EPIC FF35 + 2x Anamorphic

[Robert Sanders]

Our company is considering buying two Epic FF35 cameras. The main reason we're opting for FF35 rather than S35 is because we really love the look of true 2x anamorphic lenses.

However, this brings up several questions and concerns. Mainly about the square 2x target of the lenses on the sensor, the windowing for 2x anamorphic, the metadata supplied with the footage, and the final editing workflow.

1. What is the resolution of the image when shooting 2x anamorphic on a FF35 Epic?

2. Is the target on the image plane 0.825 in by 0.690 in (1.19:1) for a proper 2.40:1 aspect ratio?

3. Does the camera de-squeeze the 2x image properly for live outputs/on-set monitoring?

4. Are there aspect ratio flags in the data so that REDAlert (or whatever's being used today for debayering) or Final Cut Pro can properly display the image in the correct aspect ratio?

5. Can you drop the R3D files right onto the FCP timeline and see the 2x anamorphic footage properly de-squeezed - live?

6. Would it just be easier to debayer all the footage in another app first (de-squeezing it, adding black padding to the top and bottom, and generating 1080p letterboxed ProRes proxies?

or

7. Screw anamorphic all together and just shoot with a nice set of RPP or Master Primes and crop for 2.40:1? I know many of you really support this variant, but we REALLY love the look of anamorphic glass. And it's nice to have the option to shoot either spherical or anamorphic which is why we're leaning toward the FF35 so much.

Thanks in advance for any guidance!

Rob Sanders
www.starwaypictures.com

[David Wyatt]

These are all really good questions - don't know how much luck you'll have getting Red to answer them at this stage though!

I can't see a problem with the camera being able to unsqueeze the anamorphic image live since this is what the Red One has recently been able to achieve. I'm not entirely sure how much sensor real estate a good set of anamorphic lenses will take up but something tells me there will be quite a bit left over if the FF35's sensor is 36mm x 24mm and anamorphic is [not quite sure here] something like 22mm x 18.59mm? It'll certainly be interesting to see head to head footage on the FF35 Epic of proper anamorphic footage vs great lenses like Master Primes cropped to 2:40 (I don't think you'll gain much by going the anamorphic route except getting that unique "look" which has so many admirers.....mainly people of a certain age that grew up on Spielberg films :thumbup:).

[Steve Gal]

Anamorphic = Magic

[David Mullen ASC]

Anamorphic lenses generally cover Super-35 width (24mm) even though the format only needs to cover 22mm. And if the image circle from an anamorphic lens is actually a vertical oval (I'm not sure if it is or not, but that sounds reasonable) and that oval is at least 24mm wide if not more, then it's definitely taller than 24mm.

In fact, if you assume that the oval is half as wide as it is tall, and it covers 18mm vertically... then the oval is 36mm wide. Of course, you'd have to get a 1.20 rectangle out of that oval for a 2.40 image.

If you wanted to use all of the vertical height of the 36mm x 24mm sensor, your anamorphic lens would have to cover 29mm x 24mm (1.20 area with a 2X squeeze). That's a 37.49mm diagonal.

Current 35mm anamorphic lenses only have to cover a 25.4mm diagonal.

Anyway, until you know exactly the image circle of your anamorphic lenses (which vary by focal length) you're not going to know how much of the 36mm x 24mm sensor you are using, and until you know that, you can't figure out the resulting pixel resolution of the cropped image.

But if you just crop a standard 22mm x 18mm 35mm anamorphic frame from a 36mm x 24mm sensor that is 6K, you end up with a 3.75K frame... so let's be optimistic and figure you won't have trouble getting a 4K anamorphic frame off of the 6K sensor.

[Robert Sanders]

Current 35mm anamorphic lenses only have to cover a 25.4mm diagonal.

Anyway, until you know exactly the image circle of your anamorphic lenses (which vary by focal length) you're not going to know how much of the 36mm x 24mm sensor you are using, and until you know that, you can't figure out the resulting pixel resolution of the cropped image.

But if you just crop a standard 22mm x 18mm 35mm anamorphic frame from a 36mm x 24mm sensor that is 6K, you end up with a 3.75K frame... so let's be optimistic and figure you won't have trouble getting a 4K anamorphic frame off of the 6K sensor.

Thank you for your response David.

We're not so much interested in using the full height of the sensor as we are interested in windowing the sensor to 22x18. And since the sensor is slightly larger than we need then the FF35 is perfect for anamorphic (and significantly cheaper than an ARRI D21).

And a 3.75k frame seems perfect suitable for our needs and more than we need (resolution wise).

I guess now all we need to do is figure out how we're going to deal with the footage in post. Which method will be the most painless while maintaining as much of the RAW image as possible?

[Robert Jackson]

My math is terrible, but it seems like using standard PL-mount anamorphic lenses you could shoot on a Red One using the full height of the sensor and 16.72mm of the width. That would yield something like 2540x3096 of captured image, which would then be unsqueezed to 2540x6192. Seems pretty workable to me, but of course I'm just speculating. That would at least keep you from having to wait for an Epic to arrive and it seems like it would yield about the same results that you're going to be expecting.

And of course Red's RAW processing software allows you to crop the image however you'd like, so handling the image as it comes out of the camera shouldn't be too hard. Theoretically (which means I have no real idea, but thought I'd toss this out there). :thumbup1: