Revenge of the Great Camera Shootout Pt2 - Beyond the Alphabet

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Very interesting results, I'd picked C, E and F (in no particular order) as my favourites.

Seeing the footage again (with the cameras labelled this time) I think I was able to pinpoint what made those three cameras (Alexa, Epic, C300) stand out for me - Colour.

They had the most natural looking colours, and that's what made the difference to my eyes. I thought I'd pay more attention to things like highlight rolloff and tonality (I'm not all that fussed about resolution), but it was really just the colours that drew my eye in the end.

I think that's why the Sonys (F3, F65) didn't work for me, they had that glaring contrast between the blue daylight tones and the warmer 'interior' tones, which I didn't like at all.
 
Grug said:
Very interesting results, I'd picked C, E and F (in no particular order) as my favourites.

Seeing the footage again (with the cameras labelled this time) I think I was able to pinpoint what made those three cameras (Alexa, Epic, C300) stand out for me - Colour.

They had the most natural looking colours, and that's what made the difference to my eyes. I thought I'd pay more attention to things like highlight rolloff and tonality (I'm not all that fussed about resolution), but it was really just the colours that drew my eye in the end.

I think that's why the Sonys (F3, F65) didn't work for me, they had that glaring contrast between the blue daylight tones and the warmer 'interior' tones, which I didn't like at all.
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I'm there with you. Not because A, H, I were so bad, but of course only a fool would pick the first choice in a blind test. And by H and I , I had over analyzed, but still found them very agreeable. Of course G was Canon dslr, which for the web is more than fine.


The thing for me was that i shoot with natural uncontrolled light, and that is where the quality of highlight rendering and color accuracy comes into play.
 
Postmaster said:
Funny how different the perception among DPs is. A was my favorite and I disliked B and the iPhone the most.
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I almost didn't have least favorites. being that in controlled light situations, even the playing field. But I disliked the motion of these two. more so the iPhone. I had read that B was the GH2, so I may have been bias.
 
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Now that we know which is which, substitute letters by names, and my call was... http://www.dvxuser.com/V6/showthread.php?284906-Revenge-of-the-Great-Camera-Shootout-blind-test
First a tie between F3 and Alexa (they both look great). Then another 3 tied: Epic (which looks great except for the blown-out highlights), C300 (which has very slight aliasing) and F65 (which looked slightly too digital at times). After that would come the 7D (somewhat soft, maybe less DR than others, some issues in the highlights). Then a tie between FS100 (somewhat soft, less DR than others, lots of aliasing, some noise) and GH2 (impressively clean -except for some slight aliasing-, but looking very digital). And finally iphone (horrible).
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Ranking the 7D just behind the big boys makes me feel very nice about my current camera: after a couple of years with a Canon APS-C, I've switched over to a NEX-5N, and I'm finding it a very nice improvement (a lot sharper, a lot less aliasing/moire issues, and still very nice colors and an image that doesn't look too digital, it has just the right balance of softness and detail) (later this week I'll be uploading a shootout with the 550D/T2i, 5N, GH2, D800).
 
The F65 looked the best to me. Most natural lighting out of all of them. Probably because they didn't adjust anything. Every other one looked lit. In a bad, tv-soap kinda way.
 
I was a little disappointed since I saw episode one about the gh2 B (From what people said and the crew description I was sure it was it), because of the over-lit soap-opera, over sharpen digital look. I think that it was the crew that tried perhaps a bit too much to compensate the perception that this camera would has less DR and sharpness than the other pro camera. I am sure they did not see the other ones work and perception went a bit overboard.

From what I have seen and done the gh2 is capable of much more natural organic look than that. Just saw this
done on the gh2. A bit sharp and gritty, but still very organic. The lens seems to be a very important factor for the gh2. The super sharp modern lens also tend to give this over-sharpen digital look to the gh2. But in the end what this test does is put ART, craftsmanship at the heart of cinematography. Those last years, it is all been "my camera is better or bigger than yours". Now what this shows is that appart from two cameras Iphone and 7D (This is my personal observation and others can disagree) everyone can do very very nice images that can be very close to each other that even putting them side by side, it would be difficult to choose which is which.

The last episode will surely show where are the difference and nowadays I would say it is DR. The pixel peepers will rejoice because they will have material to dismiss and degrade. As many said, the DR makes a very big difference in cost as would need light/generator etc and I agree 200% because I have been claiming it all along that we are already there in term of sharpness and low light with the cheaper cameras. But if you are an indie you have one very important thing that a Hollywood crew does not and it is time. You don't have a multi million dollar cast, costing ten of thousand of dollar per hour to film. So you can choose another time where the light is less harsh. Have time to gel the windows etc. This is a very demanding scene that they have done to stress the camera and you don't have to shoot like that every-time.
 
I was a little disappointed since I saw episode one about the gh2 B (From what people said and the crew description I was sure it was it), because of the over-lit soap-opera, over sharpen digital look. I think that it was the crew that tried perhaps a bit too much to compensate the perception that this camera would has less DR and sharpness than the other pro camera. I am sure they did not see the other ones work and perception went a bit overboard.

From what I have seen and done the gh2 is capable of much more natural organic look than that. Just saw the film bellow done on the gh2. A bit sharp and gritty, but still very organic. The lens seems to be a very important factor for the gh2. The super sharp modern lens also tend to give this over-sharpen digital look to the gh2. But in the end what this test does is put ART, craftsmanship at the heart of cinematography. Those last years, it is all been "my camera is better or bigger than yours". Now what this shows is that appart from two cameras Iphone and 7D (This is my personal observation and others can disagree) everyone can do very very nice images that can be very close to each other that even putting them side by side, it would be difficult to choose which is which.

The last episode will surely show where are the difference and nowadays I would say it is DR. The pixel peepers will rejoice because they will have material to dismiss and degrade. As many said, the DR makes a very big difference in cost as would need light/generator etc and I agree 200% because I have been claiming it all along that we are already there in term of sharpness and low light with the cheaper cameras. But if you are an indie you have one very important thing that a Hollywood crew does not and it is time. You don't have a multi million dollar cast, costing ten of thousand of dollar per hour to film. So you can choose another time where the light is less harsh. Have time to gel the windows etc. This is a very demanding scene that they have done to stress the camera and you don't have to shoot like that every-time.

 
+1, Daniel. All cameras are quite capable. I'm a proud owner of a GH2. At the first look I picked B because it really stood out. You could see the actors faces, for example. Second viewing... not so much. Third time... Yeah. But I know my camera, I know my skills (which I try to push a little more everyday). With those two combined I can get the look I want. Sometimes the limitations are frustrating, but it's also what makes me my most creative. Would I use another camera if I needed it and the budget allowed it? Yes. But I would probably get more lights and lighting accesories before that. And after lighting I would pick lenses before the camera.

People really need to put it on them selves and not the gear. I still can't believe that some people refer to this as a test to pronounce a winner... This image pretty much sums up my thoughts when it comes to some people. But it applies to all sorts fanboys, trolls and haters.

alwin_toffler.jpg
 
My favorite was the Alexa, which was also the only one I was able to spot. I had also liked C & E.
 
@hempo22 Part of creativity is to work around your gear limitation and it has been since the start of cinematography. Many don't have the basic knowledge about light, so they want the camera to do it all. It is like the, "push a button generation" we live now. If it does not work so it is the camera fault and not the operator fault, because the ego is so high. I saw some people on nofilmschool saying how they have have lost all respect for people that voted b the best. So he was referring to Coppola, loosing respect to someone like that because of a camera shootout. Damn it not a film, it is just a camera shoot-out. This shows you the ego of people with no known work behind a keyboard that we see every-time. Now this is by no mean to bash nofilmschool, which is one of the most balance art/gear site I can see on the net.
 
F65 was my favorite. Alexa was a close tie, actually it was a toss up between those two. They looked the most natural as far as color space and both had great DR. These two looked the most like a movie to me.

The Gh2 was one of my least favorite because it was over saturated which made it look more like a youtube video than a movie, IMO. I know that is very subjective. Perhaps a different color grading could have made it look better. Other than the over saturation, it looked pretty good.

the rest looked average to me, the 7d and Fs100 about the same, nad of course the Iphone looked like crap, but it is a phone after all.

I have seen a LOT of Red Epic footage that looks fantastic, but it didnt' really stand out here. I think the lighting just didn't take advantage of the qualities of the Epic camera. It looked good, just not as good as the F65 and Alexa.

I'd be happy to shoot with a 7d, Gh2 or FS100. I'd take the Arri or F65 if I had the budget for it, and after those two the Red Epic because despite this test I know how pretty Epic footage can look.
 
Here was my response , I personally like "A" the best which was the Sony F3 & a tie for second was the C-300 and Arri.. Looking at the shootout again though I must say the the Canon 7d looked horrible. I shoot on Canon's and damn I can't believe it looks that bad compared to the others.
vision_filmz said:
Personally I hated the way "B" looked, it looks to much like video. Real sharp and everything fake, film in my opinion looks more organic/natural which is why I like the the other scenes better. Personally I like A the most with E and F coming in and a tie for second. B by far looks clean and razor sharp but I truly do not like that image at all, truly hate it.
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When I downloaded the source 1080p video and watched it, I realized I disliked the 7D even more than the iphone. I really cannot get beyond the softness.
 
DBP said:
When I downloaded the source 1080p video and watched it, I realized I disliked the 7D even more than the iphone. I really cannot get beyond the softness.
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The 7d in these tests looks worst than the iphone, but I am also 1000% positive that from beginning to end they seriously messed up the work flow. There are hundreds of thousands of videos online to prove it. Also it's not about the softness they just did not use the camera properly.
 
Hm... this is interesting to me, because I'm surprised that the Epic wasn't my third choice, E.

F, H, E and C was fourth for me, so that's odd. I've never been a major fan of the C300 but here it looked pretty on par with the other cameras. I knew B was GH2 at first glance, and found it pretty distasteful, just didn't like the light at all...

What is not a surprise, though, is that a single glance of both Sony cameras and I knew which ones they were. It's been a curious thing for me, how people can't see the motion in Sony cameras being completely different from the other cameras. Stacked against the Alexa, F65,and Epic the motion of the F3 and FS100 sticks out in a major way. It screams "cheap".

All that said... it's clear that everyone has something that's important for them when choosing a tool. I'm probably gonna take another look at the C300 soon, and definitely can't wait until my Magic Cam ships to have the DR and tonal range of Alexa footage (yet a smaller sensor).

DBP said:
When I downloaded the source 1080p video and watched it, I realized I disliked the 7D even more than the iphone. I really cannot get beyond the softness.
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It's amazing what lining images up in a row and then comparing does to perception. Alone, the 7D image looks "plenty resolute", but clearly it's nowhere near so as the other cameras in the line up.

But some people like the softness though.
 
The C300 and fs100 surprised me the most. The fs100 stood out as being good bang for buck. Whereas the c300 stood out as keeping up with the big guns. If it were 2k 200mbs, there would be few or no issues.

Where the C300 is not like, say the alexa, is when it is directly compared. There was a side by side, a while back, where the scene was lit for the Alexa, and the C300 did not handle the scene with the same grace.
 
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Kholi said:
But some people like the softness though.
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I think it's because so much of the movie watching experience for a lot of us in my generation and up was through analog cable and VHS throughout the 80s (and then poorly maintained projector optics at the local cineplexes) that the erroneous assumption is made that "film" is not high resolution or possesses a detailed image.
 
The fact that the GH2 was picked out even in the big screening, is telling. I think the iPhone and 7D would stick out with their artifacts, but the GH2 slipped under the radar.

Coppola choosing the GH2 does not mean as much as Willis choosing the GH2, imho.


If one can ignore the artifacts and low resolution on the 7D, it actually had good mojo.
 
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