I just saw the new Johnny Depp movie, Public Enemies. The film is loaded with what looks like lateral color (transverse) chromatic aberration. (The purple kind in the middle of the scene along bright lines, not the red/cyan sepatation at the edges) Got distracting at times. Anybody know if they used lots of fast lenses shot wide open, or could it have been shot digitally, and perhaps what I saw was not CA, but sensor bloom?

Just a guess, but perhaps it was caused by the projection system at that particular theater?

EBH

EB-1 wrote:
Just a guess, but perhaps it was caused by the projection system at that particular theater?

EBH


Possible, but in several decades of seeing movies everywhere, I've never seen anything like this before.

I don't know if this is related, but there was a thread on PhotoNet this morning that talked about the odd way this movie was filmed, and how strange the cinematic feel of it was.

There are lots of movies where it can be spotted in scenes with bright hi lights. I am sure they use very fast lenses even today.
Perso I do not mind to see these abarrations and even enjoy them when I see some kind of aberration in an animated movie, like ghosting. Many of these recent films just look to clean and to unbelivable perfect

According to the review by Mark Kermode, it was shot on digital.

Yeah, I just read the Photo.Net thread. Shot on digital. Too bad. Not ready for prime time IMO. Kodak better still keep making cinema stock for a while yet.

maybe it was deliberate

Yup -- shot on video, which seems a really dubious choice for a period piece, since it screams "shot last week!" Especially so for a period that is so linked in the popular imaginary to the look of classic Hollywood. The handheld nighttime action scenes were downright bad -- the big Wisconsin shootout looked like something shot in one evening for a History Channel reconstruction. Fuzzy brown mush, punctuated by streaky, ugly highlights.

Blech.

They've put flare and other "aberrations" into animated films for the look of it these days to. Not sure why.

Yes, it was shot on video just like Collateral and Miami Vice (M. Mann's last two movies). It's a visual style that he's been developing for quite some time and I think it's brilliant.