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Everything posted by jcs
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More example pics here: http://brightland.com/w/the-full-frame-look-is-a-myth-heres-how-to-prove-it-for-yourself/
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I would expect C300 II to have best DR (FS7 similar), motion, RS (6ms), clean blacks (latest FW) of the lot. Skintones and PDAF make a compelling argument for the additional cost.
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DPAF with Canon lenses? Fast, simple menus? Skintones out of camera? Rolling shutter? (~6ms on C300 II). CLog 2 ARRI settings look really nice with little effort- an ARRI clone with PDAF on Canon lenses. Sony is slowly getting better skintones with every new camera release; would expect the FS7 II to be closer to Canon/ARRI in skintones vs. the FS7 I. For someone without a lot of Canon lenses, the FS7 II will be a nice option for sure.
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Makes sense- ProRes is 10-bit, 1DX II MJPEG is 8-bit. Using "Pro" (XFAVC-like) H.264 with 422 and IPB will get you much smaller files while retaining high quality. Even consumer 420 H.264 IPB with sufficiently high bitrates (150Mbps or more for 4K) can look really good: likely won't be able to see any difference at all on the final 420 IPB low-bitrate H.264 YouTube/Vimeo consumer playback experience. I don't bother to transcode the 1DX II footage, though I only use it sparingly for 4K60 shots (else C300 II 1080p IPB 10-bit 422 at 50Mbps (greenscreen with limited motion). If you're not using 4K for the final, you could transcode to very high quality 1080p, saving about 4x the space.
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$650 for Scratch might make sense for commercial productions. For the hobbyists on EOSHD, free or low-cost ffmpeg-based solution will probably work fine (ProRes is a relatively simple 10+ bit MJPEG-like codec and worked fine in my tests while creating Photon, with ProRes output test edits in Premiere and FCPX).
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Will your MPC play ProRes? Any Windows tool based on ffmpeg can do ProRes if exposed in the GUI (as with Photon). High bitrate 420 H.264 will probably be fine, especially if 4K. You'll be hard pressed to see the difference between 420, 422 and even 444. Ultimately it's going to be 420 for final viewing (unless doing a theatric release). Yeah the 1DX II is a very nice 4K60p (and 4K24p) specialty camera. Coupled with a C100 1/II or C300 I/II makes a nice pair for 1080p (or 4K with C300 II).
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What NLE do you use? If PP CC, you can use MXF OP1a and have a ton of pro H.264 options. There's also Photon which supports ProRes on Windows and Pro H.264 options (10-bit 422, 444 etc.).
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C100 II internal recording looks detailed and cinematic-
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It's true that there are multiple ways to implement this: http://harvestimaging.com/blog/?p=1560. Do you have have a link showing how modern consumer CMOS sensors implement your description, where the binning implementation results in no noise reduction? Lots of papers showing noise reduction from binning (Kodak and Phase One): http://asp.eurasipjournals.springeropen.com/articles/10.1186/1687-6180-2012-125, http://www.quantumimaging.com/binning/ The original C300 just takes R and B as is from the Bayer array, where two copies of G are averaged together for a low-pass filter- no traditional de-Bayering takes place.
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Mathematically, when two sensors are sampled and results combined, that's an add operation, which must be normalized by a divide by 2 or bit shift right operation. (sensor1 + sensor2) / 2 = average. This is the same as a box or low-pass filter. The math applies to any sensor system, including consumer devices: http://www.photonics.com/Article.aspx?AID=23653
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http://www.vision-systems.com/articles/print/volume-10/issue-10/technology-trends/sensor-design/binning-techniques-increase-signal-to-noise-ratio-in-cmos-imagers.html
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Pixel binning averages multiple pixels together, which is effectively a Box filter or low-pass filter, which means higher frequencies such as noise will be reduced. Cubic or Lanczos filters can downscale while preserving detail (very fast on a GPU (an iPhone can do it; Sony might be doing something better than a Box filter)). Aliasing can be reduced when doing an oversampling rescaling operation such as pixel binning vs. nearest neighbor (no averaging or interpolating) or line skipping which will increase aliasing and Moire.
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To reframe, Canon likes to err on the side of reliability. Canon may want an engineering 2x safety factor, so 80MB/s would be their required minimum. 100MB rated may not be met for continuous writes as some cards are much slower than their rating. E.g. ask 5D3 ML users about actual CF performance: I have a 128GB UDMA 7 card sitting on my desk that wasn't even close in rated write performance. CFast 2.0 cards are held to a much higher performance standard, and I haven't read any reports of CFast 2.0 cards running slow. Even better, CFast 2.0 cards over USB3 are blazing fast- if you shoot a lot of footage and/or need to do on-set transfers, file copy time savings is significant. I wasn't thrilled about having to get yet another set of (expensive) cards and readers, however in practice the performance is pretty amazing and useful.
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478Mbps is 3587MB/min = 3587*8/60Mbps for 24p. 4K60 is 5733MB/min = 5733*8/60 = 764Mbps for 4K60. 17 Minutes at 4K24 and 10 minutes at 4K60 per 64GB card. From the 1DX II manual, page 319. The PDAF autofocus on the 1DX II and Canon Cx00 cameras are currently unmatched in the market for large sensor cameras (Sony is catching up). The A7R II's AF is not bad, however the A7S II AF is too slow and not accurate enough to be used without also actively helping with manual focus and/or half pressing the shutter button while recording (OK for live events, not narrative etc.). If you can transcode the 1DX II files on ingest, treating them like RAW, etc., then the long term file size isn't an issue (just more time/work, but not too bad if you automate it). To get 4K files down to 100 to ~300Mbps and still look good you'll need to transcode to H.264 IPB, which NLEs nowadays play like butter (200MBps IPB might be the sweet spot. For low motion 100Mbps should be fine (same as A7x, GH4 4K)). For your business requirement of beauty/makeup in the studio, F5.6 or higher is perfect since the scene will be well lit and shallow DOF can be an issue (and you'll have complete control over what's in the background).
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For makeup videos, skintone is very important. The Sony A7S II or A7R II (perhaps better skintones?) along with a Canon still camera to shoot reference stills for color grading could work if you require 4K on a budget. If you can manage the file sizes and your NLE can handle the 1DX II 4K files (such as FCXP, PP CC sometimes can, sometimes can't, each release has a variety of bugs as do the NVidia drivers) it will produce great skintones and decent 4K (but not true, full resolution 4K- it's somewhat soft/low-detail 4K. You'll see this if you want to punch in to 100% (1:1 pixels) on a 1080p sequence). For well-lit studio shots, the XC10/XC15 could also be a great 4K24p option with smaller 4K files (305/205Mbps) using a more modern codec (XFAVC) vs. MJPG on the 1DX II (~478Mbps).
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I pretty much only use the Sony 24-240 with auto ISO for live events on the A7S II. Using AF with manual override (and vice versa) it works well enough (not nearly as good as Canon PDAF, but workable). Covers everything you need and is sharp enough. A lot of folks put that lens down, however online reviews also rate it highly: https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1126138-REG/sony_sel24240_fe_24_240mm_f_3_5_6_3_oss.html , https://www.amazon.com/Sony-SEL24240-24-240mm-3-5-6-3-Mirrorless/dp/B00U29GNC8 .
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Hobby or for profit? If for profit and you need 4K, C300 II is a great option if you can borrow and pay off quickly. I use the C300 II and don't currently use 4K as we're shooting a lot of content and most consumers don't even have a way to view 4K material. So the C100 II is a great camera if you want to shoot right now, get things done quickly, along with tiny files and very high quality 1080p. RED cameras are a totally different experience and use case vs. a Canon Cx00 (number one, no PDAF). I use the 1DX II only for short interviews and initially 4K60p (until I switched everything over to 1080p to speed up production). Since the 1DX II 1080p isn't very good, 4K24p must be used and downscaled to 1080p in post. This looks great however the files are huge. The C100 II is a much better choice for those on a budget looking for a good reliable all around performer. For long form 30min plus- C100 II all the way. You don't need 4K.
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Haha I love audio. Here's a big pile of ego: for my day job I wrote real-time audio DSP software for years and wrote the real-time audio engine for MySpace Music's Karaoke software. Also play acoustic and electric guitar and compose on keyboards (basic stuff using Logic X for our video productions; now hiring more experienced folks as I'm not fast enough at my skill level). Familiar with signal processing theory (and applications writing low level code) through music theory and intuitively understand what sounds good by ear. Years ago a friend put a pair of Stax electrostatic speakers on my head through a Carver Magnetic Field Amplifier after utilizing certain plant compounds and it blew my mind! Later I listened through Stax headphones at NASA Ames Research Center through a Convolvotron 3D VR system with a Polhemus 3D tracker- another level of audio mind-blowningness. Finally, hearing Bowers & Wilkins Nautilus Speakers and similar in prepared rooms (including an anechoic mixing room at GTE Imagetrek) topped out the high-end audio listening experience. As time progressed, consumers got used to and were OK with highly compressed MP3/AAC audio on comparatively very low quality headphones and/or home speakers. I realized the 99% of people didn't care about ultra high quality audio and would never hear audio at these levels of quality. Additionally, listening to crap audio helps keep the high end stuff sounding killer. Otherwise there's a never-ending chase for more quality. Steve Martin summed it up here with the Googolphonic (note the proper spelling before Google bunged it up :)). After years of software and product development, I'm focused on creating and using the simplest systems possible, where quality is balanced with cost and system complexity. For our own productions for Cosmic Flow (my current day job, software tech is now part time), in-camera audio is ideal. C300 II preamps are good enough, and so is the $500 Audix (I use it with the Schoeps for two channels vs. 2 Schoeps). Even the A7S II's preamps are good enough when using the Sennheiser G3 wireless on location. For separate audio I wouldn't use anything less than a Sound Devices 702 (and would hire a sound person). I used to use an RME Fireface 800 for computer audio, then replaced it with a $140 FocusRite Scarlet 2i2 (v1) which actually has better sounding preamps. After many years the budget 2i2 hardware crapped out and I replaced it with a Sound Devices USBPre2 I had purchased as a tool to get high-quality preamps into DSLRs years ago. The USBPre2 doesn't turn off when the computer is in sleep so I had to purchase a USB switch (not a big deal but was surprisingly hard to find a USB switch that cut power and handled data lines properly too- that was the only one I found that works). After so many years of going deep in tech, for the final product, and in the case of video, the story and emotion are far more important. The C100 II with an Audix, Shure, Audio Technica, or Rode mic, and a Mogami or similar quality cable (tried budget cables- not worth it), will provide a perfect balance of good enough quality, low system complexity, and highly versatile usability to be just about perfect for the OP and others wanting to get things done quickly with low effort, low cost, low headache, and least time to produce something cool. Ultimately, we want the gear to just work and get out of the way of the creative process.
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The C300 II preamps sound pretty good, though the limiter isn't as good as Sound Devices. I would expect the C100 II to sound not too far off (who knows, Canon might even use the same parts/circuits to save cost). From what we've shot so far on the Schoeps CMC641 and Audix SCX-1HC (way lower cost and not far from the Schoeps in sound quality) into the C300 II, I'm not sure a Sound Devices would provide significantly better sound in the studio. For location shoots, Sound Devices will likely sound better, however as a one-man band most of the time, I prefer not to use separate audio to save time in post (and reduce shoot complexity). Someday I might do a dialog test with a Schoeps CMC641 into a Sound Devices USBPre2 and compare quality to the C300 II.
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Something like this: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0083EQS3I/ref=pd_cp_421_1, this https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01B6011GO?psc=1, and this https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00RN76282/ref=pd_bxgy_421_img_2?ie=UTF8&psc=1 can solve the power issues (I built something similar, works great).
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While the new Zooms are much cleaner than before, Sound Devices still sound better, and more importantly, have a killer analog limiter that sounds pretty great where other devices would produce a ruined take. For slight clipping it's transparent.
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If I can match an A7S II to the 1DX II and C300 II (actually all to each other), I'm sure it would be fairly easy to match the XC10 and 80D using similar/same picture profiles (and maybe even no post work needed).
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Remember the C100 II has PDAF which is the best AF on the market. The 6D is FF, the 80D is APS-C crop. Unless you're a shallow DOF junkie, the 80D is newer with the latest PDAF and could also work as a B- video camera, allowing you to use all the same lenses on both cameras.
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The challenge you'll find with the 1DX II is that if just want good 1080p, you have to shoot 4K and downscale in post. The 4K files are of course gorgeous (as is the 4K60p), however they are also huge, and even with very powerful computers NLEs like PP CC have trouble playing these 4K files in real time (not an issue with FCPX on the same hardware- even 4K60p plays like butter). For short interviews/shots and/or when you can frequently offload to hard drives, it's not really an issue. However if you need to shoot a live event that is long, you're out of luck unless you can afford to miss some footage when switching cards (and don't run out of cards). As for stills, the 5D3 has higher resolution and I haven't seen any DR advantages during real-world shooting giving the 1DX II an advantage (I'm sure it's there I just haven't seen or tested it). For sports style shooting, absolutely the 1DX II is a better choice. I haven't shot on the C100 II, however the C300 II is a superior video camera to the 1DX II. The 1080p is gorgeous and the files are small. The 1DX II 1080p is soft and aliased, barely OK for closeups but too soft and aliased for wides. The C100 II 1080p is also gorgeous and the files are tiny. A really good fit given the OPs original specs. The C100 II is S35 and lenses like the Sigma 18-35 1.8 and Canon 17-55 F2.8 (used extensively in Cartel Land) are great for low light and run & gun.