Will The Creator change how blockbusters get filmed?

[TomTheDP]

Things will change. The FX3 is still a far cry from an Alexa 35, but it isn't that far. A few cameras down the line and the different will be even less noticeable. 

Really their budget savings were in lighting. You can use really small lighting equipment when shooting at 12,800 iso. 

It feels gimmicky to me though. The movie was funded by Sony. Why didn't they use an FX6? Same sensor but you have SDI outputs and a more rig friendly body. Maybe because advertising the movie was shot with the more expensive FX6 won't sell as many camera bodies??

I am sure the FX3 was a nightmare for AC's to deal with.

[IronFilm]

I'm eagerly awaiting the Sony GX3  

 

 

[kye]

39 minutes ago, IronFilm said:

I'm eagerly awaiting the Sony GX3 

Well, if it goes from GX3:

to FX3:

..the GX3 will be the size of a matchbox!!

Then, in a massive twist no-one saw coming...   Sony releases the next version of the GX85....!

[Matt Kieley]

8 hours ago, TomTheDP said:

It feels gimmicky to me though. The movie was funded by Sony. Why didn't they use an FX6? Same sensor but you have SDI outputs and a more rig friendly body. Maybe because advertising the movie was shot with the more expensive FX6 won't sell as many camera bodies??

I am sure the FX3 was a nightmare for AC's to deal with.

This is not even new for Sony. A handful of years ago there was a horror movie, The Possession of Hannah Grace, that was shot on the A7S II. It was released by Screen Gems (Sony) and there was also a lot of marketing around the fact that they used that camera. You could also see in the BTS material the camera was HEAVILY rigged out, which I thought was funny. 

[IronFilm]

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-features/the-creator-budget-gareth-edwards-1235609000/ 

"...if you take the Excel document for a Hollywood blockbuster and start deleting zeros, you’re going to find you’re crippled really fast and you can’t really do anything and you’ll be complaining the entire time. But if you take the indie movie Excel document and start adding zeros, it’s the most liberating thing in the world."

[IronFilm]

 

[ntblowz]

 

 

[Trankilstef]

Interesting ITW of Oren Soffer here.

[MrSMW]

Hoping to go see it ASAP but it’s a case of finding a local enough cinema here in France that is showing the Version Originale and not the Version Français dubbed offering…because it should be a criminal offence to watch any movie if it has been dubbed into another language!

Not watching any spoilers or BTS prior either and actually rarely watch BTS because I know a lot of it is not real, but just like magic tricks, but I don’t wish to peak behind the curtain.

[ntblowz]

Straight from DP

[ntblowz]

More inside look from DIT

https://ymcinema.com/2023/10/06/shooting-a-blockbuster-with-the-sony-fx3-a-rare-inside-look-by-the-creators-dits/

 

They used Atomos Ultrasync for timecode

[ntblowz]

https://www.indiewire.com/features/craft/the-creator-ai-director-gareth-edwards-interview-1234908016/

 

He used 10% budget for the actual shoot, and rest goes to post.

So 8 million for the actual production and 72 million to vfx/sound/design.

 

[IronFilm]

10 hours ago, ntblowz said:

Straight from DP

well, that's a lie, it's not 2x the weight difference between the stripped down FX6 and the stripped down FX3 

When he gets that wrong, how much do you trust this is the truth as to the reasoning behind what he's saying now? Or maybe he's too just part of the marketing aspect of this film, "we're so special and uniquely innovative". 

10 hours ago, ntblowz said:

More inside look from DIT

https://ymcinema.com/2023/10/06/shooting-a-blockbuster-with-the-sony-fx3-a-rare-inside-look-by-the-creators-dits/

They used Atomos Ultrasync for timecode

And Tentacles as well:

"An Audio Timecode was added by connecting Tentacles to the FX3 to match all the metadata."

You can see an old original Gen1 Tentacle here:

 

There is a Betso SBOX-1N timecode box there too?? With a cable from a USO on it. 

[kye]

3 hours ago, IronFilm said:

well, that's a lie, it's not 2x the weight difference between the stripped down FX6 and the stripped down FX3

Yeah, sounds to me like marketing spin, where you say something that's technically correct (so if anyone asks you have an answer) but not relevant in any practical sense.

For example the FX6 gets a lot heavier when you mount a screen etc, that the FX3 already has, but they shot in RAW on an Atomos, so the FX3 would never have been used without the screen anyway...

[kye]

To be honest, the whole thing of this movie getting all this hype for being shot on an FX3 seems ridiculous.

I think on paper it sounds like this is an incredible thing where a big budget movie shot on a tiny cheap camera, which is the kind of story that makes people who can only shoot on tiny cheap cameras feel better, but it's not true.

Even if you have a tiny cheap camera, you don't have $72M to spend in post...  

.....and if you had $72M in post, you could have shot it on an EOS M using Magic Lantern and it would have looked almost as good (professional colourists and VFX artists are incredible - high-end work looks great mostly because of those, not the camera that was used).

The image isn't really that much better than other things

I mean, can you tell which of these below is the FX3, or the Venice 2, or the G9ii, or the R6ii, or the GH6?  It should be obvious right - the Venice 2 is something like $50K, and the G9ii and GH6 are consumer MFT cameras, and the FX3 should be easily identifiable, right?

The FX3 isn't really that small

You might be thinking the FX3 is small because it's smaller than a 5D, for example:

But that's not what it looks like, this is what it looks like:

It's not that cheap

So you want external RAW - sure.  The Fujifilm X-S20 does Prores RAW, and it's $1299 - which is a third of the cost!

Oh, you want 16-bit RAW, not that crappy 12-bit RAW that the Fuji shoots.  Let me ask you this - have you ever seen the difference?  Have you graded it?

I didn't think so.

If I showed you a 12-bit RAW video graded by a professional colourist or 16-bit RAW video you shot and graded yourself, which would be better?  Maybe you should shoot your movie (or cat video) on the Fuji and pay a professional colourist to grade it - it would look better....

It's a marketing stunt.

[markr041]

Btw, according to one of the crew in a blog post, GoPro's were also used. But that is true for many productions.

[MrSMW]

54 minutes ago, kye said:

It's not that cheap

And really, there are better options for shooting steering wheels whilst driving.

I think it’s overkill and a GoPro mounted on his hat would also have allowed him to keep two hands on the wheel. Or one hand on the wheel and the other on his coffee.

[IronFilm]

5 hours ago, kye said:

Yeah, sounds to me like marketing spin, where you say something that's technically correct (so if anyone asks you have an answer) but not relevant in any practical sense.

For example the FX6 gets a lot heavier when you mount a screen etc, that the FX3 already has, but they shot in RAW on an Atomos, so the FX3 would never have been used without the screen anyway...

Exactly, any minor slight arguments in favor of the FX3 being their main/only camera is totally irrelevant once you look into how they were actually using the FX3! (for instance, always with an Atomos recorder and two timecode boxes on it, etc etc etc) 

In my opinion, they should have used half a dozen or so FX6 bodies with maybe a couple or so FX3 bodies for the very niche uses of crash cam / drone camera. (although it appears they used GoPros as well??? Again, I'd lean towards choosing a Sony RX0 mk2 instead... you can get s-log with 4K 10bit 422 files out of it, with a S16 sized sensor)

 

5 hours ago, kye said:

Even if you have a tiny cheap camera, you don't have $72M to spend in post...  

.....and if you had $72M in post, you could have shot it on an EOS M using Magic Lantern and it would have looked almost as good (professional colourists and VFX artists are incredible - high-end work looks great mostly because of those, not the camera that was used).

Or $8M to spend on the production itself during filming. 

5 hours ago, kye said:

But that's not what it looks like, this is what it looks like:

Interesting, the Cam Op isn't even using the Atomos as a monitor! But has added a SmallHD as his monitor for operating with. 

 

[PPNS]

its a marketing stunt obv, and nothing will change because of this movie, but it’s still a cool accomplishment to shoot an ambitious feature length film with a consumer camera. I wish i was shooting features.

[kye]

2 hours ago, PPNS said:

its a marketing stunt obv, and nothing will change because of this movie, but it’s still a cool accomplishment to shoot an ambitious feature length film with a consumer camera. I wish i was shooting features.

Do you think the FX3 is a consumer camera?