DEFINITION’S 4K CAMERA LISTINGS
BASED ON:
NOT SO BLACK & WHITE DOP Erik Messerschmidt makes use of two old favourites for Mank, but it certainly wasn’t intentional When it came to choosing a camera, it was always going to be a Red for David Fincher and Erik Messerschmidt, who respectively direct and film the series Mindhunter using a Helium 8K. But whether or not Mank would be shot using a colour or monochrome sensor was always up for debate. “I initially thought that shooting in colour and correcting it to black & white would be advantageous to us,” says Messerschmidt. “I thought we’d have more flexibility in post: we could do composites and adjust tonal contrasts between shades of colour. But after some comparison tests, there wasn’t much to discuss. It was clear that the monochrome sensor was superior, with a depth of tone and dynamic range that just didn’t exist in the colour sensor.” The Helium 8K Monochrome was paired with the Leica Summilux-Cs, which are also the lenses of choice for the creative duo on Mindhunter . But familiarity wasn’t their only reason for selecting them. “I went to Panavision in Los Angeles and looked at every lens they had,” recalls Messerschmidt. “We put them on a projector and tested the resolving power of each lens to see which were dirty and which were sharp. We must have tested several hundred lenses, but the crème de la crème of that bunch were the very modern large format lenses – we did some test shots with those and ended up liking the Leicas.”
SPECIFICATION
SENSOR – FORMAT AND SIZE
Helium 35.4MP CMOS, 29.90mmx15.77mm
60fps at 8K (8192x4320), 75fps at 8K 2.4:1 (8192x3456) 60fps at 7K (7168x3780), 75fps at 7K 2.4:1 (7168x3024) 75fps at 6K (6144x3240), 100fps at 6K 2.4:1 (6144x2592) 96fps at 5K (5120x2700), 120fps at 5K 2.4:1 (5120x2160) 120fps at 4K (4096x2160), 150fps at 4K 2.4:1 (4096x1728) 150fps at 3K (3072x1620), 200fps at 3K 2.4:1 (3072x1296) 240fps at 2K (2048x1080), 300fps at 2K 2.4:1 (2048x864)
FRAME RATES
EF, F, PL, Leica M
LENS MOUNT
Redcode Raw, ProRes 4444 XQ, 422 HQ, DNxHR HQX
RECORDING OPTIONS
16.5+ stops
EXPOSURE LATITUDE
30 DEF I N I T ION | FEBRUARY 202 1
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