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The contagious visual blandness of Netflix

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Re: The contagious visual blandness of Netflix

#461

Post by matt-attack »

mort96 wrote: post #108
matt-attack wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you're saying is equivalent to: "Impressionism is objectively worse than realism. Look at a Van Gogh painting, there's hardly any detail. It looks coarse, and grainy and the brush strokes are so wide I can hard tell what's what. Starry Starry Night would be objectively such a better painting if he had just reach for a finer brush and included more detail. Adding more detail would have made it far more realistic,…

I have no problems with non-realistic art forms. I think 12 FPS hand animation can look amazing, and the 12 FPS is part of the artistic expression. You're right, realism is absolutely not always the goal, and being unrealistic is sometimes the point . But for the kind of movie that's supposed to take place in a world very much like ours? The kind where it's just a camera filming actors in a street or whatever, and th…

> The kind where it's just a camera filming actors in a street or whatever,

Hopefully this image search [1] answers your question. The photographs in each of these was "simply taking a photo of a street, a common real-life thing". Yet, when you look at them, almost every single one of them is highly stylized. Whether it's simply by being B&W (yes that's not reality), having pronounced bokeh, strong silhouetting, or even vignetting, etc. They're all absolutely not what I'd call realism.

Realism is just boring. And artists don't find much appeal in producing it.

[1] https://duckduckgo.com/?q=street+photography&t=osx&iar=image...

Re: The contagious visual blandness of Netflix

#462

Post by matt-attack »

Godel_unicode wrote: post #210
matt-attack wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you're saying is equivalent to: "Impressionism is objectively worse than realism. Look at a Van Gogh painting, there's hardly any detail. It looks coarse, and grainy and the brush strokes are so wide I can hard tell what's what. Starry Starry Night would be objectively such a better painting if he had just reach for a finer brush and included more detail. Adding more detail would have made it far more realistic,…

It’s hard to argue that it’s an intentional artistic choice if the overwhelming majority of compositions use it. It would be like saying a Monet being viewed through oxygen/nitrogen atmosphere is an artistic choice.

I never said intentional. Up until the last decade, filmmakers had little choice but to distribute films in 24fps. I'm ignoring the few titles where they did indeed experiment with higher ones, like Oklahoma at 30fps and Brainstorm.

Re: The contagious visual blandness of Netflix

#463

Post by dylan604 »

dekhn wrote: post #450
dylan604 wrote: post #391

Earlier quoted context omitted.

probably? are we just making stuff up now just to prove a point?

I mean, I work with optics, and I know the history of making good glass, so.... no?

the fastest commercially available glass is 0.75-1.0. that means the 0.7 from the glass Kubrik used is still the fastest. i seriously doubt that even someone the likes of Kubrik would have the clout to approach the NRO and ask for whatever the best they have is to shoot a feature film. so your non-classified caveat is kind of pointless.

Re: The contagious visual blandness of Netflix

#464

Post by hef19898 »

shagie wrote: post #459
hef19898 wrote: post #439

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems like need to use my 50 f1.8 more often!

A 50mm f/1.8 (or f/1.4 if you have a bit more money) is a beautiful lens to work with. On a full 35mm frame, it provides a normal field of view which approximately matches the field you see (kind of, we've got two eyes and so more of a panoramic view, but unless you're pulling out an xpan ( https://www.hasselblad.com/about/history/xpan/ ) it isn't something that you can capture - still catches the part that you see l…

For everyday use I have a 24-120, the first VR model, ultra sharp on a D700 so I got lucky even if the VR doesn't work anymore. Lately I found myself using a manual focus 300mm often... The 50mm was mostly used for low light, now I need to experiment with shallow focus depth a bit more. I'm missing something on the short end, either a 20mm prime or a 16-35 (or something similar). A 85 f1.8 sounds tempting so, as does a 80-300 f2.8, or a... A gear aqusition syndrom is bad desease...

Re: The contagious visual blandness of Netflix

#465

Post by shagie »

hef19898 wrote: post #464
shagie wrote: post #459

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A 50mm f/1.8 (or f/1.4 if you have a bit more money) is a beautiful lens to work with. On a full 35mm frame, it provides a normal field of view which approximately matches the field you see (kind of, we've got two eyes and so more of a panoramic view, but unless you're pulling out an xpan ( https://www.hasselblad.com/about/history/xpan/ ) it isn't something that you can capture - still catches the part that you see l…

For everyday use I have a 24-120, the first VR model, ultra sharp on a D700 so I got lucky even if the VR doesn't work anymore. Lately I found myself using a manual focus 300mm often ... The 50mm was mostly used for low light, now I need to experiment with shallow focus depth a bit more. I'm missing something on the short end, either a 20mm prime or a 16-35 (or something similar). A 85 f1.8 sounds tempting so, as doe…

> A gear aqusition syndrom is bad desease...

For my Nikon 35mm cameras... I have a 16mm f/2.8 fisheye; 17-35mm f/2.8 zoom; 35mm f/2.0; 50mm f/1.4; 85mm f/1.8; 105mm f/2.8 micro; 135mm f/2 DC; 70-200 f/2.8; 80-400 f/4-5.6 VR; 200-500mm f/5.6

The 80-400 is very nice and I used it for a long time but when I got the 70-200 (I have, though it is in the car bag rather than hiking bag) the 80-400 just doesn't have as much of a place.

The 16mm I'm not even sure where it is now - it was too easy to make mistakes with it ( https://www.deviantart.com/shagie/art/Fisheye-Oops-2767240 ) - the 180° field of view means that straight down is straight down - lean out and do funky tripod setups to avoid having what is straight down show up in the frame.

And yea... Nikon... I've also got a Maymia 645e with 3 lenses, Hasselblad XPan with 2 lenses (I just couldn't justify the price tag on the 30mm f/5.6), and two Horseman 4x5 (one field, one rail) and I typically have the Nikkor 210mm f/5.6 on it though I've got a shorter lens too - just that one doesn't have the image circle allowing for useful movements... I think it's a Schneider 135mm f/5.6, but I'd have to check. The common design for a 135mm has a 200mm image circle while the Nikkor 210mm has a 295mm image circle - and that's a big difference.

---

Another thing to do with the shallow depth of field is to get some extension tubes. I've seen photographers use the thinnest extension tube for some shots so that it reduces dof (it gets into macro equations), but not too much that they loose too much distance focus. And since there's no glass in there you're not degrading image quality with another refraction (compare teleconverters).

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/375238-REG/Kenko_AEXT...

https://www.diyvideostudio.com/do-extension-tubes-cause-shal...

Re: The contagious visual blandness of Netflix

#466

Post by hef19898 »

shagie wrote: post #465
hef19898 wrote: post #464

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For everyday use I have a 24-120, the first VR model, ultra sharp on a D700 so I got lucky even if the VR doesn't work anymore. Lately I found myself using a manual focus 300mm often ... The 50mm was mostly used for low light, now I need to experiment with shallow focus depth a bit more. I'm missing something on the short end, either a 20mm prime or a 16-35 (or something similar). A 85 f1.8 sounds tempting so, as doe…

> A gear aqusition syndrom is bad desease... For my Nikon 35mm cameras... I have a 16mm f/2.8 fisheye; 17-35mm f/2.8 zoom; 35mm f/2.0; 50mm f/1.4; 85mm f/1.8; 105mm f/2.8 micro; 135mm f/2 DC; 70-200 f/2.8; 80-400 f/4-5.6 VR; 200-500mm f/5.6 The 80-400 is very nice and I used it for a long time but when I got the 70-200 (I have, though it is in the car bag rather than hiking bag) the 80-400 just doesn't have as much o…

This is some nice equipment! I'm kind of envious, especially if you find time to shoot all of that somewhat regularly.

I was that close to pull the trigger on a great condition 80-200 f2.8 Af-D, but then I realized that the, again manual focus, 80-200 f4.5 just sits in a shelf... But heck, is that old thing sharp, I'd say on par with the 50mm.

Regarding teleconverters, the old 300mm works incredible with the equally old 2x TC, the 1.6 AF TC had worse image quality. And telling the camera that it is a 600mm f7.1 lense gets exposure just right, shooting handheld at ISO 200-400 for stills and 800 for birds and such gets quite some keepers. It does lack the flexibility of zoom, I love this 300 regardless. It is such a master piece of precision mechanics and optics, without any electronics, that I don't even miss AF. Well, most of the time that is...

I like the fish-eye shot with the shoes in it! Just thinking of that problem with a camera where the VF only shows 95% of the image...

Are those Kenko rings any good? I'm asking for a friend with occasional bouts of GAS...

Re: The contagious visual blandness of Netflix

#467

Post by jfengel »

whstl wrote: post #431
pbronez wrote: post #417

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ugh the Lost thing was so infuriating.

The Lost finale was definitely disappointing, but at some point it was expected. At some point it became clear that the mystery was just a huge MacGuffin, and the writers had painted themselves into a corner. I think that taught newer generations of Showrunners to not make the same mistake. Modern shows like Breaking Bad and Dark managed to finish right on time with perfect endings. (GoT however...)

New generations, maybe. JJ Abrams himself still seems to love a mystery box, to the detriment of more than one major franchise.

Re: The contagious visual blandness of Netflix

#468

Post by antifa »

whstl wrote: post #431
pbronez wrote: post #417

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ugh the Lost thing was so infuriating.

The Lost finale was definitely disappointing, but at some point it was expected. At some point it became clear that the mystery was just a huge MacGuffin, and the writers had painted themselves into a corner. I think that taught newer generations of Showrunners to not make the same mistake. Modern shows like Breaking Bad and Dark managed to finish right on time with perfect endings. (GoT however...)

> I think that taught newer generations of Showrunners to not make the same mistake

I'm worried the opposite lesson is being learned here. Most shows "build up" then not worry if it's actually going somewhere or even can have a good ending.

Nowadays the exit strategy is first and doremost a cancelation or the next writer's problem.

Re: The contagious visual blandness of Netflix

#469

Post by shagie »

hef19898 wrote: post #466
shagie wrote: post #465

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A gear aqusition syndrom is bad desease... For my Nikon 35mm cameras... I have a 16mm f/2.8 fisheye; 17-35mm f/2.8 zoom; 35mm f/2.0; 50mm f/1.4; 85mm f/1.8; 105mm f/2.8 micro; 135mm f/2 DC; 70-200 f/2.8; 80-400 f/4-5.6 VR; 200-500mm f/5.6 The 80-400 is very nice and I used it for a long time but when I got the 70-200 (I have, though it is in the car bag rather than hiking bag) the 80-400 just doesn't have as much o…

This is some nice equipment! I'm kind of envious, especially if you find time to shoot all of that somewhat regularly. I was that close to pull the trigger on a great condition 80-200 f2.8 Af-D, but then I realized that the, again manual focus, 80-200 f4.5 just sits in a shelf... But heck, is that old thing sharp, I'd say on par with the 50mm. Regarding teleconverters, the old 300mm works incredible with the equally…

It's been a while. My last dedicated time was 2017 (the eclipse). When I lived in California, I went to Lee Vining for two weeks in October every year.

http://shagie.deviantart.com

https://shagie.smugmug.com

And then there was '09 after I was laid off and just drove around for a few months.

Outside of that... I really haven't had the time in the past several years to take a dedicated chunk off and just go. Maybe this year.

The Kenko rings work fine for AF lenses (G lenses have some difficulty). Two of my photos from long ago shot with 'em:

https://www.deviantart.com/shagie/art/Daisy-s-Closeup-511810...

https://www.deviantart.com/shagie/art/Macro-Rose-5117983

Re: The contagious visual blandness of Netflix

#470

Post by [deleted] »

kyleyeats wrote: post #411
Godel_unicode wrote: post #352

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t understand the reasoning here, are you saying that GoT was a tech demo? To me it made sense that as the show got further along and the situation grew more dire that it would be visibly darker as a metaphor.

Sure, it's a tech demo. If you set the brightness on the demo to 7 early on and say "This is dark," you can then turn it down to 5 later and that will seem even darker. The idea is to start at 7, not at 5, because when you have to turn it down to 3 you can't see anything. The Craster's fight and the wall fight were both at night and looked great. But maybe they should have been a bit brighter so there was more room f…

[deleted]
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