kye

13 hours ago, lsquare said:

So the reason why ProRes RAW has my attention is because the Panasonic GH7 has it. It seems like more and more consumer/prosumer cameras have some form of ProRes recording rather than CinemaDNG. I guess whether it has "true" RAW or not isn't really the issue. I want to be able to adjust the white balance on my videos in post with little to no loss in quality like I can with RAW images. This is why I never shoot in JPEG. I have never really worried about file sizes. Storage is cheap even though I deal with video. 

You can actually adjust WB and exposure of LOG images just like they are RAW if you have the right colour management setup.  It's complicated, but there is a lot of good info out there if you're curious.

6 minutes ago, eatstoomuchjam said:

Again, if you want to say that a given lens has a look associated with it, that is completely true and accurate and real.  But that's not a "medium format look."  I have a Mamiya 7.  It uses sharp, modern, high-contrast lenses that are basically optically perfect.  Does it not have a medium format look?  Does my Fuji G617 have a large format look despite not supporting movements and having a modern sharp lens and (at best) moderately shallow DOF due to the 105mm f/8 lens?

When I put my 50/1 Noctilux on my camera, do I instantly get a medium format look when it's wide open?  That lens has lots of character/design flaws and extremely shallow DOF.  Does the Noctilux have more of a medium format look than the Mamiya 7's 65mm f/4 does on 6x7cm film (equal to about a 32.5mm f/2 lens in FF terms)?  What if instead I use the v1 Canon 35mm f/1.4L?  Shallower depth of field + seems to be loved by the "3d pop" crowd.  Is Army of the Dead the most medium format-looking film of all time since it was shot entirely with the Canon 50/0.95 dream lens wide open?  That lens is LOADED with character and the DOF in that film is shallow to the point of being obnoxious.

By many of the definitions that are being bandied about, I have medium and large format cameras that cannot have a medium or large format look and I have smaller format cameras that have a ton of it.

There are no definitions of looks.  You can't assess if something has the medium format look with a checklist.  Ask different people what the look is and you'll get different answers, because people notice different things.  There are commonalities, sure, but it's not a precise thing.

Also, not all lenses have the same character.  Your Noctilux 50mm F1.0 lens might have completely different optical aberrations than the average vintage MF lens, so the feel of it would be very different.

It's like cooking.  If two people make cakes with the same ratios of flour and water and sugar and eggs, and then all add "flavouring" then will they taste the same?  Of course not.  The "flavouring" matters, and can vary hugely.

Imagine comparing 8mm film and iPhone 4 video.  We could go through every category of image assessment and rate them and maybe we'd conclude they both had video quality at 5/10.  Do they look the same?  Of course not, because the individual characteristics that make up the "8mm look" and the "iPhone 4 look" are very different, despite the fact they've both got a similar amount of imperfections / character / aberrations / etc.

It's like if you're making a horror film vs a rom-com.  In the horror film you don't just use "horror lenses" or "horror angles" or "horror lighting" or "horror music" or "horror dialogue" or "horror sound design" or "horror colour grading" etc.  The horror in the film comes from using all of them.  Hopefully the rom-com uses completely different elements in all departments too..  the "look" or "feel" of the final film comes from the combination of many subtle elements combined together.  Same with images.

People that are into lenses look at sample images and can read them like a book.  Some people can even tell what optical formula the lens uses from looking at a single image.  The clues are very subtle, but they're all there.

5 hours ago, lsquare said:

I always want to shoot at the highest resolution possible.

Why?

There is absolutely a difference of looks between the formats, but it doesn't mean lens equivalency is false.

Lens equivalency says that "all else being equal, a 28/2.8 will look the same on FF as a 14/1.4 on MFT" but the thing is, actually making a 28mm F2.8 lens and a 14mm F1.4 lens would end up with subtle differences in how you would do that.

The "look" is really a combination of the subtle differences in lens design.  The MF look is probably just as much an artefact of history and would incorporate the lens design quirks of the time.  A modern MF camera with optically pristine lenses wouldn't have as much of the look as an MF film camera with vintage MF glass.  A FF camera with a super-fast lens that has the same design flaws as the common MF lenses would have a lot of the MF look.

Lenses aren't perfect, and much of the "look" is due to the imperfections.  Reducing the discussion down to FOV and DOF is throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

1 hour ago, John Matthews said:

Let's remember the great Francis Ford Coppola Preferred the hacked GH2 image! That must have pissed someone off. In my opinion, pissing people off by shooting "lesser" gear is a good reason to continue to do so. I still use my GH2, old reliable, and get paid for it.

My vague memory was that the GH2 image was more contrasty and had more edge, more of a look to it.  From that perspective I can see why someone might prefer it, especially if they had something in their mind about the vibe of the footage and that look was better suited.

My experience of the blind tests is that it's all about colour for me, except if there is something obviously wrong with one of the cameras like the codec is breaking or something.  I also don't care about resolution after 1080p because I find 4K etc too sharp unless something has been done to tame it, so in these tests I would actually have a slight preference for lower resolution cameras, but ultimately the colour wins out, and that's why I pick the most expensive ones.  I think that's because I know you can make an image look less nice, but making them more nice is virtually impossible.

Perhaps the only exception to picking the most expensive cameras was the test that Tom Antos did with an Alexa and some BM cameras and others, where I rated the Alexa lower, but that was because it was massively green for some reason, so perhaps something went wrong in doing the test.  I'm not critical of Tom though, actually doing your own tests is completely unforgiving and it's easy to miss something.  It's also not the same as real shooting, so it's not something that you benefit from shooting a lot either.

In the blind tests I must admit that I have really enjoyed the image from the modern BM cameras (P6K and UMP12K and newer) and because this was done blind I know I actually do like them.  The differences in the blind tests are often much less than when looking at footage, I suspect it's partly because of prejudice but mostly because when people have access to an Alexa they mostly know what they're doing and use great lenses and light and grade the images really well, so comparing two tests when one is done by 10 professionals in a studio with $10K of lighting and the other is done by some guy in his garage on the weekend, well, you're going to prefer the Alexa of course!

That reminds me of this test from a long time ago which has many of the worlds most sought-after lenses, but at 54:40 it has the brilliantly named Dog Schidt lens, which is a Helios 58mm with the coatings removed so they flare a lot.  The frames where it's stopped down to F4 (55:32) and without a light creating heaps of flare will show that it's actually a very nice looking lens, and helps you 'calibrate' yourself to the setup they have for the test - very high quality images indeed.

1 hour ago, IronFilm said:

Nope. 

https://www.eoshd.com/news/zacuto-revenge-shootout-part-2-results-revealed-francis-ford-coppola-and-audience-majority-give-win-to-gh2/ 

I did that test, blind, scoring and taking notes and reviewed my answers.

Then I looked up which was which.

Then I looked up what each of them cost.

Then I cried.

I wish there was some kind of prize for being able to sort them in descending order of price, blind, but no reward came.

Sadly, I've done that more than once in blind tests.

1 hour ago, John Matthews said:

One thing I learned from watching those videos was that if you take 2 Alexas and film the same thing at the same time with the same WB, you still have the possibility of having visible variations in color. This was a big surprise to me and it's no surprise to me that there would be even more variations with a GH7. I guess even $100k cinema cameras have copy variation and DP's continue using Alexas. The real question is: does it really matter so much? I think if you're a pro colorist, you can make any cameras appear similar enough that only a pro colorist would know the difference. In short, I don't think it really matters for 99.9% of the time. This is probably more about workflow.

This is why I have emphasised colour grading to folks.  Over. and. over. again. lol.

I know you finish your images in post and don't expect the camera to create completely finished images, so you're one of the few who understands that a file on the card isn't a finished image, but there aren't that many of us in amateur circles.

It really goes to show how ridiculous it is when people are nit-picking straight 709 conversions, as if this is what matters - as if anyone professional would ever use that for literally anything.  Even the BTS would get a LUT or basic 5-minute look applied over it.

For most high-end films and TV shows, the final grade is more different to a straight 709 conversion than the differences between the 709 conversions of completely different brands of cameras.

1 hour ago, John Matthews said:

On a side note, I thought the GH7 looked better than the Alexa in most of the shots with a simple 709 Lut. Blasphemy?

Not at all...   with colour if it looks good, then it is good.

The rest is preference and the creative vision for the project.

1 hour ago, zlfan said:

is it better than go pro 12?

I can make go pro 12 footage surreal looking. 

will this one have enough info in the footage?

or better yet, will there be enough content in the footage?

3 hours ago, PPNS said:

i guess its a nicer starting point than the v log conversion.

It might be.  The only way would be to get your hands on the files yourself, or to have a professional colourist weigh in (which I have suggested....:) )

2 hours ago, BTM_Pix said:

I think you might be surprised.

Shooting baked in and not noodling around in Resolve has a great appeal to many people who have either tired of the noodling or are entirely put off by the noodling.

And its not particularly about a skill deficit either.

A lot of stuff I've seen people doing in Resolve has gone from node trees to node forests and I think a lot of people will appreciate and be more productive with a more straightforward approach.

So, its not necessarily about the profile per se in terms of how it shapes up vs V-LOG, its about it being the authentic starting point for those ARRI looks and having the choice to just load one up and get on with it.

Yes, this is entirely possible with Panasonic's own V-LOG luts so there is nothing new here except the question of do these ARRI looks look better if I want to shoot baked in ?

The jury will be out on that for a few months.

I don't know, you might be right, but half of what you say makes little to no logical sense.  But, people don't make sense, so that's hardly a good predictor.

The number of nodes in a node graph is a bit of a red herring really:

• Pros often only have half a dozen nodes to start off with
• Huge node trees aren't more complex than simple ones, they just do one operation per node, if you tweak each dial in LightRoom then you're making 15-20 adjustments, so it's not like the pros make more adjustments necessarily
• Spending $200 extra to have LogC, and still needing to do significant colour grading to the image (which is needed for Alexas and V-Log cameras alike), but not wanting to have a node with a CST in it makes very little sense...  like saying no to climbing Everest because you can't be bothered putting your socks on

I really only see two situations where it would make sense.

The first is where you like the GH7 LogC + ARRI LUT look a lot better as a starting point for the grade than you like the GH7 VLog + CST + ARRI LUT.  

The second is where you want to match it to an Alexa and the LogC gets you closer as a starting position.

Not recommended, but possible.

Epic rig....

26 minutes ago, BTM_Pix said:

I think a big bonus for this for GH7 owners will be being able to use Arri's free online Look Library tool to preview and download pre-made authorised LUTs to get fast and painless results in camera.

A bit of a downer for the LUT peddling bros though.

https://www.arri.com/en/learn-help/learn-help-camera-system/image-science/look-files#/ict/looks/view/sw/ref/3/a/0/b/4/fav/r55i

 

I think the LUT bros are going to lose market share to the Film Look Creator when Resolve 19 comes out of beta, but realistically there will probably be so much market growth with new video creators that their sales might still rise in absolute terms.

I'm wondering how much more we'll hear about the GH7 LogC.  It's early so people are still finding out and maybe there will be all this information and body of knowledge that gradually makes it into the non-industry / YT / online space, but I also wonder if "GH7 LogC doesn't match Alexa" will be the last we hear from it and it just disappears.

ARRI have been talking about the "workflow" benefits, and the ARRI guy said that it allows people to put LogC footage into the NLE and then grade in the log space and then convert to 709 at the end, instead of starting with 709 footage and grading that.  When I heard that I was just like "huh?" because people buying flagship cameras haven't done that in a decade, and even colourists are gradually moving from grading in LogC to ACES or Davinci Intermediate.

Maybe I'm missing something incredible, but if so, no-one has said anything yet, and I subscribe to the right kinds of places to hear it...

4 hours ago, Emanuel said:

I stand BTW... what people do to justify the existence of their useless jobs and salaries...

I've seen the insides of a significant number of offices, and I can assure you, useless people who can survive in the corporate environment can easily do it without creating any tangible outputs at all.  It's incredibly difficult to actually deliver IT changes in a large enterprise IT environment, so only the most switched on and talented people are able to do it.

Saying that people are successfully making changes to justify their useless jobs is kind of like saying that there are all these useless film-makers making feature films that get cinema releases just to justify themselves.

2 hours ago, zlfan said:

in the comment, he mentioned that the whole project was 10 million bucks, there were 25 camera rigs for realtime streaming. that means about 30 grands for each cam for this single project. 

That's the US...  so a budget of 30K per cam minus 25K for insurance coverage leaves 5K... 

21 hours ago, lsquare said:

I'm just learning about this format. Isn't RAW just RAW? Why would there be ProRes RAW and ProRes RAW HQ? Are both of these formats truly RAW like CinemaDNG?

I'd suggest not getting too far into the weeds with this - people get all funny about things like this when in reality they don't really have much significance.

Start with a goal, such as the ability to shoot some situation or other and have the final graded results be of a certain quality, and then work out what is required for that.

Others might disagree about this, but I think there isn't a single situation where the difference between uncompressed raw and 3:1 compressed raw actually makes any visible difference to the final edit, let alone what is visible once it is compressed to the deliverable.  Doubly-so if you're delivering to a streaming service who will compress the living daylights out of the file.

6 hours ago, PPNS said:

tastelessly shot and lit imo. they really couldve used olan collardy again

...a skintone comparison it sure 'aint!

But if you know what you're looking at then other things can be inferred.

13 hours ago, eatstoomuchjam said:

Also keep in mind that the giants have become so giant that it somewhat flips the usual rules when it comes to improving the user interface to delight users.  If YouTube make the interface worse, will you stop using it?  How many people will?  Does the new UI somehow result in people staying on their site and seeing ads longer, even if that time is spent frustrated and clicking on things?  If so, they get more revenue.

This is also why sites like instagram and facebook so strongly prefer the algorithmic feed to a chronological feed (despite that most users seem to prefer chronological).  If you catch up on a chronological feed, you stop browsing facebook.  If they randomly show you new posts mixed in with a bunch of garbage that you already saw, you spend more time clicking around and searching for the new posts, during which time they can send you more ads.

THIS.

They're constantly seeking to make the site/app better.  and "better" means more profitable.

10 hours ago, Emanuel said:

The point is when we notice them...

Everyone will die some day no matter how many times we change. This is something I think the most stupid thing the human race is. That is, to not be aware of it. Pretending it is what it is not.

Changes apply when they bring something of value.

When not?

Absolutely.  

Changes are to bring something of value.

Value.

Shareholder... value.

Maximise shareholder value.

.... remember, if you're not paying, you're the product!

13 hours ago, eatstoomuchjam said:

Open gate recording is available on a number of cameras, not just Fuji and Panasonic.  Some cameras even have a 17:9 sensor so open gate is 17:9. 

As far as using a 3:2 or 4:3 sensor to capture for 9:17, 1:1, and 17:9 delivery, it's intended to save time for people who want to deliver to multiple platforms and don't want to have to reshoot.  Plus the ergonomics of many cameras are impaired when turned on their side.  I would also worry less about capturing for vertical in the highest possible resolution - if your camera is 6k pixels wide on a 3:2 sensor, the vertical resolution will be close to 4k - which is more than enough if people are watching vertically on their phone.

Part of what's tricky is that many cameras only allow a single box to hint at the final frame so you'd need to guess at the vertical frame or use tape on the screen to indicate it (or something like that.

I have a vague recollection that a recent camera allowed multiple framing guides at the same time so you could put up the vertical and horizontal boxes at the same time on the monitor.  Seems like a good idea, but can't remember where I heard it.

16 hours ago, BTM_Pix said:

Have you got a link for the comparisons ?

I've not seen anything from the limited number of people that have one in hand that shows much of anything in LogC3 let alone an A/B against an Alexa etc. so I've been waiting for the like of CVP etc to get one to show that sort of comparison.

I've seen one frame on Twitter shot in LogC3 that made me think "mmm that is actually quite nice" but I've read a comment from whoever it is that did that video you posted the other day that says its "confirmed" not coming to S5ii etc so my bubble has been burst on that front.

They were shared privately, but there will be a YT video, so will share that when it surfaces.  The images I saw were partly graded so were more a work in progress sort of thing and most likely will get changed before publishing.

I haven't seen comparisons of GH7 V-Log capture -> CST to LogC vs GH7 LogC capture, which would be the comparison you'd want to see before making a purchase decision.  It might be that the GH7 LogC doesn't match Alexa colours, but it might still be better than capturing in V-Log and grading from there.

I think it's a real pity that ARRI didn't go absolutely nuts and profile the sensor and then have a 64x64x64 LUT that matches it to an Alexa within the GH7 DR range.  It's not like the GH7 is going to cannibalise Alexa sales....

2 hours ago, lsquare said:

I'm not really sure where to post this since the digital video forum here doesn't seem to be as active.

Open gate recording seems to be a recent phenomenon. I think the Fujifilm X-H2s is the only other camera besides the GH6/GH7 to offer this. Is this really as good as what Panasonic says it is? They frame it as capturing it once and easily change it to the aspect ratio that I want depending on the delivery format. For example, wouldn't I be better off getting an L-plate and recording videos vertically rather than recording them in landscape position, but in open gate? I think I'll get more resolution and potentially the framing or angle of view will be different?

Maybe I don't understand things as I'm not an expert on videography. Help me out! Thanks!

If you shoot for social media then you might need to publish in vertical, square, and landscape, so open gate means you don't have to film the same thing three times.

Also, anamorphic.....

Also also, GH5 from 2017 had it, so "recent" is a relative term.

Also also also, film had it from before most of us were born, so "recent" might not be the right word....

2 hours ago, lsquare said:

I'm just learning about this format. Isn't RAW just RAW? Why would there be ProRes RAW and ProRes RAW HQ? Are both of these formats truly RAW like CinemaDNG?

Probably not.

But you probably don't want uncompressed RAW because the file sizes are astronomical.  There are compression schemes which are very close to be visually lossless, which are almost as good, and save a significant amount of storage.

Depending on your needs, you're likely willing to sacrifice some image quality for some space savings.  For example, you might accept a 1% loss in quality for a 50%+ reduction in file size, etc.  BRAW has compression ratios between 3:1 and 12:1, even on their top cameras, so the artefacts from huge compression ratios can't be that bad, and you can get a lot of compression before people can even notice.

2 hours ago, Emanuel said:

YT... same people with the same issue and POV so I think we shouldn't be all wrong, isn't it?

 

 

https://www.androidpolice.com/youtube-new-desktop-design-nobody-likes/

 

I spent a few dozens of minutes trying to fix it... LOL when I realized this doesn't affect all accounts anyway... *sigh*

 

When will these people stop to waste the time of users pretending to convince the world and boss their salaries are of any use?

 

YT keeps changing things, maybe this is the first time they've done something you didn't like, or maybe you never noticed before?

They've made two changes in the past that fundamentally changed how I use the site, which annoyed me no end, but it is what it is.

When will they stop?  Never.  This is because:

• If you don't change you die.  If you don't believe me then feel free to make a post about it on your myspace page.
• Things are improving, for the most part, and A/B testing is how they work out what to do, which is the scientific method which built civilisation.  If you think things don't get better then fire up Windows v1 and your old Nokia.  I'll see you in a week once you remember how to manually setup the TCPIP stack to get network connectivity working.
• Improvements are made incrementally without people noticing.  If every few years Facebook or Google released a new version then it would confuse the absolute crap out of everyone, but when they trickle the changes through in tiny little bits then no training is needed and mostly people adapt pretty smoothly.  For example, Amazon makes changes to their live website 2-3 times per day on average.

I've seen some early ARRI vs GH7 LogC images, and let's say they're....  not similar.

For anyone hoping to get a pocket ARRI, lower your expectations.

.....and go back to working on your colour grading.

wrong thread.  dammit.

9 hours ago, PannySVHS said:

Highlights look awful in this video imho @kye I really like some very subtle hues in the footage and the rendering of textures. Some shots look 100% like Aja Cion, in a good way and in a bad one as well, some look akwardly and unpurposefully dark, some look promising. Mixed bag with interesting things to come hopefully.

I guess mileage varies depending on how you look at the footage.

What I see in it is:

• pretty heavy grade done but footage looks consistent and hues look right, including skin-tones
  this indicates that the sensor and profile behave well in the grade and don't get pulled around in unnatural ways - this is a lot less common than you'd imagine and many of the grades I've done end up making different tonal or colour regions of the footage don't look coherent with each other..  
   
• saturated edges look fine
  this is very difficult because doing a strong subtractive saturation operation is very challenging as it stretches tones apart significantly based on their hue.  this is especially difficult on edges where if you have an edge of a coloured object against a neutral object then in the space of a few pixels you go from saturation being low to being high, now this wouldn't normally be a challenge because maybe they're at a similar luma level but after the subtractive saturation operation the saturated pixel is now significantly more saturated but more importantly its also now dramatically darker.  this will ruthlessly reveal compression artefacts on edges, and is the primary reason that I have to go B&W and blur the absolute crap out of any footage I shoot on the cheap action cameras etc for cheap camera challenges
   
• greens look good
  shots like the dog at 0:54 show deep saturated greens in the foliage in the background, which have clearly been significantly altered.  in real life the graduations in greens amongst footage like this are very subtle, and yet the colours in the video look dense and the opposite of stretched low-quality footage, they have a density that is reminiscent of the things that the 5D with ML does very well (but I'm not saying this is at that same level - this video isn't enough to judge that)
  anyone who has declared war on yellow-ish greens like I have and tried to grade them back into looking lush (or even just not dead-looking) will know the whole thing exists on a knife edge.  the fact that you're cooling the shadows and warming the highlights (which this grade does quite considerably) also stretches the greens too
   
• shots look to have usable DR in outside scenes in full-sun on surfaces that would be blindingly-white
   
• there is an effortlessness to the colours
  when you look at film there is an effortless coherence to the whole thing, like it was always going to be this way that it would be silly for it to be any other way - the colours in film look like this was their destiny - you don't question it.  this coherence is incredibly rare for digital and especially smaller sensors when not given enough light, so although the outside sunshine pics are great, it's the inside shots with the deep shadows that show off a coherency into the lower registers of the tonal ranges.  the colours don't cheapen, they don't thin, they don't shift, or become glaring or dull, etc.

etc.

Hollywood colourists can work low-level miracles, but will be the first to tell you that if the footage is lacking then there's a limit to what they can do - more would be asking for high-level miracles!  Either this footage is good and the colourist was a super-star, but considering this is a YT video, I'm leaning on it being a good-to-very-good grade on top of very capable footage.

The more I colour grade my own footage, the more I see when I look into the footage of others.