Outdoors ...
 

Been up in north and spent all day outdoors shooting landscapes as it's the very lasts of this winter that we have trees covered by icy snow. Found the EF 28-300mm/f3.5-5 L lens highly useful with Red One and preliminary the image quality seems to be very good. Today there it changed back and forth from snowing to sun shine every five minutes and a lens from wide angle to a moderate tele is quite useful in conditions when it's difficult to change a lens without getting snow to the sensor.

The good news of the day was that the long lenses will work after a software update to the mount. The newest version of the long lenses such 500mm/f4.0 and 600mm/f4.0 with the IS stabilizer work already with the Birger mount. Found this once had a chance to make tests this evening. The problem is related only to those lenses which havea focus speed switch and as said this will disappear after a software update.

The last weeks I've been generating Cineform avi-files from the Red R3 raw files I've shot during the last year using Redcine. It has been a pleasant surprise to discover that shots taken in rather low light result in very low noise 2K 16:9 avi files.

Grading the raw files require some experience to get the best possible outcome. Redcine is a pretty good tool, it only takes quite a lot of time to export the files. So far I've graded each shot separately and then left the computer to process the files over night.

Samples
 

Here are some samples of what I shot last weekend. The trees covered by icy snow are shot with the EF 28-300mm/f3.5-5 L (camera: 4K 16:9 mode) and a ND filter and the Great Grey Owl with the EF 28-70mm/f2.8 L lens (camera: 2K 16:9 mode).

Fab stuff Lauri, this is one of my favourite owls. Im trying to film Short Eared owls at the moment....if I could only get that range on them! I'm guessing you were about 15 metres ?

I'd love to talk about your beautiful Great Grey Owl, Lauri, but recent photoshopping has wiped out my credibility (temporarily!).

I am much more impressed by the sheer variety in the cast of snow-creatures moving left-to-right across the stage in your bottom-left photo. That is a truly wonderful shot.
I would have thought that only humans of differing ages and sizes could convey such diversity but you have captured all those shapes and movement within a scape of tree tops in frozen snow ... quite bloody marvellous.

Lauri,


How about putting a bit of actual video up on vimeo HD??


Great shots!!!

we are still covered in snow and it is snowing al day today.

At least lauri has trees, Heck I haver a tuff time finding one, eh? ell, at least a naturally occuring one!

Great shots! I could never tell these were taken with a video camera rather than a stills SLR.

My main argument for prefering the EX3 over the RED for wildlife is the limied reach. When I mount a 600mm lens on my EX3 I get an effective 3300 mm lens but when mounted on the RED it is still 600mm.

Ofer - Thats not actually the case, because you can apparently 'shut down' portions of the sensor, so I guess that simply gives more flexibility.

Quote
"In the 4K mode the factor is about 1.4. In the 2K mode there's another factor of 2, so a 400m lens in the 2K mode corresponds to a 1100mm lens in a 35mm SLR camera."

Hi Lauri


Could you post a little clip on Vimeo or other.


Gilles

Thanks for the input Mat. A 400mm lens on the EX3 is like a 2200mm lens on a 35mm SLR which is significantly longer the the 1100mm you mention.
Generally speaking, although I have no experience with the RED ONE and I am sure it is a fantastic camera based on the images I have seen, I still think it is not the best camera to use for wildlife. Not enough reach as mentioned, heavy, huge files - looks like an over kill to me if you are not planning to show your work on the big screen.
The EX3 is a fantastic camera, coupled with the Flash XDR - gives you top quality footage which is accepted by every TV channel - 1920x1080, progressive, 4:2:2, 50-100 Mbs.
Cheers,
Ofer

Just returning from shooting in the north. But, yes, I'll create some clip in the near future.

The slight problem is that I'm producing a large document taking couple years and according to the agreement not allowed to post any clips or clips similar to those that will be included in the final document.

Ofer, as Mat said it all boils down to the sensor size and clipping yields larger zooming factor. However, after got Red One I've pretty much given up of making close ups´with long teles. The nice thing of HD is that one can shoot images showing also the environment and I find them far more interesting than close ups. Or whenver I make need close ups I put a short lens and remote control the camera. But, of couse, this is a matter of taste.

Agree. Nature with animals instead of animals in nature ...

Sverker

check LentoVision: Birds.

I just got back from a deserted island shoot with RED, Arri / Zeis Master Primes etc etc. It was my first shoot with RED and the project is a feature on Sea Lions....

I loved shooting on RED, and actually found it relatively straight forward, a few little glitches and focusing is extremely critical. Probably the biggest challenge is the sheer size of the rig fully kitted for wildlife. There was only two of us on the shoot and we probably could have done with another at least. I have attached some piccy's below.
The other challenge is the amount of times we needed to lens change which was always a nervous time in the dust and wind.

Here are a couple of pics

http://www.ginclearfilm.com/images/s...joredsmall.gif

http://www.ginclearfilm.com/images/s...redsmall_1.jpg


Cheers

Jon

Looks like you get into some great opportunities Lauri with some awesome encounters. I would also like seeing some video. Using a video camera for stills is not the same as a DSLR for stills. Having both a Video Cam and DSLR's I would never dream of capturing still images with my Video Camera as the image quality is just not there for that irregardless of what Video Camera you are using or what the MFG touts.

Hi Lauri

Terrific shots with the Red. I to like the wide shots with wildlife, however, I find the medium and tight shots are also needed for great story telling.

Best,

Leon Lorenz
Canadian Wildlife Productions: Grizzly Bears, Bighorm Sheep in Alberta & BC Rockies DVD Videos

Sample video
 

Here's finally a sample video shot with Canon EF500mm/4.0L lens (without IS) and after 53s there's also the EF 1.4x II extender in front of the lens:

www.luontovideo.net/EF500mm-and-1.4x-sample.wmv

It's all shot in about 10 minutes from our backyard. So, perhaps better not to expect an artistic view. There is also a clear difference between this compressed and an uncompressed file.