(Background on thread.  Debate on if digital can archive the quality of film, especially at low light..  The performance of the new Canon 5DmkII was mentioned)

—–

To ad to Julio’s points.

The camera he is talking about is the Canon 5DmkII.

Currently this camera is making a mess of the digital film camera industry. I know Sony, JVC etc are all running scared.
They are literately selling 5x what they expected on this product. It’s success has changed the industry completely.
This camera makes all there 50-100K kit all seem obsolete. Tho , there is more to a camera then a sensor. (But strangely many people cannot see past that. Ie form factor, the package etc.)

Now, Nikon will likely bring out a competitor at the November show for Pro still cameras. And.. the Nikon has even BETTER low light performance then the canon.

In the Stills world, Film is totally been abandoned apart for the niche areas where some aspects of film still produce desired results that digital cannot. However, this is not common, and a very expensive way forward.

This will of course happen in the motion film area too. I am a little surprised it has taken longer then it has, however, as I have said, there is more to taking a shot then the camera, its the camera man too. This is a generation thing more then anything else.

I have noticed that film-tech seems to be an ivory tower with man holding onto the romance of film. Personally I don;t care. I am a computer tech that has drifted into the doing digital side of exhibition. I just observe and based on what I see, make conclusions.

Film is simply out of date.
I like to compare it to DJing (For which I did for 10 years when I was a younger lad) evolved from vinyl records to CD’s or other forms of digital playback..

At the end of the day, the punters on the dance floor didn’t really care if it was vinyl or CD, the story that was the track was shared and they enjoyed it.

Tho the debate between DJ’s was heated and went on for years. Today, the top DJ’s basically never use vinyl any more.
WHY, well as I like to point out, what sounds better is not really the issue here. The main reason they don;t use vinyl is because vinyl has limitations. While digital has Blue sky. The DJ’s, though the use of digital, have created new playing styles and performance possibilities. Impossible with vinyl.

This holds true for Film as well. Film is dead to me as.. it simply cannot evolve anymore. But once we are digital, the sky is the limit. Night shots that are impossible using film. etc.

One of my favorite would be a new standard of 60fps for cinema. Can be easily converted down to any common distribution format in use today, and would make a film screen, using clean digital images, look like a window into the world that the film creates. Something film grain, scratches and gate movement can never do.. (60fps for film is possible, but like 70mm unrealistic anymore. too $$$$$$$)

So, to me. Film, please leave the building, its time to ignite the booster and leave orbit, and you don;t have a ticket.)

To finish of, I would like to also visit the definition of what make one better then the other.
If we want to talk about which can be better.
Many of you say, film looks better…. if your looking at an answer print compared to 2k. But then again, apple with apples, there are 8k digital systems out there. That would even arguably compare with 70mm.
If we talk about the typical image a widely distributed film presents on screen compared to 2K.
A typical 2K system will ALWAYS look better due to the massive lossy process the film has to go through.

So which is better. What is possible or what is typical??
Please take this into consideration.

James

Can Avid afford to become a footnote in the history of Editing software..

Apparently not.

Recently I hear (On the Quiet) of Avid selling a post production company 2 x Avid DS system for the price of one, plus an editing station for…..  And get this.. $50,000.

Basically for the price of the hardware.  2 x 8(cpu) way systems with adrenalin and Raid systems.  And an extra PC for the edit station.

Now that’s desperate.

As a DCI digital cinema expert and past owner of a Film and TV production studio and facility, unfortunately, this comment is a little miss-leading.

Let me explain why.

I am involved in the installation of DCI projectors within Australia.  As such, I am well informed of technical roadmaps and installation numbers.  Currently the DCI equipment being installed is 2k, general projecting SCOPE as 2048×858 and FLAT (1.85) as 1998×1080.  The DMD, or DLP chips are 2048×1080 in total.

At the current rate, we will not see large penetration of DCI in all cinemas, especially in non-US cinemas, for quite some time to come.  Even in the US the change over is not near 50%.

Current roadmap for 4k DLP support?  Not even being talked about yet.

Life span of a DLP projector.  Expected 10years, however, Cinemas are use to 40 years lifespan on a traditional projector, so expect them to run them into the ground, 15-20 years.

I would expect the world to be fully DCI in about 5-10 years.

If we add all these time frames up, etc.  Don’t expect to see 4K cinema for 20 years. Maybe more.

Now lets look at who can tell the difference between 2k and 4k.  From many people I have spoken to, even trained pros have a hard time telling the difference is at a reasonable distance from the screen.  Sure, if in the front row it is much easier.  In general, however, it is expected that the general cinema goer, 99% would not tell the difference.

As a cinema owner, can you justify spending hundreds of thousands of dollars just to keep 1% a little happier?

What I am trying to point out here is that 2k is pretty much it.  Doing production in more then 2k is a good way to simply spend more money on Post with no real way to get it onto a cinema screen for a very long time to come.

RED1 queasy 4K bayer as opposed to real 4k  (when you say 4k you mean 4k of resolution.  4k baye, DLPr is not 4k resolution.)  the RED1, in a 2k workflow is most likely the best bang for $$$ camera currently available.

RED cry the “Obsolescence Obsolete” tag line, but this is more hype then reality of what is involved in real production.

Cost, destination format, qualified workflow.  This is what you as a producer should be excited about.  Not how many angels can dance on the head of a pin.

SideNOTE:  Over sampling or more then 2k aquisition is very useful for certain post requirements.  Mainly CGI, but in general, it has no bearking to the final result in a 2k workflow.

See “Channel 4 pulls plug on red button interactive advertising”

I have been expecting this for a long time.  Hopefully we can accept this and move on.

Unfortunately there is still quite a bit of traction in this area in some parts of the web based video.

Alex Lindsay of PixelCorps, who makes a lot of Web video content, still pushes this idea quite strongly.  This goes against the trend of; 1. Apple dropped Quicktime technology supporting it. 2. the MPEG standard created to bring this technology forward has largely been abandoned and never implemented to a usable degree.

In my blog I have always tried to make it clear that this type of technology would never take off.  The main reason for this is simple. Implementation costs.

Costs for making video content are getting more and more fragmented as the path to the view gets more and more fragmented.  There is already a huge amount of pressure on cutting costs for making advertising content or content in general.  Adding to this cost with interactive content such as the red button, simply does not make any sense.  If you want to do interactive, go use google AdSense at a fraction of the cost.

This is not to mention that interactivity during linear video content had always been a questionable feature.  Views like un-interrupted viewing.  People PAY to have no commercials.

Long form linear content with interactive advertising was dead before it began.  The big players just didn’t want to believe it.  They thought they could control the direction of the industry.  How wrong could you be..

]]> http://www.crafted.com.au/blog/2008/12/03/last-nail-in-the-coffin-for-interactive-tv/feed/ 1 http://www.crafted.com.au/blog/2008/11/25/red-camera-nothing-but-hype/ http://www.crafted.com.au/blog/2008/11/25/red-camera-nothing-but-hype/#comments Tue, 25 Nov 2008 13:28:40 +0000 JamieG http://www.crafted.com.au/blog/?p=205 Red Digital Cinema recently dropped all specs on its Scarlet and Epic product range as Nikon and Canon bring out cameras of equivalent performance (Ie Canon 5D MkII).  A month later they announce a totally re-vamped vision with what one would consider to be “the dream vision” of film making equipment.  The question here is.  Can they deliver on this?

To gudge this, lets look at the track record.  The RED1.

From talking to people from the prosumer and professional areas, I get two different perspectives.  The Prosumer, wanting the big toys for no money pant RED as the coming of the messiah.  The Pros, who have been using Viper and other uncompressed hi-end systems consider RED a bit of a Joke, but do respect how quickly they have developed an impressive camera.  Still, it has quite a number of problems.

The Pros have some major issues.

1. It over heats under heavy use.  The running joke with the hire companies is it may be cheaper to rent then a uncompressed system, but you need two on set to make sure you have no down time.  Tho I do hear the later revisions  have improved this problem greatly.

2. The colour depth of REDCODE codec is good but uncompressed is better.

3. Its NOT 4K.  Its a good 2K camera.  It uses a bayer filter.  This is not a true pixel for pixel sample.  So please…. stop calling it a 4k camera…  Please goto wikipedia for an explanation.

4. Until recently you could not work natively on redcode-codec files adding a complex addition to the workflow.  I have heard of quite a few major productions having to do neg match to media files as meta data errors and other problems have been occurring on the workflow.

5. Red has not delivered on a number of promised features.  Number of audio track supported.  Support for 4:2:2/4:4:4 single/duel HDSDI out put.  These are major issues to the Pro.

The key to the RED is the sensor.  Who makes the sensor then..  Well that’s a secret.  This is what makes me most nervious of all.

Let me go over some Sensor history.  Many of you may be wondering how RED was able to jump so far ahead in Sensor technology.  Well, this is because it is already a very old and mature industry.  In my career, I have worked for Kodak on the Cineon Project, the first of its kind to bring film into the digital age.  I have been involved in the engineering of a film recorder.  We also planned to make a film scanner, but it’s a bit late for that now.  During this time we went over engineering products suitable for building these tools.  From hi-resolution sensors to line arrays.  Strangely enough these components have been around for quite some time.  There reason for existence.  Robotic eyes.

Very hi-resolution sensors exist, for example to detect imperfections in CHIP manufacture.  These sensors are easily re-purposed into what the RED1 became.  The biggest problem to overcome was that the sensors did not have a data path capable of bringing images of at the speed required for film.  This is the main redesign needed to archive what RED did with RED1.

Sony and other manufactures where starting from scratch as they consider bayer filters as a non-professional way to capture 4:2:2 or 4:4:4 images.  For example, why we have 3 chip cameras, sampling the full colour for every pixel in the sensor.

RED1 4k bayer equates to a little better then 2k at 4:4:4.  So really the RED1 is an amazing 2k camera.  Please don’t call it a 4K camera.  Maybe a “4k-bayer”.

This explains how RED had a perceived jump on the incumbents.  It was not so much a jump as looking at the problem from outside the square.

So really, RED has aligned itself with one of these sensor makers and focused them on making sensors which are more suitable for film acquisition.

The real question here is.  Can RED get this secret company who specialise in sensor development to make sensors to the specifications announced in the recent dream fest?

My personal opinion is that what they have put on paper is possible.  But the time frame arguable.  And now canon and Sony may start playing with the same rules. RED may have some real competition.

Consider this.  If Canon/Sony, with its years of engineering know how, brings out a camera even close to the RED products. Who are you likely to purchase.  RED who are learning as they go along, or Canon/Sony, who really know about building pro kit?

This is simply a reality check for those wraped up in the RED hype. If the RED1 does it for you great.  Canon looks like having kit coming to market soon that will be equivalent in some ways to RED1 and better then the original promis of scarlet..  RED has promised us some vapourware we may see in the future.   But really.  If I cannot touch it, its not worth my or your time.  If your in production, its what you can do today, not what you may be able to do in the future.  Focus on what can be done and your more likely to actually get a prodcution finished.

To help with examining these raw files, I have both cropped a sequence and isolated an image to demonstrate some of the observed issues with the raw files produced by the 5D..

The above SWF file shows a section of the sky from the “bridge shot”.  I have extracted frames from this shot, converted them to uncompressed PNG and placed them in a SWF file.  You’re looking at the raw, uncompressed footage playing back in the Flash window.  Total of 25 frames.  Note the noise and visible macro blocks.

5D example

I took the above section from a frame of a predominantly bright image.  As to be expected, a well lit image looks clean and devoid of “blocking”. But on closer inspection we can see something passing in front of the lens creating the darker to lighter gradient.  As you can easily see, noticeable “blocks” are evident, especially in the blue portion.

Otherwise following is my brief outline and reasoning for this being a revolution in Film acquisition.

As a Still camera, the 5D is a resonable upgrade to compete with Nikon’s new range. However, the Nikon range does still appear to have an advantage in over all still quality.

In the Video area, the 5D looks better then the RED-scarlet (3k imager with bayer filter = less quality then 5D)  RED has withdrawn the current Scarlet specs.  Becuse of the 5D or not, the general still camera industry has surpased the scarlet product and currently I would expect a RED-1 type feature set in the Scarlet body if they plan to still “blow us away” as it is put.

The 5D, from my understanding, can function as a video capture device while at the same time capturing 22mega pixel stills.  This indicates that it is doing a real time sample from 22mega pixel for 35mm sized imager, to 1920×1080.  As such we are geting a large over sampling of the captured image down to 1920×1080 HD resolutions, we will be getting an amazingly clean image.  The 5D also has a new sensor that is more sensitive to light giving you images that look amazing in low light.  This also lets the film maker get away with less lighting (Saves costs) and also get a look usualy only available in much more expensive kit.

The big question is the video codec used and effective quality obtained.  36.5mbit H.264, at double the effective quality as MPEG2, will no dough give us amazing images.  H.264 has also been extended to be able to do 4:2:2, 4:4:4 10bit, 12bit colour and up to 4K image sizes. Will the camera be able to take advantage of this?  Does it now?   Strangely I have not bee able to find any details on the Internet as yet. Even is the  camera does not support these standards yet.. future versions are likely to.

The limitation to 30p (30 frames per second) is most likely more of a marketing issue then a technical one.  After all, this camera is not ideal for a film maker.  The form factor is for a still photographer, not a film/video maker.  I personally expect to see a new Canon XL-video camera in the future that has 5D core technology in the centre with the film makers form factor around it.  Add all the different frame rates and other film/video centric options. (And double the costs of the 5D most likely) and we have the future of Canon Video product line.

If nothing else, this camera indicates that a 35mm sized imager should now be standard for any PRO video camera.  Raw 4k imagers are also old hat.  We now expect over sized images giving us a over sampled result down to 2 or 4k sizes.  These are ideas RED is even struggling with.

RED may have started from scratch with nothing to loose by making a film/video camera taking full advantage of current technology.  However, once Canon and Sony also take this position, canabalising the current product ranges, RED is unlikely to match the experience and knowledge of either of these two companies.

Canon are at those cross roads now.  Sony are likely to get their last as they are the leaders in the top end.

This will be an amazingly popular camera as armature film makers can really justify its costs as it is inexpensive and can also be used as a very good stills camera, which is also an item any Film/video maker should have in his bad.

Recently we created a new show reel and so I quickly loaded it to my YouTube account here

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CCl0PVC617U

Suddenly I noticed a new BUTTON under the Number of “Views: X” text below the video.

“watch in high quality”

This did bring up a considerably better quality version.  I imagine this is the H.264 version that would be available to iPhones and other H.264 based Youtube viewers.

This is good to see as typical youtube content can be apsolute rubbish.  This does bring the quality of content up enough to be more compelling on larger TV type viering.

In any case, here is the show reel embedded from Youtube.

I also wanted to give vimeo a go.  I heard it was a good alternative to YouTube.  And I must admit.  Its very good.  I found it very easy to use and gave great feed back with the status of my video upload and encode.  The final quality is also quite good. They also support HD. My only problem is that I uploaded a MPEG2 8mbit file which I used for the DVD.  As such it has some interlace content.  vimeo did not deinterlace the content.  Doh!

digitAll Show Reel July 2008 from James Gardiner on Vimeo.

This generated a louder than expected amount of noise/news in the Blogosphere.  So much noise, in fact, that there must be more to then than meets the eye.

After spending some time considering this, it occurred to me that this goes beyond what operating system may be better or worse.  The typical issues we judge an operating system on no longer effect how an operating system is sold.  Even if we overlook that Steve Jobs is never likely to let this happen, OSX going open is, at this stage, a very interesting idea.

Firstly let us look at traditional methods to divide, concur and dominate the WAR of the OS.  Ie, Microsoft.  Bill Gates may have had questionable business practices, however, he did completely dominate the computer industry and become the richest man in the world and stayed there for a considerable time.  The use of the Operating system was to his company, the golden handcuffs for the consumer.  Once you had them on your operating system you have great influence on what they run on that operating system.

But that was then and this is now.  If you look at future trends in operating systems, you will see they are going towards the “FireFox Mozilla” type business model.  Ie, give it away for free, then make money of the fact you can drive the users to services in which you get a kickback.  Ie, Firefox makes most of its money simply from Google adsense and the fact the default page and search bar is Google.  Add to this that the future for general applications liek Word, Excel, is as applications served up as services.  Ie, they are not connected to the OS so much anymore.

Firefox runs on the OS.  So whoever controls the OS is, if producing an equivalent product to firefox, likely to grab this market as the users upgrade.

That is where the new trend of the OLPC has grown.  Cheap Laptop computer which the industry expects to become consumer level Internet devices.  Ie, like purchasing a pay as you go Mobile phone but in this case a tool to access the internet.  There is a lot of sense to this as using the internet to do you banking and other tasks becomes the only method available.  The larger segment of the community is going to have to start getting online.  They will also want black box, (Cannot crash or get viruses etc.. )  Some expect the phone to take on this role, but phone can only do so much even if it is an iPhone  .

This is such a serious issue, Microsoft, with recent changes rumoured (from Windows Weekly with Paul Thurrott) to be happening to Genuine Advantage (Software that Microsoft uses to make sure your PC has a valid licensed) has basically made their OS FREE.  Yes, if you did not know, you may soon be able to install Vista or even XP-SP3 on a computer and it will operate fine.  It WILL ask you quite often to purchase the product.  However, you could, if you can put up with it, continue to use the OS for free.

This also explains why XP has gained a new life as Vista simply cannot run very well on these low end OLPC, while Linux can.

So, the trend for operating system into the future is FREE.  Vista may not be free yet, but even WINDOWS 7 has many rumours around it that it will be a very cheap, pay as you go operating system.  Ie, the OS, word, any app you run on it will be a SERVICE in the future.

If we consider this, what incentive does Apple have in releasing OSX to the general computer hardware?  Probably none.

Apple has set up a reputation of excellence.  In general, OSX is, by and far, the best operating system available.  It does have its issues. However, I would have to agree it is amazing.  For example, in doing my investigation of this topic, I installed the Hackentosh/OSX hack for any PC, onto my home computer.  A quad core Q6600.  And let me tell you, it generally runs up to twice as fast as Vista 64.  Has a cleaner interface.  Simply works far better than Vista in so many ways.  I am defiantly considering a Mac for the future.  Still it does not run so many open source tools I use frequently… (I will be testing running XP virtually next. )

It is a hard call.  Should apple open OSX to this new era of operating system?  Right now, I would say no.  If, however, OLPC or similar devices do start to take huge market share, Apple will need to release a similar device, and forgo the usual extremely high margins.  This will be a hard call for Apple.  The Mobile phone market was ripe for dominating.  The OLPC market will be very different.  Open source Linux, and Hardnosed Microsoft are already jostling for position here.  The Macbook AIR indicated Apple has its eye on this market, but unless they can bring out a competitive priced item, I do not see the Apple pulling this off.  They will have to go open platform if they plan to become more then an OS for the elite.

Finally, considering Steve Jobs, this is exactly where he wants to be.  And OS for the Elite, so don’t expect any movement here while he is on watch.

Note additional: ASUS will soon be selling all Motherboards with Embedded Linux in the BIOS. No HD no OS needed. Turn on and you have a OLPC type unit that you can use to access the Internet and all the Internat applications.