Sony announces fix for zoom lens distortion

J

Jim Ritscher

Well-known member
At NAB Juan Martinez announced there will be a free user-conducted software upgrade for the FS700 and FS100 to correct distortion in certain lenses. He didn't mention it, but I imagine it covers the pincushion distortion on the Sony 18-105 servo zoom lens. Sometime in the fall, or so. Other new lenses coming too.
 
Saw that! Encouraging. Now that the 28-135 is coming out the 18-105 look much less attractive to me though. But nice to see that Sony keep updating the camera. Hope they sneak in some other improvements as well while they're at it.
 
Great news for the 18-105! While they're creating new firmware and all, I hope that they consider implementing XAVC-S as an alternative onboard codec and look into finally fixing the fugly highlight aliasing.
 
The fix for zoom lens distortion is buying a decent zoom.

Correctly warping distortion in a 4K or lower image really isn't ideal. Depending on the level and type of distortion it may also involve cropping and scaling the image to fit the frame after correction.

There's an abundance of decent manual zooms over the past few decades and maybe some decent modern electronic zooms coming up.

Protest against this idea of software fixes for lenses by not buying them... it's poor cheap optical design but still charging a lot for it.

(rant over)
Paul
 
Well, there are really no alternative power zoom lenses unless you want to spend $10.000 or more.
Looks like the 28-135 will be a serious effort to make (what I assume will be) an affordable quality power zoom. If the price of that is that it has to use some amount of software correction I think it's well worth it.
I find power zooms invaluable when shooting live events with a limited amounts of cameras.
On the FS700 that allows me to zoom with the zoom rocker and control focus with my left hand. Not sure how I would do that at the same time with a manual lens.
Also I find the face detection fuction very useful in these circumstances.

And if there's ever a FS700 successor with a similar full frame sensor as in the A7s, these f​4 lenses will be very useful indeed.
 
paulcurtis said:
The fix for zoom lens distortion is buying a decent zoom.

Correctly warping distortion in a 4K or lower image really isn't ideal. Depending on the level and type of distortion it may also involve cropping and scaling the image to fit the frame after correction.

There's an abundance of decent manual zooms over the past few decades and maybe some decent modern electronic zooms coming up.

Protest against this idea of software fixes for lenses by not buying them... it's poor cheap optical design but still charging a lot for it.

(rant over)
Paul
Click to expand...

{rant at your rant} :)

Digital imaging is getting 0 and 1s into the computer. Who cares how it is done. Hasselblad invented this technology and it is excellent. Lenses like the 645 covering hassy 28 are done like this. And having owned the Hassy 35mm (£2.5g) id much prefer the wider 28 at £1.8g

Nothing offers this (super useful) range/price point/mass of the 18-105

Would I prefer proper manual glass - of course - but not at £30g and 6kg

Trouble with this lens if the other (18-250sony is anything to go by) is the MF is so unresponive as to make it unusable - an entirely different argument.

S
 
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paulcurtis said:
The fix for zoom lens distortion is buying a decent zoom.

Correctly warping distortion in a 4K or lower image really isn't ideal. Depending on the level and type of distortion it may also involve cropping and scaling the image to fit the frame after correction.

There's an abundance of decent manual zooms over the past few decades and maybe some decent modern electronic zooms coming up.

Protest against this idea of software fixes for lenses by not buying them... it's poor cheap optical design but still charging a lot for it.

(rant over)
Paul
Click to expand...

I have to say, I for one, disagree. I care if it looks good, not how they do it.
If they are able to use software fixes and make it look as good as it did on my VG20,
then I'm buying one for my FS700. There is what, the Cabrio 19-90 at $35,000 or
the new Canon lens at $31,000? It's not like there are options in the low budget arena
right now. The 18-105 looked just great on my VG20 and if they are able to squeeze that level
of performance out of it for $598, I think it would be a pretty good deal. Sure I'd prefer a nicer
lens, but our options now are spend upwards of a new car, or go this direction. Absent a bunch
of new clients that REALLY like my stuff, that's not going to happen.
 
Seems there is a double standard, here. When this lens first came out, I suggested that it could be fixed in post. What followed was a diatribe about how horrible these software fixes are. Now that the almighty Sony is wanting to sell a rather horrible lens design by offering in camera software correction, everyone is jumping on the bandwagon in extolling the wonders of this lens.

Seriously folks, if you're a R&G shooter, I can see why you'd want this lens to work, regardless of the image quality. With 4k recording, this kind of correction won't look that great. But then, R&G shooters prolly won't be shooting 4K.

Regardless, I wouldn't touch a lens that uses software correction.:banned:
 
Some may have went on a 'diatribe' about how horrible software fixes were, but not me. I tried the lens on my FS700 and my VG20 and
almost kept it due to how good it looked on my VG20. Obviously a software fix, but really....I don't care as long as it looks good, and
in 1080 (which is what I shoot) it looked very good. But on the FS700 it looked horrible, and I want a lens that can work on both my cameras,
so I sent it back. I had heard rumors that Sony may fix it for FS700, but when I called their pro division, they told me, that no, there was no
plan to have the lens working on the FS700. Obviously that changed. I will reserve judgement for now, as I do not know how it will look on
the FS700, but if it looks as good as it did on the VG20, it would be totally worth the small cost of the lens.
 
I spend quite a bit of time working with lens distortion in vfx, i know how normal lenses distort (some shockingly so) and how we need to distort other elements to work with them. I just have an issue with the degree of fixing these lenses require and the sort of effect that has on the image - perhaps i'm more sensitive to it.

There are some lovely old photo stills lenses with good ranges and really good quality. If these examples could be designed (by hand) many years ago then what's the excuse of poor design now? Especially when you have lens manufacturers like Sigma doing a great job with modern tools.

Yes there's a trade off between speed, range and size but an f4 lens distorting this much - to the point where people think they're faulty?

The power zoom better be good, but it's a full frame lens! Why? When there are so few full frame cameras to put it on (so i guess the A7s is a forerunning of a prosumer version otherwise why develop this lens?)

cheers
Paul
 
While I think image/glass correction is great in theory I would alert on major caveat.

I would be most surprised if this lens works with the 07q which I guess gets the image data at a point in the chain where such corrections would occur.

It would seem that the O7q would need to get the needed metadata from the lens and have the needed tracking info to twist the image.

S
 
morgan_moore said:
While I think image/glass correction is great in theory I would alert on major caveat.

I would be most surprised if this lens works with the 07q which I guess gets the image data at a point in the chain where such corrections would occur.

It would seem that the O7q would need to get the needed metadata from the lens and have the needed tracking info to twist the image.

S
Click to expand...

+1 That's a very good point, the RAW data certainly wouldn't be undistorted as it cannot be, and whilst DNG does allow for lens distortion metadata, i can't say i've seen it used that much and everyone would have to agree on the amount and type of distortion - usually it's dependent on focal length and therefore that metadata would have to be recorded too.

Nah, that would be a nightmare for everyone down that path....

cheers
Paul
 
To the OP...where does Juan Martinez say this? Is there video? I saw a video of Juan saying that the 700 will get the update. Thanks!

 
I'd been tossing up this lens or the 24-105 on speedbooster. It would be really nice to retain power zoom and autofocus, and for some jobs that may even rule the 24-105 out.

now that I'm shooting more with the 7q it's going to be a real pain if sony in camera fix the lens for fs700, yet I can only use it with hd not the lovely 4k2hd, or 2k/4k raw.

I cant any imagine convergent design cooking up some special sauce way to do this in conjunction with Sony, but who knows.

Mitch, can you confirm that if sony fix the distortion in camera, which modes that will work on in the 7q?

probably change the lens I buy...
 
imaj said:
To the OP...where does Juan Martinez say this? Is there video? I saw a video of Juan saying that the 700 will get the update. Thanks!
Click to expand...

Yes, I think I saw the same video. It was at the backend of a video on changing the F5 to F55. I assumed that the update also will apply to the FS100, but I'm not sure.
 
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