Super 35 may not be the cause of film grain! (1 Viewer)

[Jeff Kleist]

Adam, you left out my smiley
I'm agreed that grain is not a bad thing, it adds texture and character to a film. And I"m only against Super35 for theatrical viewing, becuase I do find the grain highly intrusive in many films (expecially the opening to Harry Potter, which as I said above is just as much the fault of poor lighting)
The end of me in this thread

 

[Michael Reuben]

And comparision between DVD quality and your theatrical experience may indicate the influence of grain on the release print/stock, with no association to the method of acquisition.

Amen to that, Scott. The grainiest film I've seen in theaters in the last year was XXX, which was shot with anamorphic lenses. I'll be interested to see how the DVD looks, because I'm betting the grain will be gone.
With DVD, there's also the possibility that grain was removed during the transfer by some form of digital noise reduction. That often results in a smooth video image, but it alters the look of the film. Several Anchor Bay titles (e.g., Bad Boys) suffer from this, as did the Lion's Gate release of Monster's Ball.
M.

 

[Scott H]

The grainiest film I've seen in theaters in the last year was XXX, which was shot with anamorphic lenses.

I haven't seen XXX (though I was browsing some campy boutiques with Asia the other day), so I can't speak to it's grain, but I have an associated point...
Myself, and most others that I know in cinematography and post-production, associate intrusive scene specific grain with anamorphic acquisition. And do so with validity. When filming anamorphically you are more likely to find yourself in an exposure bind, often due to a combination of shooting schedules and slow anamorphic glass (slow as in light transmission, and possibly in setup time - both camera and lighting). Thus, I believe you are more likely to encounter pushed processing, which exacerbates grain, in anamorphic films.
Examples of arguably obtrusive grain in modern anamorphic films? Check out Michael Mann films.

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

Jeff: Too often I miss your tongue in cheek humor Sorry 'bout that...