C200: what would be the flaw of the Canon c200?

P

Pierre Le Blanc

Member
Years after years I get really disappointed with Camera Manufacturers.
1)Sony FS5 seem a perfect camera on paper but freaking codec was useless for S-log. The Sony F55 image need a lot of work to look cinematic is was too plastically and o sharp RAW files were super huge and almost impossible to estorage without expending a fortune.
2)Blackmagic URSA mini FPN was useless sometimes at ISO 800 and anything over for sure.
3)Canon C100 promised that Color Science was going be on par with C300 but that was not the case even with a externall recorder.
4)DJI always cheat the specifications a few weeks ago I received my Spark (That I bought for specialy for hiking) just to find out it didn't shoot Photo RAWs and image controls are very basic.
and list go on

Always manufacturers are not 100% honest with the specifications, I'm sure the C200 will have a Flaw that will let down a lot of people, My guess is the RAW format would takes months to be easy accessible by current NLE or Resolve. We already are learning that Slow motion resolution is very soft a very close to 720p.

Whats your best shoot about the c200?
 
I hate the fact that C200 production line will be to slow to produce them in quantity to satisfy the market needs and that C200 waiting list will be too long.
 
Pierre Le Blanc said:
Years after years I get really disappointed with Camera Manufacturers.
1)Sony FS5 seem a perfect camera on paper but freaking codec was useless for S-log. The Sony F55 image need a lot of work to look cinematic is was too plastically and o sharp RAW files were super huge and almost impossible to estorage without expending a fortune.
2)Blackmagic URSA mini FPN was useless sometimes at ISO 800 and anything over for sure.
3)Canon C100 promised that Color Science was going be on par with C300 but that was not the case even with a externall recorder.
4)DJI always cheat the specifications a few weeks ago I received my Spark (That I bought for specialy for hiking) just to find out it didn't shoot Photo RAWs and image controls are very basic.
and list go on

Always manufacturers are not 100% honest with the specifications, I'm sure the C200 will have a Flaw that will let down a lot of people, My guess is the RAW format would takes months to be easy accessible by current NLE or Resolve. We already are learning that Slow motion resolution is very soft a very close to 720p.

Whats your best shoot about the c200?
Click to expand...

Simple, no XF-AVC and when Canon graces us with it in February, most are betting it will be 8-bit and possibly as low data rates as the internal .MP4.
 
Yeah. The weird lack of a middle-ground codec is the biggest one.

The other is that shooting in Raw Light requires you shoot DCI 4K, so it adds an extra step cropping down to UHD if you need to do that. I also don't think you can shoot 2K Raw Light... so it's full-raster only. That's going to be some jumbo file sizes.

Lack of a second CFast slot with those file sizes is also a bummer. You can really only carry about 30 minutes of footage (256GB card) on-board without swapping cards.

No Raw output at all. It's internal Raw Light to CFast only.

Those are the ones that come to mind.
 
I think you need to calibrate your expectations. Too often, people here seem to expect an 8k Alexa for the price and size of a DJI drone.

Now, that is not what YOU are saying, I just mean to say we need to look realistically at it all.

There are brands that compete on spec and those that compete on performance. Spec oriented brands (let's call them 'Type A') will implement and market features regardless of how well they work in real life. The main point is: get people excited. Some of the things they include will work well and some will lead to disappointment.

Other brands are more conservative (let's call them 'Type B'). They carefully adopt features when they are ready, leading to a feeling of being behind the curve. Their products might also seem under specced, since they lack some of the items of "aggressive" manufacturers.

Most of the time, a company isn't strictly A or B, but it's often quite clear what ideology the decision makers adhere to. In my mind, Canon is clearly more of a Type B.

Anyway… The C200 seems like a honest product so far. The files are nice. On my Mac Pro I get realtime playback up to 25 fps (I haven't tried high fps material) on the edit page with the native Raw Light files on a 4k timeline in DaVinci Resolve. That's good performance. On the color page, with a few qualifiers and a hand full of nodes I get 22-25 fps. I currently have a single RX 480 8GB card. With a 1080 Ti, you're essentially looking at double performance. I could also add a second 480 (or rather replace with two RX 580s) and also more than double the performance for a low cost.

File sizes will be prohibitive for some. But it's important to understand that it's not because Canon raw light is bloated, but rather that 4k DCI, 12bit raw files WILL be large. Canon's 3x-5x compression seems to hit the sweetspot for pure quality, but it would CERTAINLY be VERY cool if Canon would implement an additional raw codec that would compress files 8x-12x. So – same raw solution but with more compression. And maybe 10bit to get files even smaller:

Canon RawLight[SUP]CINEMA[/SUP] 12bit ≈ 1Gbit/s
Canon RawLight[SUP]STORY[/SUP] 10/12bit ≈ 300Mbit/s

REDcode is very flexible this way. Canon wouldn't need to offer every single level of compression, but I can see that ONE MORE version of Raw Light would make sense: maximum compression WITHOUT the image falling apart. It might very well be that this is what we got with the current 1Gbit flavor, and in that case.... oh, well....

We already know that the C200 will get a codec more designed towards "hit record and let it roll". Yup, probably 8bit. But if it's 8bit, 422 XF-AVC at around 305Mbit (like the XC10/15), I'd say "try it before you knock it". You will have no problem shooting Canon Log with that and grade it back to normal contrast/saturation without breaking if you shot it properly.
 
Interesting, Where did you get C200 cinelight RAW files from? Are they publicly available?


AndreeOnline said:
I think you need to calibrate your expectations. Too often, people here seem to expect an 8k Alexa for the price and size of a DJI drone.

Now, that is not what YOU are saying, I just mean to say we need to look realistically at it all.

There are brands that compete on spec and those that compete on performance. Spec oriented brands (let's call them 'Type A') will implement and market features regardless of how well they work in real life. The main point is: get people excited. Some of the things they include will work well and some will lead to disappointment.

Other brands are more conservative (let's call them 'Type B'). They carefully adopt features when they are ready, leading to a feeling of being behind the curve. Their products might also seem under specced, since they lack some of the items of "aggressive" manufacturers.

Most of the time, a company isn't strictly A or B, but it's often quite clear what ideology the decision makers adhere to. In my mind, Canon is clearly more of a Type B.

Anyway… The C200 seems like a honest product so far. The files are nice. On my Mac Pro I get realtime playback up to 25 fps (I haven't tried high fps material) on the edit page with the native Raw Light files on a 4k timeline in DaVinci Resolve. That's good performance. On the color page, with a few qualifiers and a hand full of nodes I get 22-25 fps. I currently have a single RX 480 8GB card. With a 1080 Ti, you're essentially looking at double performance. I could also add a second 480 (or rather replace with two RX 580s) and also more than double the performance for a low cost.

File sizes will be prohibitive for some. But it's important to understand that it's not because Canon raw light is bloated, but rather that 4k DCI, 12bit raw files WILL be large. Canon's 3x-5x compression seems to hit the sweetspot for pure quality, but it would CERTAINLY be VERY cool if Canon would implement an additional raw codec that would compress files 8x-12x. So – same raw solution but with more compression. And maybe 10bit to get files even smaller:

Canon RawLight[SUP]CINEMA[/SUP] 12bit ≈ 1Gbit/s
Canon RawLight[SUP]STORY[/SUP] 10/12bit ≈ 300Mbit/s

REDcode is very flexible this way. Canon wouldn't need to offer every single level of compression, but I can see that ONE MORE version of Raw Light would make sense: maximum compression WITHOUT the image falling apart. It might very well be that this is what we got with the current 1Gbit flavor, and in that case.... oh, well....

We already know that the C200 will get a codec more designed towards "hit record and let it roll". Yup, probably 8bit. But if it's 8bit, 422 XF-AVC at around 305Mbit (like the XC10/15), I'd say "try it before you knock it". You will have no problem shooting Canon Log with that and grade it back to normal contrast/saturation without breaking if you shot it properly.
Click to expand...
 
Pierre Le Blanc said:
Interesting, Where did you get C200 cinelight RAW files from? Are they publicly available?
Click to expand...

See post above.

I'm using DaVinci Resolve R14 beta[SUP]4[/SUP]. The latest beta[SUP]5[/SUP] has just been released, but I haven't downloaded it yet.

So there is already support for the files, in a way.
 
Pierre Le Blanc said:
I noticed the files opened but there is not option for WB or ISO
Click to expand...

I haven't seen a white paper on Raw Light yet and I don't think I've read that ISO is changeable in post (it might be). Canon does however say that white balance is adjustable in post. Also, Resolve 14 is beta software, so further support might come in time.

I have my own theories how things might work, but I'll wait for Canon to release more information on the topic.

But calling it Raw Light, to me, is signalling that it isn't simply raw. There are catches attached—not necessarily meaning that image quality will suffer, but maybe there are things we can and cannot do.

For now, those files are good to test system performance and check out the image fidelity.
 
I also notices that those MP4 are almost as good as the RAW files in term of Color dept and details. Maybe because the algorithm is so great or something is not right with the RAW files. But when I had tried other RAW format there is always a huge diference.
 
AndreeOnline said:
... File sizes will be prohibitive for some. But it's important to understand that it's not because Canon raw light is bloated, but rather that 4k DCI, 12bit raw files WILL be large. Canon's 3x-5x compression seems to hit the sweetspot for pure quality, but it would CERTAINLY be VERY cool if Canon would implement an additional raw codec that would compress files 8x-12x. So – same raw solution but with more compression. And maybe 10bit to get files even smaller:

Canon RawLight[SUP]CINEMA[/SUP] 12bit ≈ 1Gbit/s
Canon RawLight[SUP]STORY[/SUP] 10/12bit ≈ 300Mbit/s

REDcode is very flexible this way. Canon wouldn't need to offer every single level of compression, but I can see that ONE MORE version of Raw Light would make sense: maximum compression WITHOUT the image falling apart. It might very well be that this is what we got with the current 1Gbit flavor, and in that case.... oh, well....
Click to expand...

I had mentioned this upon announcement. Sony's "Raw Light", aka X-OCN, is 661 Mbps and Canon could indeed offer a further reduction in file sizes. On other hand, one could compress them in post as well.

But there's obviously this hideous gap in other codecs. If one needs a highly compressed codec but still high quality image, Samsung NX1 had HEVC built in three years ago, where 40 Mpbs was "consumer" and 80 was "pro". For someone shooting a lot of daily footage, an 80-150 Mbps HEVC (NX-1 had a higher bit rate hack) on SD cards would last and last and last.
 
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