Uncompressed for less - Reel-Stream discount for DVXUser members

P

pertierr

Well-known member
Hello DVXUsers,

Reel-Stream is pleased to announce a special discount for dvxuser.com members. For a limited time you can receive a $200 discount on the Andromeda system by entering the following coupon code when placing your online order at www.reel-stream.com: f35v6x

Unleash the imaging capabilities of the camera you already love to use. The Andromeda system taps into the pure uncompressed RGB 12-bit digital video data available directly from the imaging block of the DVX100/A/B, yielding:

- Increased resolution, user selectable SD and HD output up to 1540x984
- Increased latitude/dynamic range, 2+ stops over standard DV output
- Uncompressed raw RGB (4:4:4) digital video recording, free of compression artifacts
- Realtime user-defined 12bit->10bit or 12bit->8bit color curves (LUTs)
- Monitoring tools such as histograms, X/Y flip for 35mm adapters, reticules and more
- User-defined Monitor and Render LUTs
- Process raw data into movie clips or image sequences in numerous formats, compressed or uncompressed, SD or HD, you choose.

For more information please visit www.reel-stream.com or email Juan@reel-stream.com

Cheers,
Juan
 
That's very cool. I might consider it if I wasn't still paying off my DVX. You know what would make Andromeda even more enticing? Well audio for one, but beyond that, a port of sculpture HD for the ipod. The screen might be small, but that would be so sweet for run and gunners. I wonder how much raw HD video you could fit on an 80 gig pod.
 
The problem with recording directly to something like an iPod is bandwidth(data write speed), not storage space. Andromeda needs a drive that can at least record 28MBytes/sec. The system works completely uncompressed, so there is inevitably a large bandwidth to be handled. There are now small bus-powered drives such as the 2.5" 7200RPM Hitachi and Seagate hard disks which can handle this, however iPods are much slower.

Cheers,
Juan@reel-stream.com
 
pertierr said:
The problem with recording directly to something like an iPod is bandwidth(data write speed), not storage space. Andromeda needs a drive that can at least record 28MBytes/sec. The system works completely uncompressed, so there is inevitably a large bandwidth to be handled. There are now small bus-powered drives such as the 2.5" 7200RPM Hitachi and Seagate hard disks which can handle this, however iPods are much slower.

Cheers,
Juan@reel-stream.com
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Oh, I see. Too bad. Wishful thinking I guess. Thanks. It's still some sweet tech. I've been more impressed with stuff from the Andromeda than the HVX so far. Maybe someday after my warrantee is up anyway, and I have the money, I'll make the upgrade. Hey, are there any plans to make it work with some kind of more portable 7200RPM hard drive system?
 
There are new computers such as the MacBook Pros that come with internal 7200RPM drives. This means that with our system you can just use the laptop as both an uncompressed HD recorder and monitor, as well as doing other operations such as histograms, framing reticules, monitor LUTs and X/Y flipping(if you use a 35 adapter) which normal monitors don't usually do.

Also, about the audio, remember that your DVX continues to operate normally, regardless of whether you are using the uncompressed output or not. This means that you can just run the tape as you normally would, and use the uncompressed audio from the DVX. You can even use the DV footage itself as offline editing footage if you are going to an HD/film uncompressed target, which may be beyond your editing system's capabilities for real-tme. Of course, you can also render out lower-resolution or compressed dailies from the raw data and use these as offline footage. It's your choice.

Cheers,
Juan
 
This has probably been discussed in another topic but: Where does the 1540x984 resolution come from? does the dvx have 1500x984 ccds? Or is the image "uprezzed" from the native res. All the sample stills seem out of focus to me, and a bit "wavy"
 
Pukki said:
This has probably been discussed in another topic but: Where does the 1540x984 resolution come from? does the dvx have 1500x984 ccds? Or is the image "uprezzed" from the native res. All the sample stills seem out of focus to me, and a bit "wavy"
Click to expand...

The answer is called pixel shift. I don't totally understand how it works, but somehow it captures more rez than the camera uses, and the andromeda taps the CCD directly to capture all that waisted data. It's not just an up rez. Did you really look at all the samples? Some are quite sharp. That is up to the operator.
 
Wow! Congrats on the release and how long will this discount offer be good? I have a few things on order right now that funds are earmarked for but this is next for me! Oh yes, I imagine this would void the warranty , since I just bought my camera in August.Or is Panasonic happy with the mod?
 
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Jeans and cheesailor are correct, the answer is pixel-shift, and i'll go into more depth on how it works:

In basic terms, the DVX has 3 CCD sensors. Each sensor is roughly 770x492. However, the actual resolution of the entire 3CCD imaging block is not necessarily the resolution of each sensor. In the case of the DVX the resolution of the 3CCD imaging block is about 1540x984.

To explain why, let's talk for a second about cameras that use a single sensor to record color images (instead of 3 sensors like the DVX and HVX). Examples of cameras that use a single sensor are DSLR's, Dalsa Origin, Arri D-20, etc. Digital Imaging sensors are monochromatic in nature, which means they can only 'see' in black and white. This is why cameras such as the DVX use 3 sensors, each sensor records one basic color Red, Green or Blue.

You may be asking yourself, if sensors are monochromatic, how do single sensor cameras record color?

Single sensor cameras commonly employ what is called a 'mosaic' pattern of color filters. What this means is that each pixel on the sensor has a color filter in front of it that is usually either Red Green or Blue. So when you get an image from the sensor, you actually get a monochrome image where each pixel corresponds to the value for a single color. For example, one line might be: Red, Green, Red, Green, ... and the next line may be: Green, Blue, Green, Blue, etc.

In order to get a full color image with full RGB information for each pixel, the data needs to be processed(or demosaiced). Usually it involves looking at surrounding pixels to fill in the missing information for the center pixel. So if you're looking at a pixel for which there is Green information but no Red or Blue, you would look at adjacent Red and Blue pixels to interpolate the missing information.

The bayer mosaic approach sacrifices color resolution for luminance resolution. Luminance resolution is usually the determining factor in how humans in general judge sharpness and resolution in general.

How does this explain pixel shift? Well, you can apply a similar concept as seen in a mosaic sensor, but using 3 R, G, B sensors. In the case of the DVX, if all three sensors where aligned with the image, then you would only get a 770x492 image. However, the sensors are not aligned but shifted from each other. For example, this means that if you look at a green pixel from the imaging block, it captures an image detail that sits 'in between' red pixels. This effectively incrases the luminance resolution of the entire imaging block, and generates a much larger native frame size.

As always, there are advantages and disadvantages to doing this. One of the most marked advantages is that by using this pixel-shift system, the pixels on the sensors have more surface area as opposed to using a single sensor of larger resolution, because each sensor has less pixels on it. This usually means better dynamic range and sensitivity. This is one reason why our system exhibits a wider dynamic range than most(if not all) prosumer HD cameras out there.

My apologies for the long post but I hope this helps.

Cheers,
Juan
 
I would like to know if there are any full length motion pictures in the works done with Andromeda. I checked IMDB but nothing came up.
 
If you mean a feature you will be able to watch in the theater in which Andromeda was used then yes, although you will probably not find the details in IMDB since to the best of my knowledge it only has very general technical information. We can't say anything else until the movie is in theaters though.

To date the system has been used in everything from independent movie productions, music videos, commercials, etc.

Cheers,
Juan
 
pertierr said:
If you mean a feature you will be able to watch in the theater in which Andromeda was used then yes, although you will probably not find the details in IMDB since to the best of my knowledge it only has very general technical information. We can't say anything else until the movie is in theaters though.

To date the system has been used in everything from independent movie productions, music videos, commercials, etc.

Cheers,
Juan
Click to expand...


Thanks again.
 
Hey there. I'm definitley going to be getting the Andromeda upgrade in the future, the only question is when. Basically, I'm just wondering how long this deal will continue, and if it can also be stacked on top of the student discount? Thanks!
 
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