Please help me and tell me I am not insane. When you watch a soap opera as opposed to a movie there is a substantial difference in the “quality” of the filming. Not so much that it’s better or worse but the soap opera looks more stark somehow.
I was reminded of this when I was re-watching some X-Files and they switch back and forth between this starker shooting for the creepier shots and then go back to what seems like the more “movie” style?
It’s almost like the soap operas aren’t touched up at all and everything else is. I don’t know how else to describe it, I’m pretty clueless about movie/TV making in general.
No, you’re absolutely correct. Soap operas are shot as video, while movies are shot on film. Film has a “softer” look, and depending on the cinematographer, you can do things with film (contrast, color saturation, etc.) that wouldn’t be done on the assembly-line production of soap operas. There’s also the element of lighting; movies tend to be lit with much more detail than a soap (or sitcom) which usually tends to have the entire set lit more or less evenly.
I don’t know about X-Files, but you see this a lot on Monty Python’s Flying Circus, where the studio shots are generally on videotape, and outdoors shots are on film. At least once or twice a character comments on the difference.
Soap Operas are shot with minimal camera angles on video because they are producing 5 shows per week.
That’s not all they save on budget.
My friend was a recurring character on Guiding Light, and she told some story about how the nasty green room got updated once when CBS used the studio for some big event, and as such they got a nice green room out of it.
I used to notice the same thing on BBC productions that they would show on Masterpiece Theater back in the 1970s…it makes me wonder if that was standard practice for the BBC back then (videotape in the studio, film outdoors).
WAG here, but I also wonder if part of the video quality of soap operas has to do with their narrow production window. They have to crank out 5 hours of content (well, less commerical time) every week. Might not leave a lot of time for lighting set-up, or post-production work.
Also, if you ever notice those “behind the scenes” types of footage when shooting on a movie set, the behind the scenes is usually shot on videotape and it never looks the same as the movie. They could be shooting a scene and from behind the scenes (on videotape) it looks pretty stark and cheesy, but the film version looks better. I think it also has to do with the frame rate. The film frame rate is lower (about 24 frames per second) vs. video (almost 30 frames per second).
And some TV shows are shot on film which is why they look different than other shows shot on videotape.
I’s not a cinematographer, but I’ve taken a lot of professional still portraits.
When I photographed a person (or object) in a precise manner I try to make the lighting interesting by using back lighting, low angle lighting, moderately high contrast etc.
OTOH if I’m photographing a large group of people or several groups of people in quick succession I use bland, even light. Dramatic lighting could burn out a shiny bald head, or turn a woman’s crow’s feet into deep crevices.
In movies the director has the time and the budget to use interesting light in every shot. In a soap opera, they want to make sure that everything is decently lit even if the actors mess up their blocking. Better safe and boring, than interesting but unusable.
No - if anything, the film suffers in translation from 24 fps to 30 fps to be shown on TV.
There’s just worlds of difference between tape and film - a feature film will go through painstaking manipulations in post-production collectively called color timing to suit the director’s vision, be it soft and dreamy, hard and edgy, plain, or whatever. Those “behind the scenes” things are done in a more “verite” style - someone shoots tape and it’s used as-is without hours of tweaking.
Have a look at the deleted scenes from just about any movie on DVD - very often, these scenes got cut before the final color timing and post production was done, and they look wildly different as a result.
I’m not sure if it’s an insult to film or a compliment to tape to say that “raw” film looks about the same as video. I do know that film has gobs more raw information to work with than tape - more image detail, more colors, a wider usable contrast ratio and so forth.
The Twilight Zone episodes that are shot on video (maybe five of them?) look pretty different. Also, somehow more “real.” Like we’re watching a home movie or a behind the scenes thing rather than an episode.
I’m kinda surprised that people have to be told about the differences between video and film. The visual style is so incredibly different to me – tape looks more like real life, film has sort of a filtered/softer look.
It’s not just soaps. Most US and UK sitcoms of the seventies, eighties and well into the nineties were videotaped, using multiple cameras. It is vastly less expensive and requires less post-production work. These days, more and more comedies are filmed with a single-camera via multiple takes (to get different shots, such as reaction shots or anything from a new angle), then edited together seamlessly.
Of course, sticking to soaps, several of them tend to have their own “look.” Young and the Restless is notorious for having darker sets and lighting; everything seems more elegant, jewel-toned, a bit more sophisticated. (No comment on whether this is matched by the writing!) Days of Our Lives has a bright, pastel, heavily-filtered look, which not coincidentally began when Deirdre Hall’s “Marlena” returned to the show in the mid-1990s. My guess is it has two reasons: a) to make Marlena look like a viable romantic lead able to get pregnant (instead of a woman nearing 60) and b) to prevent numerous hospital calls relating to Kristian Alfonso’s scarily prominent neck cords. Guiding Light relatively recently went to a filmed look in a desperate attempt to be relevant, for all the good it did 'em (RIP GL). The ABC soaps (All My Children, One Life to Live, and General Hospital) are all “of a piece,” and seem warmer, earthy, even when GH is focusing endlessly on violent mob whores Sonny and Jason. Though AMC tends to be a bit brighter than its two compadres.
Well, I do know the difference between video and film. I just never knew that’s why. Meaning, when I see it, I know it - otherwise this thread would never have been, but I never knew why.
Plus you’d have to know something about film, wouldn’t you? I’ve never taken a single film or photography class, never delved into that world at all. I am content to just sit back and enjoy the results.
But that being said - awesome! It’s so good to know I’m not crazy. I have often wondered but not enough that I remember when I get to a computer and ask.
It’s not just the video/film thing, it’s the sound.
I think soaps tend to record audio live. I don’t know for sure, but they all have this background hum added to a vague coffee-can echo. I find it incredibly annoying, especially when added to the stark, uninteresting lighting.
A lot of the focus so far has been on the depth of field differences between film and video, but I think the bland, even lighting has more to do with it.
There are 35mm lens adapters for video cameras that produce a depth of field that’s pretty indistinguishable from film. Does anyone (Cartooniverse?) know if the soaps use these?
Seems like when *Entourage *was doing the story line with Vince acting in the “Smokejumpers” movie, and they cut from showing the show itself to showing the movie-within-the-show, the whole “look” of it all was immediately different. (Other than, of course, suddenly narrowing to the movie’s aspect ratio, with a black bar at the top and bottom.)
Same with the Japanese commercial Vince filmed with Drama. When the showed the actual ad itself, within the show, the “look” was different to me.
But I wouldn’t have been able to articulate why, without this thread! Thanks for all the video/film info, Dopers!
That’s the one that is always shooting in outdoor locations like parks, presumably because it is cheaper than a studio. I think this is their last “season”; CBS cancelled them recently.
