Why digital is not better than film

Welcome to the 21st century. You can call your Uncle Mort from the top of Mt. Everest while conducting a live web chat and then find your frozen sherpa via his GPS tracking system. Ah, the joys of the digital age. Everywhere we go, there is this assertion that digital is inherently better than analog, no matter what. Well, I have a complaint.

As insane as it may sound, when it comes to media, digital cannot compete with analog formats. In fact, the truth be told, the only reason why there is a digital superiority complex is really because of the fact that digital formats are the least degradative formats on the market. The Library of Congress still keeps all of its audio masters on vinyl because vinyl lasts longer than tape or CD. Still, the fact of the matter is that the music industry now is completely digitized from the studio masters to the CDs. The film industry even went to recording all of the live sound on DATs. Then, sound engineers working on films discovered that digital tracks tended to hide what's known as the "buzz track" of background noise, so the transition was made from analog to digital and then back to analog. Hmm.

Which brings me to the real topic: despite what George Lucas and Sony may tell you, digital is not a better format for movies. While it would be foolhardy - and wrong - to assert that the advances made in video technology in the past ten years are negligible, there are simply too many problems in video technology - some correctable, some inherent - for this to be a worthy adversary to film. And yet it seems that DV is winning over not only consumers but filmmakers. This scares me.

First, let me declare some things straight out. I have no particular passion for film as a ding an sich - it still could use some improvement and certainly is not the perfect moving image medium, but, like democracy, it's flawed but is the best we have. I work in the Digital Media Center as a video specialist and have made hours of videos, editing completely digitally. I have even made a short video with a DV camera the school funded. I have also taken film production courses and shot a short film, not to mention all of the analysis of film technology and film language I have written on in my classes as a Film and Media Studies major. That is exactly why I feel qualified to write this - I've been on both sides.

Film is an analog medium; there are no ones and zeros and there is no clearly defined pattern, matrix or algorithm within which silver halide crystals and film emulsion grains must fit. Digital video, on the other hand, is a pixilated format with a limited resolution - nothing can change this. While film can be blown up to a tremendous proportion with very little graininess, digital video can, at best, attempt a shoddy interpolation within a fairly limited zooming range. The minuscule size of film emulsion grains, combined with the virtually unlimited variations it can be rendered unto create a non-absolute resolution which has been roughly estimated at somewhere between 100,000 and 10 million times that of digital video. There simply is no way that you can compare the two without running into these differences.

Furthermore, there is a much more precise, controlled manner in which film is shot - while it is a frequent complaint that it oftentimes requires manipulation with considerable lighting to shoot film well, the best looking digital video being shot today still requires the same type of lighting rigs. Because film is a chemical process, the subtlety and permeability of the medium allow for far more elaborate, sensitive and believable management of the image. Even the state-of-the-art 24 fps rigs currently put out by Sony and Panavision cannot fully accomplish this.

What is the most unfathomable characteristic of video may be seen as somewhat philosophic, but I can fully relate to it: the difference between film and video is the difference between dream and waking reality. The plastic qualities of film allow for an experience in which the images are rendered as dream, mutable and uncertain. Video cannot provide for this and will never provide this, for digital video is an absolute and discrete form, completely non-plastic. I have no qualms about documentaries taped onto video, although it is arguable that a heightened sense of the surreal, if wanted, could be tapped from a well-filmed documentary.

As humans, we see a world not truly video or film. Both are representations of the way we see things, yet film and video both have visual properties resembling the hyperbolic and mimetic not to be found in normal human vision. No format is truly better, but as a statement of artistic promise - and non-absolute control, for all artists are tyrants of their creations and vice versa - film has the possibility and connotation of dream and painting which can not be substituted by a digital copy, much like the Corel Painter program - as cool as it is to play with! - in the Digital Media Center pales in comparison to the painting studios across the courtyard. As long as video attempts to imitate film, it will always be the inferior format.

"But Brian," you say, "that's all very interesting and such, but I only have a few bucks on me and besides, it's so much easier to point and shoot!" Which is exactly what this digital video/film war is all about. No one on the planet who is at the epicenter of the argument is honestly going to tell you that, given an infinite budget, they want to shoot their masterpiece in digital video. No, the digital wars in Hollywood focus solely on the cost of shooting and developing film versus digital video, not on their artistic qualities. It means that production has less people to account for; it means that studios pay less per hour; it means that shoots can go without interruption for more than ten minutes; it means that the position of cinematographer is becoming more obsolete; it means that editors' and special effects artists' jobs are easier. It is an argument full of sound and fury, but signifying nothing within the artistic realm. It is only an economic argument, and I am outraged. Why? Because if Hollywood makes a full and final transition to DV, that's it. Endgame. Already in the past thirty years, the film market has been on the decline - there are decent development labs in only a handful of cities anymore. If everything goes to digital, then these multi-million dollar facilities will shut down permanently. And nothing will restore them, because it would simply be too expensive to start up again. This must not happen.

But back to your question: yes, you can shoot more cheaper on DV. But if you have access to a real camera, be it 8mm or IMAX, get your hands on that baby and shoot less. Shoot something shorter. The experience of learning how to really operate and shoot a camera is an invaluable one and immensely marketable. And your product will look much more respectable. Like it or not, everyone's made a DV short or film, but film fests accord more respect on a film short. I would too. It takes a higher level of precision and persistence to produce a 5-minute 35mm film than it does to get a camcorder, shoot your two-hour video and edit on your home computer. The other thing that this breeds is a greater care for your image, your plot and your message. Sure, your auto focus, point-and-click still camera may occasionally shoot some great, coffee-table-book-worthy images, but if you really want to get great images, you are going to have to buy a real camera and learn more about filters and developing. Art is not point-and-shoot, ready-made, look-ma-no-hands.

If I sound incredibly supercilious, sentimental or elitist, I apologize, but it's one thing to hear that your best friend is going to shoot something in DV and another to hear that Spike Lee or George Lucas is doing this - although not really surprising in the latter's case. I am positive that Bergman and Kubrick would not have shot in DV if given the option, nor would Welles; Spielberg already has said he won't and Coppola released Apocalypse Now Redux in a new Technicolor dye-transfer print that puts digital projection to shame. Scorsese, Fincher, Arronofsky, Willis, Nyquist, Hall, Altman, Fellini, Herzog, Kieslowski, Lean, Deren, Kurosawa, Hitchcock, Ray, Bunuel, Resnais, Cocteau, Lang, Powell, Coen, Truffaut, Stone - can you imagine any of these filmmakers' bodies of work if shot on video? I know you can't!