Digital doesn't have to look this bad

0:00 You're probably familiar with the Netflix look.

0:02 This is that flat gray washed out look that you

0:04 see on most of their TV shows and movies.

0:07 Like I noticed it on Amazon Prime and Disney Plus.

0:09 You could boil it down to digital and film and how

0:12 film has this very tactile gritty look and digital is flat.

0:16 But I could argue that with a good colorist and cinematographer,

0:20 digital can look really good.

0:21 Like these are some of the last short

0:23 films that I've shot with professional studio level colorists.

0:26 Other ones working just with the DP was

0:28 able to create and just with more independent colorists.

0:31 And I'm so proud of the image of all of those.

0:33 So I really don't think like the argument from like digital to film

0:37 really says a lot in this because digital can look quite good.

0:43 I'm going through all this footage and it's really bothering me cuz I'm like,

0:46 is it just a color grade thing?

0:48 Are they just exporting it a little too flat?

0:52 Like if you just boosted the contrast up and like,

0:55 I don't know, give it just a tad bit more color.

0:58 Like that kind of makes it look a lot better.

1:02 But then I started doing it with the Harry Potter trailer.

1:04 This is what really stood out to me.

1:06 I'll paste it on there and like already like

1:08 just cranking the contrast and like this looks tremendously better.

1:14 And that's just like contrast and a bit of color.

1:18 But that's not the whole picture.

1:20 And there's a reason why studios are probably doing this.

1:23 Then there's the other argument of the studios

1:25 being able to have control over the post-production,

1:28 which my buddy Patrick to Massa does a really good video on this.

1:31 So I won't dive too far into it.

1:32 But basically the theory is that these studios want to be able

1:35 to have control over their image

1:37 in post-production so they can add visual effects, they can add shadow.

1:40 And with software as robust as it is now,

1:42 it's really easy to add dimension, depth, halation, haze, shadow.

1:47 You could do a lot in post-production and more than ever before.

1:50 So DPs are probably more inclined now to shoot just with a little

1:53 bit more definition so you can bring that back in the image.

1:57 And also camera manufacturers have just really

1:59 gone down the rabbit hole of making cameras

2:01 that could just shoot so much definition

2:04 that in post-production you could just bring back everything.

2:07 And then you're not feeling like that creativity that you felt on set.

2:11 I always think limitations are way better than having infinite [music] canvas.

2:14 And I think the direction we're going with camera technology is too limitless.

2:19 Now the third argument and the one I think is probably the most

2:21 plausible in all of this is that these streamers from Netflix to Amazon

2:25 Prime are trying to create content for an array of different screens

2:29 from flat-screen television in someone's bedroom

2:32 to their laptop to a cell phone.

2:34 A bunch of different screen qualities

2:36 with different settings that they're trying

2:38 to kind of make the one-size-fits-all look that works for all of these.

2:42 Which is crazy because we've all watched like

2:43 a movie by Roger Deakins that works perfectly fine

2:46 on these streamers and no one's complaining about what

2:49 they look like if they're too dark or whatever.

2:51 It's also no mystery that platforms like Netflix are using a model

2:54 that's similar to what Tik Tok does to keep people's attention span.

2:58 If you have someone's face that's well lit and you can

3:00 keep your eye directed at that person's face to maximize screen time,

3:04 they are going to try every technique within the book

3:07 to keep people engaged and entertained

3:08 rather than being artistically influenced.

3:12 So while I think all of those things are true,

3:14 for me as an independent filmmaker, there is a problem that I'm still facing.

3:18 There's zero studio interference.

3:20 So I'll go out into a location that I'm really excited to go and shoot in.

3:24 I've got my cast and crew, we're ready to go.

3:26 I've got a great team of people.

3:27 And then we go into the space and for some reason,

3:30 it doesn't matter or how much lighting,

3:32 the most talented cinematographer ever you're working

3:35 with, you just can't get the shot.

3:36 It just doesn't look good and you're doing all the things.

3:39 Why?

3:40 And I finally realized it.

3:41 I figured out what it is.

3:43 It has nothing to do with streamers, attention spans, digital or film.

3:47 It actually has to do with the era we live in.

3:51 To figure out if this point actually worked,

3:52 I looked at two shots from two different movies.

3:55 One is this movie called Good Fortune with Keanu Reeves and Seth Rogen.

3:58 And then this other one is this 1970s indie that stars Jack Nicholson.

4:02 Both are like kind of diner restaurant scenes.

4:04 One's daytime, one's nighttime, so give credit to both of those.

4:07 There's something missing in the modern shot versus the old shot.

4:10 And we can look at this through different examples.

4:13 And I don't think this really has to do with color grade, digital, film.

4:17 And as a camera nerd, I don't want to hear this, but this is exactly the problem

4:20 that we live in, which has to do with tactility and status.

4:23 Both these shots look so beautiful,

4:25 but the difference between the two is stark because of the tactility

4:29 of one and the sort of flatness of the other.

4:32 Look at the materials that they're wearing.

4:33 You've got vibrant colors across the shot.

4:36 And not only just with what people are wearing,

4:38 but look at the actual seats that people are sitting in, the floor, the ceiling.

4:43 Everything has color and vibrancy.

4:45 Versus you compare that to a diner scene from a show now, it's gray and flat.

4:50 You don't actually have any color separation other

4:53 than what the DP's trying to pull out.

4:56 You could say this maybe lands on the production designer,

4:58 but production designers are only so good

5:00 as what spaces they're able to work in.

5:03 Now sometimes they can build spaces that look quite nice,

5:05 but other times if you're shooting on location,

5:07 you're kind of getting what you can.

5:09 To show you all I'll show you like a location scouting website.

5:12 Here in Canada, we have this thing called Set Scouter

5:15 and it's a like Airbnb for finding locations for movies.

5:18 And if you look at the locations available, there's a commonality between them.

5:22 A lot of them are gray, flat, metallicy with zero texture.

5:27 It's all just kind of the same wash of things.

5:31 And this is what I recognized when we were

5:32 shooting our new our most recent short film Destination,

5:36 which was we were shooting in some of the most

5:38 beautiful homes and spaces way beyond whatever I could afford.

5:42 And they looked good and felt good to stand

5:44 in as like a human looking for like a really nice space.

5:47 But when the camera actually found the frames,

5:49 it was really hard to make them look good because there was no color separation.

5:54 We were really trying to seek out like things

5:56 that had texture at least to make the characters pop.

5:59 But a lot of the stuff was very neutral toned, it was gray.

6:02 And then you partner that with actually how scenes how homes are lit now,

6:07 which is not candles or Edison bulb light bulbs.

6:11 It's all LED white pot lights that just don't look good.

6:16 And yes, your DP could just light it not with that kind of lighting,

6:20 but when you're trying to seek out practical

6:22 lighting within a space to make it believable,

6:25 it's really difficult to take something that is already in the space and pretend

6:30 that it doesn't exist and rather production

6:33 design things like lamps inside the space.

6:35 This is like a technique you can use, but it's not always the most applicable.

6:39 Back in the day, if there was a chandelier in the shot, the DP would like,

6:42 let's use that as our source light and make the scene work around that.

6:46 Now we have pot lights and LEDs.

6:48 There was a cool thing I saw about the movie Drive,

6:50 which is it was the last movie that was

6:52 shot in LA that used the sodium vapor lights, like the yellow looking lights.

6:57 That's why it has such a look.

6:58 You compare movie Drive to a movie like Crime 101,

7:02 which I think is beautifully shot.

7:04 They both have a different look.

7:06 There's something different between the yellow

7:08 and orange tone to now this digital cleanness.

7:14 And it doesn't always have to do with cameras and film and studio interference.

7:18 It has to do with the era we live in.

7:20 I saw this really cool diagram of the color spectrums that we used to live in.

7:24 I think it was like from the 1800s onwards into now the 2000s.

7:29 And if you look at it,

7:30 it's actually really depressing the direction it goes into.

7:33 So it starts like very vibrant like a rainbow and then

7:36 eventually it just funnels down into being like gray, flat, muddy tones.

7:43 And that influences how we think and feel.

7:46 Even cities like don't allow you to paint your color your house

7:50 a certain color so that it sticks within a certain tone.

7:53 And this doesn't just influence the setting of where we shoot our movies,

7:57 it influences how we artistically represent ourselves in our work.

8:01 If we're just exposed to gray and flat,

8:04 I think that trickles down into the work that we're creating.

8:07 Even movies that should be vibrant and have

8:09 a ton of color and contrast still come out flat.

8:13 And going back to movies that were shot in the 70s,

8:15 there was so much texture and detail not

8:17 only within the people's faces and the setting, but also within the materials.

8:22 You get to work with a crew, you get to collaborate with production designers.

8:26 And they're the like secret sauce to making shots look beautiful.

8:30 If you're working on a budget and you're setting your film in this era,

8:34 you're limiting yourself to the materials that we have,

8:36 which is a lot of plastics, synthetic materials,

8:39 and stuff that just doesn't look good on camera.

8:42 The stuff that read well in the golden age of cinema

8:44 was stuff that actually had a certain like material to it.

8:49 It's like wood grain and cotton.

8:51 It was natural materials.

8:53 So while I do think the conspiracy

8:54 of Netflix trying to build attention hooking content using

8:58 all the tricks in the book to keep you engaged the same way Tik Tok is true,

9:03 I also think we live in a very uninspiring era.

9:07 And for me as a filmmaker, I never want to set movies that are based

9:10 in 2026 because nothing really looks as good as let's

9:13 say something that was based in the 1700s where

9:16 wallpaper filled the wall or there's wood grain texture.

9:19 Light was motivated from candles and lamps.

9:23 This era just sort of feels too optimized and synthetic and less tactile.

9:28 When I was talking about movies being set in different eras,

9:30 I looked at Steven Spielberg as a good example piece.

9:32 He's someone who has shot movies in [music] the past,

9:35 also shooting movies set in the future and current time.

9:39 And what I recognize with his stuff is he's still using

9:42 things with tactility even though based in eras that are less tactile.

9:47 For example, the new trailer for Disclosure Disclosure Day is set,

9:52 I believe, in 2026 least now-ish.

9:55 And if you look at the locations they're shooting in, there's wallpaper,

9:57 there's like metallic metals, things with reflective surfaces.

10:02 Even if it is in someone's modern day home,

10:04 there's kids drawings in the background, there's lamps and dim lighting.

10:09 So, even if it's in sort of moderate-esque spaces,

10:12 he's wearing them down or adding texture into the space,

10:16 making them feel like they're still set

10:18 in like the '90s even though it's current.

10:20 Like, look at this couch.

10:21 This couch is not from 2026 whatsoever.

10:25 It's definitely like something from probably ET, but yet it works.

10:30 And it's because it looks good and tells more story

10:32 than half the you can buy in IKEA right now.

10:35 Why would they do this?

10:38 So, if you're ever watching a movie and you think, "Oh,

10:40 what's Why does this not feel good?" Or perhaps you're shooting something,

10:43 take a look at what's within the frame and less about what's shooting the frame.

10:48 And yes, it could be studios trying to keep people's attention

10:51 span hooked by making the image just flat so you just like,

10:54 I don't know, are drawn into it more.

10:56 But I would argue that the production

10:58 designer and cinematographer did a good job.

11:00 I think it actually has more to do with the space

11:03 and sort of tones that we're working with in now.

11:06 Now, this is all just from personal experience.

11:08 I want to know what you guys think.

11:09 Let me know in the comment section below.

11:11 I could be just some crazy guy or maybe there's a point.

11:14 But this is all just from personal opinion.

11:16 As you can tell, I have to pee.

11:18 So, I'm going to go.

11:20 I love you guys.

11:20 I'll see you in another video.