IndieWire, on Soderbergh’s upcoming movie, Unsane:
Taking a page from Sean Baker’s “Tangerine,” Soderbergh shot the whole movie on an iPhone. While Baker has said he used a phone instead of traditional cameras due to budgetary constraints, Soderbergh said he was so impressed with the quality of iPhone cinematography that he would likely continue to use phones to shoot his movies going forward.
And:
“I think this is the future,” he said. “Anybody going to see this movie who has no idea of the backstory to the production will have no idea this was shot on the phone. That’s not part of the conceit.”
The filmmaker has experimented with digital cinematography for years, going back to 2002’s “Full Frontal,” but found that the iPhone offered unparalleled quality. “People forget, this is a 4k capture,” said Soderbergh, who was long a passionate advocate for the high-end RED cameras. “I’ve seen it 40 feet tall. It looks like velvet. This is a gamechanger to me.”
Soderbergh doesn’t need to scrimp and save on his movies. He’s had enough big box office success (Erin Brockovich, Oceans 11/12/13) that he can do pretty much as he pleases. The fact that he can get what he wants from iPhone says a lot.
It kind of blows my mind to think that a director of some renowned would choose to film using his phone. How far we’ve come.
That’s super cool.
I imagine Jim Jannard might not have been very happy to see this interview.
Assuming its like other “shot on iPhone” ads I’ve seen, it will still use a crazy amount of add-ons and still be a pretty pricey piece of kit for the average home person to replicate. Once you get to that level, I just don’t understand the point of using the iPhone.
is the point being made that this is easy for people replicate at home? my take was that he just feels it’s good enough for production use, which is impressive on its own.
I was making two points, 1) by him saying “I prefer to shoot on iPhone” its somewhat misleading as they aren’t just taking the iPhone and using it raw. They are adding a considerable amount of expensive and speciality add-ons, and essentially just using the sensor from the iPhone and nothing more. 2) If you are going to go to that length, I don’t really see the point in using the iPhone sensor in the end. If you have to do all those add ons and spend all that money anywhere, then what is the point of doing it on an iPhone. You’ve already replaced everything but the sensor. I see your point, “but the sensor is still good enough to be used for this.” But that isn’t what they are saying. They are saying “iPhone is good enough” when in reality that aren’t really using the iPhone aside from its sensor. I suppose its still an achievement, just not one I understand from someone who isn’t constrained on cost. If I was to go try to make a feature film it would be filmed on iPhone and maybe have an aux mic, because I couldn’t afford anything more than that. It also wouldn’t look like the films he will make either.