720P Red versus 720P Varicam: Sharpness

[Pete Barden]

Hi all,

I've been shooting with the Scarlet for several months doing natural history TV work and since the camera had its 1K 720P update I've been shooting at this resolution a fair bit because a) it gives you a higher framerate of 90fps, which is useful for filming birds in flight and b) it allows you to get more telephoto, which allows me to cut a sequence that isn't just made out of mid shots. The onliners have come back to me and said that the footage is softer than that of the 720P Panasonic 900 Varicam (their A cam) even with sharpening applied. They've said the higher resolution stuff I've been shooting with the same lenses looks sharp. Since this is the first time we've all put a Red project through post I'd be grateful on people's opinions on whether they think it is true to say that 720P on the Red will be softer than 720P on a 900 Varicam. From what I'd been told about the robustness of the Red codec and the fact that it is a much newer codec than DVCPro HD, I was surprised and disappointed to be told this by our onliners.


I am still hoping that they will be proven wrong, which may be the case if the footage hasn't been sharpened adequately. I've had some tips on the forum before about sharpening 2K footage, but we can't seem to get this footage to sharpen up as well as the Varicam can output. I'd be really grateful if anyone could share their sharpening settings for 720P footage and also what software they use to do it. We seem to have had better results with the Sapphire plugin in FCP using a QuickTime, rather than with the Red file in RedCine X. The problem we have is that we are dealing with thousands of clips on a fast turnaround series so we're trying to find a global setting that can be applied to every clip and replicates the sharpening that the Varicam does in camera. I'd be grateful for any advice.


Many thanks,


Pete

[Andrew Gentle]

I would expect this to be the case. The RED ethos is to oversample and downscale to a sharp image. The Varicam is designed to deliver to the 720p format. I would be trying to shoot at 2K at least if your delivery is 1K. Remember that through the debayering process, the image will have a measured resolution of around 80% of the actual image dimensions.

[Álex Montoya]

It's really not a good idea to shoot 720p on a Scarlet. The Varicam has got 3 1 Megapixel CCD's, while the Scarlet has one CMOS. At 1:1, the debayered resolution can very well be less than the one the Varicam yields.

The Varicam is designed for 720p, the Scarlet isn't. If you need high frame rates you should really get an Epic.

[Álex Montoya]

That said, get the sharpest posssible lenses. I hope you are not using Canons at maximum aperture.

[Pete Barden]

Thanks very much guys. That's obviously a shame to hear. I think the Varicam would have been my ideal camera for long lens work after all. No wonder it's been kicking around so long. I've managed to get some decent stuff at 720P. I guess the problem comes when the lighting isn't favourable and the subject is a long way away, then it really doesn't hold up where higher resolutions could
still give you a half decent image. I think I'll stick to 4K 30fps and 3k 48fps from now on. I'd love the Epic but money doesn't allow right now. It looks like I'll have to work harder to get close to my subject to get the equivalent FOV. I've been shooting with the Sigma 300-800 and got some nice results. The Canon 100-400 doesn't seem as sharp to my eyes and has yielded the more problematic 720P stuff. Also, I try not to shoot wide open. I'm normally around f8-f11. I'd still be very grateful if anyone could suggest which software has given the best results for sharpening as there are some clips that are going to need some work!

Many thanks again

Pete

[Álex Montoya]

Jim said at some point that, given a sharp lens and correct focus, the best settings would be a unsharp mask filter @ radius 0,6/threshold 0/amount high, form circa 100 to 200.

I've tried these settings and they work pretty well.

[Pete Barden]

Thanks Alex. I've just been having a discussion with the onliner and we're wondering if those settings would apply to all resolutions. For example would a 4K image need less sharpening because it has a higher resolution and a 1k image require more sharpening because it is is lower res and therefore softer when delivering 1080P HD. We're going to have a play with the sharpening this afternoon.

Thanks again,

Pete

[Zul, Y]

That said, get the sharpest posssible lenses. I hope you are not using Canons at maximum aperture.

Jim said at some point that, given a sharp lens and correct focus, the best settings would be a unsharp mask filter @ radius 0,6/threshold 0/amount high, form circa 100 to 200.

I've tried these settings and they work pretty well.

What he said! :)

Pete, if you have access to PL mount and Super16 zoom lenses, you should do a test at 2k and 1k and see how that holds up.

[Álex Montoya]

The settings don't vary because you are always recording 1:1. With the Red cameras you don't record a downsampled image.

Anyway, if the recorded image isn't as sharp as possible due to the lens or bad focus or whatever, try with a higher radius.

I just sharpened a shot with a Canon zoom full open and had to use radius 1,7 for optimal results.