Arri's New Camera

[Guest]

Can the ARRI do that? (Just wondering.)

Hell, even Red can do that. Didn’t the Fs7 bring “burning in” and “LUT” to the masses?

 

[NorBro]

Atomos probably made it famous (to the masses).

 

[NorBro]

If it's not automatic how will an idiot get good results since they can't figure out how to find and apply the LUT in post?

Yes, the Arri can burn in the footage too. Since the Arri can automatically apply the metadata of the LUT, I've never actually felt the need to burn in the LUT nor have I ever had a client request me to do so. On the other hand, I try to burn in LUTs (or picture profiles, as they're called) all the time with the C300 Mark II, and only shoot Log when a client specifically requests it, in part because the C300 Mark II doesn't get automatically LUTed in Premiere, as well as Canon's LUTs being crap.

I do see your point, but IMO anyone working with LOG footage and LUTs should have the experience and knowledge. It's not really difficult.

Most of the time - like in your case with stories you've shared - it was just miscommunication (or no communication at all for that matter).

You can look at it in both ways: If there is an "idiot" who won't find the LUT then there is an "idiot" who will apply a LUT on top of the automatically applied LUT. Both cameras make it very, very easy. The Pocket 6K workflow not being easy isn't a valid argument, IMO.

But being unable to easily match it to your ARRIs makes perfect sense and a reason why it may not be financially cheaper for you in the long run.

 

[Guest]

I remember first few times working with an Fs7, everyone kept saying, “baked in” and walking up to the monitor, and saying “is that a lut?”. As i wasn’t used to the new jargon, i kept thinking, everything is a LUT, everything we see uses a look up table of some sort. And what is baked in about 10bit 422 file, they tend to be quite easy to alter in post. I’ve taken a prores LT file from 3200K to 5500K without anyone noticing. It still looked good.

I was amazed at how quickly the new lingo was adopted, and how it kind of all didn’t really make sense, yet made perfect sense.

 

[NorBro]

I was initially very confused by it all in 2014.

To this day, I strongly feel there are some LUTs from manufactures that don't even look right on their own cameras.

 

[Guest]

I was initially very confused by it all in 2014. To this day, I strongly feel there are LUTs from manufactures that don't even look right on their own cameras.

S-Log is a LUT. As much as any other camera profile is. If you see an S-Log picture style on you monitor, but record to the “rec709” standard picture style in camera, what did we just do? Did we just make S-Log our MLUT? If the standard profile is 12bit 4:4:4, is it still burned in?

 

[NorBro]

I have tried REC709 --> LOG transformations on Atomos recorders. One main project years ago was with a Canon DSLR.

The idea came from people making/selling C-Log LUTs for non C-Log shooting cameras claiming to provide more DR.

All of them did more bad than good (via the recorders).

 

[NorBro]

LOL.

You'd also shake your head if you knew how much money I spent on purchasing people's LUTs.

This was at a time before anyone and everyone was a content creator.

4K slow-motion on YouTube was very, very rare.

___

EDIT: (Post I was replying to was deleted.)

 

[Guest]

yeah, those were good times.

(I deleted my comment. was going to rephrase, but looks like you caught the right spirit of what I was saying. thanks!)

 

[Run&Gun]

Sam Hargrave is the director. And come from being an Aussie stunt co-ordinator.

He conceived and choreographed the fighting and camera operated the oner in Atomic Blonde in the stair well. That was his audition.

JB

JB

Finally got to watch it last night. I really liked it. The "oners"/fight scenes just blended in and worked and felt so natural*. And a great soundtrack, to boot.


*I've seen a bunch of "oners" over the last few years that just seem so forced and appear to be "vanity shots" that don't help tell the story and actually detract from it. Like "Too Late".

 

[morgan_moore]

Well, I guess that comes down to editing then, and you're just saying the editor didn't take the extra step of showing how well the footage can be pushed. If the original files were made available like John Brawley made his available in his camera test topic, then anyone could see how well the footage could be pushed in post. In any case, that's more work and most tests aren't going to have everything you want.

Being that I don't edit often, I sometimes consider the emphasis on things like shooting RAW or Log for most post flexibility as well as higher resolution for post-reframing to become a crutch for DPs who can't shoot well. I'm in the camp of trying to get it best in-camera. Sure, anyone can still make mistakes. But it annoys the heck out of me when a producer says to "frame wider" so that they can then adjust the framing in post. Perhaps in a world were adjusting in post resulted in inconsequential image quality loss, and the camera had proper frame lines as metadata setup so that the desired framing was shown in post while also recording outside of the edges of that frame for post adjustment, then I wouldn't mind it so much.

A 10 or higher bit file is gonna have more colours than youtube.. so you are only going to see differences once you pull the files around in the grade so A vs B tests really only have value when we get the files or IMO a good commentry of a colourist examining the files.

Also the content of that film is fairly poor mixed with the exposure choices. One should be looking for tones (eg blue sky on a wide) or a sidelit bowl or dish, CUs of skin, and also areas of the images that smoothly move from exposed to blown or shadow clipped which exposes the different clip points, if there are, of the two cameras.

As for DPs making mistakes often that is the tools available to them on set HD monitors viewing 4k, and lack of huge HMI packages to lift the shadows in wide scenes. The DR in meny natural scenes will change from a foggy day to midday sun and shadows, unless you are shooting raw or WDR or adjusting 'picture profile' shot by shot it is unlikely that even the best DP can capture the most detail possible with the given chip.

If you want to shoot completly burned in for 709 delivery may I suggest the Sony FS100 as best use of ones budget. Cheap, huge paint menu and very efficient codec of 23mbs. (http://www.sammorganmoore.com/fs100-ferrari-profile/) Interestingly I think my skins in the FS100 test are better than on the girl in the ArriVsBmc test.

Nothing I say is making a comment on which camera is better.

 

[Mitch Gross]

Very few people understand that baking in a LUT in-camera or on an on-board device such as an Atomos recorder is technically inferior because it is almost always a 17x .cube or a 33x or 65x that is concantenated down to a 17x. So the same LUT applied in post can be of a higher quality, not to mention more precisel tuned so that adjacent better intercut.

 

[Mitch Gross]

Part of the point of my Toyota & Porsche comment is that they are inherently different markets. ARRI will never sell as many cameras in a year as Canon or other similar manufacturers. Not by a quantum factor. And that's just fine, they can't make them that fast anyway.

A Toyota can be an excellent vehicle, rich with quality features and dependable as hell. But a Porsche is precision-built to a level of excellence beyond what Toyota builds. If Toyota tried to go to that hand-crafted, exacting difference then it would take a lot longer to build and cost much more for each car. A Porsche is an exacting high-performance machine for customers who care about the difference and it is far more than just a badge or status symbol. For those who do not care the Toyota offers a great value. But no one mistakes one for the other and each has its rightful place.

 

[morgan_moore]

Part of the point of my Toyota & Porsche comment is that they are inherently different markets. ARRI will never sell as many cameras in a year as Canon or other similar manufacturers.

But once they are actually not as good as Canon then what? Sure a few DPs that are big on Insta use them but the pracitcing majority will surely go to the best tool same as the virtual death of Hasselblad?

 

[Mitch Gross]

But once they are actually not as good as Canon then what? Sure a few DPs that are big on Insta use them but the pracitcing majority will surely go to the best tool same as the virtual death of Hasselblad?

You would need to define "actually not as good" wouldn't you? A Porsche is a lousy vehicle for hauling groceries, but it certainly has its place.

There is a TON of production that involves a camera crew of 1 or 2 people. That's realistically not ARRI's current market (although it used to be with their 16mm cameras). There is also a considerable industry with camera crews involving three or more people. In these productions the ARRI cameras are very well designed and accepted. The features and functions cater to the needs of these clients. So I question the concept of "not as good" here -- not as good for what and to whom?

 

[Grug]

But once they are actually not as good as Canon then what? Sure a few DPs that are big on Insta use them but the pracitcing majority will surely go to the best tool same as the virtual death of Hasselblad?

I don’t follow the logic there Sam. S35mm Alexa has been the industry standard for coming up on 10 years now. In all that time (10 years. In DIGITAL cameras), no other manufacturer has managed to best their sensor for dynamic range and the aspects of image quality that most people care about.

Similarly, no one has built a camera that has slotted more-comfortably into regular production environments, with the build-quality and fuss-free experience to match.

With Mini LF, this run is simply continuing in the small sector of production that demands 4k capture.

So no one’s managed to catch them in the last ten years, and they have the next evolution of their camera tech coming out next year. So what reason is there to assume they’re at any risk?

They can’t lose the low-end market to cheaper mass market cameras (since they’ve never been in that market anyway), and the high end of the market they have comfortably sown up.

Even their closest competitor (Sony’s Venice), which offer a whole host of hugely compelling features compared to the Arri, is only making very slight in-roads on the German’s territory.

 

[NorBro]

Very few people understand that baking in a LUT in-camera or on an on-board device such as an Atomos recorder is technically inferior because it is almost always a 17x .cube or a 33x or 65x that is concantenated down to a 17x. So the same LUT applied in post can be of a higher quality, not to mention more precisel tuned so that adjacent better intercut.

Really depends, IMO. The cameras I mostly used with an Atomos had 10-bit and/or 422 only through HDMI so baking in the LUT was superior to adding it in post over the 8-bit 4:2:0 internal file.

Now I do it on the Pocket internally and it looks amazing.

You're the guy who knows this stuff better than most, but IMO you'd be very hard-pressed to see a real world difference when it's done right in the camera. Maybe only when a particular piece of hardware is destroying the image somewhere in the pipeline.

But as far as applying it in post and having more flexibility tuning in, no doubt.

 

[morgan_moore]

You would need to define "actually not as good" wouldn't you?

The features and functions cater to the needs of these clients. So I question the concept of "not as good" here -- not as good for what and to whom?

I said arri 'should' be bust- they are not and you point out exactly why - which to some extent I agree with.

Arri are right in at my local college, so this is what the (cinema) kids are learning on trusting and beleive to be the best. So Arri are right in.

But as Ive said it is slippery. In stills we found that with increasing resolution, ability to peep and see forcus errors, and the increasing excellence of canikon focus (and an ISO advantage) that the single focus 'blads kind of just drifted away - my 'blad was 25ISO vs the nikkon being for for 800 or so.. the gap became so huge, that one could leave the big lights and the 'blad in the van and be done with the nikon in 10mins.

One never sat down and thought 'right im gonna change' one just realised the thing was covered in dust and the (two different kinds) of batteries were flat. Then it got traded.

I guess the rental model, the fact that producers/directors go on name and other factors slow that down with motion cameras.. and that canikon are still a bit crummy.

---

Arri play a blinder at the local college by donating or cheaping kit. The kiddoes learn to use arri and get indoctranated. If I were a tutor and by asking them to justify the cost of rental (as they would have to budget every project) by doing competent test that proved the Arri was going to make the production more profitable than using a P6k.

 

[morgan_moore]

I don’t follow the logic there Sam. S35mm Alexa has been the industry standard for coming up on 10 years now. In all that time (10 years. In DIGITAL cameras), no other manufacturer has managed to best their sensor for dynamic range and the aspects of image quality that most people care about.

.

The alexa has been in the lead for 10 year for 2 reasons..
1) film heritage
2) they were not completely stupid... (unlike the rest)

One phone call to a photographer would have got the response 'we love the low resolution, big pixel cameras, they are the best' - that is a call arri made and most didnt.
Any one who knows anything knows that a 2.5 s35 looks better than 4k S35. Defo 5-10 years ago that was the case. Maybe not today.

Again they realised the best way to up resolution and retain quality (DR) was to stick a couple of chips together. Again well known info with photographers. Phase One had been doing that for years. That kept them in the game for the last 5 years.

Arri 2 Everyone Else .0


So no one’s managed to catch them in the last ten years, and they have the next evolution of their camera tech coming out next year. So what reason is there to assume they’re at any risk?


I think they are at risk because some tech (af for example) is in the hands of some companies 10x bigger with a consumer base to fund them. It could be seen that canon 1dx for example is made at a loss (of huge RandD costs) but is test bedding technology that becomes trickled into prosumer models which may then get the investment back.

They can’t lose the low-end market to cheaper mass market cameras (since they’ve never been in that market anyway), and the high end of the market they have comfortably sown up.

But the low mass market cameras (cars, steak grills, etc) prop up the pro models which are loss making tech test beds and tools

Even their closest competitor (Sony’s Venice), which offer a whole host of hugely compelling features compared to the Arri, is only making very slight in-roads on the German’s territory

Of course. Sony are not sexy and things like the raw workflow on V1 of the F65 gave sony cinema a massive kick in the nuts. Not to mention the FS7, which inspires any upwardly mobile DP to leave sony asap.

Arri kept ahead as the others are basically losers - Canon and Sony lost - Arri didnt win - but they cant bank on that for ever.

I mean who walked into the C300 design meeting and went 'magnifico, slick, elegant, zehr gut, ya technic, wunderbar, klassic' ? no one. Just no one in Japan had the balls to tell thier boss it was sh_it

 

[DLD]

The problem ARRI may face is that, with the streaming businesses so multi-tiered, a C500MKII and FX-9 would be more than enough for most low-to-mid budget productions and the above cameras' low light and AF performances would give it a leg up over the AC crewed sets. And, once someone gets used to Canon or Sony and purchases lots of EF or FE AF glass, the ecosystem begins to play a more important part. And then, even presuming the Alexa look stays superior, one begins to think that he can get that look in post since there's enough information/data in the files and only a pixel peeper might notice any difference in the final product.

And the budgets would be far more reasonable with C500MKII and FX-9 too.