DEMAND for NEW HIGH ASA CHIP?

[Tim Naylor]

I'm somewhat new to this board. I've been learning all I can before I take delivery on my RED in a few weeks. I've shot film for the last 20 years and video for at least half that. I have my first RED job next week. It's quite exciting to break my Red cherry.

That aside.

The one thing that seems to pop up is the issue of RED's effective ASA. After talking to several DP's as well as watching this most informative interview with Rodney Charters ASC http://www.reel-show.tv/index.html?vidId=00074 it seems that above 250-320, the chip begins to introduce noise. Though Rodney Charters never explicitly said so, I feel that the show he DP's, "24", may have stayed away from RED because being a big available light show, 250 asa limits their lens options. I also have an inside info that Law and Order passed on RED for similar issues (it's shot on Genesis now at 1080). Which is a shame.

Further in Charter's interview though, he explains that he feels 1080 Pro Rez is an excellent finishing option and that for broadcast there seems to be no compelling reason to finish or deliver in 4k for now.

Which leads me to try and elicit a discussion, petition, whatever you want to call about the possibility of RED developing "the RED Broadcast Chip". This would entail a 2k chip that comes in Super 35mm dimensions, instead of the current cropped 2k at app 2/3". Since smaller pixels lower ASA, the purpose of this would be to have a chip with a significantly bigger pixels hence higher ASA (500-640 or so) and still retain the full frame super 35mm image.

As Scarlet and Epic will be embracing optional chip designs, I think this would be a good option to have. Most projects will be shooting for the small screen. I feel 2-3k is more than adequate resolution for that. However, this seems to fly in the face of the new announcements sentiments of reaching for the sky in terms of resolution. I hold my breath for the 1000 Mega Pixel 1 foot x 2 foot Uber Monstrosity imager announcement at NAB.

Jokes aside, if this is a major hurdle or if there's any demand for such a chip or if RED just doesn't see going backwards in rez is of any interest, I'd love to see a passionate discussion here. Are we to be stuck with low ASA's (relative to film) for the next few years or more? It seems to me it would be in RED's interest as a higher ASA option would drive the sales of their not so speedy zooms and their less than super speed primes. I'd love to be able to shoot with mostly available or street light on a zoom - even at 2k full frame or at a higher stop for other applications. Offering a lower rez, higher ASA chip would be like different film stocks in a way. As Kodak knew that one stock doesn't fit all, why not a similar approach with chips.

As I've noticed, many a thread here has turned into product reality.

[Mark Mannschreck]

HERE HERE

AND it would be great if Red offered a lower res/faster sensor upgrade option for R1

I wonder how much the ASA could be effectively raised by halving the photosites? Doubled the light gathering abilities I suppose? What would that mean logarithmically? I'm terrible at math.

[M Hsu]

I'd also love to be able to shoot in low light. I almost bought a nikon D3 because useable 6400 is a mind blowing thing. Even useable 1600 with a 1.2 lens gets you workable images in cities at night. I am probably going to buy a 5D mkII for low light video. Of course, the results from monstro remain to be seen and Jim no doubt probably has been working on it.

[Tarek S. Kandil]

Is the RED sensor rated at 250?

Would they implement this variety by changing the box? I can imagine a sensor that you would slide into the brain, this is what I thought RED would do before the 13th. Is that you could buy the things like cards, with a special cover or something that opens on insertion, mechanically and simply, protecting it outside the cam.

I haven't heard of many digital cameras shooting well at low light, haven't tried RED yet and am new to film so am only stating what I heard. Is it true that digital photography needs to be flooded with light in its nature? This is a rule of thumb here in lebanon.

Bigger cells (pixels) sounds like it makes sense, but then sensor size will be altered so wouldn't be interchangeable. Also if I understand correctly the surface area of the light sensitive element (sensor) affects depth and focus and all...

If you could slide the chips into the enclosure, you'd have to house it. So that the slot is sized for the case/housing and the thing is different sizes mounted on it. Kinda like a 3.55 floppy, but the thing opens up to a sensor. Or a S8 cartridge.

Or you could just buy brains at different ASA's... but that would up cost, or you wouldn't have sensors rated at different ASA's you'd have a camera brain for each asa, sounds like a lot.

You'd minimum need 2, a fast brain and a slow brain (sounds odd when not talkin bout film). But the pro would always like more...

Are we suggesting the brain be taken further apart?

Interesting. Dunno if I got anything wrong, if so would appreciate correction. Very new to imaging.

Nice topic.

[Shawn Booth]

Shooting in low light - you mean having to shoot without lights... It would be cheaper for you to purchase a tiny lighting package than for you to upgrade if RED ever listened to this. I doubt they will... Thankfully.

ASA1000 on B17 is beautiful...

Face it, you need light... You are no longer using a prosumer camera. What's your guys' next request? FULL AUTO MODE (where the camera turns itself it on, sets up, finds the shot...)?

[Michael Lindsay]

Couple of opinions:

Without greater dynamic range a faster chip is not that is useful for me.

Red's announcements actually points towards half of what you want. The Epic most (on this list) have expressed a desire for has bigger pixels.

Since Genesis is more of a traditional camera the end user is kept away from 'Red style' processing mistakes. Red 500asa correctly downsampled to 1080p material does hold up.

I really hope they can deliver 13+ stops with FF epic. 13+ stops and T1.3 lenses will deliver city night life with available light. On Red at the moment my problem is blown highlights losing their colour NOT speed.

regards

Michael

[SF Geek]

Shawn, with all respect, I think you're missing the point. This camera is slow. If you rate it as you would film, it comes out to be more like 160ASA than 320. Spot metered gray card at 320ASA, is at about 25IRE and needs an extra stop to reach its 50IRE middle gray. That's not very fast. You might want to underexpose since you have more information there than you would film, but i would not consider Red rated at 1000ASA (in terms of light metering, not as a setting on the camera) as producing images at acceptable noise levels.

I don't think people are asking for a camera you don't have to light for. People don't always shoot 500ASA film because they can't afford lights.

I would be interested in a native 2k, super35 sensor. Especially if it was fairly easy to change out, like film stock.

[Nicholas Shields]

Higher ASA would be great!!! We've shoot almost everyday with our Red and anyone who thinks it looks good in low light or has a decent dynamic range is fooling themselves. A great deal of professionals have said the exact same thing. The camera rates at 320 at best - in daylight, 200's in tungsten. The noise in the blue channel is brutal. The camera, as a whole, is great, but it has a long way to go before it can fend off the advantages of film's speed and dynamic range.

Nick.

[donatello b]

". Spot metered gray card at 320ASA, is at about 25IRE and needs an extra stop to reach its 50IRE middle gray"

if you want zone V ( middle gray ) to be at 50 IRE then you are going to get a ISO around 160 ... IMO zone V is NOT 50 IRE ( on RED or FILM) ... i rate it at ISO 320 for daylight and prefer ISO 250 for tungsten ... i don't know the IRE reading for zone V as i don't use IRE ...

from what i recall 50 IRE (middle gray) was used for video camera's in the 70-80's but it is not used in film ..
i have never seen a film to tape transfer with zone V set to 50 IRE .... if one prefers 50 IRE then IMO they are going to only have about 1 1/2 stops before they reach 100 IRE ...

[Sanjin Jukic]

Red with Leica Noctilux-M 50mm f/1.0 by night 720p (http://www.purgatorymagazine.com/_downloads/lenstests/Leica_Noctilux_50mm_f(1)_720p_h264.mov)

RED with Canon 50mm FD f/1.2 by Night 2K (http://www.purgatorymagazine.com/_downloads/lenstests/Canon_50mm_720p_h264.mov)

All shot at wide open and processed at 320ASA in RA.

Missing maybe use one of 85 filters (85, 85B, 85C) just to produce natural colors when shooting with tungsten WB outdoors.

Of course I could go to smaller aperture... it's about the lens test purpose only.

[Charles Angus]

Denser photosites mean lower noise, no the opposite. This is a very common misconception.

Bigger physical sensor size is what you want.

[Mark Mannschreck]

Shooting in low light - you mean having to shoot without lights... It would be cheaper for you to purchase a tiny lighting package than for you to upgrade if RED ever listened to this. I doubt they will... Thankfully.

ASA1000 on B17 is beautiful...

Face it, you need light... You are no longer using a prosumer camera. What's your guys' next request? FULL AUTO MODE (where the camera turns itself it on, sets up, finds the shot...)?

I suppose Kubrick had an f/0.7 adapted from NASA because he couldn't afford a tiny lighting package.

ASA1000 on any build isn't very useable (unless you are intercutting with Phantom footage) and that isn't the kind of speed I am talking about...

I think many of the changes to Epic and Scarlet came because of DSLR's like the 5D MK2 and the path that they are on... The BIGGEST attraction of the 5D MK2 to me is it's speed.

[Shawn Booth]

wait wait wait - i wasn't saying it was rated at 1000, just said it looked beautiful. i was monitoring at it recently and thought, wow, what an improvement - looks beautiful.

yes, this camera is slow.

I have noticed a lot of complaints by people who wish to shoot in low light situations when they actually just want to shoot without light -

- NOT SAYING EVERYONE FALLS INTO THIS.

[Eki Halkka]

yes, this camera is slow.

Exposure is always a tradeoff - how many stops over the gray card before clipping versus how much noise is tolerable, especially in shadows. Exposing for higher ISO will maintain much more of the highlights - the down side is, you'll get more noise.

I recall when exposed based on grey card at ISO 320, Red One gives a very clean image with (roughly) four stops over grey before clipping, and seven below before full black/noise floor. Expose it at ISO 2560, and you'll get 18dB noisier image with seven stops above grey card and four below. If you properly scale that 4K original down to 2K, the noise level is reduced by 12 dB due to averaging pixels together. If you scale to SD resolution, it's reduced by 24 dB total - so it has less noise pixel for pixel than the original slow 4K image.

Now, which one of those is the sensor's native sensitivity? In a way, you could say both are, all are, nothing is ;-)

ISO rating of a camera that outputs RAW is pretty arbitary, based on taste. Where do you wanna set your gray at...

The best way is to simply forget about ISO and gray cards, and always expose the image as bright as you can without clipping highlights, regardless of the content of the scene.

Edit: i just found this nice thread about the issue...

http://www.reduser.net/forum/showthread.php?t=12863

[combatentropy]

2K S35 would be great.


If you rate it as you would film, it comes out to be more like 160ASA than 320. Spot metered gray card at 320ASA, is at about 25IRE and needs an extra stop to reach its 50IRE middle gray. That's not very fast. You might want to underexpose since you have more information there than you would film, but i would not consider Red rated at 1000ASA (in terms of light metering, not as a setting on the camera) as producing images at acceptable noise levels.

Before you rate it like film, you must apply curves in post. Curve the highlights, raising the mids. That would pull your grey card to 50 or 75 IRE, and see if the noise is objectionable. A video chip is like reversal film (lots of undiscovered country in the shadows) instead of a negative (lots of headroom in the highlights). Keep that in mind in post.

Watch Roger Clark pull an astonishing amount of latitude from a Canon DSLR here: http://www.clarkvision.com/imagedetail/dynamicrange2/ (he didn't do it by combining multiple exposures either)

[RyanKunkleman]

I'm somewhat new to this board. I've been learning all I can before I take delivery on my RED in a few weeks. I've shot film for the last 20 years and video for at least half that. I have my first RED job next week. It's quite exciting to break my Red cherry.


just as a side note. for your shoot you should try and get Eric J. Camp to be your DIT if you are in new york. if you are shooting west coast feel free to give me a call.

[Radoslav Karapetkov]

Wow, this really interests people, in one form or another.

But I think that such a cam would need the Monstro [or better] sensor tech + 16 ADC converter -> to able to handle the superior DR.

I don't think RED will go in this direction, but if they do, it certainly won't come soon. But I'd gladly wait for it.

It'd be a dream cam: S35mm sized, 3K RedCode at up 60 fps [at least], ~ 15 stops of DR :w00t: , 800 ASA native.

Juz dreamin.

:usd:

[Daniel Browning]

the possibility of RED developing "the RED Broadcast Chip". This would entail a 2k chip that comes in Super 35mm dimensions, instead of the current cropped 2k at app 2/3". Since smaller pixels lower ASA, the purpose of this would be to have a chip with a significantly bigger pixels hence higher ASA (500-640 or so) and still retain the full frame super 35mm image.

In a RAW camera, smaller pixels don't make the sensor slower, they just make post-processing a little faster.

As Charles Angus and Eki have already said, resampling the smaller pixels to the same size of the big ones equalizes the speed difference.

In fact, for all DSLR/digicams, the ones with the smallest sensors have the highest sensitivity per area.

[SF Geek]

It's true that there's more info in the shadows in a digtal medium as opposed to film. Maybe the grey card was not a good example. It brings up the lack of standards in this raw workflow that Stu at the Orphanage was talking about. Sure you can shoot a chip chart and curve it up in post, just like you could print up or push in post with film. What I do know is that if i want to represent skin tones as accurately to my eye in redspace (which is my "standard" while shooting) I have the gaffer set their meter to 160 at incident and I set my stop to that. It's true that there isn't that much room in the realm of overexposure, in that respect your stop and lighting is set by circumstance. I know that in redspace I have a certain level that can be brought up and have an acceptable amount of noise, I also know how much more info I have over 100IRE. It all comes down to setting some kind of standard and figuring out how far you can stray from that in either direction.

[Tim Naylor]

In a RAW camera, smaller pixels don't make the sensor slower, they just make post-processing a little faster.

As Charles Angus and Eki have already said, resampling the smaller pixels to the same size of the big ones equalizes the speed difference.

In fact, for all DSLR/digicams, the ones with the smallest sensors have the highest sensitivity per area.

Forgive my ignorance, but could you break this down in more layman's terms - don't quite understand what you're saying. I'm coming from primarily a film / 2/3" ENG style camera background. So in essence, are you saying pixel size has little to do with sensitivity/noise? I just found with recent HD cameras they tended to have lower sensitivity when the pixel size was decreased (ie. Varican vs HPX 500). So I'm trying to understand how this doesn't apply to CMOS.

In any case, so are you saying resolution and sensitivity do not correlate? If so, what is the major challenge to a higher sensitivity chip?

I know some may think my sentiments are "prosumer" but I just enjoyed the last ten years or so of vision stocks. And yes, in our "prosumer" way we often lit scenes with candles and flashlights. But RED's current "ASA" (I know some object to the term) or let's say threshold, is the difference between street ambience or bringing in a 20k or shooting wide open or at a 2.0, or however you want to look at it.

I'm willing to contend with it for now. But I must admit I was let down to see a lot of hype about hyper resolution (28k or whatever) and no mention of increased sensitivity. When Kodak makes a revolutionary product announcement, it was usually about breakthroughs in sensitivity as it relates to clarity.

The last thing I want to see in 2009 the launch of 5k plus chip and no major advances in ASA.

[Charles Angus]

Wrote a very detailed post, then safari crashed on my iPod. Sigh.

Basically, you can underexpose and then push a larger sensor more than a smaller sensor, because the added noise is removed by the downrezzing process.

Example (for 2k delivery):

2k 500asa chip has x noise.

4k 500asa chip pushed one stop also has 2*x noise, until we downconvert to 2k, which reduces the noise to x.

I just made those numbers up to illustrate the principle, but I think it makes the point.

Hope that helps...

[Charles Angus]

Oh yeah, I also meant to point out that this had nothing whatsoever to do with CMOS Vs ccd.

My understanding is that the Varicam will have more leeway in post to push process (as it were) than the 500.

[Hans von Sonntag]

I'm purely guessing, but with Monstro's sensor's wider DR of 13 stops, I'm sure it won't be a 320 ASA sensor. I suppose 800 ASA will be realistic. And if you consider reduced noise though oversampling by downscaling to 1080p 1600 ASA will be a viable option.

That's going to be enough speed.

Hans

[J. Bernard Vallon]

That's going to be enough speed.

Hans

The beauty of digital is that it doesnt have the chemical limitations film has. After several generations of cmos, the photography world uses cmos sensors that can crank to 2000 iso and look fantastic blown up, even without noise reduction.

800 would be enough for now.

[Sanjin Jukic]

With RED1 all you need is a fast lens.

DR +1 stop will come with Mysterium-X or +2-3 stops with Monstro.

Upgrade your R1 or trade it for EPIC.

But don't worry right now about ASA "faster" chip because you already have enough with 320 ASA with MysteriumR1.

Have a look:

http://homepage.mac.com/sanjinjukic/RED/RED_320ASA_REDAlert.jpg
Shot on RED with Canon 50mm FD L f/1.2 @ wide open f/1.2, RED alert output situation.

http://homepage.mac.com/sanjinjukic/RED/ASA320.jpg
"Normal" or standard R1 320 ASA output and CC with Orphanage's PanaLog2Lin in Shake that "simulates" Panavision Genesis film out. All is fine here and on a bigger picture it looks better.

http://homepage.mac.com/sanjinjukic/RED/ASA400.jpg
400 ASA output and CC withOrphanage's PanaLog2Lin in Shake, already starts clipping highlights.

http://homepage.mac.com/sanjinjukic/RED/ASA500.jpg
500 ASA output and CC with Orphanage's PanaLog2Lin in Shake, even more clipping highlights.

All shot on RED1 with Canon 50mm FD L f/1.2 @ wide open f/1.2.

f/1.2 could be something like a T1.3.

[Graeme Nattress]

8798 My light meter was telling me around ISO5000. Tungsten light, B17.

Graeme

[Rudi Herbert]

Consider this also,

Most of the fears about low sensitivity steam from the fact that most people seem to believe that they want as much detail in the dark areas as possible, but, do they really? One of the things that makes film so filmic, much more so than dynamic range, depth of field, etc, is the rich, contrasty look it offers, with bold blacks in stark contrast to shiny, light areas everywhere, even in daylight exterior scenes. It is one of the inherent features of film, and one that seems to be overlooked all the time by those tirelessly trying to bring video up to the film level.
Yes, I agree that if you have more dynamic range and a more sensitive sensor, you'll be able to end up with more balanced images, but the truth is that most projects never need that, and truthfully, it is even aesthetically unpleasing. The more neutral your shadows look, the flatter the image you get. Look at most TV shows and films nowadays, most of them shot with huge lighting budgets and on 500 ASA film or sensors, and yet, most blacks are crushed to some degree, because guess what, this gives the image that rich look that most people associate with high production values.
So, if you are going to deliver a product where crushing the blacks will a) reduce or eliminate completely any noise you might get from a slow sensor and b) yield a final product that perfectly complies with the contrasty aesthetics expected, and encouraged, by 99.9% of all productions nowadays, why not stop worrying about a slow sensor that cannot "see" so well in dark scenes and instead use its strengths to their best, i.e. with properly lit scenes, you'll get a beautiful color and tonal rendition that approach that of slide film and easily surpass negative's film? Look at Sanjin's images above, once properly treated, the blacks get crushed a bit, but all noise disappears, the important areas still remain visible, the colors improve dramatically and the image now has that rich, filmic look. I don't need to see into those dark areas, it is a night scene, so I'm happy (and genetically predisposed) to accept that, at night, the sky and unlit areas will look BLACK. Unless of course you are Michael Mann or a proponent of his school of thought...

[Thomas Wright]

As I understood it, the initial post was about having a 35mm sensor (therefore depth of field) with 2K resolution. and that Tim thought the larger pixels would afford higher EI as a bonus. I think the point is gold. One wouldn't need huge processing power nor take time to down-res etc. and would be able to hit the high-speeds 2K allows for without sacrificing the DEPTH OF FIELD INNIT. that's what it's all about for me.

That and colour space.

If RED made a Scarlet with a 2K 35mm chip, PL mount and did 150fps I'd start saving.

[Daniel Browning]

So in essence, are you saying pixel size has little to do with sensitivity/noise?

Correct. Sensor area and technology have more to do with it, except that, generally, smaller pixels have higher total sensitivity.



I just found with recent HD cameras they tended to have lower sensitivity when the pixel size was decreased (ie. Varican vs HPX 500).


My conclusions are based on tests I've done on raw cameras. I don't test video cameras like my XH-A1 because the manufacaturer could be doing a million things in the in-camera software, such as noise reduction. So I can't draw any conclusion about pixel size or sensor size using a video camera: I can only talk about the performance of the entire camera system with certain in-camera settings.

RAW lets you do everything in post-production software, so you can really see what's happening and even compare two cameras on an even playing field.

However, even with that caveat, I'll say that many of the people who prefer SD over HD cameras do so because they are applying a higher standard to the HD camera, like a longer yard stick. They aren't resampling HD down to SD to compare at the same output sizes.



In any case, so are you saying resolution and sensitivity do not correlate?

Yes. There are ways that they do relate, though. For example, if every pixel size had the same technology (same QE, read noise, and FWC per area), then as you get smaller and smaller pixels, each pixel has less and less sensitivity per pixel.

Most camera comparisons are done with 100% crops: comparing per-pixel to per-pixel instead of image to image. This leads to misguided conclusions, because the pixel doesn't matter: the final image is what matters. After you resize the pixels down to the same resolution as the large-pixel camera the results are the same (or better).



If so, what is the major challenge to a higher sensitivity chip?


EDIT: forgot to answer this question. One of the biggest challenges is physics: there is only so much light to capture, and you can't see light that isn't there. Most sensors already capture between 25-70% of the light falling on them. The theoretical limit is 100%, and after that there's no possibility for improvement, even theoretically. That's why we only see small QE improvements. The D3 had a huge fanfare and it's QE (sensitivity) improvement over the 1Ds Mark III was/is only 15%.

Since sensitivity is so close to the maximum performance, most of the low light performance improvement in the future will come from reduction in read noise, where there is no theoretical limit (but plenty of practical ones!).



I'm willing to contend with it for now. But I must admit I was let down to see a lot of hype about hyper resolution (28k or whatever) and no mention of increased sensitivity.


I would expect that is because it's too soon to make comments on the final characteristics of the sensor. However, Jim did spill some of the beans already in this comment:


Mysterium-X...has 1 full stop more DNR and less noise and is twice as fast as Mysterium

This could be due to a twice as much sensitivity, half the read noise, or a combination of the two.

Generally people are concerned about sensitivity due to low light performance. Low light performance is often helped by improvement in read noise too, because the shadows and even midtones often fall into the area dominated by read noise. Technically, read noise isn't related to sensitivity, but it is definitely related to low light performance in today's cameras.

We're very close to the theoretical limit of sensitivity (QE), so the only way to get more than a stop improvement will be to use larger sensor sizes, hence FF35, 645, 617.



The last thing I want to see in 2009 the launch of 5k plus chip and no major advances in ASA.

[EDIT: fixed quote that was attributed to Jannard instead of Tim.]

Keep in mind that RED's ASA rating is only a recommendation, like every other manufacturer's rating. Even if they make *no* improvement to sensitivity, and all the improvement is only in read noise, then I expect they would increase the recommended ASA. And they should.


My light meter was telling me around ISO5000. Tungsten light, B17.

Wow!

[Graeme Nattress]

Exactly. Low light can look nice on RED. It will only look better as we move forwards, too.

Graeme

[Tim Naylor]

Thanks for the information Dan,

Cleared up a lot of mysteries of the mysterium. These are the kind of answers I was looking for. Looking forward to the new updates and new chips.

Anyway, it's six days and counting to my first RED gig. I'm armed up to 12k's. Should have more than enough stop. Will need to get more advice on IR's and blue signal but that's another thread.

Thanks all.

[Tim Naylor]

PS. Dan
The second to last quote "The last thing I want to see in 2009..." you attributed to Jannard, when I think I stated it in a recent post.

[Antoine Fabi]

Well, i can't understand why we should expose REDONE sensor like film anyway.
A sensor does not react like film.

I feel the RED sensor has less highlights headroom over the "usual" greycard exposure.
But i also see that RED sensor has better shadow info.

So i always underexpose (compared to usual greycard method) with the RED, keeping about the same shadow details as film, and thus preserve very good highlight details.
I can lift the mid tones a little without causing banding.

..and it's where raising the mid tones (LUTs in camera) for shooting is so usefull.

This method gave me the superb results.

Antoine

[Graeme Nattress]

Antione, you are using the camera and exposing how you want to, to achieve the results you want!

No digital sensor has any headroom at all. They all clip at a certain brightness levels, so all your range is "below" that clip point. Decide how many stops of headroom you need below clip, and place your mid grey there. Then you can still see down into the shadows below that.

Graeme

[LEON]

Graeme,
why can't we use hightlights mask in camera ?
Too much computing or some physical limitations ?

[Antoine Fabi]

Hi Graeme,

That's probably why you said a year ago "expose for highlights".
But i still think that i had to change my way of thinking going from film (photography) to digital sensor.

At least, this conservative method worked great for me.

I prefer to preserve the highlights.
I never found film to have a ton of shadow details anyway.

[Graeme Nattress]

Best that you do that in a colourist package with secondary colour correction where you have control over the process.

Graeme

[Antoine Fabi]

Graeme,

Let's assume i could do a black shading calibration on a perfectly balanced 5% gray surface, could i then be able to use the full 12bit ?

I have not experimented this one...

Just curious... :)

Antoine

EDIT:...because i always have to bring the black level down a little in post anyway...

[Graeme Nattress]

Black shading should be done one black... Lens cap on, iris down.

Graeme

[Antoine Fabi]

Sure sure!!!

...but just for the curiosity...

...would the camera still retain the full 12 bit info even if it would record a little contrastier image ?

[Graeme Nattress]

The whole system is set up so that black is recorded at a known black. Trying to muck around with that does not sound like a good idea to me.

Graeme

[Antoine Fabi]

Graeme,

It appears you're not watching hockey and still working :)

thanks!

Antoine

[Graeme Nattress]

I've been to a few hockey games - it's fun live, but I don't think it's the same on TV.

Graeme