Compulsory viewing for EOSHD readers!

[Quirky]

why not give us a good 2K image out of the camera? Put all that bit rate into colour and DR, etc, etc.

 

Yes, we are the noble Knights on a guest for the Holy Grail. Along with our noble king Andrew, anointed by the Lady of the Lake, we try to find a trail pass those woeful French who taunt us relentlessly, and throw cows and manure upon us from the mirrored bowels of their Canikon catapults.

But Thou shalt not give up, noble Knight, not even before the 4K layer of shrubbery! Carry on!  :P 

[Jacek]

4K offers a good 2K image, but as I've said above, why not give us a good 2K image out of the camera? Put all that bit rate into colour and DR, etc, etc.

It's not that simple. They did it in GH4  - 200Mbit 2K. While the image is great, downsampled 100Mbit 4k is still better.

 

There is one more thing - these all are hybrid stills/video cameras. That means they just can't go lower than 8 megapixels in 16:9.

For 2k video the best sensor would have 2 megapixels - 1:1 full sensor readout with best DR you can get. But nobody would buy still camera with 2-3 megapixels :)..

 

So 4K video looks like natural resolution for hybrid stills/video cameras. Sony did a 12 megapixels A7S and it is the lowest limit for photographers I suppose. And GH4 example shows that it's better to output that native 4K image than try to downsample internally.

[Guest fe4a3f5e8381673ce80017d29a8375f1]

It's not that simple. They did it in GH4  - 200Mbit 2K. While the image is great, downsampled 100Mbit 4k is still better.

 

 

This is irrelevant. I'm talking about 10bit, 422 in camera. This can be done at bit-rates lower than 200mbs. But the GH4 1080 200mbps doesn't do that. In fact the image is worse than the GH3 at 50mbps!

 

If you don't want real 13-stop dynamic range, grading latitude and colour depth, that is fine. But neither the GH4 or A7S offer this (GH4 offers 10 bit 422 via HDMI, but that's yet another step away from 'in-camera').

 

Your point about hybrid cameras is irrelevant too. The A7S gives a perfectly sharp, moire & aliasing-free HD image with a 12 megapixel sensor. Many camcorders downsample high-megapixel sensors to output HD (the C100 has a 4k sensor for example; the F5 until recently was HD output)

 

Can we leave this please? It's getting silly.

[aldolega]

For pretty much anything not involving fast motion, it's really quite silly to compare the GH4's 200mb/s mode to its 100mb/s modes, or the GH3's 50mb/s modes: those are IPB, and the 200mb/s is All-I. IPB is vastly more efficient with its bandwidth, so long as you don't have fast, continuous motion over most of the frame.

Compare the GH4's to the GH3's or 5DIII's All-I modes, and there won't be nearly as much complaining.

[estarkey7]

Yes, lighting is the key, but how can you accurately represent that lighting w/o wide dynamic range?

You light within the dynamic range of your medium. I think lots of people get lighting confused with exposure. They are related only by lux/lumens. Just because you can get the proper exposure doesn't mean your talent will look their best or the mood is right.

This where the differentiation between documentary and creative filmmaking are most evident: Documentary captures what is there in an accurate manner to represent truth. Creative throws truth out the window to immerse in the fantasy.

Do you think the film emulsion of Citizen Kane had fifteen stops? I don't know either ;), but they still consider it one it'd the best films of all time.

Of course it will make it easier if a cam did ISO 500,000 with 15 stops smooth as glass, but until then we can use fill light and work within a useable 9-10 stops.

[sunyata]

do a lot of people get lighting confused with exposure? i'm not sure about that, that would assume people think they are interchangeable terms.

 

anyway, the thing about Citizen Kane is that it was shot between f/8 and f/16, it used fast film, custom lenses, lots of artificial light, all to get as long of focus as I've ever seen still to this day w/o compositing.. but i'd venture to guess that the Kodak Super XX which they used, still printed > 13 stops once it was processed.. unfortunately we'll never get to see the original print quality. 

 

 

 

in agreement with your fantasy comment, that's why i can watch this movie over and over.

[Andrew Reid]

A good discussion in the video there.

 

But which part do you think is 'compulsory' schooling for us here at EOSHD Matt? :)

 

Is it the "4K is coming and it will steam roll over you so wake up" part, or is it the tired old part about 2K being "enough".

 

Both arguments are presented in the clip.

[richg101]

yes.  it seems the discussion changes direction very quickly and almost argues against itself.  Never the less an enjoyable interview which brings up lots of valid points from old men (in a good way) with lots of real world knowledge.  cheers for sharing :)

[Andrew Reid]

Yes, lighting is the key, but how can you accurately represent that lighting w/o wide dynamic range?

 

Just light for a narrower dynamic range.

[sunyata]

yep, but that statement wasn't a literal question, it was just for the sake of discussion, i.e. rhetorical. 

 

rather than a 4k vs 2k war, they seem more concerned about dynamic range and the image quality of the end format. they mention that they don't really care about resolution, they want _____ blank, which sometimes comes across as nice colors, at other times they call it dynamic range, but i think we know what they're getting at, it's the quality of the image not determined by resolution alone. and one person does mention none of his female (but be honest, guys too) are eager for 4k.. that's an age old problem, the fear of the close-up.

 

i hear what ebrahim is saying about never getting enough resolution.. i'm gonna fall on the side that says there is such a thing as too much resolution.. unless we're trying to publish for massive screens that we don't currently have. 

[Andrew Reid]

They are right about dynamic range being important but actually from the perspective of us, i.e. video shooters on far more democratically priced cameras than the Alexa what you want is that full pixel readout the 4K cameras have (GH4, A7S, etc.). Pixel binning and line skipping on 1080p DSLRs damages the image in all sorts of ways. Dynamic range suffers, so does colour.

 

So 4K is not just about a resolution gain for us, it is the gateway out of line skipping hell.

 

Once you appreciate that and get a 4K monitor like the Samsung for $599 I just reviewed you will see how something like the GH4 or A7S has pushed the envelope in all respects for image quality, codec, dynamic range, etc. compared to what we had before from our consumer DSLRs.

 

And if you want 1080p or 2K out of it just downscale in post. I question whether you need to go to all that effort to soften the lens on set to improve skin, I think it can be done in post with a reduction in micro-contrast and some other techniques as well as a final delivery in 1080p on a non-clinical display technology such as a projector.

 

The other argument is interesting, does the higher detail of 4K and HFR 48p kill the illusion of cinema. I think it depends on the subject matter. For documentaries where you want hyper realism it's great. For a costume drama or glossy escapism like Dallas I can see why creatively Rodney Charters has concerns about it. He's completely right to have those concerns, as are the actors. 4K and HFR certainly didn't work for me when I watched The Hobbit. Hated it.

 

But whether creatively it suits your project or not, the fact is 4K is coming fast and is the next standard for us all. Same as 1080p is today. And nobody wants to shoot 480p today do they?

 

People watching movies on mobile phones and tablets need 4K more than they think. At such close viewing distances you really notice.

[leeys]

Some of the arguments here remind me of stills photography over a decade back, when people were starting out and raw capability was starting to be available. Fast forward ten years and no pro would want a camera without that capability, even if they shot JPEGs 90% of the time.

 

We're back at this stage with these cameras - I'd love to see raw video implemented with sensible software options like we have for stills. That'd really shake up the market, me thinks. Unfortunately the hardware isn't there yet. I don't think there's a sensor readout and bus transfer that can deal with that on a cheap enough basis, is there?

[elgabogomez]

They are right in certain aspects, and even if they are the PROS and the highly respected DPs, it is their opinion, doesn't have to be mine ;)

However, i surely think there is a disconnection between what the tools we now have can do and the medium we have to deliver can show to an audience, after all, this is what film/video/audiovisual is all about, right? show a cohesive piece of work to an audience, say something to someone/others (ie. not just yourself).

The granny tvs of old are what the medium of moving visuals goes to in the end, and even the latest samsung 4k display is an 8 bit display at its core; a few years back i was obsessed by getting the best picture quality tv for the least amount of money to watch blu rays and hd dvds at home (being a cinefile and a movie collector) and started reading sites about display calibration and black levels and plasma vs lcd and ire and 2.2 gamma, and, and, and... And it all boiled down to the same 8 bit per channel rec709 you media makers know well and long story short, the most innovative "technologies" rendered a "wrong" less accurate image (sharp's quattron, sony trilumminous, panasonic full range, etc. and i'm not even touching the 60,120,240 hz refresh soap opera interpolation stuff.)

So the cinema is afaik the only consumer place where bigger than 8bit colour is presented to audiences and there you depend on the theater displaying it right, with a good lamp, etc. so, in many instances, movies are still looking better at home, on blu ray, in 8bit colour space.

So, in terms of high DR, higher colour space we (as expectators) are far far behind and there is a real disconnection between what an image looks in the DIT bay and the final outcome and that's what these 3 DP's are really complaining about, they are seeing the original work of art they do transformed to 8 bit nintendo alike dopplegangers. And it is sad :(

[Guest fe4a3f5e8381673ce80017d29a8375f1]

A good discussion in the video there.

 

But which part do you think is 'compulsory' schooling for us here at EOSHD Matt? :)

 

Is it the "4K is coming and it will steam roll over you so wake up" part, or is it the tired old part about 2K being "enough".

 

Both arguments are presented in the clip.

 

The "Compulsory Viewing" title was intentionally provocative to encourage debate. :) As you say, the video makes it clear it's a complicated issue, particularly at the top of the filmmaking ladder. But I think it also makes it clear that it's not necessarily top of the list.

 

My personal take on it is that I wish Panny and Sony had offered really robust in-camera HD (i.e. 10bit 422) before jumping to 4K with their prosumer cameras. It doesn't take a genius to see that it's a company-wide marketing strategy rather than an obvious fit for hybrid cameras. I'm not too tech savvy, but I don't really understand the argument that 4K is great because it avoids line skipping etc. The A7S outputs 1080 from a high-megapixel sensor, as do a lot of camcorders like the C100, without any such image problems. I know they are compressed codecs but then there is the 5DIII with ML RAW - superb HD image from a superb stills camera (I assume this does line skip?). My point is that it can be done. Blackmagic aren't making hybrid cameras, but they've proved camera size and cost is not the problem with the Pocket. Robust codecs can be put into small cheap cameras - even hybrids.

 

I'm not against 4K personally - in an ideal world I would choose it. But not at the expense of the other stuff. A genuinely robust image, with real filmic dynamic range, colour depth and grading latitude are much more important to me than a 4K compressed codec with 'decent' levels of the above. Don't get me wrong - the GH4 is an incredibly great camera. I just don't think we should pretend that 4K is the answer to our prayers. AFAIK there's no reason any of these companies couldn't have brought out a hybrid that shoots nice, sharp ProRes HD if they wanted to.

 

For most of us - other than the reframing aspect - 4K is a workaround. I say call a spade a spade!  :)

[AndrewM]

The discussion in the video did shoot off in a bunch of directions, which makes it hard to summarize. But if I were going to try, I would say the morals were the following:

 

They would rather have the next step be  high dynamic range and larger color gamut with the same resolution than higher resolution with the same range/gamut for delivery of content. In other words, they like the new Dolby HDR stuff.

 

 

In terms of cameras, the nice things they said about higher resolution were all about effects, and crop in post. Not anything much about improving the image by improving the resolution. The big step, according to them, was not resolution but sensitivity - increased sensitivity meant easier/lighter/cheaper lighting, and more natural light.

 

I think dynamic range is way more important for us than it is for them. They are working in a world where if the shadows are dropping off into black, then they tell someone to shine a light there, and if the highlights are clipping, then they throw up some gels or some diffusion. They have whole crews, and a controlled environment, so they can make the scene fit into the dynamic range they have. They might like to deliver in HDR, and they might like to have the safety margin that the latitude gives them, but that isn't the main issue.

 

For most of us, the issues are different. We don't have the control over the environment, and we don't have three people working the camera and another whole crew manning the lighting. So high dynamic range is more about the fact that we can't be sure the camera is set just right or the scene is set just right, and we need to be able to fix in post and not worry so much when we shoot.

[Tim Fraser]

There is one more thing - these all are hybrid stills/video cameras. That means they just can't go lower than 8 megapixels in 16:9.

For 2k video the best sensor would have 2 megapixels - 1:1 full sensor readout with best DR you can get. But nobody would buy still camera with 2-3 megapixels :)..

 

Yes this is on the button, and why picking up a Canon prosumer camcorder with 2 megapixels might not be a bad option for good lighting conditions.

[mfeldt]

 

Assuming that here on EOSHD we're focusing on low budget, what matters is priorities - I'd take a 10-bit, 13 stop 2K image over a 4K camera with less 'meat' to its image.

 

 

I agree, but do you want 3 additional stops that cannot be encoded into the image?

[mfeldt]

Some of the arguments here remind me of stills photography over a decade back, when people were starting out and raw capability was starting to be available. Fast forward ten years and no pro would want a camera without that capability, even if they shot JPEGs 90% of the time.

 

We're back at this stage with these cameras - I'd love to see raw video implemented with sensible software options like we have for stills. That'd really shake up the market, me thinks. Unfortunately the hardware isn't there yet. I don't think there's a sensor readout and bus transfer that can deal with that on a cheap enough basis, is there?

 

 

There are sensors, actually cameras that could do the job, e.g.:

 

http://www.lumenera.com/usb3/lt665.php

 

or

 

http://www.edmundoptics.de/imaging/cameras/usb-cameras/point-grey-grasshopper-3-high-performance-usb-3-0-cameras/88-514

 

Getting from there to a handy device incorporating the usual comfy features videographers are used to should be a development project of one or two years.

[Guest fe4a3f5e8381673ce80017d29a8375f1]

I agree, but do you want 3 additional stops that cannot be encoded into the image?

Huh? What do you mean? In terms of delivery? It's not as simple as that.

[mfeldt]

Huh? What do you mean? In terms of delivery? It's not as simple as that.

Maybe I'm too naive about the dynamic range of an analogue image, and maybe it leads to far off topic... but I thought:

 

13 stops dynamic range gives you 2¹³ = 8192 discernible grey levels, while a 10 bit image can just convey 1024 levels of grey. So you're loosing what your camera delivered in the encoding process.