FS5: Noise level. What is your opinion and experience?

R

RASL

Member
I feel the FS5 is terrible at handling noise. I also own the FS7, so I do have a point of reference and certain experience shooting in slog.
Even when overexposing and shooting outdoors, noise will always be very present in midtones and shadows. So when I compensate for the overexposure, some of the noise in the shadows will obviously be gone, but not from the midtones, as it would not make sense to crush them! I find that if there is any mild shadow in your footage, it is impossible to deliver somewhat noise free images from the FS5 without the drawbacks of using NR in post. And I am not talking from a picky or pixel peeping level, about artifacts due to the XAVC-L codec or UHD at 8 bits; the noise is just too apparent and ugly, even at HD! That does not happen to me with the FS7 at all. And others with more experience have told me the same.
It is a shame that the noise quality I am getting out of the FS5 is very bad. I heard this happened especially after FW2, when they reduced the NR level in order to avoid the smearing problems (I never used the camera before the FW). The result is that the FS5 is too bad to be a B camera for the FS7, in my opinion. But what is your opinion and experience? Thanks in advance to whomever answers.
 
I use Slog2 at its base ISO of 3200 or 0DB gain.

I can only compare it to my C100/300's and feel it is slightly subtly more noisier but its very fine noise and still acceptable.

Just don't ever go over 3200 ISO to keep noise to a minimum.
 
Thanks for the replies!

I am using slog3 at the base ISO of 3200 and have also tested slog2. I never go beyond 3200 for the slogs and I overexpose frequently by 1 stop to reduce noise. However, it is still very visible. I agree it is fine noise, but you would expect clean images when they are exposed correctly at the base ISO of the camera and even more if you consciously overexpose. This just doesn't happen to me in shadows and midtones with the FS5. With the FS7 it is a whole different story! That is why it is difficult to intercut between them.

From what I have seen, the FS5 at the base ISO of 3200 is like the FS7 at ISO 3200-4000 in custom mode. But the huge difference is that with the FS7 you would be going beyond its base ISO, so you would just have to go back to 2000 to get clean footage (in my case, I will always use Cine EI and stick with 2000 anyway); but with the FS5, you just can't lower the base ISO of 3200. The cinegammas in the FS5, in the other hand, will deliver very clean footage at their base ISO - which is 640, 800 or 1000, depending on the one you use. And even if you put some gain in them, they will still be cleaner than the slogs.

What this tells me is that the base ISO of 3200 for the slogs is just too high. If a future firmware lets you go down to ISO 2000, I bet the camera will deliver much cleaner and nicer images. Some decisions Sony made with the FS5 are simply baffling, like the way to adjust white balance with the sgamuts and especially the base ISO of 3200 for the slogs, that basically condemns the camera to always produce somewhat noisy footage.
 
I've got a similar thread going, so I thought I might chime in. Have any of you found using non log cine-gamma profiles significantly improves low-light noise performance?
 
Nearly any ISO number that is displayed on a Sony camcorder is going to be higher than what the sensitivity really is. All you have to do is rate the camera yourself to see this is true. As I point out in my FS5 training video, S-LOG is really around ISO 2500 if you expose whites (as Sony recommends) around 60%. I prefer to expose my S-LOG whites around 75% and so that makes the sensitivity of my FS5 closer to 1000 ISO.
 
Doug, thanks a lot for your answer. Very happy to see you here helping around. I rented your master classes for both the FS7 and the FS5. They were all very helpful!

I absolutely agree with what you said here and in your master class about exposing slog. Even in the FS7 I tend to overexpose to get cleaner images and that works great (I like Cine EI with the camera rated at ISO 1000). The problem I am seeing with the FS5 is that the base ISO of 3200 introduces too much noise to begin with. So even while overexposing, noise in mild shadows will never go away. Here is an example of what I am thinking: lets say I use slog3 with an ISO of 8000 on the FS7 and then overexpose a shot by 2 stops. In theory, I still rated the camera at ISO 2000, its base ISO, only loosing 2 stops of dynamic range in the highlights. However, since my starting point was such a high ISO, even with the overexposure compensation the shot will be noisier than if I would have actually used the base ISO and exposed correctly. Or am I wrong? If I am, please feel free to point it out, I will appreciate it.

So what I feel is that with the FS5, even when I overexpose, noise is still visible because the base ISO for slog is already too high as a starting point to create clean images. If they rated the camera at ISO 2000 it would be a lot easier to get clean images - and I would still overexpose to get even cleaner images, following your suggestions for slog. If I am indeed wrong about what I am thinking and saying, then the problem might simply be that the FS5 just produces too much noise with slog. And I miss not using slog3 with the lut I made as a starting point, which has the colors right for my taste and type of work.

And Sean: yes, my experience with the cinegammas has been much better regarding noise levels. Using them at their base ISO or even with a little gain produces much cleaner images that slog. So in lowlight situations they worked nicer for me. But more experienced people like Doug might have a better opinion about this.
 
There are numerous annoyances about the FS5 and the slight noise in Slog is one of them.

There is new firmware coming out soon so i hope they address this.

One thing I have been doing to reduce pushing the footage so much is by using a different matrix like Pro or Cinema rather than S.Gamut in Slog2. (I also add about +2 Saturation) By doing this i can custom any white balance I want and colours don't need to be pushed so severely in post. All it needs is a contrast adjustment and I don't need any LUT to shift colours back into the REC709 space. By doing this the image is not manipulated as much and possibly could help you with noise. But having said that I always use very slight Noise Reduction to taste.
 
RASL said:
But more experienced people like Doug might have a better opinion about this.
Click to expand...

Here's my opinion: I don't use S-LOG with the FS5. Why? Because I only shoot 4K and 4K on the FS5 is only 8-bit. There is no way I'm going to shoot 8-bit S-LOG and expect that to be gradable in post. 10-bit is required. So for me, the FS5 is only to be used for a WYSIWYG look using one of the Cinegammas if you want 4K. If the combination of 4K and S-LOG is important to someone (as it is to me) then I would highly recommend getting an FS7 instead.
 
I totally agree with Doug (even if my experience with the FS7 is still very limited, and with FS5 - none). But I know how difficult (should I say impossible) is any serious picture levels manipulation in 8 bit, and I already have been quite successful in very serious tweaks to my FS7 10 bit picture! This is why - even just for a serious hobby use - I broke my bank and went with the FS7... Don't regret it the slightest (apart from sometimes regretting spending quite a money on the kit 28-135 lens which is not wide enough, especially now that the much cheaper 18-105 got the fw upgrade eliminating what was the reason I had dismissed it for my FS7 - the unpredictable focus operation). So, if somebody as experienced and knowledgeable as Doug told me "man, you do have a good lens for the money; the 18-105 still is not comparable even after the sw update", I'd become even happier with my purchase... :) Oh, and Doug - I realize there are much better lenses out there, but they are far beyond my reach :(
 
As to overexposing 1-2 stops by using EI (reducing MLUT exposure with gain switch, and then compensating by opening aperture accordingly) - also Alister Chapman recommends this method as an effective and consistent way of reducing noise in post (in his tutorial No. 7 Cine EI and Exposure Index...)
 
Speaking of Alister recommendations, in his tutorial No. 6 he recommends using S-log3 with S-Gamut3.cine (as opposed to S-Gamut) as "easier to grade" color space. I don't have enough experience with both to actually tell whether this is true - but one thing I noticed: when using Sony's Catalyst Browse, I'm only able to apply a 709 LUT on S-Gamut recorded picture; when I record using S-Gamut3.cine colorspace, the "source" is locked as sRGB and even applying the 709 LUT doesn't work (of course it does in NLE). What's the reason for this Catalyst limitation?
 
Thanks to everyone that has replied. I agree with what you all said.

I do own an FS7 along with the FS5. I purchased the FS5 as a B camera due to its size and weight. But despite being a $5,600 camera, I find its quality very lackluster. From what I have been able to test, a $1,000 camera like the a6300 produces cleaner images with the slogs, despite being 8bits also in HD. Why? Maybe because its base ISO is much lower - 800, if I do not remember wrongly.

Doug, you have a lot of knowledge and experience in the industry and you have worked with Sony in the past. Do you have any contacts you could address this problem to? I understand perfectly that you would not need this, since you always use cinegammas with the FS5. But it would be very helpful if you did it for others. I really believe that if they lowered the base ISO for slog, the FS5 would be an entirely different camera. Or see better what they can due to fix the noise issue, which I heard got a lot worse after FW 2.
 
I was working with Sony all this week at NAB and I did have a chance to lobby the Japanese engineers for some improvements to existing products and essential features that I think need to be added to cameras that aren't even released yet. All I can say is that they were very receptive and eager to hear the views of anyone who stopped by the booth and had suggestions or complaints -- much more so this year than any year in the past. So maybe there is hope you'll get what you are asking for . . . and more. But often the changes we'd like in a product that has already been released can't be done due to hardware limitations.
 
Great news, Doug! Glad to know you were able to speak with them and that NAB was a good opportunity for other customers to also address problems to Sony. Thanks again for all your time and answers.
 
Doug Jensen said:
I was working with Sony all this week at NAB and I did have a chance to lobby the Japanese engineers for some improvements to existing products and essential features that I think need to be added to cameras that aren't even released yet. All I can say is that they were very receptive and eager to hear the views of anyone who stopped by the booth and had suggestions or complaints -- much more so this year than any year in the past. So maybe there is hope you'll get what you are asking for . . . and more. But often the changes we'd like in a product that has already been released can't be done due to hardware limitations.
Click to expand...

I pray for some features:
- be to have Variable ND filter enabled but being able to dial to Zero.
- lower ISO in SLOG
- Battery display in minutes
- noise reduction at users setting
- HD 100Mbps
:thumbup:
 
Doug Jensen said:
I was working with Sony all this week at NAB and I did have a chance to lobby the Japanese engineers for some improvements to existing products and essential features that I think need to be added to cameras that aren't even released yet. All I can say is that they were very receptive and eager to hear the views of anyone who stopped by the booth and had suggestions or complaints -- much more so this year than any year in the past. So maybe there is hope you'll get what you are asking for . . . and more. But often the changes we'd like in a product that has already been released can't be done due to hardware limitations.
Click to expand...

Wish I could have been there to lobby about the inferior mic preamps on the FS7 (compared to the pmw line). Also 2k recording mode.
 
XSVpro, thanks for linking your video! I downloaded it from Vimeo in its original uploaded quality. Although it must already be compressed, it can be seen clearly that at ISO 800 the image was a lot cleaner. At ISO 1600 there is still quite a bit of noise, but less than ISO 3200.

I totally agree with the features Beehop mentioned. All are very useful and I think my first priority is still a lower base ISO for slog. The ND would be nice; also if you could start with only one stop of ND and not 2 stops, but I think this is not possible. And I would really like to have DCI 4k and 2K resolutions in the FS5, and 2K in the FS7 (like Basspig). I know the difference between UHD/HD and 4K/2K is very small and almost useless if you want to recompose; I wish that because the small difference gives a nicer aspect ratio, in my opinion.

By the way, have any of you noticed any strange color shifts in the FS5 while using S-Gamut3.Cine/S-Log3 at a WB of 3200K? I have not done tests with other picture profiles. But with S-Gamut3.Cine/S-Log3 at 3200K, I see yellows a bit over saturated and shifting towards a greenish hue. Most of the time it is not something difficult to correct in Resolve, but other times it has given me headaches. While S-Gamut3.Cine/S-Log3 at other temperatures is very similar between the FS7 and the FS5, at 3200K it is not, at least from what I have shot. Anyone has seen this? Doug?
 
Hi guys. So I'm currently grading very noisy footage form my FS5 (again) and so frustratingly I found my way to this thread. I really need to learn this properly. I'm now aware of the 2000 iso option and thought it would be good to re-kindle this thread to bring the discussion up to date as I've only just discovered this was a thing. How are people shooting with S-Log now? In my tests this morning it certainly seems to help reduce the noise in the shadows so I'd like to start using it. Typically I try to expose for s-log on my FS5 using reflected whites at 75% as reccomended by Doug. Its a bit hit and miss as mostly I do run and gun type work so can't always expose as properly as I'd like.

I have a few related questions that I'm scratching my head over.

(1) When i import clipped footage into FCPX the scopes are telling me that both Slog 2 and Slog 3 clip at 109 IRE. I though Slog 3 clipped around 93/4? Why does it show in my scopes up to 109?

(2) When I set up my zebra 2 in the FS5 it stops showing Zebras on clipped areas at 107 IRE when using S-Log 2. So no zebras appear at all if set to 106, it needs to be on 105. So put another way I used to think my zebra 2 was'nt working properly as I had it set to 109 to show clipped areas but I have to set it at 105 to use Zebra 2 as an over exposure tool.

(3) I understand that exposing white in S-Log at 75% essentially over exposes (compared to Sony's recommendation) the image and one needs to bring down the levels in post before applying a conventional S-Log LUT to get in a good ballpark to start grading. Is this still the case when shooting at (the previosluly impossible) 2000 iso in S-Log. If someone could explain it in children's language that would be most helpful :-)

(4) to follow on, If I want to start shooting S-Log 2 at 2000 ISO (because I've deemed it to look the nicest on this camera) and still correctly (over) expose the image what should bright white be (still 75%)?

many thanks

Before anyone suggest I buy a monitor, I can't afford it so need to use the limited exposure tools in the FS5 to expose properly. Well actually I do own a gratical eye and I turn on the included in-monitor Slog LUT that Zacuto supplies and then I usually eyeball it with 70% zebras set to get a measure of the scene old skooll style. I appreciate this method will not be over exposing in the same way as using reflected white at 75% will do but it's what makes it look right to my eye so I go with that.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top