Shutter smear...

[Brook Willard]

Any plans to integrate shutter smear? With a digitally controlled shutter and such a broad range of control available, it seems reasonable that digital shutter smear could be integrated. Pixels on the sensor could be mapped to expose at slightly different times but for the same interval, resulting in the same visual phenomenon that a rotating shutter creates.

This is not to say that I noticed strobing. For all I know, smear could already be integrated into the digital shutter mapping. It could also be impossible... I just don't know.

Any plans?

[JD Holloway]

Post effect?

[Jarred Land]

shutter smear isnt a good thing... so i dont know why you would want to make the camera do it by default. Alot of work is actually done to reduce smear, specially amongst highlights.

[Brook Willard]

I've just found that sometimes the smear resulting from a 180 degree shutter helps combat strobing, most notably at the beginning of or end of a camera movement. Perhaps I've mislabeled what I'm thinking of...

[Graeme Nattress]

Or look at it the other way: it's edge sharpness that makes for stutter. That's why HD stutters even when shot like film as they always seem to crank the edge sharpness way up. Bring it down and shoot with 35mm DOF and you don't get the stutter you'd normally get.

Graeme

[Jason Francois]

Would strobing be the jittering effect on the white lettering on the tail of the plane during a couple of the dogfight shots in the footage?

I never got a chance to ask what this was due to, but it was fairly pronounced.

Now, before any fanboys go overboard on me, just know that I still think the foogtage was phenominal. :)

[Graeme Nattress]

I had the feeling that some of the stuff I saw in the aerial shots was more to do with the camera being shaken around, but I'm not 100% sure. That said, as we refine things in the lab, we'll learn more about the the cameras in this regard.

Graeme

[Brook Willard]

I know what you're talking about, insanity. I believe it was a result of the helicopter mount's apparent sketchiness.

[David Mullen ASC]

If the electronic shutter seems to be a little "crisper" than its mechanical counterpart in a film camera, one solution might be to just slightly increase the exposure time, like using a 200 or 220 degree shutter instead of the standard 180 degree shutter. This would add a little more smear to the motion, but not be too objectionable.

In 24P HD, I sometimes use a 1/32 shutter speed instead of 1/48 -- partly to gain another half-stop of light, but also to reduce strobing at the expense of more smearing. In a low-light emergency, I might use 1/24 but then you definitely get a non-film-like smeariness with faster motion.

As Graeme is saying, the other culprit is edge-enhancement in video, which exagerrates the sharpness of the moving edge.

I'd also think that, to some degree, the excessive depth of field that some video cameras have also would contribute to the feeling of strobiness, because more of the image is in sharp focus, thus your eye is paying attention to more areas of the frame that are strobing. Just a theory.

[Graeme Nattress]

That sounds right David. Because we don't have the moving blade we can compensate for opening the shutter very slightly longer. Be interesting to try that on RED as soon as that's all enabled. Might be good to work out special visually equivalent shutter speeds to match a rotating shutter if that ends up being the case.

One of the nice things about doing 4k is the lack of need for the excessive edge sharpening you need on lower resolutions. That said, if you look at the NHK 8k stuff, it's very edge enhanced, and suffers because of it....

Graeme

[wshultz]

Awesome David. Learning more "stuff" already!
I'm filing this under "tricks of the trade".

[Jason Francois]

I had the feeling that some of the stuff I saw in the aerial shots was more to do with the camera being shaken around, but I'm not 100% sure. That said, as we refine things in the lab, we'll learn more about the the cameras in this regard.

Graeme

Thanks Graeme. From what I could tell it only looked to be in one spot on the frame, but then again it could be the focus of my eye. I was going to go back in to watch the footage again to analyze it better, but didn't have the time.

I'm certainly not alarmed at this point, because it could be caused by many things and motion in the other parts of the film were perfect. I don't know if the letters being white and in motion in relation to darker scenes might matter (way over my head), but I'm sure something will surface and a fix (if needed) will make it's way to the camera.

It might have even been the projector, because very few people noticed it and it was VERY obvious.

Now, come to think of it, it might have been the 8 shots of espresso. :)

Can't wait to test my own camera's limits.

[dalen johnson]

I had the feeling that some of the stuff I saw in the aerial shots was more to do with the camera being shaken around, but I'm not 100% sure. That said, as we refine things in the lab, we'll learn more about the the cameras in this regard.

Graeme

speaking of 'shake' (forgive me, Im a camera newbie), will it have Image stabilization like in the canon xl1?

I remember one day I had IS off and the camera was on the tripod...I looked throught the viewfinder through my office window, and it was horrible how much shake was going on. The floor level I was on vibrated, I guess...would never have known.

Also with all the talk of handheld noise, etc in still photography in low light, etc. how does this play in with Red being hand held and 'shake'. In still world you use lower ISO and f stop, what about 'film'/video...again, I know with the canon xl1 it had IS in the lens.

This is something I am real curious about red.

Peace

Dalen

[Brook Willard]

No, the RED ONE will not have image stabilization. Such features are more suited for consumer camcorders, not professional digital cinema cameras. :)

[dalen johnson]

No, the RED ONE will not have image stabilization. Such features are more suited for consumer camcorders, not professional digital cinema cameras. :)

why more suited? Canon has it...it was used in production shots as well as our high end panasonic and sonys?

Im not convinced that professionals dont need IS.
As mentioned, I looked through the lens, quite suprised that it had a steady vibration...on a tripod.

And with the shake here, may not be related, I truly am curious.
But now that you say it doesnt happen, I have 2 further questions...

- will there be some IS in the future? (in body/lens)
again, I dont see this as consumer only...if it works and benefits, why not incorporate?
- Until that time (which may not be from the sound of the reply) what do you do to reduce shake.

Yes most film is always on a tripod, or whatever...you never see the dude handholding the camera, nor can you with the size of those really. So, in some sense, 'professionals' dont need it.

But red is to a whole new market now - anyway, thanks for the responce.

Peace

Dalen

[Gavin Greenwalt]

From a post stand point I know that sharpening can indeed increase strobe. I used sharpening just last week on a project because I needed the frame to 'sparkle and pop' more for effect (I was trying to emulate the look of sun flares on distant water). This is especially true on transparencies and fine detail. I would imagine motion blur on film would be very similar to a transparency. The edge enhancement doesn't know what to make of a big evenly toned blob so it enhances its outline. The brain assumes that the density of a boundary infers the density of shape. So solid outline = solid shape. Just as if you had shot it with a fast shutter.

Dalen the reason RED does not include IS is because that is a feature of the lens, not the camera. The RED camera does not support automatic lens features and by extension image stabilization.

Now the answer you really want to hear: the reason why you don't want to use IS: IS does just that, it stabilizes the image. The problem with it is, it doesn't know what movement is intentional and what movement is random so if you try to do any camera moves the image will 'bound' from angle to angle instead of moving in a nice smooth motion. Try it with your camera on a tripod. You'll find starting and stopping a nice smooth pan will be far more challenging with the IS on.

[Jonathan Payne]

Wait, does this mean that the Peter Jackson footage has the same shutter characteristics that the milk girl footage had? I had always assumed that the original footage didn't have the final version of the electronic shutter enabled. I remember thinking the color, the resolution and the latitude in the milk girl footage looked stellar to say the least but the one thing that left me feeling cold and distant was the stiff, slightly strobing shutter (and yes I know that a film camera strobes to some extent but this was not the same thing).

Now I'm beginning to worry a bit. I remember an old thread a while back (I think it was on DVXuser and before there was a REDuser) and Jim was graciously asking for people's input on what kind of shutter we all wanted to be emulated in the Red and I remember people all listing off various Arri and Panavision looks (that thread was the first time I realized that the shutter from an Arri 435 would look slightly different than the shutter from a Panavision Millennium for instance) and I thought everyone was in agreement that they wanted at least the ability to try and mimic a film style 180 degree shutter smear. After all isn't the goal of the digital cinema visual to have the option to keep things we like about the 35-mm cinema look (thus the across the board agreement on 24 frame acquisition, cropping to 2.40, variable frame rates, etc.) while getting rid of things like grain?

Don't get me wrong, I'm a red fan-boy through and through. I'm a total believer in this camera and all of the software, hardware, and people that figured into creating it. It's just disturbing to hear that the very un-film like shuttering exhibited in the milk girl footage might be the ONLY option after everything else has been created 210% better than any of us could have wanted (or maybe even deserved). Even if that is the only option I'll buy this camera the day I can afford to but it would be nice to have some clarification.

[ChristopherKenworthy]

I love all the camera-speak, I really do, but from a director's point of view I'd say the best way to eliminate stutter is to follow a subject rather than pan through space. You can shoot Arri 35mm, and if you pan too fast through nothing, you can't help but see stutter. So, follow something other than space. Spielberg, as I'm sure everybody knows, always hands off motion like this, to guide the camera, rather than having it hose through space with the entire image stuttering. Did anybody see Heaven a few years ago? There were lots of long, fast pans and moves through empty space, and the audience was drawn right out of the movie, because you couldn't see anything other than stutter. As Jim said in another thread, there are lots of ways to shoot bad Red footage, and for me, that includes set-ups that encourage stutter.

[Jim Arthurs]

I saw the short twice, once very close to the front, the next time at the mid-way point in the theatre for a better overall viewing perspective.

As far as strobing goes, I saw nothing that was more (or less) than I would have expected from the same subject matter shot on film with the same shutter.

[Jonathan Payne]

ChristopherKenworthy- Agreed! I'm not talking about unmotivated panning, I'm not really talking about panning at all. I'm talking about motion blur of the subjects themselves and any slight camera moves that might accompany the actor as they move around a bit. This is why the milk girls clip scene was a perfect example of this, there was very little camera movement as it was all minor action and yet there was that stuttering shutter none-the-less. Let me reiterate, I love the red camera and I'll take it either way, just looking for clarification from the people in the know if there was an effort to provide the option of a popular 35mm film camera-esque motion blur (as that would be my own personal preference).

[garageman]

ChristopherKenworthy- Agreed! I'm not talking about unmotivated panning, I'm not really talking about panning at all. I'm talking about motion blur of the subjects themselves and any slight camera moves that might accompany the actor as they move around a bit. This is why the milk girls clip scene was a perfect example of this, there was very little camera movement as it was all minor action and yet there was that stuttering shutter none-the-less. Let me reiterate, I love the red camera and I'll take it either way, just looking for clarification from the people in the know if there was an effort to provide the option of a popular 35mm film camera-esque motion blur (as that would be my own personal preference).

This is a very valid point that needs addressing and the only way is to show more footage.

[Scott H. Jones]

I just assumed that the shaky helicopter stuff was a creative choice. There was plenty of smooth stuff too so it seems unlikely it was a bad mount.

[garageman]

It's not about shaky footage, as that is an operator's business, but strobing footage when subjects are moving.

[Jeremy Hughes]

why more suited? Canon has it...it was used in production shots as well as our high end panasonic and sonys?

Im not convinced that professionals dont need IS.
As mentioned, I looked through the lens, quite suprised that it had a steady vibration...on a tripod.

And with the shake here, may not be related, I truly am curious.
But now that you say it doesnt happen, I have 2 further questions...

- will there be some IS in the future? (in body/lens)
again, I dont see this as consumer only...if it works and benefits, why not incorporate?
- Until that time (which may not be from the sound of the reply) what do you do to reduce shake.

Yes most film is always on a tripod, or whatever...you never see the dude handholding the camera, nor can you with the size of those really. So, in some sense, 'professionals' dont need it.

But red is to a whole new market now - anyway, thanks for the responce.

Peace

Dalen

Shoot 4K and when cropping to 2K, have some sort of digital image stabalization. Isn't the sensor 4900x2540? If Digital image stabalization were integrated here, it'd help a lot. Since it's really a rather small vibration.


I love all the camera-speak, I really do, but from a director's point of view I'd say the best way to eliminate stutter is to follow a subject rather than pan through space. You can shoot Arri 35mm, and if you pan too fast through nothing, you can't help but see stutter. So, follow something other than space. Spielberg, as I'm sure everybody knows, always hands off motion like this, to guide the camera, rather than having it hose through space with the entire image stuttering. Did anybody see Heaven a few years ago? There were lots of long, fast pans and moves through empty space, and the audience was drawn right out of the movie, because you couldn't see anything other than stutter. As Jim said in another thread, there are lots of ways to shoot bad Red footage, and for me, that includes set-ups that encourage stutter.

I'm pretty sure as long as there's 24fps, there'll be stutter. The best you can do is the distract people from it. Don't misunderstand me, I love 24fps, but stuttering is a problem with most newcomers to 24fps. Even 60fps has some stuttering.

[Graeme Nattress]

Boris and Natasha work very differently to Frankie. I didn't notice any stutter on the "normal" shots, only the aerial work and I've been starting at this footage quite a bit.... The rest all looked nice and smooth.

Graeme

[Jarred Land]

It's not about shaky footage, as that is an operator's business, but strobing footage when subjects are moving.

garageman... your doing a good job of pissing me off.

The arial stuff we had some things working against us... the mount was not a gyro mount, a very long optimo zoom was used, and there was alot of rotor slop.

[Graeme Nattress]

I didn't see any strobe on movement Jarred. Did you?

Graeme

[Jarred Land]

no i didn't... and i never heard a single person out of the thousands that watched the footage mention it.

[garageman]

garageman... your doing a good job of pissing me off.

The arial stuff we had some things working against us... the mount was not a gyro mount, a very long optimo zoom was used, and there was alot of rotor slop.

Some of us haven't seen the Jackson film and the comments made on strobing refer to the milk girls footage. I only want to know if this strobing is evident in later footage shot with the later prototypes. I wasn't refering or criticizing shake in the camera work that is supposed to be evident in the Jackson film, why should that bother anyone?

[Jarred Land]

because your talking out of your ass...

quite alot of your last posts have been implicating negative visual attributes the film in an attempt to stongarm us into posting the film online.. and thats not cool.

[garageman]

because your talking out of your ass...

quite alot of your last posts have been implicating negative visual attributes the film in an attempt to stongarm us into posting the film online.. and thats not cool.

Fair enough in that case I apologise if that's the impression I gave but I didn't even consider I'd have the power to strongarm anyone into doing anything. I wasn't being negative about the look of the film as I actually like it's look from the stills, comparing it to "film" doesn't even come into it for me, only the way it acquires shots. I do have a genuine concern about strobing which is evident in earlier footage.

[Jarred Land]

no worries man... just make sure your criticism has the right motivation and everything will be good.

[garageman]

no worries man... just make sure your criticism has the right motivation and everything will be good.


My motivation is in no way critical of RED or those involved in it's making, it's just sometimes I find that some considerations slip under the radar among the heaps of praise, which you have worked hard for no doubt.

[donatello b]

RED 664 there should be plenty of clips out with REDs 1-400 for you to decide if it fits your "likes" before your camera ships ...

IMO Milk Girls is old ( older prototype etc ) ... perhaps the PJ short will be released with a feature or it will play in festivals...

[Martin Drew]

Just a thought. Is there an intelligent post sharpening app out there using some kind of motion detection to ease off sharpening in areas of motion. I presume that would reduce some of the exageration of sharpening artifacts in motion images.

M

[Deanan]

I didn't see any strobe on movement Jarred. Did you?

Graeme

I'm not Jarred, but I play one on TV.

I didn't see any strobing that was obvious and i watch the the move
about 20 times all the way through (and bit of it a whole lot more).

Any time you have less than a 360deg shutter you risk strobing.
It's a fact of life and is effectively managed by limiting the speed on your
moves and shutter angle (though much less often that way).

It's a trade off... you can't try to achieve the same look of
film without accepting it's constraints at the time. A 1/48 sec or
180deg shutter gives you a certain cadence and motion blur
that is just one of the things that's part of the film look.

That's not to say you can't use a 360deg shutter when you need to... :)

Deanan

[David Mullen ASC]

The strobing really is a result of the fact that 24 fps is barely fast enough to hide that you are capturing motion as a bunch of still frames, so we need a certain amount of per-frame blur to create the illusion that the motion carries over into the next frame. Too little blur and the motion looks pixellated; too much blur and it looks smeary.

If the shooting/sampling/projection rate were high enough, then strobing wouldn't be a problem and we could get away with less blur per frame. But then you get into that problem that high sampling rates make digital photography look like classic 60i interlaced-scan video photography, which does look smoother than 24 fps film or 24P video. So to some extent, the strobiness of 24 fps is just something we've become conditioned to.

[Daniel Reichenbach]

I remarked the shutter, talked about it with Brook. He told me, that it could be also a problem from the projector. He explained it by the different heat of the projector. In the morning (thats true) there was more shutter than in the afternoon. Hmmm, don't know if that explains the things, Mullen is right, 180 shutter means 1/48 speed in a still camera, if you open the shutter, the exposure time will be lower, the exposure time calculates like this: Exposure=Frames*360/shutter angle

[Brook Willard]

I don't remember saying that... though I did comment on the lack of complete calibration.

There wasn't a shutter problem with the camera or the projector and I didn't notice strobing. Let the record show that. :laugh:

[Daniel Reichenbach]

Possible, don't wanted to bring you in a strange light Brook, could be my bad english :usd:

[Antoine Fabi]

I saw the short twice, once very close to the front, the next time at the mid-way point in the theatre for a better overall viewing perspective.

As far as strobing goes, I saw nothing that was more (or less) than I would have expected from the same subject matter shot on film with the same shutter.

Exactly,

I saw it twice also. ...and i looked very very carefully.
I go often to cinema, and it looked about the same as 35mm.
Now you may want to play a little with the shutter speed for the desired motion caracteristics.

I was litterally charmed by the image, its texture, its beauty.

This is a @#@# of an achievement.

Congrats! This is unbelievable.

[Gbabymogul]

The strobing really is a result of the fact that 24 fps is barely fast enough to hide that you are capturing motion as a bunch of still frames, so we need a certain amount of per-frame blur to create the illusion that the motion carries over into the next frame. Too little blur and the motion looks pixellated; too much blur and it looks smeary.

If the shooting/sampling/projection rate were high enough, then strobing wouldn't be a problem and we could get away with less blur per frame. But then you get into that problem that high sampling rates make digital photography look like classic 60i interlaced-scan video photography, which does look smoother than 24 fps film or 24P video. So to some extent, the strobiness of 24 fps is just something we've become conditioned to.David, how do we emulate the motion characteristics of film with high end digital cinema (like the D20, Viper, Genesis, and now RED ?). Don't say 'shoot film" , hehe. I know there was a lot of talk about some shots in Apocalypto, but I've seen enough high end digital films that didn't have any of that strobe look to prove it an exception to the rule.

So far, there isn't enough footage to properly evaluate RED in that respect, but if it were a factor, i'm sure you would have mentioned it in your review (very cool btw). I know each of the aforementioned cameras use a different shuttter aesthetic (almost as proprietary as codecs, it seems). Personally, i'd rather give up some data for better motion, then preserve it without - especially since I plan to do a lot of tracking... "New World" type work.

And since it's not a mechanical shutter, couldn't we have a menu of shutter choices ? (although that'd probably be cost prohibitive, and might be patent infringement).

[Alexander Nikishin]

I'm wondering, which camera shutter did the Red team choose to emulate in the end?

[Jonathan Payne]

So a few things:

1) Jarred I just want to make it clear that the purpose of my post was not in anyway related to strong-arming you guys into posting footage. My portion of this thread probably isn't even relevant to the PJ footage because they were also shot with early versions of the RED one. I certainly haven't seen the PJ footage. If you ever see my name next to a post, let it be known that I am never trying to smear RED, troll the message boards, or make fun of you guys or your beautiful achievement in anyway. Personally, in regards to showing the new footage, I have voiced my support for Jim's suggestion to set up screenings. I'm sure you agree that a screening in a theater in 4K is much more effective anyway. Plus it can all be done to the RED team's own specifications and comfort regarding how and when the material is shown.

2) I am just wondering about how the particular look of the electronic shutter has progressed -- something akin more to the milk girls footage [the only footage I have seen projected], or something more akin to the shutter/motion blur of a 35mm camera with a mechanical shutter? I am still just intensely curious about whether or not a decision was made to go ahead and try to emulate (or at least give the option to try and emulate) the look of a 35mm mechanical shutter (as much as can be done with an electronic one)? I realize that the two are inherently different and there is probably no way to completely mimic a mechanical shutter look without a true mechanical shutter. But I also think it's a valid question of aesthetics and as I mentioned before, Graeme and Jim were both commenting in that old thread on this subject that they had some leeway in creating different looks and that they were, at the time, trying to decide what the look of the RED one's particular electronic shutter would be.

3) Graeme said that there were shots in the new footage that looked "nice and smooth" and that's always good to hear.

[Jonathan Payne]

I guess I should have just written what Alexander Nikishin just wrote.. #2 in my post is just a more verbose version.

[Jarred Land]

Jenga your good in my books dont worry.

[Alexander Nikishin]

Jarred, I've got beef with you for slapping my gf's hand when she touched the Red spider camera setup. :weight_lift:

[Jannard]

This is not an easy topic... and we aren't ready to discuss it fully yet because we are still experimenting with different combinations. It is a bit more complicated than you might expect.

Jim

[Alex Boothby]

The only thing that matters is the image. People often get hung up in pointless technical analysis and forget the most important thing.

[Gbabymogul]

I believe many of those cameras use a mechanical shutter (Genesis, D20, not Viper).

There was a long discusion about shutter speed over at dvinfo. Here:

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=76426&page=3

Lots of technical stuff about image tearing & mechanical shutter vs. rolling shutter vs. global shutter...Well, i ain't no expert but I believe that the Arri has both and electronic and mechanical shutter (mostly because of the needed OVF), and the Genesis is an electronic shutter. I was wrong about the Viper (just assumed) ; apparently it is a mechanical shutter only according to Mathew Greene, from the same thread you quoted :
Not that strange. Many people don't realize that all Frame Transfer CCD cameras (Like the ones currently manufactured by Grass Valley) have a spinning mechanical shutter. If the shutter wasn't implemented these cameras would have horrible vertical smear. You can find them on Phillips, BTS and now Grass Valley cameras. The Viper is one example.

My main point was that since RED isn't using an OVF (no shutter required) and since i've heard everywhere that there are no moving parts in the cam; this guy assumed "electronic shutter". In that case, I was positing an in camera processing of the CMOS output to emulate a variety of shutter looks. I'm no chip engineer, so that's probably a stupid idea...



:Guinness:

[David Mullen ASC]

The Genesis has an electronic shutter and viewfinder.

The Viper only has a brief mechanical shutter to transfer the sensor charge; otherwise you're seeing the effect of its electronic shutter for anything except nearly no-shutter settings for maximum exposure time.

Only the Dalsa and Arri-D20 have a mirror-shutter and optical viewfinder.

[Alex Boothby]

Didn't know that about the Genesis. Thanks for the correction David and G.

[Gbabymogul]

The Genesis has an electronic shutter and viewfinder.

The Viper only has a brief mechanical shutter to transfer the sensor charge; otherwise you're seeing the effect of its electronic shutter for anything except nearly no-shutter settings for maximum exposure time.

Only the Dalsa and Arri-D20 have a mirror-shutter and optical viewfinder.Thanks David; that's what I thought. With the chip sensor design at the stage it's at, I thought the main reason the mechanical shutter is included in the D20 is for the OVF (or in the Viper's case a charge device). I know virtually nothing of the Dalsa, though

I'd be surprised if RED had a mechanical shutter (or even a combination) since it requires neither an OVF or charge device management.

Maybe we won't know the exact way (or aesthetic) Jim has chosen, unless someone with an engineering degree figures it out.

;)

[Anders Holck]

Info on the viper shutter:
http://www.thomsongrassvalley.com/wp/anonymous/About_electronic_and_mechanical_shutters.pdf

As David says it's only a tool to eliminate the vertical smear of the CCD.

[Jonathan Payne]

This is not an easy topic... and we aren't ready to discuss it fully yet because we are still experimenting with different combinations. It is a bit more complicated than you might expect.

Jim

Thanks Jim, understood. I didn't realize that you guys where still tinkering with the electronic shutter. Hope all goes well.

[Brook Willard]

This is not an easy topic... and we aren't ready to discuss it fully yet because we are still experimenting with different combinations. It is a bit more complicated than you might expect.

Jim
Good enough answer for me.

[Jonathan Payne]

I believe many of those cameras use a mechanical shutter (Genesis, D20, not Viper).

There was a long discusion about shutter speed over at dvinfo. Here:

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=76426&page=3

Lots of technical stuff about image tearing & mechanical shutter vs. rolling shutter vs. global shutter...

You know This was the thread I was remembering where people were talking with Jim about the electronic shutter on the RED camera. I guess it wasn't at dvxuser or reduser.

Personally I'm delighted to re-read this quote on that thread from Jim as it's exactly what I would hope he'd say:

"People hold a "film look" in high esteem. It "feels" right. That "look" includes a few anomalies, like 24 frames a second (instead of a "now" looking 60 fps), grain and a motion handling "tear" from a mechanical shutter. People have been begging for this look instead of a Betacam video look. We are striving to provide the "feel" experience with the RED ONE. After all, it is a digital cinema camera. If you want a harsh broadcast video look, I suggest you shoot 60fps or buy a video camera and save some money.

Jim"

[Illya Friedman]

The only thing that matters is the image. People often get hung up in pointless technical analysis and forget the most important thing.

If only that were true. Having the best possible image is extremely important. I think most everyone would agree it's the MOST important thing. However, it is NOT the only thing that matters.

Having what many in the industry have called the best images ever produced by a digital cinema camera, Dalsa is keenly aware of this. Just as I'm sure Red and all the other manufacturers are too.

Illya Friedman
Dalsa

[Alex Boothby]

Ha ha. I guess that comment was directed at the non-camera manufacturers in the crowd. :innocent:

[Jarred Land]

lol.. wacka-cha.

[Michael Schrengohst]

That sounds right David. Because we don't have the moving blade we can compensate for opening the shutter very slightly longer. Be interesting to try that on RED as soon as that's all enabled. Might be good to work out special visually equivalent shutter speeds to match a rotating shutter if that ends up being the case.

One of the nice things about doing 4k is the lack of need for the excessive edge sharpening you need on lower resolutions. That said, if you look at the NHK 8k stuff, it's very edge enhanced, and suffers because of it....

Graeme

The NHK stuff was really unwatchable. It strobed and was over-exposed.
You could see some wierd noise in the dark blue water flyovers. The RED footage at the Apple booth was easy to watch. Maybe the difference between a real director and DP vs. a camera tech pretending to be a DP?

[dalemccready]

I've found with some HD footage people react really nervoulsy to watching 24P footage without seeing it at 48Hz (projected or interlaced). This can make HD seem overly stuttery, but interestingly, if I let people know it'll be fine on set, they stop seeing it pretty fast.

[tomf]

great discussion. [bit of confusion between shutter and stutter, but we understand that not everyone's first (or second) language is english :) ]

it's interesting to note (unless i have missed it being said here already...) that traditional cinema projectors actually flash each celluloid film frame twice. that's because the human eye is able to discern blank gaps (strobing) if you only flash 24 images per second on a reflective white/silver screen.

in other words, cinema has traditionally been acquired at 24fps (camera), distributed at 24 fps (prints), but projected at 48 flashes-per-second. it's still 24 discrete images per second, but each frame is flashed twice by using a double-bladed shutter in cinema projectors (the film is only moved forward after each frame has been projected two times).

so it seems to me, that when we talk about the film look (referring to an experience of seeing a movie in an actual cinema theatre), this plays an albeit small part in our overall percpetion of the visual texture of what we are watching.

disclaimer: this is more trivia than anything else, it does not affect cameras, production/post pipelines, digital projection, or viewing on electronic monitors... just our experience of watching celluloid :) :) :)

[Antoine Fabi]

so, like film,...maybe the RED 4K projector should do 48 fps...? ,,,but then you need a mechanical blade.

Seriously, when i use 200 deg shutter speed on my HVX200, it looks way better.

[David Mullen ASC]

Flashing the frame 48 times per second in a projector reduces visible flicker, not visible strobing.

And digital projectors already have higher image refresh rates that 24 Hz.

[Volker Ehlers]

What about compensating ramps via shutter on RED-ONE?
Will this be possible at some stage with RED or 2nd party accessories?

Will it be possible to program different speeds with different shutter settings for compensation? Will they be available an a simple "change speed button" similar to ARRI shutter compensated camera bodies?

Volker

[P Andersson]

Not sure, but if it is the reason that film stutters less than video because the shutter allows the light to gradually increase and gradually decrease with a solid plateau in the middle, whereas digital sensors start and end their capturing abruptly.

Would it be possible to build in this as a variable function into a sensor?
Perhaps with the two "slopes" overlapping minimally.

It looks on the propeller picture as if the sensor is doing this gradual thing already though, so maybe this post is completely pointless.

[tomf]

David is absolutely correct. i should have been more precise and said visible flicker ;)

thanks David.

[tomf]

RE: the sweeping/wiping effect of a rotating camera shutter blade (as opposed to a projector shutter blade) as it gradually reveals and then gradually hides the film aperture :

the physical shape and motion of a camera shutter blade (or more precisely, the variable wedge-shape opening of that shutter blade) certainly has some effect on the look of the motion blur that appears in the final still image burned onto the film negative. i suppose that how much of an effect could be debated, but it's there.

i can't speak from a position of knowledge for simulating this effect with CMOS sensors (although i remain hopeful), however i do know for a fact that there are 3D animation/rendering programs that actually attempt to mimic, approximate, or at least consider a virtual moving camera shutter blade during the time-sweep for each rendered frame.

to simulate this rotating shutter "effect" with a CMOS sensor, i presume that RED would have to be able to selectively read input from a variable sub-set of the pixels on the sensor, ramping up the sub-set during the beginning and ramping down the sub-set at the end of the frame exposure. how much of an actual effect that would have on the final image is a very interesting question...

apologies if this analysis is "overkill" or "too much" for some readers. i for one am obsessed with the way that motion blur looks different in film, vs. video, vs. HD, vs. 3D renderings, etc.

and yes, i agree that the propellor still-frame already has very sweet motion blur... would love to see it IN motion ;)

[Brook Willard]

What about compensating ramps via shutter on RED-ONE?
Will this be possible at some stage with RED or 2nd party accessories?


This is possible in-camera.

[Jeremy Hughes]

http://www.100fps.com/how_many_frames_can_humans_see.htm
Great article for people who are new to all this. I read it long time ago. Having a username like OcularLimpidity, I have to post it. :)

[Rainer Fritz]

I'm reactivating this great thread again please. I wrote about greame's improvements to the colorspace, and so I wanted to ask if there are improvements possible to the shutter smear or motion stutter effect? I watched in the last time much of RED material in the theatre digitally and analog. Little bit more at the digital projection than the analog I saw in hard contrasts and camera moving a for me strong motion stutter. Would it be possible to discuss such a improvement?

thx
rainer

[Charles Angus]

In the words of Han Solo, "Where did you dig up that old fossil?", but referring to the thread in this case...

[Rainer Fritz]

So we had a showcase today in Vienna, where we projected RED Material in digital 2k (DCP via CP2000 Beamer) and on a 35mm copy. The stutter is on the analog print not so hard as on the digital projection. Is there any chance to reduce a little bit more the motion stutter? if you have high contrasts in the picture, specially in front of white it is distinctive visible.

[Sanjin Jukic]

I was there and i saw it too.

But also I saw the same or similar issue on film many times and the most and last famous was at "Dark Knight" film projection (Haydn Kino Großer Saal) with sequences shot with IMAX camera, like a city pans from the sky (helicopter or...), etc...

[Jeff Kilgroe]

Oh, wow... zombie thread. Why did it have to come back to life? Why??

Anyway, there are lots of factors that contribute to stuttering and it's true that the RED One doesn't give the same sort of exposure roll-off and smear that a mechanical shutter does. Do we really want this? Best solution is to lengthen exposure time a bit -- I think David Mullen posted that very same suggestion to this thread, uh, like 2 years ago.

Shutter smear, soft edge wipes, control of skew, etc.. Are all something that could theoretically be addressed with future sensor designs and camera software (firmware). The read reset of the photosites on the CMOS sensor would need to be controlled, even individually. It's been discussed before, it's theoretically possible at some point. Can't be done with the current Mysterium chip and probably not with Mysterium-X. With the current Mysterium, rest timing is hard set and remains constant, regardless of exposure time. So you actually increase the rubbery skew "rolling shutter" effect by using a faster exposure time.

On the RED, if you want sharp, stuttery, with little blur and more apparent skew, use a faster shutter. If you want more blur, perceptibly smoother motion, less apparent skew, use a slower shutter / longer exposure.

[Rainer Fritz]

Jeff, thx.... so I think we could close it....