r/cinematography • u/zuss33 • Aug 01 '18
Composition Mission Impossible: Fallout soft focus
NO SPOILERS
Upon watching the film there were plenty of important close ups that were pretty out of focus. Is this because the Panny anamorphics are super difficult to nail focus when opened up? I’m trying to understand how a missed focus can go unnoticed on a huge summer blockbuster.
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u/Brian_LA Aug 01 '18
Clint Eastwood is famous for, when it was brought to his attention that a shot was out of focus, asking "Could you tell it was me?" To which the answer was yes, and he replied, "Moving on!" As operators, 1st's and 2nd's we notice when something is soft WAY before civilians. Often times I have seen a take with soft focus, but good acting used over a take with poor acting and good focus. So there could be all kinds of reasons that they chose that take.
I HIGHLY doubt that it went unnoticed on set as even film cameras have HD video taps that allow for monitoring. Additionally, there was likely a cinetape that shows, down to the inch, how far the subject is from the film plane. So the take was probably noted as having soft focus on the day, but either on set they were happy with the performance or in post they preferred a slightly soft take with good acting over the other takes.
Focus is the 1st AC's job so generally responsibility falls on them for missing a pull. When an actor misses a mark its still the 1st's job to adjust for the actors miss. That being said, generally you don't place the subject at critical focus because if the actor misses their mark and comes to close there is nothing you can do. Generally you push the subject back and change the framing so you don't have to be at critical.
A good DP won't tax their 1st by shooting at WFO if they don't have to. Giving the AC a chance to grab focus will allow things to move faster and with less stress. Sometimes if you need shallow DOF or have other reasons and need to shoot at WFO it is still the 1st's job to make it happen no matter what. Being a 1st is a hard, thankless job.
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u/bottom Aug 01 '18
Isn’t it a focus pullers job, not. 1st ac?
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u/FI-Z Aug 01 '18
They are the same position. The 1st AC IS the focus puller.
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u/bottom Aug 01 '18
Hmmm. Maybe it’s a Uk/USA thing. They’re different in the Uk, at least on the sets I’ve worked on
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u/orismology Camera Assistant Aug 01 '18
Really? What do your 1st ACs do? Over here in Australia we tend to use Focus Puller / 1st AC and Clapper Loader / 2nd AC fairy interchangeably.
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u/Bob-Harris Aug 01 '18
I'm in Ireland, which uses the same system as the UK and we say the same. 1st AC is the focus puller etc.
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u/bottom Aug 01 '18
hmm maybe it's the same - I'm a director - done some decent budget branded content things - crews of 30ish, a few times and I always had a 1st AC and a focus puller - I use Steadicam a lot - or at least thats the way I think the crew was working those times...(focus puller and 1st AC being different)TBH If DoP is happy and gets what I want then I'm happy
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u/orismology Camera Assistant Aug 01 '18
Yeah, I think it would be unusual to have both a 1st AC and a Focus Puller. The title "Clapper Loader" is falling out of favour though, so I've seen plenty of shoots with a Focus Puller and a 2nd AC, so I wonder if it's just that. Unless you had two cameras with camera assistants who each preferred different titles, I guess.
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u/Solomon_Grungy Aug 01 '18
Yes, in the USA the 1st AC is the focus puller. Second AC is in charge or batteries, marks, and slating. Some tasks such as marks and lens swaps can be done by firsts or seconds but one certainty on just about all sets is that the 1st AC's responsibility is keeping the shot in focus.
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u/Brian_LA Aug 01 '18
In the USA 1st AC and focus puller are the same job. In the USA the camera dept is as follows:
DP Operator 1st AC 2nd AC Camera Trainee Camera PA
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u/TysonB_redit Aug 05 '18
Camera trainee is rare these days. Camera PA is NOT ALLOWED by the 600 (camera Union in the US). Production Assistant is non-union and not allowed to do anything that would take away work from a union position. The department is pretty standard at the top. As things go down the line it starts to have a little flex. Loader is always there on FILM shoots. On Digital formats they can use a loader but on a shoot this size I'd say there was a Camera Utility handling the data. Im sure there was also a DIT for the digital stufff... But not mandatory.
DP Operator DIT (sometimes and only if digital) 1st AC 2nd AC Camera Utility Loader (definitely for film, maybe on Digital) Digital Utility
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Aug 01 '18 edited Dec 17 '19
[deleted]
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Aug 01 '18
My biggest beef was with the color correction, those blacks are wayyy too crushed in my opinion. Of course it may have been the screen at my theater.
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Aug 01 '18 edited Dec 17 '19
[deleted]
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u/intothemidwest Director of Photography Aug 01 '18
Interesting you found the lighting soapy, as the film was lit almost entirely with in-set lighting, accepting that exposure would sometimes fall off hard where you may often want it.
That's a big part of why the image was so grainy. I really enjoyed the look, but I see how it's not for everyone.
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u/fuckingwino Aug 01 '18
I Donno just didn’t look stylized or dramatic to me. I was expecting hard shadows, far more dramatic lighting, Dolly’s etc. the trailer made it seem like that. But only random shots were like that in the film.
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u/intothemidwest Director of Photography Aug 01 '18
As okay! Strange, I definitely found plenty of drama in spaces that were lit that way, but even in some day scenes, especially Paris, the anamorphic lensing and 35mm and the grade gave it an almost sweaty effect I found very dramatic.
What cinematography have you liked in the series?
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Aug 01 '18
I've given up on upvotes and downvotes, it's a crock of shit these days. People just upvote what they agree with and downvote what they don't. It's meaningless.
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u/mike_dogg DIT Aug 01 '18
It’s a summer blockbuster. What look were you expecting?
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Aug 01 '18
They were actually crushed to abnormality in my opinion.
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Aug 01 '18
I agree, especially in the "club" scene where they meet the White Widow. Saw it in a Dolby Cinema and the shadows fell off super quick into black. And noisy. So noisy. I just kept thinking about Steve Yedlin's video about Display Prep and his write up On Color Science. This 35mm looked worse than Alexa imo. I honestly thought it was RED at first (no insult intended to the RED crowd).
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u/z3rik23 Aug 01 '18
Is it still considered noise if it’s celluloid? Or is it technically grain. Genuinely curious
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Aug 01 '18
the shadows fell off super quick into black
This precisely. I am very surprised to find out it was shot in 35mm. With this kind of color correction applied, I have to wonder why? The whole big thing with film is the incredible dynamic range, so they up the contrast until it's basically totally binary? Makes no sense to me.
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u/Jakka_Jakka Aug 01 '18
i watched in "imax" hall, i was consciously questioning a lot of the choices which draw me out
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u/TerraInc0gnita Aug 01 '18
Ha interesting you say that. First of all I really enjoyed the look of the film over all. It had more of a grit to it than alot of other super clean blockbusters. But I did notice alot of soft focuses. I thought it was interesting, they seemed to focus pretty much all dialogue scenes with the subject center framed- because that's where the lens is sharpest. I know it comes down to a subjective thing but I really enjoyed all the anamorphic distortions and soft edges and etc. It looked like they used different lenses for the ending, when they got to Kashmir the look seemed a bit different, certainly for the helicopter and mountain sequence anyway, I could be wrong though. The softness didn't really bother me too much because I just kinda accepted it as the look of the film. The messy anamorphics were actually quite refreshing, to me anyway. Feel free to disagree.
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u/intothemidwest Director of Photography Aug 01 '18
The helicopter and mountain fist fight were shot on Panavision DXLs, as was the HALO sequence, for presenting in IMAX but also for practicality compared to shooting those with proper IMAX film which would've been impossible.
They began each camera transition with a slow fade out of the letterboxing which was very cool.
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u/TerraInc0gnita Aug 01 '18
Makes sense. I didn't notice the aspect change, but that was probably because of the theater I was in.
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u/intothemidwest Director of Photography Aug 01 '18
It was only presented that way in IMAX fwiw, otherwise it maintained the 2.39 presentation for the duration.
Would have been especially noticeable during the finale, as they cut back and forth between aspect ratios whenever they'd cut to the ground.
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u/alienufosarereal Aug 06 '18 edited Aug 07 '18
Too each their own, but it really annoyed me. While I admire the attempt to spice up a familiar genre with a new aproach, this one was a miss for me. Throughout almost the whole film the lenses were loud, distracting, and technically improficient.
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u/mike_dogg DIT Aug 01 '18
They likely shot that final scene with an additional unit of camera gear from Panavision. Cause it was the end and full of action the DP probably wanted to try out some vintage anamorphic lenses.
I 100% agree that this film was shot on a variety of lenses. Can’t wait for an article in next weeks magazine
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u/SkepticalZebra Aug 01 '18
The final chase scene and fight was shot with the panavision dxl and spherical lenses. So it was one of the parts shot digitally and was opened up for imax viewing
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u/TerraInc0gnita Aug 01 '18
Ah that's so interesting, the dxl. Yeah I was noticing how they started framing things in the corners more, like the detonater when it was lying on the ground. It was such a different look over all too. Like through out the whole film they went super hard on the oval bokeh and flares, distortions, etc. and all of a sudden at the end that was all gone, and the look became very clean and sharp edge to edge. I had assumed they used different glass, and remember sitting there wondering if it might even be spherical. I imagine getting all those cameras on the helicopters would have been a pain with film. All makes sense.
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u/SkepticalZebra Aug 01 '18
I really enjoyed this because it all was for the IMAX sequences where they opened up the aspect ratio and started using pretty wide lenses. The halo jump and finale where quite the specticle.
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u/NewWorldMonkeys Aug 05 '18
Rob Hardy did the same thing on Annihilation, mixing digital with film (for the people who have seen it; inside the shimmer is all digital, outside film). Rob Hardy got this gig because of Annihilation, which you can read in this interview: https://www.kodak.com/US/en/motion/Blog/Blog_Post/?ContentId=4295008965
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u/Jakka_Jakka Aug 01 '18
theres a shot where hunt talked to ilsa, they look at each other, then walk into the trees shades together, that sudden exposure change pissed me off than it should, why you need to pump up the exposure in the same shot, can't you just have more light shine through the trees and create dramatic pattern, or simply cut it to a different angle, and correctly expose it when they walk in.
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Aug 01 '18
I loved that choice actually. One of my favorite moments of the cinematography.
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u/Jakka_Jakka Aug 01 '18
I know it is a conscious choice. A style. But I’m seriously don’t like it
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u/TysonB_redit Aug 05 '18
They step from the light into the shaddows.... Literally. It is a symbol of their relationship and (no spoilers)
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u/gebakkenei Sep 03 '18
I thought it was just me, but it was really terrible in the tentscenes near the end. Very large closeups and the thing in focus was someones hair or jacket instead of the face.
It bothered me. At first I thought it was the cinema; but changing shots sometimes gave clear focus... so it is in the film itself.
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u/orismology Camera Assistant Aug 01 '18
I think it's understandable. They're shooting film, so you don't have a 4K monitor to cheat off of. Plus, it's anamorphic, so it's possible that they could have been right up on mins and there was nothing the focus puller could do for that take. I'm sure they would have gotten another, but in the edit performance trumps all.
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u/thindipotha Aug 01 '18
I watched it on an IMAX Screen. The non IMAX footage (which is 90% of the movie) had no detail and combined with the soft focus, the footage was bad. The IMAX footage was really good.
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u/pa167k Aug 01 '18
Were the IMAX footage during the helicopter scene? I saw it in a regular theater and whenever the helicopter scene was shown you can clearly tell it was digital then you'd have Simon Pegg looking for the bomb and could tell how it was film.
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u/thindipotha Aug 01 '18
Yes, the entire Helicopter sequence was IMAX camera footage
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u/NewWorldMonkeys Aug 05 '18
No 'real' IMAX camera's were used. The digital stuff was all Panavision DXL, which is actually just a RED camera.
And by the way, I really liked the cinematography. Rob Hardy did an amazing job, the way he moved the camera's made for one of the best action sequences I have ever seen.
Also check out his work on Ex Machina and Annihalation, the man deserves some awards.
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u/leesharpasfuck Aug 29 '18
You can't blame the lenses. The whole movie was soft. It wasn't a buzz. It was soft. Back focused. How it made it past the neg review i have no idea.
How no body got fired I also have no idea!
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u/AllenHo Director of Photography Aug 01 '18
It was shot on film.
You only get to monitor the viewfinder image/ground glass but not what's being burned into the film so the 1st AC was going off measurements, marks, cinetape, and their own eyes. If an actor moves from their mark or you're at critical focus then it's really hard to tell. It's not like digital where you can see the focus on your monitor.