Bleach bypass look

[Nicolas Hanson]

I'm preparing a session with some modern war footage shot on Alexa 65 and Cook lenses. I'm asked to reproduce a bleach bypass look, and Band of Brothers, Saying Private Ryan, and Seven are brough up as references. I want to know as much as possible about the look and process. Any insight? Both theory, creative and technical? 

Edited December 9, 2016 by Nicolas Hanson

[Thomas Singh]

I've had great success with lowering the master RGB-gain and increasing the luminance gain. That is a common technique to produce a silver tinted image. If you study Saying Private Ryan there are also some clipped blacks and blown out highlights.  

[Stig Olsen]

Some years ago I used the technique above to emulate the bleach bypass look on this scene. The keywords were desaturation, silver retention, grain matching and blacks / highlight control. The reference image on the left side is from Band of Brothers and the shot on the right was shot on RED MX.

In the premium collection you can find an article about Saving Private Ryan by Dale E. Grahn, and we'll hopefully very soon publish a very in-depth article about Band of Brother. Like a bunch of other articles we're waiting for studio permission.

 

[Bruno Mansi]

Today, we tend to think of bleach bypass as one particular look, but in regard to the actual chemical process that was omitted during the developing of photographic film, I read an interesting bit of information on Kodak's site.

To quote...

"Different results are achieved according to which step the skip-bleach technique is applied. When applied to an original negative, the effect seen on a print made from the negative results in lighter and possibly blown-out highlights, higher contrast and perhaps higher graininess. When applied to the print, the effects are mainly seen in the shadows, which will be darker, richer, with higher contrast, less detail (possibly blocked-in) and with desaturated, muted colors. These effects can be very scene-dependent."

[Ildus gabidullin]

 

 

 

[Andreas Brueckl]

I usually do a full grade first. Saturated, balanced,..normal stuff, not to contrasty though.

Then on top I do the bleach bypass with something about  20% saturation and slightly more contrast done in curves.

As last node or layer I can always blend it into my picture the way I want it.
With this I preserve more natural colors and the skin tones still look human .

 

[Tom Evans]

ENR and Bleach Bypass are two different processes. On the movie Evita the lab retained only about 38% of the silver (ENR process = Variable process from 0% silver to 100% silver) and they did a complete bypass in Seven (they left 100% of the silver in the print). The look depends on other factors as well. Different stocks, exposure etc. On Seven they flashed the negative (to soften the contrast by darkening the highlights and leaving the blacks very dark) and pushed the 5283 stock one stop. So, "Bleach Bypass" can be quite different. The technique discussed above gets you close. Then, fine-tune until you get something you like or that is close to your references.

Edited December 16, 2016 by Tom Evans