Will digital ever replace film?
Will the digital mediums replace emulsion photography, even if only partially?
–N
If you’re going to allow me the “if only partially” escape clause, then certainly. Well-regarded films such as TADPOLE and PIECES OF APRIL are already being shot on digital video, as are the SPY KIDS movies and the STAR WARS prequels. On the distribution side, most new theaters are being built to allow for digital projectors (which will be installed whenever someone figures out who should pay for them).
Speaking in vast generalizations, digital is usually cheaper and faster than film. Videotape costs less than film stock, particularly when factoring in development and printing costs. Editing is already an almost-entirely digital process, so shooting digitally saves you a step. And studios dream of being able to digitally transmit their movies directly to the multiplex, saving the cost of striking and shipping 2,500+ film prints.
What’s more, the recent generations of digital projectors are quite good. You could switch over every movie theater in America and most people wouldn’t notice any change.
For all the progress that’s been made in digital cinematography — and it’s considerable — film still has some significant advantages that will keep it viable for decades to come. First, there’s a lot of entrenched experience. Cinematographers know film and love it. Second, film technology itself has improved dramatically. Today’s film stocks allow you to shoot in lighting conditions that would have been impossible a decade ago, and techniques like silver retention and skip-bleach processing allow for a lot of creative freedom. Third, the resolution of digital cameras still can’t match film — and when they do, there will be other creative reasons (such as film grain, focus and contrast) why you might still not be satisfied. Finally, on an $80 million movie, the film costs aren’t prohibitive, so there’s no reason for many movies to switch to digital video. (There is, however, a lot of pressure for one-hour TV shows to switch to digital cameras. Many are making the change.)
On the other end of the spectrum, digital video is a godsend for the $80,000 movie, where film and processing could eat the entire budget. Since it is these smaller movies where tomorrow’s filmmakers get their start, I can envision this new wave rising up through ranks with digital cameras in hand, and never trading them in for the “old” film cameras.
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January 15th, 2004 at 8:55 pm
Thank’s, John! Wait ’til the audience gets HDTV and full bandwidth streaming of top-notch digital productions right in the comfort of their homes… it will indirectly signal the rush to “TRUE” cinema’s wide-screen projection magic. Aaaahh, the amazing quality we’re now capable of; The medium is improving by the day, in fact!
January 20th, 2004 at 1:17 pm
What about Maxivision 48. I’ve never seen it but heard that it is better, sharper and clearer than digital and the projectors are far cheaper. Also, the projectors can show regular film as well. What do you know about it?
January 21st, 2004 at 2:17 pm
Maxivision is a film system which uses a wider format and runs at 48 frames per second, as opposed to the usual 24 fps. I’ve never seen it demonstrated, but apparently it looks great. “It’s so much better than film or video,” says Roger Ebert, which is perplexing — because it is film.
My hunch — and I’m happy to be proven wrong — is that it will never catch on. In order to run at 48 fps, each Maxivison movie is actually twice as large as normal prints, when the great goal of digital projection was to elimate the cost and burden of film prints. Even if the picture is sharper, there’s not enough incentive for studios or distributors to make the switch.
March 9th, 2004 at 8:27 pm
Untrue, Maxivision is not twice as large as normal prints. The reason why is that it eliminates a lot of the wasted space found in a traditional 35mm frame, much like how Super8 and Super16 work. As 35mm has a narrower aspect ratio than both Super8 and Super16, this new form actually means that 48fps (which is only 1 mode of 2 for Maxivision) is only 50% larger than the traditional 24fps film. If you run Maxivision at 24fps (the other mode) you actually get a 75% smaller film. And you can switch between the modes on the fly, thanks to digital control technology. So use 48fps for action scenes, 24fps for the rest of it. Also, Maxivision has eliminated the optical sound track, a holdover from the 30’s that is no longer necessary thanks to modern digital sound systems, allowing the frame to be wider. End result, you get a 40% larger frame while using 25% less film for the same number of frames.
March 10th, 2004 at 9:21 am
Thanks, Nate, for your thoroughness. I think Maxivision has done a smart job optimizing existing film technology, but I still doubt we will see many theaters switch over. It doesn’t offer the economic incentives digital distribution does.
March 25th, 2004 at 2:59 pm
35mm Film will improove, just you wait and see. And before video can ever match film there will be something totally different. JUST WATCH!!!!!
May 21st, 2004 at 2:42 pm
I think what we’re talking about it economic feasability, and Maxivision wins that battle hands down. Are the studios going to be paying for the theatres’ new digital projectors. The answer is NO. So what incentive is there for a theatre owner to switch to digital projection if digital is only “as good” as film? None. However, theatres’ costs to upgrade to Maxivision systems are minimal in comparison. Also, security is much better with film – anyone can view a digital image, but one on film is pretty hard to steal…
May 21st, 2004 at 3:32 pm
As for Eric’s comment, yes, the conversion costs to Maxivision should be lower, but the studio has additional costs in order to make the special prints required. Also, they have no way of knowing whether Maxivision will even be around in a few years.
Here are a few related articles of interest. First up is a link discussing the Digital Cinemas Initiative, set up by the seven studios to help figure out technical issues involving digital cinema, and hopefully set some standards:
http://www.mkpe.com/articles/2002/Newco/newco.htm
Second is a Hollywood Reporter article about a test film DCI shot to compare differences between digital and film:
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/thr/search/search_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1963552
Just so we’re clear, I’m not a digital-or-die guy. But I think the “film means film” philosophy ignores historic precedent. Each new era of cinema has brought huge changes (sound, color, digital animation) that were denigrated by some purists at the time, but ultimately allowed new types of movies to be made.
June 3rd, 2005 at 8:58 am
But Maxivision is a 500% better picture than the currently superior film and in the long run about 50 times less expensive for theater owners than digital systems. Plus they don’t have to scrap the old system so they can show the majority of cinemas being produced as well as those shot on Maxivision. Current projectors last for 20 some odd years but digital projectors are outdated with-in 2 to 5 years. It seems to be the business of “making filmmaking easier” dueling against the business of “showing films for profit”. And the best picture for the least amount of money is probably going to win.
June 3rd, 2005 at 7:59 pm
I don’t think that digital projection necessarily means the end of film because I think the best of both worlds is to: shoot on film, do a nice telecine or high-end scan, do all your digital effects and titles (if needed) on your nonlinear system, and then output it to a file format or tape format that will be in turn projected in the theater. This is a much cheaper pipeline both for studios and for independents. The digital versus film question then becomes an aesthetic and economic decision. I think people who prefer the aesthetic of film will still shoot film though.
July 21st, 2005 at 9:18 pm
I think what you will find is a blending of these two mediums. Now that digital intermediates are coming down in price, allowing for movies like City of God, Amelie, and Oh Brother Where Art Thou and hundreds of others to be shot on film but digitized and printed from a digitized edit (rather than a negative), you will see more movies taking advantage of the best of both worlds: film origination, but with digital flexibility.
For example, Aaton’s little 16mm camera called the A-Minima (used in City of God) is being marketed, interestingly enough, as an HD camera — although clearly it is a film camera. Why? Because its size and workflow is just like HD but it takes advantage of the incredible new strengths in 16mm film stocks and the assumption that filmmakers will shoot cheaply on 16mm but ultimately for HD purposes. And indeed this is exactly what City of God did, and they were nominated for a cinematography Oscar.
Film looks amazing, and digitized film looks even better, cleaner, and with greater color correction control.
Even 16mm film is far beyond digital video and probably will be for a long time. Remember, just as video is getting better… so too is film.
July 22nd, 2005 at 10:24 am
One thing to remember is that despite the costs, digital projectors are proving more enticing since there appears to be the growing trend in 3-D and animation. Now that those films have a vialble outlet, it’s making more economic sense to start making the switch to digital projectors, hence an increase in shooting in digital.
April 22nd, 2006 at 9:52 am
Digital cinema is a disruptive technology. The studios will be distributing movies digitally so skipping the whole film process will save them a bundle. So when film is shot and scanned digitally for archival and distribution purposes, you can expect that every frame will be 4K in size. There are digital video cameras that shoot 4K being developed as I type this and by the time you read this, you’ll be able to get one, albeit at considerable cost.
With HDTV making inroads into the home, people will be used to the grainless imagery of High Def video. Film will begin to look archaic and moviegoers will soon (read 5 to 10 years) embrace digital media as will the studios and theater owners.
July 18th, 2006 at 5:54 am
always will stay a lot of ppl faithfull to old good cam with good old photo film. not a bunch of preferences and other positives will enlighten them to gave up it. romanticism? conservatism? :)