Challenging the camera
 

So far haven't own any camera that has not eventually shown some limitations. One of the difficult items is to get beautiful shots of pure (mid-) gray images. In this sense Red One does better than the cameras I've had before, but still, I'm not yet completely satisfied and I guess this has to do with the limitations following from the sampling rate.

To get the best possible sampling rate one should 'exposure to the right', and this is what I always try to do. The difficulty is, in fact, one should not exposure completely up to clipping, but instead up to the point at which the highlights start to compress, i.e., up to the point that still retains linearity.

The image below of trees covered by icy snow on a cloudy day is pretty much like shooting a gray card while asking for a rich amount of gray tones. So, it really pushes a camera to its limits. In this kind of conditions the 8-bit HDV and DV cameras tend to generate images as if the trees were covered by bit dirty snow and this shot taken with Red One is the best (motion) image I've ever got of this item. But still, the amount of captured tones is rather small and when I open the flat image with the gamma curve tool the 12-bit sampling rate prevents me from getting as much tones as I would like to have.

It's going to be interesting to see next winter how the new Mysterium-X sensor in 16-bit Red Epic-X will manage in similar conditions.

Just in case somebody gets the idea that it's gray and dull here, attached here also couple images taken last Saturday under bright skies.

Lauri,

I don't wish to hijack the thread but how did the Arctic Hare / Rabbit on the left hand side of the top right hand side frame get frozen in that position..................? :)

Al

It's always exciting to learn that other people discover things that my eyes have not spotted at all. :-)

After posting the last images of trees covered by icy snow -I'm afraid there is no word in English for this kind of snow which is formed by moist when it condenses on trees on the higher parts of the hills while air masses move upwards along the hill and become cooler- had some discussion also on RedUserNet, and then Graeme Nattress, who is the main camera and post color algorithms developer at Red, contacted me.

As a Canadian Graeme was well aware of the problem of shooting snow and the difficulty of getting details captured of brigth pure snow. He explained that in this kind of conditions the human eye is very adaptive and is able to adjust the dynamics extremely fast. That is, when we move our eyes from one spot to another, the eye acts like a high dynamic range system quickly adapting itself with different levels of light. In my ears all this makes a lot of sense and is in line what I've elsewhere read of the eye. The conclusion was, it remains a problem to come up with photos that are alike of what our eyes see in such conditions.

Here's another image of swans that I shot last spring. This was taken early in the morning during the sunrise. The sun was on the left and everything appeared extremely bright. After a rather cold nigth when the sun came up there was a lot of mist in air for a moment above the water reflecting light beautifully.

Since last spring I've wondered how to color grade such an image. It seems impossible to get anything that resembles what I saw -beautiful bright white tones with slight rays of yellowish/reddish light. After discussing with Graeme, came to the conclusion that likely simply can't reproduce what I saw. So, tried another approach and tinted the image to come up with some delicate tones that created the impression of a bright morning. If you compare to the other frame without the slight tones, you'll see, I guess, what I mean.

Or, how is it in your eyes, does the latter version Swans-2.jpg without the tinted colors give you an impression of extremely bright light? In my eyes can't avoid thinking the latter one creates a feeling of a foggy morning as if the sun was behind the clouds.

I like swans2 better

Laurie,

I like the tinted version best. I am out all the time looking at waterfowl and morning and evening light is virtually never blue, as in picture 2. I have seen images close to your rendition of what you actually saw.

I think color correcting natural images is only good when it is done to emulate what it actually looked like. I have seen so many stills over done it is a joke, particualrly sunsets.
Often the lighting is very subtle.

good j0b with that!


Must asy I love velvia images with great lighting!! Video like that would be to die for!!


dale

Excellent summary
 

If you haven't yet seen Meryem's excellent summary, it's wortwhile to read it:

http://www.dvinfo.net/article/misc/s...010-event.html

The new technology will bring a lot of new possibilities into wildlife shooting .

Raw and updates
 

I've had my Red One now for more than two years. During this time there has been several updates in the camera firmware and postprocessing software systems.

Yesterday I started to cut some footages I took of a Golden eagle eating a rabit in a snow strom in the end of 2008. At this time the Birger EF-mount was not yet available and therefore had temporaily a Nikon mount. As far as I can remember there was very little light available and I had to shoot all day with iris f2.8. Or in other words, setting the exposure was not a problem; just set the biggest iris and exposure time 1/50s and you need not to change the settings during the whole day.

I've opened these files every now and then to discover it was indeed a gray day. But yesterday, I got rather surprised when I opened the same files with the newest RedCine-X version and started to color grade the files. In less than a minute I was able to pick nice documentary style of colors, check for instance the red blood on the eagle's beak. As far as I can remember, with the old version of RedCine (and the underlying Red's 'Color science') did not manage to do the same.

Summing up, in raw files there is a lot of flexibility and when the camera manufacture makes an effort to squeeze the best out of the sensor, it definitely shows up. Of course, RGB-files can also be adjusted, but still, I would say, not to the same extent.

Below is the original image 'straight out of the box' based on camera's metadata, and the other one is the RedCine-X color graded version.

Resolution and stabilized images
 

Recently have stabilzed quite a lot of footages. Although I never shot having camera on my shoulder, still when shooting flying birds, camera is running on a dolly, or when shooting aerials, the camera motion is not as smooth as what I'm looking for. This forces to use some stabilization. Since I'm editing 1920x1080 masters the 4K and 3K resolutions of Red One yield quite a lot of head space for stabilization. And it really shows up.

To stabilize an image some zooming in is necessary, and if a HD footage is stabilized and the result is a HD file, then one typically recognizes the outcome is bit softer than the original clip. So, all the headspace is wellcome. Here's a short 4second sample:

www.wildcine.fi/Sample.mp4

To see what I mean, compare the left and right hand side of the clip; The images were processed as 2K files and downrez to 1K. As a result there is no visible difference in sharpness/softness. The very same effect happens when 4K images are downrez to 2K or full HD.

Then something else. The Adobe workflow of Red R3D-files is finally what one can hope for. The latest update 5.02 of Premiere Pro makes it possible to color grade files in RedCine-X and then import the grading into PPro as metadata. This is a significant improvement and makes editig much easier. It's also pretty amazing that R3D-files can be edited in real time. The RedRocket card supports now real time debayering and if one does not have the card, one may still edit 1K files, copy the cut on the timeline to 4K and then only render in 4K.

It feels like it was not that long time ago when my first Canopus card made it possible to edit DV-files in real time at home. Now, the same is possible with 4K files. Would not have expected this five years ago.

Finally, I think this thread is coming towards its end for the very reason that it seems Red is not far from getting the Epics out. At that point I'll swap to the new camera as well. During the time I've been shooting with Red One much has been said and written about the camera. I've been very pleased with the camera. It has exceeded my expectations and it has been much better out there in the middle of nowhere --also in cold conditions. The camera is bit heavy, but should I say, lighter than what I thought. Perhaps the quality of the images has somewhat compensated the weight as after all can't say the weight has been any issue.

swans , eagle & lakescape
 

1. The horizon visible in Image 1 locates the swans in a natural environment. Without a location, Image 2 invites observation of the birds as if they were posing in a studio.

2. Image 2 brings the eagle to life. From Image 1 it is imaginable that the eagle has just frozen to death and will be embalmed in ice overnight.

3. In mid-distance the left side is brighter but that's because it's nearer the sunlight. The trees in foreground show no difference to me in detail between both sides but that's partly because the dark/light pattern of conifer tops is strongly uniform.

Where can I now read Meryem's summary? I miss Meryem but I only have photos of White-tailed Eagles and a stag from lakeside Killarney to offer; no video until next year, hopefully

Here's perhaps a better example of what I tried to explain in the previous post. This footage is a test how steadily I manage the camera on my shoulder while was moving on a skido. The footages itself is rather useless.

To demonstrate the point I added a stabilizing filter tyring to make the clip as steady as possible. For this reason allowed the software to zoom in as much as possible. The stabilized part is pretty smooth, and now, my point is, the original image is 4K. That yields a lot of headspace. The stabillized version of this shaky shot is still I guess around 3K resolution, so there's still plenty of space to downrez to HD 1920 x 1080.

The sample footage was processed on 2K and downconverted to 1K but should give an idea that the extra resolution makes quite a difference if shots need to be stabilized. The first 12 seconds is the original footage, the next 12 seconds the stablized version. The stabilizer creates some funny artefacts, but never mind. Here's the link to the sample

H264 file, 17.5MB : www.wildcine.fi/Stabilized-sample-H264.mp4

FLV file, about 4.8 MB: www.wildcine.fi/Stabilized-sample.flv

Red One, Canon EF 16-35mm f2.8 L, 1/50s, f8.0
Location: Oulanka National Park, Kuusamo, Finland
One week ago

http://www.wildcine.fi/A061_C057_0917FF.jpg

Hi Lauri

Wow that image is simply stunning !

I just thought I'd post a link to a UK doc ' The Wild Places Of Essex' that was shot on RED. It might be of interest and is a personal fave :-)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2m_Cww9f2MA

Hi Mat,

This is tremendous film-making. Beautifully put together and very engaging.

Any idea which lenses they used for the long shots?

Paul

Last comment on RED One in wildlife shooting
 

Everything comes to end at some point, and this will be my last comment on Red One camera in this thread.

When got the camera I started to shoot a wildlife document of Kuusamo highland reagion located in northern Finland and the east side of it is on the territory of Russia next to the Finnish border.

ARTE tv will show the

French version:
Une annee sous la lumiere arctique

and the

German version:
Unter Nordfinnischem Firmament

in Europe September 27th in the evening and a re-run October 4th. BBC Worldwide will show the document elsewhere except in Scandinavian countries.

The Finnish version be shown by YLE in Finland at some point near Christmas and the same might be shown also in Sweden and Norway in the future.

Summing up, I've been very very pleased with the Red One camera, and found it very reliable out there in warm, cold, dry and wet. I can sincerely say, have enjoyed this camera more than any other one I've ever owned. Everything suggests the new models Epic and yet unreleased Scarlet are even better for wildlife shooting, but that will be another story. This fall should be exciting in this respect.

Mat, I enjoyed the link you posted, thanks for sharing it! Also wish to thank everybody else who've posted to this thread and shared their thoughts.