movie I’ve seen that was shot with a digital camera (and a pretty inexpensive one at that). Because of this, and because it’s in black and white, Frances Ha seems simultaneously very old and very new.
A. Annie Baker's article is trying to sell a DVD.
B. It's doubtful that Ms.Baker saw the film in a top flight theater, or, at the very least she didn't notice the digital artifacting which is something that can be smoothed out digitally for home video.
C. It is downright ridiculous on its face to say that it's the most "analog-feeling" movie, when 16MM ANALOG FILM is still available if you want it to have a "luminous, throbbing quality".
Like I said, go see FRUITVALE STATION or BEASTS OF THE SOUTHERN WILD if you want real analog throbbing luminously.
There's an article in the july issue of American Cinematographer about Frances Ha. The DP said they considered to shoot it on film (super 16 and 35mm too) but decided to switch to digital (he didn't say anything about the reasons, I guess it was partly about budget). Their first choice was an Arri Alexa but they wanted to create a lo-fi look and that's why Canon 5D was ultimately chosen. The film grossed about $4 million in the US so I think it's some kind of a low-budget movie. To be honest digital grain was a little bit disturbing at first but the dialogue was so good that I could forget about the look.
About B&W shot on digital... this is not just a DSLR issue, check out the year's another B&W film "Oh Boy" (RED One) or Joss Whedon's "Much Ado About Nothing" (Canon 5d + RED) and compare it to Béla Tarr's "Turin Horse" (b&w, photochemically timed, 35mm) or Miguel Gomes' "Tabu" (b&w, 16mm) or the Artist (35mm on color negative film converted to BW in post). Film grain is different. It doesn't mean Frances Ha looked bad, but could've been better if they shoot it on film. That's all.
And yet, it's playing a a large number of screens anyway.... Substance over look?
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