4K, 2K raw and the rest on the Shogun and 7Q+

Y

yadnom1973

Member
I’m looking at a recorder to go with a FS700. At the moment the two obvious choices are the Odyssey 7Q+ and the Atomos Shogun Flame or an old Shogun which is a bit smaller. I find all these units to be too big and unwieldy but the only other option is the Sound Devices PIX-ES and this one will not play nice with the FS700 I think.

The Odyssey looks like the best built option with the metal body, the Shogun looks a bit plasticy and toy like in comparison but then the Odyssey 7Q+ is a £1000 more.
I’ve been reading and trying to understand the difference in their relative abilities to record but have become confused as the landscape is changing so quickly and most of the stuff I find is from before the latest updates to the Atomos line, so I thought I’d come here and see if anyone could help me out.

Slow mo would be nice but I’d not put up an extra £1000 for it and I’ve little interest in the screen resolution or colour reproduction. As long as it can punch in pixel to pixel for focusing and has the usual histograms, zebras and false colour. The 1200 nit screen is a nice touch though, saving me the considerable cost of buying a new screen for the steadicam.

My main concern is what you are getting out of the units at the end of the shoot. They both record raw DNGs now on paper and the Odyssey is doing a very good job of it I think but has anyone been using the 4k and 2k raw on the Shogun? How is it looking? Is it a painless experience to shoot in? The Odyssey 7Q+ describes in a few different placed how it can “supersample” the 4K raw into 2K and HD and a few people have talked about how great the final image is but I’m not sure what the difference is between the Odyssey’s “supersampled” 2K raw and ProRes and the Atomos 2K raw and ProRes, if there is any?

I’ve gone a bit cross eyed reading up on these devices and there ever changing specs, and I will get back to it in the morning but if in the mean time anyone has any advice it’d be much appreciated
 
I'm the guy who can tell you all about the Odyssey7Q+, and it looks like you've collected a bunch of info already. I'll hold back for now so that others can comment, but I will state that currently the Odyssey7Q+ does more for the FS700 than any other device, and we feel that the way in which we have implemented our tools and functionality to be the best in the business. Happy to give more detail on this but I don't want to clog the thread.
 
The way I understand it you need that 4K raw signal coming out the Fs700 to really get the best out of ether recorder but you'd be the perfect person to explain this idea of super sampling, is this just the term applied to when one of these units creates a lower resolution image from a higher resolution image or is there a difference, for example between the way the Shogun takes a 2k raw dng and the 7Q takes a 2K dng from the 4K coming out the camera?
 
I have an Odyssey 7Q (the version before 7Q+) and it works really well with the FS700, it also supports my Varicam LT which is great. As you might know you have to buy the raw-license, but once it's done it supports many cameras and is very versatile. Just like you, I would really like if there was an Odyssey with a much brighter screen, if Convergent Design ever makes such a model it will be number one on my "things to buy" list. I considered the Atomos Shogun Inferno for a while (because of the bright monitor), but there's something about the design that I don't like. It's just too big I guess. I've spent too much money on gear recently but when I have saved some money I guess I'll go for a Boland monitor to my stabilizer, but I'd really prefer if it was a new Odyssey with a really bright monitor and maybe some features which come in handy on a stabilizer, like a horizon indicator.
 
SuperSampling refers to what happens when an Odyssey7Q+ (or an Odyssey7Q) takes a signal of one resolution and renders it as a video of a lower resolution. It is NOT the same as a simple and standard downconversion. First there are numerous algorithms for downsampling with names like Parzan, Cubic, Sinc, Lancos 6, Impulse, etc. They offer various advantages and disadvantages. We devote a great deal of processing to deliver a very good downsampling that is far more advanced than the "nearest neighbor" concept of most simple downsamplers. Secondly, most throw away the available extra information of color detailing available in the greater resolution of the source image. But we utilize this color information to render a very high color fidelity image. The result is a much better HD image taking the FS700 and going 4K RAW->HD ProRes in the Odyssey7Q+ than by pulling the HD video signal directly from the camera. It's a pretty easy comparison to make and Philip Bloom did an excellent job of it in a video he made when we first released the function.

https://vimeo.com/90469354

Please note that this is from two years ago and we have improved the image considerably since then over a series of firmware updates. I can't comment on what Atomos does in the Shogun both because I do not know and it would be rude of me if I did, but I do not believe that Atomos offers any form of Downsampling or SuperSampling. Please also note that the Odyssey7Q+ offers a similar SuperSampling function taking a DCI4K or UHD HDMI signal and converting it to a high quality 2K or HD image. This is particularly useful in small mirrorless cameras such as the GH-4 or the A7SII where the camera does not have the processing power available to do the best conversion. In particular the Sony cameras will always deliver an 8-bit signal in 4K or HD, but using the Odyssey SuperSampling we create a 10-bit color depth from the available color information available in the 4K resolution.

To your question of how the Odyssey7Q+ creates a 2K CinemaDNG file from the FS700 RAW output compared to how the Atomos recorder does, I will point out four things:
- This is in fact not a SuperSampling, but instead it is native resolution to matching resolution
- It again is not my place to comment on the performance of someone else's product
- That said, the competition currently doesn't actually do this. I believe they only do 4K up to 30p.
- Both brands record using SATA drives, and a SATA bus can only pass so much data before saturation. In the case of the CinemaDNGs created from FS700 RAW, the maximum available from a single SATA bus is 4K30p and 2K120p. The Odyssey7Q+ has two SATA SSDs on independent buses to allow RAID recording for 4K60p and 2K240p. This also allows the 4K120p burst, which depends on the 4K60p signal throughput. So a device with only a single SATA brive will never be able to record 4K60p, 4K120p burst or 2K240 in CinemaDNG.
 
First, make sure if you really want to shoot Cinema DNG, those files are HUGE!
If raw to ProRes is enough (even there i almost never shoot 4K because files are too big).

The function I use the most is the Odyssey's 4Kto2K mode, which yields fantastic 2K images. There's nothing equivalent on any of the Shoguns, you can only get 2K if the FS700 is set to output 2K, which is does by means of line skipping, which is not as good, and can be prone to aliasing and moire.

If high frame rates really isn't important to you, then the Shogun or Shogun Flame could do. Otherwise you have to look at the Shogun Inferno for a more comparative product. None does CinemaDNGs yet. There's some beta firmware that does it but not sure how stable that is.

The 7Q/7Q+ is a better product for the FS700 hands down. The day when the Inferno has all promised functions it will be a close call. If I bought one today it would probably be the Inferno as the cost of the 7Q+ is almost €1000 more and to me that's a lot of money. And the fact that the raw bundle makes it useful with other cameras is moot to me as I only ever use it with my camera and when I eventually upgrade my camera it will be to something like the FS7 that has 4K 10bit internally so then I won't be using an external recorder anyway...

Also, the Atomos user interface looks great while that on the Odyssey looks like crap and is also not very user friendly.

That said, I really like the 7Q and if money is no concern it's definitely the one to get.
 
Thanks for the replies. The Bright screen was not something I was even looking for when I stared this but I’ve just done a bit of musical chairs with steadicams on eBay and though I’m very happy with where I landed, I’ve not got a working screen so this 1200 nit screen is suddenly quite a good idea. It will not be the deciding factor though unless all the rest is equal and it sounds like that is not the case.

So, super sampling. Yes Dmitrizigany I agree, DNG is a ***** in 1080/2k, I’ve never even tried it in 4K but it would without a doubt be unmanageable. An in-between resolution or a Raw compression is what’s needed, I had gotten very excited by all these 4K cameras having Raw capabilities but really to use it in any practical way you need the compression like the Reds and Alexas. There are some workarounds with Ciniform and the newer slim-whatever but it’s a fiddle.

This is why my interest in this super sampling (SS). I suppose it’s a processor thing, I’m guessing Resolve and such would use a similar process to the 7Q’s super sampling when exporting a 2k from a 4K master? A higher quality 2K raw or 2K ProRes HQ would be a very big deal to me, I’m presuming all the ProRes can be HQ? But can SS be used to create a richer lower resolution Raw? A SS 2K from the 4K for example?

There seems to be a bit of confusion on the 2K resolution. As I understand it Mitch you are saying that the 7Q will take the 4K Raw and then SS it down and deliver a very high quality 1080p, though I’m unclear on whether this is a ProRes or a Raw. You do then go on to say there is a 2K Raw and 2K ProRes. But the 2K Raw is a one to one conversion, the camera in simply set to output 2K raw instead of the 4K raw so no magic there. Dimitrizigany is saying that the 2K is very good but he is also saying it’s created from the 4K in-camera by line skipping which is prone to aliasing and moiré.

Can the 7Q or the Atomos capture a high quality 2K Raw or ProRes from the 4K Raw or is it always collected by one of these binning processes like the line skipping mentioned?
 
Milan O, yep the Atomos design is pretty tacky and plastic looking. I really don't give a **** how something looks as long as it dose the job, but those Shogun bricks with the bright rubber bumpers smell wrong. I like to see kit as robust and compact as possible with as many physical buttons as possible. But I see a lot of reviews these days with people talking about how pleasing the interface and the histograms look, whether they like the logo. A marketplace where the customers are more involved in how pretty there tools look leads to devices that become bloated

The 7Q looks like it's the much better design but it's a £1000 more, that's no joke.
 
yadnom1973 said:
The 7Q looks like it's the much better design but it's a £1000 more, that's no joke.
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There is a price difference, that's right, but the O7Q+ will give you other options as well. For instance you can record two HD signals at the same time with no additional cost. I don't know if that's possible on any other recorder/monitor. This feature is really handy if you have two different cameras. It helps you match their output in a better way since you can directly switch between two cameras and view the result on the same screen. I don't care much about how my gear looks, but the Inferno is just too big. The only thing that makes it interesting is that it's a recorder/monitor with a bright screen.

I also don't know anything about the support from Atomos, but IMO the support from Convergent Design is great. If you use your gear to make a living, it's very important to get help if you need it. Just having Mitch "around" (he seems to be everywhere) is really helpful, I only know two other persons from different (and much bigger) companies that come close, but you won't find them here.

In the best of worlds we'd have a bright screen, all recording formats from all cameras, recording to a removable high speed M.2 SSD and all this to a low cost. Maybe in the future all these things will come true, but as it is now we have to choose. When I bought the O7Q it was the only choice, so it was an easy one. Today I'd probably go for the O7Q+. I just don't see myself working with something as big as the Inferno.
 
From the FS700 4K RAW, Odyssey can create a 2K or an HD (1920x1080) Apple ProRes file. One cannot go from 4K RAW->2K RAW without reducing image quality in a variety of ways. Once the image is turned into video it is much easier and visually more pleasing, but then you're not going to reverse-process it back into a lower rez. "mock RAW".
 
Ok I understand, and to make the 1080 ProRes it uses the various super sampling algorithms but to make the 2K it's just a simpler down scaling from the 4k or dose it use the super sampling for the 2K ProRes as well?
 
yadnom1973 said:
Dimitrizigany is saying that the 2K is very good but he is also saying it’s created from the 4K in-camera by line skipping which is prone to aliasing and moiré.
Click to expand...
No. The camera can output 4K or 2K raw. This can be converted by both the 7Q and the Shoguns to 4K or 2K ProRes. However, when the output on the camera is set to 2K there is line skipping etc.
The 7Q can also take the 4K signal from the FS700 and turn it to much better 2K (or HD if you wish) than if the camera was set to output 2K. This is great as you get better quality 2K/HD for those situations when you really don't need 4K. This function is not available on the Atomos Shoguns.
 
Ok that's good; the confusion is in the terminology. Super Sampling as I now understand it is a specific process that creates a very high quality, increased bit depth and sharpness, lower resolution from a higher resolution. What I was unsure about was what SS resolutions the 7Q could create from the 4K raw signal out of the FS700 using this process. I've now found a page dedicated to the FS700 within the Convergent Design web site and I think it's saying that it can SS from the 4K Raw into 4K (not sure how that works), UHD, 2K, UND (I'm not familiar with this one) or HD. All in ProRes 422 HQ.

This SS sounds great and is one of the most persuasive things I found in the 7Q's favour.

If you are still about Mitch could you confirm this and also I would be very interested to know one more thing about the SS process. If the 7Q takes the 8 bit high res out of these little mirror-less cameras and uses an algorithm to increase the bit depth in a lower resolution. Dose it apply this same algorithm to all the processing it does? So does it take the FS700 4K raw and improve the effective bit depth in the lower resolution ProRes that it make from the FS700?

This may seem like an odd question with the 12 bit raw coming in but there are a few folk who say the 4K raw coming in has been quite heavily processed just to fit through the 3G SDI pipeline. A subject for another thread maybe.

I must admit I'm a bit suspicious of this. I thought this is information was simply was not gathered by the sensor and I struggle to see the relationship between resolution and bit depth. But what do I know, I never fully understood all the dark magic performed in the heart of the camera by demosaicing algorithms and their kin, maybe 8 bit can grow to 10 bit if you have enough 8 bit pixels.
 
yadnom1973 said:
This may seem like an odd question with the 12 bit raw coming in but there are a few folk who say the 4K raw coming in has been quite heavily processed just to fit through the 3G SDI pipeline. A subject for another thread maybe.
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I would not call it heavily processed. My understanding is it is compressed 3.6x and encoded with a SLOG2/Sgamut curve at 12bit precision to fit over SDI. That is quite lightly compressed, the same minimum compression the F5/F55/F65 have and similar to RED's minimum compression ratios.
 
So these other posts of the Fs700's externally rerecorded ProRes being weaker, you don't think this kind of compressing could be to blame? Sound like something that would not really be noticed in grading. If it's the same as the F55 and Red's I might just right these posts of as some subjective worrying about how much the kit costs.
 
yadnom1973 said:
Ok I understand, and to make the 1080 ProRes it uses the various super sampling algorithms but to make the 2K it's just a simpler down scaling from the 4k or dose it use the super sampling for the 2K ProRes as well?
Click to expand...

SuperSampling for both. If fact the only difference between the resulting 2048x1080 and 1920x1080 files is that on one we chop off the extra 64 pixels from each side.
 
yadnom1973 said:
Ok that's good; the confusion is in the terminology. Super Sampling as I now understand it is a specific process that creates a very high quality, increased bit depth and sharpness, lower resolution from a higher resolution. What I was unsure about was what SS resolutions the 7Q could create from the 4K raw signal out of the FS700 using this process. I've now found a page dedicated to the FS700 within the Convergent Design web site and I think it's saying that it can SS from the 4K Raw into 4K (not sure how that works), UHD, 2K, UND (I'm not familiar with this one) or HD. All in ProRes 422 HQ.

This SS sounds great and is one of the most persuasive things I found in the 7Q's favour.

If you are still about Mitch could you confirm this and also I would be very interested to know one more thing about the SS process. If the 7Q takes the 8 bit high res out of these little mirror-less cameras and uses an algorithm to increase the bit depth in a lower resolution. Dose it apply this same algorithm to all the processing it does? So does it take the FS700 4K raw and improve the effective bit depth in the lower resolution ProRes that it make from the FS700?

This may seem like an odd question with the 12 bit raw coming in but there are a few folk who say the 4K raw coming in has been quite heavily processed just to fit through the 3G SDI pipeline. A subject for another thread maybe.

I must admit I'm a bit suspicious of this. I thought this is information was simply was not gathered by the sensor and I struggle to see the relationship between resolution and bit depth. But what do I know, I never fully understood all the dark magic performed in the heart of the camera by demosaicing algorithms and their kin, maybe 8 bit can grow to 10 bit if you have enough 8 bit pixels.
Click to expand...
Let me put it this way: The Odyssey7Q+ recognizes what the input signal is and gives you the highest quality output possible. It is an active process that our engineers worked long and hard on to optimize for different input and output signals. I could go into deeper detail but it would be a long drone. We do this where others simply only offer a direct copy and leave it at that.
 
That's fine Mitch you have been more than helpful, I don't think I'd consider the Atomos anymore for what I'm wanting to do. The 7Q looks more suitable, the 4K Raw Super Sampling is for me the strongest point in it's favour. My choice is now between the Ursa Mini 4.6K and the FS700 / Odyssey 7Q and comes down to the 4:1 compressed Raw and ergonomics against the low light performance and full frame FOV.

Iy might be time to try and rent or borrow these cameras before committing to a final decision.
 
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