I'm an imagination person first. There's a theme park carnival universe in my head / heart - then I'm an an actor, then a writer, then a director, then a DP and then an editor (I think... the orders of those things switch around a lot - and I'm not including music or broadcasting or hosting which I did a lot of too).

Somehow after or before or quantum sideways of that I have something to do with the Thrice Great Okapi but let's not get into that now. Why must you readers always distract me? Oh wait, you haven't read this yet. It's me who's distracting me. So sorry, let me get on with it:

As the title says. Digital Film Making Finally Beats Chemical Film Making.

I just viewed Prometheus. This article is not so much about the movie plot or merits. It was OK. OK it was a little better than OK... I'd say 3 stars out of 4 for you geeks out there. It was dark and highly predictable in that same way that so many sci fi movies are with their ominous shots of Halo like activity that we've seen so many times before but it was a [i]fairly[/i] good movie none the less and the visuals are amazing!

The focus here is that it was shot, edited, and projected entirely digitally. No chemical film. Remember when CDs had AAD, DAD, DAA OR DDD? Well this was the DDD of motion pictures (and then in 3D too so really it's almost DDD+3D). I viewed it in 3D on dual 8K digital projectors from a digital source (it was shot on Red Epic digital cameras with Zeiss Ultra Prime and Angenieux Optimo Lenses) and I was so impressed that it led me to write this column that will only be appreciated by hard core film or motion picture buffs, fellow film makers, or total and absolute techy nerds.

I apologize to my regular 'wacky guy with a hat" audience about the extreme levels of techy geek I am about to enter but I am compelled to write on this for my film making friends. We really need to change that terminology to 'motion picture' or 'movie' making, because old school film making is finally really dead and unnecessary. OOPS I just blew my whole article away! That was a huge spoiler... oh well ...crap...so anyway I thought I'd give the above disclaimer, and now having done that... here we go!

Chemical film is finally dead. Let me make it clear I don't say this with any sort of hatred of chemical film like it is some witch or beast that needed to be slayed. I LOVED the look of it, but it was/is just way too expensive. People who had the money liked this fact as it keep them in some sort of elitist control club. I did not. I used to have fantasies of stealing panavision film equipment when I found out they only rented and didn't sell film cameras and related equipment. I say this as a LOVER of the motion picture 24p chemical film look who has been on a loooong (add as many o's as you need to make that long really looooong) quest to make movies that looked like what...well... movies looked like... well.. at the movies!!!

I was not once ever satisfied with my 60i vhs or 8mm or hi8 or super v or even later with supposed masters work on the digitally shot and digitally projected movies from the Star Wars fiascos to the IMAX lies (especially in 3D) until now.

Watching Prometheus on dual 8K projectors was the first time I could sit closer than mid row and be absolutely immersed in the entire film without seeing the artifacts of digital film making or 3D problems. The picture was as detailed as I have ever seen - other than some outstanding real (chemical film) IMAX 3D films - but nearly the same, and there were no pixels, the brightness was excellent, the 3D did not flicker. I mean seriously - holy s*%t it finally works! Give someone a gold star sticker!!!

DEEPER INTO THE TECHY GEEKY WORLD OF MOTION PICTURE MAKING - FORMERLY CALLED FILM MAKING in part II: