Hi!

I noticed that there are many people around the world with big HDTV screens and projectors. Well here's a link to a litte clip:

www.drachenfeder.com/int/dach_after.avi

it's 720p 24 frames/s. It's divX coded but still decent quality. I'd like to ask for your opinion of this image compared to the FX1 image. Any comments are welcome.

Greets
Markus

Interesting. Hello Markus, what is the source of this clip. If you did it, give some more background. What's the original size and etc. Thanks.....


Michael Pappas

@Miachael Pappas

It's the original size. Well before going thru divX it was 4:4:4 uncompressed. It's shot with our self build HD camera direct to disc. We do curently some beta testing and I'm interested how the picture this camera produces "feels" on different screens.

Check out this clip:
www.drachenfeder.com/int/take1.avi

It's more cine like. Although there is a small problem with fixed pattern noise in the bright areas. We fixed this already, just hadn'd time to convert a new file.

Markus, is this the Silicon Imaging cameras, which by the way is down the street from me in Costa Mesa CA. I like the quality. I am going to swing over to the PC/HD system later and view it. Are you from the Alternative Imaging forum on this Board. I am very aware of this gear if so. I have been quietly watching this section for some time. The clips that I have are very few, two to be exact and they are outstanding even for wmvhd's down-conversions from the original SI camera shots. They are the closest to film I have seen in some respects, and by far blow the HDV out of the water. I have told Chris Hurd a while ago that the alternative board section is and should be voted number 1 in DV magazine as being the most cutting edge publicly on display in HD/digital cinema research and design. IF THERE ARE ANY DV-MAGAZINE EDITORS ETC, THINK ABOUT GIVING THIS A BLURB IN THE DV magazine to DVinf.net "Alternative Imaging Methods " forum

Markus what players will this view with, my VLC won't play it for some reason. Strange that on my Internet Explorer OSX will. I would like to see more done with this and if you could point me towards links with other shots I would like to see and study them and report back here. Thanks

To others that have not known about this section here on DVino.net. Here is the link. If top notch HD 4:4:4 is what you need or even 4:2:2 go have a look at the cutting edge:

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/forumdisp...?s=&forumid=70

PS: Markus you need to make those links hyperlink so we can do a "save as" to desktop.

Michael Pappas
Arrfilms@hotmail.com

<<<Originally posted by Markus Rupprecht : @Miachael Pappas

It's the original size. Well before going thru divX it was 4:4:4 uncompressed. It's shot with our self build HD camera direct to disc. We do curently some beta testing and I'm interested how the picture this camera produces "feels" on different screens.

Check out this clip:
www.drachenfeder.com/int/take1.avi>>>?


MARKUS.................OUTSTANDING...........

I suggest others take a look at this link too:

www.drachenfeder.com/int/take1.avi

Michael Pappas

It should play with the latest divX player or VLC player. and well, it's not done with a SI camera. I won't get into details on what chip we build our camera around. But be shure, we did it indie style. I'd really love to get some feedback on the "feel" of this pictures before getting involved in endless technical discussions. I'm a director after all. And we started this entire "build your own HD cine cam" adventure just because I was a few weeks away from shooting and totally trusted the industry with the specs on the JVC HDV cam. And it sucked. color resolution, compression. Awfull. Well, soon you will get the entire story. But for now...

The homebuilt HD cam footage looks great but it's a static shot. I'd love to see some fast pans and heavy motion shots. I guess some heavy motion night shots would be the ultimate test. We already know that the HDV really shines there!

<<<-- Originally posted by Troy Lamont :

When you're talking digital displays the actual pixel resolution is the same as the viewable.
-->>>

Huh?...... Actual physical pixels in a screen don't necessarily indicate the viewable resolution. Despite only having 1330x800 physical pixels, the Sharp Aquos can display 1080i full screen viewable, just the same as 1280x720 fills the full 1330x800 screen size.....same deal with all of my digital monitors (regardless of their actual resolution). However, the more physical pixels in a screens' makeup, the greater the clarity.

<<<--
Not true as I pointed out above. Your set and the 45" 1080p Aquos sets are different models, you can't compare resolution specs. You may also want to check your specs again. The Sharp 1920X1080 is 1920X1080 viewable, it's already been confirmed by several owners.
-->>>

No dissension here..... I don't believe I stated that the 45" or 55" Sharp LCD displays were any resolution.

<<<--
As far as I know, 720p is at 60Hz or 60fps. That's about as far away from a filmic look as anything. There are a lot of other processing in each HDTV set that may account for a different look on each set.
-->>>

Would that make 720i 120fps? And, yes I know there's a lot of other processing going on in HDTV sets, which was the intent of my original post.

BTW, I hope you made a mistake in quoting Kevin Dooley without assignation in your reply to my post, otherwise it could appear to misrepresent my original post.....

Hey, what the heck is that? It looks remarkably like film.

Is this something that's be available soon? Is it a portable unit or one of those make-shift cameras that won't be good for field work? I'm very interested in this if it's going to be available for under $7,000!

Murph

Excellent images...
 

Since this is a thread about the FX1, I'm not going to disdain any further discussion about this topic with you. It seems as if you hit the nail on the head with the first word of your quote above. Do your homework thou hast not an inkling.

Markus,

These clips are excellent! I played them back on my 55" HDTV and I thought I was at the movies! Very smooth, very detailed with excellent contrast. Kudos.

You have to reveal the source and thanks for the clips.

Kaku,

Was I under the assumption that you were going to do an 'official' review once you're done with your real job? :)

Any more clips pending?

Thanks again for all you've provided.

Troy

<<<These clips are excellent! I played them back on my 55" HDTV and I thought I was at the movies! Very smooth, very detailed with excellent contrast. Kudos.
You have to reveal the source and thanks for the clips.>>>>>

I agree.......
I watched them on the big screen last nignt, amazing looking. This is many many years ahead of what the consumer will have. My brother thought it was a HD trailer from a movie when it first rolled on the 50" HD screen....

This was just a simple AVI, imagine what the 4:4:4 or 4:2:2 version looks like.

Here is a link to the people who shot this and other stills form his camera. It's in German so you will have to translate.

Still Images shot with his Homemade HD cam:

http://web2.1289-1.1st-housing.de/72...emplate=plain&

http://web2.1289-1.1st-housing.de/72...emplate=plain&

http://web2.1289-1.1st-housing.de/72...emplate=plain&

MAIN LINK- ARTICLE to his HD system:

http://web2.1289-1.1st-housing.de/72003


Now back to the FX1
Now as I have said before, I would like to see someone shoot some tripod shots
of people interacting with one another with the HDR FX1. I don't have accsess to it or i would be filming actors etc. Kaku and the others that are lucky to have A FX1, go film people-kids, well composed shots etc. Oh yeah 0db gain too, and 1/60th.

FYI on hyperlinking your web links:

[url ]www.dvinfo.net/conf[/url ]

Now, I had to put a space between both "l" and "]" so you'll need to take away that space, so you get:

www.hdvinfo.net/conf

If you want to make it a clickable text link, do this:

[url =www.dvinfo.net/conf]DV Info Net Forums[/url ]

Again, get rid of the space between "l" and "=" and also "l" and "]"

You'd get:

DV Info Net Forums

Your friendly wrangler,

heath

I'm reading the article through Babel fish--and my head's spinning--Gosh, it's hard to get through those translations.

<<<-- Originally posted by Betsy Moore : I'm reading the article through Babel fish--and my head's spinning--Gosh, it's hard to get through those translations. -->>>

When using the Babel Fish: DON'T PANIC.

Hey Markus,

I noticed one of the photos was captioned 720p--are they all 720 or are you messing around with 1080 too? What do you imagine this camera would cost (ballpark)

As they say in your country,

Donkey Shame:)

From the article:

"We had 3000 euro, a half-full tank and were nonsmokers. The development of DRAKE 1 could begin..."

I suspect this is the babelfish translation of a Blues Brothers reference. Anyway, it looks as if Markus and company are using medical or industrial CCDs and engineering their own DSP and capturing direct to disk. I wonder how the optical path works? Is it a 3-CCD with prism arrangemet? The article talked about black & white CCDs, but I can't understand the details. I understood the desire for a true 35mm light path to duplicate 35mm depth of field directly onto the CCDs.

I truly want to see how the "small problem with fixed pattern noise" has been fixed. This is no "small problem" - it looks like getting much too close to a DLP projector! Not very pleasing. You can also see this problem in the 2nd still that Michael posted. Look at the shirt.

For $3000 Euros, this is a very interesting development. Imagine if the the near future if 35mm equal "webcams" were sold that connected directly to a laptop or a firewire hard drive, and had a PL mount, Nikon mount or even c-mount lens on the front.

Remember, Dalsa was involved in medical imaging long before they started developing a digital film camera.

I also just realized I've just helped pull this thread way off topic. I want to join everyone else in thanking Kaku for posting the clips. Watching these images playing through VLC player on my Apple Cinema Display was awe-inspiring! I've noticed that after downconverting to DV, the images look much more like "live video", but that's probably just a function of a 60i capture with a 60th shutter. If Sony will only offer 24p on the pro model, I have no doubts that this camera will be ready for indie film applications. The level of detail is stunning, and puts any DV camera, even the higher end broadcast cameras to shame. Sony is going to own the under-$50,000 camera market come next April!

<<<-- Originally posted by Scott Anderson : Sony is going to own the under-$50,000 camera market come next April! -->>>

I wouldn't speak so fast. ;)

Hi Frederic,

Your work with LumiereHD is making it possilbe for my files to be available which I thank you. It wasn't possible to provide such without your software.
Am I correct that I can't demux FX1 files with version 1.2, or I'm doing something wrong.

If there's something I can help you, please let me know.

<<<-- Originally posted by Frederic Haubrich : I wouldn't speak so fast. ;) -->>>

...I'd love to ask for more info, but I also know that if you do know something, you won't be able to spill the beans yet.

I just hope all this HDV stuff shakes down by April/May. I'm pushing the limits of my DVX and need to move to the next level. Sometime late next spring or in early summer would be a great time for me to do that and I plan to buy the best camera I can afford then. It must do 24p and at least as much resolution as the FX1 and also be easily manageable in the field. I'm guestimating my budget will be $25K. Something like that recently announced JVC pro HDV camera may be an option, the pro version of the FX1 may fit the bill too if it indeed does 24p (but I doubt it will). Maybe Panasonic will have a successor to the DVX100? Maybe I'll stumble across a Sony HDC-F9x0 on eBay (yeah, right). I just hope something comes along... It just looks like the prosumer market is going to fall short of what I need and top out at about $7K and the extra I can scrape up for my budget won't buy me what I really would like to have. As of right now, it looks like I'll be buying the pro version of the FX1 and possibly a wide angle lens attachment as well as an underwater housing... But it's all pure speculation at this point. ;-/

Jeff

Kaku,

You are correct. Version 1.2 isn't yet compatible with the Sony devices. Version 1.5 will be fully compatible with all the Sony HDV cameras and decks.

Someone asked a while back in this thread about shooting HD and capturing standard DV widescreen. Here is a link to a post on the Vegas forum where a Sony rep says that you can do this:

http://mediasoftware.sonypictures.co...=327630&Page=0

Jeff,

All I can say is "24p help is on the way"...just teasing. It sounds like your wishes will come true sooner than you think, at a more affordable price than you think. HDV is about to become a very competitive field and the ultimate winner is going to be the consumer.

If you plan on waiting a few months until you make a purchasing decision, you're in good shape.

<<<-- Originally posted by Frederic Haubrich : Jeff,

All I can say is "24p help is on the way"...just teasing. It sounds like your wishes will come true sooner than you think, at a more affordable price than you think. HDV is a about to become a very competitive field and the ultimate winner is going to be the consumer.

If you plan on waiting a few months until you make a purchasing decision, you're in good shape. -->>>

Hehe... Well, hopefully you're right. It will be at least 5 months before I make any purchase, so I think I'm in good shape in that regard. Although, with the lack of official announcements and rumors flying around, I find myself saying "screw it" and I start dreaming up ways I might be able to afford a CineAlta. Hehe.

Jeff,

5 months sounds like perfect timing for a sound HDV purchasing decision.

Frederic,

Could you please confirm about the following? Does LumiereHD version 1.2 capture footage from HDR-FX1 at 1080i with no modification in the data?

More clips added
 

These are totally nothing interesting to watch since they are shot for comparing the frames. So, please don't blame me for shooting something not fun to watch:). It was quite challenging because of the situation on this location at this time of the day. But I think it might give you good ideas of how this cam takes shots like these clips under a terrible circumstances.

These clips are shot in front of my company.
I named these files HDV frame comparison footage, abbreviated as "HDVfcmprsn". These are shot at around 16:30pm, it was getting dark.
No gain added:), F1.7, 1/60, no cinematone even the ones with cinemaframe.

HDVfcmprsn24f.m2t Cinematone off
HDVfcmprsn30f.m2t Cinematone off
HDVfcmprsn60i.m2t

Just in case you can't find the directory...
Here! <Thanx to Heath for reminding me, I keep on forget what it was>

Don't enjoy but compare them well!! :)

Re: More clips added
 

Ok, analysis:

1-60i mode shows the most interlacing artifacts (a lot)
2-Cine24 loses a lot of resolving power
3-While 60i produce the sharpest image, Cine30 is #2.

I made screen captures uncompressed of all three clips and used the B.G. post at left as a guide, I blew it up 300% in Photoshop. It is pretty clear cut.

That means this camera's Cine30 is NOT from a real progressive CCD as some have said and that it just de-interlaces the footage a la Magic Bullet in camera.

Cine24 loses a loy of details and is choppy. Garbage look filter.

Thank you Donal for the analysis.

I should have done DV shooting at the same time. I will do that tomorrow and probably replace with these clips (so, there will be three HDV and three DV clips).

FORGET the 24 cine thing - looks like an effect !!! 30 cine thing is more useable BUT this camera is INTERLACE and that is where this camera SHINES !!

1080i !!!! is excellent ... want 24progressive = look elsewhere ...
don't even consider the FAKE 24 on this camera !

if you are getting interlace artifacts at 1080i then you are either watching on a progressive screen and screen size is smaller then 1920x1080 , and /or your processor can't play back the clips at 29.97 ... well actually if you are playing back on WMP the codec that it is using really wasn't designed for the sony HDV compression .. if you have a HDV plug-in that i suggest you see what speed it's playing back the clip ??

you need to set your monitor to 1920x1080 or larger if you want to see 1080i !!!! if the clip will play back at 29.97 you will see very little interlace artifacts on progressive screen ...
if your player has to scale the clip smaller then it might be introducing artifacts ???

<<<-- Originally posted by Kaku Ito : Frederic,

Could you please confirm about the following? Does LumiereHD version 1.2 capture footage from HDR-FX1 at 1080i with no modification in the data? -->>>

Yes, you are correct, the captured footage from the FX1 with Lumiere HD 1.2 isn't modified.

Frederic

This thing of the pulsating lights in the night shots...

Is that something that can be fixed on location? On a film camera (sorry, but that's where I'm from) you tweak the camera speed a smidgen, or adjust the camera shutter angle (usually 180 degrees does the trick). But on a video camera such as this are you stuck with this one frame rate that's non-tweakable?

Another question:

Those of you who are able to view Kaku's footage (I can, but it stutters a bit) what kind of systems have you got?

How much of an upgrade are the rest of us going to have to make to edit this stuff?

Best regards

<<<-- Originally posted by Karel Bata : Another question:

Those of you who are able to view Kaku's footage (I can, but it stutters a bit) what kind of systems have you got?

How much of an upgrade are the rest of us going to have to make to edit this stuff?

Best regards -->>>


I viewed it fine on a stock 1ghz Apple eMac at work. Nothing fancy(and not the fastest Mac out there)...but VLC plays the clip fine.

The footage is jaw dropping..in terms of "bang for the buck" and "quantum leaps"...this camera is it.

>> How much of an upgrade are the rest of us going to have to make to edit this stuff?

I've been editing and converting Kaku's files in Vegas 5 using a P4 2.4Ghz machine and it works, but playback in Vegas/Media Player 9 can be stuttery/jerky especially in Vegas. Though converted files play back great, of course.

My understanding is that Cineform's file format is the way to go for editing and post production work. It captures and converts the MPEG-2 video into an avi file.

From what I've read, the Cineform file format takes up 25-50 GB of space for every hour of MPEG-2 video and it uses 4:2:2 instead of 4:2:0. It looks like there's a plug-in for both Vegas and Premiere Pro.

Don,

I can't agree with you more.

From my prior test with other cams on 24 frame mode, I'm not too concern about 24 frame mode neither, but if the target is converting the footage to film, I guess some people needs to find out how this cam does on 24 frame.

I decided to buy this cam after the test I did at Ginza, and it is 1080i format, AND anamorphic DV should be better than PDX10 or certainly VX2100(have to test on this matter). The use 30 frame for less detailed shots when sound or the message has to be expressed.

<<<-- Originally posted by Frederic Haubrich : <<<-- Originally posted by Kaku Ito : Frederic,

Could you please confirm about the following? Does LumiereHD version 1.2 capture footage from HDR-FX1 at 1080i with no modification in the data? -->>>

Yes, you are correct, the captured footage from the FX1 with Lumiere HD 1.2 isn't modified.

Frederic -->>>

Frederic,

That is great. How is developing going on 1.5?
What I can report to you is that your LumiereHD 1.2 seems to capture FX1 footage no promlem. Since LumiereHD 1.2's converting function is not supported with captured FX1 clips, I'm using MpegStream to convert to say Decklink 8bit or DVC PRO HD files, however it results in missing frames in the part with a lot of motion.

Kaku

Kaku,

We are moving along. Lumiere HD 1.5 will be compatible with the FX1, the Pro version and the Sony HDV Deck.

I'm curious how you got Lumiere HD? Did you buy it from a reseller in Japan?

Frederic

<<<-- Originally posted by Frederic Haubrich : Kaku,

We are moving along. Lumiere HD 1.5 will be compatible with the FX1, the Pro version and the Sony HDV Deck.

I'm curious how you got Lumiere HD? Did you buy it from a reseller in Japan?

Frederic -->>>

Great. Let me know if you need external beta testing. I have most of the key CPUs and hardware for testing. Also, I've been a beta tester of very famous music software for over 10 yearsl, so I know all of the NDA stuff.

I purchased your software from your website under my name soon after I got my FX1. I could help you in Japanese on your website or distribute your software in Japan. Check out my company site for my business. CreativeSuite (in Japanese but you can see what we sell).

Kaku,

Is that night footage pulsating light fixable on location with your camera? It would be a drag to have to run at 30fps for some locations if the rest of the footage is at 24 or 25.

(BTW What music package do you use? Just curious.)


Michael,

Thanks. Is that conversion to avi lossless?