Sumix 2/3" 1920x1080 CMOS

Jose A. Garcia · October 7th, 2007, 07:20 AM

So you're saying a standard view could be achieved with a lens between 12mm and 25mm and 50mm would be a clear telephoto.

Sorry, I didn't know that. I thought those measures were just 35mm equivalents.

By the way, where are those conversion charts (the Fujinon ones)? I need to see the values for 2/3" sensors.

Take Vos · October 7th, 2007, 08:42 AM

If you click on the lens to see the information, just scroll down a little to show the angle of view. Like here:
http://www.fujinon.com/Security/Prod...x?cat=47&id=92

Take Vos · October 24th, 2007, 03:32 AM

I just received my Fujinon lens.
I have not tried it yet, but the construction seems quite solid. Also interestingly there are 10 blades in the iris, It is pretty circular when almost closed or almost open, but is more star-like when medium open.

Noah Yuan-Vogel · October 24th, 2007, 12:49 PM

Any other info on this? Jose, you mentioned hardware lossless compression? Where did you hear about this? There is no mention of it anywhere. Sounds cool, but you cant guarantee lossless compression will maintain any particular compression ratio... and without it i dont see how they could be pushing 1080p60 over gigabit and definitely not at 12bit. If SI cant do it, how would sumix? hey if they really are finding a way to compress the data a little bit before running it over the gigE that would allow use of the full capabilities of the camera. If they can back this with good software, this could be very nice. rolling shutter is definitely still an issue, and that 1080p60 spec is probably only for 8bit. I'm surprised SI doesnt seem to have an option to output 8bit with the benefit of 33% higher framerates. Also, keep in mind that without a good raw compression option like cineform raw, you might need a RAID to capture stuff from this. anyone know if there are any differences between the versions of this altasens sensor? or is it just a couple of pixels of resolution?

Jose A. Garcia · October 24th, 2007, 04:36 PM

Lots of questions!

Well... Hardware lossless compression is confirmed by people at Sumix. 1:1,7 ratio to be exact. SI can't extract 12bit at 60p because they don't compress the signal at all before reaching the computer. The software, as far as I know, is a new version of the standard Sumix tool to capture images and video. It can control every single aspect of the sensor from resolution to fps, and talking about fps, they're suposed to be very precise.

Rolling shutter may be highly reduced if you shoot ala SI2K, that is, you shoot at twice the fps and discard every other frame. That also gives you the 1/48 shutter speed you need to get a filmlike motion blur.

You don't need RAID to capture with this camera. People at Sumix are using 2,0Ghz processors and standard laptop HDDs to capture 1080p60 and the sensor is an AltaSens ProCamHD as well as the SI2K's.

By the way Take, keep us posted on the Fujinon lens. They're suposed to be quite good. In fact, SI was going to add a couple as part of the SI2K bundle.

Noah Yuan-Vogel · October 24th, 2007, 04:58 PM

Ok if there is no compression before reaching the computer, how can it be called hardware compression? (maybe it isnt supposed to be but that is what you said in the first post) and how can they put a 125MBps 1080p60 (8bit) data stream over gigE From my understanding, if highly optimized, you might be able to get 90MBps over GigE if you are really lucky? or is the 60fps number just a theoretical number for what the sensor is capable of?

Laptop HDDs eh? 12bit@1080p24 compressed 1.7 is around 45MBps which seems like it might be tough for a laptop HDD. Not impossible, but very tough to guarantee. How can they guarantee lossless compression at 1.7x? At least from my understanding, real non-destructive lossless compression on photographic images shouldnt be a problem at 2x, but technically if it is constant 1.7x compression it may not be nondestructive. What if you shoot a bunch of grain/noise? does it drop frames because the image compression ratio got too high to compensate, or does it start to become destructive to maintain the 1.7x compression? I think its a great idea, just trying to get an idea of what their version of "lossless" really means.

Sorry for all the questions, but i am intrigued and you seem to have answers. If they got it right with this camera, this could be big. I love the look of the altasens sensors. From what I've seen it appears to have greater dynamic range than RED.. and for $2000 instead of SI's $17k..

Daniel Lipats · October 24th, 2007, 05:46 PM

Im really excited, I can't wait. I have been anxiously waiting for the 353 for what seems like about a year, still nothing. But from what I gather this thing is even better.

Has anybody used Sumix cameras before? What is the software like?

I can't find much information about it on their site..

<edit>Never mind, I suppose its the CommandShot software. There is some information about it here:
http://www.sumix.com/products/cameras/software.html</edit>

Noah Yuan-Vogel · October 24th, 2007, 08:19 PM

well i wouldnt get too excited, i mean SI has had an equivalent camera out for nearly 2 years now i believe. Granted their version was $5k last i checked. Having worked with the M73 sumix camera, i would be careful not to expect too much. They are an industrial camera company, not digital cinema. The software for that camera has a lot of features, but was limited in some very important ways. I would not consider it ready for video production unless your idea of video production is hooking the camera up to your desktop computer, having a ton of control over the camera, but what seemed to be not particularly accurate framerates, no ability to optimize for rolling shutter, and a pretty tedious data workflow. When I was working with that other sumix camera, I tried to build my own software interface using their API, which is fairly easy to use, but all in all, it might be tough to get what you want from the camera unless you have serious programming skills or sumix really ramps up their support for tv/film production workflows in their software. When it comes down to it, these cameras have a few amazing features that you cant get unless you buy another camera that is 10x the price, but if you cant shoot with it or have to spend a year developing software and building hardware for it, its not worth much to someone who actually wants to shoot movies.

That of course isnt to say that the right person couldnt get a lot out of this camera.

Solomon Chase · October 24th, 2007, 08:43 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Noah Yuan-Vogel

well i wouldn't get too excited, i mean SI has had an equivalent camera out for nearly 2 years now i believe. Granted their version was $5k last i checked. Having worked with the M73 sumix camera, i would be careful not to expect too much. They are an industrial camera company, not digital cinema. The software for that camera has a lot of features, but was limited in some very important ways. I would not consider it ready for video production unless your idea of video production is hooking the camera up to your desktop computer, having a ton of control over the camera, but what seemed to be not particularly accurate frame rates, no ability to optimize for rolling shutter, and a pretty tedious data work flow. When I was working with that other sumix camera, I tried to build my own software interface using their API, which is fairly easy to use, but all in all, it might be tough to get what you want from the camera unless you have serious programming skills or sumix really ramps up their support for tv/film production work flows in their software. When it comes down to it, these cameras have a few amazing features that you cant get unless you buy another camera that is 10x the price, but if you cant shoot with it or have to spend a year developing software and building hardware for it, its not worth much to someone who actually wants to shoot movies.

That of course isn't to say that the right person couldn't get a lot out of this camera.

True. This is the first camera Sumix is marketing as a "digital cinematography" camera though, so hopefully there will be more out of the box support and work flow accommodations. The extra bandwidth of GigE and on-camera compression is a great start.

Daniel Lipats · October 24th, 2007, 08:57 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Noah Yuan-Vogel

unless your idea of video production is hooking the camera up to your desktop computer

Thats exactly what I had in mind :)

I dont know if you have been keeping up with my posts on the 333 thread, but I built a camera platform which integrates the desktop pc and camera into a single package. My new version is only a bit bigger, even possibly smaller then a pro shoulder cam like sony XDCAM for example.

The best thing about this setup is that when a new camera head comes out, all I do is replace the 333 with the Sumix and make any necessary adjustments to linux/windows environment. If I ever want to replace the Sumix, just remove it and mount a new head.

Im really looking forward to getting my hands on that API.

Noah Yuan-Vogel · October 25th, 2007, 10:16 AM

I mean there are plenty of productions where running a camera tethered is reasonable, and it certainly isnt that complicated to build a relatively portable computer that could be shoulder mounted. I did this with the old sumix M73 usb camera. I unfortunately never got around to shooting handheld or in a production environment (only shot stuff like motion and resolution tests while developing) with it because unfortunately the motherboard i was using stopped working. any pictures of your camera platform, daniel? do you have a thread about it? only thing is, if the requirements are anything like SI's camera, you might not be able to run the sumix on the same computer as the elphel. From the sound of it, sumix's compression isnt on-camera like elphel, so youll be dealing with 10x as much data (7MBps max on elphel vs 70+ MBps on sumix). This means more CPU and HDD speed (although one can be traded for the other). Also I know SI has particular requirements in terms of gigE chipsets because of the need for especially large jumbo packets when pushing that much data over gigE, this might be the case for the sumix as well for capturing any video formats requiring much more than 70MP/s.

Daniel, I saw some of the footage you posted from the stuff you shot on the 333. How did things go in terms of rolling shutter and accurate framerates/audio sync? I mean I can imagine shooting things that have little movement and where audio can be VO'd where none of that would be much of an issue, but that could be quite limiting in many cases.

Jay Burlage · October 25th, 2007, 10:59 AM

Any future plans of offering this package with the altasens bitsdream sensor?

Noah Yuan-Vogel · October 25th, 2007, 10:59 AM

Hmm I must have missed it before but it does mention

"Hardware image processing (gamma, brightness, contrast, median filter, lossless image compression)"

as one of the features. But Jose mentioned earlier that they do not have the ability to apply compression before the data reaches the computer. This seems conflicting, unless there is some other definition of hardware image processing I am missing. I know the M73 had gamma, brightness, and contrast (as well as LUT if you use their API) hardware controls but also similar software controls (plus saturation). The software controls took a lot of cpu power and the hardware controls took none. Big difference. If there really is lossless compression in camera, thatd be something SI doesnt have and could really make a big difference in terms of getting the most out of the camera. I certainly wouldnt mind being able to shoot 1080p60 even if it had to be 8bit log instead of 12bit raw.

Jose A. Garcia · October 25th, 2007, 11:16 AM

Noah, if you read my post again, you'll notice I said "SI can't extract 12bit at 60p because they don't compress the signal at all before reaching the computer". I was talking about Silicon Imaging, not Sumix. Sumix DOES include realtime hardware lossless compression in this camera.

Noah Yuan-Vogel · October 25th, 2007, 11:18 AM

i wonder if anyone is taking advantage of anything like bitsdream yet. It has always amazed me there wasnt more push for HDR video. RED, SI2k etc are great but a significant increase in exposure latitude of video could have a greater effect on the popularity of video than higher resolutions, color samplings, or frame rates ever did.

Then again, now we have to worry about rolling shutter artifacts, with hdr im sure we will add in all kinds of hdr motion artifacting.

October 7th, 2007, 08:42 AM	#32
Take Vos Major Player Join Date: Mar 2007 Location: Amsterdam The Netherlands Posts: 200	If you click on the lens to see the information, just scroll down a little to show the angle of view. Like here: http://www.fujinon.com/Security/Prod...x?cat=47&id=92 __________________ VOSGAMES, http://www.vosgames.nl/ developer of Boom Recorder and Mirage Recorder

October 24th, 2007, 03:32 AM	#33
Take Vos Major Player Join Date: Mar 2007 Location: Amsterdam The Netherlands Posts: 200	I just received my Fujinon lens. I have not tried it yet, but the construction seems quite solid. Also interestingly there are 10 blades in the iris, It is pretty circular when almost closed or almost open, but is more star-like when medium open. __________________ VOSGAMES, http://www.vosgames.nl/ developer of Boom Recorder and Mirage Recorder

October 7th, 2007, 07:20 AM	#31
Jose A. Garcia Major Player Join Date: May 2007 Location: Sevilla (Spain) Posts: 439	So you're saying a standard view could be achieved with a lens between 12mm and 25mm and 50mm would be a clear telephoto. Sorry, I didn't know that. I thought those measures were just 35mm equivalents. By the way, where are those conversion charts (the Fujinon ones)? I need to see the values for 2/3" sensors.

October 24th, 2007, 12:49 PM	#34
Noah Yuan-Vogel Major Player Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: New York City Posts: 613	Any other info on this? Jose, you mentioned hardware lossless compression? Where did you hear about this? There is no mention of it anywhere. Sounds cool, but you cant guarantee lossless compression will maintain any particular compression ratio... and without it i dont see how they could be pushing 1080p60 over gigabit and definitely not at 12bit. If SI cant do it, how would sumix? hey if they really are finding a way to compress the data a little bit before running it over the gigE that would allow use of the full capabilities of the camera. If they can back this with good software, this could be very nice. rolling shutter is definitely still an issue, and that 1080p60 spec is probably only for 8bit. I'm surprised SI doesnt seem to have an option to output 8bit with the benefit of 33% higher framerates. Also, keep in mind that without a good raw compression option like cineform raw, you might need a RAID to capture stuff from this. anyone know if there are any differences between the versions of this altasens sensor? or is it just a couple of pixels of resolution?

October 24th, 2007, 04:36 PM	#35
Jose A. Garcia Major Player Join Date: May 2007 Location: Sevilla (Spain) Posts: 439	Lots of questions! Well... Hardware lossless compression is confirmed by people at Sumix. 1:1,7 ratio to be exact. SI can't extract 12bit at 60p because they don't compress the signal at all before reaching the computer. The software, as far as I know, is a new version of the standard Sumix tool to capture images and video. It can control every single aspect of the sensor from resolution to fps, and talking about fps, they're suposed to be very precise. Rolling shutter may be highly reduced if you shoot ala SI2K, that is, you shoot at twice the fps and discard every other frame. That also gives you the 1/48 shutter speed you need to get a filmlike motion blur. You don't need RAID to capture with this camera. People at Sumix are using 2,0Ghz processors and standard laptop HDDs to capture 1080p60 and the sensor is an AltaSens ProCamHD as well as the SI2K's. By the way Take, keep us posted on the Fujinon lens. They're suposed to be quite good. In fact, SI was going to add a couple as part of the SI2K bundle.

October 24th, 2007, 04:58 PM	#36
Noah Yuan-Vogel Major Player Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: New York City Posts: 613	Ok if there is no compression before reaching the computer, how can it be called hardware compression? (maybe it isnt supposed to be but that is what you said in the first post) and how can they put a 125MBps 1080p60 (8bit) data stream over gigE From my understanding, if highly optimized, you might be able to get 90MBps over GigE if you are really lucky? or is the 60fps number just a theoretical number for what the sensor is capable of? Laptop HDDs eh? 12bit@1080p24 compressed 1.7 is around 45MBps which seems like it might be tough for a laptop HDD. Not impossible, but very tough to guarantee. How can they guarantee lossless compression at 1.7x? At least from my understanding, real non-destructive lossless compression on photographic images shouldnt be a problem at 2x, but technically if it is constant 1.7x compression it may not be nondestructive. What if you shoot a bunch of grain/noise? does it drop frames because the image compression ratio got too high to compensate, or does it start to become destructive to maintain the 1.7x compression? I think its a great idea, just trying to get an idea of what their version of "lossless" really means. Sorry for all the questions, but i am intrigued and you seem to have answers. If they got it right with this camera, this could be big. I love the look of the altasens sensors. From what I've seen it appears to have greater dynamic range than RED.. and for $2000 instead of SI's $17k..

October 24th, 2007, 05:46 PM	#37
Daniel Lipats Major Player Join Date: Feb 2006 Posts: 260	Im really excited, I can't wait. I have been anxiously waiting for the 353 for what seems like about a year, still nothing. But from what I gather this thing is even better. Has anybody used Sumix cameras before? What is the software like? I can't find much information about it on their site.. <edit>Never mind, I suppose its the CommandShot software. There is some information about it here: http://www.sumix.com/products/cameras/software.html</edit>

October 24th, 2007, 08:19 PM	#38
Noah Yuan-Vogel Major Player Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: New York City Posts: 613	well i wouldnt get too excited, i mean SI has had an equivalent camera out for nearly 2 years now i believe. Granted their version was $5k last i checked. Having worked with the M73 sumix camera, i would be careful not to expect too much. They are an industrial camera company, not digital cinema. The software for that camera has a lot of features, but was limited in some very important ways. I would not consider it ready for video production unless your idea of video production is hooking the camera up to your desktop computer, having a ton of control over the camera, but what seemed to be not particularly accurate framerates, no ability to optimize for rolling shutter, and a pretty tedious data workflow. When I was working with that other sumix camera, I tried to build my own software interface using their API, which is fairly easy to use, but all in all, it might be tough to get what you want from the camera unless you have serious programming skills or sumix really ramps up their support for tv/film production workflows in their software. When it comes down to it, these cameras have a few amazing features that you cant get unless you buy another camera that is 10x the price, but if you cant shoot with it or have to spend a year developing software and building hardware for it, its not worth much to someone who actually wants to shoot movies. That of course isnt to say that the right person couldnt get a lot out of this camera.

October 25th, 2007, 10:16 AM	#41
Noah Yuan-Vogel Major Player Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: New York City Posts: 613	I mean there are plenty of productions where running a camera tethered is reasonable, and it certainly isnt that complicated to build a relatively portable computer that could be shoulder mounted. I did this with the old sumix M73 usb camera. I unfortunately never got around to shooting handheld or in a production environment (only shot stuff like motion and resolution tests while developing) with it because unfortunately the motherboard i was using stopped working. any pictures of your camera platform, daniel? do you have a thread about it? only thing is, if the requirements are anything like SI's camera, you might not be able to run the sumix on the same computer as the elphel. From the sound of it, sumix's compression isnt on-camera like elphel, so youll be dealing with 10x as much data (7MBps max on elphel vs 70+ MBps on sumix). This means more CPU and HDD speed (although one can be traded for the other). Also I know SI has particular requirements in terms of gigE chipsets because of the need for especially large jumbo packets when pushing that much data over gigE, this might be the case for the sumix as well for capturing any video formats requiring much more than 70MP/s. Daniel, I saw some of the footage you posted from the stuff you shot on the 333. How did things go in terms of rolling shutter and accurate framerates/audio sync? I mean I can imagine shooting things that have little movement and where audio can be VO'd where none of that would be much of an issue, but that could be quite limiting in many cases.

October 25th, 2007, 10:59 AM	#42
Jay Burlage Regular Crew Join Date: Sep 2007 Location: Ann Arbor, MI Posts: 39	Any future plans of offering this package with the altasens bitsdream sensor?

October 25th, 2007, 11:16 AM	#44
Jose A. Garcia Major Player Join Date: May 2007 Location: Sevilla (Spain) Posts: 439	Noah, if you read my post again, you'll notice I said "SI can't extract 12bit at 60p because they don't compress the signal at all before reaching the computer". I was talking about Silicon Imaging, not Sumix. Sumix DOES include realtime hardware lossless compression in this camera.

October 25th, 2007, 11:18 AM	#45
Noah Yuan-Vogel Major Player Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: New York City Posts: 613	i wonder if anyone is taking advantage of anything like bitsdream yet. It has always amazed me there wasnt more push for HDR video. RED, SI2k etc are great but a significant increase in exposure latitude of video could have a greater effect on the popularity of video than higher resolutions, color samplings, or frame rates ever did. Then again, now we have to worry about rolling shutter artifacts, with hdr im sure we will add in all kinds of hdr motion artifacting.