Avatar Sequels no longer on Red?

[M Most]

All tech reasons aside.
You dont need to work with marketing to understand that this film is produced by Sony.

No, it's not. It's a 20th Century-Fox property (at least until the Disney deal closes).

Jim can shoot with whatever he wants. But he does have a good history with Sony, having had them help design the separate body_and_lens cameras used on the first Avatar, as well as a number of underwater capable setups he's used on various projects. So it's not particularly surprising that he'd lean towards their products now, particularly with them being open to revisiting the separate lens unit design.

And, not to mention the fact that in the end, practical photography represents only a small fraction of what this movie ultimately will be.

 

[Hrvoje Simic]

So me guessing, camera choise here has little to do with what camera manufacturer is top notch, it´s more about how much money Cameron can eak out of them. As there is plenty cameras today that hold up way above cinema resolutions and quality standards.

It also might have *something* to do with Cameron's technical background, long year relations with Sony and jointly co-developed solutions.

https://www.sony.com/en_us/SCA/comp...rons-lightstorm-entertainment-to-shoot-a.html

 

[Aris_Gavriilidis]

What DSMC-3 needs (in my humble opinion) to elevate RED past the current competition:

- Brand new sensor(s), (which will definitely be a part of the new platform) but with considerably more range in the highlights, as opposed to digging further into the shadows, even at the expense of resolution. 6K/8K is more than enough
- Lose the blackshade calibration
- A body with more physical buttons, perhaps a side panel with three on top, three on bottom just like the Alexa's beloved one
- Color that looks like a film stock straight on the card
- New, faster media than the current mini-mags (again, definitely happening)
- Uncompressed option, perhaps a RedCode of a 1:1 ratio

On a personal side note, I love my Epic Dragon and will continue to shoot on it for years to come, I know it'll be able to hold its own against the newer cameras we're seeing, I'm just observing that the industry is moving further and further away from RED, at least on the mega-budget feature level, so there's clearly a need for some major improvements.

 

[Steve Sherrick]

What DSMC-3 needs (in my humble opinion) to elevate RED past the current competition:

- Brand new sensor(s), (which will definitely be a part of the new platform) but with considerably more range in the highlights, as opposed to digging further into the shadows, even at the expense of resolution. 6K/8K is more than enough
- Lose the blackshade calibration
- A body with more physical buttons, perhaps a side panel with three on top, three on bottom just like the Alexa's beloved one
- Color that looks like a film stock straight on the card
- New, faster media than the current mini-mags (again, definitely happening)
- Uncompressed option, perhaps a RedCode of a 1:1 ratio

On a personal side note, I love my Epic Dragon and will continue to shoot on it for years to come, I know it'll be able to hold its own against the newer cameras we're seeing, I'm just observing that the industry is moving further and further away from RED, at least on the mega-budget feature level, so there's clearly a need for some major improvements.

- Better highlight range is always welcome
- What you are looking for is better auto black calibration.
- I like buttons, but I'm getting old so maybe I'm a bad judge.
- Not sure what you mean by "looks like a film stock". Film is a different acquisition format with a wide variety of stocks/looks. If you mean you want it to behave like film stock, that's a catch 22 as film is both better and worse than digital. Ideally, I think what most want is an image with great dynamic range, rich color rendition (color accuracy is a bit subjective of course), noise that is not fixed pattern, high bit depth, efficient compression (and perhaps an uncompressed option), etc.
- Faster media, with higher capacities at a lower cost is always welcome
- Uncompressed option is great to have, however an 8K uncompressed image is quite a beast. Not sure how many productions will be shooting that in the near future.

 

[Aris_Gavriilidis]

- Better highlight range is always welcome
- What you are looking for is better auto black calibration.
- I like buttons, but I'm getting old so maybe I'm a bad judge.
- Not sure what you mean by "looks like a film stock". Film is a different acquisition format with a wide variety of stocks/looks. If you mean you want it to behave like film stock, that's a catch 22 as film is both better and worse than digital. Ideally, I think what most want is an image with great dynamic range, rich color rendition (color accuracy is a bit subjective of course), noise that is not fixed pattern, high bit depth, efficient compression (and perhaps an uncompressed option), etc.
- Faster media, with higher capacities at a lower cost is always welcome
- Uncompressed option is great to have, however an 8K uncompressed image is quite a beast. Not sure how many productions will be shooting that in the near future.

When I say color that looks like a film stock, take the Alexa for example, what it gives you on the card is something like a 5213 colorized image, so what I mean is, as opposed to getting color similar to what your eyes see, let's call it "scientifically accurate", you get "aesthetically pleasing", so tones akin to different Kodak stocks, like 500T 5219, 200T 5213 etc. So quite literally simulating a particular stock, or at least a palette based on the most popular stocks, what each person prefers is totally different.

 

[Eric Lange]

I didn't know this was the NOT SHOT ON RED section lol...

Shouldn't this be in 'Off Topic" ;-)

I'm sure some RED cameras will eventually make it into the mix. They usually do in one capacity or another.

 

[Eric Lange]

I was very surprised that Avatar 2 and 3 went with Venice over Monstro, but the removable sensor block does make sense.
Indeed, Red seems to be losing a lot of ground lately, Helium didn't see any significant adoption for big budget feature films and Monstro hasn't really caused much interest either from what I see, with the exception of Panavision's DXL2 of course. I wouldn't be surprised if DSMC-3 drops earlier than 2020 in response to everything happening. I'd also be willing to bet that sensor tech in those new bodies will be based on Gemini's dual sensitivity pixels and will be the way to go from DSMC-3 forward.

All good points / notions...

Avatar 2 then Avatar 3 could be six years before that finishes up if then … Who knows what is the best set of solutions through all of that.


That SONY VENICE thing is nice but very prototype / hacked looking... With cabled head.

That configuration can be MUCH improved (in general) so will be interesting to see and learn what they finally end up working with four or five years from now. And how production models may differ in the future.

It's all good but better IS better !

________________________________________________________________


More manufacturers should have official "special" applications department for these kinds of things (pro-active engagements) rather than just waiting / hoping something more useful or convenient comes along.

 

[Jacobo Martinez]

Just in case no one has seen this SONY VENICE video. I must say, Venice looks beautiful. Its also great it has it's own look and feel, different than any other camera, options are always good!

Full aspherical 4k
https://vimeo.com/265485072

Full Anamorphic 4K
https://vimeo.com/273384314

 

[Nick Morrison]

Has there ever been an Oscar nominated film shot on Red?

Best Picture:

2009: District 9
2010: Social Network & Winter's Bone
2011: Tree of Life (some RED)
2015: The Martian & Room

If you include VFX and Acting Awards, yeah many many more.

 

[David J. Buchanan]

What DSMC-3 needs (in my humble opinion) to elevate RED past the current competition:

- Brand new sensor(s), (which will definitely be a part of the new platform) but with considerably more range in the highlights, as opposed to digging further into the shadows, even at the expense of resolution. 6K/8K is more than enough
- Lose the blackshade calibration
- A body with more physical buttons, perhaps a side panel with three on top, three on bottom just like the Alexa's beloved one
- Color that looks like a film stock straight on the card
- New, faster media than the current mini-mags (again, definitely happening)
- Uncompressed option, perhaps a RedCode of a 1:1 ratio

On a personal side note, I love my Epic Dragon and will continue to shoot on it for years to come, I know it'll be able to hold its own against the newer cameras we're seeing, I'm just observing that the industry is moving further and further away from RED, at least on the mega-budget feature level, so there's clearly a need for some major improvements.

This is a dream. And a dream I don't really agree with.

DSMC3
- NOT new sensors, but the ones we have now that can be changeable by user
- Better improved color science and no CMOS smear
- Variable ND that has clear mode and no green tint
- Sidekick that makes sense for ACs
- Gray bodies to dissipate heat
- And yes, better auto black shade like most other cameras

 

[Aris_Gavriilidis]

This is a dream. And a dream I don't really agree with.

DSMC3
- NOT new sensors, but the ones we have now that can be changeable by user
- Better improved color science and no CMOS smear
- Variable ND that has clear mode and no green tint
- Sidekick that makes sense for ACs
- Gray bodies to dissipate heat
- And yes, better auto black shade like most other cameras

- User replaceable sensors sounds like a great idea, but I insist, we need new sensors, maybe not straight away, but a chip that has more range into the highlights than the shadows, like I said before is a must.
- The color science is already phenomenal, just not pleasing to the eye, that's what needs to change.
- Variable ND might be a stretch if they keep the same body size but I'm sure they would be a welcome addition.
- Don't think simply painting all the bodies gray would make a huge change to heat dissipation with all that insane computing in there.

 

[Savannah Miller]

Wasn't the CineAlta specifically developed to shoot Star Wars? Was there another digital camera that George Lucas could have used to capture those movies?

 

[Savannah Miller]

You'd think one could make up their mind between asking a question and a claim based on knowing the answer.

16 bit A/D is required to be able to quantize that DR.

I was not referring to making a claim so much as Sony seems to listing the spec of 16-bit a/d converters whereas Arri uses 14x2. The Arri engineer said that 16 was much more expensive. 14-bit linear should be able to hold all the dynamic range of RED's current line up, no?

 

[Marc Wielage]

Wasn't the CineAlta specifically developed to shoot Star Wars? Was there another digital camera that George Lucas could have used to capture those movies?

Not in 1999 & 2001. As it was, they had to bend the Sony R&D engineers' arms to force them to give them a 24fps mode. David Tattersall told me a few years after that that they had some heated discussions about Sony because it was discovered that it wasn't possible to turn off the image enhancement. Sony reportedly had to rewrite their firmware to make that possible. Those early CineAlta days were rough...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CineAlta

 

[John Brawley]

Not in 1999 & 2001. As it was, they had to bend the Sony R&D engineers' arms to force them to give them a 24fps mode. David Tattersall told me a few years after that that they had some heated discussions about Sony because it was discovered that it wasn't possible to turn off the image enhancement. Sony reportedly had to rewrite their firmware to make that possible. Those early CineAlta days were rough...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CineAlta

And to add further,

In the link to Cinealta it talks about a film called Vidocq as being the first film shot that was "entirely digital" but that can't be true. I can think of a bunch of digital films shot before 2001. Maybe the first to shoot F900 entirely.

I recall shooting some demonstration tests for FACTS, the Federation of Australian Commercial Television stations in '98 / '99 as they were lobbying the Australian government to make HD part of the change over to digital transmission using a then prototype HD camera that would later become the F900. It was HDCAM, but a 1035 version (the Japanese HD system) instead of the 1080 system it became.

Anyone remember when Sony used to say HDCAM was 22:11:11 ? (4:2:2)

JB

 

[John Brawley]

Not in 1999 & 2001. As it was, they had to bend the Sony R&D engineers' arms to force them to give them a 24fps mode. David Tattersall told me a few years after that that they had some heated discussions about Sony because it was discovered that it wasn't possible to turn off the image enhancement. Sony reportedly had to rewrite their firmware to make that possible. Those early CineAlta days were rough...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CineAlta

And to add further,

In the link to Cinealta it talks about a film called Vidocq as being the first film shot that was "entirely digital" but that can't be true. I can think of a bunch of digital films shot before 2001 (Dogme anyone ?) Maybe the first to shoot F900 entirely.

I recall shooting some demonstration tests for FACTS, the Federation of Australian Commercial Television stations in '98 / '99 as they were lobbying the Australian government to make HD part of the change over to digital transmission using a then prototype HD camera that would later become the F900. It was HDCAM, but a 1035 version (the Japanese HD system) instead of the 1080 system it became.

Anyone remember when Sony used to say HDCAM was 22:11:11 ? (4:2:2)

JB

 

[Hrvoje Simic]

I was not referring to making a claim so much as Sony seems to listing the spec of 16-bit a/d converters whereas Arri uses 14x2. The Arri engineer said that 16 was much more expensive.

Still don't see the basis for the claim about Red A/D.

Sony and Arri have different approaches, background, philosophy, IP, processing tech and sensor sourcing. And Arri sensor is 8 years old. At least.

It is not only much more expensive but also generates much more heat, requires more processing power, juice to run it and it is more challenging for sensor production.

Arri got 14 stops in 2010 mixing two gains of 14bit A/D and Sony got 15 stops with single 16bit A/D in 2017.




Now just for fun, even if we disregard the latest Panasonic/Fuji sensor tech, let's guess what could be theoretically possible in 2019 with two parallel 16 bit A/D readouts based on today's sensor performance.

 

[Brian Boyer]

Another recent cinema experience was Quiet Place and in the first few shots with beautiful tonality and organicity it was obvious it was shot on film. And seeing who was the colorist...."uhm yeah that explains a lot".

SEMI SPOILER ALERT

Aside from the fact that film still looks bloody good, I think there's a very practical plot-driven reason for shooting on film for A Quiet Place.

The "danger" lights. Hundreds of deeply saturated red holiday lights had to look red in order to accentuate the point and visually make sense. White, overexposed blobs with pink halos, which is what all current digital sensors in a dusk/sundown situation would yield, would not have been nearly as effective.

Shooting that type of light with digital sensors in broad daylight when you're already stopped down to accommodate the bright daylight environment is no problem. Holding the saturation of the red color (like brake, traffic and X-mas lights) while in focus in lower light levels is asking too much of digital sensors at the moment.

This is part of the reason why I keep saying if RED wants to regain some feature film and tv market share, they should figure out a way to crack the sensor saturation code and produce true film-level overexposure latitude.

 

[Sabovic Adis]

"Sensor saturation code"?! "True film-level overexposure latitude"?!

And I always thought that there's DR, and how one maps/remaps linaer to 709, 2020 etc...:smile5:

 

[Brian Boyer]

"Sensor saturation code"?! "True film-level overexposure latitude"?!

And I always thought that there's DR, and how one maps/remaps linaer to 709, 2020 etc...:smile5:

To be clear, when I say “code” I don’t mean actual computer code. “Cracking the code” is a figure of speech.

Secondly, as an example, look at the Venice illustration above. The most highlight latitude it can achieve is 8 stops above 18% (middle) gray at fairly high ISO values.

Film can achieve somewhere between 1-2 stops better highlight latitude than that, depending on the stock, at much lower ISO ratings.

It has always gotten the most out of its DR on the top end whereas digital video is much more sensitive and a better low light performer.

So, I’m not necessarily talking about adding more DR to a sensor so much as I’m talking about a different distribution that allows for significantly better highlights than what we can currently achieve at ISO ratings between 500-1000.

However and whatever that technology looks like is up to the engineers.