austinchimp

I'm actually more interested in your post stabilization software. It seems to do a really good job with some quite shaky footage. What did you use?

Can I ask what camera's you're used to working with? Just to get an idea of what you're comparing it to. Very interesting.

As an A7s and 1DC owner there really is something about the 1DC colour - particularly for me in C-Log - that just feels right. Without talking about magic and starting an argument about what exactly that is, the colour just feels right on an intuitive level - almost as if I'm looking through the optical viewfinder and not a recording on a screen. I can totally understand the importance of capturing a real feeling image when shooting your loved ones.

While the Sony image is much cleaner and can therefore be pushed more to higher ISOs and to an extent pushed around more in post without worrying about noise, I could never quite get the colour to the sweetspot of looking natural.

On the other hand the 1DC is physically a bit of a brute, has huge heavy batteries, requires an external monitor to expose and focus corectly, uses expensive CF cards, has no decent high frame rate mode and isn't exactly inconspicuous.

On balance I'd say they're both great in different ways. I was meaning to sell my A7s when I bought the 1DC but I've found I can't yet bring myself to do it.

Nice - great look and grading. Which shots were pp5 and which were s-log?

Sorry if this is a silly question but is this 1DC lut available on it's own and if so how can I get it? I assume it's a LUT designed for grading 1DC C-Log footage?

I also shoot a lot of stills at events, although it's a distant second to the video. So I knew I needed something that did both and did it well. Another benefit of the 1DC is that it works perfectly with my Canon lenses which are cheaper and which I prefer to the Sony stuff. The A7RII caught my eye when I heard it has fast autofocus with EF lenses.

Thought I'd write down a few thoughts about having bought a 1DC as a A7s user. Before that I started off working on SVHS, PD150s, Canon DSLRs and then a GH2, a Blackmagic Pocket and a GX7 as my personal cameras. I've worked in TV, sports and events and now do mostly corporate stuff largely as a one-man-band.

I love my A7s, I really do. And I still haven't gotten the nerve to sell it as I was planning to when I bought the 1DC second hand. The reason I was looking to move on was that I was had experienced difficulty on jobs getting the colour of skin right. I do a lot of work indoors, and in mixed lighting. I also do a lot of work outside in bright sunlight. In both conditions I had difficulties, although in natural light I also had times when the A7s just nailed it.

However the times when it didn't quite work because of artificial light, or a wonky white balance or just some strange bad voodoo just got to me in the end and I decided I wanted a camera that could give me colours that just felt right - that felt real. Hence the 1DC.

First of all, it's a bit of a shock going back to a DSLR form after the tiny, light, inconspicuous and technologically packed A7s. Even the feel of the mirror flipping up just to see a live preview is quite jarring, also not having an EVF, peaking, zebras or any other modern conveniences. On the other hand the 1DC feels like a solid professional piece of high end kit, which is a nice feeling and I like to think causes me to be a little more deliberate in my use of it and even in my framing.

The picture, despite what I've been reading lately, isn't perfect. I haven't used an external monitor with it yet so I've been exposing by eye and by judgement, and when you get it wrong and underexpose it can be noisy. Likewise if you're not shooting in C-Log then the highlights are alarmingly easy to blow compared ot the A7s cine profiles. If you're shooting in 1080p modes too it has that slightly brittle quality to the colour and to the noise that I'd forgotten with the Sony. Whatever you say about the Sony colour, the picture is silky smooth even if you push it. I've rarely had the A7s image break up on me, even if I'm correcting exposure up or down a bit. With the Canon I feel I have to be a little careful again. It's a beautiful image in 4k, but just doesn't feel as elastic and silky as the Sony in 1080p.

However that silky smooth quality was also something that bugged me in the Sony sometimes. It can have a slightly unreal plasticy feel to it, as if you're watching waxworks instead of real living people. That's where the 1DC comes in.

Shooting Log and scrading with a lut and some simple curves - or even without the LUT - I can get beautiful natural looking tones from the Canon if it's lit and exposed well. It almost looks like Red Dragon raw in some cases. The highlight retention is also beautiful.

I'm still working out how I feel about it, but the 1DC has given me a renewed appreciation for just how easy to use the Sony is. I hear a lot of people bashing it for it's ergonomics but really we're spoiled, the camera is a little marvel. I'm still not sure which camera I'd choose to take out with me on a trip or a long job yet. I've been using the Canon to get used to it and in some ways I'm amazed and impressed by it, and in others I pine for the A7s. Sometimes it's a good thing to appreciate the strengths of what you have rather than expecting more expensive kit to be better in every way.

At the moment I feel like the Sony will give you good results in about 80% of situations, and only fall down in certain situations. I feel like the 1DC will give me breathtaking results in about 40% of situations, good results in about 30 pecent of situations, and disappointing results in 30% of situations. That's not based on evidence yet, just on a feeling. I hope that changes as I get used to it more. Initially I had a sinking feeling when I saw the reviews coming in from the A7RII, and regret that I hadn't used the 1DC money to buy one  of those. But now I'm starting to appreciate the magic this camera is capable of, and looking forward to digging out it's secrets.

Conclusion of the story - yes the 1DC is a beautiful beast, but the A7s is still a very capable and loveable little thing. I just wish I could have cracked how to make it sing in more cases.

If anyone's interested, here'a a little test film I shot on an afternoon out. Shallow DOP shots of grass, sun through tree leaves - you know the sort of thing. Also there's a girl in it too.

As someone who recently bought a 1DC purely for the time it saves me in grading skin, I'm seeing some real improvement so far in the samples from the A7RII over my A7s.

One of the footage samples from the A7rII even had a custom profile of cine 4 and S-Gamut and ungraded the footage looked great. You'd never get good looking footage out of the A7s with S-gamut without some significant grading.

I wonder if we'll get any confirmation if they've tweaked the colour science, or if it's to do with the different sensor.

Maybe because the test footage available looks like this - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ZNDoCA32ks

I'm liking the colour from this camera so far as opposed to the A7s. Could it be that everyone has learned to grade S-Log 2 suddenly? Or have Sony improved the colour science?

I've definitely had some moment watching the test footage, particularly Davide's film above, where I thought 'oh this feels real' that I seldom had with A7s footage.

Ah well as with all lucrative markets my opinion is that the corporate world is both difficult to crack and yet if you get your foot in the door it can be surprisingly easy to become a company's agency of choice just because in big business people often like to have a safe option. Once they know you can do a decent job it'll take a lot to dislodge you.

Which brings us back to the discussion about gear. I don't think for one second that most of the people with the power to hire you know much about camera specs or the latest and greatest technology. However they do care about results. There's actually a lot of pressure on people in the corporate world to 'do things'. Whether those 'things' actually make an impact or not is often not the point. The point is to be seen in the company to be a do-er, and to have something you can put on your list of 'achievements' when bonus time comes around. Which in marketing can translate to making/commissioning a cool looking and expensive video. And yes, it often is important that it's expensive.

When a marketing team commission a video they want it to be impressive, and to look better and sexier and bigger than the previous ones. Hiring a crew with a big and sexy looking camera is part of that, but another aspect (that's debated on this forum at times) is that there is such a thing in my opinion as an expensive look, which expensive cameras tend to give you. Sure you can make the greatest and most creative work of genius ever on a GH2, but something shot on a Red Epic carries a kind of weight in it's imaging that affects people even if they don't know what it is or why it has that effect.

If you're a marketing person you're more likely than not a little obsessed with image and look and feel. So it makes sense that an expensive crew with an expensive camera producing an expensive looking 'hollywood' type image is going to seem very attractive. Just my opinion.

As someone who works in corporate marketing and also does what I can in terms of production, this is exactly right in my experience. It doesn't have to be Red cameras necessarily - could be Arri, Blackmagic, Sony, whatever -  but knowing that you're hiring someone with a track record and high level kit makes me very confident in giving them money.

Wow, nice job Matthew. What did you do exactly to make that correction?

Yes I'm also waiting for this comparison. Also with the A7s in there too. Andrew's comparisons are excellent and I do trust his opinions in general - although the reviews often miss the vital ingredient of tests on skintones.

Colour is something I've been thinking of increasingly as an A7s owner. Despite trying many different things I just can't seem to reliably nail colour in this thing. I can get close and make it look good, but with quite a lot of tweaking and effort which does no good for my blood pressure in the professional environment.

Then on the other hand I've downloaded 1DC footage and with a simple luma curve created a look that blew my mind - so rich and natural looking. Hence my attention moving to the 1DC and NX1. If the NX1 can be used to get a 1DC type look then I'd be very interested. However from what I've seen of the Samsung so far it's got a problem with artificial looking sharpening and aggressive crushing of the blacks which looks digital and cheap.

I'd be interested in you throwing the A7s with a Shogun in there as well if you're talking about image comparisons. Not necessarily as part of the formal test, but just your opinion. I've been considering jumping from the A7s to either the NX1 or the 1DC. One of my main concerns with the NX1 though is that it will have less resale value a year down the line versus cameras from more established brands.

I have to admit I too am confused by what this article is saying. Are you making fun of the kind of people who would buy this, or aren't you?

If you are, then I do think that's unfair. Most of us started with little knowledge and some less than top level kit, just what we could afford, or indeed what we received as gifts from well meaning relatives who didn't know what the latest cool kit was.

If the article isn't making fun of those people, then I have no idea what it's trying to say.

Edit: Having said that, it is indeed a ridiculous box design.

​Is it just me, or are the S-Log clips from this camera so far looking a bit more natural and, well, nicer than the stuff from the A7s in terms of colour? Yes most of the stuff has been graded and are all desaturated and hipstery, but there's none of the off, weird green skin I'm used to... Could just be that they've been shot and graded properly.

I think it's impossible to judge based on this. It's heavily graded win Philip's typical style (raised blacks and James Miller's Deluts) - which I'm really not a fan of. Doesn't look cinematic at all to me, but I'm sure it's all about the grading.

loving the Lumetri colour panel so far. I've jumped right in and the way it integrates so many tools and adjustments seamlessly is a big game changer for me.

This is truely the worst camera showcase I can imagine, despite them obviously putting some resources into it.

Even the behind the scenes is shoddily made. Very strange of Samsung to promote this on their official channels.

I tried playing around with the broadcast colours in Premiere but it doesn't seem to have the same effect as Ebrahim's example.

Wow Ebrahim, that looks great. Ugly highlights are a real problem. Anyone know an equivalent in Adobe Premiere? Or any analysis of what's going on there?

Great colours J.F.R. That's the kind of look I'd love to learn to produce reliably.

Well this thread pretty much shows me that it's not the camera, it's my grading ability that needs to improve!

I do think the fact that visually exposing the camera in S-Log is tricky adds to the problems many people encounter as well. Seems like a lot of skin is poorly exposed (often over exposed in my opinion) often leading to pale washed out skin and weirdness.

I'm sorry to return to what is an old topic by now, but I'm wondering what people's thoughts are on this subject.

My own feeling is that I'm moving more and more away from S-Log and even the cine picture profiles and more towards capturing a rich colour palate in camera at the time of shooting.

Capturing in a flat or LOG profile in this camera seems to lead to milky, chalky kind of flat colour both in skin and in general. Now granted, that is also due to a lack of grading expertise, but I see this in so many videos and in my own work. I feel that the punchy rich colours that people love about the NX1 for example are possible in the A7s, but perhaps not in the profiles we've all been concentrating on.

Take for example Brandon Li's film Gateway to the Ganges - https://vimeo.com/116044343

i don't see any S-Log footage coming anywhere near that. 

While I appreciate the looks you can get from the S-Log footage, what i really find myself responding to these days is richness and depth of colours rather than the desaturated low contrast look which is so en vogue.

My current go-to profile has been Kholi's cine2 picture profile, but even that seems to lack that immediacy that says to the brain "This is real" that's hard to bring back in during grading.

Maybe I'm just doing it wrong.