Mastering to bayer images doesn't seem like a very good solution to me. The only situation where you'd want this is if you edit in RAW images, and don't do any postproduction treatment whatsoever. I wouldn't want to convert my CGI and other special effects and treatments to bayer images...

I think the focus is best kept to an affordable high-quality acquisition workflow. As long as there are solutions to convert the RAW images, everyone can edit and master in a a format that suits their needs and budget: DVCProHD native (for minimal bandwidth and storage needs) to 4:4:4 uncompressed HD and visually lossless solutions like Cineform somewhere in between.

Bar3nd

Why is everybody trying to edit HD natively???

The best approach by far is to edit a low-res NTSC DV-based, or M-JPEG based offline and then online the footage without any compression, etc.

Use that uncompressed 12-bit source as your master. Color correct the RAW footage, do whatever you want, but I think it's actually kind of silly to try and edit full-res HD when it means you have to compress, etc. and jump through countless hoops to "edit in HD".

Also while I think that Cineform or even DVCProHD is a nice format for editing, it hamstrings you if you have a good editor who's an AVID or FCP guy, not a Premiere Pro person. Apple's DVCPro won't work with AVID, and Cineform won't work with either program. This isn't a pro-mac, anti-pc argument, this is what are good trained editors familar with. Maybe with small independent stuff PremierePro or Vegas might be a nice choice, but by far the most experienced professional editors are going to be on AVID and then FCP.

So the best, most editing-app agnostic approach is an offline/online approach. Use a common everyday Quicktime format like DV that will work with AVID or FCP or even PremierePro, render to that codec in NTSC, edit your offline, and then online in whatever package you want with a high-bit-depth DPX or TIFF file sequence.

I guess if everybody here wants to edit stuff themselves then they can do whatever they want, but when you start to farm your editing jobs out to professional working editors (not in-house corporate industrials where there are a lot of Premiere Pro guys, but they aren't film editors), you're going to have to face a market that's dominated by AVID with FCP creeping in.

Also keep in mind that there are a lot of Meridian and AVBV-based AVID's still out there cutting film material in Hollywood or for Hollywood-destined stuff. Some Adrenalines too. Those guys, unless the Adrenaline folks have the latest updates can't edit in HD or these fancy codecs.

Jason,

You are "hamstrung" what choice you make there is nothing new to that; comprises are everywhere in the post-production workflow. Choosing a off-line vs on-line workflow is your choose, we know there are clear advantages and disadvantages to both. The workflow I just had involvement in, was off-lined on a AVID and on-lined on Premiere Pro run Prospect HD. There where no PC vs Mac issues here, the mixed workflow performed there individual tasks as needed. In the future we are going to see more direct on-lining not less, as the technology allows for this preferred workflow (overcoming the issues of storage and bandwidth.) There are far fewer "hoops" than you would imagine, editing in HD is getting easier, and biases against compression are fading rapidly. You just need the right sort of compression. ;)

Why is everybody trying to edit HD natively???

The best approach by far is to edit a low-res NTSC DV-based, or M-JPEG based offline and then online the footage without any compression, etc.

I'm not interested on editing HD natively, though if I could do an HD online on my Mac, I'd certainly jump at the chance. But it's not essential.


But it's eventually got to be cut somewhere - and while we hunt around for a good cheap codec that does what we want it to, we have to keep in mind that probably someone besides us is going to have to cut with it to. I for one don't look forward to having to carry harddrives with my images and codecs around with me when I want to get an online edit or a filmout done. Which is the main reason why DVCProHD seemed like a good idea at the time. Should have known it was too good to be true.

David,
This may have been asked before, but are there any plans for CineForm to support FCP?

Joshua,

Yes they are plans to support FCP in the future. Our codec technology is very portable and I'm sure it would run very well on G5s.

David.

is this a thread about edit
or camera ??????

I do guess a new thread about edit would be better
sorry
only my 5 cents

<<<-- Originally posted by Ronald Biese : is this a thread about edit
or camera ??????

I do guess a new thread about edit would be better
sorry
only my 5 cents -->>>


It's both, but more camera than edit. Whatever software we use to capture the images, if we can't edit them, then we've wasted our time and energy. So that has to be decided now as well.

Doesn't anybody here know the old and good DLT tapes?
Fastest models go up to 72 MB/s

As another FCP user, this sounds really great (especially since you are the only one out there with a native Bayer codec)!

You may have a much easier time editing with a compressed tape-based format like DVCProHD or another intemediate format like Cineform on the PC before you go down the DLT route. That's going to cost you some serious $$$'s, money you might as well spend on hard-drives which are faster and random access.

I was just talking about data security never said to edit using directly the DLTs, that would be a nonsense.

Also if you want to output to a DVCproHD, wouldn't be better using DLT instead?
If a HDD hits the floor what happens?
What is the result if the same things happens to a DLT ?

I fact DLT aren't more expensive than disks or DVCproHD.
How much does a DVCproHD tape deck cost?

A 600 GB DLT tape costs something around $180.
How much goes for a simillar HDD ?

A DSR11 DVCAM tape deck costs around $2,500.
The highest SDLT tape drive costs around $4,000.

I can't see your point when you are saying $$$....sorry.
Also I didn't know there were disks faster than 72 Mbytes per second..... :)

Also if I were doing some shooting and need to travel a long a distance, going from cars to planes, etc , I'd for sure choose a DLT and be happy the rest of the road!!!!!

PS: (not related with you Jason) Sometimes it looks to me that people isn't talking about doing things the cheap way but more of some kind of price madness with ridiculous numbers like wanting to replace $ 2000 dollars products investing just $100........
What we are talking about here is having an "affordable" (doesn't mean cheap, bargain,free or the like) way of shooting High Definition with top quality.
I can't understand why if someone is able to buy a 30,000 new car he cannot invest $20,000 or $30,000 on professional equipment which is supposed to be used to generate some revenue.
What is the usual monthly income for everybody here?
Unless you are from a semideveloped country like I am, with a standard monthly income of less than $300 and technology prices from developed countries, then that kind of discussion begins to have no sense.

Sorry if I went too far...

New Sumix cameras.
 

Nothing extra special, some new micron models, no Altasens yet.

Wayne.

<<<-- Originally posted by Ronald Biese : is this a thread about edit
or camera ??????

I do guess a new thread about edit would be better
sorry
only my 5 cents -->>>

When there are cameras to discuss we tend to discuss that, otherwise we fill in time, keep the thread alive, and discuss other issues. Works out fine now days (in early days too much discusion at once, but now fine).

<<<-- Originally posted by Juan M. M. Fiebelkorn : Doesn't anybody here know the old and good DLT tapes?
Fastest models go up to 72 MB/s -->>>

Yes I tried to talk about this 6 months, or so, ago. $180 for 600GB tape is too close in price to an array of cheap 200GB harddrives, is there any cheaper? I suggest that existing decks could be used to backup drives (rent one or go and rent time on one) can DLT be rented day by day? HDD very durable, but would not trust them for long term archival storage, so tape would be good for that. In the end maybe we should pick the best HD format and convert finished productions to that, then studios, and TV could easily use that.

----------

Any thoughts on the new Sony HDV, it's mpeg2 compression apparently goes down to 4.7(4.3??):1. How good is it compared to vissually lossless?

To all, if we can get DLT/Tape cheap enough, we can backup to it and reuse more expensive drives. So we don't buy $3K of drives for each production.

Storing in Bayer Raw. This would gives us best quality to work from and re-edit in the future.

Re: New Sumix cameras.
 

Any thoughts on the new Sony HDV, it's mpeg2 compression apparently goes down to 4.7(4.3??):1. How good is it compared to vissually lossless?



As I understand, it's fine as long as you don't need to move the camera at all.

If you try to pan or boom or do a nice dolly move - artifacts galore.

Good, that's all I needed to hear, the higher variable compression stated doesn't help in the most crucial area.

<<<-- Originally posted by John Nagle : Wayne,

Do you have any more info on the new Sumix cameras, I went to their site and there is no mention of them there. -->>>


Yeah, sorry I knew there was something I forgot to cut and paste in the rush, the address:

http://optics.sumix.com/products/cameras/index.html

Thanks Wayne,

I found them, no real move forward there for the moment for what we want here.

One other thing of interest from Sumix, they are talking about a 3 sensor IBIS5A camera with global shutter that might be of interest.

Where did you read that, I am unobjective on the idea, a three chip Alatasens insread yes, yes, yes, with pixel shift like the XL1 and DVX100 has that canbe used to get much higher res, the IBIS struggles with colour global, maybe a new version of the IBIS5B or C with increased fill, but the A, I don't know?


Actually go over the dvx100 mod thread and look at our discussion over there at the moment. That camera will record a HD frame much bigger than 720p ;) If the same thing were done on a three chip 720p camera we would get much more than 1080p likely with better accuracy (definetly better sensitivity) than bayer 1080. If we went for it on a three chip 1080p camera we would end up well and truelly in SHD territory (exactly where we need to be). Very good thinking.

Steve what do you think, oh great camera Guru?


Wayne.

AVID now has DVCProHD support
 

Xpress Pro HD:

read about it here:

http://www.avid.com/company/releases...rohd_prod.html

So first FCP, and now AVID (which also gives Windows people access to DVCProHD)-maybe Premiere Pro next?. I don't think they're using Quicktime, but at least you now have access to native DVCProHD on Windows, so you could theoretically go back-and-forth losslessly by using a tape deck and firewire and not doing any effects till your final edit (so that you can transfer the native bit-stream to tape without any renders and generation loss).

(take note I'm not Steve, nor a camera guru ;) )

Really......how can I say this......coming from you dear Wayne...


Such a GREAT IDEA!

really good, pixel shift.I should have thought about it.....

avid express pro
 

the 49.95 upgrade to hd, on avid express pro, is pretty cool too.

Obin,

If you are around please let us know how you are getting on with the SI3300.

Re: AVID now has DVCProHD support
 

<<<-- Originally posted by Jason Rodriguez : Xpress Pro HD:

read about it here:

http://www.avid.com/company/releases...rohd_prod.html

So first FCP, and now AVID (which also gives Windows people access to DVCProHD)-maybe Premiere Pro next?. I don't think they're using Quicktime, but at least you now have access to native DVCProHD on Windows, so you could theoretically go back-and-forth losslessly by using a tape deck and firewire and not doing any effects till your final edit (so that you can transfer the native bit-stream to tape without any renders and generation loss). -->>>

This is pretty interesting. Current plans are to make the source code for writing the DNxHD format freely available, so this looks like a good format to transfer raw Bayer capture data to. Softimage XSI can already render to the DNxHD format, which is a serious space saver for a multilayered composite.

sorry guys no news at the moment..I will be back soon

<<<-- Originally posted by Juan M. M. Fiebelkorn : (take note I'm not Steve, nor a camera guru ;) )

Really......how can I say this......coming from you dear Wayne...

really good, pixel shift.I should have thought about it..... -->>>

You can say, the "usual, charming, brilliant idea" from me, if you want to. Don't get the ideas wrong, I just like to find the best and simplest solutions to problems, even if they are a bit radical, as long as they get the job done better. Actually I have been thinking of pixel shift like solutions for years, with all these bayer cameras I just never thought of cross applying it here. Best thing is that the cost of applying should work out to be cents per camera head (as you are just sticking one chip in a slightly different position, everything else on the head stays the same).

Actually, the reason I mention it, is to give any camera manufacture reading this that wants to do 3 chip, like Sumix, a nudge in the right direction ;)


For David, and other editing folks. There are a whole heap of different pixel formats, pixel shifts etc that can be used. Maybe it is a good idea to have a simple pixel definition descriptor in the editor to define new formats that the editor can use to process them.


John

Where did you find out about that 3 chip camera?

Sudden Revelation.
 

Takes time sometimes, it was sitting right under my nose.

I think there is a simple way to get much more than 2:1 lossless, though I don't know of computing power requirements:

It is over at the technical thread:
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthrea...986#post251986

POW. Sumix strikes back.
 

This is directly from Farhad at Sumix:
KA-POW!

Then:
What I think? I think dat's a spicy meatball.

Farhad added in a subsequent email that their lossless compression is doing about 2:1, except in very noisy images. Apparently they can go up to 35fps even without compression, so 24fps with 2:1 compression should be a breeze in terms of data rate.

He also clarified that the 32 megs of RAM is to "smooth out hiccups and control the frame rate exactly. Also it is used for compression and other future image processing." Future image processing.... Mmmmm....

That's all for now,
Ben Syverson

Hey Ben,

BTW, is that 60fps at 1920x1080?

Also at what bit-rate?

I suppose you could get 60fps 1920x1080 at 12-bits packed over Gigabit ethernet, but just curious to see if that's what they're in fact doing, or if they' still plan on recording 8-bits per pixel.

60fps at 12bit 1920x1080. No comprimise.

Great

Ben can you email them my compression idea over at the technical thread, with 32MB data chunks they should be able to achieve more than 2:1. It looks like they can software update the programmable controller with it after release.

Ben can you get a pricing on the three chips, and any details on the M version of the IBIS5?

My guess is that they are not being slack and are puting in everything practical. Well I am willing to live with the new release date as they are going to lower price and improve performance.

New IBIS sensor, New IBIS sensor, yeah, I've been asking about this hopefully it will fix up problems. This is also excelent news for Drake, as it should be compatible. That is probably why the present IBIS5 sensor has been hiotting below $200 oem.

They must have dropped the straight firewireb, due to the lack on motherboards.

I wonder if they plan twin gigabit cameras in the future to handle higher speeds?

Higher speeds? Why? If you need more than 60fps at 1920x1080 at 12bits, you should wait a few years. :)

I think they dropped firewire B for simplicity -- they have other scientific sources that definitely need Gigabit Ethernet, so I think they went with that first.

Pricing is SUPER low -- they said to quote you around "$3K." I don't know what the M version of the IBIS-5 is like, but I have to be honest -- I'm all about the Altasens. I don't give a lick about the 3-chip IBIS, even though that's likely to be a super-smooth camera. They understand what we want and need, and will only do it if the image quality is good enough.

Wayne, what exactly is your idea for better than 2:1? Remember that this is 2:1 in terms of the Bayer, not the final RGB. If you can get better than 2:1 on a Bayer image, I'd love to hear how....

All the best,

- ben

Well here is the ibis5 page on the M (MONO version, so I don't know if it is an upgrade to the A, but I have sent off for another data sheet).

I have to run out the door (re-edit: so much for that idea), but from a glance at the specs it seems the big difference is high fill factor sensor cell the rest of he specs don't seem overly spectacular).

Here are the relavent links to the tech:

http://www.fillfactory.com/htm/produ...bis5/ibis5.htm
http://www.fillfactory.com/htm/techn.../high_fill.htm
http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-P...&RS=PN/6225670

This paper, at a glance, seems that the future IBIS's will be good competition for he Altasens (but don't know how much carries to IBIS5).

http://www.fillfactory.com/htm/techn...f/Dierickx.pdf


Other insteresting stuff, but no indication it is on the IBIS5:

http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-P...S=PN/6,545,303

http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-P...&RS=PN/6011251

http://www.fillfactory.com/htm/techn...blications.htm

I knew there was a cheap 3chip prism out there, from my calculations a prism could be able to be made cheap.

IBIS already does 450Hz sensor (under $1000) but I am interested in cheap sensor with a bit extra speed for 120fps speed (for special effect ts buffered to main board memory).

The pricing seems to be great, nearly the same as the original pricing (I think it was $2795), down from those $4K+ pricing.

<<<-- Originally posted by Ben Syverson :Wayne, what exactly is your idea for better than 2:1? Remember that this is 2:1 in terms of the Bayer, not the final RGB. If you can get better than 2:1 on a Bayer image, I'd love to hear how.... -->

I have a link to it in the technical thread above, I have been discussing it with David there. The principle is simple, transmission and tape comrpession format have error correction overheads, and compress over one to x frames, all that limits comrpession ratio. So I suggested (as we had upto 8GB on board (now 32MB on the head) that we could do file like compression accross the lot. I posted a link to the best file compression product with image comrpession mode before. We assume that video lossless codecs are the best, but how many frames do they compress across, one, maybe 6? For us we can go beyond that (if we have the processing power), as I said go to the link above and have look.

Thanks

Wayne.

I suppose, if you could set the Alatsens to 120fps 720p mode you could get it, but you have to use a special decoder for the distorted bayer pattern. For this sort of effect, that ussually looks weird, that is acceptable anyway. But if you are going to show at 1080 60fps (which some people want) you will want 120fps to seamlessly slowmo that on screen "kiss", or head turn etc. I suppose we don't need hat quality anyway, we can digitally take the 60fps and use it at 24fps on 60Hz screen.

Of note: In recent months I remember reading somewhere of some rpocess to get one photon to charge two electrons. That is equivalent to a QE of 200%.

If this new IBIS can cu it as good as a Micron, hen hopefully they use pixel shift ;).

Now does this 3 chip camera use microlense, that would give us trouble when using large aperature optics, or does it just use the new well method?

Microlinses are much more a pain
with wide angle, proof
on a Canon 16 M still cam, wide angle is shit
on a Kodak 14 M there are no lenses,
they are other problems, moire, anti alaising
but hell sharp even with wide angle
only you have to tweak each pic
on a PC with Kodakt software.

By the way, I have found out that IBIS5a sensor in around 100 euro whole sale. So cameras on it could be quiet cheap.

I also was over at the HD for indies site and saw a news listing for a 8 drive Sata RAID array that would do 500Mb/s, so I imagine 4 drives should be able to do 250MB's. So a three chip Alatsens, is 150+ MB's, a three chip Ibis would be 75+ MB's, both with pixel shift. So does that mean you can times the res by 4, which means it beats Bayer 8 and 4 mpixel in data requirements, virtually no light loss? Sorry, just waking up from dream land, ahh 3 chip, pixel shift, mmm, sleep again....

I don't believe microlenses could become a problem even using a wide angle lens which was prepared for a resolution of around 160 line pairs per millimeter.
We are just using 2 Mpix sensors not 14 Mpix ....

I posted an update to the technical thread by mistake, to do wih fast laptop drives benchmarks, 80GB 1.8inch, and Windows XP PDA.

I would like to ask a question though about pixel shift.

It has occured to me in the distant past, to shift two of the primary colours, rather than just the green value that the DVX100 does. This basically gives 3 times the resoltuion in each direction, but it occurs to me that I haven't heard of it being used like that, and there maybe a good reason for that. So would it work, or is there some problem with doing that?

Thanks.

Wayne.

I guess shifting just the green is the optimum.That way green pixels are getting the intensity values that fall on the in-between spaces of the R/B sensor pixels, Giving you something like a 100% fillfactor (with a three sensors covering the same area)
I can't see what would be the advantage of shifting two of them if you don't have empty areas to cover .....

But are there any diadvantages to shifting two, like do we loose effectiveness in defining colour, pixels or brightness. I am interested in this because it allows a progressive SD 3 chip to do 1080p.

Another question what is the most sensitive sensors/camera for somehing like this, and what are the best value cheap ones.

I think Pana may have used it in the DVX100 not for future HD, as some suppose but to get rid or artifacting from inter pixel spaces etc.

I think you won't be getting anybetter resolution, just that.
I say this because, with the green sensor shifting you are covering all the empty spaces available.....going beyond that you will be just superimposing pixels again, Am I clear now?

I don't really know, what I can tell you is the DVX100 is rated at around 640 ASA and I can asure that is true.My experience with it during 2 months confirmed it (you know going shooting through dark streets and being able to see more through the camera than what your naked eyes can see is an amazing thing ,mostly when we are not talking about a night vision device or a night-shot handycam :) )

There isn't a thing like "artifacting from inter pixel spaces " (in fact something related in some way with that is what we call "aliasing").
If it existed monochrome cameras would be full of them....which is not the actual case...

What I meant was, when there is incomplete fill between a pixel, and it shows up in a image (because not enough pixels are used to missaliagn with the format) in things like edges that move from pixel to pixel and blink out temporaily as they do.

Yes, on those camcorder info tests there was a vast differnce between the Sony's and the Pana in low light, but in other tests, when they spent time in manual control, they got the near the same lighting levels. I see the raw tests shows a lot of range, compared to normal, I wonder if the camera actually can go lower in low light.

The Pixel shift gets it's resolution from being able to mathematically sample the difference from the overlapping pixels forming artificial sub pixel quads, so you can mathematically sumise what the diffrence means on each of these quads, to form 4 new pixels, instead of interpixel spacing, giving the extra resolution. That is what I meant, that the reason 3 missaligned pixels are not used, might be some fundamental break down in quality of the samples etc.


Thanks

Bye.