Leaderboard

OK, I have a black one inbound and should be landing tomorrow or Thursday… I tried to get the LTD version but has to come from PannyBoy direct and they have zero stock, so black it is. My S9 is still not fixed and I have missed it on the first 3 jobs of the year and with 5 more imminent, can’t wait any longer. On the off chance my fixed S9 does turn up prior to these next 5 jobs I am away for, I’ll use both as a bit of a test but regardless, probably have a place more now for the L10 until an S9II comes along. My experience of not having a mech shutter has not been the greatest and the role either of these units is destined for is more photo, so…

These are really nice. The best is the footprint. I played around with SpektraFilm but didn't do much with it. I should try it again.

I’d have urged caution in buying the Luna before DJI released the Pro version of the Pocket 4 anyway but now the P4P has been officially released in China then I would definitely hold out for some comparisons. One of the major USPs of the Luna is the excellent removeable remote screen but it seems DJI have an interesting solution with a small external remote for the P4P. Its a bit of a swings and roundabout in that it is more convenient with the Luna but it’s equally true that if you drop the remote then it’s game over until you can locate a new one. Insta threw everyone a curveball (shills included) by releasing the Luna far earlier than expected and it’s worth considering that this was in part motivated by them discovering their major USP was about to be countered with the P4P solution. Oh and the 17 stops of dynamic range of the P4P is interesting too.

I find it difficult to believe that worse quality as such is the motivating factor, but a less polished result, a less artificially processed and perfected result may be desirable when one wishes to appear authentic and I do believe a lot of people are tired of the ultra-processed images from mobile phones and editing apps. They may also be tired of commercial images for partly similar reasons: DYI images may look more real and home-made, and somehow more true to the person in the photos, even if not captured by extended arm holding the camera but someone who truly knows the person in the picture. In some cases, commercially produced portraits which often reflect the photographer's tastes and some product or image style that the photographer has found successful and applies to all their clients. Doing it yourself for an authentic feel doesn't mean the quality of the photo has to be poor. Of course, it's possible that some people specifically want a "different" look such as 8 mm film etc. but I don't think this is common or at the core of the issue, the excessive processing and manufactured "perfection" is much more likely to be what triggers a change in fashion (or perhaps I am just wishing that). You may be correct that the smartphone generation sometimes just wants to use something other than their smartphone, that's perfectly understandable and would be a healthy development. In my mind "high quality" and "smartphone" are difficult to put in the same sentence with a straight face. High quality for some things, yes, but for a lot of things, not good quality at all.

Good points from @eatstoomuchjam. That's why I went for the sharpest frame grabs I could find - considering the range of variables involved a soft looking grab might have been a scanning issue or provenance issue or there might have just been movement in the frame. Now that I've done that analysis I'm wondering where to from here. One thing I can do is to take my S16mm emulation and scale it 50% of the size and then adjust my power grade to match the grain and halation etc, and see if that looks like a 35mm scan (it should - that's how film works!!). If so then I can proceed on that basis, but if not then I might have to get feedback and iterate again to get something appropriate. Once I've got that sorted out then I should be able to interpolate / extrapolate the parameters that needed changing and get a range of looks that vary from 8mm up towards 16 and 35mm and then beyond. At that point it'll be interesting to explore different combinations of: Film sharpness and grain Lens emulations Filtration (diffusion etc) From these I should be able to get a range of common looks, inspired by different combinations like: 8mm shot on-the-go Bolex 16mm camera shot at night The look: Faster 16mm film with mediocre prime lenses shot wide open Krasnogorsk-3 16mm camera during the day The look: Slower / clearer 16mm film with standard zoom lens (17-69mm F1.9 Zenit) shot stopped down 35mm film camera with master primes, or Cookes, or Panavision C-Series & T-Series, etc (I have a few lens tests with many of these lenses so should be able to recreate something that smells vaguely right by changing the vignetting, edge softness, CA, bloom, etc) I'd imagine that certain combinations will be more convincing than others, as we've likely come to associate certain image attributes together. Obviously I won't be recreating them faithfully, but simply by taking inspiration from these a range of looks can certainly be developed. One thing I have noticed is that lens designers often get custom requests from film-makers to tune a set of lenses to have a customised response. For example maybe they want the speed and bokeh from a set of lenses to remain as-is but want more/less horizontal streaks and much more diffusion, etc. This is noteworthy because if film-makers are are interested in different combinations of lens attributes then I don't feel like I need to try to get a perfect emulation of one lens or another either - it doesn't matter so much when you view it from a creative perspective rather than engineering perspective. This is why my goal in my S16 emulation project wasn't to emulate this or that film stock, but rather to get something that looked like it was shot on some unknown stock with unknown provenance (e.g. maybe it's expired or wasn't stored well etc).

Raw pictures taken with a OnePlus 8 pro modded, lens used: Linos Mevis 16mm F1.6

Yes, it's on my radar too. Their Discord server is where the action is if anyone wants to follow along or get involved. Sometimes there are even daily updates so it's very much still in development.

no 12 bit codec (whether it's PR444 or raw) makes it kind of DOA for me. that tended to be kinefinity's main selling point imo. conceptually its cool, but I just got a BMCC6K FF for 1500 euros second hand as a B-CAM. same sensor, same open gate capability, gives me an option to use an EVF as well, and it lets me do more in the grade.

Anybody checked out the "M-LITE"? A 3D printed modification of the EOS-M: oh snap....