Tweaking the Redrock M2 - Journal Entry & Photos

C-Mac

C-Mac

Well-known member
Hey Guys,

After speaking with Spinflight on this forum and shooting some footage with my HVX M2 rig, I decided to make some tweaks to the system.

Here's my journal entry on this process... you can see photos of the process and grabs from Rocket Men pre the tweaks and more grabs shot after the tweaks. I feel that these tweaks have greatly enhanced the performance of my M2.

Hope you enjoy and find it useful?

http://www.pulsecinema.com/M2/

Here's a few full rez images.

http://www.pulsecinema.com/M2/FREZ/

If anyone in the LA area wants to enjoy the play follow the link below. If you wanna go, book in advance as it's a small theatre and has been selling out for every show:

http://www.entitlementpictures.com/rocketmen.htm

chris
 
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Love the thread. The after shots are really tight. Huge difference, or atleast i thought. I wonder if the outdoor lighting helps.
 
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Hard mount = Yes. I've noticed the key difference between the SGproRev2 and the M2 (in it's mechanical attachments) is the HARD MOUNT. I saw SOTTY's hard mounted footage and it was exceptionally stellar, this was from an M2.

Looks like Hard mount is DEFINTIELY the way to go with the M2.
 
We got our M2 fine-tuned last week and upgraded with the hard mount, and it looks to made a tremendous difference in overall sharpness so far.
 
dougspice said:
We got our M2 fine-tuned last week and upgraded with the hard mount, and it looks to made a tremendous difference in overall sharpness so far.
Click to expand...

Good deal, the soft focus was killing me, but now I can live again ;)

chris
 
dogcat said:
Love the thread. The after shots are really tight. Huge difference, or atleast i thought. I wonder if the outdoor lighting helps.
Click to expand...


Thanks and Nahh, I felt my outdoor shots were soft focus from the moment I got the unit.

chris
 
dogcat said:
any reason why that would be?
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I read some where that the P+S Technik is CNC (computer numerical control) machined, while the M2 is not. This means that it would not be perfectly precise. Each part would have some variance. My journal entry shows how I adjusted to try and compensate for those variances.

chris
 
D'oh! -- i shudda thought of ebay.

thank you and nice work with the post, journal and the shoot. also i did a shoot w/the P+S Technik a few weeks ago, it was very nice on a lot of fronts, but the light-loss was more than a stop greater than with the M2. the gaffer asked if we were shooting 100-speed film!

again thanks,

eric
 
Lill Creates: said:
D'oh! -- i shudda thought of ebay.

thank you and nice work with the post, journal and the shoot. also i did a shoot w/the P+S Technik a few weeks ago, it was very nice on a lot of fronts, but the light-loss was more than a stop greater than with the M2. the gaffer asked if we were shooting 100-speed film!

again thanks,

eric
Click to expand...

LOL @ 100 speed film. My gaffer couldn't believe the amount of light we needed for the living room scene. We used every light we had and I wanted more fill light. It was the 20mm f2.8 that killed us on that set up.

chris
 
What surprises me is that most M2 owners have not learned this already. A bit of research turned up why the SGpro's image was sharp from edge to edge. The Hard Mount disallows the mechanism to move in front of the lens during operation.

C-Mac, your mount assembly looks cool and doesn't take away from the M2's pro aesthetic.
 
Kholi said:
What surprises me is that most M2 owners have not learned this already. A bit of research turned up why the SGpro's image was sharp from edge to edge. The Hard Mount disallows the mechanism to move in front of the lens during operation.

C-Mac, your mount assembly looks cool and doesn't take away from the M2's pro aesthetic.
Click to expand...

Thanks and I agree, I think the Hard Mount is smart move...

Here's a few full rez images.

http://www.pulsecinema.com/M2/FREZ/


chris
 
im actually suprised to read this about a late model M2. as an M2 owner myself, without modification of any kind, i havent experienced any issues with soft focus at all even when using just the soft mount. the rods are plenty solid enough, and the images Ive been shooting after about 2 minutes of focus setup have consistently exceeded my expectation. of course the majority of the time the whole issue of focus only stems from whether or not the camera is correclty focused on the intermediate imager, and the quality of the lenses used. although in this case its not one of the majority. .. anyhow, mine set up perfectly right out of the box and the images are tack sharp. but it is nice to know that a few adjustments can right any possible wrongs for anyone who decides to invest in the unit. its a great tutorial youve set up that anyone should be able to follw with some patience and a steady hand. :)
 
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