grain in still photography and grain in motion pic

[AlexGfromUK]

The discussion about 35 and 70mm films got me thinking about how little I notice photographic grain in films.

Conversely, when I look at photograph, it's actually one of the first things I'll pick up on even if not intentionally. I know one explaination is that the grain in a motion picture isn't static and its patterns don't repeat. But I can't believe this alone accounts for the difference when I think about how big the grain would be on, say, a 20foot by 10foot print made from tmax 100 neg film.

When you factor in the size of a 35mm motion picture frame being around half the size of a 35mm still frame, it seems totally amazing to me that the grain in motion picture film does'nt look massive!

Does anyone have an explaination for this descrepancy or is it simply that the grain is constantly changing? surely that can't be the whole story???

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[Matt Pacini]

Well, I don't have a technical explanation, only a guess, because I've done a lot of serious thinking and discussing of this also (as anyone trying to do something serious in Super 8 has thought over).

I think it's a couple of things.
1. The moving grain is a big issue. You just don't have much time to see the grain pattern, like 1/48 of a second.
Keep in mind, that the screen is black for the same amount of time, and you don't notice that either! That should be the bigger mystery!

2. I think it's because you are drawn into the story, the characters, the look, etc., and the part of your brain that is constantly analyzing things switches over to analyzing that stuff instead.
Of course, this only goes so far, and if it there is too much technical degradation, of whatever sort, it's going to interrupt that, and you're back to noticing what's wrong with the picture again.

When I saw Titanic, I was shocked at how grainy it was. I mean, I really thought it stood out in a big way, but nobody I talked to noticed it, even filmmaker friends.
Granted, I was sitting kind of close, (but not too close), and it could have been a bad print, but I doubt it, given the budget of that film, I would imagine they were a little more careful than the average film.
Anyone else notice how grainy it was? (It was shot in Super35, like most of Cameron's films).
So I don't know if I'm right, but I think it makes some sense.
If there's a better explanation, I'm all ears!

Matt Pacini

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[#Pedro]

I think it?s simply because a photo print you hold right in your hands, close to the eyes. In cinema, you have a significant distance to the screen, the image size projected into your eyes becomes smaller than that of the print close to you. And in a smaller size, the grain dissappears. If you would project in parallel a film and a 35 mm slide taken with 100 ASA, you shurly would regognize that the film is grainier than the still.
Pedro

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[MovieStuff]

Why do we have two topic with the same name?


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Roger Evans
MovieStuff
http://www.afterimagephoto.tv/moviestuff.html