Will HD Destroy Documentary Photography?

[wayne_naughton]

<p>Just saw a documentary on the Mumbai massacre (from the BBC i think). The whole thing was shot with a sickly green colour cast and the colours were super saturated, interviews seemed to be done in deep shadow. skin colour was almost cartoonish. The film was just frightening, but it looked just UNREAL. the CCTV was absolutely horrifying... BUT....all I was thinking was is this FOR REAL??? The non cctv footage LOOKED like some awful MANGA comic, some crazy cartoon and surely, that will lead to a desensitising, a detachment if you like to the actual event.<br>

I want my news to be presented without embellishment, without enhancement if you like. This constant blurring these days between fact and representations of the facts just leaves me cold and is downright dangerous. I mean if you watch a BBC doco for an hour and walk away wondering whether what you just saw is fact, faction or pure fiction, well, what's the point? HD has no place in the documentary or reporting community AFAIAC, It is as much a manipultation of reality as any photoshop filter. Get rid of it.</p>

[graybrick]

<p>Another sweeping doomsday prediction based on a single application of a versatile technology. I'm not sure what your reference to CCTV means. HD is simply another advancement in imaging. It's up to the production crew how it's used. More likely the BBC will ruin documentary photography.</p>

[steve m smith]

<p>More likely the conversion from one TV standard to another is causing the colour cast.</p>

<p>I don't believe the BBC will ruin documentary photography.</p>

[wayne_naughton]

<p>The film consists of cctv footage of the event(s) interspersed with interviews with the survivors. I think hd is wonderful but NOT in the world of news and documentary.</p>

[waltflanagan]

<p>HD is about higher resolution. It doesn't have anything to do with saturation, shooting in shadows or green color casts. If the creators of a show wish to boost the saturation, shoot in shadows, or add a green color cast that is up to them. There is nothing about shooting or processing in HD that forces them to do so.</p>

<p>after seeing many nature documentaries in HD I don't want to see them in standard def anymore.</p>

[Matt Laur]

<p>How can High Definition make a bit of difference, in the sense you describe it? You're complaining about color, saturation, and lighting choices made by the producers. You don't really explain why you think it would have been better with fewer pixels (lower resolution), or why documentary work would be improved with lower-resolution recordings.<br /><br />A proper HD image, 1080 pixels tall, looks better than an old NTSC or PAL signal at half of less of that resolution. If you don't like the <em>aesthetic </em>decisions made by producers when they choose contrast, saturation, etc., don't you think that's rather a separate consideration from the resolution? How many pixels doesn't drive decisions about what you DO with those pixels.<br /><br />It's like wondering if the fact that it's possible to hold down the shift key when you're typing, and thus shout in all caps when entering the subject of your post on PN will somehow destroy "writing."</p>

[tomwatt]

<blockquote>

<p>I don't believe the BBC will ruin documentary photography.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>You haven't watched 'the beeb' much have you? Seriously though, the camera(s) you have on hand during an event are what counts. If they're state of the art, wonderful, if they're not, what they produce is the record of the event(s).<br>

Gardner and Sullivan's Civil War 'action shots' leave a lot to be desired (in contrast to their more composed shots). But we're not able to pop back into history with an IMAX rig and shoot to our heart's content.<br>

I guess I don't understand the OP's concerns. If watching documentaries that are shot in lower resolution negates their content, can we film our current politicians in 240P and negate them? I'm willing to give it a shot.</p>

[randall ellis]

<p>It's a matter of taste (or lack thereof) and of popular trends. Read about historiography sometime. History has always been recorded in conjunction with the trends of the time. Homer very likely did not record the Trojan War exactly as it happened - or if he did, the world certainly has changed quite a lot. This is no different...</p>

<p>- Randy</p>

[richterjw]

<blockquote>

<p>I want my news to be presented without embellishment, without enhancement if you like.</p>

</blockquote>

<p>Is there any such news? Just because it's not visually enhanced, doesn't mean it hasn't been tuned up verbally or embellished in other ways. And that's not a recent development. JR</p>

[eric friedemann]

<p>Also note that HD cameras like the RED ONE line promise the innovation of high resolution with a sort of RAW editing capibility. If you look at the third link, there's an HD video- apparently shot by an ametuer- that exhibits nuanced color with good shadow detail, even in low light. This type of video capture would be swell for documentary work:</p>

<p><a href="http://www.luminous-landscape.com/essays/red-raw.shtml">http://www.luminous-landscape.com/essays/red-raw.shtml</a></p>

<p><a href="http://www.red.com/cameras/">http://www.red.com/cameras/</a></p>

<p><a href="http://www.vimeo.com/1021632">http://www.vimeo.com/1021632</a></p>

[eric_arnold]

<p>to answer the question, no.</p>

[tom_thumbnail]

<p>Whatever that sickly green stuff you watched was, it is unlikely to catch on or continue on since it looked so bad. </p>

[muaythai]

<p>Havent seen the Manga Mumbai docu, but I suspect the OP needs to get their tv seen to.</p>