SIGMA FP with ProRes RAW and BRAW !

[OleB]

32 minutes ago, kye said:

On paper the FP is really not the right camera for me, but the image is so compelling that I can't eliminate it from my short-list for my next camera, whenever I end up doing an upgrade.  In terms of image quality, I really think that the FP could be the last camera you'd ever need to buy.

I agree with everything you have said. What the fp does now using that ARRI LUT is extremely interesting, I have never seen a camera before where you get skin tones which are directly out of camera on the skin tone line of the vector scope unless you have set a totally wrong white balance. Usually that needs a lot more work. This point alone makes me very happy.

Working hard currently to get my hands on an Alexa for testing both cameras at ISO 800 side by side. Granted I will provide the results here once I have done so.

What I wanted to express again is my gratitude for all of your contributions on this topic. Without this forum I would never gotten to this point and I am extremely thankful for that.

[TomTheDP]

2 hours ago, OleB said:

I agree with everything you have said. What the fp does now using that ARRI LUT is extremely interesting, I have never seen a camera before where you get skin tones which are directly out of camera on the skin tone line of the vector scope unless you have set a totally wrong white balance. Usually that needs a lot more work. This point alone makes me very happy.

Working hard currently to get my hands on an Alexa for testing both cameras at ISO 800 side by side. Granted I will provide the results here once I have done so.

What I wanted to express again is my gratitude for all of your contributions on this topic. Without this forum I would never gotten to this point and I am extremely thankful for that.

I could do those tests for you next week and send you the files. 

The Sigma FP is really nice. Great color reproduction. It certainly doesn't have the dynamic range of an Alexa but that is ok. 

My biggest gripe with it is the micro HDMI which makes it scary for professional use. 

[OleB]

58 minutes ago, TomTheDP said:

I could do those tests for you next week and send you the files. 

Tom to you have a Ninja V available as well? Because then you could upload the ARRI conversion LUT to the Ninja V to exactly monitor the camera. I would be very much interested in the result of ISO 800 from the fp against the Alexa. Theoretically they should be identical with the difference being the DR obviously. 

[TomTheDP]

59 minutes ago, OleB said:

Tom to you have a Ninja V available as well? Because then you could upload the ARRI conversion LUT to the Ninja V to exactly monitor the camera. I would be very much interested in the result of ISO 800 from the fp against the Alexa. Theoretically they should be identical with the difference being the DR obviously. 

I could possibly borrow one. Would expose them at the same aperture? 

[OleB]

39 minutes ago, TomTheDP said:

I could possibly borrow one. Would expose them at the same aperture? 

That could be one approach yes. Depending how close the ISO ratings of both companies is it might give slightly different exposures though. Let us see 🙂

[TomTheDP]

47 minutes ago, OleB said:

That could be one approach yes. Depending how close the ISO ratings of both companies is it might give slightly different exposures though. Let us see 🙂

I'd probably do one exposing to what looks normal per camera, one exposing for highlights, and one where both are the exact same aperture/ND. 

I can say having used them together on jobs the Sigma is amazing in terms of image quality. The workflow is just a pain to where I wouldn't use it on most projects as a main camera. But it punches way above its price tag.

[kye]

12 hours ago, OleB said:

I agree with everything you have said. What the fp does now using that ARRI LUT is extremely interesting, I have never seen a camera before where you get skin tones which are directly out of camera on the skin tone line of the vector scope unless you have set a totally wrong white balance. Usually that needs a lot more work. This point alone makes me very happy.

Working hard currently to get my hands on an Alexa for testing both cameras at ISO 800 side by side. Granted I will provide the results here once I have done so.

What I wanted to express again is my gratitude for all of your contributions on this topic. Without this forum I would never gotten to this point and I am extremely thankful for that.

I wouldn't be too focussed on getting skintones right on the line, there is quite a lot of variation in where skintones get placed.  If you're curious I can dig up some previous tests, but I looked at a promo video from Canon and one from ARRI and the Canon had skintones to the right of the line (towards red) and ARRI had then to the left (towards yellow).  Both videos were exemplary and the skintones in each looked fantastic, so they are definitely correct, despite the vector scope saying they're 'wrong'.

If you're curious, I recommend doing some tests where you take a few images and rotate the hues as far towards yellow as you can go without making people look sick, and then as far as you can towards red without making them look sunburnt and then enable the vector scope and see where you put them.  Maybe your preferences are really attune and you really do prefer them very close to the line, but maybe you will find that there's a range of hues that you find acceptable.

It's also worth mentioning that getting the skintones 'right' (whatever that means for you) is only really relevant in neutral grades.  If you start grading a project with a more creative grade, like a film emulation, a split colour (like orange/teal or yellow/magenta etc), or just applying a single colour as a wash over the top, then your skintones can still look fine but they will be waaaay off in pure technical terms.  The normal approach for colouring in this way is to apply a strong look to the footage and then blend a bit of the original (balanced) skintones back over the top with opacity, just to pull them back into the range where they look ok but also look like they fit into the world of your colour grade as well.  Happy to find an example of that process if your interested as well.

10 hours ago, TomTheDP said:

I could do those tests for you next week and send you the files. 

I'd also be very interested in that test.  Please share 🙂 

6 hours ago, TomTheDP said:

I'd probably do one exposing to what looks normal per camera, one exposing for highlights, and one where both are the exact same aperture/ND. 

I'd suggest that matching exposures between them is a more relevant test rather than matching ND or Apertures, which is only a relevant test if you're planning on using the two cameras side-by-side.  Then again, considering how malleable each of these are in post a small difference in exposure or WB shouldn't be an issue.

This is a test that I think is worth doing as properly as you're able to (I am aware how much time these take to do) because I don't think that anyone else has done this comparison, and I think it's actually a very important comparison because I think the FP will actually get far closer than almost anything else around on the market at the moment.  I really feel that the FP / FP-L cameras are radically under-appreciated and that if there was more awareness of how good the image really is then it would be far more widely appreciated.  (and Sigma would be far more likely to make an FPii and that would be good for all of us!)

[OleB]

4 hours ago, kye said:

Both videos were exemplary and the skintones in each looked fantastic, so they are definitely correct, despite the vector scope saying they're 'wrong'.

Yeah, actually I was writing a little bit too strict. I meant to say they were really close to the line and just looking great. Agree about the different skin undertones. My daughter is more reddish, my wife has a more yellow one. 

4 hours ago, kye said:

If you start grading a project with a more creative grade, like a film emulation, a split colour (like orange/teal or yellow/magenta etc), or just applying a single colour as a wash over the top, then your skintones can still look fine but they will be waaaay off in pure technical terms.  The normal approach for colouring in this way is to apply a strong look to the footage and then blend a bit of the original (balanced) skintones back over the top with opacity, just to pull them back into the range where they look ok but also look like they fit into the world of your colour grade as well.  Happy to find an example of that process if your interested as well.

That is really helpful! Due to all the technical things I had to get out of the way first I was not really starting to create creative grades until now.

My planned approach is to color correct the material to get it looking "normally" first and afterwards put a creative grade on top. There I understood it is impossible and not even considered being helpful to have skin on the line. 😄 That mix you are describing sounds really interesting and I would be very happy to see an example.

 

[kye]

3 minutes ago, OleB said:

Yeah, actually I was writing a little bit too strict. I meant to say they were really close to the line and just looking great. Agree about the different skin undertones. My daughter is more reddish, my wife has a more yellow one. 

That is really helpful! Due to all the technical things I had to get out of the way first I was not really starting to create creative grades until now.

My planned approach is to color correct the material to get it looking "normally" first and afterwards put a creative grade on top. There I understood it is impossible and not even considered being helpful to have skin on the line. 😄 That mix you are describing sounds really interesting and I would be very happy to see an example.

I think the colourists refer to the initial adjustments as "balancing" the image (although it's not a universally used term) and they'll then apply a creative colour grade over the whole scene / film.  

I don't know how technical you like to get with grading, and it's a very very deep and technical topic, but I'll try and give you some examples.  It also depends on what software you're grading in, because Resolve uses Nodes and that means that either some things get done differently to a layer-based package, or it means you can do things that can't get done in a layers-based package.

I had a video in mind that showed it clearly but couldn't find it, but this one describes a similar approach - I've linked to the relevant timestamp:

This is part of the node graph from that grade:

Node 4 takes the balanced image from node 2 and does a serious grade on the image that screws up the skin-tones, but node 6 takes the same balanced image from node 2 and has a key on it to only select the skintones and then he grades in node 6 to push the skintones so they look ok sitting on top of the grade from node 4.  ie, node 6 is at 100% opacity over the top of node 4.

An alternate approach, and the one I was describing, would be to have node 4 do the same grade, and keep node 6 as being a key of the skintones, but instead of node 6 having a grade on it and sit at 100% opacity, I'd keep it having no grade at all and starting from 0% opacity just bring the opacity up until the skintones stop looking wrong.  This technique works well if the grade in node 4 is absolutely full-on, because if that is the case and node 6 was at 100% opacity then you'd have to do a lot of grading on node 6 to get the skintones to sit nicely over the top.

A completely different approach is to grade the whole image with a serious grade, then in a node after that you'd try and get a key of the skintones and then adjust them how you want them.  This is a way to do it when you don't have parallel nodes, but it makes pulling the key much more difficult.  One way to make this easier, if the software allows it, is to pull a key of the skintones from the balanced node before the image has been really messed with but use that key for the skintones node after the serious grade.  This is another awesome feature of Resolve - the blue inputs and outputs on the nodes are for the key, so you can pull a key on any node and then connect that Key Out to the Key In on another node.  

(Side note: you can also connect between the key ins/outs and the image ins/outs which allows you to process the key using the normal controls of a node.  I haven't seen anyone else do this but it works and I've used it in real projects to refine keys etc).

There are other approaches as well, and it's worth setting up a test project and trying to think of all the different approaches and different tools you could use, and just trying each of them to see which ones you like and which ones you find easier to use etc.

Just for fun, here's another video that uses parallel nodes and all kinds of fun stuff to create a strong look:

 

[TomTheDP]

@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. 

[OleB]

16 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. 

Thank you very much for your efforts, Tom! I am downloading the files right now and will check them asap. 🙂

[kye]

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?

[TomTheDP]

9 hours ago, OleB said:

Thank you very much for your efforts, Tom! I am downloading the files right now and will check them asap. 🙂

 

3 hours ago, kye said:

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?

I am excited to hear your guys thoughts. 

The white balance and tint was quite different on the two cameras. The Alexa has a bit more texture I would say, the sigma a little cleaner. 

[OleB]

On 11/8/2022 at 5:34 PM, TomTheDP said:

 

I am excited to hear your guys thoughts. 

The white balance and tint was quite different on the two cameras. The Alexa has a bit more texture I would say, the sigma a little cleaner. 

Tom, I would like to test the files this weekend. What have been the ISO settings of both cameras, expect that the Alexa was on ISO 800, the fp?

Cheers!

[TomTheDP]

7 hours ago, OleB said:

Tom, I would like to test the files this weekend. What have been the ISO settings of both cameras, expect that the Alexa was on ISO 800, the fp?

Cheers!

I believe both were at 640 iso 

[alanpoiuyt]

A few shots from my California Roadtrip this week.

Sigma fp / Aivascope 1.5 anamorphic with Helios 44 taking lens and Laowa 9mm f5.6.https://vimeo.com/770296545

[kye]

On 11/12/2022 at 12:48 AM, TomTheDP said:

I believe both were at 640 iso 

When I (eventually) get around to grading these, any objections to me posting the graded images in the thread?

[OleB]

Have played a little with the files. Seems that the white balance and exposure was different. But once that has been set approx. the same the fp files look astonishing close the the ones from the Alexa.

For the Alexa I have just chosen the ARRI Rec709 LUT built into DaVinci.

For the fp settings were as follows:

RAW settings: 

Blackmagin Design + Blackmagic Design Film

CST: In: DaVinci Wide Gamut & Blackmagic Design Film => Out: Arri Wide Gamut 3 & Arri LogC3

LUT: Same built in ARRI Rec709 LUT

 

[alanpoiuyt]

21 hours ago, alanpoiuyt said:

A few shots from my California Roadtrip this week.

Sigma fp / Aivascope 1.5 anamorphic with Helios 44 taking lens and Laowa 9mm f5.6.https://vimeo.com/770296545

 

[TomTheDP]

On 11/12/2022 at 11:01 PM, kye said:

When I (eventually) get around to grading these, any objections to me posting the graded images in the thread?

No go right ahead 

 

On 11/13/2022 at 7:23 AM, OleB said:

Have played a little with the files. Seems that the white balance and exposure was different. But once that has been set approx. the same the fp files look astonishing close the the ones from the Alexa.

For the Alexa I have just chosen the ARRI Rec709 LUT built into DaVinci.

For the fp settings were as follows:

RAW settings: 

Blackmagin Design + Blackmagic Design Film

CST: In: DaVinci Wide Gamut & Blackmagic Design Film => Out: Arri Wide Gamut 3 & Arri LogC3

LUT: Same built in ARRI Rec709 LUT

 

The white balance was set the same on both cameras but yes they are a lot different in how they interpret it. The exposure looks a lot the same in REC709 but when switched to a log profile it looks a lot darker on the FP. 

Feel free to share stills of your grades!!