Block Accuracy - How Do We Know?
Posted: Fri Jan 15, 2010 10:42 pm
So I'll preface this post by saying I've been block-obsessed of late. I won't go on with stuff I put in my other thread about trying to find a match for "THE" block, but I'm curious to know what techniques hat Indy makers have used to find out whether their blocks are spot on, and (to be bold) whether anyone, be they hat-maker or owner, can replicate the sort of match-ups I posted in the other thread. viewtopic.php?f=1&t=44705
In the time I've been coming to the site, I've seen some great shots of hats, but it has been VERY rare that I've seen one that's a dead ringer, and never have I seen a single hat PROVEN to match THE hat (thus THE block) from every angle. I don't like the "each hat maker has his own vision" idea when it comes to "THE" shape. That's why I used the technique that I did - I wanted a way to kind of geometrically enforce accuracy, rather than a "let's look at these side-by-side" - because I soon found things would look spot-on until you tried to tried the overlay method. I can't think of a more accurate way to ensure a block is accurate vs. an approximation. For me, I wanted perfect.
If the shape of the hat didn't line up with the movie when I found the right angle, it meant the block was wrong / not close enough - simple as that. This is why I got very excited when after much work and analysis and overlaying and re-adjustment, the hat would always match up when I found that right angle. This never took very long at all once I'd got the shape right.
So I'd just love to know how similar / different the closest hats are - If anyone wants to have a shot with your own hats, I'll give you the "secret" formula. The major factor is focal length. With me, most shots were achieved on a Nikon digital SLR with a focal length of 55mm. This results in very little distortion, and is most similar to the optics of the film.
Once you've taken your shots, it's just a matter of dropping them into your image editor (eg Photoshop) over the top of a screencap or still image, and setting the transparency to 40%.Then you just adjust the size of your image to the scale of the hat in the movie, and see how well it matches. If it doesn't match, you'll get a weird doubling effect.
But if anyone bothers doing this, remember, it's quite easy to get one angle perfect - you have to get multiple angles of the same hat without a rebash, and don't use any sort of distortion or uneven scaling; otherwise it's cheating!
Any takers?
In the time I've been coming to the site, I've seen some great shots of hats, but it has been VERY rare that I've seen one that's a dead ringer, and never have I seen a single hat PROVEN to match THE hat (thus THE block) from every angle. I don't like the "each hat maker has his own vision" idea when it comes to "THE" shape. That's why I used the technique that I did - I wanted a way to kind of geometrically enforce accuracy, rather than a "let's look at these side-by-side" - because I soon found things would look spot-on until you tried to tried the overlay method. I can't think of a more accurate way to ensure a block is accurate vs. an approximation. For me, I wanted perfect.
If the shape of the hat didn't line up with the movie when I found the right angle, it meant the block was wrong / not close enough - simple as that. This is why I got very excited when after much work and analysis and overlaying and re-adjustment, the hat would always match up when I found that right angle. This never took very long at all once I'd got the shape right.
So I'd just love to know how similar / different the closest hats are - If anyone wants to have a shot with your own hats, I'll give you the "secret" formula. The major factor is focal length. With me, most shots were achieved on a Nikon digital SLR with a focal length of 55mm. This results in very little distortion, and is most similar to the optics of the film.
Once you've taken your shots, it's just a matter of dropping them into your image editor (eg Photoshop) over the top of a screencap or still image, and setting the transparency to 40%.Then you just adjust the size of your image to the scale of the hat in the movie, and see how well it matches. If it doesn't match, you'll get a weird doubling effect.
But if anyone bothers doing this, remember, it's quite easy to get one angle perfect - you have to get multiple angles of the same hat without a rebash, and don't use any sort of distortion or uneven scaling; otherwise it's cheating!
Any takers?