New Sony 4K camera at NAB

HKO

HKO

Well-known member
http://www.fdtimes.com/news/sony/new-sony-camera-4k-and-beyond/

Prototype anyway - interesting times we live in:laugh:

She is not a mere 4K motion picture camera. Behind the PL mount, there’s an 8K sensor: 8768 x 2324 pixel single CMOS sensor (that’s 20.4 Megapixels) — Super35 3-perf size, 16-bit RAW output, 16:8:8.

That is some serious number crunching right there.

What does the image look like? The pictures from the prototype, on a large 4K monitor, were stunning. Rich blacks, incredible detail, superbly sharp. I’m guessing the native ISO sensitivity is around 800-1000 — just quick speculation in a dark test room and a tabletop set.
 
It will be awesome and it will be pricy. :D Only thing I don get it is 8768x2324 sensor --> what aspect ratio is that?
 
matoliki said:
It will be awesome and it will be pricy. :D Only thing I don get it is 8768x2324 sensor --> what aspect ratio is that?
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Well, if it's square pixels, it'd be 3.77:1. So I would presume it's not square pixels.

A 4K 16:9 image would be 4096 x 2304. So presumably it's somehow oversampling by a little over 2x on the horizontal.
 
Barry_Green said:
Well, if it's square pixels, it'd be 3.77:1. So I would presume it's not square pixels.

A 4K 16:9 image would be 4096 x 2304. So presumably it's somehow oversampling by a little over 2x on the horizontal.
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Or it's the new RibbonVision aspect ratio. Or maybe it's somehow 3D ready.
 
It's not due out for another four months or so. Real pricing will be announced closer to actual ship date. It's clear from that article that the design has changed substantially from what was originally discussed, so don't be surprised if the price point has changed from what was originally tossed around.

You may hear firmer numbers at NAB (mid-April) or they may not release the actual number until it's available for shipping in June/July. $7k may be MSRP with a $6K "street price", or it might actually be $7k now... doesn't really matter as you can't buy it yet anyway.
 
I think all of this starts with what I call "Imaging Philosophy"

You can't end up with a good result if you don't start with a good fundamental idea of where you are headed when you start heading there.

That being said - I feel the F3 fits into a really good niche, and starts with some good fundamental imaging philosophy.

It's still a very different and in many ways conservative imaging philosophy - but I think its getting a little better.
 
This thread might be confusing people.

The original post is about the 4K camera Sony will show at NAB as described by FDTimes.

The DV article someone posted is about the S35mm NXCAM (that is discussed in another thread) and I think Barry is talking about that camera. According to the Sony PowerPoint slide that camera will be less than $7000 and will ship in 1st half 2011. It's a 1080 camera.

The 4K camera is just a prototype. There's no word on price or availability. However, we know JVC and Canon are both working on 4K cameras to some extent. Even if this Sony ends up being an ultra-high-end mucho $$$ camera, I'm sure there will be other 4K cameras in a few years to choose from.
 
Piolet said:
However, we know JVC and Canon are both working on 4K cameras to some extent
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Looking at the prototype of the JVC camera pictures I must say that the body looks identical to HM100 series. HM100 was a camera described by someone as "tossed five to five on Friday night". The idea was nice, produced adequate picture, but the lens barrel design and the controls sucked!
After having all sorts off issues with JVC's HD100 and subsequent design/built/control issues with HM100 I swear I will never buy JVC again.
 
Barry_Green said:
Well, if it's square pixels, it'd be 3.77:1. So I would presume it's not square pixels.

A 4K 16:9 image would be 4096 x 2304. So presumably it's somehow oversampling by a little over 2x on the horizontal.
Click to expand...

Film and Digital Times has an article about it. They are speculating its a quincunx style sensor arrangement. The "Q67" if you will, but being that this sensor has a 20.4MP sensor it won't be '67', but rather a bit more.

This probably has a lot to do with the new CMOS sensor technology talked about at the 2011 ISCC, with the new ADC that forms virtual pixels from multiple photosites on a global shutter sensor.

Time for some seriously, non-official, pre-announcement, highly speculative math excercises. Many astute readers have been emailing or posting the big question, “How can the new Sony CineAlta Camera be 16:9 and greater than 4K when its pixel count is 8K x 2K? 8 x 2 is like a super wide-screen 4:1 format, isn’t it?” No.

After spending time with some leading non-Sony academic and technical gurus over whiteboards, computers and Sake in Asakasa, here are some thoughts until the mysteries are revealed at NAB.

The sensor is 27 mm diagonal: slightly wider and a bit shorter than the F3 sensor. We don’t have the dimensions yet. It’s similar in shape to the F35. (The F35 is CCD, not CMOS.)

The CMOS sensor of the new camera is 20.4 Megapixels, 8K x 2K. Output is 16 bit RAW, 16:8:8. Normal frame rate is 1-72 fps and High frame rate is 1-120 fps. There will probably be a rotating mechanical shutter to handle this. The pixels on the new CineAlta Camera are arranged diagonally, diamond shaped, and have a unit cell size perhaps 1/5th the size of the F3 pixels.

Native data rate was estimated at 20 Gbps, and it can be compressed 4:1 for the 5 Gbps sustained data rate of the SR Memory Cards. A 1 TB SR Memory Card will store about 1 hour of “footage” at 24 fps.

How can they do this? How is 8K x 2K possible? What if the horizontal pixels were sliced, divided or multisampled? In other words, if the pixels were rectangular, not square…taller than wide…

This math exercise was done mainly to try to explain that 8K x 2K is the imager resolution, not the format size. Anyway, I’m more interested in how good it looked–wide latitude, gorgeous color, rich blacks, high ISO. We’ll have to wait until NAB for the rest…
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http://www.fdtimes.com/news/sony/8k-x-2k/
 
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