Finally... my XHA1 and Redrock M2 rig...
 

Anyone here of any huge problems using GG adapters and HDV? I heard there are some grain issues... anyone got any fixes?

Have a look at some of the pix.
Anyhoo... enjoy... will get some footage up tommorow..

Matt

The worst part is, I got it about 4 hours ago, and I havent even shot anything with it yet... jsut couldn't resist.

Matt, i say u head over tomorrow, we'll shoot some footage, see how well it handles on my merlin, I am actually curious to see how also the footagae looks on my 24 inch dell, & for fun, we'll throw the footage on my projector too!

Hey man... I am busy today, but how about Sunday... maybe this morn I am busy at 2pm today. gimmie a call. My number is on my MSN name,

Wow- what an impressive rig.
Post some vids when you're ready.

I just need to go grab some BNC cables and a BNC to RCA adapter... then I'll shoot some stuff and get it up.

I am absolutley amazed by the lowlight capabilities of this camera. I got exposure with a single 60watt bulb i my room last night, through the M2 and a 1.8 lens without gain... truly impressive, although anything above 6db of gain is approaching unacceptable and the Noise Reduction REALLLLY ghosts...

OKay, first testing note... the motor mount must be all the way at the bottom or else its visibile in the M2... the XHA1 can BARELY zoom in and keep focus... its pretty much the zoom hits the right angle of view, it snaps into focus, and a mm further and you lose everything, so its critical to be zoomed in jsut enogh
will come up with a number soon

It should be right around Z 50... please confirm this when you can. Thanks a bunch! Great pics!

Really? Mine is at 70...


What gives?

I have it hardmounted with the 72mm achromat... I might need to remove some spacing via UV filters... hmmm...

EDIT: I removed a UV filter and got it down to 63... trying to get one more off, but it's stuck pretty tight!

Oh no, if you're saying it's 70, then that's what it is. I don't have an M2. And I didn't realize you could focus that close at 70. Sure appreciate the quick response with the Z number,

Okay, so, It seems at 68 I can get the Ground Glass in Focus, but I am still getting vignietting cause I can't zoom in quite far enough and retain focus...

Any ideas?

EDIT: Sorry chris, didn't read your post...

It seems around 70 is the magic number. However, I am getting some vignietting and I want to get the zoom to about 75 while still being able to focus... would a spacer tube acieve this? I am a little rusty on my Optics Knowledge...

Matt

P.S. Henry Cho, if you read this post, please respond... I think me and you are the A1/M2 pioneers...

Very interested in using the Redrock with my A1 but am very interested in the grain, especially against a light background when panning the camera. I've used two different versions of the LETUS on my XL-2 and really like the adaptor, but am curious if the Redrock is better for HD.

A full uncompressed file posted would probably be hugely popular and much appreciated for those of us still waiting on making a decision. I know beggars can't be choosers, but a few clips inside and outside close ups and wide exterior with camera move would be MUCH appreciated. Thanks for your efforts!

Cant post anything yet to due to hardware needing upgrade (processor!) webspace down and being incredibly busy, but here are some purely subjective things I have noticed using the A1, M2 combo

(Watched on colour-corrected 42" Sony Bravia with SXRD via component cables)


-Colour saturation is diminshed by maybe 5-10% via the adapter. This can be compensated for by boosting the colour gain in camera.

-Resolution seems degraded by about 5% (estimate) but this is also using Canon's 24F which apparently degrades res by nearly %30 (correct me if these #'s are wrong please!). However, Subjectivly, I think the 24F looks just as good as the 60i resolution wise, and for motion characteristic and strobing, it is identical to the DVX 100 and XL2... looks great!

-Grain: In a well lit situation, I didnt notice any extra grain, with gain settings on 0. The glass spins fast enough so that the HD doesn't pick it up. I heard some Vibrating adapters have issues with it, but the M2 seems to work jsut fine.

-Low light: The camera itself is a beauty in low light. Colours don't get muddy, and it exposes well. With the adapter, the lowlight drops by about 2 stops (using a 50mm 1.8 lens), so you need to compensate by adding more light (in a cinematic environment) or boosting the gain. I find that using 6db of gain is a good tradeoff between exposure and grain, or opening up the shutter to 1/24 of a second.

An interesting note, is due to the optics of this lens, I cannot quite zoom in far enoguh to remove 100% of the vignietting while still keeping focus. I don't know if a spacer tube is the answer, maybe someone can tell me. Also, the amount of zoom (69% according to the camera) gives the internal iris an f stop of 2.4, therefore, you lose even more light. I wouldn';t really use any lenses slower than 1.8, and for my next film, I am using only 1.4's

I am happy with the combo so far, but want to eliminate the vignietting (image circle isn't quite big enough) and play with the custom presets to help reduce nosie in the gain settings...

More to come soon, promise

Matt,

I can't find your number, i emailed you mine, gimme a call. My car is having prblems so I am pretty much immobile tomorow so head OVER! We'll shoot, experiement a little with the cam and we can transfer to m2t on my machine, and upload some footage for those on this forum

Cant wait to check out the rig again, altho it does look somewhat strange considering it's no longer the XL2!

Okay, your place sounds good... maybe tommorow afternoon. I'll call you at around 12:30

Do you have the achromat for the M2 Matthew?

Indeed! Doubt it would work without it.

I have the 72mm Achromat for HD from Redrock... The reason this is happening is that the A1's "telephoto near-focus" (I always forget, is this macro or micro) is a little weak...

Hi Matthew. I have the M2 on an A1 and you can indeed get focus on the gg at the required zoom. I was also in your position and thought perhaps a spacer was needed.

Ok this is much easier to do on a HD monitor but I have also tried it on the LCD and it worked.

FYI I am sliding my m2 all the way hard against the achromat itself. OK so as per the manual zoom in so in your frame you can see the semi circle of the gg filling your frame.

Then get a hard source light point your rig at it then move it off centre left or right until you have some shadows appearing on the opposite side in your frame. Make sure your gg is switched OFF. At this point you should be able to get good focus on the GG.

Then zoom just a little and repull your focus, and repeat until your vignetting is gone.

Henry actually came up with this method and it worked perfectly for me.

Ah, but you see, my M2 is hardmounted to the adapter so I am a little closer to the M2 body than you are I believe... I may add a little tube to help...

Sorry, are you saying your achromat is not connected at all to the body? Or just with the hood ?

Also, what is your zoom # at... I added my little tube, and it seems to work a bit better now, can zoom into 73 and maintain focus

You are using the m2 with 72mm HD achromat. This should work. No spacer needed. Sorry have no idea what the z was at.

i screw the achromat onto the camera, then push the m2 as close at it will go, hard against the achromat.

BUt do you still have the little plastic thingee (Uh, it's a 55mm UV filter and then maybe a 3/4 tube made of plastic) still attached? It's what the rubber hood used to be attached to...

That would provide a certain amount of distance, and since I put it back on, it focuses better... the threads on it just are stripped out cause of the plastic.

Would love to hear Henry weigh in, cause I know his is hardmounted. I think today I'll try and take some M2 footage to post and see if I have gotten rid of the horrible vignietting.

Matthew, any luck yet? I'm seriously considering this a G1. In fact you beat me to it, so I have real need to know this. Also, 35mm lens are you using? I have access to some old Nikon F lens'. An 85 and 150 and a few others.

Thanks, and yeah, it looks awesome.

I, I got it sorted out by throwing a few extra uV filters in place... no spacer tube is needed, just needs to be the normal length away... (Mine was shorter due to modification) Zoom number is 73, fstop, 2.6 making it eat a bit more light... ergh.

Will post some stuff as soon as my comp is upgraded@!

Sorry Matthew didnt realise you were on a modded unit. Thus the variance. I would invest in a spacer and get rid of those UV filters if I were you. Any additional glass is going to degrade your image.

Anyone knows if the magnet trick works with the A1? Or if it has a on-camera "image flipper"?

Ditto on the extra glass, especially if it's cheaply coated, it'll mess with your image.

Depending on the design, you could remove the glass from the filters and retain the bezels as a temporary spacer.

OH, no glass :P I smashed it long ago... *evil Grin*

matt, congrats on finally getting your a1. it seems like you got some of your a1/m2 issues out of the way, and the rig is looking fantastic. can i ask how you're managing to get the rods pushed through the camera baseplate? are you shimming the m2 itself?

in any case, this is the way i have my setup currently configured:

m2 --> 55mm uv (the one that came pre-attached to the m2) --> 55mm male-to-male coupler ring --> 72mm-55mm stepdown ring --> 72mm hd achromat --> a1.

i'm using the achromat itself to attach and detach the m2 from the camera.

i also nudged the motor in the m2 up just a smidge (about a mm) from the very bottom so that i could clear the ground glass and motor at reasonably similar times. i found i had to zoom in a little too far to clear the edges of the gg when i had the motor pushed all the way down.

with zoom set at 69/70, i'm getting no visible vignetting and an aperture of f2.4 with the iris wide open.

EDIT:

oh i see... you're using the cavision baseplate.

just to add... i found the a1's peaking and magnify focus assist tools work beautifully together, and are invaluable for setting accurate focus marks with the m2.

How about some footage someone? I'd really like to see the M2 with the A1 as that is a route I am considering.

hey martry, from your post in the premiere forums, you will see I am still waiting to upgrade my comp. I cant really edit and capture the HDV yet, but by the end of the week, it should be good.

Will have it up REALLLY Soon... promise.

Sorry henry, missed your post..

Yes, the peaking while recording is truly great. Makes focusing the M2 so much easier! and getting focus on the GG is easier too!

I am still working out my best system... I am currently zoomed to 73 with an fstop of 2.6, but would love the extra light, so I'll try moving my motor up a touch... how much would you say, a few mm?

hard to give an exact measurement. as you probably know, moving the motor around is an inexact procedure... it took me a few tries before i got it acceptably close. i'm inclined to say it was about 1mm -- it was really just a baby nudge at the end.

Matt just shoot with ur cam, and then bring the tape and camera over on thurs,we can do a quick transfer (& edit) if necessary.

Around 10%:

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showpost....2&postcount=17

Thank you Mathieu, I didnt think it could possibly be 30%!

I finally have the GG in a good spot, zoomed to 68, fstop of 2.4, sharp edge to edge.

Mike: Yeah, this week is jsut crazy. Thursday aint gonna work again and then this weekend I am on a shoot and animating all weekend, but next week I can definatly get some stuff up! I did shoot a bit last night and convert it to HDWMV but again my webspace is locked up at the moment. I hate to keep you all waiting so long!

Matt

Any news on posting some footage?

Happy for you, but If lcd can't be flipped, where's the point?

Pretend it's a view camera and learn to shoot with an upside down image:)