Getting maximum results out of your XL1.
 

I own a XL1S Pal version, I'm about to make my first short. I still find that I don't think the resolution is enough to keep me happy.

Anyone have any tips or tricks on how to maximize the picture clarity and resolution on your XL1 but still keep a "film like" look?

I think those things are a bit of mutual exclusive on that camera.
Personally I'm very happy with the resolution of the camera (I
have the PAL version as well) even in frame mode.

Can you talk a bit about what settings you are shooting with?
I tend to shoot at 1/50th shutter with gain at -3 db, sharpness
in the default setting and shooting in frame mode in full manual
mode and manual focus as well.

I like the camera all and all, very much so infact, but I tend to think that the resoution is a bit small when on a TV. It's almost unacceptable if you shoot 16x9 and show it on a widescreen television. But I guess I'm picky.

I'm going to shoot a short about a piano player with that has new goals in life, he now works at an office and never plays anymore. One day he gets really ill and travle to the hospital to find out that he has a leathal illness. He turns back to his roots at a piano player to write one last peice.

The shots are going to be at an office, (large windows) and at his home with his grand piano. (also very large windows) The locations (rooms) are about 30 square meters.

I shoot 1/50 but i find 1/25 gives smoother video. I usually ride fully MANUAL too, gain set to 0. Does the -3db give any improvements?

I watch 28 days later and it was shoot on XL1's What I know about their setups is more or less that they had standard XL1's with broadcast optics. (I guess they used some form of a adapter)
I found that it had good quality overall (some scenes gave away that it was a DV camera but most diden't) so I feel my camera still has a lot of potential I don't know how to handle.

I'm going to put loads of effort into the lightning to get really balanced light.

I want to know if you can do anything to reduce compression (I know that it's not common I browse this forum several times aday so I'm pretty up to date) but I want to know the tricks of the trade. Filters, other lenses?, signal management and so on.

You basically cannot decrease the compression, it is fixed at
5:1. You can ofcourse give it the best signal possible by shooting
with enough light.

Keep in mind that frame mode will lower the resolution, so will
shooting at 1/25th. Better to stick at 1/50th if you want max
resolution. I believe most of 28 days was shot interlaced as
well.

-3 db helps to eliminate noise and thus get the most clean signal
to the compression chip as possible. The more noise in the signal,
the sooner you will start to see the compression (basically).

Also keep in mind that the 16:9 mode will NOT add resolution but
actually SUBSTRACT resolution since the camera is just cropping
the footage (resolution loss) and then stretch it (sharpness loss).

Futher, you should shoot through the sweet spot of the lens
in the f4.0 - f5.6 range as well if resolution is that important to
you.

If you have a full resolution picture exported from a movie you
shot that shows the resolution loss well, do put it up somewhere
so we can take a look.

As always something could be "wrong" with your camera as well.

hey if you really want a wide screen look why notput an anamorphic adapter on the lens (the dvx100 is a good choice, but gives a little bit of a fisheye) but that way you don't get the resolution loss.

If you are really worried about resolution maybe you should consider renting a DVCPro or DV50 for your short. You will get higher res but it's going to come at a higher cost. Like everything your have to weigh the compromises, DV can look good if well lit and carefull handled in post, 28 Days Later proved this.

what camera mode ?
 

Do you mean you shoot in Tv mode?

How do you do that ?

Thanks

Okay, from your questions I can see you don't know much about
this terminology or how your camera works. In that light I must
also doubt your statement about resolution a bit.

My first suggestion is you read the manual 10 times with the
camera next to you so you can check what the manual is
describing. Your question "how to shoot in the f4.0 - f5.6 range"
is easily answered with that. This is your iris setting for the lens.
The lower the number the more light comes and the higher the
number the less light comes in.

Interlaced has nothing to do with TV mode. TV mode is a mode
where you can control the shutter and the camera controls the
other settings.

Frame mode vs. interlaced is setup in your camera's menu and
is a different way of capturing the images all-to-gether. I would
first master the basics before touching on that subject.

I remembered something and see that you picked up TV mode
from our earlier thread here.

In that earlier thread I was referring to have a television (TV)
system is interlaced and not progressive (frame) mode.

The Canon XL1S also has a TV "mode" (shooting mode) where it
controls the camera for you, but you can still set the shutter
manually. It should also be able to record in progressive/frame
mode when you set it to TV, but I'm not 100% sure on that.

I can see how these two "TV modes" might be confusing. Sorry
about that.

Rob,
You are right, i should read the manual 10 times but it's boring learning the theory before facing the actual problem. So i am trying to proceed with a mixed of practice and theory.
Please feel free to simply send me back to the manual when ever you feel.

In this case i was interested on the subject issued by Andreas on how to get good video quality.
You mentioned that shooting at 1/50 is good for resolution. So i was asking how do you actually do that, how do you set your camera? do you have to shoot in Tv (time priority) mode?

thank you for your patience
stefano

Yes, you have to shoot in TV mode OR Manual mode in order to be able to ajust the shutter speed. You can adjust it with the two buttons at the bottom of the camera, near the iris wheel. You will have a resolution loss when you go lower than 1/50 .

I highly recommand to use your camera in MANUAL mode if you want to get maximum results of your XL1.

By the way, I never had to complain about the resolution of my XL1 (the old one, not the "s" and an NTSC version) even if it is projected on a big screen. The end result is always great!

I'm quite sure my camera is ok. I'm just picky I guess.

I've notived that interlaced gives quite an improvment over frame mode. But when I deinterlace my interlaced clips they still look "video" to my frame mode clips. I use Vegas 4.0 when I interlace. I use Vegas to edit and color correct too. Am I doing something wrong?

My movie is a no budget film and with my payments on the camera a anamorphic lens is not the way I can go right now.

So to recap, Sweetspot on the lens, 1/50 shutter, -3db on the camera along with a lot of light.

How come 1/25 reduces resolution to 1/50?


So I got a better grip on what parameters to operate my XL1 on.
Now I just have to figure out how to give it more exposiure latitude ;P and a more shallow depth of feild. I've been tempted to rent a Mini 35 but I can't seem to find anyone that have them for rent in Sweden. I also found some filters that give better exposiure latitude. I'm not sure if I am a believer or not yet.

Doing deinterlacing in post is difficult as you found out. The XL1
does a very special kind of "deinterlacing" that accesses the CCD
chips in a different way. You can basically never 100% reproduce
this effect in post.

See my reply in this thread for a bunch of links to other
threads that talk about the best de-interlacing options within
Vegas.

I'm not sure what the technical reason was again why any shutter
speed below 1/50 (PAL) or 1/60 (NTSC) looses resolution (I think
one field is discarded for some reason). I do know that if you
shoot frame mode you are not loosing any more resolution when
going to 1/25 since the camera is operating in a different way.

...just curious...what should be the first priority for picture quality (when some conditions like lighting can't be changed)...having the lens at f4.0 - f5.6 or gain at -3?

Fiftieth
 

Like Rob, I'm not totally clear about the shutter speed question.

It's obvious that at 25 frames per second, you're recording 50 fields per second so it would seem on the face of it that slowing the sutter to less than 1/50th should be impossible.

Does anyone know how slower speeds work? Does shooting a 1/25 simply record the same field twice?

Not sure this is of any real importance but I'd like to know.

Roger