Arri Film & TV Colours ‘Every Thing Will Be Fine’ in Stereo 3D on DaVinci Resolve

The recent project from director Wim Wenders, ‘Every Thing Will Be Fine’, has been graded on DaVinci Resolve at Arri Mitte, part of Arri Film & TV Services in Berlin, by colourist Philipp Orgassa.

The film, focussing on a distracted novelist who accidentally hits and kills a child while driving, is shot in 3D by cinematographer Benoît Debie, in order to produce an intensifying effect that draws out the emotions of grief and trauma the protagonists feel. This is Wenders’ first dramatic production in 3D, following his two documentary projects ‘Pina’, nominated for an Oscar, and the ‘Cathedrals of Culture’ architecture series.

Philipp Orgassa needed to manage the complex challenge of high contrast and numerous visual elements within a stereo production environment. “As in many of Wim’s films, colour plays a significant role within the narrative, but as soon as you put on the 3D glasses, the range in light is diminished,” he said.

“Pushing up the contrast can risk blowing out the details, so we had to use various tricks to keep the vibrancy that Benoît Debie, the DP, had captured on set. We used Resolve’s noise reduction throughout the grade, which helped us to produce a very rich contrast in 3D. We worked wearing 3D glasses in the grading theatre to make sure the depth and emotional connection that Wim wanted from the stereo effects remained intact.”

Wim very often uses natural light in his films and Philipp relied on luminance keys within Resolve to prevent the shots in bright sunshine from blowing out excessively. He said, “The keys were used in almost every frame but in particular, one long scene had been filmed in the snowy depths of a Canadian winter. So we still had to be able to keep the detail of the snow, which would have ordinarily been blown out due to the stereo projection weaknesses."

Unlike the common use of 3D in movies, where everything remains in focus to make elements pop out of the screen, Wim determined that the film should retain a cinematic look and feel, which has the opposite effect of drawing the audience into the drama. “There was a lot of shallow depth of field and out of focus elements, just as in a normal feature film, which we had to manage,” explained Philipp.

“As well as using a print LUT to eliminate the digital look from the footage, I used Resolve’s Power Windows and tracking for both eyes simultaneously, as well as for sharpening and blurring particular elements. It was a complex but really interesting process to work with, as it balanced the best of what stereo effects can produce with the beauty of more traditional cinematography.”

You can see how the finishing process for this movie was completed at Arri Mitte by online & finishing artist Chistian Troger on the Mistika post production system, incorporating Philipp's graded files, in a further article here.  www.blackmagicdesign.com