Feature film in Brazil - some images
 

Hi,
Our camera was rented to a feature film in Brazil.
It's a country movie, about a 70 years old man.
Roberto Laguna was the DP, and Paulo nascimento is the director.
The camera is a F330 with 17x Fujinon.

http://www.lumiere.com.br/cinemadigi...1-valsa-04.jpg
http://www.lumiere.com.br/cinemadigi...6-valsa-21.jpg
http://www.lumiere.com.br/cinemadigi...7-valsa-08.jpg

You can see more images at www.lumiere.com.br/cinemadigital

Gérson Becker

great shots....these XDCAM cameras make some great pictures. are the images you posted graded or straight out of the camera?

thanks for sharing

also: What Lens did you use?

Thanks

ULi

Hi Paul, thanks.
The images are straight from the camera. The grading will begin next week, and after that the transfer to 35mm, using Scratch at some point.

Hi Uli,
The lens is a Fujinon XS17x5.5BRM-M38 and a coral 1 filter was used aolmost all the time.

Gérson

There seems to be quite a bit of chromatic abberation in the second picture. Is it the lens? How are you going to deal with that?

I've seen the same problem with my set-up and have seen it on other camera/lens combinations. This pattern always manifests itself as a blue outline on the right hand side of an object when there is high contrast involved. It is most problematic at the long end of the lens with a wide open aperture.

Some have speculated that it's a type of CCD overload. It's hard to put it down as strictly CA due to the lens because I've seen it on different camera/lens combinations... even network golf broadcasts. It seems to be more like a set of conditions that can bring out this problem across many camera/lens platforms.

-gb-

Hi Jiri,
This a problem that appears since we bought the camera. The DP was aware of this limitation. And tried to avoid the set up were the problem appears.
As Greg sad, it's not a lens problem.
Joseph posted a link were Sony talks about a replace to the filter optical unit.
Seems they find the problem:
http://195.2.37.154/indexes/pi/EB/Feb_2007/00043097.pdf

Gérson

Wow Gerson, this is significant. Thanks so much for that link! As I said, I've had this situation before, but have learned what conditions cause it and how to avoid them.

-gb-

Wow, those are some nice screen shots.... i can't wait to see a little bit of footage from your film. There is a definate lack of sample footage in the XDCam forum..... It would be great to see some good footage to showcase what the camera can do. what i've seen so far makes the XDCam comparable to High end Canon footage (XHA1, XLH1).... Thanks

Optical Filter Replacement
 

For those who haven't checked, the replacement filter is $372.67. I'd love to know if anyone has made the purchase and successfully done the adjustment procedure after replacing the filter, as it looks a bit involved.

And, of course, I'd love to see the results.

Any possibility that newer XDCAM units are fitted with this new filter and not the old one? We shoot with an F330 now but are considering purchasing an F350...

Thanks,

Erik

This sounds like a design flaw. If I read this correctly the CCD block is overly sensitive to UV. As most lenses only offer chromatic correction for light in the visible spectrum a CCD block over sensitive to UV would exhibit excessive CA caused by UV light which will come into focus at a shirter focal length than visible light, hence the fringing. This is a common problem with some of the telescopes I use for astro photography. The fix there is to use a UV filter or special minus violet filter that cuts off the Violet and UV end of the spectrum.

As Greg has said this would explain why this crops up with many lens/camera combinations. I wonder if it is why some HDCAM's seem to exhibit a lot of CA.

According to my Sony dealer, who talked to his Sony Rep today... new production cameras have the new filter in place.

PDW-F330L SERIAL # 10,001–10,372

PDW-F350L SERIAL #10,001–10,515

Peter

hmm.. My serial goes into 11.

Thanks for the feedback, this is very interesting. Does it mean that if the camera HAS the proper filter, the CA (or whatever it is) will be eliminated, or at least less pronounced? And if so, is this a common issue with other cameras using a built-in filter wheel?

I used to have a Sony DSR500 with a Fujinon lens and CA never came up. Perhaps I never noticed it and being in the SD domain, it wasn't that much of an issue. With my more recent JVC HD100, which doesn't have a filter wheel, the CA was a major problem, particularily with the stock lens. I have also seen it with the Sony HVR-V1U, which of course doesn't have a filter wheel either.

Hence the question: how much is this an optical issue vs. chip/filter wheel matter?

My guess is that newer cameras with the filter will exhibit significantly less CA. This may be a problem particular to the F330/F350. The CA shows up in SD from time to time on my F350. It is probably more pronounced due to the smaller chip size. I will be getting mine done.