kye

17 hours ago, MrSMW said:

I came to the conclusion early this year that until cameras come with internal VND’s that turn on or off depending on whether you are in stills or video mode, other than occasional times, it’s better to dedicate units to stills OR video.

I'm guessing you're quite sensitive to 180 shutter then?

I see more and more wedding videographers and even high-end YT channels use super-short shutter speeds rather than NDs.  With phones exposing via SS I think that most social-media-oriented folks have just gotten used to it.

6 hours ago, Kisaha said:

Sound is the single most important technical aspect of film making (taught in film school, and known by experience).

Maybe doing ADR would be much better and consistent. 

Also, the office sequences have a strange axis rule tweaking going on..or is just weird shot selection.

These are the 2 things that put me off a bit.

Did you think they were breaking the 180 line?

I'm curious because I didn't notice anything like that, or don't remember noticing anyway.  Maybe you're more sensitive to that than I am.

On 11/10/2022 at 7:58 AM, herein2020 said:

I know a lot of buyers of the EOS R really complained about the lag. They had one on display in a store once and I picked it up and just panned from side to side while looking through the viewfinder; the lag was so bad it was the final nail in the coffin for the EOS R for me. I was truly in disbelief that anyone was willing to put up with it.

I think at the end of the day I am probably the only one that notices the shots I missed or didn't get perfect while knowing the lag caused it. The only time when the client noticed as well was the ballerina shoot. She was giving me looks that made it clear she didn't know why I wasn't nailing her leg and arm placement mid leap. 

Honestly, I am probably just making it more than it is.  If I did not rely on flash so heavily or shoot so many specific situations that require both flash lighting as well as precision then the lag wouldn't bother me as much. With sports you can just hold down the shutter so mirrorless is definitely capable of capturing peak action even with the lag. At events people are used to redos over someone blinking so that's not a big deal either.

For 99% of my work, only I will know when I missed the exact moment I wanted due to the EVF lag so I can live with that.

I think it's highly dependent on the situation.

This article details the process to get the below shot - apparently these birds dive at around 25mph and even when using 10fps burst mode on a D4 most frames didn't even include the bird at all so it took about 720,000 photos to get a perfect one:

In terms of if it matters or not, I find that in my own personal work my experience of shooting is highly dependent on if I feel that I'm getting footage I like.  That might be different if I was merely trying to please a client in order to put food on the table and new lenses in the collection, but who knows - we're all different and keeping up morale and creativity is a personal thing.

On 11/9/2022 at 11:47 PM, Marcio Kabke Pinheiro said:

Kind of a lottery.

Went to a festival some days ago, they stated clearly "no professional or ILD cameras allowed", which blurries the boundaries even more, hehehe. Did not wanted to risk it, brought an old Sony HX9, some usable stills shots.

In the entrance, saw a hipster trying to bring in a Leica M with a 50mm Summicron - not the best combo for a 20000+ people festival, I must say. 😄 The security just asked "it changes lenses" and the idiot said "yes". The guard was in a good mood and just said "ok...go in".

In general, they just hate "DSLR style" cameras (hence my preference for "rangefinder" bodies - not for nostalgia, is just everybody thinks it is a film camera). With my m4/3 bodies, the only concert that my cameras were banned was when I brought a GH2 with kit lens (because it looks "DSLR") some years ago...all the GXs, even with tele lens, no problem at all.

Probably my X-S10 with the 55-200 would be green lit, but since would be a time consuming trip to my home, did not wanted to risk. But the FZ1000 is getting on just in case, for big festivals could be indeed a good choice - usually the stage is well it and the smaller sensor would be less of an issue.

Yeah, that's the kind of challenge I have with cameras..   the rules aren't clear, the security guards aren't experts, and you don't want to have to leave anything with them (or sometimes you simply can't leave anything with them).

One temple I went to in Bangkok had a sign...  8mm film cameras are OK, 16mm film cameras are not.  This was in 2018.  I wish I'd taken a photo of it.  I'm not sure how they'd have classified my GH5, so I tried to keep a low profile.

Here's a video showing some ARRI Alexa Classic footage upscaled to 8K with Topaz.  It's in bits throughout the second half of the video.

https://youtu.be/YJpQCSFZMTM

(link won't expand, not sure why)

TBH I thought the results looked quite mixed - some shots looked much higher resolution but other shots just looked the same (had the same 2K film-like rendering and noise) so I guess it depends on your tastes and input footage.

This might be a better real-world test as it doesn't seem to be only the cherry-picked footage that gives great results.

19 hours ago, Marcio Kabke Pinheiro said:

You always note the difference - I tought than moving from the 20mp m4/3 to 26mp X-mount will not bring too much of a difference, but I was wrong. Both in quality and storage requirements...

For some instances, 40mp would be very useful. For concert shooting, the ability to crop from 40mp to 20mp would be very welcome. But for "no crop" work, not so much.

One thing that was never explained (or tested): if you drop the resolution from 40mp to 20mp in stills, it is oversampled or line-skipped? If you don't need the 40mp for some work, a oversampled 20mp image could both bring less storage requirements AND (maybe) more color accuracy. This would be a very interesting alternative to me - albeit, if oversampled, probably would not diminish rolling shutter (could even increase it).

And for video, the 40mp sensor needing to crop to be oversampled in 4k was a HUGE bummer.
 

Oh yeah, extra resolution is noticeable - especially when you're the one taking the shots and able to pixel-pee in post.

I guess the challenge I have with high resolution is that it only excites my brain - any image that has made me FEEL anything has either been 2MP or analog, and most of the seriously emotional images were actually slightly blurry.

I don't know if higher resolution stops me from feeling something or stops the shooter from creating emotive images, but whatever it is, as resolution goes up they become less important.

I've heard he wants to take it in the direction of WeChat.  If that's true, and he pulls it off, he'll make an absolute killing.  There is definitely demand for many of the extra features that WeChat has that twitter doesn't, so it'll be a matter of implementation.  Twitter seems to have been devoid of any serious innovation for quite a long time now.

18 hours ago, Marcio Kabke Pinheiro said:

Music festival / venues are becoming more strict here and started to ban all ILC cameras, hence I needed a fixed lens one.

How do they assess if it's a MILC or fixed lens?  I wonder if a small enough camera with a "fixed" looking lens would work?

11 hours ago, herein2020 said:

I think that would work fine for something with a predictable trajectory like a person walking or in a situation like the ballerina where you can just hold down the shutter and pick the best one later (if you are using continuous lighting); but it is impossible to predict something that happens with completely unpredictability when combined with flash synch constraints as well as an EVF which is only showing you something that already happened. There is no way to predict a quick dress flip, hair toss, over the shoulder glance, etc. when the EVF is so far behind you don't even see it until it is over.

It is kind of ironic because my keeper rate for sharp images went up due to the improved AF of the R5, then went back down due to the EVF lag so I ended up around where I started. I would actually prefer an occasional out of focus image to what I am dealing with now which is missing peak action moments.

I have to imagine that most people who are fine with the EVF lag aren't filming the type of subject matter that I am where I am so dependent on flash recycle times.  Don't get me wrong though, for pretty much everything else I shoot (headshots, portraits, events, etc. etc.) the R5 is great since I can either redo, everything is predictable, or there is continuous lighting (the sun).  But it really irks me when I get in situations where an OVF would be far more reliable after paying so much for the R5.

Yes, being able to anticipate the moment and compensate for it by hitting the button early would be highly dependent on how predictable the perfect moment is, how long the delay time is, and how good you are at compensating for the delay.

It seems like you have particularly good timing and are operating in less predictable scenarios so the performance on offer isn't sufficient to meet your needs.  Pity.  Ultimately though, you have to go with what gets you the most keepers.  After all, cameras are tools, not toys, right 🙂 

3 hours ago, Rhood said:

Thanks for the tip. I don't wear glasses.
I had thought about the diopter, but didn't know the not focusing looking directly at subject and switching to the viewfinder.

Might go with a recent iPhone at the moment. And maybe next year go for XH2S and have the XT3 as backup and replace my 550D.

I've found that adjusting diopters can be really tricky because if you adjust them then your eye just adjusts to compensate, so your eyes kind of don't tell you when the diopter is adjusted wrong - you just end up with eye strain after a while and you don't really know why.

21 hours ago, gt3rs said:

Regarding the EVF latency I'm really not sure what to say and it is probably that some people adapt better than the others.

Getting used to there being a delay in something is absolutely a thing.  

I've had the experience several times where I went from something that had a delay to something that had less delay and the sensation that you get is that the thing happens before you hit the button!  
Obviously it wasn't beforehand, but I was so used to the delay being there that my brain had eliminated it.

Some people may be better at adapting to small delays than others of course.

23 hours ago, Django said:

Never meant to single out the FX30. Really all I'm saying is I'd like mirrorless manufacturers in general to focus bit more on RS. We've got 10-bit log, we've got RAW, ProRes, 4K120/6K/8K etc. But read-out times are still average to poor on most of these prosumer cameras. I understand stacked sensor tech is still fairly new and expensive, I just can't wait to see it in every hybrid. XH2S is the only affordable large sensor camera that seems to sport one at the moment.

What is the bottle-neck on most cameras?  is it the sensor, or some chip that is receiving the data down the line?  

If it's the latter then it could be something that could get a bump by buying a faster processor for whatever function that is, but if it's the former then it's really about the sensor and I suspect there's probably no free lunch in that regard.  If you want a faster read-out then you tend to only get one with lower resolutions or lower bit-depths.  

In that sense, manufacturers have been upgrading the data rates but instead of giving us the same resolution as the last generation and better RS, they're giving us more pixels and same/worse RS.  Just another reason why this resolution fetish is screwing the majority of us for the sake of a few people who actually benefit.

22 hours ago, TomTheDP said:

@kye @OleB

Here are some comparisons. 

One with pure tungsten, one with a 5600k and RED light, one daylight shadows, and one daylight sun. Hopefully these are helpful. Worst part of this is uploading to the drive takes like 12 hours lol. 

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1qxyxV-fFrBnyAh66joyRlgc2J6Xwbn7J?usp=share_link

I actually did expose both cameras exactly the same as they looked similar at the same ISO. Outside shots were at F11-F16 and further adjusted with the shutter. Lenses were Meike 35mm on Alexa and Meike 50mm on the Sigma. 

I'm also downloading, but it'll take some time (both to download and to check them out!).

Thanks, this should be really interesting.

Do you have some thoughts after shooting it?  I presume you've had a bit of a look at how they compare?

1 hour ago, Owlgreen said:

Do you know any model names?

No, but I think it might have been either on the DSLR Video Shooter YT channel or on the Anamorphic on a Budget channel.  I vaguely remember that it might have been in a monitor roundup style video where they compare various monitors, but I can't recall exactly.

Hope that helps, although googling things like "custom desqueeze monitor" etc might generate some results?

1 hour ago, A_Urquhart said:

Ha, that really rolls off the tongue....how do you pronounce MILVC? 😉

Or mil-vuc

Or mil-vac

Or M-ilv-K

1 hour ago, MrSMW said:

If I had to put a label on it, it would neither be 'hybrid' nor 'cinema', but probably what it is; a MILVC.

In terms of the label, it doesn't help at all.  Every camera from an Alexa LF to the OG BMPCC to a Sony VG900 Handycam is a MILVC.

2 hours ago, Owlgreen said:

Effectively, I want to be able to turn the anamorphic elements of the lens 90° relative to the way they would typically be oriented. The axis of the desqueeze would then also need to be rotated 90° for proper monitoring. 

That makes more sense.  I'm assuming the de-squeeze functions of the monitors aren't orientation specific - otherwise just tilting the monitor would fix it.

I'm not aware of any, but I'd suggest that @Tito Ferradans might be the best person to ask, if he's around and notices I've tagged him 🙂 

I know there are monitors around where you can enter the squeeze factor yourself rather than choosing pre-defined values, but I don't know if they would go <1.

I'm confused.  Anamorphic lenses squeeze the image and the monitor de-squeezes it so that round things stay round and your actors don't sue you.

If you're shooting with an anamorphic lens then wouldn't you still need to have a monitor that desqueezes it?  Or do you want to have people looking like bean poles / trolls?

7 hours ago, A_Urquhart said:

In addition......The ability to zoom in 1.5 times in 4K or 2x in HD with no apparent loss in quality due to the oversampled sensor is an interesting feature. Just playing at this stage so haven't tested if it is actually lossless but zooming on primes is novel! 

This is how I operate my GH5 - using MF primes and getting extra reach using the 2x digital zoom which recording 1080p on the GH5 is still oversampled from 2.5K.  The only issue with such a setup is if your lenses are sharp enough!

Hardly anyone seems to shoot this way as it's basically never talked about, which means that this feature set isn't that common - even the GH6 doesn't have it.  It's a big deal for me because I've literally designed my lens set around this feature.

4 hours ago, A_Urquhart said:

After playing with it for a few hours.....I don't think the FX30 should really be compared to hybrid cameras as that's not it's focus. It's a video camera (or 'cinema camera' as they seem to be called these days!). I think it's closest competition is the Pocket 6k or Canon C70. 

It's much more like a video camera to use, which to me is a good thing. Has proper Audio and timecode capabilities, not likely to overheat as it has a fan, supports 4 channel 24bit audio recording, doesn't have the 30min record limit many other cameras have when shooting 10bit codecs etc etc.

These conveniences when used in a professional environment are invaluable and well worth the asking price. Sure, If you have no need for them then they are kinda pointless but this is why you shouldn't compare this to many hybrid cameras. 

I agree that it should be compared to video/cinema cameras, not hybrids, although these days there's a spectrum on the video-side of cameras between completely manual cinema cameras and completely automatic video cameras, with many cameras sitting somewhere in-between, so a lot of cameras have video features that are hybrids of cinema and video cameras.  This spectrum isn't something that most people are really that aware of, and people just seem to look at the video functions of cameras as a random soup of potential features that have no overall structure or philosophy, which TBH couldn't be further from the truth.

1 hour ago, Matt Kieley said:

like some of the sign replacement VFX shots

There were sign replacement VFX shots?  Didn't notice them at all.

16 hours ago, Rhood said:

Hi all,

I love a viewfinder. I really do.
But after seeing through the viewfinder, my vision gets blurred for a few seconds.
I've been having this for quite a long time now, and it's getting worse.
Does anybody have this too?

So now I'm trying to let go of the viewfinder.
I have an XT3 which I use for studio work (and film projects), there it's quite easy to not use the viewfinder.
But I also have a Canon 550D which I still use for point & shoot kind of stuff, not in the compact way that I take it everywhere with me. 
More in the sense of filmset, concert, bands, vacation, etc.
I use the 550D viewfinder only, the screen live view is not very useable for me. A small vintage manual focus 50mm f1.4 lens is almost permanently attached to it.

So the 550D kind of needs a change...
Any advice, suggestions or thoughts? 

If you need some parameters
• I like the 550D's grip's form factor style (the XT3 even with small rig's L bracket grip is slightly awkward handling)
• Some articulation in the screen is good
• If it has a pancake lens with autofocus in the 50mm range, that's great (I do like an aperture ring, but that's probably too much to ask)
• I like dedicated buttons, like with the Fuji X range. But I'm open to other stuff.
• Has to be able to shoot RAW (stills), and the RAW format should be supported by Capture One. 
• Better low light performance than the 550D now that we're changing.
• Budget, let's say around 500. (flexible)

List of things I'm considering
• Fuji XE with a grip attachment (but the 50mm lenses stick out quite a bit, could vintage lens but also quite sticking out)
• Fuji X-Pro with a grip attachment (but the 50mm lenses stick out quite a bit, could vintage lens but also quite sticking out)
• Sigma Quattro seems like nice grip, but the camera seems quite big. Also not sure if C1 supports, and lens mount is sticking out a lot
• A new iPhone with one of those dedicated camera grip things and a (tele)lens attachment. (I actually hate taking pictures with smartphone, but maybe not with these toys)
• Fuji X100 if it had a 50mm f1.8 (or lower) I would have chosen already.

Have you tried adjusting the EVF diopter?  It sounds like yours isn't adjusted properly.  My understanding of how to adjust them is to set it so that your eye doesn't have to change focus when looking at the subject directly and looking at the subject through the viewfinder.

These adjustments are super-powerful - my dad wears pretty strong glasses (which obviously aren't compatible with putting your eye right up to the viewfinder) and he's always been able to adjust them to compensate for his vision, so they're at least as powerful as a pair of relatively strong prescription glasses.  

5 hours ago, TomTheDP said:

Yeah I know some shooters who still prefer the 5D over the likes of the Panasonic S1 or Pocket 4k. 

I am super happy with the performance of the Sigma FP which is only 12 bits. Maybe color depth beyond that isn't that important. Who knows 

Yes, the FP is a fascinating data point - having a spectacular image but it not being "better" in many/most of the specs that we tend to pay attention to.  Food for thought.

5 hours ago, herein2020 said:

Not everything comes down to specs,

+1.

I think that how the camera makes you feel when operating is very under-rated, and even more-so if you're also directing.  I've shot with cameras before that just make you feel like you're fighting it the whole time - the exact opposite headspace than you want to be in when doing something creative.

I know that I find the GH5 to be particularly pleasing to use, partly because it's a reliable and comfortable in the hand, but also because I know the images it captures are almost always really nice to edit / colour in post, to which I attribute the IBIS, high-bitrate 10-bit log, and my favourite lenses which are fast primes.

10 hours ago, Alexis Fontana said:

I’m in the summerhouse and bored.

If you have a shot that you would like a look on then grab a still and post it here. Exr or tiff, and in LOG is nice. Please tell me what camera it’s shot on so I can make an accurate conversion.

 

Wide shots or close ups with skin tones (macro stuff of flowers and objects are less interesting 🫠)

 

And maybe someone wants to challenge me so we can make a nice little competition.

 

Hit me!

Fun thread!

I'm happy to dig up a few stills.  Did you want nice easy ones, or some more challenging ones?  🙂

5 hours ago, TomTheDP said:

Honestly 12 bit RAW isn't a RED or ARRI competitor. To me that is the difference between a lot of lower end cameras compared to Venice, ARRI or RED.

RED and Venice are doing 16 bit and the ARRI is 14 bit readout into a 12 bit log Prores or RAW. These other cameras are doing a 12 bit readout into 12 bit linear RAW. It isn't the same. Maybe I am being too spec obsessive though. If the image looks good you can't argue with it. 

Yeah, I thought that 12-bit RAW sensor readout (and the corresponding 10bit log) was pretty much the standard on almost all cameras that have a log profile.  I thought that some cameras had a 14-bit readout but it wasn't that common.

Of course, that is just another feather in the cap for 5D with Magic Lantern - 14-bit RAW straight to the card.  Still a standout spec and stand-out image, 14 years later.

14 hours ago, bjohn said:

I know this is way off topic, but I read somewhere that the newest generation of Nikon batteries that fit the original Pocket have longer life: you can probably run the Pocket for a whole 20-25 minutes on one instead of the 10-15 minutes max that I got from my old ones. I just use a NP-F adapter nowadays; haven't used internal batteries in years.

The latest batteries for the OG BMPCC get WAY more than that - I got 49 minutes of RAW recording from one 1200mAh battery, and 33 minutes of Prores HQ from a different battery (but it wasn't fully charged).

I unpacked the brand new Wasabi 1200mAh batteries and put them on to charge, so the test was done taking a brand new battery straight out of the charger. I was recording in RAW the card filled up after 23m, with the battery at 54%, so I formatted the card and hit record again, and when it got to 5% battery life it was at 26m, which makes 49m for one the life of a single 1200mAh battery.  That's probably a best-case scenario, but it's pretty darn good if you ask me.  

Second brand new battery recording Prores HQ died around the 20% battery mark, and recorded a 33:22s file.  I'm not sure if it charged properly as the charger kept turning off but it only registered 81% in the camera when I put it in, so maybe not fully charged, but that's also not bad.

This is approaching the battery life of the modern gigapixel monsters that dominate the market now.  The BMPCC battery life complaints are something that used to be bad but are much more 'normal' now, not great, but not unheard of either.