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Old March 10th, 2011, 08:53 AM   #1
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PDW-700: Chromatic aberration or blue fringe?

Last week I took some shots in a metro in Rotterdam with a PDW-700 and a Canon HJ11 lens in 1920 x 1080 50i, completely zoomed out and iris full open. I was shocked when I saw some high contrast shots during logging: blue, purple and green "color shifts" belong the edges from the lamps. So I contacted Sony (because they just serviced my camera) and they told me this is just a chromatic aberration lens-problem. So next I contacted Canon and they told me that it is blue fringe and a little chromatic aberration. They told me that they could update my HJ11 lens so it would be ALAC compatible and then the purple and green would disappear a little, not completely.
Now I'm home again, with my fresh updated ALAC compatible lens but still there's a lot of "color shifting".
So, anyone, please take a look at the pictures and tell me what it is and how to solve this problem.

These three pictures below where shot BEFORE the ALAC lens update.

Take a look at the lights left and right top, and the white board at the right:
http://www.camerawerk.tv/01.jpg

See the two marks and the pillar on the left:
http://www.camerawerk.tv/02.jpg

Take a look at the yellow "M" and the traffic sign on the right; there is a blue "copy" of the traffic sign on the right:
http://www.camerawerk.tv/03.jpg

I can't take shots in the same situation but I took some new ones and noticed a little performance in the green and purple, but the blue offset doesn't go away, anyone?
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Old March 10th, 2011, 02:55 PM   #2
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Re: PDW-700: Chromatic aberration or blue fringe?

Well known problem with unsure solution. Try a different lens and see if it is better. Maybe Fuji instead of Canon. Not the worst I have seen and not the best.
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Old March 10th, 2011, 07:21 PM   #3
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Re: PDW-700: Chromatic aberration or blue fringe?

Yes, it's CA. Always looks worse when focus is a little off, plus I assume the iris is wide open, so it's worst case scenario. It's not a camera fault. You might want to consider getting the lens serviced or at least have an optical engineer project it to compare with a similar lens just to check the collimation etc is OK.
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Old March 12th, 2011, 05:47 PM   #4
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Re: PDW-700: Chromatic aberration or blue fringe?

Benno,

Have you access to another lens and similar locations for a comparison record test?
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Old March 13th, 2011, 02:14 PM   #5
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Re: PDW-700: Chromatic aberration or blue fringe?

Alister: Yes, Iris was wide open and gain was +6 db, it was very dark over there.

David: No, I have only this lens and an oldy j15. Also I can't reproduce this, this metro station was 150 Miles from my home and I'm not able to film in this station again. This station was hired one night for a fire-practice once.
I tried to reproduce this somewhere else but with no succes. I think it was very bad luck according the TL-lights or something like that. At Canon they told me this is a camera problem, the lens is okay but Sony says it's the lens.....
I'll trie some tests again when I'm home, now I'm in the Alps to try my new camera: the GoPro....something completely different.
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Old March 17th, 2011, 02:35 PM   #6
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Re: PDW-700: Chromatic aberration or blue fringe?

Looks like classic chromatic aberration to me. That means you might be able to minimise such by trying a different lens or checking the one you used (as Alistair has said). But remember, Canon HJ and Fujinon HA series lenses all seem to exhibit a degree of CA, some are just worse than others. Get a lens 3 times the price and it might go away... In general, the 700 does also seem to be more prone to accentuating the effects of CA.
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Old March 18th, 2011, 02:35 AM   #7
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Re: PDW-700: Chromatic aberration or blue fringe?

Yes, thats very Lens-dependend. I have a SD Lens here (YJ12x6.5) that creates easily the effect you describe.
With my Fujinon ZA12x4.5 its much better, probably even better when less zoom factor (and less WA).

You can close the iris more to avoid it or make the effect less obvious.
I found that it often depends on the angle of shooting as well.

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Old March 18th, 2011, 03:07 PM   #8
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Re: PDW-700: Chromatic aberration or blue fringe?

I really got burned by this when I first got my 700. Both lenses that were fine with my HDX-900 really went to Hell in the corners with color fringing. Neither is an ALAC lens. Some of this has to be the nature of the photo-sites on the CCD because the lenses were the same.

After looking through the Paint menu I found a possible source to the Knee Saturation and Knee Sat Level on and with a + value.
I turned off Knee Saturation and that seemed to help. I was busy at the time so didn't even get to try if the Knee Sat Level had a minus value that could tame it even more. I would give you the menu #'s but they change with the firmware revisions. Handy.
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Old March 21st, 2011, 04:53 PM   #9
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Re: PDW-700: Chromatic aberration or blue fringe?

I am suffering from blue fringing with the PDW 700 as well, it seems to go beyond what you expect from regular CA. I first noticed it with a canon J11 and J17 but have now upgraded to an HJ 17 and it is no better. It is most obvious at the sides of frame when shooting against a window or bright light source and the lens is zoomed out to its widest. It is really quite severe, many pixels wide. The problem is greatest when shooting obs documentary where you have little control over your shooting environment and shooting interiors with a window shot in available light.
I tried to get my HJ 17 upgraded to ALAC but Canon UK said that it needs a whole new servo which is £3000, I am reluctant to go down this route as I don't think it will solve the problem although it may help a little.
I have found using hyper gamma 1 instead of the standard gamma helps a little ( it takes some of the zing out of the blue edge). I have not yet tried turning off the knee sat but may give that a go.
I can't help thinking that it is not just the lens as it seems too severe for that and also my lenses have not displayed it on other cameras, I wonder if it is something to do with the prism. I don't know if the PDW 700 is worse than other cameras or whether other cameras with the power HAD FX sensor all do this.
The dealer who I bought the 700 from cannot find a solution and said that he has seen the same problem even when using primes.
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Old March 22nd, 2011, 11:28 AM   #10
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Re: PDW-700: Chromatic aberration or blue fringe?

switching KNEE SAT off or lowering its value unfortunately also affects the overall kneed picture elements - it helps the blue effect but generally degrades the knee´s functionality.

...

ULi
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Old March 22nd, 2011, 03:22 PM   #11
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Re: PDW-700: Chromatic aberration or blue fringe?

Chris: Very strange that Canon tells that you have to get a new servo, my lens is a HJ11x4.7B IASE and the software update costs € 250,00 and took about 15 minutes.

I took lot's of test video's and have to say that the chromatic aberration is 95% gone now! But the blue fringe still appears. As Canon told me this is a camera problem. Sony told me to first update the camera with the latest firmware (1.71) and after that try if it's better. I'll do this next week and will reply here soon.
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Old March 23rd, 2011, 05:11 PM   #12
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Re: PDW-700: Chromatic aberration or blue fringe?

Benno, I think maybe it is because your lens is a B IASE, am I right in thinking that this is the one with the focus servo, the Canon tech said that if my lens had a focus servo ( it is a HJ 17 BIRSE with only a zoom servo) then just the software upgrade would make it ALAC compatible. The reason for this is that the camera needs to know where the lens focus and zoom are set to for ALAC to work. I had the software upgrade but sadly ALAC is still not recognised.
I wonder if the blue fringe is CCD blooming rather than a lens CA, it would be great to think that Sony's latest firmware will correct this but I don't hold my hopes high. Please let us know your experience after the upgrade.
I am surprised there are not a whole load more threads/posts about blue fringing with PDW 700s as I am finding it a really big issue and it lets down an otherwise great camera.

Check out this thread by Dennis Wood about CCD blooming, XH-A1 chromatic aberration..blue meanies?


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Old March 23rd, 2011, 05:15 PM   #13
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Re: PDW-700: Chromatic aberration or blue fringe?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Uli Mors View Post
switching KNEE SAT off or lowering its value unfortunately also affects the overall kneed picture elements - it helps the blue effect but generally degrades the knee´s functionality.

...

ULi
Yes I agree with you, for this reason I am reluctant to switch it off.

chris
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Old March 23rd, 2011, 05:48 PM   #14
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Re: PDW-700: Chromatic aberration or blue fringe?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Chris Kenny View Post
Benno, I think maybe it is because your lens is a B IASE, am I right in thinking that this is the one with the focus servo?
Yes, you're right. To activate the ALAC function everytime I put my camera on I have to zoom in and out, and adjust the focus once, after that the ALAC function is activated.

Tonight I did some test shots with the new 1.71 firmware but the blue fringe is still there. I contacted Sony about it and am waiting for their reply.

Something completely different: I can't find anywhere on the internet what the differences are with the new 1.71 update. Sony only tells two little differences but I noticed also a new setting under the Noise Suppress page: you can set it low and high now. Low is the same as it was before and with the high setting more noise is gone, BUT the sharpness of the picture is also gone and that doesn't look good to me. So I really don't know why anyone should use this setting.

Here are some pictures:

ALAC off:
http://www.camerawerk.tv/Geen%20ALAC...ware%20171.png

ALAC on:
http://www.camerawerk.tv/Wel%20ALAC%...ware%20171.png

And a shot 5cm from my LCD screen with a black background and a white foreground. Blue fringe is good visible here (also the wide angle distortion from that close ;-)
http://www.camerawerk.tv/LCD%20scherm.png

ALAC on and Noise Suppress high:
http://www.camerawerk.tv/Wel%20ALAC%...ess%20high.png

UPDATE March 24:

Some new pictures, here's a sample of a shot of some trees with ALAC on and off, I think the difference is amazing so my lens-update was very useful. This picture is scaled to 200% to see it better. It's a selection from the upper left top of the lens:
http://www.camerawerk.tv/Bomen.jpg

And some Blue fringe, which I can't get rid of, the first picture is from the PDW-700 with ALAC on, the second is from a very cheap photo-camera. There's lot's of blue fgringe around the window:
http://www.camerawerk.tv/Wel-ALAC-raam-video.png
http://www.camerawerk.tv/Raam-foto.jpg

Last edited by Benno Zwanenburg; March 24th, 2011 at 05:04 AM.
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Old April 8th, 2011, 03:54 PM   #15
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Re: PDW-700: Chromatic aberration or blue fringe?

Benno

Quote "Noise Suppress page: you can set it low and high now. Low is the same as it was before and with the high setting more noise is gone, BUT the sharpness of the picture is also gone and that doesn't look good to me. So I really don't know why anyone should use this setting."


You are right noise suppress at high level does soften the image, it is almost like the detail has been wound down, it does a very impressive job of reducing the noise though, was this shot at 0db gain?
Personally speaking I don't mind the slightly softer picture, I think HD can sometimes look a little too sharp- especially on people shots at BCU, people in close up now need makeup where before with SD you could often get away without.
Have Sony given you any new info on blue fringing since the new firmware.?

Last edited by Chris Kenny; April 8th, 2011 at 03:56 PM. Reason: insert quotation marks
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