120fps 2K 2:1 soft images issue

[Sebastian Gross]

hey guys,

had a 120fps shooting at 2K 2:1 RC 36 Redrive on a 20mm UltraPrime.

during focus pulling everything seemed nice and crisp to us on the EVF and on the LCD, too,
but during playback the footage was all soft and no comparision to what we saw before.
the edges seem really crisp but the skin and all other details like chains, zippers look pretty much gone.

same on a 45mill.

i've been told that the camera isnt able to process the sharpness, too while running at 120fps and i'd have to put it in later.

any suggestions?

 

[Stephen Williams]

2k on the R1 always dissapointed me, 3k looks way better & cuts wery well with 4k IMHO.

hey guys,

had a 120fps shooting at 2K 2:1 RC 36 Redrive on a 20mm UltraPrime.

during focus pulling everything seemed nice and crisp to us on the EVF and on the LCD, too,
but during playback the footage was all soft and no comparision to what we saw before.
the edges seem really crisp but the skin and all other details like chains, zippers look pretty much gone.

same on a 45mill.

i've been told that the camera isnt able to process the sharpness, too while running at 120fps and i'd have to put it in later.

any suggestions?

 

[Sebastian Gross]

well that doesnt really help. cant get rid of the feeling that the footage is somehow lousy debayered..

artifacts. lines. it just isnt sharp. nowhere in the image.

 

[Mark Toia]

I remember having the same issue...

For some reason it looks great when focusing, but play back was rubbish, but next tim we shot some cars running through mud with a 200mm and the images was great!
I was also confused. sometimes great, other times not great.. I couldn't work it out either.

http://www.zoomfilmtv.com.au/ftp/FCP_3way_colour_correct/colour_key_RED.mov

 

[Mark Toia]

I remember having the same issue...

For some reason it looks great when focusing, but play back was rubbish, but next tim we shot some cars running through mud with a 200mm and the images was great!
I was also confused. sometimes great, other times not great.. I couldn't work it out either.

http://www.zoomfilmtv.com.au/ftp/FCP_3way_colour_correct/colour_key_RED.mov

 

[Sebastian Gross]

thanks for this amazing clip - reminds me of how sharp it should be, but i am a million miles away from that.

any other ideas?

 

[Mark Toia]

nope sorry... this was build 14 two years ago! .. don't know why its gone worse.
It's a real mystery.. good one year, crap the next. 'I'm sure it's a debayer problem.
Have a look at the FULL SIZE PROXIE quicktime. that (not the hi) but the biggest one. That will tell you some home truths.

 

[Sebastian Gross]

i did. the full res proxy looks like crap. there's banding no sharpness at all - more or less like a low res version of what should be there.

DEAREST FORUM - i really need help.

 

[Hans von Sonntag]

2k on the R1 always dissapointed me, 3k looks way better & cuts wery well with 4k IMHO.

Yes, that's true.

I only got acceptable results when shooting close-ups with shallow DOF. On long-shots the pictures always looked kind of blocky, broken. No wonder. 2K to 1080p is an up-res when you factor in a debayer-loss of approx. 20-25% of the resolution of the RAW file. 3K, however, works very well for 1080p.

Hans

 

[Sebastian Gross]

solved it.

without getting to detailed i get the impression that the camera created proxies by debayering at 1/4 or just a bit more.
davinci 7 got grip on the raw files and debayered correctly but i only see the results when the footage is rendered.

thanks.

 

[Sam Winzar]

From my experience it is pretty clear that the camera doesn't play back at full quality. Normally this isn't much of an issue as you can get away with playing back 4K footage at a lower quality on a 720P output. However, when you're playing back 2K at a lower res you really notice it. Playing back 2K ANA footage is particularly bad from my experience.

 

[Todd Jones]

Glad you solved this. We have shot a ton of 120 fps and not seen this issue. I have had issues though that the raw files made insignificant when you started working with them. Raw is so nice that way.

 

[JD Holloway]

2 k 120 fps preview is like a 1/4 debayer of a 1/4 of the sensor and typically at a high compression rate.

I'm no expert but I will chime in.
Long lenses may fair a little better as out-of-focus areas are easier on the compression (typically).
Doesn't help with the debayer though unless it floats-to-bandwidth, I would think.
That being said Graeme is a smart guy!
The kick ass pick-up shot uses a long lens (shallower DOF) and the water produces a lot of motion blur.
Both reduce the needed bandwidth, both for the proxies, and for a better debayer later.
Mark, your AC rocked the house on that one. Sweet!

Your 20mm UP will require a lot of bandwidth, typically, as 20 mm has deep depth of field. (over-simplified I know)
This will be more obvious in proxies, but can be mitigated to an extent after a full debayer and "crisping/sharpening".

What's scary to me is some people have cut together full television episodes from the proxies...
That's like producing photographs from your jpeg thumbnails...

 

[Cail Young]

It's my opinion that REDCODE 28 at 120fps is starting to throw some details out just to stay realtime; if you shoot the same shot at 24/25fps RC28 you should see more detail. It's something I really need to do a test on soon.

 

[Peter Dmitriyev]

I shoot alot of 120fps and couldn't understand the fix, can someone (Sebastian?) please explain what it is you did to fix it?