News posts from 2004 Q4

[Michael Struthers]

If you haven't seen "Faster Pussycat, Kill Kill" you've missed a great piece of entertainment.

[Aldo Erdic]

"the world's first and only concept for non-contact UV photon induced electric field poling of ferroelectric non-linear photonic bandgap crystals" (from Jesse's link above)

......easy for them to say!

[Rob Lohman]

...the show's recent move to fully-digital production.

The first thing I can tell you is that the high-definition footage looks absolutely amazing. For the new season, Enterprise is shooting with Sony's HDW-F900 digital camcorder, on HDCAM videotape and using Sony's CineAlta 24P processing instead of the usual 35mm film and photochemical processing...

http://www.thedigitalbits.com/#nx01dvd

Check the site for more.

[Ken Tanaka]

In the course of looking up information on the new Arricam D-20 I came across an interesting NAB 2004 interview with cinematographer Michael Ballhaus regarding his perspective on the general state of digital cinematography. I think you'll find it a good read.

[Mark Kubat]

this news seems more tailored for the JVC cam at the moment - no doubt support for the new Sony FX1 is bound to follow...?

http://www.ulead.com/aboutulead/press/pr10-06-04.htm

[Michael Struthers]

*L* Arent' DP's great? The only guys on the set more full of it than the director.

[Marcus van Bavel]

DVFilm Atlantis 2 is finally here.

Atlantis is commonly known for its unique approach to converting PAL to NTSC in a manner that makes it look very close to film. The PAL is first converted to progressive-scan, then resampled to NTSC 60 fields per second with a modified 3:2 pulldown. The results are much better than conventional PAL to NTSC conversions: vertical detail is preserved, excessive motion blur or image doubling is avoided, and the processing is fast (1 minute of video takes about 4 minutes of processing time).

Now the same approach can be used for NTSC to PAL conversion with Atlantis 2.

For converting NTSC to PAL, Atlantis first converts the NTSC to 24P, by using similar methods to our acclaimed product DVFilm Maker, then speeds up the playback rate slightly to 25 frames per second. Three different kinds of NTSC can be converted: 1) normal 60i NTSC shot with 1/60th sec shutter speed, 2) NTSC with a 3:2 pulldown such as produced by a 24P camera or film telecine'd to NTSC, and 3) NTSC with a 2:3:3:2 pulldown such as produced by a DVX100A or Canon XL-2 24P camera. Atlantis can remove both continuous cadence and randomly edited footage with a changing cadence. The cadence is detected automatically from the analysis of motion in the video.

One of the possible unique applications of Atlantis 2 is for the editing of 24P-NTSC video in a PAL-capable editing system which would not otherwise be able to edit at 24 frames/sec. The clips are captured in the editing program's NTSC mode, then converted to 25P. The clips are then edited together in the editor's PAL mode and prepared for transfer to film or conversion back to NTSC. One of the main benefits of this method over editing in a 24P system, is that the playback from the editing system through firewire is true 25 frames/sec, not simulated 24P with a 3:2 pulldown, or other pulldown that can exaggerate motion judder.

Atlantis also features a unique motion blur method which can reduce aliasing on high-shutter speed video and poor quality video. Another optional feature can reduce flicker caused by progressive-scan material that is intended to play back on an interlaced monitor. It can also simulate red emulsion shift and film grain if desired.

Atlantis 2 is $195 (Windows/Mac) and can be purchased online at http://dvfilm.com

[Don Berube]

http://www.cherryos.com

Nice!

- don

[Ken Tanaka]

First Mac OS emulator for PC's that I've seen.

[Don Berube]

Click HERE for a video clip detailing the feature benefits of the new CherryOS MAC OS X emulator for the PC.

- don

[Barry Gribble]

That's very interesting.... I really doubt that it would be able to carry something like FCP or Photoshop in emulation tho... the speed would be slow, I am guessing...

[Christopher Lefchik]

First Mac OS emulator for PC's that I've seen.

Here's another one.
http://pearpc.sourceforge.net

A rather interesting approach is used by this project, which sadly looks like it has been abandoned.
http://www.daunity.org/macehq

And here's a guy who installed OS X on Windows XP running on OS X (yes, you read that right).
http://sveinbjorn.vefsyn.is/mac_on_win_on_mac

[Rob Lohman]

" PAL is first converted to progressive-scan "

" then resampled to NTSC 60 fields "

" vertical detail is preserved "

I find the last statement a bit hard to believe. Footage is
de-interlaced, then re-interlaced and vertical detail is still there?

Also resolution is dropped from 576 lines to 480 lines and
vertical resolution is still preserved?

It might look marvelous, but that statement makes no sense (to me).

[Marcus van Bavel]

Assuming the source video is from an interlaced PAL camera, the vertical resolution is at most 75% of 576 lines because the camera blurs out the vertical detail to avoid interline flicker on interlaced monitors. .75 x 576 is about 432 lines. Here is a an article by Steve Mullen which describes why this is so:

ftp://ftp.panasonic.com/pub/Panasoni...ressive-WP.pdf

When Atlantis (or DVFilm Maker) deinterlaces PAL, motion is detected and a soft mask is drawn around the static areas of the screen, and the static areas are left untouched by the deinterlacing. This preserves the full vertical detail in the static areas of the screen. The human eye can detect sharpness only in static areas, so the scene appears just as sharp after deinterlacing (with the DVFilm method) even if there is something moving in the frame.

The resulting progressive-scan image of 576 lines, but with 432 line vertical resolution, is interpolated to 480 lines of NTSC.

Since an NTSC camera must also spoil the vertical resolution to avoid interline flicker, it has only about .75 x 480 or 360 lines vertical resolution. Thus the NTSC image created with Atlantis from an interlaced PAL camera, has better vertical sharpness than the same image recorded with an interlaced NTSC camera, even if if both are viewed on an NTSC monitor. This is one advantage of using Atlantis with a PAL camera to create NTSC. The second advantage is you have a higher resolution image for transfer to film.

Of course, the interline flicker can be a problem with a progressive-scan quality image on an interlaced monitor, however Atlantis 2 gives you control over that and you can apply a deflicker filter, if that is your choice. Some customers will prefer the higher-resolution image.

The only case where there is an unavoidable loss in vertical resolution is 25P (progressive-scan PAL) converted to interlaced NTSC. In that case the deinterlace step is skipped by Atlantis and it does a simple interpolation and field-repeat conversion to NTSC. The vertical resolution is reduced from 576 to 480.

For more info on Atlantis 2 ($195 Windows or Mac) see http://dvfilm.com/atlantis and for DVFilm Maker 2 ($145 Windows or Mac) see http://dvfilm.com/maker

[Chris Hurd]

Many thanks as always, Marcus... by the way, we have a review of your book up on our main site now. Thanks again,