tokhee

voted for the NX1!

Went to Porto on vacations this past week, what a wonderfull city ! Will be doing a video of it soon (trying to go for a watchtower of turkey feel). Anyway, I found a new 16-50S for 499€ and couldnt afford it, still bummed about it, but I might be able to get it, but its a shame I just got the 18-35mm...I dont really know what to do...
Also, tested some new in-cam settings, here are the graded results !













 
 

http://***URL removed***/forums/post/57659433
http://***URL removed***/forums/post/57659433
regards :-)

I really don't want to start a debate about Samsung so I am going to just say that that is your opinion and my opinion is that samsung makes many fantastic products with leading edge technology.
I also believe your statement about "Most of what they do is pretty shite or a sneaky copy of X" could be said about almost every company that has ever existed including apple, Cannon, Panasonic, Black Magic, etc. They all copy each other and they all make alot of shity products that is what competition is all about.

If you need great colors I would rather go for the NX1... (you also get great AF at the same time if you use NX S lenses)

I'm on a film festival committee.  Trust me when I say almost all indy movies look really good these days.  IQ looks on par with just about anything.  Even work that has limited dynamic range still looks pretty impressive.
As for all the other stuff that's actually more important in making a narrative film... well, not so much.
So, if you think what camera you're shooting with is what's holding you back.  IMHO, you're wrong.  So, you pick up and use what you're going to pick up and use.  That's it.  Stop thinking about the limitations of it.  You made the choice, move on.  Now, make smart lighting decisions.  Get a good audio guy (for god's sake please do this), concentrate on telling a good story, and find some actors that can actually do so.
Trust me, no one's going to give two shit(es) if you're dynamic range in 10 stops or 13.  Your skin tone looks a little goofy?  Oh well, I forgive you if you're showing me some interesting characters on screen.

I'd love to see someone post some footage from the new high bitrate 2.5k hack!
Let's remember, this topic is for footage and discussion of footage, not general discussion or whining about the community. Thanks!

Minor update, still doing what Im doing, still digging and documenting what changes Im finding in the firmware, have started to explore with telnet and the camera. Its looking good. Have a few ideas on how it utilizes firmware updates but nothing solid yet. But I like how both stages are progressing. Although i wish I had more to show haha but dumping c isnt going to have a point! I should have a major update in a few days though!

This is more along the lines of what I am working on. The bitrate mod that they did should be good for most. But I am diving deep into the fw, Still a good time away until my end shows any gains. But like I said a few posts ago the more I find the more excited I get. I can look at the mjpeg encoder cpp and see if things can me modded to allow a higher frame size. But again thats just adding to the list of things. But at least things have moved up! Maybe samsung will have an official word the more news of these mods get better known
 

Some interesting tidbits found tonight. 

"setpath    0 - 2(0:OTF/1:IPCout/2:RawOut/3:Ldc Out/4:120FPS OTF/5:120FPS IPC out
        6:120FPS Raw Out/7:120FPS Ldc Out/8:panorama/9:MFZoom)"
"sensorframerate    12,15,20,24,25,30,40,50,60,100,120,240
        outputframerate    12,15,20,24,25,30,40,50,60,100,120,240
dataframerate      12,15,20,24,25,30,40,50,60,100,120,240"

Still looking for the encoder though. To confirm srp or other hardware. But the closer it gets. And then the real fun happens!
I can look into the nx500 firmware deeper after I do the nx1 and see what can be added or changed. I do have a want for a nx500 b cam, especially as a gopro stand in due to them being cheaper! Make everyone want this samsung gear now that they cant get them. Maybe it was samsungs plan all along.
Edit
"HEVC Encoder
%s:%s(%d)> Width(%d) or height(%d) is not multiple of 8
%s:%s(%d)> HEVC[%d] Cfg WH %dx%d %d, BR:%dkbps GOP:%d > size 0x%x > return %d"
the full sensor read out should be possible with this also notice gop setting and bit rate.
 
I will have to look at the encoder.cpp file which is where things get more complicated but this is very good news.

I have a few githubs for other projects and its a good idea. it would be more of a blog, the amount of data I have examined would be too much to try to make sense of, as I said, I was working on this for my own personal goals a few months before I even found this thread.
Ill see if I can create something tangible in the next few days github wise and Ill post up. Alas text cant convey how excited I am as I go through all this info. I had a want for it to be a good system and it has surpassed my expectations. Great things can be done with it. 

Just finished my first Music Video, not exacly as I planned it would go, had some setbacks on filming and what not, but yet still pleased with how it turned out. Everything was shot on the NX1 and the aerials on the P3. Was a great challenge, doing something as "big" with such a tight budget, but loads of fun ! Let me know what you guys think =) 
 
 
Also, to anyone interested, heres the band iTunes page, they got some great songs =) https://itunes.apple.com/pt/album/new-dawn/id953049235?app=itunes&ign-mpt=uo%3D4

Hey, Guys. I wanna share my last job. It was a completely insane run and gun stealth job for a local artist making an urban intervention.
Gear used: A7r II, Sony FE 28mm F/2  (always in f/2) and Sigma ART 50mm with a Fotodiox adaptador (only a few shots).
Settings: 4k 24fps, Full frame and Crop Mode. Color: Autumn Leaves -1 -2 -3.  Used clear zoom in some shots too. AWB in all shots (specially horrible in sodium lights)
The great pro of this setup was the weight and the fact that it was perfect for point and shoot. I didn't have time to prepare, light or anything else. Probably the A7s II would made a better job with low lighting, but the superb AF (even with 50 ART + Fotodiox) plus the capability to use FF or APSC (and clear zoom( was a great deal. Hope you like it. It's not beautiful, but I think the message was delivered.
The Youtube compression is way better than vimeo (try to watch in 4k):
 
Context: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-35796529
http://edition.cnn.com/2016/03/13/americas/brazil-artist-protest/index.html
 
 
 

bit harsh don;t you think?
I don't know.  From the looks of it, they spent quite a few hours driving around the streets taking an awful lot of effort at night risking arrest and personal injury, for an artistic/political cause.  I expect at the time the shooter was under a lot of pressure to get the shots while keeping a look out for authorities. At least he's made a finished piece!  
 
I personally enjoyed the film.  looks nice.  well edited. serves the purpose.

I believe I have found the sdk for the srp. And quite a few examples of the c scripting style used before it is parsed into the machine state and binary. Working backwards it should be possible to figure out how it is compiled and explore what lies inside the system. It seems similar to an fpga so it shouldnt be very hard to dissect. Things that can be added over just changing the config files. Will update as I go. Keeping these updates short as I have a lot to do with making sure I fully understand the inner workings of this system.

Good news, bad news.

Good news is that I have learned a lot about the srp( samsung reconfigureable processor) architecture. Bad news. It is very very very very complicated. Machine compiled c into binary. Unknown yet when it is loaded into the firmware and if the .cpp files that are listed are infact that, or just other hard ware controls

So the srp is like an fpga in the way you can change what it does on the fly. It differs in the way that it uses VLIW instead of bits to do its magic.
Reverse engineering the binary into something workable.. is possible, but time will tell if and how much can be changed. The plus side of a simple isp changing values in softwear can do something like what the gh2 hack did. The downside being you are stuck with the hardware.
The plus side of the srp implementation.. Building a custom algorithm to..exchange the hevc codec with something else.. Could be possible. Unknown yet if the nr is a part of this or just a software implementation.

Also if the rumors were true about the ml guys approaching samsung, this would be why it didnt happen. They dont release the srp compiler. One instance of them giving access to it at the SAIT school in Korea is all I could find. very very proprietary.

But the dream for me of having a cheap 14bit 6.5k red competitor is what keeps me going. The confirmation of the UHS-II bus sweetens the deal. Going to investigate the possibility of a SD-SATA converter.. I wouldnt mind having a 1tb ssd attached to the back of the camera.


TL:DR This camera is complex and things are not getting easier but still progression is being made.

It was written in the .cpp files showing the hz of the sd bus, this would be an incremental increase test that would just be raising it until it crashes or to the limit stated by the sd association. And if it changes depending on what type of file is being written to it. As well as tracking the sensor and chip heat out put to see if it is underclocked for a reason. Lots of fun.
 
 
Not at the point yet, still tearing it down. The base tizen didnt seem to change much through the updates. It was the control files for the camera, written in c and a whole new ball game. I do about 15 hours of work into this a week, which isnt much considering but things are moving. If you wanted me to just make hello world appear it wouldnt really prove much, at least not in the way that this camera works.

 
 
Have not got to that point yet, still diving into the code and doing a control file comparison, as the updates for the camera happened they state what they changed, and that is what the major key point of what Im doing is. Its one of the nexts steps though. 
 
I can update as I progress and post summaries of what I find. Just to find the rgb888 and lut info I had to look though about 15000 lines of code. Its tedious. But worth while for me in the end, so I will continue to dig and deconstruct. And update!

I posted about the work Im doing on the firmware side of the nx1 a few pages back, but it was/still is hidden for some reason. 
**no longer hidden on page 11 at the bottom. Much more detail about what I have found on the camera.**
To sum it up, I have been working on this the better part of 6 months, didnt know anyone else was interested until I found this thread a bit over a week ago and posted my findings. Im at a point of comparing the changes in the firmware versions to see how the code is written. I have uncovered the bootloader, the file format and language used for their custom control files for tizen, info on lut, rgb 888, sd card bus speed(its quite low should be ush1 u3 but its not set close to the speed stated in the sd association docs) and a few more things. 
My goal is similar to what the guy said on the gh2 hack. I had a hacked 144mbs gh2 I used for 5 years until moisture killed it a few months ago. The tech inside the nx1 should be capeable of pushing the hevc and the sensor to the limit, even if it shortens the life by 4-5 years its still cheaper than a red by a magnitude.

Ideal goals for me are raw/compressed raw output, see if cdng or another compressed raw format would work. As red raw is just their version of jpeg2000 modded for cine work.
There is not a deadline I have set to finish this, as this is just one of many projects I have on the go but comparing it to other cameras its quite promising.

If anyone wants a chance on a cheap Zeiss or Voigtlander Prime, they can also do Gunpowder a solid.
They all cover full frame Canon, Sony, Panasonic, Olympus, Blackmagic or Samsung with a cheap adapter.
For eoshd members I will of course post extra pictures, answer comments etc if askes
More stuff will be for sale soon, but in the regular Gear Sale Thread.
 
Zeiss Jena 35mm f2.4
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/252301417245

Zeiss Jena 135mm f3.5
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/252301430295

Voigtlander 50mm f1.8
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/252301420627

Super-Takumar 55mm f1.8
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/252301412835

Jupiter-9 85mm f2.0
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/252301427311

Chinon 28mm f2.8
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/252301424599

All well said.
I also think motion cadence is related to true frames captured vs compressed motion. My nx1 and fs7 tests with sharpness on minus 10 or as off as it could be w leica r lenses still has that digital feel.
But yes always w digital sharpening off.
The f35 has a beautiful buttery feel but the pocket camera has more dynamic range. I would be curious to do a test. Also pocket camera vs 1d c.
Digital bolex....my issue w it is native oso feels like 200 asa and only 12 stops dynamic range plus just a fischer price like build. No offense to those who own it. Same poor build found in the original pocket camera. That lcd was hvx200 bad.
 
Robert bressom shot an entire film on the 35mm lens. What was the film called. And chivo...did children of men with just wides. No need for any type of lens. There are no rules. Just make the film look good to support the story.

I’ll admit it, I use camera forums a lot.  Too much, probably. I use them to check out the latest cameras and lenses and lights and accessories. I waste about two hours a day on them.  Time I could spend watching “the View.”
When I started out shooting part-time in 2005, I got a DVX100 because a juggler who was a featured extra on a tv show called “Sons of Saddam” told me to.  “Cause it does 24p.”  I didn’t know what that meant, but I plunked down $3,000 - all the money I had in savings on this camera.  
The camera could have been a bust.  But I did it because a juggler who played one of Saddam’s sons goons said so.  That’s how easily influenced I am.
Then I bought a HVX200, not even testing it first.  “Cause it can do HD.”   I bought the Redrock micro adapter because I watched the work of MacGreggor and some other DPs back then do stuff on a Gorilla 35 lens adapter that hadn’t even come out.  I hadn’t even tried it first.  Just sent in my credit card info.  
Rinse and repeat.
All these periods of time I bought things just based on videos I saw shot on them. No tests - I didn’t understand tests.  Just videos shot with them and the opinions of people I respected.  I could look at screen grabs but just scroll down to their opinions.
Well finally 11 years later, I am seeing what I was doing - buying based on people’s emotions.  Based on the emotions of people whose work I liked.
This is fine to do, but it’s not always the smartest thing to do.  
There are several, maybe twenty influential figures online in the cinematography world.  David Mullen, Shane Hurlbut, John Brawley, Art Adams, Geoff Boyle, and of course Andrew Reid, come to mind as leaders who people follow and listen to.
Even the opinions of the above people and the other influencers are, in the end, just their opinions.
When someone says, “this to me screams filmic” or “this looks digital” - again, that’s all an opinion.  If they say, “that grade is terrible” or “man you nailed the skin tones” - again, that’s all opinion.  Even looking at test charts and camera tests, the results are subjective.  Aesthetic is subjective.  There are scientific tests, but they lead to opinions.  This isn’t pure math - this is an art form.
There is no such thing as filmic.
Everything is digital.  Film emulsions see the world differently, but they go through a digital intermediate.  They become digital .  And I think that’s probably about 99.9% of all films shot on celluloid.  Maybe a few hipsters shoot film and use a steinbeck, but they still upload their results to vimeo, which converts this to a h.264 file.
I have very strong opinions, and a lot of people have very strong opinions.  That’s why we work in film.  It’s an art form that is full of passionate people.  But I also have low self-esteem.  My whole nature of existence is based on others approval.  I’m getting better at trusting my own self, but this is my basis.  
I think maybe most artists have low self-esteem or why would they want to share their art?  Is it ego?  Or the attempt for others to connect?  Yes that’s part of it.  But whether you want to admit it or not, we love when people love our work.  We live off the feedback, or why would we check vimeo 5 times a day to see if someone commented?  Why else would we have awards?  Especially in an art field where awards are just based on opinions of a community who may or may not get your work?
Something is beautiful if you think it is.  You don’t need an oscar in cinematography to be happy with your lighting or camera movement or angle, or have your opinion mean anything less if you aren’t in the ASC.  Everyone brings something unique to the art form.  Everyone brings a new perspective that is needed, especially now, when everything feels pretty much the same.  

No one cares, but here's a new teaser:
 
I wrapped the film yesterday. I got some good stuff. The rough cut is all done. I'm waiting to hear back from the composer of the first film.

I don't think I currently have the experience or time to successfully modify the NX1/NX500 firmware. I don't even have one of those cameras. However it would be a shame to let the interest in this die, so I guess I'll post some of my notes/thoughts about the firmware in hopes that it might help keep the ball rolling.
Note: if you aren't into technical minutiae, the only interesting part of this wall of text is the bulleted list at the end detailing what is and is not possible in my opinion.
Here are the files listed in the header of nx1.bin (version 1.4.0):
version.info:    offset=0x0          size=0x3F   (same as found in /etc/version.info)
linux image:    offset=0x0130       size=0x00624748
idk:                   offset=0x624878     size=0xD8E9
linux image:    offset=0x632161     size=0x3192E8
linux image:    offset=0x94B449     size=0x638518
idk:            offset=0xF83961     size=0x01FF10
idk:            offset=0xFA3871     size=0xB35140
rootfs:         offset=0x1AD89B1    size=0x117A89FF     (lzo compressed ext4 filesystem image)
opt:            offset=0x132813B0   size=0x58E91C   (lzo compressed ext4 filesystem image)
pcachelist:     offset=0x1380FCCC   size=0x7000 (PAGECACHELIST, preceded by a header, I think)
idk:            offset=0x13816CCC   size=0x35BCC44  (lzo compressed. header indicates swap image?)
Anyone with the skills to reverse engineer a camera could figure this out pretty easily, but it was fairly tedious so maybe this will save someone 20 minutes of poking around in a hex editor. If anyone knows what's up with the files I've labeled "idk," I would love to hear about it.
The checksum algorithm is fortunately unchanged from the NX300 as far as I can tell.
As documented at sites.google.com/site/nxcryptophotography/diy-firmware
"width=32 poly=0x04c11db7 init=0xffffffff refin=true refout=true xorout=0x00000000 check=0x340bc6d9 name="JAMCRC""
"jacksum -x -a crc:32,04c11db7,ffffffff,true,true,00000000 [file]"
The main camera app binary is (I'm pretty sure) located at /usr/apps/com.samsung.di-camera-app/bin/di-camera-app in the rootfs. It seems to access the hardware through a relatively high-level API with the /usr/lib/libmm* libraries. libmmf-camcorder.so is particularly interesting. The function I've focused my attention on is mmf_camcorder_set_attributes(), which comes from libffm-camcorder and is used repeatedly in di-camera-app. It conveniently (and strangely IMO) takes strings as identifiers for the attributes that are apparently being set (why not just an enum? I suppose I shouldn't look a gift horse in the mouth...). Some of those attributes include "target-time-limit," "audio-encoder-bitrate," and "video-encoder-bitrate." The guy who successfully removed the recording time limit on the NX300 did it by modifying the instructions that set the variable being passed along with "targe-time-limit." I found the control flow instructions he mentioned in that thread, so it should't be hard to get rid of the time limit on the NX1, provided the camera accepts the modified firmware. The NX500 is probably similar. The "video-encoder-bitrate" attribute also looks promising, though it would take some more advanced reverse engineering to figure out where the values are being set.
So from what I've seen and read, here is what I think is and is not possible to modify on the NX1 and NX500:
Remove time limit: Highly likely. Seems to be the same as the NX300. Pretty easy too, if there aren't any new security measures in place. Increased bitrate: Possible. Needs some real reverse engineering to find where the rates are set for each resolution and quality. Noise reduction and sharpening: Possible. Haven't seen anything that looks like it's controlling these, but if setting the bitrate works, this should be possible too. FWIW I think that increasing the bitrate would help with the noise reduction issues. H.265 tends to smooth things out a lot to achieve low bitrates. Re-enable 2.5k on NX500: Plausible but difficult. It depends on whether they just removed it from di-camera-app, or if they removed it from the underlying libraries as well. Either way it would likely require actually adding control flow to the binary, which opens a whole new can of worms. Beyond my current ability, for sure. Focus peaking for NX500 4k: Maybe? I have no idea, really. There might be a good reason they didn't include it, there might not. 4k crop on NX1: Plausible but even more difficult. We know the hardware can do it, but it was probably never implemented on the NX1, even in pre-production. Gamma profile on NX500: Plausible. Similar to porting the NX500's 4k crop to the NX1, I think. 6k 24fps H.265: Highly unlikely. The H.265 encoder would have to support frame sizes larger than DCI 4k and be able to handle twice the pixel rate (clock speed) of 4k. Furthermore it would require implementing a brand-new video mode at a very low level. I can't say for sure it's categorically impossible, but don't get your hopes up. 10bit H.265: Nope. The H.265 standard does indeed allow for 10bit encoding, but I highly doubt Samsung would include the significantly larger (wider busses, more complex encoding) hardware necessary to do it. It would be a miracle if Samsung had really decided to go to all that effort and not use it. 6k or full sensor 4k at more than 30fps or 1080p at (significantly) more than 120fps: Impossible. The image sensor simply isn't fast enough. If you hope for this you will just be disappointed! RAW Video: Not really. It might be theoretically possible to dump the live-view feed as in Magic Lantern. Who knows how fast the SD card interface is, though. Certainly no more than 1080p. I can imagine tricking the GPU into packing 12bit 4k RAW into 1080p 444 HDMI like Apertus, but consider that a pipe dream. Don't get your hopes up. Anyway, that was longer than I expected, but I enjoyed poking around in the firmware, so I don't regret it even if it comes to nothing. It's a shame Samsung appears to be dropping the NX line; they are cool little cameras.
p.s. If you know anything I've said is wrong, please correct me; I'm learning this as I go along.

Shoot in log and expose to the right. Don't believe the 35% middle grey Canon says in log. Aim for 50-60% with caucasian skin tones. ProRes is nice but it's really not much more detailed than the mp4 or AVCHD if you expose correctly. There are tests around youtube and vimeo outlining this. 

In my experience shooting Wide DR gets noisier and has more artifacts than c-log. I like to grade. When we say expose to the right we're talking about checking your waveform. Look for skin tones halfway up the meter.