Originally Posted by PimpDaShizzle
Holden Pike, gave me the idea for this thread. Being as it is with Collateral, Once Upon a Time in Mexico, 28 Days Later..., where do you think the digital technology is going to take us?
Already it's given us the ability to set up a shot in half the time. Documentaries can now keep the camera rolling longer due to the tape being far cheaper and longer. Editing is a snap. There's no generation loss (transffering film back and forth causes a loss of data/quality). Production companies are going to be more willing to fund a project due to the cost. The equipment's smaller, in most cases, making for new styles and shots, and the equipment usually cost less, making the DP more comfortable with the idea of shooting a scene that might be dangerous for the camera.
I don't know that there will be a dramatic revolution that will unfold with pomp and circumstance, but it does give filmmakers another tool. Like any other tool, it can be used well and it can be used poorly. Because of the cost issue, you'll see it to continue most in the independent field at first, where small movies can be made quickly and now that much more cheaply. In the last couple years we've seen projects like
Tadpole,
The Anniversary Party and
Pieces of April made that much more viable because of DV. And at the same time we'll continue to see established filmmakers, who could work with filmstock if they wanted, make the choice for DV anyway depending on the size and type of project (Soderbergh with
Full Frontal, Spike Lee with
Bamboozled, Altman with
The Company).
And of course not just American filmmmakers are making use of this tool, but all over the world. The Canadian Inuktuit production
Atanarjuat is a beautiful movie in any format, and Lars von Trier is really setting the bar high with
Dogville and
Dancer in the Dark.
The most inventive use of DV yet is from overseas: Aleksander Sokurov's
Russian Ark, brilliantly designed and expertly achieved as one single 96-minute uninterrupted take, something that is simply impossible with standard film (Hitchcock must be somewhere weeping with envy).
DV has already been used in genres that rely on effects and supposedly more complex shots, from
Collateral and
Once Upon A Time in Mexico to
28 Days Later... and
Open Water to the
Spy Kids flicks and the upcoming
Sin City. Hell, Georgie Lucas used DV for
Star Wars Epiosde II: Attack of the Clones.
There's really no limit to what might be done. More and more filmmakers will give it a whirl, with all levels of result. But the casual filmgoer won't notice much of a difference either way, and filmstock certainly isn't going anywhere for quite a while. DV is another option out there right now, but the rate of advances made using it will be the same as any other format, always ultimately dependent on good filmmakers making good movies, and not reliant on anything as rudimentary as the tools at their disposal. A great director armed with a talented crew and a good script can make art using anything and everything they have, be it DV or anything else.