SeeingEyeBlog

Among the other new developments in my life and work is the trend towards color timing. I got into color work a few years ago, through watching a colleague and friend on his own color timing jobs. I realized that with an all-digital workflow (particularly with the RED), there is temptation at every step–zoom & reframe a shot here, use the wrong codec there–to either disenfranchise the cinematographer at best, or cause irreversable image degradation at worst. It was clear to me that I needed to be my own colorist. I would have no one to blame but myself, and it would assure me of committing to projects on which I actually want to spend the extra effort. Luckily I was ahead of the curve and had a couple years of practice long before Apple acquired Silicon Color and democratized everything. But Apple’s acquisition happened at the perfect time–just as two features I had shot were going into online/color. We got a great deal at a post house whose FCP/Color room was well below the radar compared to their normal da Vinci suite. There, I color timed Yesterday Was a Lie (F900) and Broken Windows (S16). Currently, I have an upcoming feature which will follow a similar DI process to Laser Pacific’s inDI, with little old me at the helm.

An oldschool colorist may not agree that the software solutions are worth their salt. But I don’t care much, and here’s why. A discerning eye can tell the difference between a print finished photochemically versus one put through the digital intermediate process, and most discerning eyes will usually agree that the photochemical finish looks sharper with better detail, yet the DI gives you far more control (which, psychologically, can make up for sloppiness on set and cause a false dilation of the good/fast/cheap triangle). So my point is, we’re clearly taking a step backwards, but technology is catching up fast, bringing with it many steps forward. This step backwards is the time we as cinematographers need to change the game. There is so much control available to us in the color suite, we need to master it all. It’ll enable us to truly preserve those beautiful houses of cards we so delicately assemble on set. Learn to color time your own work, and join the movement to make “DP/Colorist” a commonplace term among producers, directors and post supervisors. That way, when a DI looks as good as photochemical finishing, we will retain our mantle of image quality shepherd. Maybe some of us can even pioneer this at the union bargaining tables next time. I would love to get a clause in my contract for my color timing efforts.

As many of you know, I’m a cinematographer, which means my office is a film set which can change locations every day, even twice a day. Frequently my office is a vista overlooking the ocean at dawn, the roof of a skyscraper, or in a car.

To help ease the transition to exclusively shooting feature films (which means a rocky income during down time between projects), I’ve started working on a per-project basis as a colorist at a post production house. That means that for weeks at a time my office is a windowless room with four monitors and one dim light.

I have to admire people who can sit at a computer all day. Granted, I do 14-hour shifts with only two or three breaks (that’s what we’re conditioned to in the production world). But still, sitting all day exhausts more energy than the physicality of shooting a motion picture.

Working as a colorist does have its benefits to offset the backbreaking labor of sitting still. As cinematography becomes more and more digital, the cinematographer will start to lose authority over a film’s look unless he can wield the image control power at every step in the flow. Previously that power was limited to the photochemical processes, but now with digital intermediate, anything is possible, and the wrong people can severely alter what the cinematographer intended on set. Perfect reason for a DP to be a colorist, because that’s the final step in a DI before laying back to film.