Which tiffen soft/fx do I get?
 

I have a canon gl1. Which tiffen soft/fx do I get to help me get a film look?

Do i get the Tiffen 58mm Soft/FX 3 Glass Filter

or do I get the Tiffen 58mm Warm Soft/FX 3 Glass Filter?

You can achieve the same results in post production. Advantages would be:
-You can undo the filter
-Varying grades/strength
-When you do it in post, the softening/diffusion will smooth over video noise and other artifacts. This doesn't happen when you use a filter in front of the lens. If your subject is well lit, this usually isn't that much of an issue although you might see video noise in dark areas of an image.
-Free

Disadvantages:
-It takes rendering. If you're always doing the effect, it's worth it to get the filter just for the time savings.

To achieve the effect in post:
Duplicate the video onto itself.
Set the opacity of the top to around half.
Add a blur to the top. Gaussian blur will work well, but tends to render slow. Your program may have faster blurs.
Add unsharp mask to the bottom layer if you want to gain back perceived sharpness.

I'm not sure what the warming part of the tiffen filters do... I don't really see any warming in the after pictures. But you can very easily add warm colors in post.

2- Turn off the sharpening in your camera to almost minimum... this will go a long way towards getting rid of the video look.

3- That filter won't really contribute much to the film look in my opinion.

matt,
i used to use the tiffen soft f/x filters but i stopped using them and went ot using post filters to achieve the same look.

FWIW the Soft F/X 3 is alot of softening. If you are going to use one I would suggest a 1 (but then again I am not sure exactly why you are wanting to use one).


matt rickman


p.s. I have also heard the BlackProMist is better for DV than the Soft FX......

I've shot with a Tiffen Black ProMist 1/2, but now that I got the DFT 55mm program I'm going to try and create the same effect in post.

I think what I have learned from this post is that there are alot of Matt's out there!


matt rickman

haha, thank you guys for the help. I guess I will do it in post if I need to.

what software are you using for editing? I am using Final Cut pro and to achieve this effect I use joes filters to achieve soft looks..

http://www.joesfilters.com/


matt rickman

I have adobe premiere pro and im going to purchase after effects/mb

Matt I would *strongly* encourage you to download both the demo of Magic Bullet and the demo for Digital Film Lab by Digital Film Tools. After working with both demo programs and talking to the company I went with DFL and am VERY happy with that choice. More presets, better control (imo) and much faster render times. It does not however do frame rate conversions, if you are not shooting in 24p. But if you are, I think this is definitely the program to get. Also check out there 55mm package, every filter you could ever want and the results are astounding. Also, I called the company when trying to decide what to buy and they spent about 45 minutes on the phone with me going over exactly what I wanted to do and how to do it. Great company.

Matt

are you talking to me?


jk


matt rickman

I have a Gl1 camcorder, should I shoot in Frame Mode Or Normal and deinterlace in post? Which looks better and has better resolution?

Matt: Frame mode has better resolution than de-interlacing in post.

What do I care I have the XL2 and shoot 24p... OOOHHH.... The other Matt, er no, the OTHER one... LOL!

Wow, both modes have their ups and downs. So Magic bullet is the closest program to make it look as good as Frame Mode (resolution/quality wise)? Are there any other softwares that are as good as frame mode? If so, are you guys willing to sell me a copy?

I shot a couple of quick comparisons with the Tiffen Soft FX 3, 4 and Pro Mist 1/2 and Black Pro Mist with the GL2. You can check it out by clicking here

Personally, I always shoot with a Soft FX 3 or at least a Pro Mist 1/4. It's all a matter of preference, but I love the look of graceful blooming highlights and a subtle softer look. While viewing on an NTSC monitor on the set, it's nice to see how the lighting will change the image with these filters, sometimes I intentionally blow out highlights just to have them bloom and look a bit magical.

For film-like fx in post, Graeme's filters over at nattress.com rock too!