TomTheDP

1 hour ago, kye said:

HA!  you don't hear the colourists saying they can match the lesser cameras to the Alexa in post!

The first thing they will say is about managing your expectations.  The second thing will be about managing your expectations.  The third thing might not be about that, but also might still be....

I have no idea what your situation is, but it might not be a bad strategy to just buy a set of matching cameras and then insist on using them on every job - you'd likely lose work because you're putting conditions on things but the final quality of the projects you shoot would go up.  Then you could focus on optimising your craft rather than struggling with random camera after random camera on each job, making your work increase over time and making you more desirable...

I don't do enough multi cam stuff for it to be worthwhile. I prefer to shoot 1 cam for narrative which is 99% of what I do at this point. 

If I were to go back a year though when I was mostly doing multi cam corporate it definitely would make more sense. It looks like this weekend I'll be using the Alexa(requested by director), a Fuji XH2S (directors personal camera), and maybe an FX30 or Pocket 4k as a C cam. We'll see how the color chart does 😅

43 minutes ago, IronFilm said:

The strike? People being forced to sell, so that they can keep on paying their mortgage, least they have to sell their house instead 

I think its the Burano honestly. Same sensor as the 80K Venice 2. Doesn't require the bulky raw recorder, weighs 3 pounds less. Why would you get the old 6k Venice when you can get the Burano for 25k. Now at 18k the original Venice is tempting, but for just a few more Ks you get brand new camera. 

The Burano doesn't have as many output or power output options though, but neither does the Alexa mini. 

14 hours ago, kye said:

LOL.  That can be taken two ways..   I'd suggest it's a subtle hint rather than a comment on the cameras!

In discussions with colourists where the subject comes up, opinions I've seen range from "results are limited by the quality of the footage" through to "these cameras shouldn't ever have existed"!!

It is definitely a better option to shoot on 3 of the same exact model camera or shoot high res and just punch in. Though it's fairly common now to use a cinema camera and then use a cheaper camera for a B & C cam. I'll use whatever I am given lol. 

Every video I have watched comparing a cinema camera to a lower end camera they say something like they can be matched in post, but then when the person attempts to do it they can't. This doesn't bode well with productions that won't have a color house doing the color grade in the post process. 

The whole post production scene that I usually deal with is a nightmare. Now it still stands that it probably wouldn't matter what camera I shot with in terms of the directors/audience noticing the final product. I am super tempted to try to start just using an FX30 on everything despite how much I dislike the SOC look. Would make my life easier. 😅

On 11/4/2023 at 3:50 AM, Kino said:

The FX6 is perfectly fine the way it is with the direct RAW output to the Atomos. The FX9 has the problem in that it requires the XDCA extension unit to do the same thing as the FX6. They need to allow for direct RAW out.

8K acquisition provides many advantages that Sony does not want to ignore for their flagship FX camera, especially considering Canon's plans for this segment. I don't see them going with 4K downsampled from 6K yet again. The camera will definitely have a new sensor, perhaps a repurposed A1 sensor (IMX 610) or something else we don't know about.

Brand new, the Venice 6K and 8K barely have any price difference as you note, but you can get a used Venice 6K for almost half the price. A Burano 6K would be amazing if they could get the price down to where the F5 was ($16K). The problem is that the Venice 6K is still very popular on many productions, both big and small, and listed as the official F5 replacement on Sony's website:

https://pro.sony/ue_US/products/digital-cinema-cameras/pmw-f5

I don't expect a "Burano 6K" for some time, but I only mention it because I think the possibility for this camera release determines the kind of features we will get in the FX9 II.

I am seeing Venice 6k kits with all the licenses and the RAW recorder for 20k now. I just saw one go for 17k, another for 13k(with no licenses). Pretty wild considering a few months ago they were around 30k + 

On 8/13/2023 at 10:21 AM, kye said:

Any industry that seems glamorous will have newcomers and amateurs undercutting the pros and starting a race to the bottom for all but the top performers who have managed to build a reputation.  

Meanwhile, in industries that don't seem glamorous, there are skills shortages and prices are going up (or quality goes down)...

Unfortunately or maybe fortunately depending how you look at it, the skill to get in now doesn't need to be as high anymore. Even many people at very lofty levels of the film industry are not as skilled as they used to be. 

DP's can utilize high resolution color accurate monitors to see what they are getting rather than light metering. Cameras are so sensitive now you don't need crazy light fixtures. A lot of big budget shows are now are using mostly small LED fixtures combined with natural lighting. There's certainly a level of skill still required especially on the biggest of productions but it's become less and less. 

Think about changing a 35mm film mag vs digital media. Same with getting good results shooting 35mm film for a wedding vs digital. Night and day 

11 hours ago, kye said:

Interesting.  It did a pretty good job then.

The things that I noticed first was the skin tones.  This is what I always look at, and is most important.  The one on the left has those nutty tan and brown hues and the one on the right has 'porange' (pink&orange) and red tones.  The hues of the skin tones are the most important thing for me in images.

I also noticed the differences in the green/cyan area top-right, which has greens on the left but none on the right.  BUT, the skin tones are so important that they're the entire ballgame if you're cutting an interview between two angles.  

A really quick and dirty way to match skin tones when they're so far apart is to just rotate the hue of the entire image.  This sounds like a brutal thing to do to an image, but it will never break the image and we are so sensitive to skin tones that what is a huge change in skin tones is imperceptible on everything else in the image.  If there is anything that goes off in the background then you can easily do a Hue-vs curve adjustment on it, which is much more prone to inaccuracies and stressing the image so it's far preferable to rotate the hue of the whole image to suit the skin tones and then do the Hue curves on the background rather than the other way around.

This assumes that you've correctly white-balanced and exposed the cameras, and are doing colour management and transforms properly of course.

Sounds like a good method. 

I didn't use the color chart in a precise way, it was held closer to the camera, probably a 6ft difference. Plus I shot the color chart about 20 minutes later. That said I'd still imagine it being closer than it was. It was a room with Cyan walls, so there is a lot of tinted light going on. I am going to try it again today and make sure I do it properly and see if it makes any difference. 

A normal shooting situation would involve more pure lighting. 

Skitones are a large reason I choose to shoot with an Alexa or at least RED. Every time I have done a mixed camera situation the colorist comments on how nice the Alexa/Red skin tones look compared to 10 bit DSLRs. 
 

7 hours ago, kye said:

I was saying that, based on the lengths that product placement and cross-marketing and stealth / undercover marketing will go to these days, but points raised since then have dissuaded me from that perspective.

The world is chaotic and sometimes things happen by accident, but the online camera ecosystem sure is eating it up!

To be honest, despite me being critical of Sony for many aspects of their business and product strategies, and of the Sony fan-boys/fan-girls for being so one-sided and so loud ad nauseam (and frequently in the face of reality) the image that they're extracting from the sensors in the FX3 and FX30 is impressive, and I definitely respect the form factor for being small but also practical / reliable.
Of course, from the company that has a virtual monopoly over sensor production, they'd be crazy not to make their products get the best from them and actively block other companies from getting access to the best results (or at least making them pay a lot for that level of performance).

I was really excited about the Sony lineup after seeing its usage on the creator. 

That said after using I am not impressed with the image. I would say Sony's low end cameras seem to have the worst color out of the box compared with Canon or Blackmagic. It doesn't carry over to the Venice line of course. It's really just a matter of balancing skin tones and accurate colors. I am sure it's not a problem for a post house to do. But for lower budget stuff where you are relying on the camera more, its annoying. 

19 hours ago, kye said:

Continuing the discussion about overall size of total rig, I just found an interesting lens for APS-C - the Sigma 18-50mm F2.8..   it's interesting because it's got a fixed aperture and is small for a APS-C lens.

Apparently it's a common lens for minimalist travel etc, when paired with the (very small) 11mm F1.8 prime for the ultra-wide / vlogging end.

Looks like a winner on the FX30. Gimbal one and done lens maybe

On 11/2/2023 at 7:27 PM, kye said:

Did you grade the FX30 to match the Alexa, or the other way around?

I see differences, but they're subtle and not significant.  IIRC it was Steve Yedlin that talked about the idea of the "cut back" test for camera matching.  Ie, if you were to have a shot from camera A, then another shot, then CUT BACK to camera B, would you notice that A and B were different.  
I think this is a good test because in real film-making you don't normally cut directly between two cameras showing the same scene from the same angle, so there is some distance there, and so in A/B testing you shouldn't cut directly between the same scene and angle because it's too stringent a test.
Yes, in theory you would cut between two angles of the same scene, but in lots of film-making you'd be changing the lighting setup between filming those angles, so getting a perfect match isn't relevant in these situations either.

That is very true. The only thing would be very interview situations where you have an A and B cam on the same subject. I haven't done one in almost a year now but I have a gig coming up where we are going to be doing that.

I used the color match tool in resolve, using an xrite chart. So you can set the color space and gamma, which I set to ARRI's. I did it on both cameras so it changed up the way the Alexa originally looked as well, with its preset white balance. 

This method would fall apart with creative lighting though. Let's say you wanted to do an orange tinted light as a key with blue for fill or something wacky. The chart is only useful for getting normal colors. 

On 11/2/2023 at 7:37 PM, BrunoCH said:

Very close. What jumps out at me is a difference in the blue of the sofa cushions in both and a difference in the saturation of the reds in the second still. 

Yes someone pointed both out to me. I didn't see them at first but its very apparent now. Definitely got it much closer than my manual attempts. I think with more fine tuning it could come closer. 

22 hours ago, Llaasseerr said:

Agreed, it's an interesting camera. In the last year I have downloaded some DNG footage and had a play with it. I find it interesting that they are so affordable used and the fact you can now record ProRes Raw just with a Ninja V. But also I think it records 2k ProRes 4444 internally, which sounds very nice indeed as long as the debayer quality is good and you don't mind dealing with the P2 media.

I have heard they are slow to boot up and have a bad menu system, also that the rolling shutter is about 15ms which is really the maximum you would put up with these days for a 35mm sensor. But it just seems very robust and properly targeted at a film maker. So if you were buying it for your own creative or doc projects, it doesn't seem like a bad option.

Yeah boot times don't bother me too much. I am used to them with older red cameras or Alexas. 

2k 444 is ideal for me codec wise. Should be pretty nice if its downsampling from the 4k sensor. 

Rolling shutter is a bit annoying but 15ms is very usable. I have honestly never noticed rolling shutter ever across my life shooting videos, other than for strobe lighting. 

21 hours ago, QuickHitRecord said:

Is the Epic image actually different? Lower compression ratios and a wider field of view but it's the same 5K MX sensor, right?

I've often heard about the magenta shadows the Epic-X but in my comparisons, the Scarlet-X has more neutral shadows than the magenta-leaning R1MX.

The RED naming has always confused me. But I am talking about the RED Epic Dragon vs the RED Scarlet X. 

Having used both the Epic Dragon has a lot more highlight latitude and the colors are more neutral. 

17 hours ago, MrSMW said:

Helped keep the budget down by around $50.

More money for donuts.

lmao, why the hell did they not use the FX6. It's such a way better ND option than a vari ND. It's not even a pound difference 1.4lbs vs 2lbs. 

I don't think the Creator will become hollywood standard as its just way too smart of a way to approach making a movie. Hollywood is too dumb to make that a standard. The high end film industry knows how to waste money like no one else. 

Such a shame the Varicam LT never took off. It really is an incredible cost/performance camera. Thought I guess it just sat in that awkward place between smaller and bigger projects. 

Somewhat unrelated to the topic. 

My attempt at matching an ARRI Alexa Classic and an FX30. 

Used an Xrite color checker passport chart. I guess that is cheating but I wanted to see if I could match them this way 100%. 

I think these are very close but maybe not 100%. Thoughts?

The more stylized one I switch the color space and gamma to RED and then put a Kodak lut on. The other two are just ARRI color space with the ARRI 709 lut. 

 

18 minutes ago, QuickHitRecord said:

I just bought a Scarlet-X that I am looking forward to working with. So that's my answer to the question posed in this thread. I already had lenses, batteries, and a monitor, so I purchased:

Scarlet-X brain with mini mag side module with dual fan replacement 2.0 (important!)
2x 480GB mini mags
Side grip
Red Pro top cheese plate
Red aluminum EF mount
V-mount battery solution (pretty difficult to find at a workable price!)
Nitze top handle and monitor mount

All in all, it set me back just under $3K.

I did a lot of research on the other legacy Red cameras before making this purchase. The Epic-X brains seem prone to failure. The Dragon-upgraded Epics and Scarlets have three OLPFs to choose from: Low Light (which is basically the same as the OLPF in front of the MX sensors and offers clean shadows but more limited highlights), Skintone/Highlight (nice highlight capture but noisy shadows above ISO 200), and the "Standard" OLPF which seems to fall somewhere in between the two extremes. Ultimately, I decided that clean shadows were more important to me than extra highlight range so I opted for the older MX sensor/OLPF.

Regarding crop, the more budget-friendly Scarlet-Xs are in the same boat as the Raven. The max resolution (disregarding the 12fps at 5K) on the Scarlet-X has a 1.14x crop when compared to 3perf Super35 film while he Raven has a 1.12x crop but is limited to a wider aspect ratio at that resolution. So they are pretty close in this regard. One thing to consider is that the Raven requires the ~$1K IO module if you want to plug a non-Red monitor into it, while the Scarlet comes with both SDI and HDMI ports standard. This pushed me over the edge and I decided to go with the older camera.

I did some side by side shots of the Scarlet-X with my Red One MX and have to say that I slightly prefer the image from the older camera (which is softer, cooler, and less contrasty). My original plan was to sell the R1MX, but now I'm having second thoughts.

I have been considering the Scarlet as well. I do prefer the Epic image. But Scarlet's are so cheap these days. 

1 hour ago, John Matthews said:

Well, I've decided to get the G9 ii. Should arrive around November 2. If people have questions, I'll do my best to answer.

Also, now that I've given up my CF Express Type B that I used for my GH6, I have many v30 cards, but no v60 or v90. I don't really need the highest data rates, but I want 4k 120fps. What card to I need for that? On my CF Express card, I could just do everything without thinking about it, but I'd rather not have to shell out serious money for a v90 card unless absolutely necessary. When I look at the 4k 120fps files, their only 100 Mbps in HVEC. Can a v30 card handle 5.8 open gate?

How did you feel about the GH6 btw? 

9 hours ago, IronFilm said:

However, Panasonic Varicam is only so "popular" in my personal rankings because there is one particular production company (which is massive) that I've worked for quite a lot, and they seem to like it on their shows. I for instance just got home from booming on location for a tv series using 2x Panasonic Varicam S35. Next couple of days I'll be in the studio, and they'll be using three Panasonic Varicam S35 cameras!

I'm quite sure however my experience is fairly atypical, and for others the Panasonic Varicam won't even rate in their top twenty cameras they have worked with in recent years. 

 

I am really tempted to get the Varicam LT. I definitely think it is a slept on camera. I guess the Venice really just replaced it. 

It is sort of like an Alexa mini but with a 4k sensor, dual ISO, and a more run and gun friendly body. 

I just got the Sony FX30 and Ronin RSC2. Going to try to incorporate more moving shots to my narrative work. I will also say Viltrox has a ton of really good and cheap AF lens options. 

I am considering selling my Alexa and getting a Mavic 3 instead. Really go all out with the small compact approach. It's hard to part with Alexa skintones though. 🤕

15 hours ago, kye said:

These young people, are they expressing this interest in a film-making context?  Are they film students?  

I'm curious...  I've never known what the cool kids were doing!

Yes film students who I assume many will be the next DP's and Directors. Not necessarily the people I know but just in that realm. I feel with the older generation it was trending more towards use the latest and biggest. Now things are more trending nostalgic. 

But that is just my random guess I suppose. 

I read a reddit thread where the author said that it seems like the Venice replaced the Alexa, this was a few years back. I have definitely not seen that. It seems like the LF is the major bread winner on every production. That is easily seen when I constantly look at the specs for a film on IMDB. It is almost always the Alexa mini or mini LF on newer stuff. 

I don't work in commercial but I have some friends that do and they say it is almost always Alexa. You have a few situations where there is a director who likes RED and they use RED, but it is rare. 

Now I am also coming from the perspective of someone who lives in the USA. Looking at american films and the commercial industry in New York City. I definitely think LA and NYC an obsession with ARRI. 

Detroit where I live there seems to be a liking for RED, especially in the music video space. ARRI is getting it's way into those spaces too. I know a production company here that was all RED. But they now have the Alexa mini LF and they seem to use it for their big stuff. 

Chinese TV is apparently pushing 8k hard so I imagine a most of their stuff will be using the Venice 2. There is Top Gun 2, but they probably would have shot ARRI if they didn't need the Rialto. Obviously it does get a lot of use but not like the Alexa. 

I am really curious to see if more Hollywood features and high end streaming shows will use the LF or the Alexa 35 in 2024. Assuming the strikes will have come to and end.

accidental repost 

19 hours ago, John Matthews said:

Here's the rub as of today in France:

Option 1: G9 ii body for 1899 Euros (I have the lenses)

Option 2: S5 ii body + 20-60 + 50mm prime for only 2099 euros

What would you do?

The G9 makes sense as you have the glass. I'd wait until it drops in price though. The GH6 is so cheap now used and is practically the same camera. It is the same with the S5 ii though, the original S5 goes for under $1000 now used. Essentially paying a grand for auto focus and prores on the S5X. 

7 hours ago, Beritar said:

I've found this interesting video comparing the G9II to some Nikon, Fuji and Sony cameras.
IBIS looks fantastic on the G9II, colors look as great as the GH6 and focus is very fast with the 12-60mm PL.

However, exactly like my GH6 in low light (and my S5II with most PP), I really don't like the details rendering of the G9II.
On the video, the woman has freckles and it's perfect to see the rendering of fine details. What I see is a a mix of smoothing and sharpening resulting in a very bad image (especially when cropping) in my opinion.
The Nikon cameras are even worse. Fine details are totally destroyed, exactly like on my good old Samsung NX1.
I'm glad I never bought Nikon cameras for video.
Sony is Sony, as always, the rolling shutter is bad, the IBIS is average, but the details rendering is much closer than what we had on the first gen S1 and S5, much closer to a raw picture without artifice.

It's always nice to see the IBIS, rolling shutter AF etc compared, but for me one of the most important thing is the pure image quality, including colors and details.
I understand some people like very soft image in video, but to my eyes the G9II (and the Z9/Z8) just doesn't look good, of course YMMV.
 

Do they have sharpening and NR turned off tho? Panasonic usually has some pretty bad processing issues that are fixed in firmware a few months later. That was the case with the S1 and S1H. Both had really bad internal sharpening that couldn't be dialed all the way off. They fixed it a few months later. 

Z-cam is developing a new M43 camera that they claim has a true 16 stops of dynamic range. This is more than what they have listed for their large format camera. I wonder if that sensor will be used in the GH7. 

Internal 444 and high dynamic range would make it an instant buy. I am close to buying the G9 MK2 as it already has everything I want though. 

I think it's a combo of the DSLR craze and new filmmakers coming from that mindset of using 35mm photography cameras. Combined with the only 4k ARRI option being LF. 

All the younger people I know gravitate towards film and more classic cinematography. I think things will trend in that direction more. Though I imagine a large amount of stuff will always be shot LF going forward. 

It is awesome to see ARRI continuing to be adamant on not needing more than 4k and S35. The original Alexa mini still gets a lot of use on higher end stuff. 

For the last couple years really big budget stuff is pretty much dominated by the Alexa LF. It will be interesting to see when and what productions choose the Alexa 35 over it.
 

On 10/14/2023 at 6:56 PM, PannySVHS said:

A polish test site found the HD coming from the S1H to be pixel perfect in S35 mode. I imagine @kye would love the thick 200mbit HD coming from this camera.😊

I had always noticed the HD was subpar coming from the S1H but maybe that is only in full frame mode.

The GH5 HD looked just as good as the 4k. Which is something I have noticed when downsampling 4k to HD, even zooming in its hard to tell a difference. 

I hope S35 becomes the norm again.