Sumix 2/3" 1920x1080 CMOS
 

Let me be the first to present the new Sumix camera:

http://www.sumix.com/products/camera...a2m/index.html

2/3" 1920x1080 progresive CMOS capturing at 60fps and sending the stream to the computer via GigE with optional hardware lossless compression.

I can't breathe...

Wait... For the best is yet to come.

It costs $2500 with a special price for pro filmmakers: $2000 limited to one camera.

Images and clips soon. They start shipping on end October.

I think they mentioned in Wayne's technical thread that they will be releasing a new version using the P4562-3T sensor in a few months... do you have any new info about this?

The P4562-3T is a 2k chip whereas the current version will only be 1920, do you think it would be worth waiting for the extra resolution?

I too have been waiting for someone to release either an Altasens or Kodak based head in the $2000 range. Hearing the price range for the Sumix is indeed exciting news. Jose, since it is a 2/3" sensor, are you still planning on using a 35mm adapter?

Any word from Sumix on recording software?

This latest Sumix news is very promising.

"I think they mentioned it in Wayne's technical thread" -- yep, see the current last page (I was wondered what Jose thought about this camera). Finally the digital revolution is going our way...

I didn't know about the 2K sensor. I'll ask them.

Of course it'll be worth to wait for the extra resolution as long as you need it. I mean, if you need to shoot something soon, 1080p is just about 6% less resolution than 2K. IMHO that's enough for most projects and even if your film is getting to theaters, fullHD can hold it without any major visual problem.

As for me, I'll probably buy this one and the 2K version too, because that way I'll have two Altasens 2/3" cameras for less than a Silicon Imaging 2kMini. Of course I won't have Cineform, but these Sumix cameras include hardware lossless compression, that's something to think about.

2/3" is a good size. It's right in the line between something that needs an adaptor and something that starts offering a pretty decent DOF. I've seen some Silicon Imaging DOF tests and I don't think it's worth adding an adaptor, just because of the loss of light and sharpness. You can always buy a tele lens if you need more DOF.

I'll ask for more details on the recording software too.

By the way, I hadn't read the technical discussion thread, so I didn't know you actually knew about this cam.

Sorry to claim I was the first to talk about it.

I'm thinking about the lenses too... I've got 3 very good FD mount primes and 6 EF zooms. All from Canon and all quite sharp and fast.

I know with a 2/3" sensor they'll all look a bit telephoto but even Silicon Imaging says their cameras can be used with those lenses (and even PL mount ones).

So what do you think? Is there some kind of c-mount to EF-mount adaptor? Is it worth it? Should I buy a good c-mount zoom and forget about larger ones?

How do they determine who is a pro filmmaker?

I guess it means "everyone who's using the camera with filmmaking purposes". I supose companies requiring machine vision devices will say so and, very important, will want more than one.

The rolling shutter isn't a problem?

Is it a problem in the Silicon Imaging cam?

I think the SI2K overcomes rolling shutter effects by shooting at twice the speed and dropping every other frame. Since the Sumix handles 60fps, I would expect it is capable of a similar solution, although custom software might be necessary.

Ok! But: http://www.sumix.com/img/screens/m73_2large.png
It's still bad. IN SUMIX WE TRUST:)
I am sorry for my English.

Mmm... You know that's from a totally different camera, don't you?

Excuse me, HV20 is only $960:
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=104431
I will purchase "SUMIX" the first, if ...

Sumix camera does 60fps and the sensor size is 2/3" (dynamic range is also better than hv20)

It is a true. But an unavailing picture turns out. Hard pixel pattern and a problem like "chromatic aberrations".

The Sumix also has an option for greater sensitivity using the whole sensor at 720p. Look, we already know the HV20 is a great camera. It's been tested against more expensive and more "professional" cams and turns out to be better than many of them. I'll always think Canon didn't actually want to build such a high quality cam. I tend to think they were trying to make a good consumer camera and they did it so well that they found themselves with the best HDV cam they had made to the day.

We also know the HV20 has a great progressive mode and with the help of a 35mm adaptor, you can get an image and motion feeling quite close to film. It's in fact an option if you want to start as a filmmaker.

That being said, we're also here to discuss other possible options when you want to go a step further in moviemaking. Options that offer 12bits of color depth, square pixels, real progresive... and, in a few months, 2K resolution. Appart from the fact that this camera doesn't need a 35mm adaptor to get a shallow DOF.

By the way, what's hard pixel pattern?

I think he means bayer artifacts, which can be solved just by using a better debayer. Chromatic aberrations can fixed by using a good lens :)

At an magnification a structure of square elements is expressly visible.
I am very interested in the good quality of SUMIX, to utillize with device of motion-control in my studio.

I always thought square pixels were better than all those strange pixel ratios you find everywhere. I mean, with a 1,0 ratio, every pixel is where it's suposed to be.

By the way, where can I find about c-mount to EF adapters?

Wow that seems to be a pretty cool thing. Now I need some money to get one ;)

Jose,
I had a number of Pentax P mount SLR lenses and got a cheap C-mount adapter to use them when I first got my Sumix. This is a good way to cheaply test the camera before hunting down C-mount lenses. The optical quality should be good enough (though some people debate that point), but the main drawback is that even a 28mm (wide for 35mm) is a mild telephoto for these cameras. If you like using long lenses anyway then you're done! I had a quick search through Google and got results for a couple of secondhand EF to C-mount adaptors on ebay, so obviously these are available. Also came across this article:


http://vsd.pennnet.com/Articles/Arti...ICLE_ID=236708

You're right John. I can't use 35mm lenses.

I've been looking at Fujinon and they've got some pretty impressive stuff at the CCTV section. They even have zooms equipped with 3 motors to control iris, zoom and focus. Too bad the control box doesn't have potentiometers, just three switches. It would be really hard to get a sharp focus while recording just using switches. Nevertheless they've got some good fixed focal 5 megapixel lenses specifically made for 2/3" sensors. Maybe three of them (16mm, 50mm and 75mm). The 50 and the 75 may be too close in lenght but they don't have anything bigger. I could use a 1" sensor 75mm though, so it works as a 100mm (more or less) or even more for 2/3" sensors.

They're not too expensive. About $300 each.

The other thing I forgot to mention to be aware of when using still camera lenses for video use is that some lenses may show "breathing" when you focus. This means that there will be a slight change of image size when you focus, even though you didn't zoom. Not normally noticeable when used for still photography, but can be a problem for critical film making use. Just how much of a problem is down to particular lenses, so cant say anything useful about it except to look out for it.

$300 sounds like a good price for a new HiDef C-mount lens. Second hand "classic" C-mount lenses can be cheap, but very often you need to factor in lens servicing ("colimation") which can cost much more than the lens in order to get professional image quality. I recently bought a second hand 26mm Bausch & Lomb C-mount lens for just $40 which was very sharp. But a Taylor Hobson Cooke lens costing the same amount was all over the place and will need servicing. With second hand gear sometimes you're lucky, sometimes not.

Thanks John,

I still have to ask Fujinon about that zoom. If it can be detached from the motor part or manipulated by hand even with it attached, it would still be a good purchase. It's a 10-160mm F2.5 zoom.

Ok. The guy at Fujinon says the zoom wasn't made to hold more than 600-700 lines of vertical resolution. He also says if the motor part is detached, the rings would be too loose. Too bad.

I asked him which lens would make a good fast varifocal c-mount for HD and 2K resolutions. If the answer's not too clear I'll buy 3 different fixed ones.

Are there any other companies offering high quality sharp c-mount zooms?

I got a reply from Sumix. Not all answers but they say the camera's been designed modular, so all they have to do is put the 2K sensor instead of the HD one. They'll do it in a few months.

By the way, the hardware lossless compression is about 1:1,7. Not too much but it still sounds good.

I am also interested in buying one of these 1" HD lenses from Fujinon. But I can't figure out what a normal lens would be.

For 16mm cameras they say that a normal lens is twice the diagonal of the film negative. But this is for a 4:3 image I guess. How is this for a 2.40:1 image (non anamorphic in this case).

A 2.40:1 image on my 1" sensor would be 14.2 mm x 5.9 mm, diagonal 15.4 mm. So that would be a 30 mm lens, or should I get closer to the diagonal because a widescreen image is supposed to be shown wide, maybe a 15mm lens.

For me the exciting potential of an affordable HD camera like the Sumix is the learning opportunities it provides. Generally people learn by doing, but it used to be too expensive to get the experience. A long time ago I used to shoot short 16mm projects but even the laboratory costs were untenable. Similarly, in 35mm stills photography it took quite a while to get a "thousand frame experience" with a camera (curbed by cost rather than enthusiasm), but it’s now possible to shoot over a thousand frames in one weekend with a DSLR if the event inspires you enough. Of course keep reading books and internet articles, but being able to shoot regularly increases the feedback you need not only to personally find out what works, but also make unique discoveries that no one else has found.

To do all this the cost of filming and making a film needs to come down. Which it has! And if your film already costs nothing, then the cost of the cinema camera (and consumables) is the only thing left that can be price cut. At the moment I think Sumix will get closer to meeting that need than anyone else we know. This makes me hopeful; it is good for morale. The days of people re-mortgaging their house to pay for a film, possibly risking a debt that will follow them around for the rest of their lives, should be over. No one should have to do that to make a speculative independent film; it’s ridiculous.

I don’t pretend that it’s likely you can make a film for next to nothing that will set Hollywood on fire -- though you should aim for that! What I do like about these latest developments and price points is that independent filmmakers might get almost the same freedom as stills photographers to find their voice: to be able to walk away financially from a film project that doesn’t connect with a buyer (and just go on to the next one). Keep making films, keep learning, and if you do manage to craft a marketable product, at least the camera format won’t hold you back. Usually sales reps and distributors want to know: "Who’s in it, how much was the budget, what was it shot on?" Well, having one out of three is a start. HDV may be better than it has a right to be, but shooting closer to cinema standards (now that we may be able to afford it) sends the right message about our professional awareness and commitment to the work. Ironically, this differential may become more important to exhibitors the better "every day" consumer cameras get.

After that, it’s all about the story, which is a harder problem to solve without money unless you have talent (coupled with experience) which can make all the difference. With affordable HD cameras coming along, there are no more excuses -- it’s down to us now. If we can stop worrying about the technical quality of the pictures (because we don’t need to worry about them anymore), maybe we’ll get back to worrying about how good our writing is and the other creative decisions we would prefer to be judged on.

All the best,
John.

We're living exciting times John!

By the way, Take, Fujinon has different lenses designed for different sensor sizes. You don't have to calculate everything because it's already been done for you. If you have a 1" sensor and want to shoot with a focal lenght very close to human eye, just choose a 50mm 1" prime. Sometimes the inches are there to specify non standard C-Mounts but with Fujinon, they're there to match the sensor size. So when you see " 2/3" 50mm F2.5 " that's a F2.5 50mm lens designed for a 2/3" sensor.

Jose,

I hope they are not converting focus length based on sensor size. 50 mm would be way to narrow for a 1" sensor, even more so for a 2/3" sensor.

They do specify angle of view:
a 12.5 mm has a angle of view of 54 degrees on a 1" sensor.
a 16 mm has a angle of view of 43 degrees on a 1" sensor.
a 25 mm has a angle of view of 28 degrees on a 1" sensor.
a 35 mm has a angle of view of 20 degrees on a 1" sensor.
a 50 mm has a angle of view of 14 degrees on a 1" sensor.
a 75 mm has a angle of view of 9 degrees on a 1" sensor.

This is from a wikipedia article:
Ultra wide-angle lenses, also known as fisheye lenses, cover up to 180°
Wide-angle lenses generally cover between 100° and 60°
Normal, or Standard lenses generally cover between 50° and 25°
Telephoto lenses generally cover between 15° and 10°
Super Telephoto lenses generally cover between 8° through less than 1°

So my real question is actually what is the normal angle of view for a 2.40:1 movie. I couldn't really find anything on the internet except something about 50 degrees, which means the 12.5mm would be a normal lens.

So you're saying a standard view could be achieved with a lens between 12mm and 25mm and 50mm would be a clear telephoto.

Sorry, I didn't know that. I thought those measures were just 35mm equivalents.

By the way, where are those conversion charts (the Fujinon ones)? I need to see the values for 2/3" sensors.

If you click on the lens to see the information, just scroll down a little to show the angle of view. Like here:
http://www.fujinon.com/Security/Prod...x?cat=47&id=92

I just received my Fujinon lens.
I have not tried it yet, but the construction seems quite solid. Also interestingly there are 10 blades in the iris, It is pretty circular when almost closed or almost open, but is more star-like when medium open.

Any other info on this? Jose, you mentioned hardware lossless compression? Where did you hear about this? There is no mention of it anywhere. Sounds cool, but you cant guarantee lossless compression will maintain any particular compression ratio... and without it i dont see how they could be pushing 1080p60 over gigabit and definitely not at 12bit. If SI cant do it, how would sumix? hey if they really are finding a way to compress the data a little bit before running it over the gigE that would allow use of the full capabilities of the camera. If they can back this with good software, this could be very nice. rolling shutter is definitely still an issue, and that 1080p60 spec is probably only for 8bit. I'm surprised SI doesnt seem to have an option to output 8bit with the benefit of 33% higher framerates. Also, keep in mind that without a good raw compression option like cineform raw, you might need a RAID to capture stuff from this. anyone know if there are any differences between the versions of this altasens sensor? or is it just a couple of pixels of resolution?

Lots of questions!

Well... Hardware lossless compression is confirmed by people at Sumix. 1:1,7 ratio to be exact. SI can't extract 12bit at 60p because they don't compress the signal at all before reaching the computer. The software, as far as I know, is a new version of the standard Sumix tool to capture images and video. It can control every single aspect of the sensor from resolution to fps, and talking about fps, they're suposed to be very precise.

Rolling shutter may be highly reduced if you shoot ala SI2K, that is, you shoot at twice the fps and discard every other frame. That also gives you the 1/48 shutter speed you need to get a filmlike motion blur.

You don't need RAID to capture with this camera. People at Sumix are using 2,0Ghz processors and standard laptop HDDs to capture 1080p60 and the sensor is an AltaSens ProCamHD as well as the SI2K's.

By the way Take, keep us posted on the Fujinon lens. They're suposed to be quite good. In fact, SI was going to add a couple as part of the SI2K bundle.

Ok if there is no compression before reaching the computer, how can it be called hardware compression? (maybe it isnt supposed to be but that is what you said in the first post) and how can they put a 125MBps 1080p60 (8bit) data stream over gigE From my understanding, if highly optimized, you might be able to get 90MBps over GigE if you are really lucky? or is the 60fps number just a theoretical number for what the sensor is capable of?

Laptop HDDs eh? 12bit@1080p24 compressed 1.7 is around 45MBps which seems like it might be tough for a laptop HDD. Not impossible, but very tough to guarantee. How can they guarantee lossless compression at 1.7x? At least from my understanding, real non-destructive lossless compression on photographic images shouldnt be a problem at 2x, but technically if it is constant 1.7x compression it may not be nondestructive. What if you shoot a bunch of grain/noise? does it drop frames because the image compression ratio got too high to compensate, or does it start to become destructive to maintain the 1.7x compression? I think its a great idea, just trying to get an idea of what their version of "lossless" really means.

Sorry for all the questions, but i am intrigued and you seem to have answers. If they got it right with this camera, this could be big. I love the look of the altasens sensors. From what I've seen it appears to have greater dynamic range than RED.. and for $2000 instead of SI's $17k..

Im really excited, I can't wait. I have been anxiously waiting for the 353 for what seems like about a year, still nothing. But from what I gather this thing is even better.

Has anybody used Sumix cameras before? What is the software like?

I can't find much information about it on their site..

<edit>Never mind, I suppose its the CommandShot software. There is some information about it here:
http://www.sumix.com/products/cameras/software.html</edit>

well i wouldnt get too excited, i mean SI has had an equivalent camera out for nearly 2 years now i believe. Granted their version was $5k last i checked. Having worked with the M73 sumix camera, i would be careful not to expect too much. They are an industrial camera company, not digital cinema. The software for that camera has a lot of features, but was limited in some very important ways. I would not consider it ready for video production unless your idea of video production is hooking the camera up to your desktop computer, having a ton of control over the camera, but what seemed to be not particularly accurate framerates, no ability to optimize for rolling shutter, and a pretty tedious data workflow. When I was working with that other sumix camera, I tried to build my own software interface using their API, which is fairly easy to use, but all in all, it might be tough to get what you want from the camera unless you have serious programming skills or sumix really ramps up their support for tv/film production workflows in their software. When it comes down to it, these cameras have a few amazing features that you cant get unless you buy another camera that is 10x the price, but if you cant shoot with it or have to spend a year developing software and building hardware for it, its not worth much to someone who actually wants to shoot movies.

That of course isnt to say that the right person couldnt get a lot out of this camera.

True. This is the first camera Sumix is marketing as a "digital cinematography" camera though, so hopefully there will be more out of the box support and work flow accommodations. The extra bandwidth of GigE and on-camera compression is a great start.

Thats exactly what I had in mind :)

I dont know if you have been keeping up with my posts on the 333 thread, but I built a camera platform which integrates the desktop pc and camera into a single package. My new version is only a bit bigger, even possibly smaller then a pro shoulder cam like sony XDCAM for example.

The best thing about this setup is that when a new camera head comes out, all I do is replace the 333 with the Sumix and make any necessary adjustments to linux/windows environment. If I ever want to replace the Sumix, just remove it and mount a new head.

Im really looking forward to getting my hands on that API.