HD100 filmout to show in LA and Chicago

[Charles Papert]

Andrew, as I said in another thread somewhere today, thanks for inviting me to participate and incorporating my footage in your presentation. Great hearing your stories from the jungle too.

[Barry Werger]

I also tried hard to see HDV artifacts, and saw few if any in the film-out! The same material, projected digitally, had many (especially in the rainy scenes). So it seems to me that either DuArt's film-out process was able to reduce or eliminate these artifacts, or the digital projection (and other digital display technologies) tend to enhance them. In any case, for the film-out, it really didn't look like an issue for the JVC.

As for colors - Andrew Young did his own film-outs, no? I found the film-out color to be much more suited to the material than the digitally projected colors...

[Michael Pappas]

Hi Barry,

I wish I could have met you. This sucks, we all need to coordinate in future events for ways that DVinfo and DVXuser people can connect.



Michael Pappas
Arrfilms@hotmail.com
PappasArts & Arrfilms Main site

CONTACT VIA AOL INSTANT MESSENGER
AT { PAPPASARTS2 }


XLH1 and HVX200 frame grabs and news here:
http://www.pbase.com/Arrfilms

http://www.PappasArts.com
http://www.Myspace.com/PappasArts

[Barry Jenkins]

Originally Posted by Charles Papert

Barry, it's interesting that you favorably noted the color imaging on the Mini35 clips--I was a bit disappointed in the rendition as it was noticeably off from the originals (which can be viewed/downloaded here); in fact I would quantify it similarly to the Andrew's footage in that it was rather ruddy and brownish with reduced saturation in the greens, somewhat sepia as Michael P. noted.

Gotcha. You know, I should have qualified that my personal preference with any video for film look application is a REDUCED tonal range, and that the place I thought that was best represented AND indicative of video as replicating filmic color was the plant shot; the others I'd agree the colors were a bit off but that plant shot I was very pleased the greens you guys got.

Also, I thought Andrew said he'd fudged with the colors a bit in your footage?

[Barry Jenkins]

Originally Posted by Michael Pappas

I wish I could have met you. This sucks, we all need to coordinate in future events for ways that DVinfo and DVXuser people can connect.

You know, that was my first time at one of these things and I've only been on the board a week or two so i figured i'd just stick to lurking. Seeing you and Shannon chatting up Papert was sort of an "All Stars of the HD Boards" conglom. Very cool :)

Originally Posted by Michael Pappas

The HVX200 holds up on the screen because it handles highlights and tone very well. A gorgeous well balanced image. As i said in the past res is only one factor, tone, color, ped, enhancement and high light control just to name a few are so important. Now if you do couple this with a high res ccd ( 1 million pixels and up ), well then you will have one hell of a camera.

And yes, I meant to say this: Even in the ragged quicktimes of your one chip recording a blind HVX Blowup on film, I felt like that stuff was better than the JVC last night (and Mike, the HVX projected footage from before was 720p without a Mini35, correct?).

In the pre-screening talk up, I felt the specs on the JVC were impressive for that price point, but felt the images didn't match the potential.

[Michael Pappas]

Hi Barry,

The HVX was straigt from the lens, no adapter. I am going to be posting some more very soon from the H1 and HVX200 off the screen. The H1 will be digital, however you will see how the H1 HD looked projected. Very nice looking.....

Here is a quote from a white paper on HDV.

{ So an HDV image encoded at 25 Mb/s (IBP) is roughly equivalent to an I-frame image-encoding of about 60 Mb/s. So, when comparing two compression schemes, remember that the higher bitrate version may not necessarily provide the better image quality }

Here is the link to the HDV white paper on HDV.

http://www.pinnaclesys.com/BSD/liqui..._HDV_40804.pdf


[QUOTE=Barry Jenkins] (and Mike, the HVX projected footage from before was 720p without a Mini35, correct?).

[Tim Holtermann]

Michael, I'm glad someone else has the same viewpoint I do about HDV. It really gets a bad rap. The way JVC is only saving 24p with HDV reduces the compression amount, it only looks at 6 frames for it's GOP and It seems to really make a difference.

As I've said over on the DVX forum, while the footage on 35mm wasn't the best I've seen it was very impressive considering it was shot with a stock camera and lens in bad conditions. To me this is much more real world than someone loading the camera up with thousands in accessories, high end lenses, etc.

[Chris Hurd]

There was some cross-posting between this thread and a newer one on the same topic over in the HD Acquisition forum, so I've merged the two of them together.

[Jim Giberti]

Originally Posted by Charles Papert

Andrew, as I said in another thread somewhere today, thanks for inviting me to participate and incorporating my footage in your presentation. Great hearing your stories from the jungle too.

Hey Charles, I meant to tell you how much I appreciated the test you did with the HD100 and P&S.
It actually helped me make what had to be a quicker decision than I planned on HD, and based on last nights shoot I'm very glad I did.

[Brian Duke]

What's your decison after tonight?

[Jim Giberti]

Originally Posted by Brian Duke

What's your decison after tonight?

I'm not sure what you mean if your asking me.

[Sean Dinwoodie]

As stated it needs to be stressed that this camera was just, taken out of the box fiddle with for a half an hour, just set to the default settings, a non-conforming standard defintion wide angle adapter was glued on, and thrown into the jungle!!!

Having said all that I think it proved to be awsome. The video held up. There was adequate resolution for a film transfer period.

I bought my first DV camera in 1995....I learned in 1995 to shoot as close to the color saturation, contrasts, and whites, etc... Paint when I shoot, not in post...We need to do that with HDV, big deal I'm used to it.

[Andrew Young]

Thanks to all for the comments. I know that what I showed was not so much "here's what it can do" and more "don't try this at home," but I'm glad people got something out of it – it’s interesting to hear the different reactions. I’m just sorry that I didn’t get to meet all of you and hear what others are doing with this medium. Extra thanks to Charles for doing that mini35 test and taking part in the presentation.

Originally Posted by Charles Papert

I was a bit disappointed in the rendition as it was noticeably off from the originals

Sorry we didn’t make more of an effort to time your footage to the original, Charles. We did it under the gun for the New York event and never had a chance to revisit it. (Excuses, excuses.)

Originally Posted by Charles Papert

Seeing Andrew's footage digitally projected I felt the color was more accurate.

I agree. The color corrected 1080p HD master on CRT looked best of all, but the filmout process was not really completed. Normally, a timer would screen the video and make additional corrections to the print. That was not done in this case. I'm afraid real jobs took precedence. Oops, more excuses :)

Originally Posted by Barry Jenkins

...the Safari footage looked a bit "dull" with colors that I'd best describe as "only going so far"...

I do feel that out of the out of the box, I prefer the Panasonic color pallet to the HD100. I'm going to have to start playing with those color matrixes. Perhaps I'll give Tim's DVX match settings a try.

Originally Posted by Barry Jenkins

...the closeups Andrew shot with a few diopters were EXQUISITE in the blow-up...

I think the reason for this (apart from the fact that close-ups always fare better in small formats) is that I was able to control the lighting in these set-ups, so I was dealing with a much more manageable contrast ratio. Out in the open in the (albeit rare) equatorial sun, the contrast was absolutely brutal, and that had a negative impact on a number of those shots - even in terms of color. I think the limited contrast ratio in Charles' material (as in my close-ups) is one of the reasons it holds up so well.

I did forget to point out (but I'm sure many noticed) that the really big views with fine detail (e.g. leaves) are the shots that most clearly show the limitations of the 1/3" chip. If only we could just stick low-con close-ups...

Originally Posted by Michael Pappas

About the film out. It felt like video more than I liked. Highlights were just too video.

I think this video look (which I also see) is a function of the default detail setting, which is way too high. I think it is less noticeable on the mini35 footage because of the slight softening that is inherent in that process. I'm curious to know if you thought the sequence of the girl painting (which was done with detail off) looked any better. It does to me.

Originally Posted by Charles Papert

I think it's worth nothing that Andrew's footage contained many scenes that are real compression challenges, such as running water

Yes, I did forget to mention yesterday how remarkable it is that those shots in heavy rain showed no compression artifacts.

Originally Posted by Brian Duke

Is it possible that you may post your process after finsihing editing to 35mm film. Like what steps you took, methods, recommendations and what to perhaps stay away from (E.g. FILMOUT).

Will do Brian, as soon as I get a chance. Got a shoot coming up so it may be a bit. Sorry.

Originally Posted by Michael Pappas

Someone needs to give Andrew a deal on a quality lens adapter and scrap that make shift one...

Well, if your going to go to the trouble, why don't you just send me a 13x? I promise I won't get it wet! :)

[Brian Duke]

Originally Posted by Jim Giberti

I'm not sure what you mean if your asking me.

You said the night made it easier for you to make a decision, so I asked what it was.

[Tim Dashwood]

My apologies in advance to Andrew and Stephen since I won't be able to attend in Chicago. I had my fingers crossed, but my clients keep asking for revisions, so no time to spare.

I hope it goes well, and please let me know how my nighttime exteriors look on the 35mm blowup.

thanks,
Tim