Dynamic Range IN RED

[CAMEN]

Better than film or not?
:dankk2:

[Stephen W]

Nope.

[mike the beginner]

Can't believe you guys are at it again??????????????

Is this another diversionary tactic to deflect red from possibly making "The best digital cinema camera" ever produced.

As a mere observer let the flipping camera be completed and used for a few major films and THEN have your boring endless discussion.


Lets start a new thread....... still photography better than film!!!!


Michael

[JTmoney]

Calm down Mike, It will be all right man. Its Camen's first post. It is true, it gets old. But we all start some where.

[acehole111]

I can safely say that the CMOS sensor in the red is pretty much on par with film if not better. Every major fashion photographer I know are now using highend Canon Digital SLR's. Every Nature photographer I know are using digital SLR's. And guess what? Their pictures are looking better, sharper and cleaner than they ever have before using film. And no lack of dynamic range either.

Let that permeate in your mind the next time you flip through a gorgeous double page spread in Vogue magazine, knowing that it was shot on the same sensors being used in the RED cinecorder.

I tend to not think of RED as a video camera at 4k Res. I think of Red as a Digital SLR camera that captures 60 frames per second.

[Stephen W]

And I thought I was keeping it short and to-the-point, rather than having a "boring endless discussion".

Camen, to answer you properly the dynamic range is not quite on a par with film (though not far off) and so far looks like it will be significantly better than any other digital format we've seen (with the possible exception of the Dalsa Origin which I haven't seen enough of to actually comment on).

But it's certainly all looking very promising.

[mike the beginner]

Calm down Mike, It will be all right man. Its Camen's first post. It is true, it gets old. But we all start some where.
__________________

My apologies to Camen sorry you don't see post numbers now so you dont know. But it would help if you took some time Camen and did what most of us do and spend some time searching or reading some of the posts.

I hate topics that end up with YOU guys falling out with each other. It brings bad blood and in any case the debate is prety pointless at least at this stage if not period.

Michael

[Clint Johnson]

Better than film? I wonder, with shutter and/or ISO bracketing we might be able to get some pretty amazing dynamic range... if the motion artifacts can be controlled?

Just pulling ideas out of thin air here but for simplicity it may be easiest and quickest to bracket the ISO at one set shutter speed? If we set the Red One to trip at 1/125th at ISO400, ISO500 and again at ISO640- with ISO500 being the “properly metered” setting... the combined exposure time would still less than 1/40th of a second.

RedCine could combine the three images together into a single (OpenEXR would be good) frame with something greater than 16 stops - variably blurred based on the actual shutter speeds and motion during the exposures of course.

It would have to be at 2K if you wanted three images but I suppose with 4K it could be used with two exposures and still give a nice wide dynamic range.

I’m just thinking out loud and there are probably a whole pile of reasons I’m unaware of as to why this wouldn’t work but nonetheless it got me thinking about some pretty sweet images.

Now how much does that 200,000:1 contrast ratio BrightSide HDR display cost?

[evenblink]

FILM SUCKS END OF DISCUSSION! Have a great day

[avocade]

One possible, albeit costly, solution would be to use more than one Mysterium sensor in the camera. Then it could capture two or more images with different ISO settings (or different "shutter settings", perhaps from using an internal ND-filter, I'm just brainstorming here...) with zero blur and full frame rates since there is no "lag" from the bracketing.

Would probably be a twice-the-price RED-camera (considering the Mysterium sensor is probably the single most expensive part), but it would surely be worth it for some people. I just wonder why this hasn't showed up in any Digital-SLR's yet. Internal bandwidth of the data-bus not up to it yet, perhaps?

[acehole111]

One possible, albeit costly, solution would be to use more than one Mysterium sensor in the camera. Then it could capture two or more images with different ISO settings (or different "shutter settings", perhaps from using an internal ND-filter, I'm just brainstorming here...) with zero blur and full frame rates since there is no "lag" from the bracketing.

Would probably be a twice-the-price RED-camera (considering the Mysterium sensor is probably the single most expensive part), but it would surely be worth it for some people. I just wonder why this hasn't showed up in any Digital-SLR's yet. Internal bandwidth of the data-bus not up to it yet, perhaps?
Hardware based HDRI. Excellent. Mind you, this could technically do be pssible on one single sensor if you shoot at 2.5K and have the camera capture every other pixel with a different iso setting, in a cross hatch pattern. Or something.

[Clint Johnson]

What I like about bracketing ISO or shutter is that it is software based and may even be doable with the Red One as it is being designed. As long as the camera can switch one or the other fast enough we could have this with the minimal incriment in time and money on Red's part.

'Cause it ain't like they're busy or anything :)

[Graeme_Nattress]

First, my famous quote is:

"You can't compare two things that are different, only two things that are meant to be the same."

RED is not film, never will be. It has it's own unique look that you may or may not prefer. And you can't rate aesthetic on a 1-10 scale (red being 11, of course) so you can't compare it to film that way.

As for dynamic range, it's not the dynamic range of film that is special, but how gracefully it breaks in the highlights. RED also seems, for digital, to be very graceful in the highlights, and it is coupled with low noise. Again, very tricky to directly compare as they are so different.

RED is just trying to make the best darn image it can. Whether you like it or not, or prefer it or not is a personal judgement.

Graeme

[Jay A. Kelley]

REDBlack rules.. Let film beat that!!

Jay

[imgentertainment@mac]

RED is not film, never will be. It has it's own unique look that you may or may not prefer. And you can't rate aesthetic on a 1-10 scale (red being 11, of course) so you can't compare it to film that way.


"But why don't you make 10 the highest"
"But RED gose all the way to 11" :thumbup:

[kprince]

Every major fashion photographer I know are now using highend Canon Digital SLR's.

Let that permeate in your mind the next time you flip through a gorgeous double page spread in Vogue magazine, knowing that it was shot on the same sensors being used in the RED cinecorder.


Actually, most fashion photographers, ESPECIALLY the one's shooting two page spreads are NOT shooting on "high end canon's". They are usually shooting on 22+mp MEDIUM format digital backs. The quality far surpasses anything I've seen a Canon produce and I love Canon cams. Not trying to start anything, just stating my point of view, I am almost 100% certain you will never find a high end fashion photographer shooting any full page or more on a Canon sensor. The client (magazine) especially Vouge, GQ etc.. usually demands the best.

[casey warren]

If the footage from RED is equal to or better than the pictures I get from my Canon 5D, I will be satisfied, and I will make two or three reservations. So far the 4K stills are looking awesome.

[doondoon]

Most "Giants" in still photography still use medium format film.
Annie Leibowitz, Bruce Weber, David Lachapelle ect.

Although, just like "kprince" said many are starting to use digital backs. I've seen a lot of photographers recently experimenting with the Hasselblad H2D which is a 39 megapixel DSLR camera.

[dvpixl]

looking at the images, it looks warm- it looks like still shots of canon SLRs.
with a nice lens in front of it. but i swear, it does not look like film simply because it's not. I'm now convinced that there is no point in trying to make digital look like film because that's just too freakin hard. but being that it's pretty darn close and even better in many many many ways, I'm completely satisfied.

[Graeme_Nattress]

Making digital look like film is hard, and really, it's a pointless task:

You loose the artistic integrity and aesthetic of good digital,
The end result will never perfectly look like film, and really, it would be cheaper to shoot film anyway if that's what you really want,
The end result ends up being neither one nor the other,

I say, just make really good looking images!

Graeme

[stevesherrick]

I think we will find out that this camera produces exceptionally clean, digital images that have film-like qualities but because of the photochemical process of capturing with motion picture film, there will always be a difference. What I think will be intriguing is not just the images that this camera can produce, but what people will do when they use the full gamet of lenses available, and then post process the images. That's when we'll see what this camera is really capable of. And that is exciting. We will probably never have a digital camera that replicates 35mm film but what we might have is a generation of films that take on their own look which people will become accustomed to and enjoy the stories being told with these cameras.

Steve

[dvpixl]

I was watching a preview of this horror flick that was obviously shot in digital cam. two things bothered me... the blue backlighting that's always apparent in some low budget digital productions, the 1/24 blur- i dont know why it's gotta look like that- some of us did much better in SCI-FI fest (but maybe it's some technical hurdle that i dont know about)-. and the really CHEESY feel of obvious video even though it was 24p. it was just too clean- and that's what's hurting to see right now. I just cannot get used to it...

If evil dead was shot on video- no way would it be the same...

just a thought. sorry to get off topic.

[mavrix]

We've made an F900 image look so close to film on a low-budget we did for Sony, that the studio execs couldn't tell that it was shot in HD. The possibilities are definitely there if you tweak with the image enough either in-camera or in-post.

And with regards to the fashion-shoots - I've shot fashion spreads and movie posters both with my 1Ds Mark II and with a Hasselblad Digital Back and much prefer my 1Ds for those types of shoots - I shot the April/May cover of Digital Photo Pro with a 1Ds. I usually only use the Phase One's and larger format cameras for advertising clients. Most magazine shooters I know are using Mark II's.