Thanks, David... now I know at least one person read it.
Unforunately ND filters are going to do virtually bupkus for DoF with your XL2. Well, they may have
some effect, but it would be barely noticible... they certainly won't let you knock out a very soft background or foreground. The tiny 1/3" chips in your XL2 just simply natively give a very
very deep depth of field, even with the iris wide-open. Of course the XL2 has built-in ND filters in the lens, so you can very easily test that.
Just about the only way to give the
illusion of a shallower DoF with the XL2 (or a similiar 1/3" camera) in addition to shooting wide open is to put the camera as far from your subject as you can and use longer lenses... probably not very practical in the living-room situation that you described.
As for the color differences in the two shots, that's simply because two different lenses were used... the 35mm DoF converted shot was using a Leitz-Panavision superspeed prime motion picture camera lens. The non-converted shot was using the stock video zoom lens that comes with the Canon XLH1. The lenses have very different characteristics, plus very different coatings. Video zoom lenses are typically quite cold and very contrasty. Mopic lenses on the other hand can vary wildly but are typically somewhat
less contrasty and warmer in tone. That's why big-shot cinematographers on feature films very carefully choose the particular lenses they use on a project... for example they might choose something like Cooke S4 primes for an action movie since they are a bit cool and very contrasty... but something more like Cooke Speed Panchros or LOMO primes for a romantic comedy since they are softer and warmer. Most of us don't have the luxury of multiple sets of primes (since they cost several times as much as the camera itself) so we often don't get to pick and choose. That's why when we made the plunge to buy lenses we got the Leitz-Panavision superspeeds that we have... they are right middle of the road as far as color/sharpness/contrast goes, so they are a fairly good choice for most any project.
I will tell the gnomes hello. Tim Wilson wanted to know if they have names... yes, they are all named Steve.
T2
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Todd Terry
Creative Director
Fantastic Plastic Entertainment, Inc.
fantasticplastic.com
