Dfx User Guide - Tiffen.com

366 Looks: Black/White & Color
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cameras CCD’s being physically smaller than 35mm film frames. A shallow
depth of field allows the photographer to isolate and direct a viewer's attention
to specific areas of the screen. You can mimic shallow depth of field by doing a
couple of things. First, by using Neutral Density filters that cut down the amount
of light entering the camera lens. This is turn forces you to open up the iris to a
wider aperture or lower f-stop--the wider the aperture, the shallower the depth
of field. Second, use a longer focal length (telephoto) lens to create a shallower
depth of field.
Lenses also play a major factor in the look of your image. Many video and
digital cameras can now accept high quality 35mm lenses. There’s nothing like
that expensive glass.
Filters
Filters, filters, filters. Did I say filters? You either add them while you are
shooting or add them later with Dfx. Filters are one of the most overlooked
items both in production and post-production. Use Color-Grad® filters to
selectively color, ND-Grad (Neutral Density) filters to selectively darken and
Diffusion filters to soften hard edges.
Grain
Another important aspect of achieving the look of film is the replication of
motion picture grain. Even in small amounts, adding film grain to video footage
or digital images will help complete the illusion of a film-like image. Film grain
can also help minimize 8 bit banding artifacts commonly found in video footage.
What you don’t want to do is turn up the gain or ISO setting on your video or
digital camera which really amounts to just a bunch of electronic noise. Film
grain is best added digitally and we provide you with a number of different
popular film stock presets.
Frame Rate and Interlacing
Last but not least, there is the issue of frame rate and field interlacing. Video
runs at a rate of 30 frames per second (fps) and film runs at 24. Each frame of
video, whether it be NTSC or PAL, is made up of two separate subframes called
Dfx User Guide
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