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Digital Black and White
- Thread starter SDBenassi
- Start date
I think any camera will look just as good in black and white as it would color. If it were color what camera would you think is best, or are you not sure.
If you have a budget, maybe renting one of the handful of dedicated BW cameras around is for you.
http://www.ikonoskop.com/a-cam-dii-pancromatic/
http://www.red.com/store/products/epic-x-monochrome-brain-only
Those two off the top of my head.
Otherwise just get the camera that gives you the most information to work with, since you, inevitably be doing the BW look in post from a color camera. RAW is where you should look, if you can afford it. I bet some solid BW could be done if you got your hands on the BMD Cinema.
If you (as DP) or your DP (as director) are particularly familiar with BW photography, and the most you can budget for is in the DSLR world, then do a large amount of look development and don't be afraid to work if filtration. In RAW you don't want to rob the sensor of data, since you can mimic the effect of various contrast filters for BW (yellows, oranges, etc) when applying your look. With a compressed camera you might as well save yourself some headache in post by doing some level of this before the image is compressed by the camera and then later de-saturated in post. Really only go down this road if you (or your DP, dunno what you do) are familiar with the techniques involved, but you can get cleaner results than just relying on post filtration on the compressed data. Whatever the final mixture, the idea is to have a clear idea of what it is going to look like at the end.
Honestly, you should have the look fairly well established before you shoot anyway (tests). That way you have a sense what will be required in production in order to make it work in post - regardless of what camera you end up with.
IMO and all that.
http://www.ikonoskop.com/a-cam-dii-pancromatic/
http://www.red.com/store/products/epic-x-monochrome-brain-only
Those two off the top of my head.
Otherwise just get the camera that gives you the most information to work with, since you, inevitably be doing the BW look in post from a color camera. RAW is where you should look, if you can afford it. I bet some solid BW could be done if you got your hands on the BMD Cinema.
If you (as DP) or your DP (as director) are particularly familiar with BW photography, and the most you can budget for is in the DSLR world, then do a large amount of look development and don't be afraid to work if filtration. In RAW you don't want to rob the sensor of data, since you can mimic the effect of various contrast filters for BW (yellows, oranges, etc) when applying your look. With a compressed camera you might as well save yourself some headache in post by doing some level of this before the image is compressed by the camera and then later de-saturated in post. Really only go down this road if you (or your DP, dunno what you do) are familiar with the techniques involved, but you can get cleaner results than just relying on post filtration on the compressed data. Whatever the final mixture, the idea is to have a clear idea of what it is going to look like at the end.
Honestly, you should have the look fairly well established before you shoot anyway (tests). That way you have a sense what will be required in production in order to make it work in post - regardless of what camera you end up with.
IMO and all that.
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