"24" quote...

[Rocket]

Hi,

I intended to use the F23 last week, until for 3 days rental with digiprimes I was quoted 25000 CHF approx $20,000.

Can you believe that? If that's not a typo, that's your Red One body right there, hmm lets see... three days rental for the F23 and digiprimes or my own Red One? Ummm, ahhh...

 

[Graeme Nattress]

Yes, RED is optically flow pass filtered. You can obviously have weaker or stronger low pass filtering. Cheaper cameras often have none, which can be bad. Some cameras try to get away with weaker low pass filtering, but that can cause bother if you use a higher quality lens. Aliassing is one of the nastiest camera artifacts and one of the hardest to remove in post. I'd always err on the side of caution with low pass filtering.

Graeme

 

[Michael Schrengohst]

Yep, adding those to the comparison table now. Thanks.

Im.thatoneguy, the F23 is still an HD camera, maybe I'm a bit too anal about this but I don't understand why manufacturers seem to think 1920 x 1080 in a 3 x 2/3" CCD configuration will do it. Sony out of them all needs to get with the program. We should send them some of those high ISO test shots from Red just to rub it in their noses.

"The F23, which supports 4:4:4 1920 x 1080 RGB imaging, is aimed at the top-end of movie-making, commercials and television production."

If that quote from the Sony website is true and they can't even engineer the camera around a 35mm sized sensor, or at least add a few extra pixels to give us a true 2K output, where does that put Red?

It'll be on the comparison table, but it's not going to fare so well.

The Phantom on the other hand is another story, 2400 x 1800 at 480 exposures per second, 1920 x 1080 at almost 1000. I am not sure if I would include it in the comparison though as it is quite a specialized camera, it kind of falls into a different catagory.

Don't worry, Sony, and the rest are all looking at what is on this board.

 

[Michael Schrengohst]

Can you believe that? If that's not a typo, that's your Red One body right there, hmm lets see... three days rental for the F23 and digiprimes or my own Red One? Ummm, ahhh...

Sure, they need to get that F23 paid for so they can buy some RED's!

 

[Phil Bates]

I am sure it (F23) has a large and growing following and is many people's #1 choice, but if Jim let them all play with Red, I'm sure they would have the same reaction as Rodney Charters....

I'm not so sure, because it's not always about about the camera. I talked with a top CineAlta guy and his concern is tech support, reliability, repairs and such. In his mind there is no track record for Red and therefore no legitimacy as of yet.

In "Red World" we all believe that image quality, price and other specs will win the day, and I believe it will too eventually. It's just that these issues are not always paramount with established producers. There's politics, agendas and Sony's momentum that will play a factor too. Just my HO.

Phil
www.artbeats.com

 

[Stephen Williams]

Can you believe that? If that's not a typo, that's your Red One body right there, hmm lets see... three days rental for the F23 and digiprimes or my own Red One? Ummm, ahhh...

Hi,

Thats not a typo. I wanted to shoot the first commercial in Europe with one, As Geoff Boyle was going to start his Rolex shoot 1 day before me, I went with a Viper package instead.

Stephen

 

[Scott Webster]

Stephen, why were you surprised by the day rate? I'm guessing the Genesis or D20 would be in the same range and based on your quote they would be looking at a 1% return on investment. Your day rate would of dropped if the rental house was operating a sliding scale such as 3 for 7 and your shoot had been longer.

The cost hasn't deterred investment with 3 cameras now available in Australia.

 

[Stephen Williams]

Stephen, why were you surprised by the day rate? I'm guessing the Genesis or D20 would be in the same range and based on your quote they would be looking at a 1% return on investment. Your day rate would of dropped if the rental house was operating a sliding scale such as 3 for 7 and your shoot had been longer.

The cost hasn't deterred investment with 3 cameras now available in Australia.

Hi,

As I would in effect be testing the camera whilst shooting, yes it did seem steep. I can get a Viper package for about 1/3 of that price which is what I did.

I understand the first commercial to use an F23 was for McDonald's in Australia!

Stephen

 

[Steven Parker]

I was able to see test footage of the F23: really nice stuff, especially the night exterior available light shoot on Hollywood Blvd. In-camera speed ramps during the shot (with auto gain exposure compensation) was very impressive as well.

DigiPrimes and DigiZooms are really strong lenses and the bigger rental houses in LA are quite excited about the F23/DigiPrimes combo.

The silliness about most of these high-end digital systems to me is that in a few years they'll be sub-par as 4K acqusisition really takes hold - while our future-proofed REDs and its tapeless workflow have been getting better and better and better... at a fraction of the cost:greedy:

The great thing is that there's more options than ever before: Phantom for extreme high-speed shooting, F23 for in-camera speed ramps, RED for everything else

 

[Rocket]

Guys, would you be willing to write a few paragraphs on your experiences with the F23, Viper and Phantom to publish on 4khub.com? Maybe some frame grabs? Maybe this should be a separate thread, but I don't know how much it has to do with Red. I'll post a thread on 4khub.com in the cameras forum for this instead.

Rich

 

[Gavin Greenwalt]

Sure, no bayer, but also, no oversampling. That means you need optical low pass filtering, which means you're not getting 1920x1080 4:4:4 out anyway. Far better to have the proper filtering at a higher resolution, and then you're oversampling if you want to go down to 1080 or 2k.

That's why I said "Bayer Debate". It hasn't been tainted by FUD.

 

[Alexander Nikishin]

Guys, would you be willing to write a few paragraphs on your experiences with the F23, Viper and Phantom to publish on 4khub.com? Maybe some frame grabs? Maybe this should be a separate thread, but I don't know how much it has to do with Red. I'll post a thread on 4khub.com in the cameras forum for this instead.

Rich

Rich, being that you are writing for 4khub, why would you include the F23 and Viper, neither of which are infact 4k cameras?

Talk RED, Dalsa, Phantom, or even that Russian 4k camera, the Kinoptic is it?

 

[Alexander Nikishin]

The great thing is that there's more options than ever before: Phantom for extreme high-speed shooting, F23 for in-camera speed ramps, RED for everything else

Instead of shooting on the F23 for speed ramps why not shoot in slo-mo with RED and ramp in post? :detective2:

 

[Rocket]

Rich, being that you are writing for 4khub, why would you include the F23 and Viper, neither of which are infact 4k cameras?

Talk RED, Dalsa, Phantom, or even that Russian 4k camera, the Kinoptic is it?

That's kind of the point of featuring them in a comparison, because they are all used for high end digital cinematography and it's hard to find all of them lined up next to each other to compare specs as well as pros and cons in use.

It's also for interest sake, if I kept things purely to 4K as the name of the site suggests, I'd be quite limited in the information I can publish.

I'm writing the feature to be a bit more contextual than just "Red is 4K and therefore is better for everything", so I want to put the specs comparison in the context of real life shooting scenarios. One of the biggest questions to ask is if a particular production is going to gain any value being shot in 4K, and if so if the value is purely aesthetic (i.e. it will never be finished above HD anyway) then it might not be worth it. In this case, the F23 or Viper might do more than a good job in the end.

So, in this particular case it's really about digital cinema cameras, not only 4K. It's definitely looking at the advantages of shooting 4K, but even of shooting 2K/HD with a camera that features a 35mm sized sensor, and thus 35mm depth of field.

In the end it all depends on intended use and intended audience. Given the Red's capabilities, I'd argue that everyone should shoot Red for everything, but that's not at all realistic so I want to put all the info and pros and cons on the table in one place. I also want to try and be balanced and objective, and get others involved with first hand experience.

If the argument for 4K aquisition comes out strong in the end, I want it to be in the numbers and facts, not because I'm twisting things in favour of 4K.

I feel I've taken this way off topic. I apologize. Anyway... so how 'bout that Rodney Charters, beyer patterns and low pass filters?

 

[Graeme Nattress]

4k makes for oversampled HD.

 

[Steven Parker]

Instead of shooting on the F23 for speed ramps why not shoot in slo-mo with RED and ramp in post? :detective2:

excellent idea - but not nearly as fun on set:biggrin:

 

[Jim Arthurs]

Leaving aside any debate about what the actual after-Bayer resolution of the 4K sensor is...

...I can't image any form of native 1920 by 1080 sensor block could EVER match it when downsampled... which is what I've been saying for the last 10 months about the RED... it's the ULTIMATE 2K/HD camera!

 

[Michael Brennan]

Leaving aside any debate about what the actual after-Bayer resolution of the 4K sensor is...

...I can't image any form of native 1920 by 1080 sensor block could EVER match it when downsampled... which is what I've been saying for the last 10 months about the RED... it's the ULTIMATE 2K/HD camera!

Yes Jim, the numbers shouldnt be comapred in isolation.
Sony has 6.3 million Viper has more pixels.
Bayer cameras process in camera to create more samples.
Also its possible to process an image by upconversion and pixel offset to create more pixels ect ect

In this discusison, the only thing that matters is the picture at the END of the production chain.

Mike Brennan

 

[Häakon]

I think the dynamic range of the F23 will be hard to beat by any camera for some time.

Stephen

Apparently, "some time" may be about a month...

"We're shooting RED side by side film. We scanned the film 4k and took both into the Baselight, compared them and then did a filmout of both. When we screened side by side, we literally could not tell the difference. In fact, most people picked the RED footage as film because of a greater dynamic range in the highlights than in the 5218. It's not enough to say it is the best digital image out there. The fact is, finally, we can intercut digital with film. It looked remarkably better than the filmed images. I thought I would never be able to say that"

Jon Farhat, VFX Supervisor, "Wanted".

Oh, and it won't cost $20,000 a week to rent. Yum.

Back to the subject of 24 (since that is what this topic is about, after all), did anything ever come of Rodney's testing? I was quite interested in seeing the footage he shot.

 

[laguun]

Hi,
I intended to use the F23 last week, until for 3 days rental with digiprimes I was quoted 25000 CHF approx $20,000.
I used a Viper instead. I think the dynamic range of the F23 will be hard to beat by any camera for some time.

totally overpriced rental prices for 3 days. nasty.

the F23 is a nice camera, but it is no real big advance over 750/790/900R/950/1500, especially when recording uncompressed instead of hdcam(sr).

In fact, the sensors the same as in the 1500, only prisms and software are modified, storing the sensor output via s-log in a more compacted gamma range into the 10bit of hdcam sr.

straight from the horses mouth, sony q&a powerpoint:
Is the F23 CCDs the same as those used on the HDC1500 camera?
The OHB prisms are capable of capturing a wider color gamut, and incorporate circuitry redesigned exclusively for F23. As a result, the F23 CCD's realize greater (extended) dynamic range and improved color performance (colorimery) over the HDC1500.
translation from sony marketing: yes, the sensors are, however prisms and software are different.
Its the same game as when sony tried to push the 900 being a 12bit camera: hdcam is 8bit, sr is 10bit. Ah yes, and the Sony Z1 we had also claimed 14bit processing btw.

The F23 sensors are still the classical sony 3*2.2MP CCD design, as in 750/900/950 etc - they have a slightly reduced noise floor, but nothing to write home about. Their resolution is slightly above 1080p as in all sony cameras.
once more quoting sony:
In terms of imager resolution, does the F23 deliver performance equivalent to Panavision's Genesis camera?
Assuming equal pixel size, a large CCD imager such as that in Panavision's Genesis camera, has a higher MTF (Modulation Transfer Function) than a smaller imager like the F23.
translation from sony marketing: no, f23 sensors have less spatial resolution

I think the dynamic range of the F23 will be hard to beat by any camera for some time.

I think you are mixing compressed gamma (as the f23 does exactly that) via s-log and dynamic range. s-log is basicly the same what you do using blackgamma and knee/dcc on the 750/900/950. Its no real dynamic range but compressing shadows and highlights in a more clever way into the 10bits of hdcam sr.

However, we didn´t test out the F23 besides some hands on at tradeshows.
I suppose we won´t in the foreseeable future - last time i spoke en detail with the sony folks about the F23 was when the camera was still a prototype back at ibc 06. If they made mayor advances since then, i wouldn´t know that and might be wrong. However i suppose i would have been contacted by our sony rep then.

Would the F23 exist in the same formfactor as 750/900R, a competetive pricing and would offer an integrated hdcam sr vcr, it might be an interesting upgrade for us.

Anyhow, I am one of the few folks here on the board who do like sony quite a bit.

Granted, their "squeeze the customer" policy, marketing-centric approach which prefers policy over technical facts here and there can be annoying... however, iy you know how handle that, be it the sony vcrs (we have 6 of them i think), their class 1 HD CRT monitors or colorviewfinders and, yes folks, even their hdcam cameras have been a tremendous asset for our work here since 2002 - and if there wouldn´t be red, we and many others would probably stick with them (and thomson gv). for a long time