High Definition with Elphel model 333 camera

Matteo Pozzi · May 7th, 2007, 02:56 AM

hi andrey I've seen on the micron page this cmos sensor
http://www.micron.com/products/cmos/highspeed/partlist
http://download.micron.com/pdf/datas...m413c36stc.pdf
for our hd camera project will be perfect
no rolling shutter problem because have truesnap micron tecnology
big enough to use 35 mm lens (so we have no need for a 35mm adaptor)
and big pixel for good low light shooting ....will be a must!
and not only for hd cinema
you can enter in fast camera market http://automotive.micronblogs.com/20...ap_global.html

(maybe in the future they will produce a 35mm equivalent 1920 x1080p for the cheap...I'm dreaming)

Features/Top Level Specifications
• Array Format: 1,280H x 1,024 V (1,310,720 pixels)
• Pixel Size and Type: 12.0μm x 12.0μm TrueSNAP
(shuttered-node active pixel)
• Sensor Imaging Area: H: 15.36mm, V: 12.29mm,
Diagonal: 19.67mm
• Frame Rate: 0–500+ fps @ (1,280 x 1,024), >10,000
fps with partial scan, [e.g. 0–4000 fps @ (1,280 x 128)]
• Output Data Rate: 660 Mbs (master clock 66 MHz,
~500 fps)

Matteo Pozzi · May 7th, 2007, 03:32 AM

maybe you already know
but ILM industial light and magic have developed :

"OpenEXR is a high dynamic-range (HDR) image file format developed by Industrial Light & Magic for use in computer imaging applications.

OpenEXR is used by ILM on all motion pictures currently in production. The first movies to employ OpenEXR were Harry Potter and the Sorcerers Stone, Men in Black II, Gangs of New York, and Signs. Since then, OpenEXR has become ILM's main image file format. "

http://www.openexr.com/index.html

and blender (the 3d model renderer for linux-win- mac- bsd.....) support it

Andrey Filippov · May 7th, 2007, 10:37 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Matteo Pozzi

hi andrey I've seen on the micron page this cmos sensor
http://www.micron.com/products/cmos/highspeed/partlist
http://download.micron.com/pdf/datas...m413c36stc.pdf
for our hd camera project will be perfect
no rolling shutter problem because have truesnap micron tecnology
big enough to use 35 mm lens (so we have no need for a 35mm adaptor)
and big pixel for good low light shooting ....will be a must!

Matteo, I know about this sensor, but there are several "but":
1 - it has 10 parallel 10-bit outputs, not just one
2 - it is much faster than even 10353 can handle
3 - that sensor is 100x price of the small ones
4 - Sensor is rather old, and I know Micron was improving sensor technology really fast. So I'm not sure that big pixels really "work" proportionally to their area 3-5-8 MPix sensors may have higher relative sensitivity.

So (for special applications) it is really easy to build a fast camera with that sensor - just connect 10 of the 10353 boards and a Gigabit switch - after it there will be a single cable to a computer that can record the 500 fps video.

Matteo Pozzi · May 7th, 2007, 03:41 PM

100x wow so more than 2000$!!!!
crazy

Wayne Morellini · May 7th, 2007, 08:07 PM

Isn't that sensor available fro around $700US?

Andrey, good idea, high speed cameras are very expensive, and I think a few people came here with cameras for less than $10K, But your plan might lead to an high speed camera for less than $5K, which some around here would be very interested in.

How is the QE and fill factor of that chip now, it was very poor before. How, does it compare to the one from Fillfactory?

About the 353, the hardware is available, but Cinema improvements have not yet been implemented (there are many sub projects going on here, like Bayer codec compression, with unknown separate time schedules).

Wayne Morellini · May 7th, 2007, 11:01 PM

I decide to post this picture here, to give an comparison here. It is an private photograph, all copyright applied.

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/attachmen...9&d=1178597753

This is from an old camera I tested a few years ago fro the digital cinema camera projects, with up to 20 stops of latitude. It was taken from my place, the blurriness is an quirk on the shot. The exposure is similar in appreciation to exposures you get in Hollywood cinema. It was close to noon on an extremely bright summers day, around an 1000KM from the equator (stacks brighter than what you are normally used to in Europe/States). The leaves on the cane, to the side, normally have large broad burnout on an consumer camera, and are quiet glary/white reflections to the eye, but are well exposed here, while maintaining an lot of features in the shadow under the mango tree (turn up the brightness ion your monitor to see).

This is taken using an latitude extension feature sadly neglected in Cinema cameras we are sued to around here. The old camera, is an maybe $69 credit card camera, with fixed set lens. It uses one of the cheapest sensors (in dollars) and one of the worse I have seen on some measurements of the earlier age of sensors, with SN of 30db from memory and plenty of image artifacts at times, but 20stops of latitude when it wants to. It is an shame not more expensive Cinema camera manufactures could at least take advantage of cheap technology like latitude extension, even when the senor had it. Puts the prices in the Digital Cinema realm into an bit of perspective.

Interestingly, one of the sensors has 70MB/s data rate, but I do not recommend this sensor (except as an improvement to the Sanyo HD cameras ; ). Micron had an extra wide VGA part with an latitude extension technology, so hopefully they will do HD ones without no or fast rolling shutter, and some more descent SN ratio, QE, and fill factor. But you can see how some of the other security related sensors, with better features than this, can be an improvement over the image of the Micron.

Thanks

Wayne.

Matteo Pozzi · May 10th, 2007, 03:46 AM

good to see this ...I think that if we want to enter the market we have to arrive at a very low price max 2/3000$ for all the system so looking at expansive component is a mistake (we have to achieve the best compromise) using cheap component....for the high quality the market is of arri, sony, panavision, panasonic...dalsa, red and silicon imaging not us at the moment! we haven't the money of those factory.
And the good is that if we arrive at a quality that is comparable we will be the winner :-)

Daniel Lipats · May 10th, 2007, 11:00 PM

I have been working on getting elphel and a pc in a single package. I finished my first version today.

Here is the 3D model where I brainstormed the idea.
http://www.buysmartpc.com/333/model.jpg

after building it:
http://www.buysmartpc.com/333/badIdea.JPG

This is just testing the concept. I picked acrylic because its cheap, available, and often used to build pc cases but I may change the build to all metal. Second, my rods are only 10mm and the next version will be 15mm to make it more stable.

I wish I could make it smaller but standard ATX motherboard size is 12"x9". I'm not too concerned about the size. Judging from what I have seen, film cameras and professional production cameras are big and bigger and that's never held anyone back.

I would appreciate any critique

Matteo Pozzi · May 11th, 2007, 01:46 AM

Cool but...
why do you want to to make all in a single package....it will be very heavy
and the tripod suffer for that!
why not make it the lighter possible and connect the pc with the ethernet cable ----and put a small pc or a notebook with a 7200hd on the floor? pan and tilt will be smoother and you haven't to pay a lot for a good tripod!

I say that because I've realised that for film project you could achieve better result investing money in all but the camera! good light and steady tripod with a cheap camera can make better result than a very good camera and low quality tripod!
olso , I've upgraded the tripod myself! I've take a good one used on ebay but if you need one I've seen this
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/produc...eo_Tripod.html
you could find it also cheaper on ebay new! :-)

Matteo Pozzi · May 11th, 2007, 02:28 AM

if you would achieve better result take one of these

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...ype=osi_widget

I've found one at 9$ and it work perfectly

Daniel Lipats · May 11th, 2007, 07:27 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Matteo Pozzi

Cool but...
why do you want to to make all in a single package....it will be very heavy
and the tripod suffer for that!
why not make it the lighter possible and connect the pc with the ethernet cable ----and put a small pc or a notebook with a 7200hd on the floor? pan and tilt will be smoother and you haven't to pay a lot for a good tripod!

I say that because I've realised that for film project you could achieve better result investing money in all but the camera! good light and steady tripod with a cheap camera can make better result than a very good camera and low quality tripod!
olso , I've upgraded the tripod myself! I've take a good one used on ebay but if you need one I've seen this
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/produc...eo_Tripod.html
you could find it also cheaper on ebay new! :-)

The reason im interested in the elphel cameras is getting a great picture for a small fraction of the price of a camera of the same class. If I was going to go out to buy a laptop to work with the camera, it would cost me a little over $1,000 which is just moving the cost of the entire system up considerably.

After doing a few film shoots already with the 333, it has been a little inconvenient shooting with LCD/desktop/tripod+camera. Moving it was difficult, and pulling focus on the 333 and especially the 35mm adapter was especially difficult because the monitor is not on the camera but on the floor or stationary stand. I had to lock down most of the shots. Also cable management was a bit of an issue too. The monitor is difficult to view outdoors too which makes it hard to frame and focus. A laptop would not be the solution for many of the above issues.

The ideal setup for me would be to have everything in a single package, and eliminate the need for a keyboard/mouse (although have a set avaliable). I plan to use a nostromo N50 for input with a set of macros to adjust camera settings and characters for "s" for scene, 0-9, and "t" for take. "S10-T2.ogm"

The tripod I was using is not going to work for a larger camera. I plan to buy something more stable as soon as i have the chance.

Matteo Pozzi · May 11th, 2007, 07:40 AM

yes but you could make it possible buying a 7"lcd 800x480 tuch screen and mount it directly on the camera like the setup used by the silicon imaging to make the film Spoon
2 cable: one ethernet for the camera and one eternet + vga converter (vga extender) for the lcd it result in a very compact head camera
....I haven't understand what is "S10-T2.ogm"
many thanks

Andrey Filippov · May 11th, 2007, 03:45 PM

Anybody coming to LinuxTag? We hope to have something to show there - USB and IDE seem to work already (although with a new Axis distro that supports them that is not yet combined with the all of our changes needed for the camera itself). The 10349 board we'll have includes serial port, USB hub (1 external USB host connector and 3 internal ports for future internal audio), and IDE port. We tried laptop 2.5" drive but had to add power so we are going to put a zif-40 connector for 1.8" drives - like "TOSHIBA MK6008GAH 60GB 4200 RPM 2MB Cache ATA-6 Notebook Hard Drive" (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16822149046)

Matteo Pozzi · May 13th, 2007, 05:37 AM

so it will be only a question of power for the choose of an hd?!?
it will also possible to connect a 3.5" hd? ...if we provide the right power?
It would be cool because it will be possible to save a lot of money (7200 for 3.5" are a standard ...and also much faster WD-raptor :-) ) maybe we could record 100%jpeg stream :-)

for linuxtag... I can't :-( thought was possible but not

I've tried ubuntu 7.04 ....very cool and fast! also the live is faster than the knoppix :-) ...I m replying from it!
and it recognize all my hardware ...the knoppix do not recognize ethernet for my hw :-(

Andrey Filippov · May 13th, 2007, 01:22 PM

Yes - it will be possible to connect the 3.5"HDD - I just think it is better to add additional buffers so when applying different powers and screw up the CPU/main board will not be damaged. This is why we prefer to start with a small drive completely powered with the internal voltage - it is better to use 1.8" as it uses 3.3V - not 5.0V as 2.5" so no converter is needed.

May 11th, 2007, 03:45 PM	#658
Andrey Filippov Major Player Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Magna, Utah Posts: 215	progress update Anybody coming to LinuxTag? We hope to have something to show there - USB and IDE seem to work already (although with a new Axis distro that supports them that is not yet combined with the all of our changes needed for the camera itself). The 10349 board we'll have includes serial port, USB hub (1 external USB host connector and 3 internal ports for future internal audio), and IDE port. We tried laptop 2.5" drive but had to add power so we are going to put a zif-40 connector for 1.8" drives - like "TOSHIBA MK6008GAH 60GB 4200 RPM 2MB Cache ATA-6 Notebook Hard Drive" (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16822149046)

May 13th, 2007, 05:37 AM	#659
Matteo Pozzi Regular Crew Join Date: Jul 2005 Location: Milan, Italy Posts: 169	so it will be only a question of power for the choose of an hd?!? it will also possible to connect a 3.5" hd? ...if we provide the right power? It would be cool because it will be possible to save a lot of money (7200 for 3.5" are a standard ...and also much faster WD-raptor :-) ) maybe we could record 100%jpeg stream :-) for linuxtag... I can't :-( thought was possible but not I've tried ubuntu 7.04 ....very cool and fast! also the live is faster than the knoppix :-) ...I m replying from it! and it recognize all my hardware ...the knoppix do not recognize ethernet for my hw :-( Last edited by Matteo Pozzi; May 13th, 2007 at 06:54 AM.

May 7th, 2007, 02:56 AM	#646
Matteo Pozzi Regular Crew Join Date: Jul 2005 Location: Milan, Italy Posts: 169	hi andrey I've seen on the micron page this cmos sensor http://www.micron.com/products/cmos/highspeed/partlist http://download.micron.com/pdf/datas...m413c36stc.pdf for our hd camera project will be perfect no rolling shutter problem because have truesnap micron tecnology big enough to use 35 mm lens (so we have no need for a 35mm adaptor) and big pixel for good low light shooting ....will be a must! and not only for hd cinema you can enter in fast camera market http://automotive.micronblogs.com/20...ap_global.html (maybe in the future they will produce a 35mm equivalent 1920 x1080p for the cheap...I'm dreaming) Features/Top Level Specifications • Array Format: 1,280H x 1,024 V (1,310,720 pixels) • Pixel Size and Type: 12.0μm x 12.0μm TrueSNAP (shuttered-node active pixel) • Sensor Imaging Area: H: 15.36mm, V: 12.29mm, Diagonal: 19.67mm • Frame Rate: 0–500+ fps @ (1,280 x 1,024), >10,000 fps with partial scan, [e.g. 0–4000 fps @ (1,280 x 128)] • Output Data Rate: 660 Mbs (master clock 66 MHz, ~500 fps)

May 7th, 2007, 03:32 AM	#647
Matteo Pozzi Regular Crew Join Date: Jul 2005 Location: Milan, Italy Posts: 169	maybe you already know but ILM industial light and magic have developed : "OpenEXR is a high dynamic-range (HDR) image file format developed by Industrial Light & Magic for use in computer imaging applications. OpenEXR is used by ILM on all motion pictures currently in production. The first movies to employ OpenEXR were Harry Potter and the Sorcerers Stone, Men in Black II, Gangs of New York, and Signs. Since then, OpenEXR has become ILM's main image file format. " http://www.openexr.com/index.html and blender (the 3d model renderer for linux-win- mac- bsd.....) support it

May 7th, 2007, 03:41 PM	#649
Matteo Pozzi Regular Crew Join Date: Jul 2005 Location: Milan, Italy Posts: 169	100x wow so more than 2000$!!!! crazy

May 7th, 2007, 08:07 PM	#650
Wayne Morellini Inner Circle Join Date: May 2003 Location: Australia Posts: 2,762	Isn't that sensor available fro around $700US? Andrey, good idea, high speed cameras are very expensive, and I think a few people came here with cameras for less than $10K, But your plan might lead to an high speed camera for less than $5K, which some around here would be very interested in. How is the QE and fill factor of that chip now, it was very poor before. How, does it compare to the one from Fillfactory? About the 353, the hardware is available, but Cinema improvements have not yet been implemented (there are many sub projects going on here, like Bayer codec compression, with unknown separate time schedules).

May 7th, 2007, 11:01 PM	#651
Wayne Morellini Inner Circle Join Date: May 2003 Location: Australia Posts: 2,762	I decide to post this picture here, to give an comparison here. It is an private photograph, all copyright applied. http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/attachmen...9&d=1178597753 This is from an old camera I tested a few years ago fro the digital cinema camera projects, with up to 20 stops of latitude. It was taken from my place, the blurriness is an quirk on the shot. The exposure is similar in appreciation to exposures you get in Hollywood cinema. It was close to noon on an extremely bright summers day, around an 1000KM from the equator (stacks brighter than what you are normally used to in Europe/States). The leaves on the cane, to the side, normally have large broad burnout on an consumer camera, and are quiet glary/white reflections to the eye, but are well exposed here, while maintaining an lot of features in the shadow under the mango tree (turn up the brightness ion your monitor to see). This is taken using an latitude extension feature sadly neglected in Cinema cameras we are sued to around here. The old camera, is an maybe $69 credit card camera, with fixed set lens. It uses one of the cheapest sensors (in dollars) and one of the worse I have seen on some measurements of the earlier age of sensors, with SN of 30db from memory and plenty of image artifacts at times, but 20stops of latitude when it wants to. It is an shame not more expensive Cinema camera manufactures could at least take advantage of cheap technology like latitude extension, even when the senor had it. Puts the prices in the Digital Cinema realm into an bit of perspective. Interestingly, one of the sensors has 70MB/s data rate, but I do not recommend this sensor (except as an improvement to the Sanyo HD cameras ; ). Micron had an extra wide VGA part with an latitude extension technology, so hopefully they will do HD ones without no or fast rolling shutter, and some more descent SN ratio, QE, and fill factor. But you can see how some of the other security related sensors, with better features than this, can be an improvement over the image of the Micron. Thanks Wayne.

May 10th, 2007, 03:46 AM	#652
Matteo Pozzi Regular Crew Join Date: Jul 2005 Location: Milan, Italy Posts: 169	good to see this ...I think that if we want to enter the market we have to arrive at a very low price max 2/3000$ for all the system so looking at expansive component is a mistake (we have to achieve the best compromise) using cheap component....for the high quality the market is of arri, sony, panavision, panasonic...dalsa, red and silicon imaging not us at the moment! we haven't the money of those factory. And the good is that if we arrive at a quality that is comparable we will be the winner :-)

May 10th, 2007, 11:00 PM	#653
Daniel Lipats Major Player Join Date: Feb 2006 Posts: 260	I have been working on getting elphel and a pc in a single package. I finished my first version today. Here is the 3D model where I brainstormed the idea. http://www.buysmartpc.com/333/model.jpg after building it: http://www.buysmartpc.com/333/badIdea.JPG This is just testing the concept. I picked acrylic because its cheap, available, and often used to build pc cases but I may change the build to all metal. Second, my rods are only 10mm and the next version will be 15mm to make it more stable. I wish I could make it smaller but standard ATX motherboard size is 12"x9". I'm not too concerned about the size. Judging from what I have seen, film cameras and professional production cameras are big and bigger and that's never held anyone back. I would appreciate any critique

May 11th, 2007, 01:46 AM	#654
Matteo Pozzi Regular Crew Join Date: Jul 2005 Location: Milan, Italy Posts: 169	Cool but... why do you want to to make all in a single package....it will be very heavy and the tripod suffer for that! why not make it the lighter possible and connect the pc with the ethernet cable ----and put a small pc or a notebook with a 7200hd on the floor? pan and tilt will be smoother and you haven't to pay a lot for a good tripod! I say that because I've realised that for film project you could achieve better result investing money in all but the camera! good light and steady tripod with a cheap camera can make better result than a very good camera and low quality tripod! olso , I've upgraded the tripod myself! I've take a good one used on ebay but if you need one I've seen this http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/produc...eo_Tripod.html you could find it also cheaper on ebay new! :-)

May 11th, 2007, 02:28 AM	#655
Matteo Pozzi Regular Crew Join Date: Jul 2005 Location: Milan, Italy Posts: 169	if you would achieve better result take one of these http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...ype=osi_widget I've found one at 9$ and it work perfectly

May 11th, 2007, 07:40 AM	#657
Matteo Pozzi Regular Crew Join Date: Jul 2005 Location: Milan, Italy Posts: 169	yes but you could make it possible buying a 7"lcd 800x480 tuch screen and mount it directly on the camera like the setup used by the silicon imaging to make the film Spoon 2 cable: one ethernet for the camera and one eternet + vga converter (vga extender) for the lcd it result in a very compact head camera ....I haven't understand what is "S10-T2.ogm" many thanks

May 13th, 2007, 01:22 PM	#660
Andrey Filippov Major Player Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Magna, Utah Posts: 215	Yes - it will be possible to connect the 3.5"HDD - I just think it is better to add additional buffers so when applying different powers and screw up the CPU/main board will not be damaged. This is why we prefer to start with a small drive completely powered with the internal voltage - it is better to use 1.8" as it uses 3.3V - not 5.0V as 2.5" so no converter is needed.