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HD production is a new world for most cinematographers who shoot film. HD is not a point-and-shoot camera system for those looking to approximate the production value of film. HD is not only new, it requires some critical thinking on the part of DP's that they may not have drawn on for a while.

Shooting on film is a wonderfully creative environment and will be for many years. Those who use film quickly move from dealing with the big issues of its technologies to the exploitation of its subtleties. HD production, meanwhile, needs care in its large-issue technologies, which can overwhelm its subtleties.

The move to HD acquisition is, as with most digital technologies, inevitable. We have learned that the move to new video formats is never bottom-up. Few producers using one format are ever motivated to move to higher levels of picture quality if it will cost more money. For a producer, the best decision is to spend less for something just as good. Digital cinematography and projection are seen as solutions to that cost equation.

Cinematographers see compromises as part of an inverse-quality equation. The reality is not just that film is so good, but that film has been so good for so long.

Another issue that is grandfathered into the HD quality equation is that electronic finish has come to dominate the release of most material shot on film. The hardest part of shooting film has always been getting it right by the time it gets to the screen. Electronic finish has made shooting film more predictable--unless, of course, the DP loses control. HD, meanwhile, is electronic all the way through to finish.

A third reality is that film is expensive. I accept the reality that people want to move to HD to save money. Our company goal is to manage the transitions from "if" to "when," and from "how?" to "how best?"

I started in the motion-picture business in the early 1970's, shooting 16mm shorts, industirials, and religious films. There was no color negative for 16mm; we had to shoot reversal--positive film, motion picture slide film. ECO was ASA 25 at 5600K and EF was rated under ASA 125. We were constantly experimenting with flashing the film to get the contrast manageable on the release prints.

The release prints for those productions were only done on film. The camera original was gorgeous when directly projected, but the management of highlights contrast and grain was a substantial burden that was worried over by everyone in the process. Timing was an arduous affair. We fretted over every piece of hot sky in exteriors and every practical light was another three minutes of work on the set.

When we went to color negative, it was a whole new world. The stock was forgiving in the highlights and by opening up the iris we could pull more detail out of the shadows. It was faster, too.

I can remember producers saying that color negative was so good that you didn't need any lights. Cinematographers were drunk with the notion that you could safely shoot over a wider range of f-stops. I remember being on overseas locations far from any lab, with no dailies, when we would all guess the exposure as if it were some daring feat. We thought that some day we would be able to throw away our light meters.

That, of course, never happened. After a period of acclimation and evaluation, the real cinematographers started learning that there were new frontiers to conquer. Light meters went from measuring the key light to measuring the fill, from measuring the sunlight to probing the shadows. Rich blacks became the Holy Grail, and detail in the shadows was desired. More lights and grip equipment were used, with greater control.

Another broad secular change happened over the past 20 years. Telecine and electronic post production made the process of picture making even more flexible. Today, The Gamma and Density Company, makers of calibration charts for film, estimates that over 80 percent of all cinematographers shooting film never finish on film.

The tools of manipulating film in the electronic world are now so powerful that it's a forgone conclusion that eventually all post production for films will be digital, like the processes used for television production. The digital intermediate is a focus of the Eastman Kodak Company as they evolve the technology of filmmaking.

The territory of electronic finish in the bigger-budget feature world is still clearly marked as the cinematographer's domain. In digital cinematography that cultural value is not universal.

One of the strengths of HD production is HD post production. It is a cost-benefit and can be a great quality benefit. Digital HD color corrects like negative in the post production domain. For the cinematographer, the issues of HD post production are an extension of the issues that are already faced in standard definition video.

Some of the issues of the past, like video noise and peak white levels, have become almost non-issues. Finally, the aesthetic imperative of the content is getting an engineering mentality out of picture making. People like Fritz Roland, a DP in the colorist chair at Roland House, are pushing the envelope of on-line color correction. Electronic post can actually make the content more powerful when in the right hands. Answers need to be found for defining those hands.

Arguments for set-up of electronic cameras to emulate film stocks have been floating for years, but the plain fact is that a good colorist can completely re-create the look of an electronic image. It is time to deal with the sloppiness of relationships and responsibilities in electronic post as high-quality dramatic content migrates to HD. The fact that both Plus8Video and Panavision advocate the use of a neutral look in the recording of HD images on the set means that someone needs to take the baton on behalf of the DP and run through the electronic post production process. As digital projection matures, another entity will need to extend the reach of the DP to the screen. Regarding the cost issue, there are a few facts that need to be recognized when considering HD for digital cinema.

One of the factors driving cost control and HD is what I define as "cablization." Cablization is the trend of media to distribute content to smaller and smaller markets, requiring smaller and smaller budgets. We have seen it done in cable TV, and now digital features are cablizing feature films. HD is one way to produce films with high production value on less money and less risk. But it is not a slam dunk.

HD is not always less expensive. There are the usual tradeoffs between film and HD that are affected by shooting ratios, number of consecutive days of shooting, temporal manipulation requirements, etc. Nonetheless, shooting HD can be very cost-effective when done on the right kind of production.

If HD is cost-effective for a production, it will not fulfill the promise of saving money or of looking good if everyone in the process does not take care. Shopping each vendor for the lowest price and the biggest promise is a sure way to spend more money shooting HD than film.

Producers need to do due diligence. They need a team of vendors that are in agreement with the production processes necessary. We have discussed color correction issues already. Time code issues are compounded when off-line editing is done in NTSC. Sound can be out of sync if the processors used are not tested. This is especially true now that there are eight frame rates available in HDCAM.

The great promise of 24P HD is that there would be one master tape for many releases. This sounds like a noble goal, but anyone who has done distribution knows that the same version of a show is almost never acceptable to two licensees. There will be re-cuts and remixes. Small thoughtless errors should not make a technology of simplification a scheme of torture.

Today in HD production we have been going through some of the same rough spots as we did when we transferred technologies within film. The changes will not go away, and, like all of modern life, they will find resolution faster than humans are comfortable. These changes will not allow cinematographers and producers to operate on autopilot. They require good critical thinking skills and a tolerance for the testing process. They will require the will to do the right thing.

When customers ask me why the tool sets of video have not historically been very film friendly, my answer is that not enough true storytellers embraced the medium to bring the culture of film to electronic cinematography. Our crusade is to preserve the culture of film while making a migration to HD. That can only happen as filmmakers participate in the process of change.

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Studentfilmmakers.com Cinematography's Digital Revolution Workshop with Roy Wagner, ASC will be held at Plus8digital Annex 111 W. Verdugo Blvd., Burbank

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