American Cinematographer - November 1998 - 90

Soup du Jour
It's

much

pronounced effect."
Additionally, he reveals that Fotokem
will be offering a scalable black-anda

white additive bath
ACE

by the end of this year.

Van Horne also

due

like ENR

points out that

the intermediate."
The

advantage of utilizing the
the interneg stage is
dramatic in terms of expense. "Ordi¬
narily, the lab reclaims the silver from
the prints and sells it, [which offsets
operating costs,]" Van Horne
describes. "But when you leave the
silver in the prints, the lab charges a
few cents per foot of film for the lost
silver reclamation. If you're making
2,000 10,000' prints, that's going to
be a big expense for the distributor. If
you can build that look into the
interpositive/internegative, then you
won't have to pay anything extra for
all of those prints."
process

From top: Normal print, bleach-bypass print, and bleachbypass negative, as processed by Fotokem. (Images
courtesy of Fotokem.)

which is

scary
other instances

idea because in all
we

recommend that," he

would

never

explains. "But

when you bypass the bleach and
leave that silver on the negative, the

added

density basically acts like
added exposure, and makes the
whites much whiter. [Doing the skipbleach processes on the print, as
opposed to the negative or interme¬
diates] obviously creates a very
different look. ENR or skip-bleach
on the print is a more subtle look
that

tend

to see more

in features,

while the individuals who

skip the
negative tend to be
working on music videos or
commercials where they want to
create a look that gets your attention.
bleach

88 November 1998

the

Sayeed (also for Lee on ClockAC Sept. '95), Lance Acord
(on Vincent Gallo's Buffalo 66, see AC
July '98) and Newton Thomas Sigel
ers, see

(for the "Demon-Vision"
Fallen).

sequences

the additional setup costs

required to incorporate silver-reten¬
tion processes, when utilizing special
process on a film, it may be too
expensive to perform the required
testing, so Fotokem has therefore
created a detailed photographic
demonstration which they screen
every Wednesday at 10:30 a.m. "We
currently show footage with skipbleach on the negative, the interposi¬
tive, the internegative and the print,
as well as skip bleach on the inter¬
positive and internegative with flash¬
ing. We tried flashing - from 5
percent to 30 percent - to get the
look of the skip-bleach print, but do
it

Malik

The

cross-processed
something of a
subject matter for laboratories,
use

film has become
taboo

film manufacturers and distributors.
In fact, very few labs even offer the
service due to the inherent conflict of

interest the

technique represents.

Duart in New York is

one

of the few

labs

currently servicing cross¬
processing clients, and dailies
manager Al Pierce states, "Cross¬
processing in the motion picture lab
is when an exposed image shot on
Ektachrome reversal film is devel¬

oped through a color negative
While Ektachrome was not
manufactured to be processed as a
negative film, this technique will
allow you to obtain a negative image
on a clear-based
original reversal film.
The effect on the screen, either by a
workprint or video transfer, is usually
a
higher-contrast and increased-grain
image. We've found that a normal to
slightly underexposed image gives the
best results for lab timing and print¬
ing equipment; too much exposure
process.

will not allow for the

use

orange-based filter in the timing and
printing of the negative. Use of this
filter will help match the crossprocessed film with the color negative
film, and thus enable the lab
time and

better

the

images."
cross-processing
on the
image varies greatly, with even
the most minute changes of the
nearly infinite factors affecting the
exposure, handling, processing and
storage of the film. "A serious prob¬
correct

The effect of

Cross-Processing
Another

technique that film¬
occasionally asked the
perform in order to radically

makers have

lab

alter the look of

picture is

cross¬

reversal film. This
method has recently been utilized by
such cinematographers as Robert

lem associated with such

Richardson, ASC (on Oliver Stone's
U-Turn, see AC Oct. '97), Elliot Davis

derivative, to stabilize the film's

(on Steven Soderbergh's The Under¬
neath, and for portions of Spike Lee's
Get on the Bus, see AC Nov. '96),

Technicolor. He adds that "such

processing

cross¬

processing is the need to use
formaldehyde, or a formaldehyde
magenta dye," states Frank Ricotta of
chemicals carry
cant

with them signifi¬
ecological and health concerns

American Cinematographer - November 1998

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