photography dead? A little writeup on frame grabbing and a few samples

[Taylor Morrison]

Thanks Martin! I am waiting for permission to do just that.

[Anthony Vu]

Or about the Epic-ly [pun-intended] un-ergonomic side grip. For event and sports shooting, it might as well have sharpened spikes on it.

I definitely find myself accidentally hitting some of the buttons on the side handle, but I won't go as far to consider it "spikes." And the battery life in the side handle isn't great, but that's been discussed to death by now.

Here is a frame grab off a prores timeline only. This is from a transcode I made for the Network and I thought you might enjoy it. To see this move at 96 fps is pretty awesome but as NBC Sports owns it I can not show it at this point. The REDMote really did perform flawlessly for me here as I had to remote trigger the camera from about 20 feet away.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/49919416/vlc...h48m43s231.png

That is a BEAUTIFUL shot Taylor. I can't imagine what this looks like in slow motion.

[Taylor Morrison]

Trey,

Generally as high as the light will allow on shutter...400 to 800th of a second. Shooting slow-motion allows much higher shutter speeds without any of the problems you find at sync speeds. Also shooting Epic at an event like this is neither fast or easy (maybe I made it sound so earlier) Being prepared and knowing pretty much want you want in advance is key I find. Sport as in real-estate is all about Location Location Location... ha ha

[Patrick Tresch]

In short, the ease of shooting, the outstanding picture, and the advantages over the DSLR’s make this camera a perfect choice for someone looking to up their production quality. So until the Alexa cuts 70% of it’s price tag, I’ll stick with the RED Scarlet-X.
Just my 2 cents,


Trey,

? Would you shoot stills with the Alexa?

Pat

[Trey Chace]

The Alexa is so damn cumbersome that I'd think that would be a tough one, especially if you're moving quick. Also, unless they've done something drastically different, the frame size would be much smaller than that of Scarlet or Epic. Keep in mind, even though I love the frame grabs and I do sell them back to clients, I don't take stills for a living, it's just a hobby and a bit of a bonus on top what I offer. Usually if I'm shooting only stills I'm just playing around with my mkIII.
cool,
trey

In short, the ease of shooting, the outstanding picture, and the advantages over the DSLR’s make this camera a perfect choice for someone looking to up their production quality. So until the Alexa cuts 70% of it’s price tag, I’ll stick with the RED Scarlet-X.
Just my 2 cents,


Trey,

? Would you shoot stills with the Alexa?

Pat

[Justin Chin]

Here is a frame grab off a prores timeline only. This is from a transcode I made for the Network and I thought you might enjoy it. To see this move at 96 fps is pretty awesome but as NBC Sports owns it I can not show it at this point. The REDMote really did perform flawlessly for me here as I had to remote trigger the camera from about 20 feet away.



http://dl.dropbox.com/u/49919416/vlc...h48m43s231.png

OMG. That's beautiful. Exactly what you want in a still/motion shot.

[David Mullen ASC]

I don't think still photography is dead -- if anything, people are taking more still pictures than ever in the history of mankind! Of course, they are also taking more video than ever too...

[Lee Saxon]

I thought I was clear about the issues of fast action frame grabbing.

Absolutely, and I agreed with everything you did mention, I just wanted to add a few more things :)

A professional at a sporting event should know more than 10 seconds in advance when something interesting will be happening.

Well sure. The problem at the moment is that if you turn the Red on a second before you have to your battery is dead before the second quarter.

With a V-lock brick you'll have the camera running for hours. Pack a couple of those in your bag, and you're good for the duration of the event.

How often have you run up and down the sidelines of a football field for four hours at a time? Maybe you're in much better shape than me but I can barely do it with a DSLR. With a 357 pound brick battery, not a chance.

And a couple of very high end stills photographers seem to disagree about your notion that Epic isn't also a stills camera.

I guess I should've said that for the moment it's largely a studio-only stills camera; a replacement for Hasselblads and Phase Ones, but not yet flexible enough to be a DSLR replacement.

Obviously that's just my opinion and my shooting style, Taylor obviously got some great results.

[Jaakko Rinne]

How often have you run up and down the sidelines of a football field for four hours at a time? Maybe you're in much better shape than me but I can barely do it with a DSLR. With a 357 pound brick battery, not a chance.

Part of the job is being fit enough to do it. Running four hours with a DSLR sounds like a holiday, try run and gunning eight or 12 hour events handheld (or worse, with a tripod if you have to move it with you) with a 20-30 pound rig without an assistant.

[Jaakko Rinne]

Here is a frame grab off a prores timeline only. This is from a transcode I made for the Network and I thought you might enjoy it. To see this move at 96 fps is pretty awesome but as NBC Sports owns it I can not show it at this point. The REDMote really did perform flawlessly for me here as I had to remote trigger the camera from about 20 feet away.



http://dl.dropbox.com/u/49919416/vlc...h48m43s231.png

That's an awesome image, thanks for sharing!