Canon 1DC crop modes - surprise!

Wow, quick on the trigger there, I answered my own question and deleted the post.

Some zooms will evidently go, most primes probably won't. Old ground.
 
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I wish they would have added a mode that takes the 4k, and interpolates it down to 2k, using 2x2 blocks, like the C100/C300 do.
 
Hi ! it would be interesting to read about some other comparisons between the 4K and the super35 crop modes
In some cases if the video quality remains high the reduced bit rate is indeed a big plus. After all a lot of high quality videocameras works with "only" 50 Mbit/s ... even less
This is 1/10th of the 4K mode
And sorry to repeat me ... I am very very sorry that such amazing device is so out of my reach.
But by the way a innovative product is always a very good news. Personally I think this is in some way the most amazing camera for video appeared on the market. A lot of videocameras out there do not hold a candle to the 1DC.
First choice the best sensor available ... and then crop it to the format you need. Like Panavision with the help of Nasa is going to do actually ... at much higher price I am afraid.
The really first photocinecamera .... amazing !
Thanks and regards,
gino
 
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Can the S35 crop mode do 60P? If so, any quality loss?

C300 style 1080p at 60P would be a huge selling point.
 
Jay:
S35 @ 60P:Looks like the answer is no.

From 1DC manual:

4K: 4096 x 2160 24p
Super 35mm Crop: 1920 x 1080 30p/25p/24p
Full HD: 1920 x 1080 60p/50p/30p/25p/24p
HD: 1280 x 720 60p/50p
SD: 640 x 480 30p/25p
 
Ah shame.... my guess is that it is using heavier processing techqniues to do a full downscale.... 60P probably just not possible.
 
macgregor said:
I just did a few more tests with the camera.

Base ISO in Canon Log: 400ISO
Dynamic range: 13stops (+6 -6)

Compresion is excellent in high detailed scenes, really bad in smooth gradients without detail (posterization occurs).
Click to expand...

macgregor said:
While the 1DC seems to produce extremely sharp footage with high detailed scenes, it gets ugly with things like this:

2_1.2.1.jpg

This is the 1DC, resized and exported in Davcinci resolve.

2_1.1.1.jpg

This is the same thing, shot with a proper 10bit low compresion camera for comparison.
Click to expand...
Did you test this banding at different ISOs? Higher than 400, in the 800 range too?
 
macgregor said:
We would need to test. Posterization could come not only from the codec but also from the 8bit color depth.

A couple more shots:


Detail vs crop mode - and check for posterization in the background (yes it's not only youtube, those steps are in the original files)

And here some DR and skintones vs other cameras.
Click to expand...

Funny, the F35 kicks all their asses, IMHO!
 
macgregor said:
As we all know the camera has a 4K 4:2:0 mode...
The 4K mode is quite sharp, it didn't show any aliasing and while only 8bits (too bad) it becomes a 444 signal once resampled to 1080p, which isn't bad right?
Click to expand...

I thought the 4K was 4:2:2 internal? Also how did you come to the conclusion of "444"?
 
lumiere61 said:
Really I do not understand why this crop mode is not everywhere.
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I totally agree with you, ideally I wish we had a camera that had multiple crop modes and still maintains equal sharpness throughout each mode.

The Nikon D4 comes close but unfortunately it is supposedly (via other reviews) very soft on all modes except their 2.7x crop mode.

I believe in order to maintain "equal" sharpness in all modes, they'd have to have a different binning/line skipping algorithm for EACH mode. Note that we're talking about sensor crop and NOT image crop, meaning we are physically using a subset of the physical area of the sensor as our focal plane to project the image.

So in saying that, a couple things come to mind:
1) A multiple crop mode sensor would cannibalize their various lines of cameras (i.e. a Full Frame camera with a perfect APS-C crop would eat into their APS-C camera line).
2) It could potentially eat into their lens sales as it would enable an equivalent FOV similar to buying additional lenses (yes DOF would be different and other lens characteristics would be different but if the operator were only going for the FOV then it would endanger sales of other equivalent looking lenses).
3) Most likely it is very difficult to maintain maximal sharpness on all crop modes.
4) You probably lose light sensitivity as you crop down because the area of your focal plane is less. But conversly you most likely gain depth of field and sharpness by having a smaller focal plane to work with.

My ideal camera would have "n" crop modes using Full Frame as it's base mode. This means we'd be able to dial in our exact crop mode to the smallest degree possible thus achieving an equivalent focal length of our choosing. All with equal sharpness. And therefore I'd only need to use a 24mm F1.4 lens for most of my projects. Imagine how quick our "lens changes" would be for things like weddings and unpredictable live events.

More importantly, we'd have a dedicated button/menu on the camera to adjust these crop modes without having to go into the menu tree.

Having said that, we now have a way of adding crop modes without having to physically crop the sensor. With the invention of speed boosters we can actually crop UP now. Most likely this is the best way to maintain a decent level of resolution for each crop mode. But the downside is that our camera gets heavier and there is no way as of yet to do multiple crops with one speed booster.

Let me know if you think this feature would be helpful. Maybe we can start a grass roots project to make a camera that has these features.
 
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nothing said:
There are other cameras with crop modes: every Red, various Nikons, GH2, even the cheap Canon T3i.

The problem is that this essentially makes the sensor smaller - not what most users want when they buy a big sensor camera. When it's a fullframe camera and the crop results in a S35 size sensor then all is good, but when the sensor isn't that huge to begin with then crop mode leaves you with a small sensor camera.

I agree, crop modes can rock if done right. I say the T3i is the most underrated video DSLR because of it's high quality crop mode, in fact.
Click to expand...

Remember that filming is all about story. So crop modes indeed can add to the story by allowing for different combinations of field of view, depth of field and focusing characteristics. A 24mm F1.4 @ 2x crop mode has a different lens characteristic than a 50mm @ Full Frame even though both have "equivalent" FOV's. So depending on how you want to tell your story, you may choose one of the other or vice versa.
 
The GH2/3 have this with "ETC" mode, I believe the Canon T2i and T3i also do it.

Really, it is called "Region of Interest", "Area of Interest", or "Windowing", at the sensor level, and it quite common on industrial cameras, as they let you control pretty much everything, even having multiple ROIs, including ones that overlap!

I'm sure that when Apertus come out with the Axiom camera, it will include these modes.
 
atarijedi said:
The GH2/3 have this with "ETC" mode, I believe the Canon T2i and T3i also do it.

Really, it is called "Region of Interest", "Area of Interest", or "Windowing", at the sensor level, and it quite common on industrial cameras, as they let you control pretty much everything, even having multiple ROIs, including ones that overlap!

I'm sure that when Apertus come out with the Axiom camera, it will include these modes.
Click to expand...

I thought the T3i was at the image level (hence the "digital zoom" feature).
 
The T3i at 3x zoom is very close to a 1 - 1 crop factor. It goes to digital zoom from there. I have done a number of ultra long range clips with a 600mm and the 3x on a T3i. Pretty incredible stuff for 2880mm equivalent :)



Cheers,

Pete
 
macgregor,
I did not know that the resolution transfers into color information, that's a breackthrough :)

in Super 35, the crop factor is 1.6, so crop lenses can be used, correct? For example Canon17-55 2.8 ?

Banding at iso 400 is lowest, does it mean that going to iso 100, and iso 1200 will create same amount of banding?
 
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