Aaton Penelope2, 6k digi-mag

[Barry Gregg]

Aaton has a digi-mag listed in the description of their new Penelope 35mm film camera.

http://www.aaton.com/files/penelope2.pdf

6k digital magazine, interchangeable with film magazines. Should only cost $150,000 or so. And they say available in 2009, maybe. Or get the Red One in early 2008 for a lot less.

[Chris Nuzzaco]

Thats kinda neat actually. Looks like they are trying what medium format cameras tried to do when digital finally caught up with them...

[Jeff Kilgroe]

Makes sense, but price seems a bit high... 2009 is really a long time away and I should have more than a good year of use on my RED by then. There's a good bet that RED will have updates of its own in '09~'10, They're not just going to sit idle.

It's cool though to have the possibility of shooting film or digital with the same system.

[Thomas Mathai]

Pricing can always change. I think preliminary pricing reflects R&D and initial cost issues.

2009 is hardly too far away, we're already into the second half of 2007.

Of course Red will have their own updates and such.

It's just interesting that someone is releasing pretty much a hybrid film/digital camera. At least that's what I'm assuming this camera will be like.

[Adam Jeal]

Maybe Jim should think about buying aaton? :) - They have great products, solid engineering and it would be really interesting to see a future Red camera that includes some of their features (not the film mechanism, obviously!).

[Jeff Kilgroe]

2009 is hardly too far away, we're already into the second half of 2007.

I was just saying that in terms of digital product development and evolution, 1.5 years is a long time. Look where RED was 18 months ago...

[PaulClements]

Problem is they're making a camera that is for the "35mm Digital intermediate age" as they put it. Red has gone beyond that in their R&D to create something that will be relatively future proof for the digital age and for significantly less. The additional benefits of workflow and what not increase the potential of Red far beyond such typical cameras in my opinion. I like the sound of 6k, but what software is going to support it? What cinema is going to support it? Do we need more resolution?

I guess the good thing about this camera is that it bridges a gap between those who don't want to shoot digital and prefer film. For the high end work we might see more people adopting digital if such an option is there to use simultaneously.

Frankly I wonder if a digital mag isn't a couple of years too late already.

[J. Bernard Vallon]

If that is a competitor for RED i feel pretty good about my reservation

[PaulClements]

I think their intention is to pick up some of those who are less willing to switch completely to digital. Basically those that aren't buying into Red.

[C.H.Haskell]

Yeah thats what it seems, like they see where the market is going so they make a hybrid of sorts to do a bit of everything...in my opinion choose your format, then choose the camera that best suits the format. A partner of mine just happned to inquire about this unit as we use to shoot with the Aaton A-minima and I was quite please with there film cameras so we shall see whats in store.

[chuck colburn]

They aren't the first to try this. I seem to recall that Joe Dunton (sp) in the UK attempted this with some already established cine camera.

[Nick Shaw]

I guess when they talk about 6k sensors they are targeting customers who are worried about the 'true' resolution of Bayer sensors. A 6k Bayer sensor could produce a 4k RGB image that nobody could question the resolution of.

Personally RED 4k is more than enough for me.

[Tom Lowe]

Maybe Jim should think about buying aaton? :) - They have great products, solid engineering and it would be really interesting to see a future Red camera that includes some of their features (not the film mechanism, obviously!).

Heh-heh, it's always fun spending other people's money. :)

[Tom Lowe]

A 6K sensor would mean beautiful-looking 4K downsamples, IMO.

[Jim Arthurs]

They aren't the first to try this. I seem to recall that Joe Dunton (sp) in the UK attempted this with some already established cine camera.

Yeah, I remember visiting with him a couple NAB's ago at a small booth in the backwaters... wasn't it an SR using a digital back replacement for the mag? I can't quite remember...

[chuck colburn]

That's the one

[Kevin Halverson]

I have been following the Penelope 2 for a while now, but its the 2 perf capability that has me really interested. None the less, a digital back option is yet another capability that makes this a really interesting piece.

[Thomas Mathai]

Problem is they're making a camera that is for the "35mm Digital intermediate age" as they put it. Red has gone beyond that in their R&D to create something that will be relatively future proof for the digital age and for significantly less. The additional benefits of workflow and what not increase the potential of Red far beyond such typical cameras in my opinion. I like the sound of 6k, but what software is going to support it? What cinema is going to support it? Do we need more resolution?

I guess the good thing about this camera is that it bridges a gap between those who don't want to shoot digital and prefer film. For the high end work we might see more people adopting digital if such an option is there to use simultaneously.

Frankly I wonder if a digital mag isn't a couple of years too late already.

You're confusing aquisition with distribution. Doesn't matter if you shoot 6k, since the end result can be downconverted to whatever is needed for distribution.

6k can be the aquisition resolution, then rezed down to 4k for everything else.

A lot of software that can support 4k, can support higher resolutions, especially if advertised as being resolution independent. It's more about having fast disks and lots of RAM, which isn't as big a problem as it used to be.

Needing more resolution is up to the production. I'm sure for some things it's a big help and for others, there's no significant difference.

[PaulClements]

You're confusing aquisition with distribution. Doesn't matter if you shoot 6k, since the end result can be downconverted to whatever is needed for distribution.

6k can be the aquisition resolution, then rezed down to 4k for everything else.

A lot of software that can support 4k, can support higher resolutions, especially if advertised as being resolution independent. It's more about having fast disks and lots of RAM, which isn't as big a problem as it used to be.

Needing more resolution is up to the production. I'm sure for some things it's a big help and for others, there's no significant difference.

My point about distribution is simply that any shift in the setups of theatres on a global scale, other than 3D will be to 4k projection. That is what is currently anticipated in the market and generally seen as the equivilent resolution of 35mm film. The purpose of a 6k sensor would be to simply discard a portion of that data every time you do a film out, and seemingly will be for the foreseeable future. Offering better latitude over more resolution would be a far greater asset. It also requires you to downsample your footage every time you go through post, rather than just working with a 4k sample from start through to finish. With 4k monitoring and projection on the horizon it makes little sense in my opinion to be working with 6k.

I was not aware of any software truly built for 6k. I always thought resolution independent was a term used liberally, but rarely truly lived upto. Do you know which software supports 6k out of interest?

[Ramesh Jai]

Problem is they're making a camera that is for the "35mm Digital intermediate age" as they put it. Red has gone beyond that in their R&D to create something that will be relatively future proof for the digital age and for significantly less. The additional benefits of workflow and what not increase the potential of Red far beyond such typical cameras in my opinion. I like the sound of 6k, but what software is going to support it? What cinema is going to support it? Do we need more resolution?

I guess the good thing about this camera is that it bridges a gap between those who don't want to shoot digital and prefer film. For the high end work we might see more people adopting digital if such an option is there to use simultaneously.

Frankly I wonder if a digital mag isn't a couple of years too late already.
IMHO I agree. It's DOA as far as digital mag is concerned.

IMHO also, 15 years from now no one will be shooting on celluloid.

[David Mullen ASC]

That camera doesn't have to necessarily be useful 15 years from now - it just has to pay for itself over the next three years or so.

I don't see the idea of "digital mags" as being DOA -- if someone has spent a lot of money on 35mm cameras, like an Arri-435, and everything goes digital someday, you will see more after-market conversions like that rather than junk all those cameras. It may not be as commonplace as buying a new digital camera, but it will probably be one aspect of the camera business over the coming decade.

The truth is, the argument that film will soon be gone actually makes me want to go out and shoot more film, not less -- before it's gone!

[Thomas Mathai]

My point about distribution is simply that any shift in the setups of theatres on a global scale, other than 3D will be to 4k projection. That is what is currently anticipated in the market and generally seen as the equivilent resolution of 35mm film. The purpose of a 6k sensor would be to simply discard a portion of that data every time you do a film out, and seemingly will be for the foreseeable future. Offering better latitude over more resolution would be a far greater asset. It also requires you to downsample your footage every time you go through post, rather than just working with a 4k sample from start through to finish. With 4k monitoring and projection on the horizon it makes little sense in my opinion to be working with 6k.

I was not aware of any software truly built for 6k. I always thought resolution independent was a term used liberally, but rarely truly lived upto. Do you know which software supports 6k out of interest?

I see the needs of acquisition and distribution are different.

You want as high quality as you can get on the acquisition side because chances are you're going to be losing a good amount of it in your distribution end.

You're likely going to downconvert or transcode your source media somewhere in your workflow, even if you shoot 4k.

While most independents may find 2k and 4k more than enough, higher budget productions may embrace the idea of 6k acquisition, especially if there is a lot of vfx or image manipulation involved.

Since some summer movies like to have IMAX releases, having a 6k version that's not uprezed from a 2k or even 4k source would be appealing.

Last year I went to a Siggraph talk about IMAX vfx production, and a common workflow workaround was that all the IMAX scans had to be downrezed from 5k to 4k because it was too hard to work in 5k. I suspect by 2009, it would be much easier to work in 5k or 6k.

A full resolution Vistavision scan is 6k. I've also seen matte paintings created in higher than 4k resolution for various reasons.

Photoshop, After Effects, Combustion can handle 6k. I would suspect Shake and the major 3D apps can handle 6k. It's all about having a bunch of fast boxes with lots of RAM.

Editing in 6k may not be possible at the moment, but we didn't have editing in higher than HD resolutions until recently.

[Ramesh Jai]

That camera doesn't have to necessarily be useful 15 years from now - it just has to pay for itself over the next three years or so.

I don't see the idea of "digital mags" as being DOA -- if someone has spent a lot of money on 35mm cameras, like an Arri-435, and everything goes digital someday, you will see more after-market conversions like that rather than junk all those cameras. It may not be as commonplace as buying a new digital camera, but it will probably be one aspect of the camera business over the coming decade.

The truth is, the argument that film will soon be gone actually makes me want to go out and shoot more film, not less -- before it's gone!
I love the look of film because I grew up watching films. I hope it never goes away.

Soon there will be a generation who will become used to content created by digital cameras (which match the quality of film). There is a chance then that film will be relegated....

When I was in film school (training to be a director) I wandered into the editing room. There was a Steinbeck available. I just picked up some rolls of film and started editing.

The feel of film in your hand as you start splicing and joining is just amazing. I never forgot that first time. So I understand when you say you feel like shooting on film just because some people say it will be no more..

[chuck colburn]

As the new higher resoulution video cameras adopt some of the features of the film cameras, (such as speed ramping combined with aperture following) they will surley replace celluoid as the capture medium of choice. An as view finders increase in resolution the difference in viewing thru a mirrored reflexed camera will lessen. But I think that if only for the spining mirror viewer with it's inherent "depth" look that adapting cine cameras to video capture is a valid idea.

[Petr Dvorak]

They aren't the first to try this. I seem to recall that Joe Dunton (sp) in the UK attempted this with some already established cine camera.

http://images.google.cz/imgres?imgurl=http://www.urbanfox.tv/images/ibcimages/joe-dunton-03.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.urbanfox.tv/articles/cameras/c19joedunton.htm&h=211&w=250&sz=16&hl=cs&start=2&tbnid=StC0hoNVsubM5M:&tbnh=94&tbnw=111&prev=/images%3Fq%3DJoe%2BDunton%26gbv%3D2%26svnum%3D10%2 6hl%3Dcs

http://www.urbanfox.tv/images/people/JoeDunton-ibc04.jpg http://www.urbanfox.tv/images/cameras/dunton.jpg

[chuck colburn]

Hahaha
That's great. Love the fact that the "mag" in the second picture says Mitchell on it, lol