“9. Scaled 720P or 1080P at 60fps.” Non-RAW recording option for the Scarlet 2/3"?

[Chris Davis]

“9. Scaled 720P or 1080P at 60fps.” Non-RAW recording option for the Scarlet 2/3"?

I couldn’t help but notice that this says “scaled,” rather than “windowed.”

I called RED to ask about this, talked to two different reps, and they could not comment…

I wonder if RED is going to introduce an option to record in a decent non-RAW format with the Scarlet 2/3”.

The $1700 still camera with video capabilities (discussion of which is banned from this site), can interpolate data from an 18 megapixel sensor at 8 fps and transcode each frame into full res JPEG’s. One could infer from this that the technology currently exists to correctly interpolate data from a 5-6 MP sensor (like the Scarlet 2/3”) at least 24 fps without skipping lines on the Bayer sensor.

I would bet the technology exists to do it at 60 fps, but maybe not 120, hence the qualification “60 fps.”

If RED would allow recording on a non-RAW format they would also get the “convenience workflow” market, which would take care of some what I bet RED’s upcoming competition will focus on (e.g. JVC’s clever XDCAM EX pre-wrapped for instant ingest into Final Cut Pro).

What do the people here think? What codec might they go with?

 

[Guillermo Freige]

My bet: RAW
After all, the 18MP camera you mention ( and I own ) can also generate 10MP and 5MP RAW files at 8 fps, so to do the same from 6mp to 2mp at 24 or 30fps seems a similar task.
And, I don't believe RED will use anything but RAW as a recording format.

Guillermo

 

[Gabe Conroy]

I recall that it is indeed scaled as opposed to windowed, and since it's scaled it's not RAW. However if I recall correctly it still uses REDCODE, just RGB instead of RAW.

 

[Jonathan Stevenson]

"The camera who's name we shall not dare utter." You guys are a trip.

 

[David Rasberry]

We don't know exactly, but I bet full resolution debayer in camera and scale to 1080p with output to a redcode compressed RGB format. Similar to what ARRI does with the D21. No loss in quality compared with post debayer and scaling of a raw file, but the look will be baked in to some extent so less flexible in post.

 

[Guillermo Freige]

Sorry, but I disagree to some extent with both previous posts. You can have a scaled RAW. A faked one, I know, but you can recreate a scaled bayer pattern (that´s what Canon do in the 5d Mk II and 7D in sRAW mode).
Of course a full RGB redcode will be preferable, because you don´t need to do a "double debayer" and it keeps more information, but if the only thing the scaling do is debayering, it will be as good as RAW in post, because no baking is applied at all, just color interpolation at the sensor native colorspace and gamma and bitdepth, without any wb or curves applied.
In fact, I don´t think RAW redcode and RGB redcode will be much different. After all, is a lossy compressed format, so to be really effective compression-wise, it must compress the R,G and B sections of the bayer image separately, or the potential difference between adjacent pixels in the bayer pattern will make the task pretty meaningless. So, the only difference between a RAW and a RGB redcode (not counting scaling of course) it´s the subsampling. A RAW one will be 4:2:2 at 3k (or maybe we must call it a 2:1:1?), and a RGB one a 4:4:4 at 1080p.

Guillermo

 

[Eren Ozkural]

sRAW was discussed at some length before. I believe that Tom asked Graham about implementing it and Graham highlighted the disadvantages of sraw (weird moire patterns, aliasing) that could probably be avoided with a decent in camera scaled debayer.