Slumdog Millionaire shot using CineForm RAW
 

Many of you may not know that Slumdog Millionaire, which did very well at the Golden Globes (including Best Picture), was mostly shot using the Silicon Imaging SI-2K camera which records natively to 2K CineForm RAW files. The SI-2K was the first RAW camera to record to a compressed format (way ahead of Red), and CineForm has some filed patents in this area. We worked closely with Silicon Imaging beginning in about 2004 on the design of the camera, with CineForm focusing on the internal compression and post workflow.

We have been told that about 2/3 of the screen time in the feature are from shots using the SI-2K. The other shots are mostly from 35mm film which intercut very nicely. The SI-2K is a very small form factor camera. Because of its small size it was able to be used in scenes that a large film camera could not. The recorder for many scenes was a laptop stuck in a backpack while the cinematographer was running through the slums of Mumbai.

Also because of its small size the SI-2K is being used a lot for 3D projects, including My Bloody Valentine (3D) that is slated for release next week.

Congrats. That is amazing advertising for your product!
Any idea if this laptop system was PC or Mac?
-C

Mac Book Pro running XP under BootCamp was used for all the street scenes. Basically the cameraman had a laptop in a backpack doing all the capture/compression. SI-2Ks where also used in studio envirments, I'm not sure they used laptops with 2K-minis or regular full body SI-2KS for that.

Hi,

Danny Boyle/Anthony Dod Mantle really did a stellar job and are well deserving of the praise they are receiving. I'm very humbled to have been part of such a wonderful team both with CineForm, P+S, and PILLE film/Stefan Ciupek in Germany who actually put together the physical "suitecase" systems used on the film.

As far as equipment goes, at that time, the SI-2K "full-body-version" (for lack of a better term . . . it's officially the "SI-2K" and "SI-2K MINI") was not available, so it's completely shot with the SI-2K MINI head. That being said, because the SI-2K is running the exact same software, sensor, and powered by the exact same CineForm RAW compression system, the imaging performance is the same between the two, and it offers a very flexible arrangement for film-making.

Thanks,

Jason