A few framestills for ya.
 

After I made a new custom kmdigital logo buttonup, I decided to use my XL-1s to capture it to show my friends. As always, I took this opportunity and freetime to experiment with "dv to cinema emulation" (I don't care if it looks like it was shot in film.. but rather that the quality is more cinematic than "video")

http://www.kmdstudios.com/custombutton.jpg

After effects was used to create this turn out. I imported the clip, and adjusted the levels. Then, I duplicated the clip layer, and set the blending mode to Soft Light, and applied a 4.0 guassian blur to the soft lit layer. Merged the comp, and then adjusted the levels again, usually I pull the left arrow to the right a bit.. the middle arrow a lil more to the right.. and leave the right arrow all the way towards the right. Added a bit of noise, and masked in some shallow Depth of Field effects. The final effect proved very satisfying when I exported and viewed on TV screen.

I am very impressed. That looks damn! good. Any tips on getting the same look in premiere?

I'm with Charles, Kevin. Really nice effect. I can't wait to see other works and your web site. When's the launch date?

Hey Kevin,

Did you also do the vignetting? if so... how did you achieve that.

Zac

<<<-- Originally posted by Charles King : I am very impressed. That looks damn! good. Any tips on getting the same look in premiere? -->>>

In premiere, I like to adjust the levels, then adjust contrast and brightness. Same usual levels adjustments, and then I put the contrast up 4 and brightness down 4, or around there depending on the shot.

<<<-- Originally posted by John Locke : I'm with Charles, Kevin. Really nice effect. I can't wait to see other works and your web site. When's the launch date? -->>>

I've been designing my studio's website just recently, and have to organize the content before the business site will launch. I've been working on my personal website for a while now, it's no where near done but I have the general design up for now. http://escape.kmdstudios.com/v2

Zac, by vignetting I assume you mean the black border to the frames? For purpose of saving people clicks, I put the images together neatly in Photoshop CS. If you meant vignetting by the black shadows around the image border, it was caused by the lighting and shutter speeds and iris. A bit of a personal touch usually. You could do it by softly masking it in After Effects as well, though.

Really good looking stills (grabs). Top notch.

Nice look!!

Looks like the xenon bulb is severly out of focus resulting in the "hot spot" and dark corners. Definitely being shown on poor projection equipment at a poor theater. :)

Also in premiere, it may be a good additional touch if you adjust the hue/saturation to a desired tint. For instance, if you want it to have a similar "look" to The Matrix, then you would put the red up a small bit, green up a bit more, and blue down just a bit.

You could give it a ery slight sepia tone, too. Just fool around a bit, but I find After Effects works best.

That's for the grweat tips