Grain in Movies Explained

Miami Vice. 300. Superman Returns. Zodiac.

All good movies, all have one thing in common: grain.

Today we'll explain in simple terminology why so many high profile hollywood movies end up looking so grainy.

Hollywood Movies that look like home videos

These movies have something in common, they were shot (primarily) on digital cameras, not film cameras.

Superman Returns was shot with the Panavision Genesis, Miami Vice and Zodiac on the Thomson Viper, 300 has a mix of film and digital cameras, but more importantly, heavy CG elements (which by nature is digital).

Why the grain?

Digital cameras, even with their latest technological improvements, still have some drawbacks, one of them being the fact that their image sensors (CCDs or CMOS chips) are more limited in the way they can capture footage than 35 mm film.

In short: digital cameras need more light to work. Highlights are blown out and dark areas are "crushed" more easily than with good film stock. A 35 MM film camera has a larger range of latitude compared to most digital movie cameras.

• The grain you see in your digitally shot movies is referred to as Electronic Noise or Digital Noise. It is different from film grain.

In short: there will be no grain if the scene is lit well and shot correctly. The Electronic Noise ("grain") comes if the sensor doesn't have enough light to work with.

Film is grainy too, yeah. That's a different type of grain though:

• Each film stock has its own particular type of film grain and directors sometimes use this to achieve a certain look.

The grain you are seeing in digitally shot movies (Miami Vice, Zodiac, Superman etc.) is caused by those sensor limitations - very generally speaking, the darker the scene, the more grain (electronic noise, digital noise) you see. On a small scale you'll notice this when you fire up your consumer video camera. Shoot something in bright outdoors, then shoot something in a dark room. Boom, more grain. And if you amp up your "gain setting" it gets worse, doesn't it?

The less light the digital video camera gets, the tougher it is for the chips. The less light, the more grain.

More (albeit incomplete) information on digital cinematography is available here.

So why are some movies shot on digital video cameras not that grainy?

You'll notice how some scenes are practially free of grain, even though they might be pretty dark.

There's an evil secret you should know about: sometimes scenes that appear to be shot at night were actually shot well lit. The scene is made to look like night artificially in post production. Since the scene was originally shot with enough light for the image sensors to do their magic, little or no digital noise appears. Neat huh?

Other reasons for grainy scenes

- sometimes a scene has CG elements that just look too fake. Or the scene was shot with great lighting and the scene still looks too fake, too "plastic" and clean. By adding a bit of grain some directors feel it makes the final scene look more organic.

- some directors like to add fake grain to give the movie an aged look. Zodiac was shot digitally on the Thomson Viper Filmstream (digital camera so potentially more grain from the get-go) but AFAIK even more grain was added later to give it that 70's look, whatever the hell that means. This is not verified however I believe it.

- Sometimes the grain/noise you see in theaters has nothing to do with the movie itself. It's a shitty copy that's running through the projector behind you. Get out and get your money back. (That's right, most movie theaters run rolls of film through projectors. That film could introduce noise/grain that's not in the actual movie. )

More reading

Miami Vice is soooo grainy!

Superman Returns is grainy! Whaaaa!