The advance of digital technology, especially in image making, is causing enormous turmoil worldwide as a new age of image acquisition looms on the horizon. Many are running for cover, others burying their heads in the sand and hoping it will all go away, and a small but growing legion are embracing the new dawn and seeing possibilities that have never existed until now.

The new Hi Definition cameras offer imaging possibilities which would have been unthinkable only a few years ago and offer the cinematographer unprecedented control over those images. As a tool for acquisition for television, Hi Definition is without peer, offering immediacy, image control and quality comparable with 35mm. Whilst recording on tape, the camera system itself has all the benchmarks of a fully equipped 35mm Motion Picture Film Camera. It is in the Theatrical arena the camera really impresses. With the introduction of the SONY 24p camera at this year’s NAB conference in Las Vegas, it is only a matter of time before cinematographers begin to realize the great advantages of originating on Hi Def.

As a brief background, my involvement in Video started about 22 years ago when my CP16 New Camera was removed from the News Department and replaced with a RCA TK76, a blue and white three tube camera which quickly became the standard for news gathering. With no introduction I was thrust into the field and left to my own devices so I immediately fell back on my film techniques and film style shooting and developed a style which was quite unique.... for the day.

Years later, and with many developments passing me by as I was back shooting film, I was approached to shoot a TV series in NYC called THE STREET. The catch, it was shooting on video...Betacam. So, off I went again shooting 40 episodes in 40 nights on the streets of Newark, NJ of a cop show which was the forerunner of a whole new visual style of shooting. We shot the entire show hand held, every scene was one shot, it was all at night and feature style lighting....but it looked like documentary. Unfortunately the show was syndicated and went largely unnoticed (although it gathered nationwide rave reviews), except by a small handful of producers who took the idea and formatted the numerous shows running today along the lines of our series.

As a result of my work on THE STREET and my work in features and TV movies, I was approached by Sony to shoot part of the demo tape when they introduced the digital Betacam. Now, several years later, even though my work is primarily in film I have again started working closely with Sony with the HD Cam. Last year I shot a comprehensive test over [Continued from printed version] 5 days on the 30fps 1080i HD Cam.

My goal was to stretch the camera to its limits in both color reproduction and over and under exposure. The camera was amazing with underexposure l altitude approaching 6 stops, although it did fall a little short in the overexposure end, only holding detail to about 1 1/2 stops. This is one of the major differences with film but requires only a slight rethinking in the way exposures are set to be accommodated. I used filtration in the same way I would for 35mm and the camera itself, when used on a gear head with extension finder, matte box, etc; looked remarkably "film like" to everyone on set.

The biggest revelation with the camera comes in the ability to manipulate color, contrast, brightness, and sharpness of the image from within the camera using the voluminous menu of setting which can be customized to each particular shot or to create an overall visual style. Once adjusted the settings can be stored either within the camera or on a removable chip so the camera can be recalibrated (or any camera for that matter) to the exact setting needed for a scene or overall "look" to a film. Having this control on set gives unprecedented flexibility with the image and when coupled with the enormous additional control in post color correction, image manipulation becomes almost limitless.

As a DP working in features this opens enormous possibilities. In the past, shooting on film we had filtration, lighting and 50 points of red, green, and blue with which we could create a visual style. Contrast this with a combination of conventional filtration and lighting and internal camera adjustments which create a visual style. post color correction on, for example, DaVinci (not to mention effects on the myriad tools available) and then....in the final film stage for theatrical release we still maintain the red, green, blue step for even more control. The cinematographer’s palette has expanded.

Of course there are a few small drawbacks with the system but these can be very easily overcome to acheive the desired results. Depth of Field has been a perennial problem with video. Due to the size of the chip the depth of field is enormous and makes use of shallow field selective focus very difficult to acheive. In my testing I discovered that with careful lighting and lens choice the illusion of shallow depth of field can be acheived and works quite well in delivering the softening of foreground and background we expect as part of our storytelling language.

Uncontrollable bright highlights also present something of a problem. For example, an explosion. Here the two options are to go for a deeper stop but as most explosions are combined with off speed photography the easiest solution is to shoot on film. The third issue is slow or fast motion and again this requires the use of a film camera. The HD Cam image can be slowed in post to about the equivalent of 48fps but it does not look quite the same as on film and obviously, more control is needed.

The question here is the inconvenience of going back to film for certain shots. It really is not too much of an issue as generally high speed cameras are brought in for these types of shots anyway and the only slight inconvenience would be transferring the footage back to Hi Def. Naturally the question arises in the long fought debate of what looks better: tape or film? To me this is not the issue. A cinematographer should be capable of making compelling images which tell a story and engross an audience, regardless of the recording medium. A lot of the debate over respective looks is, for me, a smoke screen thrown up to hide an unwillingness to venture into new territory.

Sure they look different but by the same token a reversal looks different to a negative, a high speed stock looks different to a slower stock, Fuji looks different to Kodak. In the hands of a creative photographer, however, great images are still made, great stories still told and the idiosyncrasies of each medium are disguised under the skillful hand of the artist. Obviously both film and tape yield slightly different types of images but a skilled cinematographer should be capable of making the two match. This is indeed possible and the results of HD transferred back to film for theatrical projection yields results which are indistinguishable from material originated on film.

The new 24p camera is another leap forward, especially in the area of acquisition for theatrical release. With Panavision developing an entire system around the unit, including purpose built lenses, it will only be a matter of time before the cameras start to make inroads and cinematographers will begin to see the enormous advantages of their use.

The emergence of this new generation of HD equipment opens the door to a new era of creative image making led by a young generation of image makers who have been raised on a largely visual vocabulary. We are about to see the dawn of an era of image making that will challenge our preconceptions and result in the emergence of creative image making that before now was unimaginable.

Rob Draper, ACS, is an Australian Director of Photography who lives in Camden, Maine. He has been based in the US for the past 18 years. Over the years, he has amassed an impressive body of work including hundreds of documentaries and commercials in more than 40 countries. His most recent feature THE SPITFIRE GRILL gained international acclaim after its runaway success at Sundance and his latest telefeature THE THREE STOOGES, on which he worked for fellow Aussie Mel Gibson, was one of the highest rated TV Movies ever aired on ABC.

Rob will be shooting a comprehensive test on the 24p camera in Hollywood in June, taking the footage all the way through to a film anamorphic theatrical release print.