MX500, to sharpen or not to sharpen
 

Hi,

I am still uneasy about MX500 (or PV953). The more grabs I look at the more I see of a potential problem.

The last frames I have seen are kindly provided by Justin Boyle in previous thread about frame modes. As this question has nothing to do with that, here we are in another thread.

Those birds look like cut-outs, and the culprit is a thin white ghostly line encircling the bright foreground against dark background. I was told in another thread that this effect is a result of a too much sharpening done by the camera software.

I believe there is a control in MX500 to control sharpening.

This is a personal appeal to Justin or anybody else with MX500 or PV953.

Can you take a several short videos of a high contrast detailed object, something dark against bright background or light against dark background, with different levels of sharpening.

And post the grabs, please. I would like to see if the effect can be eliminated with that control and what price you pay in details.

Thanks

Ayosha,
Don't get too uneasy about sharpening. This camera has won accolades for its video quality and I'll bet the reviewers didn't do anything with sharpening from default. At least this camera gives you the option to control it which most do not. And, if we post them, what other cameras will you compare them to? They may look terrible when viewed in closeup but actually be 100 times better than other DV cams. No frame grabs are going to look like they were taken with a digital still camera.

Hi Guy,

I know, not much out there at that size and price bracket. Except maybe Canon MVX3i (Optura Xi).

Not many grabs from that one around but there were a couple of long shots and I watched them carefully and slowly and didn't notice that effect at all and the sharpness of the video was ok (the one inside with the dog, I believe was presented to this community in the thread about deinterlacing, here now gone: http://www.photomosaic.com/movies/CanonXiShort.wmv).

I know I should go and do trials by myself, but at this moment I cannot (no cameras and no time until end of Jan).

I am sure there are others interested in effect of the sharpness control.

I cannot be the only nutter around :-):-)

Best regards, have to log off, it is midnight here and my eyes are falling out with the screen strain (in spite of my new LCD screen).

ayosha do you have a digital video camera. if so what i suggest is that you get some frame grabs and put them on tape so that you can play them back on your tv. what you will find is that you wont see any of the halo effect. this is just a guess i haven't actually seen it as a problem myself. i haven't really seen it stand out a great deal. I can also tell you that i am a bit of a critic and a hard judge when if comes to AV. I guess i am at a point where i think my camera could be better in some places however for this price i don't think it could be beaten. i must point out also i got the camera second hand and less than half the retail price so that helps too. Look i will try to get some photos up on the web in the next few days. I will probably get one of the same bird all in normal or frame don't know which one yet and then i will get three photos one with sharpness turned down low one with it normal and one high. we will see what happens then.

talk to you later
Justin

Request Answered
 

Ok Ayosha,
Anyone who will watch a computer screen until their eyes fall out deserves to get a simple request. I have posted here some frame grabs with different settings of sharpness...0, 20, 50, 70 and 100 percent. All were shot with color set to 0. The light was halogen. The grabs were taken in Vegas 4.0 from 4:3 interlaced video that was rendered to progressive (blend fields). The .BMP files were pasted into Irfanview and converted to PNG (best quality). I don't know if it means anything but the files start at 351K at 0 sharpness and get progressively larger to 421K at 100%.

Now, I only notice a small difference in edge artifacts between 0 and 100%. Maybe someone else can comment on what to look for here.

As I expected, the noise gets amplified with more sharpening.

I normally shoot on the soft side, to minimise the effects of noise. In the sharpness setting bar, I go two notches left (less sharp).

hi Guy, I just realised that our equipment is pretty much the same, Fuji S602z and MX350 for me. I am sharing all my adaptor lenses and filters, at 55mm.

My PC is way down, though, at 800MHz, a real dinosaur.

<<<-- Originally posted by Yow Cheong Hoe : to minimise the effects of noise. In the sharpness setting bar, I go two notches left (less sharp). -->>>

YowCH,
So you set sharpness at 80% (two bars left of max)? Mine is usually set around 30-40%.

well it does seem that the halo effect is a little more present in the 100% photo. The halo is still present however in the first. Well it looks like you can't really get rid of it fully but as i noted i dont really think it is that noticeable in a moving picture nor on a tv screen. you can look at it on the computer and because of the high resolution and the proximity to the screen it is more visible. I really don't think it is a problem. go try the camera out in a store and plug it into a tv. if you have another minidv cam, get a tape and bring it into a store and try recording on different cams and the go home to look at the difference. make ur decision from there. I think though that you will be impressed with the 953 but it is up to you and i think you really need to see these frames on a tv. i know for me often i'm not happy looking at my footage on the computer screen but when i play it back on the tv i love it.

Justin

Yes, I have followed some of your threads where you speak of using the Fugi wide angle on the MX350. I really like the 602...decided to buy it over the Nikon and haven't regretted it. I don't have a wide angle yet.

<<<-- Originally posted by Guy Bruner : <<<-- Originally posted by Yow Cheong Hoe : to minimise the effects of noise. In the sharpness setting bar, I go two notches left (less sharp). -->>>

YowCH,
So you set sharpness at 80% (two bars left of max)? Mine is usually set around 30-40%. -->>>

Nope, I set sharpness at two notches left of the "zero" mark. Maybe there is no 'zero' mark on the NTSC machines. If that's the case, then about 30-40%. Definitely softer than the default setting.

YowCH,
There is no "0" mark on the 953. The indicator has 10 bars between the "Low" and "High" legend. There is a caret below the 5th bar to indicate midpoint. I interpret the bars from 0 to 10 or 0 to 100%.

What I see...
 

Hi Guy,

Thanks a million, for those tests, I owe you.

My tired eyes have, unfortunately, nothing to do with this and other forums (where fun and pleasure is) but with Tax Return deadline (pain and nothing but the pain there).

My conclusions based on those are:

Even at 0% sharpness there is a visible white halo on horizontal edges. Black halo is also present but not as strong, also only on horizontal lines. There is a very small amount of halo on vertical lines.

At 100% sharpness there is stronger white halo and black halo on horizontal lines and a very small amount on vertical lines.

Based on this and on other grabs I must conclude that the original halo effect on MX500 (PV953) is NOT caused but only worsened by sharpening. It mostly affects horizontal edges. The sharper the edge is and the stronger the contrast of that edge is (of the original subject), the stronger halo effect will be, before sharpening make it even more visible. ...Now that was an awkward sentence...

The effect cannot be avoided by setting sharpen to 0%.

I am not trying to rubish MX500 here, which I haven't tried yet, and about which almost everybody have a positive opinion.

Let me see if I can entice anybody in Canon forums to do a similar test with Xi :-)

For some reason I only get a dark blue screen when I click on that link, so I couldn't view "the halo." Were you shooting toward the sun by any chance?

<<<-- Originally posted by Frank Granovski : For some reason I only get a dark blue screen when I click on that link, so I couldn't view "the halo." Were you shooting toward the sun by any chance? -->>>

Link is fine here in my office, Frank. Is opening a bit slow for some reason. Could be because my bandwidth is over 3 Gig this month. Also, that album has some pretty large files in it. Hope you aren't on dialup...cause could take a while. No sun, t'was a moonshot :-).

Ayosha,
Taxes, eh. I heard rumors that the US separated from the UK way back when over taxes...that's why we don't have any here (he says playfully). Yeah, we can commiserate with you...our time is up in April. Also, if you can get come frame grabs to compare the DV953 to, that would be helpful. Having the ones I made is an interesting exercise without perspective.

Yuppers. Dial-up. I prefer moonshine myself. :-((

Plenty of tests and grabs here but no Xi

http://www4.big.or.jp/~a_haru/

The camera with minimum halo effect is Sony VX2000, but of course no info about sharpen settings.

Ayosha,
Most of the folks in this forum are familiar with that website of frame grabs. I refer folks to it when I see the "Compare DV953 to TRV950/GL2/(Insert your camcorder here)" type of posts. Someone commented that the site favored Sony cameras, the implication being that the shots were taken in a way to make the Sony look better than the others. I don't know that that is true, but, without any information on the standards for the tests, we can't make anything but a subjective comparison between the cameras.

What we really need in the video community is a website like the one Phil Askey has for digital still cameras...dpreview.com...that provides technically sound and consistent testing results. I mean, it's great to read and contribute to the subjective opinions, critical and positive posts on this and other boards. But, after the smoke clears, it is still one person's opinion versus another's.

I agree that is a great site for still cameras, I bought my Nikon after going through his (and some other lesser) sites more than once.

When I decided to go video that was the first site I visited, I was hoping to find a DV section there....

As for objectivity of that jap site, I failed to notice any bias at all. The only objection I have is the lack of data on how the cameras were set for the tests. Then again, if there were any texts there babelfish would probably scramble them into a proper jigsaw puzzle.

I cast my line over to DV board, there was a bit of a nibble but no bites so far :-)

Ok, if someone expresses interest but has no place to post, they can send the pix to me or register at my site and upload the pix into the Gallery.

BTW, for those folks who are reading the thread but are unfamiliar with the DV953 manual adjustments, one can set the sharpness and color levels (as well as shutter speed, aperature, gain and audio) on this camera when the camera is set into Manual mode. I believe the sharpness and color settings are retained in Auto, and my eyes indicate that, but I can't find anything in the camera data to confirm that.

That is very kind of you, Guy.

Alternative is at geocities.com, free but can be slow.

Just realised MX500B could be a version with Bluetooth (£1064 at amazon.co.uk).

Next year Sony will shoehorn an mp3 player with 20Gb disk into TRV80M
and everybody would have to follow suit. And the touch screen will recognise your handwriting.

Frank, you could start another thread like what useless gadget everybody wants his/her cam to have :-)

It is getting late and I always talk nonsense at this time of the day.

Loging off
Love you all
a

Ayosha, I agree that many of the grabs from the Panasonic 953 as well as my Panasonic 852 have a lot of sharpening artifacts. But the Sony VX2000 has almost none. I got my samples from that site you suggested.

I put the Panasonic 953 beside the Sony 2000 and the difference is incredible. The Sony 2000 pictures are like a normal beautiful clear picture, like I would get from my Nikon 5400 digital still camera. The Panasonic 953 picture is sharpened to the point of being rediculus.

My Panasonic 852 doesn't have any sharpening adjustment. I thought seeing as the Panasonic 953 has sharpening adjustment this could be corrected. But based on some comments in this thread, not much. I took the Sony 2000 picture and did some extreeme sharpening on it in PhotoPaint, low and behold it turned into the same kind of low quality picture as from the Panasonic 953. Has Panasonic just gone sharpening mad?

Or am I missing something here.

<<<-- Originally posted by Ben Wiens : Has Panasonic just gone sharpening mad?

Or am I missing something here. -->>>

Obviously.

See everyone, this is why I don't like having only test shots from one camera. There is no perspective because people take snippets from here and there where there is no quality control information and try to draw conclusions...with an agenda. The DV953 has excellent video...equivalent to the GL2 and VX2000 and other cameras of that ilk when viewed typically on a display designed for the video format. When you blow up portions of a frame, you WILL find something. Every one of these cameras is a compromise and they all have faults. It's like a diamond. It is bright, sparkles and draws ooohs and aaahs on the finger, but put it under a 100x microscope and point out the flaws and no woman will buy it.

I can say this; the GS100 (and the MX5000/DV953) is the best consumer camcorder, period. :)

P.S. I saw indoor footage of the TRV80 (1/3.6" CCD) on a big projector screen and its low light performance was no good either, so I'm very glad I chose the MX5000 instead and save a lot of money. :)

Guy and Ayosha, you pay more for the VX2000, I'm sure you can expect more from it. The MX500/DV953 is not God's gift to man, you know.

Guy, here in Singapore, the digital photographic community is of general concensus that, although Phil Askey does his test scientifically, his conclusion is ineveitably biased towards Canon, but Phil is of course entitled to his opinion. At least, you can judge the test results from the website.

Ben, the 852 is a consumer cam, and auto is the prefered setting, hence no sharpening control. I have not seen the NTSC shot on TV, but here in PAL-land, the MX8/300/350/500 is certainly not up to the VX2000 in video quality. But the price difference is huge! In this matter, I concur with Guy, that when viewed on a typical home TV (30" 4:3), the Panasonic does perform fantastically. If a person wants to watch on a wall-sized screen, maybe a house-priced camera should be used. The MX/DV/GS series are certainly budget cameras.

Young Lee, you are certainly entitled to your opinion. BTW Sony is also not very good with the consumer range of cameras, certainly pricey and not delivering. I have shot (Singapore) $3500 Sony consumer cams against $1500 Panasonic or Canon cams and fine the Sony a loser (lots of grain, lack of wide angle, flaring). I am sticking to Panasonic and Canon, unless it is high end stuff from Sony.

If you look carefully at outdoor grabs from www4.big.or.jp site you will find the same horizontal halo effect on VX2000 samples as well but not as bad. VX2000 is proven to be pro's workhorse for field work, I have heard that most of last Iraq war footage was done with that camera.

AS for domestic use, it is probably too big, heavy, not as ergonomic and you can get two MX500 for one VX2000 (and no Bluetooth:-).

I am inclined to believe that horizontal halo effect is not caused by sharpening only worsened. It looks like it cannot be eliminated by setting sharpen to 0%.

Other 1 chippers (Sony TRV33, PC300 like here
http://www4.big.or.jp/~a_haru/SO/PC300/No9/park3.jpg)
have that effect to a much lesser degree but suffer from other artefacts.

Canon XV2 doesn't have horizontal halo effect but suffers from a vertical one here
http://www24.big.or.jp/~a_natsu/CA/XV2/memory/Gout4.jpg

Canon XL1s have strong horizontal halo here
http://www24.big.or.jp/~a_natsu/CA/X...10/out-AWB.jpg

Pana DVX100 shows very little halo here
http://www8.big.or.jp/~a_fuyu/PA/DVX100/No8/tple.jpg
and quite a lot here
http://www8.big.or.jp/~a_fuyu/PA/DVX100/No8/lake.jpg

There is no perfection, all cameras compromise, and some excel in one environment and are lousy in other.

Also not knowing the conditions and settings for those tests doesn't help.

That is why personal opinions about actual footage viewed on actual TV are just as important.

For the money, ergonomics, manual options, and quality as seen on TV, MX500 (with or without B :-) is still seen as a winner. But it is far from perfection.

And I am still to see and handle one in vivo.

I agree---and they just made it better, except with the viewfinder and possibly an audio problem when the LCD is flipped open. However, the MX5, or PV-DV953 costs about $1200 US, or thereabouts, and the VX2000 costs about $2200 US (or thereabouts). I have never noticed this halo effect with the NTSC PV-DV953. Funny. And for me at least, I would rather have a small, easy to carry around cam than one that's not. But, if I needed a larger cam, I'd go with older DV500---it's actually not that large if you've got it fastened to a nice tripod. :-))

Hi Ayosha,

sorry but what is the main purpose of you getting a cam? Is it going to be your first one? are you going to use it professionally? here we go again with that word...I wonder what happpened to Fred.

Tell you what, I see halos (in stores) bec I look for it (as in staring at the monitors soo intently). in the house, no, I just watch and rewind and in fact wonder at the clarity. but Im no professional of course. personally, I also prefer to soften the MX5K and GS100 1-2 notches from the default setting depending on what I'm shooting.

Just for your info, I remember having to soften the sharpness level of a TRV70 all the way down to please myself. but for the PC300, it's soft enough at the default setting. some Jap reviewers (published) share the same opinion. you might like to check that Sony model since you seem to be so particular about oversharpening. sharpness adjustment is likewise available in those Sonys.

I believe Fred got removed for his over use of the words, "professional," and "professional cams are black." I would guess he really wanted the Black Mamba instead of the silver PV-DV953. (It wasn't my doing. I rather liked ol' Fred.) :-))

I think all of you have the right of it. If you fixate on one aspect of video and make it the central point of comparison among cameras, you lose the big picture (not a pun). It's sorta like my wife and I watching our new HDTV. I am not a routine TV viewer and prefer to spend my time in front of the tube on quality productions (DVD or HD). Now, if I comment on the PQ of a really well shot HD production that the big screen reproduces well, she is not impressed. To her, it's just TV, big deal (not)! She was just as satisfied with our old 4:3 standard def big screen with all its 240 lines of resolution.

However, I like all of you, are technology enthusiasts. I pore over the technical details and appreciate how close I can come to shooting video or creating audio that approaches professional level. I would love to own the top of the line. But, am satisfied that I have, in the DV953, one of the best if not the best, small 3 CCD camcorder on the market...sharpening and all.

BTW, just a caveat on drawing quality conclusions from pix posted on the web. Most are in .JPG format which is a lossy compression format. It introduces artifacts that are not present in the original that may lead an observer to conclude the original quality was degraded. There are also multiple compression options for JPG. Who knows what was used on these pix, and I suspect different posters used different compression levels. The reference pix that I posted are PNG, so they are compressed at quality level 9 (Best).

I use the Japanese site less and less these days as they tend to favor Sony cams. I (and most anyone else) can get better results from their "less than VX2000" cams.


Your analog NTSC TV was capable of 480i but used an even and odd field of 240 interlaced lines to create a frame. That and its hard to beat a crappy cable feed on a 20" analog 4:3 set. They seem to be made for each other. Other than my wife and daughter my HDTV sits dormant except for the occassional rented or homemade DVD. I'm just thankful I don't have any burn-in issues (LCD) with as much Sponge Bob Square Pants the TV has to endure. :)

Where do I get my head examined? I'm seeing problems while others see none. Now if we could just all get beamed to a meeting spot with our camcorders and TVs I think we could start to make some progress in determining where our differences in opinion come from. Maybe I'll go down to the mall today and see if a store will let me play back my footage on different TVs.

The most baffling issue is this. When I play back all kinds of footage from my Panasonic PV-DV852, the quality is much worse than what I see on cable TV. Others say that the footage from the Panasonic PV-DV852, while not up to pro MiniDV quality, is still much better than cable TV. That's a huge difference in opinion.

Hi Allan,

Rather than repeat myself here is a link to my first post where I stated my wants and needs.

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?s=&threadid=19260

I will check PC300 in more detail shortly (over net not for real).

Seen PC330 at DVSpot.

Don't like the lack of manual settings.

I filmed with such a small boxy Sony like this and found it impossible to hold it in my hand. Ended having a tripod screwed in permanently and holding its head. And than you get to change the tape.... I simply hated the blasted thing. Funny how everybody was pleased with the result. Must be the talent bursting through :-):-)

Objectively, the quality of that video (I think it was 105 or 108 model) was below my worst VHS tape, recorded from cable TV.

Back to the old drawing board.

The PC330 is a stripped down version of the PC300, I am told.

Thanks Michael,

I see not a trace of the horizontal black & white halo effect (Pana Mx500 style) present in this grabs.

Sharpening artefacts are low and likely mostly hidden by compression (probably .jpg).

There is some colour fringing (if that is the proper terminology) best seen in xi01.jpg where top and left edges of the black bag against snow are bluish and bottom and right edges are reddish. The same effect can be found in xi05.jpg, watch the legs, and xi02.jpg at the building roof and branches above the squirrel, shot against the sky. But I am yet to see a camera without some of that effect.

The worst fault (if you can call it a fault) that I can see is yellow shift where yellow part of the image is shifted to the right as seen on traffic light boxes in xi12.jpg and cab in xi11.jpg. Compared to that red looks well contained. MX500 grabs show similar amounts of yellow shift (1%, again to the right).

Michael, you took the shoots, tell us what do you think about the fidelity of the results, you are the only one to see the original scene.

The Xi thread is here

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthrea...182#post136182

but I am not sure where to continue the discussion. As this thread is longer, and likely to be read more I propose to stay here in spite of the fact that we are talking about Xi.

Just continue here for this topic. It won't meld with the other thread.

Perhaps somebody with a DV953 would like to meet up in New York City so we can take video under the same conditions?

I'll get some "sunny day" Xi footage so we can compare it to the low contrast / overcast lighting of the current shots.

Re: the shot of the bag
The overcast sun was shining on the bag from the right side of the photo - that's probably why there's a red tinge.