Digital technology has opened many doors for micro-budget filmmakers. However, many filmmakers miss the look of celluloid… the colors, the skin tones, the beautiful highlights, and the grain… Is it possible to truly capture these aesthetics on a budget that won’t allow for the purchase and processing of film stock? Enter Digital Film Tools, and their latest plugin for editors and colorists: Film Stocks v3. In this review, we’ll take a look at the film/video version of this software and see how close it gets us to the celluloid visuals of old.
Blackmagic Design Presents: History of Country Music – Filmmaker Cole Claassen Captures the Past (Retrospective/Case Study)
How does a chance encounter bring about an on-the-spot decision to make a feature-length documentary? For Cole Claassen it all started with country music.
Find Your Set: Set Scouter Brings Digital Scouting to NYC Film Community (Industry Press Release)
New York City’s online marketplace for film, TV and commercial production locations multiplies with arrival of Set Scouter, giving producers direct line to massive inventory of residential spaces.
This is Meg: Capturing the Realities of Hollywood “Success” with Black Magic (Retrospective/Case Study)
Wrangling the monster that is the Hollywood movie industry is no small feat. Professional filmmaker Alex Ferrari has encountered his fair share of production headaches, from last-minute project cancellations to the notion that a successful film requires a massive budget and huge stars. With today’s technology on his side, Ferrari began planning for an entirely different kind of project.
The Sport Cam Revolution: GoPros, Clones & iPhones (Article/Shootout)
Last year, with the release of the film, Hardcore Henry (which was shot entirely with GoPro cameras in first person perspective), we decided that we were going to look at the different cost-effective sport and mobile cams on the market to see which ones were worth investing in for our readers. The gold standard in this market has been GoPro, who kindly provided us with one of their HERO4 Black cameras for this extended research article...
The Things We’ve Seen’s Gritty Drama: Small Budget but Big Impact (Retrospective/Case Study)
DP Steven Turco explains how he was able to maintain a dynamic, filmic look without exceeding the budget in Director Tre Manchester's film, "The Things We've Seen."