Dslr vs film zacuto shoot out

[MDP]

Would have been nice to see RED represented in this.

http://www.zacuto.com/shootout

As much as science, workflow and everything that plays a part in this test - generally what I got from it was if you know what you're doing, you can get good results.

 

[Andrew Rieger]

This seems very well done. However, It seems like they shot in circumstances that flatter DSLR's like shallow dof and low light. I am sure the flaws will appear in the res charts they previewed about. Still, the fact that you can get that close to film for under $10,000 is astonishing (that price because lets face it, the body may be $2600 but you spend thousands on the stuff needed to shoot like lenses, rails, monitors, follow focus ect.) This kind of test makes me very excited about the Scarlet. I wonder how the 2/3" would have done in this test? It may not look as nice in the dof department or in low light but would kill the DSLR's in terms of resolution.

 

[Ethan Cooper]

I understand it was a DSLR shootout, but why not included Red in the tests just to have a higher end digital camera for comparison? Would have been nice to see.

Another question I have is, why do people in the screenings talk about RAW? What exactly are they referring to there?

 

[Nick D]

I believe Zacuto already did a past shootout with Red comparing to film...

 

[Andrew Walker]

I understand it was a DSLR shootout, but why not included Red in the tests just to have a higher end digital camera for comparison? Would have been nice to see.

Another question I have is, why do people in the screenings talk about RAW? What exactly are they referring to there?

They didn't put a RED in that test because they wouldn't have been able to see almost any difference between it and the film. Plus it would have made the DSLRs look bad. But it was a DSLR test and RED wouldn't have fit into that area...maybe if it had a line skipping mode.

Yeah I don't know why they were talking about the RAW data off the DSLRs sensors because they aren't seeing it.

 

[Alex Coelho]

Look bad? Film didn't make the DSLR's look bad so I wouldn't expect the Red One to do so in this test.

As far as RAW, I think they were speaking about the possibility of a RAW format on future offerings.

 

[Jay Gannon]

I think they might of had some jiggerypokey going on to get uncompressed over HDMI, they had an AJA KiPro linked up to the DSLR's.

 

[Zhibo Lai]

So much excitement and attention has been generated by these DSLRs that I wonder if there'll be the same level of energy and excitement when the Scarlets and Epics finally arrive. Would be interesting to see if they put together a Scarlet vs DSLR vs Film shootout when it finally arrives.

 

[Andrew Rieger]

I think they might of had some jiggerypokey going on to get uncompressed over HDMI, they had an AJA KiPro linked up to the DSLR's.

from what I have heard, these were not off the shelf dslr's. keep in mind that the professionals that are using these have modified them or added a lot to get them production worthy, just look at the vincent laforet rigs or the rig robert rod used for his music video.

 

[Jay Gannon]

Well not really. The only modification available is a PL mount.
One can capture uncompressed HD over HDMI from them but its not full res.
You can add rigs etc, but that only effects your monitoring and ergonomics.

Would be interesting if they were on beta firmware with full res HDMI out.

 

[Andrew Rieger]

So much excitement and attention has been generated by these DSLRs that I wonder if there'll be the same level of energy and excitement when the Scarlets and Epics finally arrive. Would be interesting to see if they put together a Scarlet vs DSLR vs Film shootout when it finally arrives.

Keep in mind that Zacuto is an accessory company, whatever is hot, they will make gizmos for so I'm sure that after a few months of Scarlet madness, we will se a bunch of zacuto rigs designed around the Scarlet. In one of the Zacuto webisodes, they talked about how they were excited about the red system so I'm sure they are keeping up to date with the Scarlet release and when they can get their hands on real versions or at least 3D models to design parts around.

I love how at the beginning of the vid, they state that they are not selling anything but in a way, they are. Sure, there are no Zacuto products in the vid but just looking at the test so far, it does not seem that they wish to point out the worst flaws of DSLR's but rather say, "Hey, it does not look as good as film but look at how close we got it in this situation!", put the Canon's in front of a res chart and i'm sure everyone in the theater would not be as excited. So they have a test showing how close you can get a Canon to film in SOME situations and joe future cinematographer says, "Well, it looks like i'm getting a 7D" and now that he has one, he wants to add accessories so who does he go to?... Zacuto. Not explicit advertising but they are not really selling products for film cameras while they do have a ton of DSLR products. Curious how Zacuto released a bunch of new shoulder rigs and other stuff only a couple of days before they announced the test. Hmmmmm.

About a film vs scarlet vs canon shootout, probably not. The red would win at a very similar price, Zacuto would do a Scarlet vs film test but they still want to sell parts for the thousands of 7D and 5D that have flooded the market so a direct comparison between red and Canon would be a bad idea. I love how they included the Nikon and Gh1, comprehensive yes but honestly, who shoots Nikon for video, they do not even go above 720p and the Gh1, it was hot for a little while because it was the only cam that shot 24p but once the 7D was out, the Gh1 lost in almost every aspect. Believe me, once the Scarlet comes out, Zacuto will be showering it with praise calling it the next best thing since sliced bread (which I may agree with), comparing it to film and other expensive digital cameras, while selling a ton of parts for the hungry consumer.

Don't get me wrong, Zacuto makes some of the best stuff in the industry and anyone who has bought some of their parts will agree that the quality is top notch however most of the stuff seems slightly overpriced and for them to act like this shootout had nothing to do with profit is simply not the case.

 

[Zhibo Lai]

Off all the scenes they could have shot to show latitude, I found it very funny that they chose to shoot a naked girl in a bathtub blowing bubbles to show a room full of men, and probably over 90% of people on the internet who will be watching it will also be men. Looks like they took more care in keeping her breasts from being over exposed -- pun intended.

Like to hear what how women reacted to this test. Anybody show this to their wives for comment?

 

[Jay Gannon]

Yep my girlfriend was watching it with me, she was more interested in the 11 stops of possible latitude on the 7d than what the scene was.
Most DoP's and operators are men, most models are women, not unusual for the situation to be a woman in a bathtub as a test scene.

" No one would have commented if it was a man in Calvin Klein boxers , you cant have it both ways it would be ridiculous to call it sexist or chauvinistic. I was more interested in the reflections shadow and highlights. If your geeky enough to be watching this your not going to be caring about the woman in the bath your going to be geeking out." - Maebh

 

[Liam Hall]

Off all the scenes they could have shot to show latitude, I found it very funny that they chose to shoot a naked girl in a bathtub blowing bubbles to show a room full of men, and probably over 90% of people on the internet who will be watching it will also be men. Looks like they took more care in keeping her breasts from being over exposed -- pun intended.

Like to hear what how women reacted to this test. Anybody show this to their wives for comment?

What was wrong with that test was calling it a high-key test when there was nothing remotely high key about it!

People have got to remember, that this is a marketing video, not a camera test. Zacuto want more people to buy into DSLR technology so they can ship more Z-finders and Zwingthings - which is fair enough. I'm sure when Scarlet and Epic hit the streets they will be just as passionate about making accessories for those products and we'll be treated to yet more of these rather prosaic little films.

 

[Andrew Rieger]

What was wrong with that test was calling it a high-key test when there was nothing remotely high key about it!

People have got to remember, that this is a marketing video, not a camera test. Zacuto want more people to buy into DSLR technology so they can ship more Z-finders and Zwingthings - which is fair enough. I'm sure when Scarlet and Epic hit the streets they will be just as passionate about making accessories for those products and we'll be treated to yet more of these rather prosaic little films.

My post with less words, could not agree with you more. This was marketing plain and simple. Thats fine but Zacuto should not pretend like this is separate from their company. Did we really learn anything from this test? Ya, you can get a Canon to look superb in some situations but they are too limiting to be an all in one production tool. Keep things shallow, your fine, try to shoot deep focus or wide angle, they fall apart.

 

[Rick Burnett]

Correct me if I am wrong, but the Red One is not a DSLR right? So it makes sense for this test to not include it. It wasn't a "CMOS versus FILM" comparison, which then I would agree, the Red One should be included in if it had, along with many other CMOS cameras.

I'm sorry, but the Red One is an absolutely different category than ANY of these DSLRs that they tested in one main area, price. I think the purpose for this test was for people interested in DSLR technologies that are available today and see how they perform with regards to the standard of film making, film. If the Scarlet Cinema existed for purchase, I could understand that being included, however, it is not.

I certainly found the information fascinating, and more so, eye opening. The difference in the dynamic range of the cameras and how that affected the images with the loss of highlights, made me frothy at the mouth for an S35. They also haven't even begun to touch other areas where these DSLR's shine, low light higher ISO shots. Many people use these as a B cameras because of this.

The only thing they said they did to these cameras was use Zeiss lenses across all of them so the lens could be taken out of the equation. All the rest of the equipment I saw was support equipment, and didn't affect the acquisition.

I didn't find the video so far biased, and I actually found some of the comments about issues and taste very fair. I will say this though, some of the behind the scenes video parts had some MAJOR Moire and noise in the darker scenes. Horrible looking.

I love how people assume other equipment is used to get the image out of the camera, clearly, either you have no experience with these cameras, or, you don't know how to use them. One VERY IMPORTANT note about using these cameras I believe was addressed by Bloom, paraphrasing "The GH1 doesn't allow us to tweak the setting of the camera so we were not able to, like the Canon's, get the settings to a sweat spot".

Unlike shooting on a Red, most people recommend getting the look you want IN CAMERA, and by adjusting the settings (especially setting it to NEUTRAL) before you shoot. I cannot stress enough how important that is! The less you have to do in post, the better with these cameras.

 

[Vladimir Cassel]

Yeah, I'm pretty sure these DSLR tests aren't being conducted as an affront to Red camera users. This is great info for those of us interested in these cameras as well. Sleep well guys.

 

[Rick Burnett]

I'd gladly trade my 7D for a Red One with even the old MX sensor at anytime

 

[Rick Burnett]

And to answer some additional questions I noticed in the comments of the video:

"During the test we used an AJA Ki Pro and two AJA HA5's to convert the hdmi signal to hd-sdi so we could use our production monitors and waveform monitors. All of the footage was recorded to the cards in the cameras.

Full HD recording through the HDMI port is not possible on any of the cameras as far as I know. - Scott Lynch"

Which is true. I "believe" only the 7D outputs a higher than 720p but lower than 1080p HD signal during record, the rest of them switch to 480p output during record (including the 550D).

And pertaining to RED, there were two answers:

"This was a specific test of DSLRs vs 35MM Film. Thus, the RED would not qualify along with numerous other cameras. - Susan Rapp"

and

"The RED camera was considered in our initial planning stages, but we wanted our test to be specific and focused and so therefore any camera that could record raw (F35, D21, RED, etc.) was not included in the test. The test, with just the DSLRs included, was a huge project for us and every camera that we added to the test would just make the test that much larger in scope and harder to pull off correctly, as each new camera adds several new variables.

The ASC and the producers guild did a comprehensive testing with the higher end cameras, you can read about their results of their comparison I believe on the ASC website.

We really wanted to show what these lower end cameras which (like the T2i) start at around $1k, can really do in comparison to the Gold Standard. - Scott Lynch"

These are not my words, just passing them along to answer some of the assumptions.

 

[David Rasberry]

What was wrong with that test was calling it a high-key test when there was nothing remotely high key about it!

People have got to remember, that this is a marketing video, not a camera test. Zacuto want more people to buy into DSLR technology so they can ship more Z-finders and Zwingthings - which is fair enough. I'm sure when Scarlet and Epic hit the streets they will be just as passionate about making accessories for those products and we'll be treated to yet more of these rather prosaic little films.

I'd love to see Zacuto make a frame to attach the Z-finder to the upcoming RED 2.8" LCD. It might make a decent poor man's EVF.