see what I mean?

Steve your going to get a really BAD FOV with that 1/2 3.2megapixel chip if you can't do some sort of pixel binning....I hate to say it but we would not want a roi that kills the FOV to a size of a 1/3 inch chip! That will put the image DOF back in Handycam land..not a good thing

BTW,

FYI, if you're using a 2/3" chip, you're going to get around the same DOF as a 16mm frame.

Now unlike video lenses which have to deal with prism optics, 16mm film lenses open up way more, like down to f1.3, and at that f-stop, you're getting around the same DOF as a f2.8-f4 split in 35mm, which is not a lot of DOF at all-that can give you very shallow DOF like you're wanting without the need for a 35mm ground-glass optical-type effect.

For instance, there's a reason that people pay $115K for a set of Zeiss digiprimes. They can basically open up to F1.6 (the maximum f-stop for B4-mount (2/3 inch Sony mount) lenses), and be sharp as a tack whereas many other lenses fall apart at that F-stop on video cameras (again, there's a prism block limiting the maximum aperture of a video camera). With a single-sensor design there is no such problem, hence you can use optics that are very fast, and as a result get that nice out-of-focus DOF you've been wanting, without the need for a ground-glass 35mm converter.

Thank you Jason, that is what I was thinking - now how do you find a f1.3-1.6 lens that is sharp at that f-stop? I will not buy any $115k primes soon :) any ideas ?

Any of the Zeiss superspeeds go to F1.3. Also you have primes from Optimo (a distributer of russian equipment) that also go to F1.3 IIRC.

The only catch is that these are PL mount, but you can find adapters for C-mount to PL mount, and these lenses aren't THAT much, around $2K new for the Optimo's (which is a very good price for good glass). I'm sure you can find used Zeiss superspeeds, etc. on ebay or Mandy.com.

Juan M. M. Fiebelkorn wrote:
I'm feeling sad at this moment cause I see the technical part of this thread seems to go nowhere most of the time....We could always start another thread for detailed technical stuff and try to stay on topic :-)
When the moment arrives, I will need some expert coders to optimize it. Anyone here is able for this task?If it fits in with my own plans, I might be interested. Let me know how your progress is doing.
Everybody seems to ask for complete off-the-shelf FPGA projects.The Russian Net-Camera is a working FPGA project...A Xilinx Spartan3 FPGA 1 million gates costs $15You're absolutely right. FPGA development boards are cheap, so I'm planning to take a good look at that "Russian" project when I'm done with my current project. I think a "box" camera with An AltaSens chip
FPGA real-time Bayer
FPGA lossy-but-good compression (wavelets?)
Output via Gigabit Ethernet
... would be very cool.

even cooler is all the above WITH onboard SATA hard disks for capture and dsp to take care of viewfinders and playback screens

even cooler is all the above WITH onboard SATA hard disks for capture and dsp to take care of viewfinders and playback screens

hmmm . . . <cough>kinetta??<cough>

:-)

The 3.2Mpix Micron is *not* a replacement for the Altasens. It is just a different product that might fit a certain set of needs. Here is where the Micron data lives:
http://www.micron.com/products/imaging/products/datasheets.html

Wayne on Gigabit:
Most of our cameras will end up on gigabit over time. This is the raw sensor data being transmitted. When using an Intel Pro1000 interface card (<$50) and our custom drivers, expect 800+Mbps (that is bits) with any pixel over 8 bits taking 16 bits. We just tested 1920x1080x24fps@10 bits (796Mbps) and got continuous transfer and display with the SI-3300.

Obin on lenses:
For new lenses compatible with 3 micron pixel pitch, we resell Tamron, Schneider and Linos (Rodenstock). Many of the older lenses are also good since 3 microns is somewhere around the film grain on fine grain film. For $50, take a few shots. The manufacturers I listed start at around $850 for a good 25mm lens. I've had people on ebay do the size test for me on lenses before:

You can check this by holding the lens a couple of inches from a piece of paper, threaded side down. Move it up and down until you get a good image. Measure your height to the mounting shoulder. That is the flange distance. The diameter of the circle will also give you the format (1/4" to 1"). Flange distance of 17mm is c mount 12mm is cs mount (no good)

On FPGAs:
I will say again, if someone has a working design, I will consider licensing it and embedding it in a camera. Right now processors are just getting to where they can do lots of good things in real time - see Cineform for an example of what can be done on a $700 PC.

On this thread out of hand:
Anyone want to prune out the good stuff and add it to or create a new wiki? The ideal structure after the discussion dust is over would be a hypertreaded document. There is certainly a wealth of information in Alternative Imaging Methods.

Guys, what we are planning with FPGA is the same and more tha what we can do with DSP :)
I don't quite understand why everybody thinks that FPGA are expensive, that their development and programming is expensive and that they are power hungry......it seems so many lies have been told to poor consumers :).

I VOTE for a new Thread, only technical!!
And with access only to registered users (no need to tell you why ;) )

@Wayne, sorry guy but sometimes you dream to much, like a brainstorming of one guy!!
Don't expect the Via machines to be a DSP laboratory.
What is at hand now is more than enough.I say this cause the easiest way now would be to use one of that C3 machines with a simple $100 FPGA developmente board (PCI interface), program some simple routines on the FPGA (to compress?) and then recording to disk.
This way we use normal C code, combined with Handel-C or SystemC to offload from CPU intensive tasks.We have the IDE interfaces of the motherboard, we use Linux, we program a graphical interface to control the Camera System, we use a LCD touchscreen of 7" diagonal (directly conected to Motherboard's VGA) and we also add some De-Bayer simple algo to show the image realtime on the touchscreen.
This will drain only around 15-20 Watts.

@Steve: I don't understand.Doesn't Elphel's camera work????
isn't it open source?
Can't it be licensed?
Cineform's codec is great,sure!! But, would you use a CMOS camera that needs more than 100 watts and a big and heavy cooling system???
GEthernet is great, what would happen if someone combines the DCT transform that comes FREE with some Xilinx chips and an entropy encoding (maybe RLE ).My last tests show a lossless but slow compression with an average ratio of 12:1 for a lossless DCT+Huffman.
I said this because I've posted some huffman encoding implemented in FPGA....


BTW, could someone explain me why the SI-1280F-CL is never mentioned?

It would be nice to split the thread into 3 areas:

-Current development work of Obin, Rob(s), Steve N, etc. Discussion of Micron and Altasens based cameras, software development, storage, processing, and editing.

-FPGA development: FGPA boards and public domain software algorithms to run on them. This looks like the next obvious step in the camera's evolution.

-The Long View: Things that require significant optical engineering ability or are a ways away: 3 chip versions, 6 MP cameras, parallel processing arrays, etc.

This way, there is a place for everything, and any post that lands in the wrong thread can be readily relocated. I originally thought I could keep the Wiki up to date but the info volume is quite large. Moderators, could this be done?

Thanks,

Eliot

ok thread started for FPGA talk!

a quicktime idea:

http://cameralink.greatnow.com/fpga.mov

I just made a new thread and uploaded a quicktime file for you guys to take a look at :=}

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?s=&threadid=28773

Steve just what framerate can you get at 3.2mega pixels with a 32bit grabber and also with a 64bit grabber? could you get 24fps from it?? at full resolution?

Really nice.Exactly what I'm talking about in concept...

that is the $50,000 quote I got - for that concept

then I started thinking why use FPGA instead of MicroATX or ITX PC stuff? and it seems that micro PC stuff would only need a good programmer and not all the hardware design that the $50,000 would go for...hmmm so I am now going down the road of LINUX micro PC with a software IU. My Canon 10D has a DOS UI why not somthing like that for a video camera? TIVO is a standard PC with Linux on it - we can do the same for a video camera

Even Xbox has windows on it

I just need to find a good code writer at a good price :=}

Hello,

I just created a thread called 'Blue Sky Concepts for Digital Cinema Camera (http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?s=&threadid=28778)'. Its purpose is to house many of the useful potential future areas (3 CCD imaging blocks, 6 MP chips, parallel computation arrays) being researched by people on the forum that do not relate specifically to the current CMOS camera/software development underway. Obin has created a thread for FPGA work; combined with this and the original thread it should organize the posts well.

Thanks,

Eliot

EZW is supposed to be a part of JPEG2000 standard.

Some implementation:

http://pesona.mmu.edu.my/~msng/EZW.html

Original Matlab:

http://perso.wanadoo.fr/polyvalens/clemens/ezw/ezw.html

Wavelet image constructor Kit

http://www.geoffdavis.net/dartmouth/wavelet/wavelet.html


Jpeg2000 supports 16 bit and down, LOSSLESS and LOSSY, any combination possible in the same stream.Metadata is included.So you could store info about color balance etc, focus and anything else.

FPGA, microcomputer....

SUSAKU PROJECT

http://www.atmark-techno.com/en/product/suzaku.html

http://suzaku.sourceforge.net/index.php/SuzakuHardwareInfo




OpenCores already have cores for:

8x8 fully pipelined parallel DCT. Provides a DCT result every clock cycle.
QNR. Quantization & Rounding Unit.
Run-Length-Encoder.
Huffman Encoder / Decoder.

http://www.opencores.org/


Site about Mini-ITX and Nano-ITX motherboards and systems

http://www.mini-itx.com


A Xilinx Spartan3 FPGA 1 million gates costs $15


And here is a developmente board

http://www.nuhorizons.com/products/xilinx/spartan3/development-board.html

Another place for cheap development boards.

http://www.fpga4fun.com/board.html



FREE IPs

SDRAM Controller:

http://www.cmosexod.com/sdram.html



Open Core compression system

http://www.opencores.org/projects.cgi/web/video_systems/overview


Diagrams of the Elphel camera:

http://www.elphel.com/3fhlo/index.html


here is a link to a Jpeg compressor on a FPGA.It has huffman and the rest.Don't know if it could be modified to use some parts of it or.....

http://www.ece.cmu.edu/~ee545/f98/swingers/index.html

Here more really interesting links..

HUFFMAN ENCODER

http://vlsi1.engr.utk.edu/~mswiatko/ee552/proj/pres.htm

WAVELET TRANSFORM BASED ADAPTIVE IMAGE COMPRESSION ON FPGA.
(VHDL source code)
http://www.ittc.ukans.edu/projects/ACS/documents/sarin_thesis.pdf
(PDF)

REALTIME IMAGE ROTATION AND RESIZING, IMPLEMENTATIONS.
www.xilinx.com/products/ logicore/dsp/rotation_resize.pdf (PDF)

ESTIMATING FPGA REQUIREMENTS FOR DSP APPLICATIONS.

http://www.hunteng.co.uk/info/fpga-size.htm

REALTIME IMAGE PROCESSING WITH FPGA (source code and diagrams)
http://www.ece.ncsu.edu/imaging/Archives/VideoCard/Report/


Implementation of DWT (VHDL source code)

http://kondor.etf.bg.ac.yu/~dejaniv/projects/dwt/DWT_VHDL.htm

Jpeg2000 acceleration using GPU

http://www.cse.cuhk.edu.hk/~ttwong/demo/dwtgpu/dwtgpu.html
(open source, you need at least a GeForce FX)

HERE IS A LONG LIST OF FPGA BOARD WITH OR WITHOUT PCI INTERFACE


http://www.fpga-faq.com/FPGA_Boards.shtml

The absolute coolest FPGA dev system I have seen is Altium's Nexar.
They allow you to use pre synthisized blocks that they have pre defined functions. Some of these blocks are complete CPU's with memory. You can use interactive debuggers in C with JTAG support on these FPGa processors ! Right now they only support 8 bit CPU's but are adding 16 and 32 bit processors.
I swear they have designers that were found in a crashed UFO!!!
Their stuff is really that cool. Device independent too.
You don't have to know HDL. It all integrates with Protel, a high end PCB program. Transparently.
For example, it can reassign pins on the FPGA design to make the PCB routing better.
It can simulate the entire design with the C code running in it at the same time.

I believe the dev system is $8K.

See the webcast of the system intro at
http://www.altium.com/nexar/

Obin, Juan, Wayne (when you join), Les and ALL others who
want to post links.

PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE make the links hyperlinked. I've edited
all the posts above to make links work and with the high volume
of posts these threads create I have lots of work to just do that.

It is *really* simple to do, just do:

[ url ] link [ /url ]

Without any of the spaces. This will create a working link.

For more information read this link (http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/misc.php?s=&action=bbcode), please.

Thank you very much!

Please do NOT split off any more threads then the two just
created. We already have 3 threads running on this subject
and now 5. I agree that things need compacting etc., but the
best way is probably either through an article or Wiki. Then
the long running threads can be closed and new ones can
be created instead of added.

I am going on vacation for two weeks this friday and this is a
very busy week for me and the other wranglers and admins on
this board. So any chances will probably not happen till august.
I will bring these points up to the higher powers.

Thank you for the ideas, suggestions and support!

Too late, sorry, I just did while I was replying, see below. If you don't like them delete all the new threads, but I think the ones I have started divide it up nice and tightly. Once people get cameras left right and center, all development discussion is going to be swamped by camera setup issues, so we will need them anyway. By the way welcome back, I haven't heard back from you yet on the email, Rob is thinking about it.

Thanks

Wayne.

Originally posted by Jason Rodriguez : BTW,

FYI, if you're using a 2/3" chip, you're going to get around the same DOF as a 16mm frame.

Now unlike video lenses which have to deal with prism optics, 16mm film lenses open up way more, like down to f1.3, and at that f-stop, you're getting around the same DOF as a f2.8-f4 split in 35mm, which is not a lot of DOF at all-that can give you very shallow DOF like you're wanting without the need for a 35mm ground-glass optical-type effect.

For instance, there's a reason that people pay $115K for a set of Zeiss digiprimes. They can basically open up to F1.6 (the maximum f-stop for B4-mount (2/3 inch Sony mount) lenses), and be sharp as a tack whereas many other lenses fall apart at that F-stop on video cameras (again, there's a prism block limiting the maximum aperture of a video camera). With a single-sensor design there is no such problem, hence you can use optics that are very fast, and as a result get that nice out-of-focus DOF you've been wanting, without the need for a ground-glass 35mm converter.

You know, I learn a lot of things here. this would explain the low f-stop for 3chip consumer models.


Originally posted by Steve Nordhauser : The 3.2Mpix Micron is *not* a replacement for the Altasens. It is just a different product that might fit a certain set of needs. Here is where the Micron data lives:
http://www.micron.com/products/imaging/products/datasheets.html

Wayne on Gigabit:
Most of our cameras will end up on gigabit over time. This is the raw sensor data being transmitted. When using an Intel Pro1000 interface card (<$50) and our custom drivers, expect 800+Mbps (that is bits) with any pixel over 8 bits taking 16 bits. We just tested 1920x1080x24fps@10 bits (796Mbps) and got continuous transfer and display with the SI-3300.

As you are breaking from traditional cameralink capture boards, why don't you goto the next logical step and pack the pixels, then 30fps would become available? From the way your comments read it seems that you are implying that only a add in card can do 800Mps, which means not an integrated port :(

Originally posted by Juan M. M. Fiebelkorn : Guys, what we are planning with FPGA is the same and more tha what we can do with DSP :)
I don't quite understand why everybody thinks that FPGA are expensive, that their development and programming is expensive and that they are power hungry......it seems so many lies have been told to poor consumers :).

I VOTE for a new Thread, only technical!!
And with access only to registered users (no need to tell you why ;) )

@Wayne, sorry guy but sometimes you dream to much, like a brainstorming of one guy!!
Don't expect the Via machines to be a DSP laboratory.
What is at hand now is more than enough.I say this cause the easiest way now would be to use one of that C3 machines with a simple $100 FPGA developmente board (PCI interface), program some simple routines on the FPGA (to compress?) and then recording to disk.
This way we use normal C code, combined with Handel-C or SystemC to offload from CPU intensive tasks.We have the IDE interfaces of the motherboard, we use Linux, we program a graphical interface to control the Camera System, we use a LCD touchscreen of 7" diagonal (directly conected to Motherboard's VGA) and we also add some De-Bayer simple algo to show the image realtime on the touchscreen.
This will drain only around 15-20 Watts.

I doubt it, you see the difference between cheap DSP and cheap FPGA could be significant, but we only need limitted compression power for lossless (though I don't know about high compression ratios) somebody quoted figures before so some of this stuff I quote comes close to, or exceeds those figures. Sure FPGA might have lower power requirments today, but low powered compared to the hardwired alternative to a low end FPGA, I doubt it. We would be needing multiple parrallel low end FPGA's to get the performance, and that can get complex. I post FPGA stuff here to humour people, not because I think it is the most practical, lower powered, affordable solution. The things would be more time consuming than using the existing routines, from the C code, it would have to emulate. What people are failing to see is that cheap mass produced (low cost) DSP in motherboard is worth more than FPGA on PCI card. One, it is probably gauranteed to be lower powered, if not with more performance. I think the sample PCI FPGA is a good idea, if we can get a high powered model cheap enough. Another problem is that we have only one slot for Cameralink, and that will take up case room, I could fit two cards into the case, if a suitable riser is available, but this all requires space and power compared to GigE. Does your power quote include Hard Drive power cosumption. With out GigE you might aswell forget a handheld camcorder version of the cases. Brainstorming, you guys have to look at the picture from start to end and all the factors (and how to get the cheapest widely accepted product) if I can do that great, don't knock it. The FPGA/compression chip discussion is a bit premature, people are excited and bored, until somebody starts doing it, I might be enthusiatic about low pricing myself, but those examples are based on best practice mass market implementations. Which means, unless somebody like, VIA in MB, or Sumix who announced comrpession first, or SI, puts it in hardware for us will probably land up costing more than cameralink capture. I have been around this hardware development stuff before, and it aren't cheap compared to programming, not even clearspeed apparently (maybe next year) which I was aiming to approach a manufacturer to implement for us. Most of my ideas are better performers that somebody else might implement, instead of us, cheap. Here's a challenge, go and find the cost of a FPGA card/chip (chip needs another 100-200% to be incorporated) that matches the Gflop performance figures posted a few weeks ago. If you can find it cheap enough good, I'll be happy, if it only adds $10-$30 to the finale price, like somethings I am pursuing, even better. You could also go back in the three threads and see who first suggested compression in the camera head, and a number of ideas Sumix is using.


The idea for a new thread, I have allready given the homemade camera thread over to discussion. In this thread, multiple things are happening and sometimes the discussion will go one way and sometimes another, and after Obin sorts out his camera, and people sort out their compression parts, there will be little traffic. I allready post much of the camera spec and parts stuff to the Viper thread rather than here. Maybe we need threads for "Home Made HD Cinema Cameras - General Discussion" (or use my thread), "Home Made HD Cinema Cameras - Problems and Performance" (for discussion on people's individual camera problems and performance), and "Home Made HD Cinema Cameras - Technical Discussion" thread (for technical discussion and suggestions not covered in the other two). I vote against closed threads, that is why we have multiple recipients in emails. Splitting technical up into threads on FPGA, programming etc at the moment will lead to minute volumes, and having this is one thread leads to lively idea exchanges, as each can make contributions to other parts of the project. You don't see Rob's doing much programming discussion, they do it by email/phone.

I just created them, and put a link to the wiki:

Home Made HD Cinema Cameras - General Discussion
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?s=&threadid=28779

Home Made HD Cinema Cameras - Problems and Performance
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?s=&threadid=28780

Home Made HD Cinema Cameras - Technical Discussion
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?s=&threadid=28781

Have fun!

@ Wayne:
If I don't need glasses here it says:

http://www.via.com.tw/en/Products/eden_n.jsp

7 watts for 1GHZ. And if I can read well enough on the Maxtor Diamond 200 GB I have now on my left hand it says 1.63 watts.
So I can't see why it would consume far more than 20 watts....

I'm not fighting for the first prize.This is not a competition.
I'm just giving technical data about what is available with little money.I'm not saying that what you say is wrong, so I can't understand why anything I post is commented by you as "I doubt it", etc,etc.

You insist with the Clearspeed solution, OK, but don't say FPGA solution would be limited because of its cost, when a single Clearspeed chip costs 1,000 and a Jpeg2000 off-the-shelf chip costs 40.

Some more info.Generally Lossless compression requires more computation power than Lossy.So if we want or need Lossless we need more power.If you doubt about it,see an example:
When you compress or your machine, e.g. with a DV codec and with Huffyuv or Sheervideo, which one runs faster?

About the pricing of FPGA development boards and chips, it has been posted a lot of times.Boards go from 100 bucks to 3,500 (may be more I guess) and chips from 12 to 500 bucks.
If you need the URLs, I will post them at your request.

About the mini or nano-itx, I realized that it would be the cheapest and easiest solution at this moment.But seeing that an Eden processor is not a Pentium4, I guess that we would need a little more horsepower to be able to record anything on Disks, RTL.
These motherboards come with GEthernet, so no need for a framegrabber.The problem is that, if we don't use high compression, We won't be able to record on anything but a RAID 0, with its added problems.
I know also, I could use a mini-itx witha P4, but then I won't be able to run it on batteries, at least not for reasonable period of time because a P4 consumes around 100 watts.Not to mention it needs a Cooler, with a fan, which also needs electricity and produces noise.
Just my two cents.

I don't really intend to, until somebody is near ready to start work on the FPGA design, which if it is Rob, will be after he finishes programming, which might be before Sumix brings their compressed camera out. And apart from not being very familiar with FPGA, you don't really need me anyway. Just cross post all my fpga links here, and those two UK magazines, I mentioned doing the FPGA tutorial series.

Just one piont, is that the thread name excludes alternative solutions. If you want to discuss alternatives, or post fpga stuff, feel free to post it to:

Home Made HD Cinema Cameras - Technical Discussion
www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?s=&postid=198782#post198782

By the way, I have been url hyperlinking for a long while, I notice people seem to get other people confused with me. But how do you hide the address and give it a display string like in Html anyway.

Have fun, I wish you the best.


Thanks

Wayne.

I suggest you re-read your post and at least remove the "at" @ symbol. Now I post good realistic stuff to get you guys thinking, that doesn't allways work. The only "dreaming" I'm doing is dreaming of low cost realities.

The amount of watts for that hard drive is suprising, I'll give you that. The cpu, main board, and one drive would put you in that range. I am not certain about the extra power for the capture card, camera and fpga, but maybe it is still in range. Somebody recently suggested 200Watts power consumption, I thought that strange, but haven't got around tor researching it.

I am not "insisting" on the clearspeed. As has been posted before, Steve got a quote, and they are being to over zellouse in pricing at the moment, so I dropped it, maybe after they get a mass market deals it will drop in price. maybe next year. they also plan to do a PCI board.

I just thought of another problem with using PCI for FPGA and Cameralink, they both will require a lot of data transfer, and should satuate the bus on anything more than 720 Bayer. You still also have the problem of finding a part that is fast enough, more expensive, or using multiple chips, that pushes up costs compared to a comrpession chip, as you also have to factor in the extra costs in the board design, component handeling. All design/manufacturing issues. I have pushed FPGA before, but the solution has economical restrictions. Again, have you located a cheap FPGA with enough power, preferebly on a PCI 64-bit/66Mhz/PCI E card? When you say $40 of the shelf, is that single sample or the 100-10K quantities we should be talking about.

Lossless compression requiring more power, I've seen some excellent figures compared to mpeg4 etc (probably because of the extra processing to find image compromises), which lossless and which lossy compression routines are you comparing?

I suggest you read the three threads, and see who actually first suggested the itx and eden, camera head compression and most of the other things you just posted.

Originally posted by Juan M. M. Fiebelkorn :
I'm not fighting for the first prize.This is not a competition.
I'm just giving technical data about what is available with little money.I'm not saying that what you say is wrong, so I can't understand why anything I post is commented by you as "I doubt it", etc,etc.

Good, that sounds like what I have been doing all along. I'll restate my aim. Research and promote a new low cost alternative standard in video and cinema for the free benefit of the comminty. Working towards maximising it's user freindlyness, and low cost mass market components, to maximise it's sales and success in the community (by upto 100 fold), which would also help lower the cost. Seeking out the best, longterm, lowcost solutions. If it was priced low enough, reprogrammable clearspeed, or Processor In Memory, would be best in the camera head, on the motherboard that would be integrated co-proccessors (DSP's and graphic cards, and Processor In Module PC memory Sticks). And as part of this to fit it into acceptably sized casing, that users will accept. I think about these other peoples' requirements not just my own, if other people don't, then why are they bothering.

Now if you want to discuss this fpga further there is the fpga thread.

Didn't you read my post about ADV202????
its costs around $40 in low quantities.
What else? Is this a problem of "Ego" or what? (based on you saying you were the first to post about mini-itx and the rest)

I'm really tired of having to post everything three times for you to read it.
Nothing personal Wayne, but please, don't talk to me anymore.Those long posts you make answering my posts make nothing but noise.They aren't constructive and now I see I'm surfing the same wave :(.
Sorry if I upset you or anybody else here...

Sorry to do this, but could someone explain again the attributes of this "JPEG 2000?" So it's an imaging chip, right? what are the specs?


Also, can someone tell me what FPGA stands for?

Ya, I know . . . layman.

FPGA stands for Field Programable Gate Array.It's kind of a programable microchip.For example you could program an FPGA to work as an Intel 80386, or a Z80, or as a Jpeg compressor, or as Sound equalizer.

The ADV202 is a DSP (or the like) which compresses video in JPEG2000.
I've posted the specs somewhere in this thread, but I don't remember where.
Try Google.

But how do you hide the address and give it a display string like in Html anyway.[ url=http://whatever.com ] Whatever [ /url ]

[ edit ]

OK, here's a question that perhaps only Steve Nordhauser can answer. If I buy a development board for a FPGA chip, how do I interface with the camera sensor? Would someone have to "breadboard" something?

Wayne & Juan: please try to stay civil on all of this. I understand
things can get a bit heated in here, but as I've said a couple of
times already I think we need to slowdown a bit. I understand
all the enthusiasm that everybody has and wants to pour into
the thread(s), but that might not always be the best way.

It is of no use to simply dump information into this thread etc.
I have been discussing the matter with Chris and we might
create some subforums to handle threads of devices that are
actually being build etc.

However (Wayne!): I'm not back from vacation I'm GOING to
GO on vacation this friday for 2 weeks. I will be back around
August 1st. Any changes will probably NOT HAPPEN before then.
We simply do not have the time.

Wayne: I have to agree with Juan a bit that your very long
posts and the frequency in which they happen is a bit daunting.
Perhaps you can try to just summerize what you are trying to
say and be a bit more brief? That would certainly help people
read through your posts. Thank you for the consideration.

In that regards I also did not yet have found the time to carefully
read your e-mail and respond to it. I want to give a thorough
reply and not a quick one. That's why it hasn't been done yet,
my apologies to you.

On the matter of FPGA there seems to be a lot of mis-information
and confused peopl (me included). Perhaps someone can write
up a good clearly explained little article with links collected from
this thread? We can put that up as a Wiki for example.

I have questions like how would you connect a harddisk (array)
to an FPGA board and a viewfinder out and things like that.....

I am sorry, your posts can be abrasive, confusingly wondering, niosily preaching to the converted instead of reading the thread history and taking on objective discussion. It is more about annoyance at a couple of things here today, than about my ego, and it is not a good day for it. I can accept and concead drive wattage, clearspeed overprice, what ever is right, please do the same. I was asking for an example of a cheap, powerful enough, FPGA PCI?, instead of the cheap hardwired ADV202 compressor. After the last post, I was just aiming to reply to your next post, that I didn't want to talk about it anymore, as it is useless. You have not had to repeat anything three times but was not understanding. I have posted good stuff, people get out of it what they put into it, if they don't want to read it, it is upto them, they miss out. There are still some great opportunities in those posts that nobody has taken up.

Most of the things you just accused me of are actually issues I have been having with you.

Originally posted by Juan M. M. Fiebelkorn : posts make nothing but noise.They aren't constructive and now I see I'm surfing the same wave :(.
Sorry if I upset you or anybody else here...

Maybe you mean that you have the same objectives and direction as me, but the discussion has been unconstructive niose jumping defensively around. But please no more.

As it doesn't look like I am going to be doing the sponsorship drive, and got everybody in the right direction, there is no reason for me to stay around, I can easily pass case designs onto Rob, or Steve, when I get to them. Ultimately, it is not about me or about you, but about getting the project to be the most benefit to the most people, and my discussions serve that direction.

Now to wait for wrangler Rob to come along and jump all over us for disputing ;)

Bugger, you beat me to it, Rob. Sorry I was writing while you posted.

Yes your right, things do move a bit fast, I re-read the recent posts, and they do mostly seem civil enough. We both have called it quits so that is the end of it.

There is just too much volume for me to keep up, if I miss a week, I can spend over 20 hours of reading every thread and replying. Today hasn't been comfortable for me, so sorry that I am not so tolerant today.

About my threads, I don't think that was what Juan was getting at. My threads are already brief complete summaries, that is why it can take 3-4 hours to write and reduce them. I have less research nowadays, but the problem is trying to do weekly summaries instead of multiple indiviual posts (that aren't acceptable), but they are getting smaller. It is mostly a perceptual thing, if I used highlighting to break it up into individual repleis, it would help. I'll try that on one of the recent posts now, have a look and see what you think. Also, in other forums when you quote it comes out as bold indented small text. I have been reducing the amount of quoted text to reduce their size too.

On your last paragraph, design it, design boards, with interfacing components, power supply, and sockets, at this speed the interfacing can get tricky, ask Steve. I suggest people stop talking about FPGA, do the research and choose actual solutions, you'll then get your answers on the way. Brief.

About the threads, have a look at the "Home Made HD Cinema Cameras" threads, they are logically divided.

guys this is a great thread .and a great opptunity


the passions and excitment are part of this process

One local corporation taught guidelines for preserving creative energy during the brainstorming process, and I think it's applicable to where we are. Often, the best ideas have three components: creative spark, competitive edge, and ease of implementation. Generally, we self-censor our ideas in favor of practicality ... 'it's too expensive', 'it's too complex for the user' ... comments like that. All thr truly creative ideas start with an outlandish though that has practically *added later*. In that vein, you can be sure that all the most competitive ideas with the most appeal will come forth.

All this is a backdrop to the most important aspect of group thinking: don't shoot down ideas because they're complex or 'whacky'. Those are the ones that no one else has thought of. All the group needs to do is to request the originator of the 'whacky' idea to add elements that will make the implmenetaion easier. In that way, everyone stays involved and the process doesn't devolve into ego bashing.

A thought kept inside your brain is in 1 dimension. When written it can be observed and evaluated. I am in the presence of brilliant men .working for a common good , and hope that I may add something to this discourse


Thanks to All

Also, in other forums when you quote it comes out as bold indented small text. I have been reducing the amount of quoted tect to reduce their size too.You can do this by using [ quote ] ... [ /quote ]

Wayne look at what you do on the board and then I think you will find that what some of us are saying is true..all I ask is that you read your own posts -- you will see


I am looking for a zoom lens for the si1300 if anyone has any links ...

Rob did the adjustments, looks a lot better.

Richard I know your name.

That is the exactly the same process I apply, except I self apply practicality as soon as possbile (usually straight up while thinking/writing it). Any practical solution is on the table with me here, but the proccess is abit more straight foward here, as many of the technological, manufacturing and economical issues have known practical limitations. So any objective person, with the knowledge, can apply the practical correctly straight up. So there will still be differences, and differences in knowledge. But it would help if we had engineers specialising in FPGA, and mass manufacturing and board design, they could verify options quiet quickly. I certainly don't know enough, otherwise I would have done it myself last year.

Richard Mellor
A thought kept inside your brain is in 1 dimension. When written it can be observed and evaluated. I am in the presence of brilliant men .working for a common good , and hope that I may add something to this discourse


Are you saying you work with some corporation that works for the common good. Good, can I join, it sounds like where I should be working. One of my legal freinds wants me to send my unemployment solution to the prime minister, and there are many other good ideas I have written up.

Thanks Richard

Wayne.

Originally posted by Obin Olson : Wayne look at what you do on the board and then I think you will find that what some of us are saying is true..all I ask is that you read your own posts -- you will see


Groan, I do, I can't help it if some people get confused or couldn't be bothered. I spend a lot of time structuring and simplifying them. I know there is nothing really wrong with them, and I generally keep back my comments about other's inadequacies. It is all in the mind of certain people, and I am familiar with this mental problem. To read them, divide up the variouse quotes (ussually most of the message) scan the first few lines of each quote to remember the post it was from and it's subject, then read the reply if you want, then go to the next one. My sentences canbe full of information and mixed meanings, so divide them up aswell, sorry. Still, sometimes it doesn't matter how simple I make it, some people just can't understand it, even statements like "the sky is a lovely blue colour". Now it should be 10 times easier to read, and look propperly divided up in your mind instead of a page full of confusing text. Try it. Now, when I get sick, messages are a big confusing mass of text, but I still read them while I can, even if I have to read it ten times slower than normal. If I can do it, so can most. I'll try to make it easier in the future, which is easy as most of the foundations are laid and there is not much more to discuss. I have divided my past 4-5 posts up with quotes, have a look, they make a big difference in dividing up the message.

This is highly personal and I prefer not to talk about it, and I prefer not to be bothered addressing it, but I believe that it is the responsibility of a person to explain/justify/accept their actions and reasoning, and only proud, arrogant, selfish, foolish xxxs won't. Once we have strength for that, we are better off.

Hope this doesn't offend.

Simplified summary for everybody:
Uggh, Igg, Ogg, eeK ;) .

Hey Wayne,

I don't think the problem is with you or anybody else here on the list.

I think the problem is lack of focus.

I've got a great idea. Why don't we see how to get Obin's camera working as good as it can (new bayer de-mosaic filters, recording software, good lens, maybe an Altasens chip) before we jump onto this FPGA stuff. I know it sounds so nice, but I can guarantee you that you're not going to beat the Kinetta, Panavision, Arri, etc. with this home-made stuff.

You keep talking about the economics of mass-production. Well as of right now there is no mass-production and no mass-market to market to, and if a camera is going to cost $12K, you can kiss you mass-market good-bye.

There's a reason you can OEM your own whitebox computer for cheap $$$'s-there's a huge OEM market for cheap do-nothing (or gaming/non-critical task) computers!

Now how many $$$-toting producers do you know who are willing to risk their big $$$$$$'s on a shoot with your home-made camera?

None.

Yup.

No-one. Not me at least. Shoot's are waaayyy too expensive if any production value is being put into them, and the last thing that I want to happen is canceling and losing lots of man-hours and cash on a broken or not-working camera.

I think for right now Obin and Rob have the right idea. Do the simple stuff. Cheap. Leave the big stuff for the big boys right now. I find it quite comical that all the features you guys are trying to do right now and so many more are coming with the Kinetta, which is going to be a fairly cheap professional HD camera. Professional in that I can take that sucker to Mongolia and not worry about it crapping out on me or breaking, etc. It's built like a tank, has RAID-3 on it's hard-drives, a superior de-mosaicing algorithm (with de-moire software too) run in RT by a very powerful Xilinx, built in color-corrector, 10-bit uncompressed log-DPX file export (for maintaining the total dynamic range of the chip), and a very nice Altasens chip at it's core that will go from timelapse to 60fps at the touch of a button; not to mention complete sound sync with 12 channels of audio at 24bit/96khz.

You complain that cameras like that are too expensive. Well there's a reason they cost so much, and it's because you can use them on shoots that cost $$$$$$$$'s!!! Home-made put-together cameras don't get used on those types of shoots, and as a result you shouldn't be spending a whole lot of money on them, because you'll never see the return in cash in a buisness sense. Now if it's something you're curious about, or think will fill a small niche, then that's fine, but realize this isn't a mass-marketable product. If the software was there to get nice images out of these things and get them to an edit app, then I think you'd already have your marketable product. Slapping on $$$'s worth of development time in FPGA's, this, that, etc., etc. is not worth it IMHO, and that's why I feel your posts drag on too long. They're great ideas, but not for do-it-yourself projects that can't see a return in cash, and the reason they won't see a return is because they can't be used on big $$$ projects.

So instead of spouting on about speculation on this or that FPGA, megapixel, etc. why don't we figure out the simple stuff first: rolling shutter artifacts, fixed pattern noise, good software for capture and de-mosaicing, lossless file capture, etc.

So, I know your posts are with the best intentions, but right now, I think the best intension for this project is to get Obin's camera working flawlessly.

There's a reason why the evil of compressed tape and DV lives on-it's easy.

I can get a call right now, grab a camera, go to the producer's location, shoot, give him a tape that he can edit wherever he wants, and cash his check at the bank the next day.

Or if it's film, I get the film, get the camera, shoot, send film to lab, telecine, send back the tapes, pocket cash.

I'm not rendering on a computer for hours just to see what the footage looks like. I'm not explaining to the producer how he'll edit his stuff. No. Shoot, deliver tape/film, pocket cash, repeat the next day (if that's where you want it to end). Until these home-made cameras become that full-proof and that easy to use, you're going to have a much harder time making money with them, and as a result, have a harder time (or at least the normal videographer/shooter) justifying the expendature for a home-made camera that needs days/weeks of investment in assembling, and then it's a rickety pile of bolts in the field.

The truth is that producers (the one's shelling out the $$$'s for your project that you get to work on, and are paying your checks) don't have image quality at the top of their list. Content is king. No content, no money for them. So if your stuff is a hinderance to them making more content and pumping that content out quicker, better, cheaper, then it's a hinderance to them making money. Yes, the same money that you like them paying you, they must make themselves first. So if they have to settle for DV, they will, because some $$ in the pocket is better than no $$ in the pocket but "great" image quality.

Jason,
How many Kinetta's are out in production right now? Any test productions using it?
What's the price? Delivery date?

Was the demo at NAB a working camera without a sneaky umbilical cord running to a box under the desk ? ;)

I've seen no demo footage from their camera yet. I wonder if they can send or have an FTP site with some footage? Stills?
I congratulate Obin for posting short clips, albeit 8 bit, to the world.

I'm not doubting they have something, but it sure would be nice to see something from them.

True on the content, unfortunately !

I would bet that some DV PAL people would indeed risk shooting with a new camera, but you are right, it can't have a duct tape and bailing wire feeling about it. But they so desire that 'film look' so who knows what they may risk.
-Les

Jason your sooo on-the-money!! Would I use this thing for work-for-hire? HeLL NO. I will use this thing for in-house projects that I can afford to mess up and re-shoot! I am doing it because for special effects like compositing/colorwork/greenscreens/slowmotion/ etc DV DVCAM DVCPRO DvCpRO50 and even DVCPROHD and HDCAM SUCK... so I would have to rent a Viper and god knows how much that would cost not to mention I have NO idea how to use it..so back to square one - i am doing this to let some of our projects SHINE - and yes this footage SHINES when you pit it agints any of the "standard" formats ;)


ROCK ON!

Oh BTW our animation/post department LOVES this thing because now we have enough resolution to work with in post



the 1080p will only be that much better!

even if we don't have any REAL software for capture done I will be shooting a 30sec spot with this camera soon and will give lots of clips for all to take a look at ;) guess I better check and see if sync-sound works with it first!

with your permission, i wish to say a few words about big company HD and DIY HD.
i'm working in poland as film/tv director, and by chance also as a co-owner of film/video rental company.

on daily basis i'm working with film/tv/comercial crews, producers etc. we have dv,imx and HD cameras. (f900 and f750p)

yes - for now almost every producer will use $$$ HD camera. but in the nearest future? if it's cheaper and delivers the same quality? the producers really know the value of the money, so if it's worth - they will use it. even if it's not from known/respectable manufacturer(yet!).

but i beleive in this project - because it's fresh and pioneering.
how many simple guys on this planet works on DIY hd camera? not so many.
how many big $$$ companies are working on HD cameras? not so many.

you see - this is the ELITE! never mind what will happened next. victory or failure. let's try. because it's fun. and in my opinion possible.

see what jeff kreiness did - he is not big $$$$ company. he is just simple "with many quotas" guy. and he did it. and that's why we adore him.

sony is still looking for proper HD solutions, DALSA, ARRI is still looking, THOMSON, PHILIPS, PANASONIC, PANAVISON, OLYMPUS, JVC, even KODAK... is also around in this HD world, JEFF is still working... and...
the guys from DV comunity are also working on this very thing.

this is not so bad company, dont you think?

and hey - do you think that the guys from big $$$$ companies are sleeping? no - i can bet that they are also reading our posts - they KNOW!

so, at least - TRY!

OBIN and others - keep rockin'!

filip

Hey Obin,

Thanks for the reply.

And BTW, I'm not telling anyone to stop. Yes, please keep going, it's just that as of right now I felt we're getting the discussion polluted with some pretty advanced concepts/ideas when we haven't even got the basics-i.e., really good capture software and a really good bayer algorithm (you're not going to get any good greenscreen keys with a bad bayer algorithm).

Let's get this discussion back on making a useable product AS-IS, meaning I can buy an industrial camera, hook it up to a PC (maybe even a small PC), and have the real possibility of actually using it on a professional shoot, such as something on a set where I can afford to have a camera tied to a PC. Right now I love the potential for what this footage can look like, but frankly it's still not there yet for me to start bragging about this stuff to everyone else, especially a non-tech-savy producer who only understands the end product and is shelling out the $$$$'s for the production. He'll start asking questions about the noise banding, why it's so dark or clipped, the "dots" on the edges, etc.

So I'm glad the excitement's there for future production, but lets keep this right now to what it is and what it can be here in the next couple months-a very useable system where we can hook an industrial-style camera to a PC and get uncompressed-HD quality images for cheap $$'s.

How many Kinetta's are out in production right now? Any test productions using it?
What's the price? Delivery date?


The Kinetta is coming, as of right now I don't believe the Altasens chip it's using is in mass production yet, after all SI doesn't even have their Altasens camera for sale yet. Not absolutely sure on pricing, but very reliable sources have told me a good deal less than the Varicam. And yes, the NAB model was working (without an umbellical chord under the table :-), Jeff was shopping the camera around at the conference, and I got to play with it myself (although I was in a lounge/bar at the Stardust when I got to handle it, and there was no monitor-out available, so I didn't actually see any footage if that's what you're wondering), so it is a very real product, and it has many high-end people (i.e., they have some clout) in the production community pretty excited about what it can do. It should be shipping by this fall, say around October, November.

But this is a project I've known about for almost a year now, and the electronics designer on the team, Martin Snashall, is top notch and totally on-the-ball about what needs to be done with this camera. The guy's created some of the most ground-breaking stuff back at Abekas, such as the A64 and A84, and after picking his brain for hours both in email and at NAB, he knows what he's talking about whether it's demosaicing, color correction, etc. On top of that he's a top-notch FPGA programmer and has been designing video circuitry for years. At the helm you have Jeff who's been an award-winning filmmaker at Sundance, and has shot tons of films for other documentary filmmakers like D.A. Pennebaker (one of the fathers of the cinema-verite documentary), so he knows what needs to go into a camera design.

I wonder if Jeff knows about what we are trying to do ?

I just rented some equipment to an Indy gig - it's this type of gig that would really shine with a homemade HD camera - they are using the XL1 - not to diss a good SD NTSC camera but that is NOT the right tool for a movie - yet I see people use it all the time because they can't afford better ...would they rent the "homemade" Hd camera? yes AND pay a little more then the xl1 for rental.....I think that is the best market we have.


- Indy filmmaker -

I think these cameras, with good software to make them run, will be a very nice replacement for the cheap way-to-compressed HDV cameras that are starting to hit the market.

I think that's where the sweet spot will be. And here's the thing-we don't need to make all the parts.

Here's the way I see it for this market:

1) We have the cameras already. We have the PC's to record them on. Right now we need good software. With good software we can record on commodity equipment and keep costs down, yet have a very high-quality product that will beat the pants off of DV and HDV, even HDCAM (but not HDCAM-SR, right now as a tape format it has many, many advantages in ease-of-use, especially for high-end production, and very low compression-as low as 2:1).

2) After having good software, people will see that these little cameras can really work. That produces sales. Sales produce $$$.

3) Other third-party manufacturers see that there's money to be made in these little cameras, and that there's some nice holes that can be filled. Like maybe even easier-to-use software. Or smaller hard-disk recorders. Or maybe even a company is making so much money on these little industrial cameras that they are willing to fork over the $100K+ necessary to develop their own little camera that combines the whole widget.

Right now I think we're in a little bit of a chicken-egg thing. Do you make the nicest camera you can and they will come, or do you make the little cameras and get a nice installed base that produces cash and whoos other third-party after-market manufacturers into the fold? Because Kinetta's got some cash for development, they've taken the first approach, and they're doing it all-out. We don't have the capital investment, and so we need to take the second approach-create a steady income market through a saleable product by introducing the one widget that is preventing this whole thing from being useable-good, easy-to-use, non-buggy software. That will make these little cameras possible to get more money to create the big stuff or at the very least get people thinking in another direction beyond making more HDV cameras.

If somebody sees that making the back-end instead of dragging around a PC will make them money, they will do it. But nobody's going to do anything if they feel that they're sinking their money into a product that's going nowhere, and/or won't work. When this stuff is rock-solid on a PC and works, then spending 5K on an Altasens that will go up to 60fps will be cheap, cheap, cheap, instead of being afraid that you're basically losing $5K on unproven, unsupported technology that's not designed for motion-picture production.

@ Rob

Don't know if I'm the right person, but from what I've been reading if you get a camera with camera link, your board would need a LVDS capable interface.If you go the GEthernet way, you'll need a board with Gigabit interface.Anyway I'll wait for Steve's answer.

Here I've found a nice Frame grabber with Camera link which has a Virtex II FPGA included and is supposed to be programable.
I don't know its pricing, but I'm sure will be above 1k.


http://www.datacube.com/Product/Datasheets/Hardware/CameraLinkFPGAprocessor.htm

Juan: I think the idea is to NOT have it on a PCI board? Or is that
just for programming?

What is LVDS?

All of this stuff is quite confusing and I'm hoping someone can
write up a small article which summarizes what FPGA is and how
to use it.

I've indeed been wondering myself how we hook up the camera
to something like this. Either directly or through GigE or CameraLink.
Not to mention viewfinder out and harddisk access....

@ Rob L.

Well, I didn't know sorry.
I'm pointing to PCI boards because of its simplicity to work with.
And because a Mini-itx with Eden processor (around $200) coupled with a PCI FPGA board with camera link has all you are asking for!! :).
VGA output (to connect a LCD display or viewfinder), IDE interfaces for attaching disks,simplicity of programing for Graphical Interfaces,etc,etc.
All in a relative small off-the-shelf package.

LVDS is what Camera link uses internally (If I'm not wrong).
Low Voltage Diferential Signal.
So if you have a board with support for LVDS, you could work with camera link, I guess.
Hope this helps.

Google search about what a FPGA is:


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FPGA

No apologies necessary Juan. I was just wondering if PCI was
an option or not etc. Sounds pretty interesting at all.

So what does this Eden processor run? A custom "OS" or
something like unix?

Eden is X86.It is a normal PC.It runs any OS a PC Intel or Athlon runs.
The nice thing about Eden is that it only needs 7 watts for a 1 GHZ cpu (passive cooler, no fan!), against 100+ watts for a P4 and around 70 for an Athlon XP.

http://www.mini-itx.com/faq.asp

Here is something I think would become very useful, a Linux Bios replacement that lets you start an operating Linux Kernel without needing a hard disk.


The LinuxBIOS Project

LinuxBIOS is an Open Source project aimed at replacing the normal BIOS with a little bit of hardware initialization and a compressed Linux kernel that can be booted from a cold start. Other beneficial consequences of using LinuxBIOS include needing only two working motors to boot (cpu fan and power supply), fast boot times (current fastest is 3 seconds), and freedom from proprietary (buggy) BIOS code, to name a few. These secondary benefits are numerous and have helped gain support from many vendors in both the high performance computing as well as embedded computing markets.



http://www.linuxbios.org/

Jason wrote:
I've got a great idea. Why don't we see how to get Obin's camera working as good as it can (new bayer de-mosaic filters, recording software, good lens, maybe an Altasens chip) before we jump onto this FPGA stuff. I know it sounds so nice, but I can guarantee you that you're not going to beat the Kinetta, Panavision, Arri, etc. with this home-made stuff.Er ... dude, that's what I'm doing :-)

You hit the nail on the head, and it's exactly what I've been saying from day one. I don't see the need to add real-time HDI, FPGA (yet), and all this other stuff we've been talking about. If we try to compete with the Kinetta, we'd have to come up with a manufacturable product and we'd end up at the same price point. I like Kinetta and I have no desire to compete with them.I think these cameras, with good software to make them run, will be a very nice replacement for the cheap way-to-compressed HDV cameras that are starting to hit the market.Again, I think you hit the nail on the head. There is a sweet spot here that we can fill. As I've said before, an ObscuraCam (heh :-) is not for everyone; if you need the professional workflow, don't use an ObscuraCam.