Viewinder Film School

Film School: The Film Look

Image by Kodak in 'Getting the Film Look with Digital Footage' | Film Riot Image by Kodak in 'Getting the Film Look with Digital Footage' | Film Riot

Tools for making your digital footage look more like it was shot on film.

In Post

Film Riot offers their step-by-step workflow for Getting the Film Look with Digital Footage in Davinci Resolve:

Colour grader Cullen Kelly demonstrates a more in-depth process for achieving a film emulation look in DaVinci Resolve:

Brandon Li demonstrates Dehancer, a film emulation plugin for DaVinci Resolve:

In Camera

To counter the inherently clinical look of most modern digital cameras, many YouTubers, such as YCImaging, recommend using a diffusion filter on your lens…

… while others, such as cammackey, argue that halation, not diffusion, is more characteristic of film (with examples):

Filter manufacturer Tiffen offers this Triangle of Diffusion, mapping the range of effects of their various diffusion filters…

via Tiffen

… and provides an exhaustive comparison of their various diffusion varieties:

Further Viewing

Steve Yedlin, director of photography on films including Knives Out (2019), Glass Onion (2022), Wake Up Dead Man (2025), and The Last Jedi (2017), is renowned for his ability to make his footage, captured digitally, look like film:

Film School: Making Digital Look Like Film, with ‘Knives Out’ Cinematographer Steve Yedlin