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Red's Opinion on Tyler Nose Mount

danbrazda

danbrazda

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I spoke with Tyler today and was basically told the Red One is a crap shoot when it comes to the Nose Mount. They tested 2 Red Ones on the same helicopter and same Nose Mount- one came back fine and the other had excessive rolling shutter. Should this info make its way more formally to redusers (ie- a post from Jim) or is there a foolproof procedure for using a Red One on a Tyler Nose Mount?
 
SNAP! Just been informed that a Red project we're posting needed to have aerials reshot. Chopper guys insisted on SR (making 4 formats in total on this f%$^#g project!). Shame they got the frame rate wrong but we'll deal with it.
 
Just shot aerials over the Hamptons with Brian Heller using a Wescam. No problems, in fact ABC called the imagery superb. R1 M-X using 16GB cards. Lens was an Angie 25-250. Great looking stuff.
 
A tyler nose mount is going to have too much high-frequency vibration for the Red One. The Epic, with a faster sensor read-reset, may yield a better result, but essentially you wouldn't know until you tried. The helicopter acts like a paint shaker, as does anything you strap to it. CCD sensors tend to do better with problematic mounts.

I've done about 20 flights with the SpaceCam with the Red in single & 3D rigs tv shows, movies (Journey 2, Transformers 3), etc and never had a stabilization issue.
 
Ha ha. Yet another case of Red being blamed for someone else's shortcomings. Nice to know...
 
Shane Betts said:
Ha ha. Yet another case of Red being blamed for someone else's shortcomings. Nice to know...
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Well, in all fairness, we are told that the Red One's rolling shutter "isn't a problem", when it certainly is in niche areas like this. These flights can be very expensive and I'm sure there's been several times that some productions only have shaky, jello-footage to show for it. That type of footage isn't as unpleasant to look at when shot with and F35, Genesis, F900, or film for instance. You can get away with some vibration, just not with rolling shutter cameras.
 
CJ Roy said:
Well, in all fairness, we are told that the Red One's rolling shutter "isn't a problem", when it certainly is in niche areas like this. These flights can be very expensive and I'm sure there's been several times that some productions only have shaky, jello-footage to show for it. That type of footage isn't as unpleasant to look at when shot with and F35, Genesis, F900, or film for instance. You can get away with some vibration, just not with rolling shutter cameras.
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Fair point CJ but obviously some mounts don't have the problem. Pot and kettle. Red's rolling shutter is a problem in a very small number of situations, Tyler mount vibration is a problem in a small number of situations. Just nice to know there are solutions and the problem is not entirely Red's. 4k aerials would seem to have greater advantages over 1080 cameras, not sure what the advantages of Tyler over other mounts.
 
Exactly, but I'd say this is a problem with most vehicle mounts. Not just aerials. There's a good amount of business that comes to SpaceCam after the production has already tried the tyler nose/middle mount, and didn't get the results they wanted.

The Tyler mounts are cheap, but the results are a crapshoot.
 
CJ Roy said:
The Tyler mounts are cheap, but the results are a crapshoot.
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S'funny. Change Tyler Mount to Red One and you get just about a direct quote of the start of this thread. Right tool for the job I guess.
 
I've been on a show where we've used the Tyler nose mounts for aerial work two years running, no problems with either shoot. We were using 16gb cf cards, had no issues.
 
If the rotor system of the helicopter is properly tracked and balanced, you should have a smooth ride with little vibration in forward flight above 20 knots indicated airspeed. Out of track main rotors produce a vertical vibration, out of balance rotors produce lateral vibrations. Technically, main rotor vibrations are of the low frequency kind in "helicopter speak", as the main rotor is the slowest rotating component in the machine. 290-350 RPM for the main rotor is typical depending on manufacturer make and model. Can't understand why Tyler Mini, Middle, or Major mounts produce the same problem discussed here with the nose mount, as they are well isolated (if the lock is removed before shooting). Maybe wind buffet if the wind deflector is not installed on the helicopter.
 
Shane Betts said:
Ha ha. Yet another case of Red being blamed for someone else's shortcomings. Nice to know...
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Shortcomings? Not sure how to take this comment. My point in posting this was that the difficulties of using a Red One with A Tyler Nose Mount seem to be a known issue and IMHO should be added to Red's disclaimers for the camera system not unlike the official mention of Red Hard Drives being a no-no at concerts.
 
Every technology seems to have specific limitations. CMOS sensors have theirs. Helicopters have theirs. Helicopter camera mounts have theirs. Put a CMOS sensor camera on a non-isolated helicopter mount, add a not-so-wide lens and a helicopter that has a rough ride, and you just might have created a jello-cam. Red is not the only camera with a CMOS sensor. It cost's several hours of blade time, a good helicopter mechanic, some expensive equipment, and a patient pilot to smooth out a helicopter's rotor system. Even so, due to wear of metal bearings in the upper flight control system, the aging of elastomeric bearings, and extreme temperature changes, the ride will change in time, necessitating another track and balance of the rotor system. That is the nature of helicopters. Guess you could say that if you rent a helicopter and your ride is not smooth, your footage may not smooth either. I do not think this is exclusively a Red issue, so I don't agree that it is Red's responsibility to publish a disclaimer with regards to helicopter "hard mounting". I do applaud the fact that they provide and encourage Red users to read this forum to exchange ideas and experiences so we can all win. Gotta love those "win-win" games.
 
This isn't a result of CMOS sensors entirely, it's the ones with slower than necessary read-reset times for their sensors, which causes the rolling shutter issue. The phantom CMOS doesn't have the issue.

The Alexa has the same rolling shutter problem as the Red One. The MX initially had a faster read-reset speed, but that seemed to cause other issues and Red couldn't solve it. There hasn't been an Epic rolling shutter test, that I know of, but it's supposed to have a faster read-reset time, hopefully eliminating the problem.
 
Greg M said:
I need to shoot some aerials with an Epic-M...has anyone used the Tyler nose mount yet w/ Epic?
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Greg, what about Gyron? I read they were designing a new system for digital cinema cameras, and I know the BBC is using their gimbal for the upcoming Frozen Planet series.
 
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