ARRI sold to the Riedel Group

[Aussie Ash]

from Riedel group homepage

https://www.riedel.net/en/news/news-detail/thomas-riedel-acquires-arri#:~:text=Under the new ownership of,and remain headquartered in Munich.

[kye]

CineD posted this interview.  I haven't watched it yet, as I'm not exactly in the market for an ARRI anything, but I'd be curious to know if there are any plans in there to go for smaller cameras..  With MFT bodies getting larger and larger and ARRI bodies getting smaller, maybe we're at the point where they will meet!

[kye]

 

[BTM_Pix]

Hopes dashed for anyone hoping a bit more of a dynamic company might buy them and filter their products down to our level then.

This is possibly the driest takeover imaginable.

Riedel make Leica look like The Sex Pistols.

[fuzzynormal]

6 hours ago, BTM_Pix said:

hoping a bit more of a dynamic company might buy them and filter their products down to our level

Here's an anecdote regarding our level: 

A-Cam was an Alexa Mini on a documentary shoot.  The cinematographer didn't really get enough variety for the storytelling the director wanted.  We tried to make it work in the edit booth.  Couldn't do it.  Late in the edit/production when the budget had been burned, the two of us went back into the field to get necessary pick-ups.  Those pick ups ended up covering close to 1/3rd of the film.  All the footage was cut together, color graded, and released on one of the major American TV networks.  Every shot looks cohesive.  

That pickup stuff was done with my used, ebay purchased, 9 year old GH5. 

And there ain't no way anyone watching that film could readily tell the difference between the two.

That said, anybody got one of those Alexa-Minis laying around they want to give me? I'll trade you my GH5.

[kye]

10 hours ago, fuzzynormal said:

Here's an anecdote regarding our level: 

A-Cam was an Alexa Mini on a documentary shoot.  The cinematographer didn't really get enough variety for the storytelling the director wanted.  We tried to make it work in the edit booth.  Couldn't do it.  Late in the edit/production when the budget had been burned, the two of us went back into the field to get necessary pick-ups.  Those pick ups ended up covering close to 1/3rd of the film.  All the footage was cut together, color graded, and released on one of the major American TV networks.  Every shot looks cohesive.  

That pickup stuff was done with my used, ebay purchased, 9 year old GH5. 

And there ain't no way anyone watching that film could readily tell the difference between the two.

That said, anybody got one of those Alexa-Minis laying around they want to give me? I'll trade you my GH5.

Fascinating, and reassuring too.  This is why I concentrated on colour grading - the hardware was good enough and the gap was squarely with me.

Can you shed any light on what colour grading / image processing was done to get an acceptable match?  Was there any particular way you shot with the GH5, or lenses etc you used in order to get it to match?

I would think (if it was me) that going out shooting with a GH5 knowing it would have to be intercut with Alexa footage would trigger lots of thinking about how to best go about it so it would be good enough.

[MrSMW]

14 hours ago, fuzzynormal said:

And there ain't no way anyone watching that film could readily tell the difference between the two

And I don’t think anyone would anywhere these days with ‘lower tier’ kit now being so good.

[fuzzynormal]

15 hours ago, kye said:

going out shooting with a GH5 knowing it would have to be intercut with Alexa footage would trigger lots of thinking

Sure, I'll give you a deep dive.  I'll also vent a little.  You might imagine there would be some worry matching footage, but for this project, surprisingly not really much of a big deal.  We had worked with the Alexa footage for months, so I didn't fret at all that a GH5 would do the pick ups.

Why?

None of the Alexa footage was shot with a deep consideration for the lighting.  It was all very workman-like.  And the "eye" of the shooter was decent, but average.  That's really the biggest thing.

Anyway, the cinematographer and director decided to bring a rigged out Alexa to a run-and-gun-available-light shoot.  The dudes are older gents and they just felt like "the best" camera was the logical tool to use.  Not true, honestly, but you couldn't convince the cinematographer of that notion.  Which is kind of a legacy mentality with older guys, but that's what happened. 

There was a political element here too.  It's a decent budgeted doc so the "shot on ARRI" rhetoric was desired. 

Okay, so the main reason re-shoots were required: there weren't a lot of compelling shots that could juice the narrative.  The footage was decent to look at, but not dynamic.  The cinematographer really couldn't get around easy with this big 'ol rig and sticks.  Interesting things would happen situationally with the characters, but he would unfortunately deliver a single shot when dozens were needed for a good edit.  He'd just end up being burned out physically as the day went along and couldn't move into interesting places for useful footage.

Ultimately, a big powerful camera was being underutilized because of "reasons".  An Alexa camera delivers nice footage, of course, but when you're pointing it into blown out skies and shooting mid-day with it on the regular, it's not like it'll give you miraculous results. 

Here's the other rub that had me slapping my forehead, the cinematographer and the director really like the crushed blacks sort of color grade.  And they didn't mind the whites being blown, so...  That's a style that was typical a few decades ago, right?  Well, you're taking a 14 stop Alexa, throwing away a ton of information, and delivering 9 stops for the final project?   That's certainly a look.  And Michael Mann loves it as well.  But then, why the hell spend the $$ on an Alexa in the first place?

Now, in this story you're getting a bunch of bias from a guy that spent my entire career as a one-man-band.  If my background was from the more collaborative perspective of traditional filmmaking, I suppose a lot of this wouldn't even stick in my craw.  Don't discount my naivete'.

As for lenses, the cinematographer was using a very clinical variable.  Ziess cinema Zoom 28 - 80 mm.  And he liked f5.6.  Great lens, but neutral character to it with how it was used, so when we went out for more footage I slapped my Olympus 12-40 on my GH5, packed a few ND's, and went with that.

At the end of the day, it turned into an effective modest film.  Could have been better, wasn't a disaster.  imo, it was too verbose and that ends up being a slog, but all that talky stuff appeals to people that vibe on the themes of the film.  And while the film doesn't stretch to get beyond that sort of thing, the director is happy with it, so all's well that ends well.

[kye]

13 hours ago, fuzzynormal said:

Sure, I'll give you a deep dive.  I'll also vent a little.  You might imagine there would be some worry matching footage, but for this project, surprisingly not really much of a big deal.  We had worked with the Alexa footage for months, so I didn't fret at all that a GH5 would do the pick ups.

Why?

None of the Alexa footage was shot with a deep consideration for the lighting.  It was all very workman-like.  And the "eye" of the shooter was decent, but average.  That's really the biggest thing.

Anyway, the cinematographer and director decided to bring a rigged out Alexa to a run-and-gun-available-light shoot.  The dudes are older gents and they just felt like "the best" camera was the logical tool to use.  Not true, honestly, but you couldn't convince the cinematographer of that notion.  Which is kind of a legacy mentality with older guys, but that's what happened. 

There was a political element here too.  It's a decent budgeted doc so the "shot on ARRI" rhetoric was desired. 

Okay, so the main reason re-shoots were required: there weren't a lot of compelling shots that could juice the narrative.  The footage was decent to look at, but not dynamic.  The cinematographer really couldn't get around easy with this big 'ol rig and sticks.  Interesting things would happen situationally with the characters, but he would unfortunately deliver a single shot when dozens were needed for a good edit.  He'd just end up being burned out physically as the day went along and couldn't move into interesting places for useful footage.

Ultimately, a big powerful camera was being underutilized because of "reasons".  An Alexa camera delivers nice footage, of course, but when you're pointing it into blown out skies and shooting mid-day with it on the regular, it's not like it'll give you miraculous results. 

Here's the other rub that had me slapping my forehead, the cinematographer and the director really like the crushed blacks sort of color grade.  And they didn't mind the whites being blown, so...  That's a style that was typical a few decades ago, right?  Well, you're taking a 14 stop Alexa, throwing away a ton of information, and delivering 9 stops for the final project?   That's certainly a look.  And Michael Mann loves it as well.  But then, why the hell spend the $$ on an Alexa in the first place?

Now, in this story you're getting a bunch of bias from a guy that spent my entire career as a one-man-band.  If my background was from the more collaborative perspective of traditional filmmaking, I suppose a lot of this wouldn't even stick in my craw.  Don't discount my naivete'.

As for lenses, the cinematographer was using a very clinical variable.  Ziess cinema Zoom 28 - 80 mm.  And he liked f5.6.  Great lens, but neutral character to it with how it was used, so when we went out for more footage I slapped my Olympus 12-40 on my GH5, packed a few ND's, and went with that.

At the end of the day, it turned into an effective modest film.  Could have been better, wasn't a disaster.  imo, it was too verbose and that ends up being a slog, but all that talky stuff appeals to people that vibe on the themes of the film.  And while the film doesn't stretch to get beyond that sort of thing, the director is happy with it, so all's well that ends well.

Great write up and thanks for making the effort.

I can see that shooting the Alexa with a neutral / clean lens with deeper DOF and crushing the whites / blacks and it not having carefully sculpted lighting etc would mean it would be an easier act to follow for MFT.  As I see it, the limitations of the GH5 compared to the Alexa would be the colour science on skin tones etc, DR, and shallower DOF with character lenses..  most of which weren't significant in how it was shot.

I have no experience with an Alexa but I've heard that it's a two/three person camera and that operating it solo is difficult.  When I think about things like that, combined with the weight and form factor, I can really understand how limiting it would be to operate compared to how fast the GH5 etc are.

I do have some idea about coverage and how incredibly demanding actual "real" productions are.  When I analysed Parts Unknown and saw the quantity and quality of shots required for a 40 minute episode I was blown away.  Most shots were professional but not incredible, but there were something like 1000 of them in each finished episode.  Which they manage to get in something like 5 days on location.

I suspect the speed and flexibility difference between the Alexa and GH5 is really a microcosm of the DSLR Revolution.  Sure, some of that would be shooting style from the operators and some would be camera choice (ARRI made the Amira for being much more portable/faster) but even between an Amira and GH5, if the goal was getting as much acceptable quality coverage as quickly as possible then the lighter camera has the edge for sure.  Pair it with one of those tripods where a single mechanism releases all the joints simultaneously and you'd be able to really cover a scene very quickly.

I remember doing a graphic design course back in the day and they said that you can use whatever stock images you like for your projects, and as long as they don't actually clash with the theme of your project then no-one will notice.  Since hearing this I have paid attention to such things and it's definitely true - the graphics really don't have to be related at all.  I suspect b-roll is partly like this too, as long as you have someone talking and include things that are vaguely related to the subject then it'll work like forgettable eye candy to keep the viewers attention.  The Kuleshov Effect is working in your favour for sure.
I love the quote "kids love colour and motion" which I think was from a movie and used very sarcastically, but I suspect some of the purpose of b-roll is just to keep that part of our brain from getting bored while we're listening to the person say the thing.  Of course, there is an art to it for sure and talented people will be shooting and making edits that create magic by being a lot more than the sum of their parts.

Great to hear you were able to navigate the politics and that the end result was a success in the eyes of the boss.

Going back to the ARRI takeover and strategy, the fact that ARRI created the Alexa Mini as a 'special use' camera and then everyone switched to it for the whole production says (to me at least) there's a demand for smaller camera packages.  It would be amazing if the new management didn't realise this and see what they can do with smaller bodies still.  I'm sure ARRI would have a good idea about sales figures for things like the RED Komodo and Komodo-X etc, which are very small, which must further emphasise the demand for smaller packages.
I understand that cinema cameras potentially do things like heat/cool the sensor so it's at the optimum temperature and this requires size/weight for the mechanisms and also significant battery power too, so maybe making things smaller is more difficult than we'd imagine.
I like to point out to people that the GH7 has a lot more stuff in it than the smaller cameras people compare it to (IBIS, cooling, internal RAW, etc), but in this case we're comparing mirrorless cameras with cameras that literally have heaters in them, so it's not a straight comparison by a long shot.