Yong dropped by today and was talking about the 35mm adapter he's getting. Apparently, while I haven't been watching, a slew of new, cheap static and vibrating adapters have been released (check out this site). This is significant because developments like these will continue to raise the lower bar for acceptable image quality. Already, once cutting-edge SD footage looks dated. The video that comes with the DV Rebel's Guide, for example, now looks brittle and gray. Shooting in HD does make a difference but shooting with a 35mm lens is a real game changer. The footage looks dramatically better.
Each day I sit on the noise film footage, it gets worse looking, not because the footage is changing, but because the world into which it will be released is changing. One way to address this problem is to move laterally, working with the footage in such a way that its musty quality is made irrelevant, or essential to its character. This is what David Lynch tried to do with Inland Empire, using the PD-150 for its quirky, homemade quality. But it's a tough trick because of the transparent way in which we accept technological advances. At a certain point, you don't see the spectacular image of a nice 35mm lens. It just looks normal. And everything else looks bad in comparison.
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