F5: Will 4k become expected sooner than we think ?

R

ryaninoz

Well-known member
Looks like mobile phones and DSLR's will be getting 4k very soon, I wonder how long before clients expect 4k deliverables ?, if they can shoot 4k on their new samsung phone it might become an assumption that we work in 4k for every project. Although with hard drive advances raw will become less and less of a headache and in 3-5 years time I doubt it will be much of an issue but if we are surrounded by cheap devices all shooting compressed 4k then will f5 users be at a disadvantage shooting either 2k or 4k raw ? If someone with a cheap xavc handycam or dslr can offer a producer 4k that can be downloaded in the field to an external drive then that makes an f5 a harder sell to clients - if 4k becomes common place by end of next year.

Unless I am missing something - will 2k recorded internally on the f5 uprez to 4k better than a heavily compressed 4k image ? - I assume that the dslr's phones etc that will shoot 4k will be very compressed.

I take nothing for granted in technology anymore, any number of companies could release a 4k/HD raw/compressed global shutter camera tomorrow for 500 bucks.
 
4K will certainly not be commonplace by the end of the year. Actual 1080 HD still isn't commonplace.

My HD F3 will still look 10 times better on a 4K monitor than any little 4K camcorder or SLR. SLR's can't even produce decent HD as of 2013 so I dont see them doing too well with 4K in a practical format.

I think we have to split "4K" into two different things when we talk about it. There is the hyped, marketplace 4K, which is nothing more than hype that people attach "best" onto, and then there is the actual 4K or UHD technical format.

It will suck when an ignorant producer asks for 4K but can't edit it, or when they can't even tell the difference from HD, but we all know they will ask. I'd be willing to just say an HD file is a 4K file if they are dumb enough to ask for it, for many projects.
 
1080 is common in Australia, it's all I deliver now. I agree producers will ask for 4k once the hype winds up. It would be interesting to see up rezzed 2k from an f5 compared to 4k from the new sony handycam, if the HD/2k looks better then 4k delivery could just be an export issue - uprezzing - perhaps?
 
4K deliverables might be a long ways off, but 4K acquisition is here already. I rarely shoot HD anymore. 4K is going to follow the exact same evolution as HD did a few years ago, and anything you shoot in HD today is going to be as worthless in a few years as SD footage is right now. You (and the clients who rely on your advice) have to think long-term.
 
Doug.

You monitor with maybe a 720 monitor, how much of your 4k actually resolves 4k, or does it being mainly out of focus mean that you might as well shoot 2k?

You are shooting raw? 1TB per hour? Who pays for that?

S
 
This fall I've finished looking at Breaking Bad and currently I'm going through The Wire. Two great TV series that were shot on 35mm but I'm watching these in highly compressed SD. Do I notice the poorly resolved image quality? No.
I notice the quality of the story, the quality of the actors, the quality of the camera work and quality of lighting among other things. Honestly the only ones that care about 4k are TV manufactures who wants to sell you a new TV.

4k does certainly have its pros when it comes to acquisition of video to allow for a great deal of post work but other than that... well so far I haven't seen anything that would have gain on 4k. On the other hand a lossless compression and 10-bit of 1080p if brought through the broadcast chain and streaming video will be an advantage to the viewer to exploit high quality video. But efforts are better put in production design and story rather than just a higher technical resolution or spec.
 
No, I am not normally shooting RAW. Sometimes I do, but usually 10-bit 4K XAVC is good enough and the file sizes are easy to manage. In fact, 4K files sizes seem normal to me now, and HD files seem small. It is not important to me whether someone will watch the footage on a 55" consumer monitor, an iPhone, a computer, a 4K projector, or whatever. Makes no difference. What is important to me is that I am shooting and archiving 4K images for long term value.

I have no use for 2K. 2K is bullshit. The image height is exactly the same as HD so all you're getting is a few extra pixels on the sides that have to be cropped off in post. There's no image quality benefit to 2K, just more work. If I'm not shooting 4K, then regular 1920x1080 is the next best thing.

I don't understand what you mean by "who pays for that?". There's no workflow difference between 4K and HD and the only real difference is with file sizes. Haven't you heard? Hard drives are cheap!! The cost to work with 4K is practically the same as working with HD so why not? And if I'm using 4K images in an HD edit, I can zoom, crop, reframe, stabilize, and do things I can't do with HD clips in a HD timeline.

Once again, this all the exact same things we already went through 5 or 6 years ago with the change from HD to SD. Smart people made the jump to HD acquistion right away and didn't look back, even if the edit and deliverable was still SD or a few more years. Same thing today. Shoot 4K and deliver in HD until the rest of the world catches up. Lots of benefits and no downside except for a few extra hard drives.
 
Osslund said:
Do I notice the poorly resolved image quality? No.
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Well you're the only one. I definately see the difference and it is HUGE. The first few seasons of Breaking Bad on AMC were only available in SD with Verizon FiOS. I stopped watching after a couple of episodes and waited for them to come out on Blu-ray. It was well worth the wait. Like letting a fine wine age a little. I hope that you've at least seen some episodes in HD so you know what your missing? Watching a show like Breaking Bad in HD makes a huge difference to me and most other people who aren't even in the business. Why is IMAX bigger than ever? Why are theaters converting to 4K digital projectors? Why does Apple keep improving the resolution of all their devices? This attitude that it's all about the content rather than the image quality is outdated and weak. You can tell yourself that it doesn't matter, but it does.

And you also prove my point about acquistion being what is important today. Breaking Bad wasn't shot in SD because Osslund thought that would be good enough. And it wasn't edited in SD either. Breaking Bad was shot, edited, and graded in the best format they could afford without regard to how someone is going to watch it at home today. When we talk about 4K you have to separate acquistion from deliverables, because those are two different issues.
 
Hell, broadcasters and cable providers can't even do HD properly yet. Some sort of mushy, pixilated mpeg2 oozes out of the cable socket at my home. Then the LCD monitor smears it all over the screen. 4K, when they get around to it, will be heavily compressed as well and probably unrecognizable as true 4K. I suspect the current crop of 4K cameras will have come to the end of their useful lives by the time there is a 4K standard being rolled out for U.S. transmission. We'll probably see it first on Roku-like boxes.

I'm sure some segments of the market will adopt early. Not having made the switch yet myself, I'm not looking forward to copying terabytes of data after a long day of shooting.
Then again, I also said the same thing when I switched to HD, and it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be.
 
The proponents of 4k are quick to point out how worthless SD content became when HD became available. But I think it's a false comparison, in that we're reaching a point of diminishing returns. You can stretch good 1080p across a 60 inch screen and not lack for sharpness or clarity at practical viewing distances. You couldn't do that with SD content.

4k does have advantages, if only for the reframing and cropping in, but if that's your lynchpin argument to the client, then if your competition is savvy they'll say "If we put the camera in the right place with the right lens, we won't need to crop it." And if we're only talking about reframing a 3 second cut-away shot, then is that one shot worth the expense of 4k? I think not - I think the audience will forgive, or not even notice, the punchin from a 1080p source.

Of course, here comes the "4k isn't that expensive anymore" arguement. Granted, this argument holds more and more water each passing year, but I don't think the industry on large will convert in the next calendar year.

But hey. By all means, if you think the world is 4k, shoot 4k. It doesn't hurt me any. I own an excellent 1080p camera. If a client is determined to shoot 4k, we'll rent the body, and still use my Ultra Primes.

And when the industry decides that 8k is the new 4k, and that anybody not shooting 8k is a backwards neanderthal, that's when I'll be able to buy an "old" Alexa or F55 for pennies.
 
Doug Jensen said:
No, I am not normally shooting RAW. ..2K is bulls*%t.
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2k- HD same thing IMO, 2k is less key strokes :)

Now that is interesting you are shooting 4k but compressed, and baked.

It would seem to me that 1080(2k) raw is a more versatile and therefore more archive valued format, because the colour is IMO more important than the DPI

Not that there is a workable 2k raw camera right now (oh - maybe the alexa)

I think shooting, I guess, a F55 in 4kBaked is the option I would choose with that camera (although I would carefully test it versus SRcam1080 for maleability) as it presents a reasonable balance of data and image quality

I have played with upress to 4k on my F3 (10bit422) and I feel it feels like S16, versus S35 film, pleasant to watch but clearly not as good as the real thing.

It is an interesting consideration - what do you throw away - res or colour info?

And you still have not told me how to focus.

BTW If I were shooting stock on a reasonable budget there is no question in my head, 4kraw is the most sustainable.. and for stock you can keep the shots short to manage the data.

S
 
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And to answer the question will 4k become bigger - sure it will as soon as a phone/gopro has 4k

What do we do? Especially those with good 1080 camera (that will outresperform any consumer 4k cam) .. I dont know

Maybe describe our camera in terms of data rate not pixels?
 
The cycle is moving so fast right now, it's not really advisable to be an owner operator of anything expensive unless you have a clear idea on how to get the ROI for that unit. That's why my real money is in my Ultra Primes and accessories, and not in the camera body. That way I still get hired and paid even if the client wants to shoot a camera body I don't own. And I do position the F35 to clients based on it's high bit rates and best-of-class legacy. And this year I've done well with that, but I don't count on it down the road.

I think cameras like the F55 are very cool, but I'm incredibly leery of the depreciation those cameras are likely to suffer over the next year.

When announced the F65 was looking like a 90k+ package. As of today, I've seen used ones going for as little as 48k and not moving. Which means in reality, you might be able to buy one for $45k. Just scary!
 
Viddovation said:
The cycle is moving so fast right now, it's not really advisable to be an owner operator of anything expensive unless you have a clear idea on how to get the ROI for that unit. That's why my real money is in my Ultra Primes and accessories, and not in the camera body. That way I still get hired and paid even if the client wants to shoot a camera body I don't own. And I do position the F35 to clients based on it's high bit rates and best-of-class legacy. And this year I've done well with that, but I don't count on it down the road.

I think cameras like the F55 are very cool, but I'm incredibly leery of the depreciation those cameras are likely to suffer over the next year.
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Viddovation said:
There's a lot of sense in what you say here Viddovation, I suspect hard won sense. More and more I have come to believe that it's not a good time to invest in expensive state of the art, ( or is it state of the market ), camera gear. Everything gets outdated so damn quickly, and therefore looses value at the same rate. Looking ahead a year or eighteen months I wonder what the F5/55's will be worth. I hung onto my F3 simply because it truly wasn't worth selling, still isn't, but in retrospect I have regrets in buying it in the first place. It is still a good camera and still produces nice images, but producers and clients mostly want the newest and shiniest toys on their gigs…….Hindsight 20/20.
Owning good glass still makes sense, but buying the latest / greatest camera as and when it appears on the scene I am not so sure is such a great idea these days unless you can take that hit. Even if a camera does achieve it's ROI in a reasonable period of time, what happens to it after that? Sits on the shelf mostly superseded by the next "best thing ever" out. I know that only too well, been there.
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morgan_moore said:
Now that is interesting you are shooting 4k but compressed, and baked.
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Who said anything about being baked? I'm shooting 10-bit XAVC 4K with S-LOG/S-gamut. That allows for considerable options in post with Resolve Lite or even Premiere CC -- it is hardly "baked". And when it's called for, I just turn on 16-bit 4K RAW and the workflow is pretty much exactly the same in post. But unlike other camera, I never have the hassle of external recorders. Love it.
 
morgan_moore said:
Yep I shied away from the F5 and bought an F3, I could have afforded it but the ROI was not clear cut.S
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I wouldn't argue that decision and I have steered a couple of friends in that same direction. If you can't justify an F55, then get a used F3. The F5 isn't worth the extra cost.
 
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