"Lowfi
Noire"
23
November 2009
Experiments
in digital film grain: capturing, creating and compression.
The
video "Lowfi Noire" is a brief study looking at photo
ISO digital film grain, consumer grade digital video and trying
to maintain that grainy look when converted into streaming web video
(YouTube H264).
The
lighting conditions for the shoot were what you would find in an
average lounge; a few lamps and the cool glow of the television.
The
first segment was shot on a Canon IXUS 75 using continuous-shot
mode (ISO 1600). In this mode I was shooting at about 1 frame per
second. The images sequence would later be retimed in Premiere.
The ISO 1600 shots were the baseline for grain in the tests.
The
second segment was shot using the IXUS's movie mode with some extra
grain added in post.
Near
the end of the video there is a brief Maya animation rendered in
mental ray. All grain was added in post along with image post processing
to better match the style of the IXUS.
After
various tests the final sequence was compressed to AVI with the
Cinepak Codec by Radius (using the "Compress to Black &
White" option) and then converted to H264 at 5000kb/s.
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