Test-Video AG-AF 101 / Hamburg
- Thread starter Rolf Silber
- Start date
Shooter
Veteran
Zak Forsman
Major Contributor
Downloaded the source file from vimeo, converted to Pro Res, opened in Apple Color, eyeballed it to note that no shift had occurred form the original, blacks were hovering around 10 IRE. Even the "black" at the beginning of the video is gray, before any video from the AF100 starts.
Zak Forsman
Major Contributor
no. it's an mp4.
and listen, I'm making absolutely no judgment or criticism toward the footage, filmmakers, af100 or anything else. someone mentioned it looked washed out and I looked into it. i don't have a dog in this race and i don't have any points to make.
and listen, I'm making absolutely no judgment or criticism toward the footage, filmmakers, af100 or anything else. someone mentioned it looked washed out and I looked into it. i don't have a dog in this race and i don't have any points to make.
Vimeo does not alter the look of the video when you upload it. Everyone always thinks that by uploading to Vimeo the picture is going to go through some magical alteration that changes gamma and adds noise. It doesn't work that way. They even keep the original file that was uploaded so you can compare the web stream to the original mp4 (or whatever file format was uploaded) and see there's no difference other than compression. Compression doesn't change color or gamma. It just changes the resolution, sharpness, quality, etc.
So, it doesn't matter if it's the mp4 that was uploaded to Vimeo or if it was shot that way. Either way the shadows are washed out and it needs to be color corrected properly because it doesn't look good. Shadows and blacks shouldn't be 10 IRE. It's not a camera issue and it's nothing against the way it was shot. It likely wasn't color corrected properly or improper gamma settings were used when it was output to the version that was uploaded to Vimeo.
I stand by my statement that I don't see how anyone could say it looks good with shadows washed out and blacks at 10 IRE.
mkfotos.com
Well-known member
I blew up the image: http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=ronford+baker+atlas+7
That thing looks nice :-O
Shooter
Veteran
"Compression doesn't change color or gamma. It just changes the resolution, sharpness, quality, etc."
Compression throws away "quality" information. That is how it makes a large file ...a small file. The most information in an image file is "color" & "luminance" etc
Sharpness and resolution is not data per se. eg adding a sharpening or a blur filter does not add data.
Color - 4;4:4 has more data than say 4:2;0 or 4:2:1
Compression to QT has what they call the "gamma bug". a quality "glitch" although its likely it doesnt change file size in doing so.
In the case of the sample CAMERA test in this post I looked for a specific thing regarding CAMERA performance ( motion artifacting in dynamic camera movement). I was well satisfied by what I saw.
If the post was called " A color grading and CC test" I might have opined differently about it. I am a fan for "crushing blacks and saturation also - where applicable)
I kind of enjoyed seeing the detail in the shadows. I was looking for the oft mentioned "noise" (I also saw BLACK in the window frames and other places.)
To me .. this was a great "real world" camera test and one I wnated to see.
Loved Zacs comment BTW.
Compression throws away "quality" information. That is how it makes a large file ...a small file. The most information in an image file is "color" & "luminance" etc
Sharpness and resolution is not data per se. eg adding a sharpening or a blur filter does not add data.
Color - 4;4:4 has more data than say 4:2;0 or 4:2:1
Compression to QT has what they call the "gamma bug". a quality "glitch" although its likely it doesnt change file size in doing so.
In the case of the sample CAMERA test in this post I looked for a specific thing regarding CAMERA performance ( motion artifacting in dynamic camera movement). I was well satisfied by what I saw.
If the post was called " A color grading and CC test" I might have opined differently about it. I am a fan for "crushing blacks and saturation also - where applicable)
I kind of enjoyed seeing the detail in the shadows. I was looking for the oft mentioned "noise" (I also saw BLACK in the window frames and other places.)
To me .. this was a great "real world" camera test and one I wnated to see.
Loved Zacs comment BTW.
Not counting the Quicktime gamma bug which you have to compensate for or fix, I've never compressed a video to another format and had the new video file have different color than the original, especially gamma or washed out shadows and blacks. If you have, then you're doing something wrong. The gamma bug doesn't affect the video that much.
Detail is. And detail is part of sharpness and sharpness is part of detail. The more detail an image has the more data is there. When you compress something it will lose detail and it will lose sharpness. And yes, resolution is data. This higher the resolution the more data. Lower resolution, less data. That is why if you take a 1080p video and transcode it to 720p using the same codec, the 720p version will be smaller in data size than the 1080p version.
If in compression for viewing you go from 4:4:4 to 4:2:0 you won't wash out your shadows and raise your blacks to 10 IRE unless you do it on purpose by altering the gamma.
Yes, but the gamma bug won't raise blacks to 10 IRE.
I agree that the lack of motion artifacting is good, as is the lack of noise. That doesn't change my statement or what the observation I made was. Everyone is saying this video looks great and beautiful. I disagree. Washed out shadows and blacks at 10 IRE does not look good.
The post wasn't called "motion artifacting in dynamic camera movement" either. It was called "Test-Video AG-AF101", so every part of the video will be under scrutiny at that point, thus bringing up the issue about the shadows and blacks being washed out.
No argument about the lack of noise. However, washing out the shadows and blacks doesn't add detail and can actually remove detail. More detail could probably be resolved with proper color correction and getting the shadows and blacks to where they should be.
How often to do you see professional quality videos with washed out shadows and blacks at 10 IRE? They don't do it because you shouldn't do that because it doesn't look good. So to me, that is not "real world". Maybe the shoot was "real world", but the color correction is far from it.
Mike&AF - I see your point and it makes sense. And if this video footage is color corrected properly, then this footage will look EVEN greater and more beautiful. For now, I like many others here think it DOES look great and beautiful. It is not a fact just an opinion.
Is it January yet? I can't wait to get one!
Simon
Is it January yet? I can't wait to get one!
Simon
dregenthal
Veteran
Thanks for sharing your video (from a sub-$5000 camera), don't have any technical comment . . . nice work, looks %*!>#! GREAT!
heavyG
Underwater Giraffe Member
It's a Ronford Baker ( http://www.ronfordbaker.co.uk ) head, might be the Atlas 7 (?)
If you want a slider forget about the ZaZa or Kessler or Cinevate - Get a Ronford Baker Slider. Or you could buy one of those other sliders AND a house… They make some really nice stuff.