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Oscar nominees 2016! Two films shot in 65mm, Arri still dominates

Andrew Reid (EOSHD) 14 January 2016 2 min read

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Of the Oscar nominated films this year I've rounded up the best picture and cinematography nominees and dived into the technical department.

The Oscars are closing in again. It's been a great year.

Always an interesting side note for me are what the most talented directors and DPs in the world are choosing to shoot with!

7 are shot digitally, 1 a mix of digital and film, the remaining 3 shot exclusively on film and quite a mix of film too. One Super 35mm, one Super 16mm and one 65mm! Like Tarantino's The Hateful Eight (which gets a Cinematography nomination), The Revenant also embraces the larger format but in digital, shooting the new Arri Alexa 65.

The Canon C300 figures zero times (although I expect a lot more documentary and indie stuff to be shot this way) and surprisingly there's not a single Sony camera on the list not even the F65 which shows how much work they have ahead of them to shake off their video/broadcast DNA and win the trust of leading filmmakers.

Here's the full tally at a glance -

Arri Alexa cameras - 5 films
RED cameras - 3 films
Arri film cameras - 3 films
DSLRs / mirrorless / consumer cameras - 2 film (only some shots)
Panavision film camera - 1 film
Canon Cinema EOS cameras - 1 film (only some shots)

Best picture nominations

The Big Short (Adam McCay, Ryan Gosling, DP - Barry Ackroyd) - Film and digital

Arricam LT and Canon C500 (some shots). 4K Canon RAW, mastering in 2K.

Bridge of Spies (Spielberg, Tom Hanks, written by the Coen brothers, DP - Janusz Kaminsky) - Film and anamorphic

Arricam LT and Arriflex. Hawk V-lite anamorphic lenses

Brooklyn (John Crowley, Jim Broadbent, DP - Yves Bélanger) - Digital

Arri Alexa XT. ArriRAW.

Mad Max: Fury Road - Digital (George Miller, Charlize Thearon, DP - John Seale) - Digital

Arri Alexa M, Arri Alexa Plus, Canon 5D Mark II, Olympus E-M5 (some shots)

The Martian (Ridley Scott, Matt Damon, DP - Dariusz Wolski) - Digital

RED Epic and Scarlet, Dragon sensor. GoPro Hero 4 (H.264). Redcode RAW 6K

The Revenant (Alejandro González Iñárritu, Leonardo DiCaprio, DP - Emmanuel Lubezki) - Digital

Arri Alexa 65, Hasselblad Prime 65 Lenses , Arri Alexa XT and XT M, Panavision Primo, C-Series, Leica Summilux-C and Zeiss Master Prime Lenses
RED Epic Dragon (some scenes)

Room (Lenny Abrahamson, Brie Larson, DP - Danny Cohen) - Digital

RED Epic Dragon, Redcode RAW

Spotlight (Tom McCarthy, Mark Ruffalo, DP - Masanobu Takayanagi) - Digital

Arri Alexa XT, ArriRAW

Best cinematography nominations

Sicario (Roger Deakins) - Digital

Alexa XT

The Hateful Eight (Robert Richardson) - Film

Panavision 65 HR (65mm film)

Carol (Edward Lachman) - Film

ArriFlex 416, Super 16mm film

Mad Max and The Revenant (See above) - Digital

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